“Who will die?” Seiji asked, but received no response.
He stood there alone on the rooftop with the strange red card in his hand. Something flashed in his eyes.
At this moment, there was the sound of something descending at great speed in the air!
Seiji raised his head and saw a robot… no, a person wearing a science fiction style mecha armor suit descending next to him!!
He instantly widened his eyes.
Although he already knew that this world was far more high-tech than his previous world, personally seeing a flying suit of armor like Iron Man’s still gave him quite an impact.
This armor, or maybe weaponized mecha, had a black outer layer. On the surface, there were some symmetrical silver runes. Its entire body appeared smooth and natural. It didn’t attract any attention at night, plus there was also a concealment spell on it that made it impossible for ordinary people to notice.
*Thud!* It landed solidly in front of Seiji with a loud thud.
Seiji wouldn’t have felt it strange even if the mecha had directly destroyed the roof of this building with how fast it descended. Yet, it managed to land so steadily without even a tremendous sound. This mecha was definitely something out of the ordinary.
“Are you alright?” Yui’s voice spoke through the mecha’s helmet.
“Sister Yui?”
“It’s me.”
Yet another descent from the sky that would leave such a deep impression. This older sister of his was so cool!
Seiji’s cheeks twitched.
“Thank you for coming to my support. But he… Itsuki Kamitani has already left.”
Yui looked around her.
“As expected, he’s already escaped.” She seemed to expect this.
“Do you know him?”
“Yeah.”
Seiji wanted to ask: “Are you quite familiar with him?” But he felt that even if he asked this, he wouldn’t receive a response.
“He left this card behind, saying that it was for some game…”
Seiji showed Yui the blood-red card and explained what had happened earlier.
Yui looked over the card.
“Indeed, you could call this a game card. It should be fine for you to play it with your current power,” she stated calmly. “As the price for calling for my support, why don’t you enter this game and see what tricks he’s up to? I doubt that you’ll die, but there’s the possibility of serious injury. Just be careful. There’s no particular special mission that you have to carry out within the game. Do whatever you like. Just report to me afterwards.”
After saying that, Yui jumped up and flew back into the sky.
Right after that, her mecha started glowing silver and instantly vanished into a beam of light that shot off into the distance. She soon vanished from Seiji’s sight.
‘So cool… I want that type of equipment as well!’
Although Seiji had indeed used similar equipment in the soul realm, that was quite a while ago. Besides, a product usable only by his imagination couldn’t compare to the actual physical object.
Possessing a personal mecha was a man’s romance! However, Seiji figured that the mecha would be outrageously expensive.
Seiji really wanted to ask more about Kamitani and the game he was invited to. However, his sister left just like that. She was truly the type who went places as swiftly as the wind.
Seiji decided to return home.
Itsuki Kamitani was formerly from the Himiki Family.
The Himiki Family was also sometimes called the Himiki Clan. They were one of the most unique factions within the top-level factions.
The fact that they were well known for judging duels was just the surface of what made them unique. The biggest difference they had from other factions was their unique internal structure.
The core members of this faction all carried the Himiki Family name. Yet, the large majority of the core members weren’t actually related to each other by blood at all!
That was because it would be possible to obtain the Himiki Family name through ability rather than bloodline.
A child born to parents already in the Himiki Family wouldn’t be able to immediately receive the Himiki name. That child would need to take a test later when they reached a certain age. Only by passing the test would that child be bestowed with the honor of the Himiki name. Otherwise, the child would only be able to use their old family name.
Not only that, disciples of other families and factions could also apply to join the Himiki Family and receive the Himiki name if they passed the test.
This test would be administered on a yearly basis. Also, all the Himiki Family members would be reassessed each year, with those having overly low scores being stripped of the Himiki name.
So, objectively speaking, the Himiki Family wasn’t a true family. They were more like a combined group that went by the same name.
Obtaining this family name required a powerful contract ceremony. Those who signed the contract and obtained the family name would treat others with the Himiki name as true family! This effect would still remain in place for several years even if one lost the Himiki name.
That was why the Himiki Family could really operate like a family—in fact more like a family than some families, whose the members were blood-related but had terrible relationships with each other.
The fact that members from other factions could join also strengthened the Himiki Family’s relationship with the other top-level factions and families.
The core family ruling this faction, the Himiki Family, didn’t have any major grudges against any other major factions. Nor did the Himiki Family have any subordinate or master relationships with other families like the seven major Yin Yang Master families or the samurai families.
Technically speaking, the Himiki Family should be more accurately called a clan. However, they preferred being called the Himiki Family, although both names were still alright with them.
In the Himiki Family, the Kamitani Family was quite an ordinary family.
After Itsuki Kamitani reached mature age, he passed the test to become a Himiki Family member. However, his Himiki name was stripped from him after a mere two years. The reason was that he had severely injured other Himiki Family members!
Itsuki Kamitani was also a former member of Soul World who was now an important member of the Messengers faction. He was also a high-level Spirit Controller who controlled a high-level spiritual creature that he called “Sparrow”. There was also the possibility that he controlled other high-level spiritual creatures.
Seeing and reporting this person to Soul Society could help one to accrue points for their account after the report was verified.
This was all the information that Seiji obtained from Soul Society on Itsuki Kamitani.
This information cost him 10 points.
Soul Society’s accounts all worked on a points system. At first, he started with 100 points, but asking for aid had cost him a total of 1000 points! Seiji’s points with Soul Society instantly went to -910.
However, his account now indicated that he had a mission: “Investigate the strange dreams.” Completing this mission would award him with 1000 points.
The mission’s issuer was: Starcloud.
Starcloud… this was Yui’s username in Soul Society. It seemed quite fitting for her.
What exactly were the “strange dreams”?
Seiji requested more information on this specific term.
However, this information would apparently cost him 50 points!
“I already owe -910 points, so who cares about another 50?” Seiji ignored the debt warning and confirmed that he wanted the information.
An information file soon appeared on his computer screen.
Seiji gradually started frowning as he read this information.
Not long after he finished reading, the file automatically deleted itself.
According to what he’d read, this was indeed about a game, a death game played in people’s “dreams”!
So far, only ordinary people had died. No Spiritual Ability users had died from this, but this didn’t mean that Spiritual Ability users were immune to death.
Entering this game would be risky, not to mention that Kamitani was involved.
Seiji took out the red card and gazed at the pentagram on it.
The game’s rules allowed him to take one other person with him… Should he do this together with Shika?
He didn’t want his adopted younger sister to meet with any danger. Still, she was now his Spirit-branded Retainer. Telling her nothing and going to meet danger in a dream by himself seemed like it would really make her unhappy afterwards.
Seiji decided to explain everything to her as a proper partner should.
After coming to this decision, he instantly went to find Shika.
Karen was standing in confusion at the top of a building.
She saw nothing but black buildings everywhere. Flames were all over the place. There were corridors and pipes intersecting in midair, and all sorts of platforms could be seen. This was an incredibly complex terrain.
She could see some people moving, and there were sounds of gunshots, yelling, maniacal laughter, and fighting… all sorts of maniacal sounds could be heard.
This feeling of insanity melded together with the pulsating heat in the air, giving her an incredibly uncomfortable sensation.
“What… is this place?”
“This is a dream,” Kaho’s voice spoke up next to her.
Currently, Kaho was wearing a bright-red one-piece dress and wearing some sort of abnormal butterfly-shaped mask. Kaho only revealed her smiling face and glowing eyes that gave off an unearthly demonic aura.
“Have fun, Sister.”
After saying this, Kaho suddenly pushed Karen off the building!