Editing The Unexplored Summon Blood Sign:Volume8 Chapter1 (section)

===Between the Lines 1===

The intercom rang.

Each day, Aika the shut-in girl had visitors besides Shiroyama Kyousuke or Lu Niang Lan. During the afternoon, she would receive a delivery from an online store. During the morning, a caretaker would arrive to look after the 5m white liger.

Aika’s luxury apartment kept enough frozen meat in stock to last the wild animal three days, but she still needed to resupply constantly.

Thanks to that, she could keep track of the passage of time quite well for a shut-in.

Despite being an apartment, there was a delivery entrance separate from the main entrance and a young woman in a work jumpsuit used that to push in a large hand truck like she was delivering the lactic acid product famous enough to support professional baseball teams.

“Good morning, Award 870.”

“…Nn…”

“This is today’s lot. I will carry away the waste boxes as usual.”

Yes, the white liger ate several dozen kilograms of meat each day and all that food meant she also needed to use the bathroom.

The jumpsuit woman casually looked over the ferocious beast like it was an afterthought.

“No eye discharge or bloodshot eyes, teeth and gums look fine, base of the ears are fine, claws are fine, fur and oils are fine. …Okay, everything checks out. She is still the picture of good health.”

“…I’m keeping an eye on her too, so you don’t have to worry…”

“Hee hee. You’ve gotten a lot better at brushing her teeth, Award 870. She is scheduled for some professional oral care to remove the tartar three days from now. The usual on-site checkup is scheduled for 2 months from now, but please contact us if anything is worrying you. We can provide stress care with aroma and temperature therapy or provide a full-body massage using shiatsu and low frequency vibration.”

The white liger may have been receiving better care than your average businessman. It apparently took a lot for a wild animal to live in the city. Fighting over rare services like reservations at fancy restaurants or the best seats at concerts was what the common folk did. True celebrities like Aika-chan would carve out a new life cycle wherever they saw the need.

After watching the jumpsuit woman leave, Aika pulled a club-like hunk of raw meat out of the 2m cubic container that had the same structure as a refrigerator. It was important to note that one side of the container had been replaced with a thick scratching board. In other words, this would only last one day at best.

“…Here you go, liger. Your lovely meat-on-the-bone has arrived…”

The wild animal had been curled up on the floor like a small sofa, but now she slowly got up. Unlike a poorly-trained dog, she did not immediately jump at the food.

The meat was still cold from the refrigerated container, so eating it now would make her sick. Aika piled several raw meat clubs on a party-sized platter and warmed them a bit in an extra-large oven separate from the one used for human food. In the meantime, the striped bikini girl poured some animal-safe milk into a baby bottle and pressed it against the white liger’s mouth to distract her. …Of course, that baby bottle was larger than a 2 liter bottle.

In the world of classy wild animals(?), there were apparently a lot that would demand meat from animals of their natural habitat, like gazelles or gnus, but the white liger that lived with Aika was a crossbreed of a white tiger and a lion, so she was an extraordinary carnivore that could not be found in nature. Aika did not worry about that too much and had chosen lean Australian beef after monitoring her partner’s responses to different meats. The white liger seemed to like that better than the fatty marbled kind.

The oven timer’s bell sounded and the white liger’s shoulders jumped. Her curious eyes darted back and forth between Aika’s face and the oven door. She may have been imprinted with a Pavlovian link between the timer sound and food. Aika removed the heated meat-on-the-bone from the oven and walked with the liger to the giant dining room.

The animal did not eat the food yet.

The white liger used all her strength to restrain herself until she was given permission.

Aika slowly lowered the large plate to the floor and then took three steps back.

“…Okay, eat up, liger…”

The liger took a leap and then produced a veritable explosion of chewing sounds. Those hunks of meat were thick enough to stop a small handgun bullet, but she crunched through the bone along with the meat. Even if the liger meant no harm, Aika would have been knocked away if she had carelessly approached.

Aika meanwhile took a jelly drink from the fridge.

She used the small butt inside her bikini bottom to push the fridge door shut and then used both hands to turn the plastic cap.

The striped bikini girl could not cook her own food, so her diet was best summed up as “luxurious but tragic”. Even when Lu Niang Lan made something for her, the recipe was generally designed for someone who exercised regularly, so it did not always give the shut-in girl a balanced diet. For that reason, she had gained a habit of using one meal a day to make up for the part of her diet she had missed out on. It was the same idea as giving the liger her vitamins and minerals through extra-large toy bones.

“Ahm.”

(They’re saying now is the time to eat more protein, but that doesn’t really apply to me since I don’t get any exercise other than rolling around on the yoga mat while watching the guide video.)

Aika sat directly on the table instead of in a chair, placed the top of the jelly drink in her mouth, and picked up a notebook-sized tablet from a stand on the table. She lived in a large apartment, so it would be a pain to have to walk to a specific location whenever she wanted to use the computer. Instead, she had computers and mobile devices all over the place and synced together so she could see the same data no matter which one she was using. She really was a wealthy shut-in.

The tablet’s screen displayed some plain text.

Kyousuke had told her she was free to be a shut-in if she wanted, but that was not an excuse for failing to keep up with her studies. She somewhat agreed with that, so one box in her schedule was labeled “study” even though every day was summer break for her.

No matter what gap your life had fallen into, no one liked being called dumb.

A general world map was drawn on the tablet screen and red dots appeared on that. They covered the entire world, regardless of country or region.

And the question was as follows:

“As part of a philanthropic policy, a large civilian corporation provides economic assistance in order to revive cities around the world that have declined due to financial bankruptcy, declining population, environmental troubles, or rising crime rates. What is the name of the corporation that is leading this policy? Hint: The international revived cities are given the corporation’s name!”

After a moment of silence, Aika removed her finger from the tablet’s screen.

She also removed the jelly drink from her mouth and breathed a quiet sigh. She only had to look at the name of Toy Dream 35 to know the answer. That giant corporation that provided dreams to children the world over was a source of great trauma for this girl, but the name returned to her no matter how much she tried to avoid it. That was now ubiquitous it was.

“…Toy Dream…”

Her trembling fingertips typed in the necessary answer and then she closed the text app.

She returned the tablet to the table stand and finally reached for a different electronic device.

It was a character smartphone that Toy Dream had created by buying up a service provider and social media company.

…And this one was based on ''a heroine that should not exist'', so it was probably the only one that still existed.

The phone used an app that was like a cross between an email and a chat service. It was known as Assort Message and it allowed you to attach one illustration or icon of a Toy Dream character to each message. The address book linked to that app had only a single group and a few different addresses registered within.

For a reason other than high-level security, the majority of the 7 billion people in the world would not even know this one address existed.

It was an email link for the members of a certain family that was envied by all.

It was a direct hotline that let one contact the personal mobile phone of the extremely busy president of Toy Dream without even going through a secretary.

Kyousuke and Olivia were making an external attack on the mobile base created from a cruise ship in an attempt to track down the truth of the Silver Resource War.

But there was another way.

Someone deep on the inside could make a direct attack on the president.

“…”

Aika toyed with the address book for a while and then heard a low growl.

Her partner, the white liger, poked her head above the table. The animal did not even need to climb up. With a 5m body, her head stuck above while sitting on the floor.

The white liger placed her chin on the tabletop and looked up at Aika where she sat on the table. The striped swimsuit girl giggled and placed her hand on the wild animal’s head.

“Do you want seconds, liger? There’s no helping you, is there?”

Aika lifted up her small butt and hopped down from the table, but she still held the character smartphone in her hand.

(It might be time I faced this war too.)

While walking to the refrigerated container that contained additional meat, the striped bikini girl placed her index finger on one part of the screen.

She gently touched one address.

She was a girl who had vanished from the human race’s memories.

She was the granddaughter of a certain family. And Aika Toydream quietly took action once more.