“Where the heck is this new spirit?” Neri said to herself as she jumped from rooftop to rooftop. She could’ve flown to get a better view but her twin brother, Natsuro suggested to her not to.

“If you fly, AST will spot you easily and we’ll end up attracting the whole department’s attention. You can fly if the coast is clear.” Neri reminisces on her twin’s words.

Neri’s life can’t be called normal anymore ever since she touched and merged with the mysterious Crystal that appeared on her bed a long time ago, becoming a spirit in the process. As she began having flashbacks on her past, “RING RING RING,” her phone rang. Neri snapped out and pulled out her phone. It was Natsuro calling.

“Yeah, what’s new?” Neri asked him.

“Sis, I found our friend Shido, the AST, and a masked entity. The last might be a Spirit. Track my phone now,” Natsuro said on the other end.

“Already?! Ok, I’ll track your phone now.” Neri replied to him.

“Did he just say Shido?” Neri asked herself as she activated GPS and began making her way toward Natsuro’s location, without knowing what was happening while she made her way there.

“ZAFKIEL!” The masked spirit yelled. In an instant, his Angel in the form of a sword appeared in his hands. The sword is black and lime green with gears and wires lying about.

“A sword huh? So I have to use short-range myself,” Natsuro thought to himself.

Natsuro raised his bow and it turned into two kunais with vines wrapped as the handle. He held one on his left and one on his right as he charged towards the masked spirit.

The masked spirit then proceeds to summon a gigantic handless clock with lots of gears on the inside. He took out a shuriken and pointed it to the seventh number and said,” Zayin,” as the shuriken was imbued with its power.

Natsuro knew that shuriken is bad news if it hits him so he stepped back, used his arrow from earlier to grow a root, and made it shoot a shard as he threw the shuriken.

The shard hit the shuriken and was frozen in place, “I knew it.” Natsuro said to himself.

The masked spirit produces more shurikens from his bag, imbues them with Zayin, and throws them at Natsuro while charging at him. Using the earlier technique, Natsuro produces and sends root shards at the shurikens as he charges towards his opponent.

Their projectiles collided and canceled each other as the two spirits clashed with their respective melee weapons. The masked spirit swung his sword toward Natsuro’s legs but he blocked it as he aimed for the spirit’s neck with the other kunai. He jumped back with a backflip and charged again, this time aiming to slash Natsuro’s arm but he blocked it and was about to thrust his other free kunai into the spirit’s stomach but he was able to dodge the attack and kicked Natsuro in the stomach, sending him flying back.

Natsuro managed to get up again as he turned his kunai into a bow again and shot multiple arrows at him.

The masked spirit managed to deflect the arrows but Natsuro shot more arrows, not toward him but in front of him.

As Natsuro was shooting arrows, the masked spirit raised his sword to the giant clock's first number as he said,” Aleph.” He proceeds to cut a wound on his arm and charges toward Natsuro with such speed that he seems to teleport. He raised his sword, ready to slash but with his reflexes, Natsuro opened his arms and grew a wall of roots from the arrows he shot earlier to block the masked spirit’s attack. His sword hits the root wall but it is still standing. Knowing that a single strike wouldn't work, he slashed the root wall rapidly multiple times.

Natsuro immediately turned his bow into kunais again as the wall was destroyed by the masked spirit's multiple slashes. He slashed toward Natsuro’s neck but he managed to block it with both of his kunais. They both gripped their weapons with all their might.

“Who are you?” Natsuro asked his opponent as they both began to float.

The two spirits moved back, charged at one another, and attacked each other with multiple slashes of their respective weapons as sparks flew on every time their weapons collided.

“Before that, tell me yours,” The masked spirit replied to him as he flew back.

As they continued their onslaught on one another, one of Natsuro’s kunais was knocked off of his hand. Shocked, Natsuro accidentally let his guard down and the masked spirit used this opportunity to float above Nasturo, raised his right leg, and landed a direct axe kick to his head. Natsuro then plummets to the roof below, making a small crater in the process.

The masked spirit charges from above and prepares to slash Natsuro’s neck but in the nick of time, Natsuro pointed his kunai toward his neck making him stop his attack. Their respective blades are millimeters away from landing the final blow. And with that, they went into a Stalemate.

“The AST called me by the code Dream.” The masked spirit said to Natsuro.

“Well, they called me Artemis,” he replied. They talked as Natsuro got up, still in the same pose as they were before, blades millimeters away from their target’s neck.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“Why did you attack me?” Dream asked his opponent.

“I saw you observing the newly appeared spirit so I thought you were a product of the Deus Ex Machina Industries’ experiment.” Natsuro aka Artemis said to Dream.

“Well, that habit of yours must stop. Or else you’ll be no different than those AST personnels.” Dream scolded Natsuro.

“But how do you know that I am a product of an experiment?” Dream replied.

“WAIT… WHAT?!” Natsuro said in shock.

Dream then started having flashbacks of his past as he told Natsuro his story, “Yeah… A long time ago, I had a little sister. She meant the world to me ever since my father and my mother passed away. She was very sick so she almost spent her entire life in a hospital. I was the one who always stood by her side, accompanying her. Then one day, a glitchy figure showed up and introduced herself as the first Spirit. She then offered my sister a ‘cure’ for her sickness but her ‘cure’ is experimental so she needed a test subject first. I then offered myself to be the test subject, so she gave me this crystal that merged with me and it turned me into a Spirit,” Haruto explained, “Then after she deemed her ‘cure’ successful, she used the crystal on my sister and she….” Dream stutters.

“Did it... Fail?” Natsuro asked him.

“No, it was successful. But she turned into a Spirit too and worse, all her memories of the past were wiped from her. Then, she disappeared from her hospital room alongside the first Spirit.” Dream told Natsuro as tears began to form in his eyes behind the mask.

“Therefore, I tried to find her and the first Spirit for years. And now, I’ve finally found my sister,” Dream said to Natsuro as he pointed his free hand towards the newly appeared Spirit, “That.. is my lost sister.”

“What!? That is your sister? Wait a second... How do you know she lost all her memories?” Natsuro asked Dream in shock.

“Because after her transformation, she looked around confused and asked me, ‘Who are you?’” Dream told him.

“Oh wow… I feel sorry for you. Your pain is far greater than mine. Okay then, in return for your back story. Let me tell you mine,” Natsuro said to Dream, with his kunai still pointing toward his neck, “ I was a lonely kid for a long time during my childhood. I have no friends, my sister was busy with her own business and my parents were really busy. In my loneliness, my only friend was myself as I started talking to myself about my problems as if I am talking to another person. I then answered myself with encouraging words but with a different voice tone to make it sound as if another person answered me.” Natsuro said to Dream while having flashbacks of his past.

“Okay, that is very lonely of you huh?” Dream asked Natsuro.

“Yes… Then one day, it happened. My family finally decided to do a vacation together but my father’s business had a big problem so he couldn't join us. Hearing the news made my sister and I shocked. I ran outside the house, towards a certain forest.” Natsuro told Dream.

“Don’t tell me… The forest of death? You were about to commit suicide?” Dream asked Natsuro.

“Yes, I was… But on my way inside, I lost my way and found a crystal that looked like it was a half piece of a whole crystal. I picked it up, and it merged with me, making me into what you see now.” Natsuro closed his story.

“That was pretty touching.” Dream said to Natsuro.

“Yours too,” Natsuro replied. But as they were talking, a dozen flying girls surrounded them with their force-field on and weapons armed.

“AST,” they both said.

“Truce?” Natsuro asked.

“Truce.” Dream replied as they both stepped back from one another and charged at the enemies.

“Don’t you dare kill them, Dream!” Natsuro aka Artemis yelled as they charged toward their enemies.

“Okay fine, Artemis,” Dream replied.

The two spirits flew around, breaking the AST Personnels’ force field with their weapons and karate chopped each of the personnel's necks with their hand, knocking them out.

“You know, it doesn’t feel right to knock out these personnel knowing that they are girls and we’re boys. It’s kinda not gentlemanly of us.” Dream said as he dodged one of the girls’ missile shots as he flew.

”Well… This is not a time to question our morals!” Artemis said as he put his arms forward, blocking a machine gun fire with his own barrier.

In a few minutes, all of the personnel were lying on the roof, unconscious. “Well, that was quite an exercise. Nice moves there,” Natsuro said to his fellow spirit.

“Agreed, and you have some nice moves yourself,” Dream replied. As they talked about their victory, a huge tornado out of hundreds, thousands of ice shards appeared, covering the newly appeared unknown spirit aka Dream’s little sister.

“Yoshino!” Dream screamed.

“Hold up… Look there,” Natsuro said while pointing to a figure running towards the ice shard tornado with a rabbit puppet in hand.

“SHIDO?!” they both said in shock.

“You know him?” they both asked each other.

“Yeah, he’s my friend,” Dream replied “How about you?”

“W-well, I heard someone say his name so I memorized his face,” Natsuro said as he stuttered.

As they were talking about the revelation, the tornado suddenly disappeared and then they saw it… The Holy View. They saw Shido and Yoshino kissing each other on the lips as her clothes began to disappear.

“Look at that man… Your sister is kissed by your own friend. It hurts doesn’t it?” Natsuro jokingly asked Haruto as his eyes were fixed on the view.

“Well… It does hurt, but it’s for the best. Shido will protect her from now on while I can keep on searching for the First Spirit to find out why she turned Yoshino into a spirit while she promised a cure for her illness,” Dream said as he turned around.

“Well… Looks like my job here is done. See you around mate,” Dream said as he clenched his fist toward Natsuro.

“Yeah, see you around,” Natsuro replied as he clenched his fist towards Dream’s fist, forming a fist bump. But as they bumped their fists, a blinding light surrounded their entire bodies.