And here we are! Hope you enjoy this chapter!


Fumio sat in her chair, deep in thought over recent events that had transpired and what she saw earlier in the day. Her room consisted of a single double bunk bed, several bookcases littered with novels and a desk with her personal computer housed on it. Several books were littered on different parts of the bedroom floor, most of them were already stacked in small piles. Several sticky notes were tabbed on both the end wall of her room and the edges of her computer monitor. One of these notes had a single name jotted down, "Mayu". This would indicate that Fumio had some basic knowledge about the mastermind inside of the White Room, unaware of her current prisoner from Cray. Her LRIG Anne, had her card placed standing up beside the lamp that was also on the desk. She looked up at her Selector, curious as to what she was thinking about as of late.

"Are you thinking about that boy from earlier?" she asked.

"Yeah," Fumio answered "If what I thought I saw earlier before that non-Selector Battle was true..."

"You mean that time when you thought you saw the words on the back of your cards changing for a moment?" murmured Anne. Fumio nodded her head in response to that question.

Flashback

Like Ulith back from the evening of Kai's arrival, the 'prophecy' on the backs of Fumio's cards had changed for brief moment. Although the message appeared and disappeared just like that in the blink of an eye, that moment could still be recalled from her memory. Fumio glanced to a recent note that she had jotted down with the precise words that she believed to have seen for that single moment. Anne had chosen not to believe her at first believing that Fumio was being played for a fool by a trick of the light, but conceded to follow along her lead to get some meaning from what she was trying to explain to her. Eventually in the following day leading up to this current point in time, Fumio had unexpectedly found 'that' boy engaged in a non-Selector Battle with another girl. She kept in mind to remember the name Chiyori from her LRIG spectating the friendly battle, but made a mental note to remember Kai from his name being said out several times.

Keeping her distance from the shop entrance, she observed the battle from start to finish. Although she was confused as to how his Kagero cards were even able to manifest as LRIGs, Anne could still feel a strong presence, particuarly from the moment where Kai grew Vortex Dragon. After seeing the battle come to a close in Kai's victory, she stated to Anne that she had seen enough and quickly left before he had a chance to spot her. As she left the shop, she held out Anne's card in front of her as she treked back to her apartment.

"You really think he is that boy mentioned in the note you jotted down from what you thought you saw?" the LRIG asked.

"I don't know," Fumio replied "But you felt it too, didn't you?"

"Yeah," answered Anne "It wasn't a Selector Battle, yet those cards he played..." She paused in mid sentence, trying to comprehend the whole situation, particuarly regarding Kai who they had seen earlier. Fumio had shown her to a non-Selector battle where she believed that a boy from something that she thought she saw earlier and jotted down. Yet to Anne herself, the LRIG cards he used felt like they were ones that belonged to an actual Selector, even if they looked a lot 'different'. She looked up back at her Selector.

"Should we look into this further?" she asked. Anne didn't need to wait for an answer to come her way. Fumio nodded in response to her question, confirming her choice before returning to her home.

Back to the present

Fumio moved her chair over to her desk and picked up the note where she jotted down what she thought she saw on the cards for that brief moment. She still wasn't quite sure if she had jotted down everything correctly, but the words read out:

A Boy carrying a heavy burden of sin.

Called upon from his fight "Vanguard"

wielding the flames of perdition.

Seeking a way to end this conflict...

Victory will be the only way for his

wish to revolutionize.

Now, shall his "Wish Across" be ignited.

She showed the note to Anne who took her time to read through it. After several minutes of looking at it thoroughly and re-reading it, she turned to Fumio.

"I suppose I can sort of get the jist of it," she said "I mean, his LRIGs mostly resembled dragons which could account for 'the flames of perdition'. But what I don't get is that 'Vanguard' part from what you wrote down."

"I'm not so sure myself," replied Fumio "But that's one of the words I definitely remember seeing when I saw the text change." She looked over to the curtains blocking her view of the night sky, deep in thought of what was to come. "Even so," she continued "When the time is right, we'll approach him ourselves." Anne nodded in agreement, she herself having shared interest in Kai's appearance to the Selector Battles.


Kai's Rented Apartment

After taking around an hour or so to get used to his new surroundings, Kai had managed to set up everything for his living accomendations to his 'temporary' home. It was quite small having only a joint kitchen and living space along with one bedroom and a single bathroom. Despite this size, he didn't seem bothered by it that much when he purchased the apartment. For the moment though, he was at the single table in the kitchen eating away from a stew that he had cooked up earlier. It was one that he helped to prepare on Quadrifolios's first training camp back when he was still a member of the team. Over from her card, Tama watched him prepare this meal from start to finish and although she imagined it would look tasty, her heart sank when she took into account that she was still trapped inside her card. Ruko even once mentioned to her that any attempt to feed her could result in damaging the card. Nonetheless, she looked back up at Kai in curiosity.

"How does Kai manage to cook something that looks so good?" she asked.

"I've lived on my own for several years," he answered "If it wasn't for you being trapped, I would have offered some." After he took another bite from the stew he cooked up, he looked over to Tama with a question of his own. "Besides, how do you manage to survive without consuming food or drink considering you are stuck in this card?" he asked. The LRIG held her hand under chin, pondering over the answer to this question.

"... Tama usually feels something funny in Tama's stomach once in while," she answered "Other than that, Tama doesn't know."

"I see," murmured Kai. An awkward silence fell in the apartment between the two before he continued to eat at his meal. After he had finished and cleaned up, he went over to his bedroom. It was small, having only a single bed, a cupboard beside the door and a desk in front of the window present. Kai had laid out his deck from his current build around Vortex Dragon on the desk before cooking his meal. Whilst he sat down to reconfigure the deck, he looked through a Wixoss catalogue that he had purchased shortly after his battle with Chiyori to grasp a better understanding of some of the other LRIG types that were available in the game and possibly the Selector Battles for the long run. Tama's card was resting on the lamp that was present on the desk as she watched him reconstruct the deck from scratch, noticing him switch out some of his LRIG lineup for Blazing Core Dragon and Blazing Flare Dragon. She also noticed some different Kagero LRIG cards in a pile beside some spare cards he had outside of the deck, one of which depicted Amber Dragon, Eclipse.

Tama then looked over to Dragonic Overlord's card. Although the card itself had depicted a still image, she could still feel the strong presence coming from it, the same feeling she had when she saw it in battle against Piruluk. That was when she had something on her mind that she wanted to tell Kai.

"Kai?" she murmured.

"What it is Tama?"

"Does Kai think we can find a way to talk to Dragonic Overlord?" she asked. Kai paused for a moment. He thought back to his battle against Akira when Overlord had briefly managed to communicate him via a few words, wondering if such a feat was even possible. From the lores of Dragonic Overlord that he read back in his own world, he knew the dragon was capable of speech, particuarly since the existence of Tatsunagi Takuto and the power of PSY Qualia to a few individuals, Aichi and Ren included, had also confirmed the existence of Cray and the stories told through those lores. Picking up the card and looking at it closely, the words that Dragonic Overlord had spoke to him back then rang through his ears once again.

Let us win, my Vanguard...

Pondering back on that occasion, Kai himself despite managing to draw up a theory with Yuzuki of how he was able to summon his units to battle as LRIGs and SIGNI still felt he was being left in the dark on the whole scenario. Thinking over what Tama had just asked him, perhaps finding a way to talk to Overlord would answer some of those questions.

"If we can enter that space where the battles occur," he spoke "Then summoning Overlord there may give us the chance we need to speak with him." Tama nodded in agreement with a large smile on her face. Kai looked back at the time on his phone realizing that it was already late.

"Good night Tama," he said, before switching off the lamp and getting into his bed.

"Tama says goodnight!" replied Tama before yawning and drifting off to sleep.


Uemura Household

Over at Hitoe's home, all was silent and dark with everyone tucked in for sleep. Well, almost everyone. Over in her bedroom, Hitoe was already lying down in her bed, staring out of the window at the night sky. She couldn't sleep for the moment, her mind being preoccupied by something she couldn't stop worrying about. Over from her card, Yuzuki noticed this and looked over towards her Selector.

"Is something troubling you?" she asked. Hitoe nodded in reply confirming Yuzuki's suspicions.

"I'm guessing it's about Ruko," she murmured.

"Yes," Hitoe answered "I'm happy that we managed to find Tama and to know that we have Kai to help us out. But, I'm worried about what's going on with her now that..." She paused in mid sentence, unsure of what to say next. Her heart felt like it was being wrenched just thinking about it.

"I know," replied Yuzuki "With Iona in her possession, I'm not liking this one bit." She then raised her head to look back at Hitoe. "Is there anything else?"

"I'm just wondering where Midoriko could be," said Hitoe. Yuzuki pondered for a moment. Ever since Hitoe had lost 3 Selector Battles before she became her new LRIG, they had no idea of where Midoriko had gone. She hadn't seen her at the White Room when Mayu revealed the flipside of becoming an Eternal Girl and they had no idea of what happened to Hitoe's former LRIG since that fateful day. Deciding to worry about it later, Yuzuki looked back at Hitoe.

"It's getting late now," she said "We'll need all the rest we can get if we want to find Ruko and hopefully get to the bottom of this." Hitoe nodded in agreement before yawning and pulling the covers over her.

"Good night," she said. Yuzuki nodded before drifting off to sleep.


The next morning...

As morning rose over the city, Kai eventually woke up from the brightness that entered his apartment room. He looked over to the deck where he left his reconstructed deck last night with Tama's card still leaning on the lamp. Tama herself on the other hand was still sleeping soundly as if nothing had bothered her from the previous night. He looked from the window across towards the center of the city, deep in thought over all that had happened so far. Even so, part of him couldn't help but wonder about how his friends had been doing since his disappearance from back home. Kai knew for a fact that Aichi would not take this news well once he found out that he was missing from the face of 'his' Earth and would probably do something drastic to find out where he was. Despite that though, he knew he had something to do and he wasn't going to stop until he had the answers he needed. His trail of thoughts was interrupted when he heard Tama yawn loudly.

"Good morning," she said, her speech almost broken up by her yawn. Kai looked over to her and nodded in agreement. A few minutes later, after having breakfast and changing into some clothes that he bought before his arrival to his rented apartment, he set out into the streets once more with his phone, deck and Tama's card on hand. His new wardrobe consisted of a dark red shirt along with some dark trousers and a plain colored short sleeve jumper with a dark brownish shade from the collar down to the sleeves. Continuing on through the streets, he looked across the many crowds of people for Ruko. Since he got a more accurate description from Yuzuki and Hitoe on the previous day, being able to tell her apart from the rest was easy enough. The problem was finding the girl that matched the exact description and Tama wasn't faring any better with trying to track Iona. Before they could consider taking a short break, a familiar voice had called out from nearby.

"Hello again!" Kai turned around to see Chiyori dashing through some crowds of people until she stopped right in front of him. Tama called out loud and waved hello as the Selector came rushing towards him.

"Chiyori," Kai greeted nonchalantly. The young Selector nodded in excitement.

"And so, fate draws us to meet again!" she called out loud "And pretty soon already I might add." A sigh came over from where she was standing. From the tone present, Kai and Tama could tell that it was Eldora.

"If your definition of pretty soon was somewhere close to around 20 hours," she spoke "I'm surprised if you even managed to practice enough to challenge him to a Selector Battle in that timeskip." A tic mark appeared of Chiyori in annoyance, but she knew Eldora had made a fair point.

"Besides," the Selector said, briefly pausing to ponder over something "Could you take a look at this?"

"What is it?" asked Kai. Chiyori dug into one of her pockets and revealed to him a single card, Blue Storm Guardian Dragon, Icefall Dragon.

"I haven't seen this registered in any Wixoss card guides," she explained "So it was pretty surprising to find this one when I went through a few packs. I was wondering, seeing as your cards are from this Planet Cray, you would know something about this?" Kai looked closely at the card. He wasn't surprised for some reason as if he had seen it before, yet it looked different.

"I do," he replied "You've somehow managed to obtain a unit from the Aqua Force clan. A Quintet Wall to exact."

"Quintet Wall?" murmured Tama.

"A means of defense gained through a gamble," Kai explained "From what I know in the game of Vanguard, a Quintet Wall can be used to call 5 units from the top of a fighter's deck to defend their attacked unit. From what I could read, it works differently but in the exact same sense. It also appears that you can also use it to defend against SIGNI attacks as well as LRIG attacks."

Chiyori stared in wonder at the card as Kai handed it back to her. Eldora was now also curious on the matter. Neither she or Chiyori had heard anything about a Quintet Wall before in the game of Wixoss. Kai meanwhile had his thoughts set on something else. If additional Kagero cards from the day before were only present from my arrival into this world, then could 'he' be here as well?

"What's up Kai?" asked Chiyori who looked up at him in confusion.

"I've just been thinking over a few things," he replied "The card reminds me of someone I know well from my own world."

"Someone?" pondered Tama.

"Soryu Leon," Kai answered "He's one of 3 fighters I know of that wield that clan. The other two are twins that have accompanied him, Jillian and Charlene Chen."

"I see," murmured Eldora "Yuzuki told me you weren't exactly from around here so I guess it would somewhat make sense you knew something we didn't."

"So cool!" called Chiyori "This is now totally way beyond the novel! Creatures from another world have now descended onto the battlefield of destiny and I'm holding one of them!" She bounced up and down a few times being unable to contain her excitement. Kai and Eldora could only sigh at this, but could understand at where she was going with her speech. That was when Kai realized something he had to ask.

"Say Chiyori," he spoke.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Have you seen a Selector by the name of Kominato Ruko?" he asked "Hitoe and Tama told me she can also be known as Ru for short." Chiyori held her hand under her chin for a moment, trying to figure out some sense of what Kai had asked her. Then something clicked in Eldora's head.

"Now that I think about it," she said "I definitely remember seeing someone run out of that building where Iona's fan event was being held. She stopped in front of us briefly, then a voice said "Hey Ru, our first opponent." After that, she panicked and ran off." Chiyori gasped in realization, now remembering exactly what had happened back then.

"That's right!" she said "Now that I think about it, I could of sworn that voice that said "Ru" was Iona's."

"Do you know where she was headed?" asked Kai.

"Please tell Tama!" Tama cried.

"I'm sorry," Chiyori answered in defeat "I tried to give chase, but I tripped up after I ran a few blocks."

"More like a few feet," murmured Eldora. Chiyori glared at Eldora in annoyance for that smug remark but deep down, she knew that her LRIG was right. Netherless, she looked back at Kai and Tama.

"Sorry if that wasn't much help," she said.

"Don't worry about it," Kai replied "Thanks for telling us everything you know." Chiyori nodded in agreement.

"Well then, I wish you luck Kai!" she called "I think it's time Eldora and I took out this Quintet Wall for a test drive. See you around!" Kai nodded and the two waved farewell to one another. As Chiyori ran off, he looked back at Tama. The LRIG felt a little downcast from the news, but still felt upbeat with the knowledge that they knew someone who had seen her at least once.

"Tama won't give up!" she called "Not until Tama finds Ruko!" Kai could only smile a little from seeing that Tama's resolve hadn't wavered and wasn't letting the disappointment of the news they heard from Chiyori and Eldora get the better of her. He reached into his pocket for his phone and selected Hitoe's number. After a few vibrations from the phone, Kai got an answer through.

"Hello Kai!" called Hitoe "Is everything alright?"

"Yeah," he replied "I ran into Chiyori earlier. I've found out that she bumped into Ruko shortly after she ran away from the building where Iona's fan event was held, but she couldn't keep up to see where she was going."

"I see," murmured a second voice through the phone. Kai could easily recognize that voice to be Yuzuki's. "Thanks for letting us know."

"Don't worry about it," he said "At least we have someone we know as a possible lead."

"Say Kai," replied Hitoe "If it isn't too much trouble, could you meet me by the library later?"

"Yeah," answered Kai "I'll be sure to arrive there as soon as I can."

"Thank you," she said "Goodbye!" The call ended right there. Kai placed his phone back in his pocket. Tama looked up at him in curiousity, wondering about what he intended to do next.

"So what now?" she asked.

"We head to the library," he answered "And see what Hitoe wanted me there for." Tama nodded with a big smile. Kai slipped her card back into his jacket pocket and headed on his way to find directions to the city library.


Kai's World; Soryu Island

Deep inside an open cavern on the remote island of the Seven Seas, a boy was standing in front of a large pool of water in the center of the ruined cave. Several ruined stone pillars were present near the entrance of the cavern, a remainder of what was formerly left over of the Soryu Tribe in the days of old, before the Void sealed away the Aqua Force clan on the Planet Cray. The boy had yellow hair jutting out in various directions, some in larger spikes whilst three smaller spikes jutted upward from the top of his head. The boy also wore a white garb with blue colored sleeves and neck collar. A purple jewel was presemt partway down the top half of his garb between 3 gold-yellow lines running across and a single red line that went from the bottom of his collar down the whole garb to the end of the piece of fabric that made up the lower half. The boy was deep in thought, pondering over recent events that had transpired that he wasn't fully aware of, as of yet.

This is strange indeed. First Kai Toshiki has vanished from the face of this world without a trace, now I'm picking up a faint signal of PSY Qualia off Tatsunagi Takuto from someplace other than here or Cray.

He opened his purple eyes and turned around to no one in particular, the conclusion he had come to now set in stone for him.

"There is a disturbance in the wind."


There we go! So it appears that Kai's appearance in the Wixoss world has also resulted in him dragging along the Quintet Wall mechanic into the game. Also it appears that Leon has now become aware of Kai's disappearance and is looking into the situation himself. Anyway, I've posted up a link to Kai's Vortex Dragon build he used in the previous two chapters in my profile and I hope that you've all enjoyed this chapter. Whilst I'm writing up the next chapter, I'm going to allow you to ask any questions you may have about the story so far and I'll post any answers to them in an update next week. Keep in mind that I won't be able to answer every single question that may pop up (partially because of spoilers and things that I still haven't confirmed to have fully planned yet). Anyway, don't forget to favourite, follow and/or leave a review! Before I go, here's the full stats of Icefall Dragon in its Wixoss form below. Until then!

Name: Blue Storm Guardian Dragon, Icefall Dragon

Color: Blue

Card Type: SIGNI

Class: Tear Dragon

Level: 1

Power: 2000

Effect:

[Quintet Wall] Pay 1 card that is the same Color as your LRIG, then reveal and discard this card: When your opponent's LRIG or SIGNI declares an attack, you may pay the cost. If you do, reveal the top 5 cards of your deck. Then if the number of SIGNI revealed are equal to or more than the attacking SIGNI or LRIG's Level, disable that attack. Then, regardless of the result, send all Spells revealed to your Trash and place all SIGNI revealed by this effect in your Ener Zone.