Aria had just about had enough. Within the last few hours she had gone from partying on the beach to witnessing her city fall victim to unfathomable destruction and its citizens suffering horrors too numerous to count. Then she had been forced to run through and fight on the streets of Deckstoru and under them in nothing but her swimsuit with a light shirt over it and her sandals. To top all that off, since the start of the tunnel battle she had fought mainly undead ordinari with high-tech anti-deviant arsenal and some undead deviants in overdrive mode in a cramped space with nothing but her close combat skills as she possessed only a healing deva.

Yet the fates had even more suffering in store for her in the form of all the damage the rampage of fellow classmate Miluna had caused, followed by the almost equal amount of pain experienced every time mad headmistress Neana Ilre used restructuring to heal that damage. Aria endured this as she had been ordered earlier to not use her own healing too much before entering the chip controller compartment, given that the members of the group pushed there would only be able to count on her and one other classmate to patch up their wounds. Now that she and the others had reached their destination, they would only need to suffer one more restructuring session by Neana and hoped their pain would finally come to an end.Miluna had used a massive stream of acid to push seven of her classmates through the hole left in the compartment door by Miss Ilre, the contact of that much acid with the girls’ skin causing them more injuries than all the ones suffered at the hands of their dark-skinned friend up to that point. Aria had screamed and cried so much from all the agony and the stress already, though, that her body and mind had become numb and she hardly let out a few grunts as restructuring formulas started rearranging her body to a fully healed version.

She was even the first among the seven to get back on her feet and thus the first to fully understand the situation inside the compartment, which was actually much larger than she had imagined.

Martian Class #1’s close-combat healer presently stood in a short corridor leading up to the compartment itself but from this distance she could tell well enough it was actually a wide and tall chamber and one of an octagon shape, four of its walls being long, the other four – much shorter. The longer walls were navy blue, each one having on it nine inactive screens arranged in a square and control panels with some buttons on them lit in yellow under those screens, the shorter ones being dark grey and empty. The room was lit by white lights installed along the edges of the ceiling, in the center of the floor being placed a platform, out of which came a wide pole, a metal orb being attached to the top of the pole with hundreds of antennas sticking out of it in every direction, smaller antennas stemming from the larger ones. Thus, what Aria supposed was the main emitter for the signal controlling the suppressor chips implanted in every deviant in Deckstoru looked like a dandelion clock, it and the platform it stood on being surrounded by a cylindrical force field.

If there were any more details to be taken notice of within the controller chamber, the close-combat healer couldn’t see them due to the obstacle blocking her vision – a company of roughly 200 undead ordinari soldiers that were barely able to fit in the room. All their weapons were pointed at the girls, the villains only waiting for the dozen or so undead deviants Miluna’s acid stream had also pushed inside to move out of the way to open fire. Before either of the parties could make their move, however, a third party intervened.

That third party appeared on all the screens in the chamber when they were suddenly activated, taking the form of a digitalized creature wearing a formal men’s suit in navy blue with a light blue shirt and an electric green tie under it. Its most striking feature was the head, though, looking like a dandelion clock that was also electric green, only this one had a pair of navy blue sunglasses where its eyes were supposed to be, no nose and a mouth full of navy blue teeth, the tongue in which was light blue. As for the background behind it, it matched the yellow of the light emitted by some of the buttons on the control panels under the screens.

Suddenly this anomaly spoke, its voice resonating throughout the room as a result of the sound systems hidden behind all the walls. That voice sounded slightly distorted and also changed in pitch every now and then, which combined with the face of the one using it made the whole experience simultaneously annoying and disturbing.

(Mr. Dandy) ‘There are quite a few honored guests in here, I see.’ – he pointed at the undead ordinari around the chip controller with disgust – ‘No, I don’t mean you lowlife ordinari.’ – he pointed toward Aria, her classmates and the undead deviants around them next, as soon as he did that, an alarmingly wide smile forming on his face – ‘I meant that group of deviant ladies and gents in the corridor over there.’ – he now stopped pointing at them and instead waved at the utterly perplexed deviants from both sides, his grin staying as wide as ever – ‘Oh, yes! You! I can see you! Hello! Why don’t you come on closer, so I can get a good look at you, huh? I promise I won’t bite. I’ve got no physical teeth to do that with, after all.’

After that, the creature burst out laughing, Aria and the other girls looking at each other and then looking at the undead deviant soldiers who shrugged with annoyance, both groups moving down the corridor until they entered the actual chamber where the chip controller was. The anomaly on the screens seemed to be studying them now with utmost curiosity, soon enough the wide smile returning to his face as he clapped his hands.

(Mr. Dandy) ‘Well, aren’t you all wonderful! Just look at you!! Prime specimens to the last one!!! Today’s definitely my lucky day!!’

The Martians’ close-combat healer couldn’t make out if this creature was friend or foe and under the circumstances, she didn’t have the patience to wait around to find out, moving through the ranks of the still confused undead ordinari now to come closer to the screens on the longer wall to her right.

(Aria) ‘I’m happy for you, dude, but we’re in a bit of a hurry, so could you help us out and shut down this chip controller here? Or you can just take down the force-field around it and we’ll do that ourselves. So long as you throw us a bone, I’ll be real grateful.’

(Mr. Dandy) ‘Don’t you at least want to know who I am before I help you?’

(Aria) ‘I don’t mind finding out, but after the controller’s taken out. No offense, but that’s what we came all this way for.’

(Mr. Dandy) ‘You’re in my domain, though, so I make the rules. And since you haven’t done me the courtesy of introducing yourselves, I’ll be the more civilized one and do it first. My name is Mr. Dandy and I’m the AI assigned with protecting this chip controller you’re all here for. See, that’s where my name comes from. This emitter model is called a Dandelion Heart and it’s tradition in the tech community for defense AIs to be named after …’

(Aria) ‘Nice to meet ya, Mr. Dandy, but I’ll have to stop you there. You lost me with all that shit you said, so could you just tell us nice and simple if you’re going to help us or not? I’d really like to move along with this business now.’

Mr. Dandy slapped a palm across his face and sighed, clearly being frustrated.

(Mr. Dandy) ‘You youngsters really are hopeless, aren’t you? I just told you I exist only to protect the controller and you’re asking me if I’m going to help you shut it down? Though I wasn’t expecting a high level of intelligence from you, this is below even my most skeptic prediction.’

Having reached her tolerance limit for the AI, the maddened Aria threw the mini-grenade she had stolen from an undead ordinari before being pushed in the controller chamber and had gripped tightly in her hand up until now, her target being the force field around the controller.

(Aria) ‘Didn’t I tell ya to keep it simple?!’

It turned out the force field was powered by something very particular – a lightning-based deva, bursts of electric charges running across the entire surface of the field in response to the pale green explosion released by the mini-grenade. All that explosion did was push back some of the ordinari closest to the Dandelion Heart, the electricity neutralizing its destructive effects completely, Mr. Dandy on the screens now giving a thumbs down with both hands while sticking out his tongue.

(Mr. Dandy) ‘No cigar for you, missy! Or did you really think it was going to be that easy?!’

He spread out his arms next, the command this action sent to the systems within the chamber yielding a result shortly and that result couldn’t have been predicted by anyone in the room.

First, the shorter dark grey walls opened up in half vertically to reveal anti-deva weapons, those on one of the walls shooting flaming orbs, those on the other – ultrathin water streams, on the third one – crescents of condensed air and on the fourth one – rock bullets. Then the lowest part of the three longer navy blue walls, right under the control panels connected to the screens, opened up in half horizontally, a whirring sound being heard from the darkness that lay beyond the openings in those walls. Attacks came out of those three opening as well, but took on a very different shape.

From the opening on the left emerged masses of multiplying mechanical legs, from the one on the right – just as many mechanical arms and from the one opposite the entrance of the room – masses of mechanical heads, all of which looked like Mr. Dandy’s.

(Mr. Dandy) ‘This chamber is filled with the most advanced anti-deviant weaponry the market has to offer, you bastards!!! And I’ve been given charge of it to ensure no deviant will ever be able to deactivate the Dandelion Heart!!! You’re more than welcome to try, though, so I can have some fun!!!’

(Deviant Soldier) ‘Wait! Those girls may want to take out the controller, but the rest of us here actually want to protect …’

The undead soldier’s attempt to appease the AI led to him becoming the focus of the masses of mechanical arms, his Sairoid cloak managing to block some of them only for the mass of legs to move behind his back and kick him forward, right on the path of some of the water streams. Those streams got through the cloak and cut his body, though his neck suffered the most damage, the man eventually losing his head, Mr. Dandy’s face on the screens having become the embodiment of murderous fury while the background behind him had changed to red.

(Mr. Dandy) ‘As long as you’re a deviant, I don’t care what you want! If you’re not a threat to the controller now, you may become one in the future!! I can’t eliminate all potential threats, but the ones foolish enough to come into my domain … I can at least take them out and that’s exactly what I’m going to do to all you deviant scum!!! The same goes for any ordinari that try to stop me!!! You are just boring shits without abilities I have no interest in and as long as you don’t get in my way, you’ll live. Otherwise, I’m wiping you out alongside my actual targets with no remorse!!!’

Negotiating with the AI was even more impossible than the living and the undead around him negotiating with each other, all sides of the conflict renouncing any peaceful approach at that point for an all-out battle to begin. The four ordinari platoons inside the chamber focused on an elemental type weapon each, three of the lieutenants going after the sources of the mechanical arms, legs and heads respectively while the fourth one remained next to the Dandelion Heart to protect it. Meanwhile, the captain leading the company the platoons were a part of teleported next to the undead deviants left defenseless after their overdrive mode had elapsed to protect them from the vicious attacks coordinated by Mr. Dandy.

Before she could see what the Martian girls near the undead deviants were doing in this most chaotic situation, Aria’s attention was diverted toward the mass of mechanical heads, each of which was screaming with anger in its eyes, headed right for her. It seemed the AI had not forgotten about a single deviant in the room, trying to kill all of them at the same time with everything he had at his disposal, the close-combat healer needing to in turn give everything she had to survive first and leave the destruction of the Dandelion Heart for later.

While one of the female undead ordinari nearby was focused on countering a part of a barrage of fire balls with her minigun shooting pale green energy projectiles at a very fast rate, Aria snuck in behind her and kicked her in the ankles to unbalance her. Ducking to evade a couple of condensed air crescents and jumping aside to dodge the rock bullets, several of which hit the undead woman, the Martian girl pulled the weapon from her enemy’s hands, turning to the masses of heads that had just about reached her to open fire.

As it turned out, no matter how much she fired at them, the heads were so determined to hurt her that Aria only managed to slow down their advance a bit, knowing that wasn’t going to last forever because eventually the energy resource of her minigun was going to run out. And when that happened, there would be nothing to stop those heads from either crushing her themselves or pushing her in the way of one of the million attacks currently coming from all directions inside the chamber.  

Right then three of her classmates came to the close-combat healer’s aid, one of them – orange-haired and cyan-eyed nudist Rika – increasing the length of her tongue drastically and using it as a whip to break the neck of the ordinari soldier who was aiming at Aria. Another member of the savior trio, Feoria, who always had her dark brown hair tied in a ponytail, started to emit some orange light and steam from her skin while her yellow eyes shined even brighter, whatever remained of her swimsuit melting away as she stopped the masses of heads with her body alone. She had gone way past the 15% limit allowed for her heating deva, rapidly increasing the temperature of every inch of her skin and using the immense heat she now exuded to block any coming attack. Even in that state it was clear that she was blushing, though, because unlike Rika who seemed to have willingly taken off all of her remaining clothes, Feoria had always hated ending up naked due to her abilities. One thing that helped with paying no mind to the embarrassment she felt was adding additional power to her body heat by evaporating some of the blood she was losing due to going beyond her limit.

At the same time the usually sluggish and extremely lazy Turora who had the palest skin of all the girls in the class presently appeared more driven than ever, putting her hands on the back of the head of the soldier Rika had killed and whose weapon she had taken for herself. Dark purple energy that had black streaks mixed with it started to envelop Turora’s entire body, her life-draining deva soon coming into effect. The more the soldier she held aged and shriveled, the more her complexion darkened, also growing in height and across all measurements (chest, waist, hips).

When she could drain nothing more from her victim turned into a dried-up corpse, the revitalized Martian girl went to help Feoria hold off the masses of heads with her increased strength and speed as a result of the life force she had feasted on, Rika and Aria starting a conversation as they stood back to back and fired their weapons.

(Aria) ‘Thanks for having my back. What happened to the rest of the girls?’

(Rika) ‘They’re holding off both the undead and whatever shit Mr. Dandy’s let loose in here. But with only three of them, they won’t be able to buy us much more time.’

(Aria) ‘To do what?’

(Rika) ‘Take out the controller, duh! That’s why we came to save you!!’

(Aria) ‘Me? You think I can take it out?! I can only use healing and even a grenade couldn’t get through the force field around that thing!! How could I possibly disable it, then?! I’m also the stupidest person in class, so as far as strategy goes …’

Before Aria was done talking, Rika noticed the lieutenant standing next to the Dandelion Heart, shooting her tongue at his feet and tying it around his ankles to then throw him aside. He immediately ran Sairoid coming from his partial high-tech armor through the organic whip, the nudist beauty channeling healing cyan energy through it to heal her tongue as quickly as it was damaged and thus ensuring the lieutenant would remain partially immobilized.

She continued to shoot pale green laser disks at him with her newly acquired weapon, a Sairoid cloak enveloping him to protect the undead ordinari from any damage, finally managing to free his ankles from the grip of Rika’s tongue. Returning that tongue to its normal length and back inside her mouth, the orange-haired beauty turned to her classmate before going after the lieutenant.

(Rika) ‘I didn’t come to you because you’re the strongest or the smartest, Aria! I made the girls come save you because you’re the craziest!! And that’s what we need right now!!! The devas of all of us here combined couldn’t damage the force field around that controller, but your madness … that’s what’s going to take it out!!! Now go and get this shit over with while we are still able to hold off the bastards!!!’

Aria was then left alone again, one of the fireballs blasting through the minigun she held, the close-combat healer throwing it aside before it exploded and turning her attention toward the Dandelion Heart in the center of the room.

How any of her classmates could have such fate in her, she couldn’t tell. And when Zoran had first given the Martian girls the mission of taking out the controller, Aria hadn’t imagined she would end up being the one on whom it would depend to complete that mission. But the time for that mission’s completion drew near now and as it did, the weight of too many people’s hopes rested on her shoulders.

Failing all of them was unacceptable, so the craziest member of Martian Class #1 ended up using the trump card she had been developing since the Class Battle when Saya had inspired her with the technique 'Merutera's Bloodless Covenant'.

Bubbles of cyan energy formed all over her body, connecting with each other to become a complete cloak – a technique never having been achieved with a healing deva because of the complex nature of its usage. This deva was normally meant to be used on others and not on its user, so healing two separate parts of one’s body at the same time was difficult enough to try and heal their entire body simultaneously. To even have a chance at maintaining her cloak, Aria would need at least a 100% output, thinking that if Hikaru’s mother had managed to constantly suffer damage and heal herself in order to save a bunch of dumb kids before, surely one of those dumb kids could do it now when the fate of all of Deckstoru was at stake.

And just like the leader of the Summerbolt family, she pushed forward beyond all pain, exhaustion, fear and doubt. For Aria had a new mission she had given herself – to not die until she finds a way to destroy the Dandelion Heart.