Gun Princess Royale - Book 3 - Princess of the City (web version)

Chapter 13 - Part III

- III -

I jerked upright, blinked quickly to clear my vision, then focused on my surroundings.

It took a few seconds for my thoughts to realign back on track.

Looking around carefully, I saw that I was sitting on a molded bench in the long plaza that was home to the gaming arcade Mat and I frequented after school or on weekends.

Around me, people of various ages, most of them young, and most of them students, walked the length of the plaza, entered and exited the dozens of shops, ate at the café houses, or loitered about.

I stared at them, glanced up at the sky, then back down at the crowd filling the plaza.

I could feel the breeze, smell the air that carried the scent of food and people, and I could hear the overlapping conversations surrounding me, including the cries of children playing.

Looking down at my hands, I turned them over.

Pale, hairless, and smooth – just like Mirai's hands.

Then I noticed I was wearing a blouse, skirt, and dark school shoes.

A uniform?

I stood up, then walked through the crowd and across the plaza to a shopfront window.

In the reflection, I saw a rather pretty girl with indistinct colored eyes and light hair looking back at me. She didn't bear the face I was slowly growing accustomed to seeing in mirrors. Her features were elfin and more delicate than Mirai's, and when I took hold of my hair, I saw that the strands were a pale auburn in color.

Looking down at myself, I saw that I wasn't nearly as voluptuous as Mirai.

In fact, compared to Mirai, I was disappointingly flat and a deep sense of loss washed through me.

Shaking my head at myself, I regarded the midnight blue sailor uniform that I was wearing.

Telos Academy.

Exhaling heavily, I gave myself another long look in the shopfront window.

The girl looked back at me with a troubled expression.

This is me...but it's not me.

My gaze fell to my chest, and I winced at my lack of breasts.

My boobs....

Releasing another heavy breath, I turned around slowly to carefully gaze at the people and shops in my vicinity.

I considered the possibility that I was back in Ar Telica.

Had I translocated here without anyone noticing?

If that was true, then this was the smoothest jump between places I'd ever experienced. With pin-point precision, I'd been delivered to the bench seat.

Did this mean that the Sarcophagus was equipped with a trans-locating device?

If that was true, then the next question was why was I here?

And the question after that was why had my appearance changed?

I had answers to neither, so I looked at my situation from another angle.

There were two possibilities to consider.

The first was that this was indeed Ar Telica, and I was physically standing in the plaza. If true, then I suspected that my consciousness was linked to another Simulacrum. When Mirai had failed to awaken after emerging from the maturation tank, Erina had linked her awareness to that of a Simulacrum that looked like Ronin Kassius in every aspect...until he began turning into a girl. Mirai had awoken upon the Simulacrum's death by a bullet to the head.