At present, Ryosuke gains around 180–200 soul fragments every day.
After several months of saving, plus the rewards he occasionally got from taking action in between, the total number of soul fragments he could use came to more than seventy-six thousand.
If all of them were used on normal card draws, considering that the training cost to go from level 1 to level 5 is 7,400 soul fragments, that would be seven fully built five-star Stand substitutes, plus a number of four-star substitutes.
However, even though that's the case, Ryosuke had no intention of using his resources that way.
"At least fifty thousand soul fragments have to be kept."
It wasn't that Ryosuke had gotten used to being a hoarder, facing a major enemy soon yet still unwilling to spend what he had. This decision was based on two reasons.
First, most five-star Stand substitutes were honestly not very helpful to Ryosuke.
From a purely rational standpoint, even for the upcoming draw of Civil War, if it weren't for the sake of using it to revive White Snake, and because White Snake is extremely suitable for dealing with enemies like the Otsutsuki, who have incredibly strong defense and vitality, Ryosuke wouldn't have drawn Civil War at all.
Its limitations and flaws were too great.
Especially in actual use, it would take up a Stand slot, which would instead affect Ryosuke's effective damage output.
For example, take the same thirty seconds of high-frequency combat time.
"Using a six-star Stand for 20 seconds and a five-star Stand for 10 seconds" versus "using a five-star and a six-star Stand for 15 seconds each", the destructive power of the former would inevitably be greater than that of the latter.
Of course, no matter how small a mosquito is, it's still meat. Training a batch of five-star Stands and relying purely on their first-encounter kill effects to cause trouble for Momoshiki, Isshiki, and the like, then taking the chance to land a killing blow, was also a valid tactic.
The reason Ryosuke didn't do that was because of the second consideration, Fate Ink.
If the battle situation truly reached the final step, if even reviving Kaguya couldn't secure victory, or worse, as the Sage said, there was a 50% chance things would turn even more dire, then Ryosuke would have to use Amenominakanushi to search for the "pen."
As for the consequences of peering into fate, or attacks from the unknown… Ryosuke was willing to bear them.
The fifty thousand soul fragments he reserved were precisely for Fate Ink.
After all, no one knew whether using Fate Ink would require consuming soul fragments.
After consuming Fate Ink and pushing a Stand beyond its limits once more, it would definitely involve upgrading as well.
For example, going from level six to level seven.
If surpassing the limit caused a Stand to simply become an entirely new Stand, then going from level one to level seven would be an even larger expenditure of soul fragments.
Ryosuke didn't want to fight the enemy until the sky went dark and the earth turned over, both sides fighting to the death, only for him, after steeling himself and using Amenominakanushi, to fail in the end because he didn't have enough soul fragments.
Thinking of that outcome, Ryosuke shook his head.
"That would just be too ridiculous."
After reserving fifty thousand, he still had twenty-six thousand soul fragments he could use, which was already quite a lot.
"Then…"
"Let's draw."
The resonance speaker was placed on the ground, the cassette tape locked onto Civil War, and Ryosuke pressed the music playback button.
A rock-style track began to play, with classical symphonic elements interwoven in the middle. The overall style was dark and oppressive, yet also carried an indescribable sense of holiness.
Accompanied by the music, Ryosuke opened the system's card-draw interface.
Ten pulls… twenty pulls…
Forty… fifty pulls…
Ryosuke's heart was as calm as still water.
What does it mean to be a rich boss?
In a gacha game, Ryosuke was the equivalent of opening a banner and immediately dumping twenty 648 top-ups into it, letting the game feel his enthusiasm.
There was no suspense at all.
At one hundred and fifty pulls, his vision dimmed. Under the star-filled night sky, brilliant light burst forth. Ten stars fell, streaking across the horizon in dazzling arcs before landing in front of Ryosuke.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!
Accompanied by four crisp consecutive sounds, four stars appeared.
'Four-star?'
Ryosuke froze for half a second, then immediately reacted.
'Dual Stand.'
He chuckled softly.
'How nostalgic.'
It seemed that the very first ten-pull he ever did, when he drew Hermit Purple and Star Platinum, was also a dual Stand. He hadn't expected to encounter it again after so many years.
As he thought about it, the starlight condensed into a medieval full-plate knight holding a rapier.
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[Stand Name: Silver Chariot]
[Four-star]
[Owner: Jean Pierre Polnareff]
[Ability: Uses the twin-edged rapier in its hand to attack.]
[Current Level: Level 1]
[Note: One sword is enough.]
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An extremely simple introduction.
Unlike Weather Report's kind of simplicity, Silver Chariot's simplicity was because it truly was a purely blank Stand.
In the original work, Silver Chariot's strength came purely from Polnareff himself being strong.
However…
Ryosuke met the gaze of the eyes hidden within Silver Chariot's armor, smiled, and gave a slight nod. The other party planted the longsword upright in front of itself and bowed in salute.
Compared to the five-star Youthful Years, he still liked Silver Chariot more.
That headlong, unstoppable presence suited the two of them better.
After Silver Chariot dispersed, another streak of starlight flashed.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!
Five sounds.
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[Stand Name: Civil War]
[Five-star.]
[Owner: Axl]
[Ability: Summoning and transferring sins (described in detail earlier, so it will not be repeated here).]
[Current Level: Level 1]
[Note: Humans can only continue moving forward by discarding certain things, but once in a while, please also look back.]
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Finally, he drew it.
Ryosuke took a deep breath.
'Continue.'
Another 190 pulls were thrown in.
Stars fell once more.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding.
When the starlight faded, Ryosuke's expression... became strange.
"It's actually this Stand…"
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[Stand Name: Dragon's Dream]
[Five-star]
[Owner: Cult Leader: Kenzo]
[Ability: Possesses the ability to survey energy and seek fortune while avoiding misfortune. As long as one stands in a lucky position, they are immune to all attacks; when standing in an unlucky position, they will inevitably take damage.]
[The Stand itself will not take any damage and is absolutely neutral.]
[The Stand has self-awareness and will publicly disclose unlucky position information to both enemies and allies, even guiding enemies to avoid attacks.]
[No offensive capability, but touching the dragon head will trigger limb consumption and misfortune effects.]
[Note: None.]
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Dragon's Dream is a fate-type Stand that appears in Stone Ocean.
Generally speaking, fate-type Stands are extremely powerful, and Dragon's Dream is even more so, a direct manifestation of natural feng shui in reality.
The reason it was placed at five stars rather than six was precisely because, in an absolutely neutral manner, it leaks information to the enemy.
A purely two-faced Stand.
As long as the enemy reacts quickly and uses Dragon's Dream's information to seize the lucky position first, Dragon's Dream instead becomes the enemy's helper.
Ryosuke scratched his cheek.
Considering the speed and reaction ability of the Otsutsuki clan, he really couldn't think of any usage strategy for it in the short term.
He spent a bit over three thousand fragments in total and drew two five-stars and one four-star.
Then Ryosuke spent nearly twenty thousand more fragments to max them all out.
"More or less, that's it."
After reaching max level, Silver Chariot gained an armor-shedding acceleration ability.
Dragon's Dream became slightly faster at surveying fortune and misfortune. Of course, it also became faster at leaking information to the enemy.
As for Civil War, its domain range expanded slightly, to roughly a ten-meter radius centered on Ryosuke.
When summoning Ryosuke's own sins, it could also selectively choose which ones to summon.
That was good news.
Otherwise, every time he used Civil War, he'd have to put on the posture of a bloodthirsty demon king, which was really too over-the-top.
He closed the system interface.
Ryosuke controlled Civil War and summoned the sin he had "discarded."
White Snake appeared.
Ryosuke let out a sigh of relief.
"Hoo, long time no see, the damp air of Kirigakure Village."
White Snake put its hands on its hips, took a deep breath, and asked Ryosuke, "While I was gone, did you take down Mei Terumi? You two..."
It made a circle with its left hand, and its right index finger was about to poke inside when Ryosuke hurriedly slapped its hand away.
"No."
Ryosuke raised his hand to cut it off. "No one, save the gossip for later!"
He summoned Black Zetsu and handed it to White Snake.
"Check the memories in its head. What exactly is the method to revive Kaguya? So we can prepare Plan B in advance."
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