"..."
Our protagonist was flabbergasted.
"How could my life get any stranger if it already is strange enough?" He asked himself, observing the screen in front of him. It seems he has unread messages, but from who, and where did the system come from?
Before he should do anything, he thought people might look at him strangely, especially the doctor and the nurse who might enter his room, and he would look embarrassing in front of everyone.
To halt this problem, he decided to think of something.
'Hmm... maybe... Open messages.' He inwardly thought, and the transparent screen split into two, revealing two messages he carefully read.
[Welcome, Pilot. I am your Guide, created by a (R.O.B.), obviously. This is an automated message, like every other message like you leveling up or the Shugods ranking up after this. But before that, you should begin restoring King Oh-ger by searching for the Shugods other than both God Ant and God Kuwagata as they are already beside you. The fate of this world is in your hands. (Page 1 of 5)]
Shugo was silent. More like, he became silent.
"This World's fate, in my hands? Why? Shouldn't that be in Sung Jin-woo's hands? I mean, he's the protagonist, but..." Shugo scratched his head, causing the seemingly inanimate Shugods that were merely toys to suddenly begin moving. "... Yeah I'm not surprised."
Relying on that man doesn't really make him feel any better, though. He knows gates are all around the world, and his life really was not that difficult in Japan since there were 11 S-Ranked hunters from the sole strongest guild of the country and second strongest in Asia.
Plus, many millions will eventually die and the S-class hunters can't stand a chance against Monarchs even if that hunter is a National Rank hunter.
Even the guild he is in doesn't even have an A-class hunter since its Mission was to explore gates that were around B-class and below to provide an otherworldly experience from those who did not see the world behind the gates.
It was a mission that actually made him join the Guild, and to his luck, most of the people there were very friendly.
But, now focusing on the screen before him, he willed that certain message to change pages.
[And to give you a wound, let's just say you are currently unable to become a Sentai/Ranger like Kuwagata Oh-ger and Papillon Oh-ger since you have to manually create your own Oh-ger Calibur with the Shugods. That means you can only form and pilot King Oh-ger and the Super Robo's upgraded forms. To disallow full nerfs for the sake of it, you are given a fragment of the powers of the actual King Oh-ger. (Page 2 of 5)]
"... I see..."
'... I feel hurt. I cannot transform into a Sentai right now. But I need a test run way later if my powers work or not.'
Leaning back down to rest his head, he wondered how. And through curiosity, he decided to flip the page of the current message he was reading.
[Because of certain concerns, if you go to the fifth page, your powers; the fragment of King Oh-ger that laid dormant, will awaken. Plus, you need to be careful, the existence of King Oh-ger is alien to the inhabitants of this universe, the Rulers may gain interest over you, yet may deem you a threat and have their vessels kill you instead,. The Monarchs may see you as a fake, prompting them to also kill you. Also, the Shugods may die from both's hands if you kept procrastinating.(Page 3 of 5)]
Alright, now that's a huge problem, he knew there were Monarchs and Rulers, and right now the latter had noticed his existence.
Sighing, he decided to begin thinking of a way to be careful in doing his job, maybe he should just stay at home, for a a few days just to look over the news and think about what to do next.
Flipping the page of his message, he felt like he really should begin stopping his procrastination. His decisions will affect his life, and that belief is one reason he was able to get out of crappy situations that would prove dangerous to him.
An example is his foster parents were almost about to fight, but he stopped it at the last moment.
[Failure to complete King Oh-ger before Canon (2 months) means losing all your progress, even a part of the powers of each Shugod, every level and Shugod Rank you raised, and you will be reduced to fodder, which is worse than a Mob, and through that you will die. (Page 4 of 5) ]
[Once you have arrived at this page, this means that after you accept your role as the Pilot, or Leader of the Shugods, the system will be fully active. (Page 5 of 5)]
Once he had done reading the message, he closed it, then glanced at the second message.
[Your choice matters now. This is your responsibility.]
[Will you become the Pilot of the Shugods, and eventually King Oh-ger?]
[YES] [NO]
...
"Urgh... I suppose I have no choice. I'll accept." Shugo spoke, and the miniaturized Shugods near him raised their heads.
For a moment, nothing happened. Until Shugo noticed his vision become a little more clearer, and he now has a H.U.D. showing his HP and EP. He thought that the HP obviously are Health Points and the other is for Energy.
[HP: 750/1000]
[EP: 125/125]
[Level 15 ]
Shugo is currently in a state of recovery, so he knew himself that he still needed some rest in this room. But, he was still pretty curious about the other icons, namely the [Shugod] icon, which looked like the cross guard of the Oh-ger Calibur, used by the Ohsama Sentai to transform.
Before that, he checked his skills.
{ Passive }
• Innovation - Level 2
• Piloting - Level 1
• Shugod Command - Level 1
{ Active }
• Shugod Soul Manifestation - Level 1
When he tapped that icon, a new transparent screen appeared before him.
[Shugods]
• Available:
• Main Shugods (Max Rank: 10)
• God Kuwagata - Rank 1
• Sub Shugods (Max Rank: 5)
• God Ant - Rank 1
• Unavailable:
• God Papillon
• God Tonbo
• God Hachi
• God Kamakiri
• God Kumo (Both)
• God Tentou (Both)
• God Pede
• God Rolling
• God Cicada
• God Snail
• God Kabuto
• God Scorpion
• God Hopper
• God Tarantula
• God Heracles
• God Caucasus Kabuto
That was all 20 of them, and he even wondered how to even obtain them all. Since he has been given the responsibility, he needs to find a way to get all the Shugods to trust him, and that he would have to rescue all of them, too.
It is possible they would be killed by hunters and monsters, so he needed to act quickly.
But first, since he has some time left, he decided to raise his arm sideways, reaching out to God Ant and God Kuwagata.
"I've always been quite interested in insects, strangely enough. So, uh... How about you two come here?" Shugo asked, and the two miniaturized Shugods jumped and landed on his chest.
And honestly? They were kinda heavy as the hospital bed creaked a bit, and some air was knocked out of his lungs. He also noticed that the feeling of their exoskeletons felt like a mixture of cold metal and an ordinary insect's exoskeleton.
He did decide to just let them on his chest until the two Shugods noticed that someone was about to enter.
They returned to where they were, with God Ant standing on God Kuwagata's back.
A few seconds later, a doctor entered the room to check up on him, while deciding to request that he should take another day of rest before he was discharged. Most of his salary from the previous gate raid was expended, sadly only leaving a thousand yen for him.
Without much to do, he wanted to at least find his motorcycle, but because of some bad luck, it had been towed away when he arrived at the place where he previously left it.
"How frustrating..." He growled, hoping
Apparently, it had been a week after he had slept, and several tens of calls have been missed, most of which were from his companions in his Guild and the others were from his family.
Once he told all of them that he had now recovered, they all were relieved, yet it also seemed like on social media like on Blue Bird and Instadia, the discoveries his group made were straight up going viral.
But that... wasn't really what interested Shugo much, as when he asked about his motorcycle, the guildmaster immediately became silent, and decided to say his sorry.
It actually left him no choice but to take a long glance at God Kuwagata.
"Oh well, I guess I'll have to begin piloting you, then." He sighed out, making the Shugod nod its head. It flew up to mid-air and began to increase in size, surprising the people who had just been wandering around.
"Woah! That's a giant insect!" A child yelled out excitedly, before he noticed a massive ant bigger than him fly towards God Kuwagata.
Several reactions were given to this event, and even a few had gained the chance to take a few pictures, even have Shugo's figure rising to the air before he entered God Kuwagata through its exoskeleton.
God Ant landed on the top of the fellow Shugod, and began riding it.
Now inside the Shugod, its pilot felt something soft covering his waist, and realized that it was the Shugod's control sticks and levers mixed into a VR controller.
He saw a lot of his surroundings before realizing he should get to his apartment soon enough, so he thought of leaning his body forward.
The result, God Kuwagata began to move forward on midair at around 50 km/h, allowing Shugo to begin to get used to piloting it. And the moment he does, he immediately leans forward and his Shugod began to move faster and faster.
At 400 km/h he began to feel some G-force pressing against his body, until he arrived at his apartment and made a good landing.
His somewhat normal hunter life is changing, he knew that.
So why not begin looking at the news for a long while doing some research before actually looking for the other Shugods?
[ ~ TO • BE • CONTINUED ~ ]
Here are Shugo's stats as of now:
Strength: Rank C
Vitality: Rank C
Resistance: Rank B-
Agility: Rank C
Sense: Rank C