Chapter Two: The duality of a man
Location: Raizen Academy. Class 2 - 4
Dull, ordinary.
Yet that long, deliberate gaze somehow suited him.
That was Shidou's first impression of the new transfer student from the United States.
Not to mention,
That male student had an air of refinement that seemed almost artificial or rehearsed.
Perhaps he was thinking too much into it.
Not to seem like a weirdo in any way, but he was starting to get curious about Morgan.
Ringggg~
[2:00 P.M. - Afternoon JST]
Classes had ended.
Everyone had begun to fully circle, and the hustle and bustle of the transfer student episode was beginning to end.
Like that…
Soon enough, Morgan would just be another face among them.
But right now—
Shidou noticed something.
'...?'
He looked over to his side to find the male, Morgan, with a somewhat tense expression.
Rather than tense, it was clouded, as though he'd seen something that revolted him.
"Morgan-san?"
Shidou called out, prompting the male who was being called to blink into attention.
Instantly the male snapped his head towards Shidou.
"...yes?"
"Ah, you simply looked lost in thought so I thought I'd wake you up."
With those words, Shidou waved his hand as Morgan stared at the male for a moment before—
"Thank you very much, I was preoccupied with other thoughts."
After that,
He extended his hand towards his bag on the ground, in an action that seemed to reflect he was about to leave.
"Shidou~~! Get a look at this~! I finally managed to complete this event!"
"Yosha! Now I'm one step closer to reaching the true happy ending!"
A male with his dark hair sleeked to the back slid across the ground, stopping in front of Shidou's desk.
Said person had his phone screen pointed at Shidou's face as he laughed happily.
"Hahahaha!"
Hiroto Tonomachi.
Itsuka Shidou's best friend.
Naturally, Morgan knew about him a little due to prior knowledge of this world.
Curiously, he let his head slide to the back when he saw the UI and the character on the screen.
Before he could even restrain himself.
"...Doki-Doki Sister Series 12?"
Tonimachi and Shidou froze, slowly dragging their gaze to meet his.
Morgan also had a frozen expression with his mouth hanging open.
Certainly, he didn't think he'd spill them out like that, but before anything else.
"Y–you know about the DDS series?"
Seeing as he couldn't escape, Morgan sighed, resigning to the question.
"I don't simply know… I've played it all, including the DLC release for that version."
"There is a DLC release!?"
Tonomachi almost froze in shock; however, Morgan simply nodded.
Yes. Yes.
Suddenly waking in an unfamiliar world, stripped of everything once familiar, could trigger any number of reactions.
And his coping mechanism?
Research.
If this world was going to make him live in it, he might as well explore its genres, its culture, its… entertainment.
Unfortunately—
The animation here was abysmal.
Bootlegged Tokonasu knock-offs that somehow looked worse.
Not to mention the manga; oh, that was horrendous.
If Tokonasu was the peak of cringe in his old world, then the superhero comics here had managed to double it,
strapping jet engines to the cringe factor and blasting it into orbit.
Well, he wasn't complaining much.
At the very least, they served as entertainment. However, he didn't like them one bit.
… Thus, with the aim of research, he eventually went on and tried many genres, and as a result:
Below are the following of his deep research.
No Chinese Cultivation books.
Considering the Eurasian side of the world got blown into bits, he could understand.
And the loss of that led to the loss of a popular source material that would be called Manhwa.
Now, the only Chinese contents that were left were mostly folklores and stuff.
And even then, it didn't correlate much to his previous world's.
In short, everything led him, one way or the other, and he played this world's version of Doki-Doki.
Truly, a rabbit hole.
'...Crap.'
Morgan pinched the bridge of his nose, facepalming lightly.
"T–then, did you achieve the legendary ending!?"
Shidou looked equally curious, caught between disbelief and morbid fascination.
While, Morgan sighed, already regretting every life choice that led to this moment.
"You mean the harem route? Well… yes."
His expression turned weary as he said that, prompting Tonomachi to kneel on the ground.
As the male did, he was muttering something along the lines of "impossible, that's inhumane."
"Since all characters are a little bit over the top, achieving that ending is close to impossible."
'... a little bit over the top, he says.'
Morgan's lips slowly parted in exasperation. Those characters were damn yanderes!
But he had to give credit where it was due.
The entertainment industry here might have been crippled in a dozen ways…
But when it came to technology, this world was frighteningly ahead.
And when talking about that… this world's advanced Artificial Intelligence comes to mind.
DDS series and other subsequent games of its type are made using artificial intelligence.
Hence, there are broader choices and more content game devs could put out.
"No way. I actually lost to the transfer student."
Tonomachi kept on mumbling things along those lines as Morgan scratched the back of his head.
Shidou was now also looking at Morgan with that surprised 'I don't know what to say' expression.
"...what is it?"
"Aa—aa, nothing, I was just surprised, that's all."
Before Morgan could reply, Tonomachi suddenly lurched forward on all fours, practically crawling to his desk.
"Morgan-san—no, Sensei! Teach me your ways."
Sensei?
Both Shidou and Morgan tilted their heads in unison.
"Hey, that's over the top. Everyone's watching. Don't put some weird label on me."
Morgan's lips twitched before gripping his hold on the strap of his bag tightly.
"No, I shall not stand until you accept my apprenticeship, sensei!"
• "What's Tonomachi doing?"
• "And why is he calling Morgan-san, Sensei?"
• "That's so lame."
As Morgan thought, everyone, or at the very least, those that were still left, lingering in the classroom began to look over.
Slowly, whispers were beginning to form.
"Alright, alright, I'll share what I know, so stand the hell up."
He didn't want any weird talks going around just after the first day of school.
If he left like this, who knows what tales those classmates of his would spin.
And with his luck, they'd stick him on the infamous Fujoshi list alongside Tonomachi… just like they did with Shidou.
Yes, that actually happened.
'High-School girls can be scary you know.'
"Hahaha… you have it tough, Morgan-san."
Looking to the sides, he saw Shidou's expression shift into something… Wait, was that pity!?
Oh no. Oh no you don't. That is not pity. That is not allowed.
Morgan's lips twitched again, then curved upward into a too-smooth smile.
"Haah, thank you for your kind words."
With unjustified sass, Morgan replied. Yes, he does consider himself to be quite petty.
However, just when he did that,
Someone finally fell into his line of gaze.
Platinum hair that barely reaches her shoulders and a face like that of a doll.
There probably isn't anybody who would fit the description 'doll-like' better.
While noble like a precisely created artificial being, at the same time, her face did not contain any kind of emotion.
Tobiichi Origami.
'...right. AST and DEM, I haven't forgotten about those two either.'
'And, is it suspicious enough that my guardian words at a subsidiary of DEM industries?'
Morgan thinks not.
But for now,
"If you continue to crawl on the ground like a bug, then I have every right to ignore you."
"I'll stand up right away!"
Finishing that,
Screech~
The metal legs of his chair shrieked across the floor as Morgan stood, slipping his bag over one shoulder.
"Later."
With a lazy wave, Morgan walked out, sliding the sliding door open with a shhicck~
Down the hallway,
Morgan spotted a few student who went about. In a way, it was kinda early.
If he had to take a guess, there was probably club activities.
Were that to be the case then, he had one club in mind he wished to join.
Kendo club.
Naturally, he wasn't foolish enough to believe swinging a bamboo blade would close the gap against 'them'.
But doing nothing was worse.
Well, someone with pre-existing knowledge wouldn't just sit idle, would they?
Of course they wouldn't.
Hence, he did them. Martial arts and its ilk, he'd learned them all.
Thanks to that, he could boast of a flexible and disciplined body.
Yet, that can only get him so far.
Against superpowered girls, it was like throwing pebbles at a tank.
"Hah. This world is tough for males."
Itsuka Shidou aside, perhaps, that word might be true for every male. No… add Westcott to the mix too.
Honestly, though?
Morgan wasn't itching to jump headfirst into Shidou's future parade of chaos and spirit-hunting.
That road was crowded enough.
Additionally, he had no intention of becoming a background extra in someone else's harem drama.
… and, when he thought of it better.
He was okay with getting along with the so-called bad guys or at least do something remotely close to that.
"...Not a bad idea right?"
Morgan muttered more to himself half-jokingly as he walked down the stairs.
Spacequake.
That's what it's called.
An unprecedented phenomenon originally with the shifting of tectonic plates or something similar.
—It was called, Earthquake.
However, this term soon became something accompanied by a more, larger disaster, if one may say.
The first occurrence of such an unreasonable phenomenon was around thirty years ago.
Right smack in the middle of Eurasia.
A region that housed powerhouse countries such as the Soviet Union, China, and Mongolia, was wiped clean overnight.
Simply flipping through textbook photos of it was enough to make one's stomach turn.
It was as if everything above ground had been scraped off, leaving absolutely nothing behind.
Casualties numbered about 150 million.
It was the largest and deadliest catastrophe in human history.
However, …
That wasn't all.
In the subsequent months after that, similar incidents occurred on a smaller scale all around the world.
The exact number was around the barrier of fifty or even more than that.
On land, at the poles, in the ocean, even on small islands, such cases had been confirmed.
Naturally, Japan was not exempt.
Six months after the Eurasia Sky Disaster, the region from South Tokyo to Kanagawa Prefecture had turned into ruins.
Yes.
That's right that included the area that Morgan was living in today.
Tengu City.
And the beings behind this disaster…?
Spirits.
That's what they're called.