Jiang Xunian worked as a cleaner. One day, she took a job wiping down mechs at a military academy.
She was busy cleaning a mech when a teacher suddenly brought a group of students over to practice piloting one. The teacher told her to leave, but company policy required her to finish cleaning the mech and take a photo for the report right then, or her pay would be docked.
With no other choice, she hurried to work whenever the students were away piloting the mechs.
The lesson was meant to let these gifted students get a feel for mechs. The teachers knew that students without training might feel sick from the mental strain of coming into contact with one, so they weren't expecting much.
And sure enough, one by one, the students tried touching the mech, only to become dizzy and nauseous. Some even threw up.
"That's normal. You haven't been trained, so even if you're talented, contact with a mech can make you feel unwell. Unless you have an extraordinary gift..." The teacher was reassuring everyone when he suddenly frowned.
Wait, why was that girl still wiping the mech?
Hadn't he told her to leave? Frowning, the teacher walked over to chase Jiang Xunian out.
But halfway there, he suddenly stopped in his tracks.
Wait, his students had only touched the mech for a little while before getting sick and throwing up. How could she keep going back to wipe it down?
And when she saw him coming, the girl moved even faster. She clambered all over the mech, wiping every inch of it, and even had time to snap a photo before darting away like an eel?
???
*
Jiang Xunian had already secured a permanent position as a cleaner, but through a twist of fate, she was sent to study at the military academy. Since students had no job security unless they graduated, she struggled through her classes while doing her best to hold on to her permanent cleaning job.
In class, the teacher took apart a mech and asked the students to identify its components and write down where each one belonged. Everyone stared at one another in confusion. But Jiang Xunian, who worked a dozen jobs a day, walked into the classroom, saw that the mech she'd cleaned the day before had somehow been disassembled, and immediately rushed over to clean each component and put the mech back together. Then she took a photo to prove she'd finished the job.
When exam time came, the students entered a test arena full of terrifying star beasts and tried to survive their way out as quickly as possible. They proceeded cautiously, but Jiang Xunian walked in, grabbed a broom and a mop, and got to work. She cleaned the entire arena inside and out, twice over. When she came out, she even lamented that she'd nearly exceeded her allotted service time. The teachers were stunned: they hadn't seen a student leave the exam arena so quickly in ages.
At the mech competition, the other students did their best to attack their opponents, while Jiang Xunian stood perfectly still. A student from the opposing school charged at her, laughing and calling her a weakling. Then she pulled out a rag and wrapped herself around his mech, giving it a full-body spa treatment on the spot.
As Jiang Xunian wiped, she frowned. "The joints on your mech are filthy. I've been scrubbing them forever. You'll have to pay me an extra service fee later and leave me a good review."
Her opponent: ??? How had she wiped all the lubricating oil off his mech? How was he supposed to move now?
Theme: Ordinary, peaceful days are what matter most.