In a corner of a dark room, Yusei rubbed his head in pain. Never in his life did he imagine Mirai, of all people, would be the next officer in charge of the second game. In fact, he was sure that he prepared every game to be himself, or rather, the avatar clone that he had, as the opponent. For that matter to suddenly change, without his knowing, would only mean one thing. Well, two things, to be exact, but one was so out-of-this-world that he couldn’t even believe he had the right mind to ask that one.
“Huh? Why should I care about your toy?”
Those were Bruce’s words when prompted the question. The man was an idiot; therefore, he wouldn’t know how to lie. Intimidation and empty threats, those were his domain, not the kind of cunning tactics that had been employed. The thinking bits were always from his former superior, Jack, anyway.
Which meant that the other option was the only one that was feasible.
“You called, Young Lord?”
A voice echoed from outside the room.
“Come in.”
With a snap of Yusei’s fingers, the lights in the room turned on, coinciding with the entrance of a red-haired girl.
“I’ll cut to the chase, Hanabi,” Yusei spoke, his voice more serious and colder than ever. “Did you arrange Mirai to be in charge of the next game?”
“Why would you think that?” The girl cocked her head quizzically.
“The mere fact that you didn’t immediately protest against me means that it must be the truth.”
“It could very well be the Superintendent, Young Lord.”
“You could put that guy with the world’s greatest conman and he’d still mess things up… oh wait, he did.”
“… Suppose that I did have the presence of mind to go against you, Young Lord,” Hanabi, after a moment of hesitation, continued. “Even if that was the case, was it truly a bad idea?”
“This is a matter that she has nothing to do with.” The young man was firm in his stance. He knew Mirai better than anyone. She was still a girl at heart – a pure, emotional girl who would let any kind of toxicity get to her if not treated with care.
“In my humble opinion, Young Lord, Mirai deserves to partake in the ordeal, too. If she does well, she can even ask for more funds to treat her sister.”
“I was going to do that anyway, and I have much more weight than her in talking to the Lord.”
“I understand, but wouldn’t it be better for her if she were to do it by herself?”
The logic was sound. There was no denying that Mirai would be delighted if her success could help her sister, who was still in a vegetative state with no signs of healing, get even better treatment than what she had right now. Of course, this was still based on the belief that her sister was treatable in the first place, but that truth was not privy to many people. And so, Yusei couldn’t think of a retort.
However, with his instinct, Yusei knew that it was exactly something that Hanabi would use against him. Meaning that she was onto him about his agenda, and he had to shake her off and use her back.
“Very well,” stated the young man. “In that case, I’ll leave the second game to Mirai… and the third game to you, Hanabi.”
It was his attempt at bringing her back into his control again. Assigning Hanabi to the third game meant that it was this time that he could be free of her watchful eyes and work on his solo investigation.
“May I ask the reason, Young Lord?”
“What’s the difference between one and two people? If Mirai is in, then your help would greatly improve our success rate, of course.”
“While I am glad to be of assistance, I believe that it will be unnecessary,” the girl lightly bowed in a showing of allegiance. “For the Course will stop in the second game. Now, if that is all, I shall take my leave.”
“Hold on,” Yusei called. There was another reason that he had summoned Hanabi to his side, and he wasn’t about to let this chance go to waste.
“What is it, Young Lord?”
“Have you heard, seen, or read anything about the symbols of black and white?”
“… My apologies, Young Lord. I do not seem to understand your question,” the girl lightly squinted her eyebrows as her head tilted in confusion. “What do you mean by ‘symbols of black and white’? Something like the yin-yang symbols of Chinese philosophy?”
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“That could be an example, yes,” Yusei nodded. “But not those specifically. More like something from our home, and as recent as possible.”
“Hmm… I can’t say that I have. I apologize for my incompetence.”
It was an answer that Yusei had expected, yet he couldn’t help but feel disappointed. Of course, since he was the heir of Fuuma, he was given the most knowledge possible on various subjects regarding their history and myths, and if he didn’t know anything after looking at that prophecy, his partners certainly couldn’t. However, through Hanabi’s answer, another idea crossed his mind.
“Can you tell me what you know about the yin-yang symbols then? I’m curious.”
“With pleasure, Young Lord.” Hanabi lightly nodded, then continued. “Yin and yang are concepts of opposite forces, believed in Chinese culture to be the elements that make the universe. Equal but opposite in concept, like light and darkness, fire and water, yin and yang are everywhere in the world.”
That much, Yusei had already known. But it was Hanabi’s concluding words that caused his mind to almost explode:
“Yin is inherently negative, while yang is inherently positive, as their symbolic colors of black and white would tell. If yin would be ‘none’ then yang would be ‘many’. If yin would be ‘evil’ then yang would be ‘good’, so on and so on.”
If yin would be ‘none’ then yang would be ‘many’… Her words echoed in Yusei’s mind.
Many… or rather… Infinity.
The Infinite Prison…
“Young Lord, what’s wrong? You seem rather pale.” Hanabi’s voice of concern pulled the young man back from his trance.
“I—I’m fine,” Yusei quickly dismissed the issue with a shake of his head. “Thank you. You can go now.”
“Then I shall take my leave for today. Please, rest well… Yusei.”
In the end, she had discarded her formality, showing her real emotions, if just a little peek. But Yusei’s mind was on something entirely different to notice her intentions.
As the girl’s figure disappeared behind the door, the young man mumbled:
“Infinity… if this is supposed to be ‘white’, then ‘black’ must mean…”
He recalled the description of the most wanted man in the world, in a scale of danger even higher than Zain ever was.
Black hair, black eyes. The codename “Defect”.
“I think I get it now,” muttered Yusei. “That man… is Zero.”
Meanwhile, in the infirmary.
“Geez, it took you long enough!” Lewis scoffed at the healthcare robot, who had just returned after disappearing to some who-knows-where place the entire day.
“I took the day preparing your training regimen, and this is how you repay me?” AIDE, spawning out its mechanical hands to grab onto Lewis’s hair, didn’t back down from the slander.
Immediately, the thought of training overran Lewis’s discontent, and the boy’s eyes sparkled like the child he was:
“Training? Why didn’t you say so earlier? What are we training with?”
This kid is too easy indeed, sighed AIDE in its inner thoughts. Nonetheless, the robot followed its cue.
Letting go of Lewis’s hair and stretching out its mechanical arm to the top shelf of the infirmary’s cabinet, the robot took out a small remote.
“What’s that?” asked Lewis.
“Your training, obviously.”
With a press of the button, from behind the cabinet spun out a rather large machine. It was tall and sleek, seemingly able to fit one person inside, and on it was a single circular glass panel similar to a window in a room.
“Uh… that kinda looks like…”
“A coffin, yes.”
Without letting Lewis mince his words, the robot immediately replied. It was one of the few design features of the creator that it could never understand, even with the latest updates to its software.
AIDE had received the design from Yusei, and there was no doubt that this line of thinking was that of its creator, the one-of-a-kind genius S.T. – Sato Tanaka, down to even the cruddy look and absurd premise. But to go this far just to train the body was something that it couldn’t comprehend, as it could only wonder who on earth would need such an overly complex method.
Meanwhile, at Aoba Academy.
“Teach, are you sure this is gonna work?” Zain asked with doubt present on his face. “The thing just looks like a coffin.”
“Of course, it’s gonna work!” Shouted Mike in a corner, hammering away at the plethora of formula on the screen. “Are you doubting me, your Guy in a Chair?”
“Ah, yes, Michael came up with the design actually,” nodded the plain-looking gentleman in a white lab coat at the corner. “Well, I was mainly responsible for the inner workings at least, but the appearance was all on him.”
“And why do you think I asked the question in the first place?” In front of the master-disciple combo, Zain could only shake his head in frustration. There was no mincing in his words, the machine in front of him just looked like a coffin with a tiny window hole, nothing more.
“Let me explain,” prompted Tanaka, moving his hands to draw up a holographic blueprint in the air. “This is the Dimensional Coffin…”
“Why is the name ‘coffin’ already?!”
“Because it sounds cool, that’s why.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“I digress. The Dimensional Coffin utilizes space-time compression, creating an idealized training room that’s several times bigger than any facility you can find, in a condition several times greater than Earth’s gravity to simulate space travel and dilute your perception of time to maximize the learning experience.”
“But don’t we already have the virtual world to train in?” asked Zain.
“Two problems lie in that line of thinking,” signaling with his fingers, Tanaka answered. “One, the virtual world isn’t as safe as you think. With enough tech and brute force, we can easily get compromised, i.e., attacked while we’re at our most vulnerable stage. And secondly, the virtual world only helps you with training your mental aspect, such as muscle memories, game sense, etc. Since it only copies your physical data, you can’t hope to grow stronger from it.”
“And this… thing is supposed to help me with that, I assume?”
“More like with both,” smiled the scientist. “With diluted time, your thinking process will be enhanced, and with the extra strain on gravity, your body exponentially evolves. A best of both worlds, if you will.”
“That’s good and all, but how does this thing run anyway?”
“Oh, right now? 5 minutes Earth time, maximum,” Tanaka laughed awkwardly. “It takes a lot of power to run, and that’s all I can afford before the entire academy’s power system goes poof.”
Hearing the time put a frown on the young man’s face. “5… minutes?”
“Oh, don’t worry. It’s 5 minutes here, but you’ll experience something like 5 hours in the thing. Though if I were to get, say, a sample of Infinite energy like back when I worked with Ryuuhan, then you’d get a lot more mileage, but beggars can’t be choosers.”
With that ended the conversation between the members of the current NLS Club in Aoba. However, only one of them knew that the hypothetical situation was just about to unfold, far away from their current spot.