Chosen By The Lover's Constellation-Chapter 178: Star Players, Part Seven

{Enverna}

The whole ride back, as they waited for their driver and as they made their way back to Telvan, Enverna kept thinking back to the faces of those people.

Maybe she was just feeling pity for opponents she’d taken down so quickly, maybe she was being naive and she needed to remind herself that evil people didn’t always look evil, but as she thought back to them, she couldn’t help but feel like those people didn’t seem like killers.

[And yet, that was undeniably what they were, Enverna. Don’t trouble yourself too much over it.]

"I’m beat," Zura stated. "I think I’m gonna go head back to the dorm. Mel, you comin’?"

Mel took a moment to consider it.

"Yes, I... I think I’ll do the same. Good work out there," Mel, somewhat stiffly, said to Lianna and Enverna. "I’ll see you tomorrow."

"See you."

Lianna and Enverna waved them both goodbye as they stood in the hallway at the Watchful’s headquarters.

"Let’s go see Miss Taylor," Lianna told Enverna. "Then, we can finally relax a bit."

"I am eager to see what ’relaxing’ entails," Enverna replied with a wriggle of her brows.

"Envy!" Lianna laughed. "When the hell did you get so... forward?"

"..."

Indeed, Enverna herself wasn’t too sure.

But, at some point, it had happened.

Maybe it was while Enverna had been feeling that flurry of emotions from her sister’s passing, and in the process of using these "activities" to distract herself from that, she realized how much she genuinely liked it.

Maybe now that she’d somewhat formally said goodbye to her mother, and it didn’t seem like she’d be coming back to Garriden anytime soon, her mind had fully accepted this new, foreign lifestyle.

Maybe it was some combination of both.

All Enverna knew was that now, she no longer felt ashamed as Lianna’s hips tugged at her eyes. She never felt embarrassed when she and Lianna accidentally brushed up against each other, instead, she leaned into it. And, now, whenever she and Lianna would let off steam in the bedroom, Enverna wasn’t quivering under Lianna’s touch anymore.

Instead, she longed to see if she could produce that reaction from her.

So, no. Enverna wasn’t too sure what caused it, but it couldn’t be denied that things had changed.

That *she* had changed.

Setting that aside, Enverna followed Lianna to Miss Taylor’s office.

Lianna knocked twice.

"Come in."

They did just that.

But, as soon as they did, they found that Miss Taylor wasn’t alone.

[Ah...]

Enverna held back a sigh.

Caroline was there.

[Wonderful.]

The woman was standing in front of Miss Taylor’s desk, clad in a black skirt and a collared shirt of the same color, with white gloves and white boots. As she turned toward Enverna, the girl found Caroline’s eyes wide with surprise and...

Something. Enverna wasn’t too sure what, but something else was definitely there.

She turned toward them, tensing up just a little.

"Enverna! L-Lianna," she addressed them and then bowed, "it is... a pleasure to see you again."

[I’m not too sure I can say the same.]

Complex, annoying feelings began to stir within Enverna’s chest. She responded with a professional bow.

"Greetings."

That was all.

"Uh, h-hey!" Lianna said, pushing past the somewhat awkward air. "You made it! Bit sooner than I thought you would."

A bit of Caroline’s old confidence, the same confidence that had tugged at Enverna’s heart when she first met her, slipped back onto her face as she said:

"I took a rather expensive but efficient route. Now, I’m here," Caroline shrugged.

At the same time, she looked over at Enverna, perhaps trying to gauge her reaction. Enverna kept her face perfectly expressionless.

"Indeed, and I should probably get back to filling you in on the details," Miss Taylor stated, bringing them all back to the matter at hand. "As I was saying, Athene’s description of the girl didn’t give us much to go on. She’s thin, pale-skinned, purple hair, purple eyes... Mel, and pretty much every other Child of Mana, could be mistaken for her if we just go off her description."

[Aside from Lianna, of course,] Enverna added internally. [Come to think of it, why does Lianna look so different from other children of mana? I wonder if even Lianna herself knows the answer.]

"As much as I’d hate to say it, for now, all we can do is treat every Child of Mana like a potential enemy. At least, until we get a better feel for the girl’s appearance."

[Not like Caroline will struggle with that.]

"Based on what you said, though, she’s bound to be far more apprehensive about attacking us now that one of our allies survived against her," Caroline said. "How do we get her to come out and fight us?"

"She’s right," Lianna spoke up, her voice a little softer as she considered the dilemma. "If I was her, I’d probably just take the win with Xi, and sit on that for a while. Until a better opportunity presented itself."

"And, if we’re being monitored the way I suspect we are, it will," Miss Taylor replied. "Cautious as we may be, we will naturally be vulnerable at different points in the day. Whether it’s walking back home after work, heading down to the local bar for some rest, or just taking a jog around the block. I could tell you all to stay indoors and never come out until Caroline finds this girl, but, well, people have needs," Miss Taylor sighed. "Transitioning into a hermit lifestyle just doesn’t seem feasible."

She leaned back a bit.

"However, given the frequency of the attacks, Xi and Athene’s battles having happened one after the other, maybe this isn’t a bad thing."

"What do you have in mind?" Caroline asked.

"We bait her out," Miss Taylor responded. "Give her a set of circumstances, a fight so beneficial to her and her group, that she can’t ignore it. Then, face her and see if we can either eliminate her or at least cement her identity."

"Makes sense to me," Lianna muttered. "But, obviously, not all of us can participate."

"Not all of us have to," Miss Taylor replied. "All we need are Caroline, and..."

"And...?" Caroline raised a brow. 𝕗𝗿𝕖𝐞𝐰𝗲𝕓𝐧𝕠𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝐨𝚖

Miss Taylor just smirked.