"OK, it's done! Everything went smoothly."
Captain Crystal stood up unsteadily, his form had drastically changed.
With Tierra's assistance and Crystal's own tolerance, the transformation had gone exceptionally well.
Although he still resembled a knight, the gems embedded in him had become much dimmer. Behind his armored body, red puppet strings twisted and coiled incessantly, like the wings of an angel.
[El Shaddoll Grysta]- meant to be a divine guardian angel.
That said, Tierra clearly hadn't put much thought into the name when she chose it, because "Grysta," embedded in the name, also implied a fallen angel. But, considering what happened later, it all made sense.
"Ooh! This form is gorgeous, see, Hikaru, I told you we should turn it into a FIRE Attribute!" Tierra beamed at Crystal's new appearance, gazing up and rambling nonstop.
"It's just a bit too big," Hikaru muttered, looking up.
To allow Crystal to bear more "pain and hatred," he had to be expanded and enlarged so he could adapt to the new power in a stable, gradual manner.
That said, it wasn't a problem for Crystal since he could still simulate his old form.
Though his true body had changed into another card, a Spirit could travel among the different cards tied to it, just like how Jaden's Avian looked like Avian, but was actually Great Tornado, and could still represent Avian via the card.
Previously, Crystal had used Gem-Knight Prismaura and Gem-Knight Zirconia.
Now, Hikaru even had a new Gem-Knight Citrine and Gem-Knight Master Diamond, although those two cards were still undergoing Pulverization Reconstruction and needed to be scaled down to usable size, there were plenty of "bodies" to occupy.
After flexing a little, Crystal turned into a beam of light and flowed into Hikaru's Deck before reappearing beside him, now clad in the armor of Prismaura.
This size still felt most natural.
Hikaru checked the time.
He turned to Fullmetal Alkahest and the Golden Idol, the two Spirits in his camp who represented the "academic" and "rational" factions. "I'll leave the rest of the awakenings to you two."
Entrusting the rest of the Spirit awakenings to them left him completely at ease.
"No problem, Master," Fullmetal Alkahest said confidently. "I got this!"
It had been studying Professor Banner's alchemy under Hikaru for a long time. Though not officially Banner's apprentice, it had completely adopted his system. The old Metalfoes-style alchemy was long forgotten.
With the peerless Alchemist's method to learn from, it was confident it could transmute gold!
Hikaru gave a helpless laugh at its gung-ho eagerness to experiment with its newfound knowledge on the Spirits.
At least it wasn't going to perform live transmutations.
The Golden Idol lightly patted its own body, assuring Hikaru that everything would be fine. Though often overlooked and constantly harassed by the Alkahest, that same harassment made it the best at managing Fullmetal.
"Uh...Lady Winda." Crystal wanted to stay behind to help awaken Gem-Knight Lapis, so he hoped Tierra would watch over Hikaru.
"Yeah, yeah, go take care of the little knight already. You think I can't handle myself?" Tierra cut him off before he could finish. "And you two swordsmen as well, stay put in the workshop. No wandering around, train properly, got it?"
The two swordsmen glanced at Hikaru. Even though they'd witnessed Tierra's divine might and many Spirits now more or less obeyed her, these two still only listened to Hikaru. Without his orders, even Tierra couldn't command them.
Hikaru nodded.
The swordsmen bowed to him. The Fire Swordsman chuckled, clapped Crystal on the shoulder, and together they headed off to the "training chamber", the core of the workshop, where the Philosopher's Stone was housed.
With everything arranged, Hikaru returned to the human world.
He stretched a bit, opened his phone, and checked whether anyone had contacted him during his day away.
Even though it was break time, people would occasionally reach out to Jaden, for example, might ask him to come play cards in the activity room.
Still, even having prepared himself, Hikaru was shocked by the sheer number of calls and voicemails.
'...What the hell?'
He'd only been gone a day.
Did something huge happen?
He first checked to make sure KaibaCorp hadn't tried to contact him, then moved on to the messages.
Chazz, Bastion, and Jaden had all left voicemails… What had happened?
He started listening.
"Oh!?" Tierra perked up after hearing one. "Sounds interesting, Hikaru."
Instead of replying, Hikaru quickly played the rest of the messages. Once he confirmed the general situation, he hurried to gather his things and ran off to the Fusion Club's activity room.
When he burst into the room, the noise startled everyone. After realizing it was Hikaru, scattered voices began to call out.
"Hikaru!"
"Yo, Hikaru!"
"Master."
"Hikaru, where were you yesterday?!" Chazz exclaimed, beckoning him over. "Come here, fast!"
"The humans of S-Dimension decided to initiate first contact with us? Seriously?" Hikaru blurted.
"Yeah, that's right." Chazz nodded excitedly. "It's a huge opportunity!"
So this was the "interesting thing" Tierra had mentioned.
Hikaru sat with his friends.
This was insider info from KaibaCorp, and right now, even Chazz didn't care about hoarding "exclusive intel" or worrying that, as Seto Kaiba's student, he shouldn't use KaibaCorp's influence.
If not now, then when?
According to KaibaCorp's internal updates, some officials from the S-Dimension had finally agreed to conduct a first contact with their world. It was a "trial" from S-Dimension, which had long distrusted parallel-world humans.
Previously, KaibaCorp's expedition team had accidentally entered the S-Dimension and were caught by its police. Ever since, diplomatic progress had stalled. Their world remained extremely wary.
Now, after more than six months, S-Dimension was finally attempting to ease tensions. And of course, the meeting would be conducted through Dueling.
"If this first exchange goes well, we'll be looking at a whole new frontier!" Chazz declared, calculating furiously.
For him, it was a perfect chance to outshine his brothers and gain prestige in the Princeton Group.
"So, how will the exchange work?" Hikaru asked curiously.
"Master decided to hold tournaments in different regions. According to S-Dimension's request, Duelists will be selected from different levels."
"So that means there's a student tier, right?!" Hikaru's eyes lit up.
"No need for you," Chazz grinned slyly.
"Huh?" Hikaru frowned.
"Your performance during the duel with that parallel dimension was so good, Master already preselected you, if you want in, you're in." Chazz couldn't help but laugh. "Absolute Fusionist, people have been calling you that online lately, especially since that duel with Rex Raptor got uploaded."
'Wow…' Hikaru lit up.
So this was the power of reputation!
'Feels great…'
....
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Bonus Chapter @150 Stones.
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