Shin Megami Gensokyo – Distant Border of Moral Axes and Digital Demons
Premonition
"Open your eyes."
"H-hey! What do you-?!"
"It's all for a greater destiny, human. I promise, it'll be the future you desire."
"No way! This isn't right!"
"Do you truly believe that?"
"…I…"
"Please, forgive me."
"S-stop, wait!"
"So that's how it is, huh…"
"I'm sorry it had to be this way, but…"
"Not as sorry as I am. Clearly, there's no stopping what is to come. It's been an honor fighting alongside you, my lady."
"Demons… and there's so many of 'em. How the hell does she think we're supposed to beat 'em?!" The girl lying on my left slammed her fist onto the dirt.
"Calm down." The one on the right said from my other side. "If we don't want to die here, we have to fight. Our time is running short… hey, Reo? I just wanted to say… thank you. Thank you for sticking with us. I understand this must be difficult for you, especially since we pretty much dragged you into it…"
"It's fine." I replied. I got up off the ground and pulled my COMP out of my pocket. "There's no going back after this that much is obvious. No matter what, we need to get out of this. Please… don't die."
The three of us stared at the horde, and readied our weapons. "If we do die, I just want you to know… I want you to know that I'm happy I met you guys."
And thus the battle waged on. With increasing difficulty and decreasing strength, we fought back the horde, with swinging swords, slashing claws, and bursts of magical energy.
A great spear had been thrust at my heart.
I woke up in my bed in a cold sweat. I looked out my window to see that it was bright outside. Morning… I sat up, and looked at my alarm clock. 7:03 AM. I shakily raised my hand to my chest, and felt my heart beat go from Allegro down to Andante. I sat there for another minute, slowly getting my bearings together. The alarm blared at 7:05, and I immediately snoozed it, then, at last, I finally got out of bed. I walked over to the computer on my desk and turned it on. I opened up my email and scanned it for a brief moment. Aside from spam from my school and the usual message I get from my ex no matter how many times I block her about how "You're nothing without me!" and "I'm the best thing that's ever happened to you!", I hadn't seen anything exciting… that is, except for one thing sent by the Yakumo Computer System Technology Corporation, titled "Important Message: Beta Testing".
I opened it up and read it.
Important Message: Beta Testing
Dear Reo Musakui,
You and 24 others have been selected at random from millions of possible candidates to be a tester for new products. We here at Yakumo Corp. believe in providing our customers with hardware and systems that make one's life both easier and more enjoyable, as I'm sure you've seen with our Boundary OS, Violet smartphones, and our Communication Player line of handheld game systems.
Our upcoming products plan to uphold this mission, and we hope that you'll cooperate with us in the future!
You can tell your friends about this if you want; in fact, we encourage you to. The free marketing helps us out and you'll get more cool stuff for it. A win-win situation if you ask me! By the way, you may be getting a package soon for one of these products. I hope that you like what you get! :)
Yours truly,
Yukari Yakumo, CEO and Chief Engineer of Yakumo Computer System Technology Corporation
After reading this message, I wasn't sure what to think. It couldn't be a mere prank, because ZenkiMail identified it as an official email with a checkmark. It could've been an attack, but something in me believed it. I tried to delete it, but an error occurred. An error occurred again. And again. Eventually, I gave up and just shut it down.
I left my room, gave my Huskie-Shiba Inu Swift a stroke behind the ears and a "Good morning" as I got ready to shower. After 6 minutes, I got out and changed into my white t-shirt, jeans, socks, and black Chuck Taylors. I brushed my teeth, tamed my brown bedhead, and shaved my stupid face. I went downstairs and prepared breakfast. Mom and Dad still hadn't come back from their trip, so it was just me and Swift. I made some eggs and bacon, and sat on the couch, watching the news.
"The top story this morning is a mysterious murder in Northwestern Shibuya. The victim, 22 year old Ichigo Kiriyama, was found brutally maimed yesterday inside his apartment's bathroom." The announcer lady said as, the screen shifted to footage of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department investigating the apartment. "None of the victim's possessions were stolen, but his Yakumo Fox was found smashed into pieces later, with several bits of data attempted to be erased, and a simple but ominous message left behind."
The scene shifted to a thin policewoman outside the apartment looking into the camera and speaking into a microphone, with subtitles on the screen picking up words blocked by traffic noises. "The message read 'You think your such hot *bleep*, Kiriyama? Well, *bleep* you. I'm gonna find your hot girlfriend and *bleep* her until she dies! When the cops find your body, they won't even take pictures! How's that for 'pathetic'?!'"
"The prime suspect in the case is 20 year old Kunio Ishizaka, who has been previously charged multiple times with sexual assault and armed robbery. He was arrested at 3:09 this morning after he was caught stealing a high school student's bicycle, and is currently awaiting trial." The picture they showed of Ishizaka in his orange jumpsuit was creepy, even for a report like this. He had matted black hair, bugged out blue eyes, and pinkish skin that seemed to stretch over his skull like Saran wrap. He looked almost inhuman. "When he was interrogated at 3:32, he reportedly shouted 'Don't you idiots get it? The world's gonna fall apart soon, so you might as well have some fun!'
"Ishizaka also tried to terrorize his fellow inmates, so we stuck him in solitary confinement under guard. Believe it or not, he apparently understands human weak points very well." The policewoman said, looking worried. "For this reason, he will be put under guard during his trial as well, and said trial will not be open to the general public."
Once I had finished my breakfast, I took out my Violet Alexandra and read my messages. One of them was from my friend Sumireko Usami.
Hey, are you awake yet? We were gonna hang out today… Sent at 7:20 AM. Time to start walking.
I stood up and threw on my backpack.
Yeah, I am. Walking out now. May take Swift with me.
I clapped my hands and Swift ran over to me, having finished his breakfast with an eager look on his face. He was panting excitedly and had a leash in his mouth. He knew.
Yesssssss (^w^)
I opened the front door after grabbing the bags, and Swift barked. I looked down, and he was sniffing a violet, plastic-wrapped box with a round logo, the one for Yakumo Corp. The logo was a white lotus flower with gold lettering reading "YAKUMO COMPSYS TECH CORP." written around it. The very outmost part of the circle was a purple/black ring with red eye designs dotted in it and a couple of pink ribbons present on the upper and lower… corners?
There's a Yakumo Corp. box in front of my house.
There was a brief pause from Sumi as I picked it up, feeling how heavy it was.
You order something?
No, I didn't. I have no idea why it's here… It doesn't seem to be dangerous. Would you like to look at it with me?
Sure :)
I walked out into the street and started heading for the local park, carefully guiding Swift as he ran by my side.
After a short while, I finally caught up with Sumi, who was chilling on a bench playing a gacha game on her Violet Swallowtail. She looked up and grinned. Sumireko Usami was a girl with brown eyes and brown pigtails, and red-framed glasses. She was wearing our school's uniform, consisting of a purple plaid skirt and matching sleeveless top over a long-sleeved white blouse and a black bolo tie with a clasp that looked like a "Quimbaya airplane". Over her uniform she wore a black cape with a red inside patterned with runes I couldn't read, and on her head she wore a black hat with a white bow.
"There you are! Do you have the box?" she asked, adjusting her hat.
"Yep, right here." I held it out, and sat next to her. I peeled the plastic off, and removed the lid from the box. Inside the box, on top of velvet cushioning, was the two-screened Communication Player, or COMP.
"…it's a game system." Sumi said simply. "…what the hell?"
"What the hell" indeed. I picked it up, and felt it in my hand. It was, like the box, a violet color, and fit very nicely in my hands. On the top, just above the camera lenses, was the Yakumo Corp. logo. I opened it, and looked at the buttons. Speakers on each side of the top screen had two bright pink butterflies on them. The face buttons were colored like the ones on a Super Famicom controller, and the little C-Stick above it was colored yellow like the one on a GameCube controller. The D-pad, Start, and Select buttons were black and the circle pad had a red eye design much like the ones on the Yakumo Corp. logo.
"Is this the latest model?" Sumi asked, looking over my shoulder. "How'd you get this?"
I didn't answer. Instead, I turned it on, and saw a dark purple screen.
The eye present on the circle pad appeared again, this time blinking. White text appeared below the screen.
Violet Viceroy Communication Player
Powered by Boundary OS
"The Border to The Future is Open"
Eventually the screen whited out and showed a window with a message on the bottom screen.
Sumi continued to look over my shoulder as we read it together.
FROM: Yukarin
Subject: Congratulations!
If the address given to me by your parents was the correct one, then you, Reo, have received the latest and greatest in Yakumo Corp.'s technological advancements. I hope that you will use its capabilities to the fullest. We have made the ultimate combination of smartphone, home computer, and game system. The VV COMP, developed in collaboration with various Institutes of Technology from America, Japan, China, and Europe, has several new features that will enhance your everyday life, including a CPU on par with most supercomputers, the highest memory available on the market, the longest battery life of any of our systems yet, extreme durability and proofing of all kinds, backwards compatibility with all games previously released on other COMPs. Since it runs on Boundary OS, it's filled with far more power than
This system is released a week from today, as I'm sure you know, but you can brag about it to your friends that you got the system early! So go on, show it off, talk to your friends and brag about it, let them feel the system for themselves!
Warmest regards,
Yukari Yakumo
P.S. If you're still in the area when our latest press conference rolls in, be sure to drop by and say hello! If I'm not there to greet you immediately, just show your brand-new COMP to the guards and they'll let you through. They will listen to a VIP of mine well! You could even bring a friend if you'd like!
I looked at Sumi, who was shaking in excitement.
"Holy crap! Wow, directly from Yakumo herself!"
Her eyes widened from behind her glasses. "Can I come?"
"Well…"
She looked at me with such passion in her eyes, it was difficult to resist. Even if I refused, she probably would've followed me anyway.
"…okay." I grinned, and felt her wrap me up in a bear hug.
"Thank you." she said, grinning as well. "Hope I get the chance to use my powers."
I rolled my eyes. Of course she was going on about her ESP. I'd be shocked if she didn't.
She pulled out her deck of Zener cards from her sleeve and handed them to me.
"I'll prove it to you soon!" she declared. "Now, be sure to shuffle them well!"
I sighed as I shuffled them, and Swift looked on in vague interest, his tongue panting.
I had a feeling that today was going to be a long day.
A/N: …Um… hi everybody! Uh, I'm not dead. I've just been really busy these past several months… I know that's no excuse and all that, but believe me I wanted to make more stuff for you guys! Honest! It's just… in between school, bouts of illness, and some personal issues, I just couldn't make time for this. Um… hopefully you guys will like this enough to forget about Touhou – Beam Katana Chronicles for a brief moment! I hope… Yu Yevon almighty, I need to get that out of its hiatus… the hell am I thinking, starting another long term project like this? …uh, please don't hate me! I promise this story won't suck!
I'd also really appreciate any constructive criticism you have for me. I promise!
