As Minoru Kagenou, known to the public as Cid Kagenou/Shadow, sat on his throne in the rooftop house of the Midgar capital branch of Mitsugoshi, he pondered the changes he enacted since the time he was dragged into meeting Seiichi.
Flashback Start
After being returned to Manor Kagenou, he'd immediately smiled and pretended to give Claire a normal farewell. Couldn't break character, after all. Then, once it was polite to do so, he went ahead and moved to the temporary base of Shadow Garden, where he proceeded to start by squeezing as much information out of all his Shades as possible.
Not that they were unwilling, he was just being really thorough. Eta was exhausted enough to sleep like an actual log for the week following his interrogation, after all. Though it resulted in massive upgrades in the future.
Based on these changes, he changed several directives for Gamma's business plan, making Mitsugoshi more popular than before, even expanding to the Velgata Empire almost 4 years earlier than originally projected. Beta's assumed identity of Natsume Kafka and Epsilon's Shiron exploded on the scene much earlier as well. This while they worked on their original works as well, flourishing under his tutelage.
Zeta- now going as Lilith in public, as opposed to her birth name of Lilim- was ordered to form her branch as a stealth force that was to report to her. She reported directly to Alpha and him, as they were the leaders in name and fact.
Speaking of Alpha, she became more like his secretary now. A very capable and scary secretary, given she was most like him in all aspects. She took over whenever he was absent, and he relied on her most of all.
And he did start his harem… much to the surprise of his parents, who didn't remember even the dream. Claire sent letters expressing her confusion at her sword style being more unfamiliar to her. Almost like he would be able to answer her concerns. It did lower her ranking for a short while before she reclaimed that title for her year.
Beatrix, true to her word, came to Manor Kagenou, and met up with Minoru. She worked as a clandestine member of Shadow Garden, using her public face to misdirect everyone whenever necessary. This included being known as Minoru's trainer, since her setting was that she had found much hidden talent in Cid Kagenou, and decided to train him privately… much to Claire's irritation once she found out. She also served to mitigate the negative effects of Lambda's military style of training- since Shadow Garden was in essence a sisterhood, not a military organization.
Two years passed, and Minoru, having kept his word, entered Midgar Academy as an above-average, but not the top prospect of the Royal Midgar Magic Knight Academy's first years. As expected, Alexia picked him as her fake lover as in the viewing, since his talent was the only exciting thing about him- except he made her confess to him instead. After a week of dating, she uttered the Phrase of Knowing, as SG had dubbed it, and they were planning for the kidnapping. This time around, Alexia made it well-known that she was in love with him and that she would choose him as her partner if she had a choice, having resolved to announce her feelings despite her mounting embarrassment.
As such, when she was inevitably kidnapped, and he was arrested as a scapegoat, it actually cast suspicion on Zenon instead, since he was the most likely suitor prior to Minoru. As such, he was forced to let Minoru go 2 days early. Then was the ransom letter. After showing it to SG, he sent it directly to the king, which absolved him of all guilt. How did he manage that, you ask? He has SG members implanted in the castle at relatively important positions. In ALL countries. As such, when the knights tried their tactic, he killed them without any fanfare, and then he and SG commenced their attack without any fanfare.
Over the years, Shadow Garden (known jokingly among its members as Shadow's Garden, due to every single member having fallen for, and thus, regularly engaging in sexual relations with Shadow himself… he did have high endurance… which not even the Seven Shades combined could keep up with) had adopted a stealth approach, preferring silence wherever possible. This led to the Cult being even more fearful than in the original timeline, since they DIDN'T KNOW WHO THEIR ENEMY WAS!
It worked marvellously, with Alexia testifying that Zenon had kidnapped her, and had caused the explosion which Shadow unleashed with his nuclear magic. As such, the enemy was marked as country demolishers, and the Cult was scrambling to regain ground.
During the Selection tournament, Minoru ended up facing Rose in the semifinals instead of the first round. He also was less injured. As she'd been destined to join SG anyway, she uttered the Phrase of Knowing during the match, and met up in secret at Mitsugoshi to decide her course of action.
During Lutheran's hostage situation, as a result, she and Minoru combined to beat the invaders back for a bit, before deciding to split up, Rose leading the students as she should, and Minoru taking out guards and meeting up with Sherry early that day. Their meeting up was when Sherry uttered the Phrase herself, since her hatred for Lutheran was too great to suppress before that day. Though she had to be comforted due to all the emotions hitting her at once.
After enacting the original plan to return the students' magic to them, they went to Lutheran early, recording his confession to Sherry's mother's murder. This and his maddened rants painted him as the culprit again. Sherry presented the evidence, acting the part of a tearful adopted daughter learning of the betrayal. The recording was made possible due to modern tech from Minoru's origin world being reproduced by Eta (with even nobles using it to record silly moments). Again, the Cult was on the backfoot, since Lutheran still slashed him.
Now, Sherry had on the surface joined Mitsugoshi, heading to Laugus on a Mitsugoshi scholarship- but was now a SG R&D member. So it's clear, Nu had uttered the Phrase the moment she joined SG.
Flashback End
Two days later, that is to say, present time, as Rose kneeling before him and inviting him to Lindwurm while he was surrounded by his Seven Shades, Nu and Beatrix, he reflected on how his plans unfolded neatly. But that was before he saw the portal- a swirling black, purple, and red vortex forming in front of him. Knowing exactly who was calling him, he beckoned for everyone present to follow him.
As expected, he saw the familiar, unchanged visage of Seiichi Yotsuba. "Yo!" and his endearingly infuriating grin.
Minoru sighed, reverting to his school uniform, having equipped his slime clothing before. "Should I assume that you're going to be showing us more of our alternate selves, Seiichi?" He asked, Alpha looking around, since the void had changed since the last time they'd seen it…
"Yeah, figured you'd need further forewarning, since something crazy happened in that multiverse." Seiichi nodded. He still saw that breach as unbelievable, but revealed nothing in his countenance.
"Then would we be necessary?" Alpha, representing the Shades, Rose, Nu and Beatrix, asked. Zeta, no longer being ostracized, had opened up to everyone. This meant that she also had a small rivalry with Alpha.
"You and a few others. Tell Alexia later, but she won't join us for this session." he answered.
And then, as if from the shadows, appeared a tall male figure, covered in black coat with a small cloak around his midsection, with said coat having golden linings all over it. Minoru, Shades, Nu, Rose and Beatrix noticed that the costume looked like a much more practical (but less cool, in Minoru's opinion) suit of Shadow, bar one final difference - a metal mask, designed as a skull (which, Minoru thought, was cool). The figure then took off the mask and a hood, showing a face of a hardened warrior with black messy hair and blue eyes. The man looked at the company, before chuckling.
"Greetings, everyone. I had many names, but they no longer matter. Call me Advisor. Oh, and I chose this getup when my… partner told me about our audience."
There was a slight pause, before Rose asked cautiously "What do you mean, you had many names?"
"Simple" Advisor replied "I am very rarely present in my own body, and most of the time 'travel' with others. And yes, I did 'travel' with another alternate version of you" he pointed at Minoru "And it was glorious. Though, I did want to knock some sense into you." he groused a bit at the end.
"That won't be necessary" Minoru said, while others (besides hosts) chuckled "But tell me, did I achieve my dream with you?"
Advisor nodded, grinning like a maniac. Then he threw Minoru a book.
"Read it after our presentation, in your spare time. After all, you need More Power."
Then he turned to Seiichi. "Shall we, my dragonkin partner?"
"We most certainly shall, my astral partner. Though our audience is lacking." Seiichi replied.
"Ah, that's right, Them" hummed Advisor, before making a grabbing-and–pulling motion. "Come to Me." he said in booming voice.
Right! So sorry for the delay in this chapter. AceNeyros has graciously agreed to work with me for the much anticipated sequel. I'll leave it to him to introduce and talk about himself. Anyway, we'll get into the meat and potatoes next chapter, as well as introduce some of the newbies in the reaction cast. I will say that this sequel will include the movie (unless it's been cancelled)
Read and Review! Flames contribute to any scorched earth plans I may or may not cook!
Till then, Seiichi and Ace, along with their new brand of insanity, are off to the Races!
*static* Is this thing on? Oh, good. Anyway, AceNeyros here. And This, is my debut in fanfic writing! Many thanks to Seiichi for allowing me to participate.
Now, I have many flaws, shitty humour and references among them. But, I sincerely hope you'll enjoy this work.
*Editing Control Terminated*