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Crystal had often heard that when you truly love someone, you're willing to give them up if that's what it takes for them to be happy.
She'd felt that although it was a bit of an overgeneralized statement, it was still somewhat true. Of course, she hadn't been too interested in love herself at that time, and hadn't looked at it from a personal perspective.
But after meeting Emilia, the blonde girl realized that love came in many different flavors, and what she felt… was definitely not the selfless kind.
Crystal realized how vast the gap was between Emilia and herself, which was why she had tried to deny her feelings at first. However, now that things had changed — even if the credit for that again went to the very same girl — how could she let her go?
The only way she could convince herself to give up… was if Emilia herself turned her down. And even then, Crystal wasn't so sure if she would be able to remain resolute.
Maybe she would even become the type of person she looked at with scorn — those like Emilia's ex-fiancé Amos. A perverted stalker.
The mere thought caused Crystal to shudder in disgust, and she suddenly felt very thankful for Emilia's mischievous nature. Even if there were dozens of girls chasing after her at once, she was unlikely to turn any of them down… as long as they were cute.
Crystal shook her head with a chuckle. 'Emilia will probably try to flirt with all of them, and cause total mayhem. And her standards of 'cute' are really too low!'
Fortunately, Emilia was already surrounded by people like herself, Dixie, and her older sister. With them keeping an eye, it was unlikely that anyone would be able to take advantage of the girl.
Crystal sighed. "Where is she anyway? It's already been like two hours since Dixie dropped me off, and Emilia is still not home. Ahh, I can't wait to tell her about what happened today!"
After declaring her love for Emilia in front of Randy and his friends, Crystal felt as if she was filled with power and motivation, her chest full of pride.
Her intuition about the boy had really been right. Even when she went so far, he didn't even dare to fight for his fiancée! How can someone like him deserve to be Emilia's husband?
Even if it was against her father's will, Emilia was definitely not allowed to marry such a person!
When she had first set out to claim Emilia as hers in front of her 'second fiancé', Crystal had already been full of confidence, and now that she had already staked her claim while facing barely any resistance, her self-esteem shot through the roof.
The blonde even felt that if Emilia was here right now, she might just directly take her to bed! Crystal couldn't wait to meet her again.
After looking at the clock for the umpteenth time since returning from school, Crystal finally couldn't bear it anymore. "Ahhh, I'm done waiting! Where's my phone?"
It didn't take her long to find the bag she had carelessly thrown onto the study table in her room, and the blonde girl immediately made the call before she could start second-guessing herself.
The thing barely rang before the call connected, almost startling the blonde girl.
"Crystal?"
Crystal cleared her throat in embarrassment. "H-Hi! Um, w-where are you? You said you won't come to class, but will be there after school. B-But I don't see you at all!"
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The White Deer Corporation's security personnel around the heroine's home were usually quite bored.
Even with three teams, passing eight hours while remaining fully alert wasn't an easy task.
Of course, this was their job, and they couldn't very well start watching internet videos to pass time. That was a sure way to get fired within a day. No matter how bored they got, they would never do such a thing.
That being said, there were many ways to entertain themselves without compromising their duties, and one of those was betting.
Most of their bets were quite mundane, and only a few of them would bet at a time on things like if a particular person would try to cause a scene, or how likely an innocent passerby goon was to piss himself if they 'scared him a little'.
Harmless stuff, really.
Of course, their biggest bets were always on the little sister of their sis-con boss.
"Heh, I told you she was gonna use the door to get in this time. Idiots, during the daytime, there's a 53% percent chance of her acting like a regular human, as I told you. Now, pay up!"
Just as his friends were reluctantly going to accept their defeat, however, there was a sudden reversal! Not only did the girl back out of the door, but she also started climbing up the building like a nimble cat, jumping silently onto the second-floor balcony as the previous winner stared at her in despair.
"Alright, guys! Cat climb to the second floor wins this time! Pay up!"
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Emilia could hear the petulance in the heroine's voice, making her chuckle in amusement. "Are you sure? Have you looked around carefully?"
She had almost been through the restaurant door when Crystal's call came, so of course she decided to play around a little.
Landing silently on the balcony, she slipped into Crystal's room just as the girl left to check if Emilia had returned.
The heroine stared at the closed door in confusion, and the living area seemed empty as well. Realizing that Emilia had fooled her, she couldn't help but huff. "Funny! You made me look around like an idiot. I thought you were back, you—"
Emilia grinned as she put away the phone on the bed before sneaking right behind the heroine, and then…
"MOMMY!"
Her mother's confused voice from downstairs didn't help her embarrassment at all. "Crystal? What's wrong? Do you need something?"
"N-Nothing, mom! I'm fine!"
Mrs. Miller felt a little confused, but in the end she shrugged and went back to taste-testing the brand new recipe one of the cooks had come up with.
Looking at Emilia giggling to herself, the heroine couldn't help stomp her feet. "Y-You almost made me pee myself! Do you have any idea how scared I was?!"
Emilia stuck out her tongue with a naughty smile. "Sorry, sorry. Your waist looked so tickle-worthy that I just had to do it."
"Y-You—!"
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While Emilia was 'consoling' the heroine, Dixie's mom was having her own fair share of troubles.
Despite her relaxed and proud appearance in front of her daughter, Mrs. Brown's recent days hadn't really been what she could call 'peaceful'.
Even with her golden goose of a daughter-in-law letting her know of Mr. Black's sabotage strategy in advance, countering it turned it out to be far more tricky than she could ever have imagined.
The middle-aged lady couldn't help but shake her head. Even with decades of high-level management experience under her belt, the scale of the operation was simply on another level. "Can't that idiot just trust me? I mean, it's true I was gonna betray him, but he should still trust someone he's planning to cooperate with more, right?"
Although keeping the workers sent over by Mr. Black separated from those recruited by herself wasn't difficult in itself, it was only a temporary patch at best. Moreover, simply firing them wouldn't work at all.
After all, she would still need people to work in those locations, and these were all qualified professionals. Even if she fired them using some excuse, it was very likely that they could just come back using her own recruitment process, this time being even more difficult to remove.
Blacklisting them all would work, but it was also a risky move. With the Black Tiger Corporation's backing, as long as she slipped up even a little, it was possible for them to drown her in various discrimination lawsuits.
Of course, since she had assured her daughter-in-law that she would get things done, Mrs. Brown had no intentions of giving up or seeking help at all. Not unless the situation really started getting out of hand.
After a lot of brainstorming, they had finally come to the conclusion that it was best to simply keep these people hired, but transfer them to a useless, non-functioning subsidiary. Since this subsidiary will perpetually be in a 'planning' phase, the workers can only wait.
Although their company might lose some money paying these workers without getting any work in return, it was still far better than allowing sabotage.
"Hah… Dixie, the things I do for you. You don't know how lucky you are to have me as your mom. The wonderful gigachad genes, the sexy mother-in-law charm. What else could a girl want?"
Of course, implementing such a thing wasn't as easy as it seemed either, and Mrs. Brown had been through multiple migraines getting it all on track.
Mrs. Brown couldn't help but sigh. "If only they at least went with my plan for revenge, hah… it would have been so satisfying!"
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~ To be continued ~
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Thank you for all your support! :>