Wellington looked ahead at the building, aware that anything could happen. The Shadows were prone to ambushing enemies in the dark twisting corridors of Tartarus, and climbing up the damn tower without outside support was said to be suicide. For now, no expeditions had been made into the main labyrinth, but a makeshift infirmary and supply depot had been set up inside the entrance.

Mercenaries of Fortune Chapter Seven

The Midnight Channel, TV Studio area, 16:14 local time.

Yu, Enforcer, Teddie, and Yosuke were standing around trying to figure out what the hell was going on. Chie had tried to attach Hanamura and Narukami on a rope, but Enforcer shot down that idea immediately since he explained that the TV portals only work when a human or Shadow heads through. After a while though, Yosuke lost his temper with Teddie and pulled off the mascot's head, revealing an empty space underneath.

Surprised, he stepped back and said, "Whoa! Wh- What the hell are you?! It's empty inside. . ."

Teddie just simply walked slowly to his head and put it back on and said, "Me, the culprit? I wouldn't do such a thing. I just live here. I just want to live here peacefully."

Yosuke was speechless to how Teddie responded and the mascot added, "Okay. I'll believe that you guys aren't the culprits just like the mercenary and his allies. But I want you to find the real guy who did all this. You have to stop him. Promise me or else I'm not gonna let you guys outta here."

Yosuke once again lost his temper and started, "You little-" before Enforcer interrupted him and said, "Whoa there, you need to calm the f*** down, buddy!" as Teddie continued, "This can't keep going on. My home here will be a complete mess! And then. . . and then. . . I. . ." before he broke down crying.

"W- What are you crying for all of a sudden?! Geez, this thing's really weirding me out." Yosuke said in an annoyed manner.

"I have a bad feeling about this. We should head to the Twisted Shopping District in this world. That's the place where my squadron and I found Saki Konishi. Of course, we only got to her after her psyche was eaten. And there's one important bit of information for you guys: it IS possible for a human being to live without their psyche or, as religious folks call it, their soul. However, without the soul or psyche, a person will be unable to move, feed, or even care for themselves. They become empty shells that are vulnerable to their surroundings." Enforcer said to everyone.

They all agreed to Enforcer's idea and went to the Twisted Shopping District, which hadn't changed at all from when Enforcer's squadron was around. "What is this place? It looks just like the shopping district. What's going on here?!" Yosuke asked. Teddie answered, "Some weird places have appeared here recently. Things are getting so tangled, I don't know what to do."

Enforcer cut in and said, "We don't have time to bicker around. Let's head into the Konishi Liquor Store of this damn place and investigate." Just before they could do so, Enforcer felt the presence of Shadows and had everyone stay put. Sure enough, two Slipping Hableries came out of the Liquor Store and Yu disposed of them by calling Izanagi, who fired off two Zio attacks. The spells knocked down and exploited each Hableries' weakness to electric attacks, allowing Yu to finish them off with a single swing from his katana. Once that was done, Enforcer went inside of the Liquor Store and Teddie, Yu, and Yosuke followed the mercenary into the main part of the store, where they began to hear voices, everyone in the room did.

"Saki, how many times do I have to tell you!?" one of the voices said, addressing someone who was not here.

"This didn't happen when I was here with my squadron earlier. Something is definitely going on." Enforcer quickly said. Suddenly, he noticed something nearby and went for the back wall. Following his lead, everyone else also got to the wall.

"These voices. . . they're all talking about Ms. Konishi." Enforcer said to Yosuke.

"Yeah. . . I'm not liking what I'm hearing." Yosuke replied.

A sinister voice then said, "Ah, but you don't know that I like what the voices say."

Yosuke turned around and saw what appeared to be himself standing next to the exit. "She was a complete waste of my time, that Saki-sempai. In fact, this ENTIRE TOWN bores me to the point that I wished something would happen!" the 'Other Yosuke' said.

The real Yosuke couldn't say anything in response and the other added, "Now that a Shadow ate her mind, I can finally do something exciting! Isn't that right, me?!"

Yosuke: "Shut up! You. . . You're not me!"

"That's right! I am not you! Oh yeah, I can feel the power. If this keeps going, ahahaha, I'll be. . . hahahahahahahahaha!" Shadow Yosuke said.

The Shadow then transformed into what looked like a giant frog-like entity that had a humanoid upper body intersected to the back of the frog-like body. The humanoid had two large gloves for hands, a helmet that had no eyes, and a red scarf around its neck. The frog body had two large eyes and a weird 'mask-like' feature on its face.

Shadow Yosuke finally spoke, "I am a Shadow, the true self. I'll crush everything that bores me."

The monster then pointed at Yu with a finger from one of its gloves and added, "Starting with YOU!" as Yu got away from Yosuke and guarded as the Shadow hit Narukami with a wind attack.

Enforcer shouted to Yu, "I'm sure that the enemy is weak to electric attacks."

Yu decided to follow Enforcer's logic and sure enough, the Shadow was weak to electric when the Zio spell that was unleashed knocked it down. Yu then used the opportunity provided by calling Izanagi, who put up a blue aura around him. The Shadow got back up and didn't attack, but it focused for one. Yu attacked again, firing off Zio and then guarding when the opportunity provided when the Shadow got knocked down presented itself. Before long, the Shadow attacked by slapping Narukami, which had almost no effect due to Yu guarding and the blue aura around him reducing the damage.

"I can detect that you increased your defenses, Narukami. That's good, you can't let your guard down around an enemy." Enforcer said to Yu.

Yu fired off two Zio spells in quick succession, the first knocking down Shadow Yosuke and allowing him to fire off the second attack while the second hit the Shadow again and seemingly rendering it dizzy, but it simply got back up and guarded. Yu immediately guarded and the pattern that been set up continued until Shadow Yosuke was defeated.

"Damn you to hell!" the Shadow yelled as it collapsed and regressed back into its normal form.

Yasoinaba Station, 16:45 local time.

"Any idea on what's going on, Dmitri?" a random mercenary asked.

"Yeah. With how things are currently going regarding the train transporting Minato Arisato here, it's going to take only eight more hours before it arrives here at the station." Dmitri replied.

"Wow, the Shadows must be trying to kill him now that he's vulnerable."

"You got that right. Normal humans can't notice them at night, but if they attack during the day, holy shit there's going to be a panic."

"Okay, now I wonder why THOSE Shadows haven't been appearing yet."

"The New Moon isn't until the third of May."

"Yeah, that's true, but Intel suggested to me earlier that one of THEM is lurking around inside the TV world."

"Well. . . Shit, I hadn't thought of that."

"And now look at the time."

"It's only 17:00 hours. No shit."

A/N: This chapter continued off of the last one and the next chapter will continue off of this one, so there won't be any foreshadowing for a while. That said, Read and Review.