"What—Sylvia, Little Lynx, you two… are actually the Gatekeepers of this Showdown Paradise?"
Stelle's eyes went wide and round—shocked.jpg
"Damn it——!"
She suddenly pounded her fist into her palm and pointed at the two of them, shouting: "So you were lying in ambush for me here?!"
"Hahaha~"
Stelle's slightly clownish reaction drew peals of crisp, hearty laughter from Sylvia, who rested a hand on the shoulder of Lynx beside her, who was likewise unable to hold back a giggle.
"By the way, has this game already gotten this popular in Belobog?"
March 7th scratched her head in surprise.
"Yeah—after all, before the IPC's people came, no one in Belobog even knew what a video game was..."
She had to admit, this 'Aether Front' thing was really fun.
After the ice and snow melted, her identity as a polar explorer had become something of a misnomer.
The polar wilds were gone, the Fracture monsters had all become protected animals, and the danger factor of the wilderness had plummeted. Just as Lynx was pondering what she should do with herself, Aether Front came along!
It came striding toward Belobog with vigorous, youthful steps!
Little Lynx, who'd never touched a game before, was instantly hooked—she'd been grinding for days on end, not even sparing time to eat!
At first her sister kept nagging her not to fritter her life away on games and the like, but after Lynx dragged her sister into the rabbit hole too… our aspiration is to become Aether Spirit Masters!
Battle!
Aaah!!
"You two cleared the levels pretty fast~ As expected of the heroes who saved the world. But we won't go easy on you because of that!"
Sylvia declared, brimming with fighting spirit.
"This paradise is under our rule. Generally speaking, if the rookies say something nice, we'll let them earn their qualifying badge."
Lynx clenched her little fists, battle-lust blazing in her eyes.
"Facing the two of you, I can finally have a thoroughly satisfying Aether Spirit battle!"
"Oho, going for real now?"
Caelus flicked an Aether Coin lightly into the air with his thumb and caught it steadily again, a smile playing at the corner of his mouth:
"Lynx, don't say I'm bullying a little kid—how about… you send out all your Aether Spirits?"
Lynx knitted her brows slightly:
"Brother Caelus, don't look down on me! And besides, I'm not a kid anymore!"
"Sorry, Lynx, I'm not picking on you—Sylvia, same goes for you: go ahead and send out all of your Aether Spirits."
Caelus revealed a smile as sunny yet reserved as the eldest disciple of the Water-Breaking Style.
"Hmph hmph, big talk~"
Sylvia swept her slender, fair hand back with flair, her gorgeous golden hair tossing like a waterfall, carrying flamboyant confidence:
"The essence of every turn-based game is a numbers game! Open your eyes wide and watch—my precise calculations plus the power of 'Rock Surge'! ——Here we go, Lynx!"
Her gaze suddenly sharpened like a falcon locking onto its prey, her fingertips seeming to pluck a battle-note on invisible strings.
"Sis, our opponents are the heroes who saved the world. Can we win?"
"We'll win!"
Sylvia made her own declaration of victory!
"Ooh!"
Lynx and her sister exchanged glances, a tacit understanding forming of its own accord.
Sylvia deftly flipped her wrist, and an Aether Coin shimmering with blue-gold luster was already clamped between her slender fingers.
Her thumb snapped out with sudden force, and the coin shot straight up into the air, spinning with a dazzling trail like a tiny ignited comet.
At the instant it reached its apex, Sylvia spread her five fingers, palm facing up; an invisible force tugged at it with precision, and her arm swung down sharply like strumming an electric guitar!
"Take the stage, my rock band!"
Vmmm——!
The coin burst out with an intense glow that crackled with electric currents; deafening drumbeats and a stirring guitar riff exploded, and a team of Aether Spirits wreathed in arcs of energy made their entrance amid surging sound waves!
Not humanoid, but a wriggling pink mystery-creature.
Pink and soft, looking just like a slime, yet—amazingly—it sported a single ahoge cowlick, and tied beside the cowlick was a cute pair of square hair ornaments, one yellow and one blue.
"Wow, what a cute Aether Spirit—what is that?"
March 7th, whose resistance to cute creatures was a negative number, had her eyes light up.
"This is an Overlord-class Aether Spirit I caught on another planet. Her name is Bocchi-chan."
With the game tournament giving her a chance to leave Jarilo-VI for the great beyond, how could Sylvia let it slip by?
You could say that even plenty of elderly folk with no interest in games would register as Aether Front players just for the chance to travel to other planets and broaden their horizons.
Its prototype was an extremely shy and gloomy wondrous creature that loved the guitar and would manifest different forms with different abilities depending on external stimuli.
In Sylvia's team, besides the guitarist Bocchi-chan, there was also an angel-like drummer, a bassist whose face was triangular like in some ancient animation, and so on.
Lynx calmly drew an ice-blue Aether Coin from the card case at her waist and gripped it tightly in her palm.
She drew a deep breath, as if to pour all her strength into it, then gave a low shout:
"Answer me, Guardians of the Polar Wilds!"
Her arm swung out and she hurled the coin forward in a textbook throwing stance; it landed without a sound, and the moment it touched the ground, it burst into bloom.
Amid rapidly expanding rings of deep-blue light, pure as a polar glacier, several Aether Spirits formed of crystalline ice shards and radiating bitter cold quietly emerged from the drifting ice mist.
"Deep Cold Wanderer! Outer Cosmos Flame! Outer Cosmos Ice!"
In truth, Lynx had wanted to use Aether Spirits captured from other planets too.
But this was, after all, Belobog's home turf, and as a Gatekeeper it was more fitting for her to use Aether Spirits with local character.
In an instant, the arena was split between two utterly different forces: on one side, a scorching, clamorous rock storm crackling with electricity; on the other, a silent, frigid polar domain glittering with ice crystals.
Between the two of them, there were seven Aether Spirits in all, an all-Overlord-class lineup, enough to crush any roster underfoot.
Sylvia grabbed her guitar and plucked the strings; threads of electricity raced along the strings beneath her slender fingers as she proclaimed loudly:
"Bocchi-chan, raise the curtain!"
"Let's get the world hyped!"
This was Sylvia's method of raising her Aether Spirits and deepening their bond—she would perform together with them every single time.
The pink mystery-creature slung the guitar over its shoulder, a rabid glint in its eyes, howling at the moon and sneering at the sun, its body swelling from a normal slime's size to three or four meters.
Vmm-vmm——!
A fierce, rapid guitar sound rang out; a sense of rhythm pierced the ears in an instant, seizing hold of everyone's heartbeat.
"Very good!"
The frenzied air currents whipped up the hem of Caelus's black coat with a flapping snap; he lifted his chin slightly, his expression lofty and aloof.
"[Aberrant] type, then. In that case, my side will use a [Humanoid] Aether Spirit to counter."
"?"
March 7th threw out a question mark.
The type-effectiveness relationship she'd only just confirmed—[Humanoid] is countered by [Aberrant]!
You're going against the matchup!
Before she could even warn Caelus, she heard him chant sternly:
"Who reigns at the summit of Aether Front? One glimpse of Caelus, and all paths turn to naught!"
His hands, tucked in his pockets, suddenly shot out, each palm gripping an Aether Coin swirling with strange starlight.
He didn't toss them the way an ordinary person would—instead, he pressed the faces of the two coins together with perfect precision!
Vmmm——!
A pure-white beam piercing heaven and earth blazed blindingly bright, instantly drowning out the golden lightning of Sylvia's rock band and the icy-blue chill of Lynx.
"What?!"
The flamboyant confidence on Sylvia's face froze in an instant.
"..."
Lynx was completely stupefied too.
Her cherry lips parted slightly, her eyes bulging like brass bells, as she just stared blankly at that ever-growing mass of light, swelling to over forty meters.
The silhouette of a heaven-spanning giant rose up from the center of the light; red lines flowed like lava across its massive silver-white body, and its kindly eye-lamps, like two stars, gazed down at the tiny arena below and… the even tinier opponents.
And then...
Boom!
Accompanied by a muffled roar like the earth tearing apart, the Overlord-class Aberrant Aether Spirit, the pink mystery-creature Bocchi-chan, really did get mashed into paste—truly living up to the 'chan' in her name.
As the rock-band array unfolded, the guitarist's position was replaced by a giant fist, silver-white arcs of thunder leaping across its arm.
The colossal Aether Spirit merely stood there, and the vast shadow it cast was enough to completely engulf Sylvia's rock fighting-spirits and Lynx's ice-crystal guardians, exuding a merciful divinity and a heavy, crushing pressure.
Sylvia's carefully styled golden hair was blown into utter disarray by the turbulent energy currents; she gazed up at that red giant like a mythical colossus—it was just like Komon's first encounter with Nexus, the scene of Brother Junis wiping out a Space Beast with a single punch.
The guitar in her hands clattered to the ground; on Sylvia's face there remained only utter bewilderment and horror:
"Are you… are you kidding me... Wh-what is that thing?!"
Caelus, his expression solemn and dead serious, introduced it: "This is my Humanoid Aether Spirit——"
"Ultraman Ace!?"
The name was blurted out by Little March, her expression like she'd seen a living ghost.
March 7th badly wanted to grab Caelus by the collar and shake him like crazy.
You're freaking using an Ultraman to fight in an Aether Spirit tournament?!
Humanoid—is your family's idea of "humanoid" over forty meters tall?!
No wonder, when she'd asked Stelle and Caelus what Aether Spirit Bronita had made for them, the two of them had been all mysterious about it, saying they'd give her a surprise when the time came.
Was this a surprise?
This was straight-up cheating, okay?!
Lynx, even more so, instinctively took a step back, her little face pale as a sheet, that giant red figure mirrored in her ice-blue pupils, with only a single thought buzzing in her mind.
Cheating!
Referee!
I'm reporting this!
I'm reporting it, daaang it!
Someone here is cheating!
"Lynx, don't panic just yet—it might be an empty illusion, all show and no substance."
Sylvia's voice carried a faint, barely perceptible tremor, yet her tone was resolute and decisive.
As a battle-hardened Aether Spirit trainer, she knew full well that to panic now was to concede defeat—composure was the key to victory.
"Rock Surge, don't let it intimidate you! Use the combo skill—Belobog's Strongest Sound!"
The band's three remaining Aether Spirits all struck up their music, answering their master's resolve; countless materialized musical notes drifted forth like a rainstorm falling upward into the heavens, assailing the heaven-spanning red giant.
"Got it, sis!"
Lynx drew a deep breath, the panic on her little face instantly replaced by resolve:
"Outer Cosmos Ice, draw upon the frost crystals; Outer Cosmos Flame, draw upon the flame essence!"
"Eternal Winter Rain!"
The temperature around Outer Cosmos Ice plunged in an instant; countless sharp ice shards condensed in the air like inverted swords, and as its twin wings beat once, they transformed into a storm of ice-crystal rain laden with bitter freezing air, hurtling toward Ultraman Ace and blotting out the sky!
"Pure Flame Rain!"
Outer Cosmos Flame's whole body erupted with surging flames, scorching tongues of fire licking the air; countless basin-sized crimson fireballs, like a meteoric rain of fire, raced side by side with the ice-crystal storm, roaring toward the same target with an aura that would burn all things to ash!
"Combination Ultimate · Ice-Crystal Roaring Blaze!"
The ice crystals were wrapped in flame, the flames coated in frost, forming countless streaks of red-and-blue twin-colored fire-and-ice rain.
"Ultra Defense."
Caelus merely raised his eyelids a fraction, not even bothering to pull his hands out of his pockets.
Ultraman Ace struck the classic Ultraman pose, thrusting out its pecs.
Boooom——!!!
The two-colored ice-and-fire energy barrage slammed into Ace's chest; when the light and smoke cleared a little, Sylvia and Lynx were utterly dumbstruck where they stood.
No telling how much HP it lost...
In any case, the silver-and-red giant still stood towering and unmoved.
This… how are we supposed to fight this?!
Sylvia and Lynx were thrown into total disarray.
"Sylvia, I think that line of yours was spot-on—the essence of every turn-based game is a numbers game."
Caelus folded his arms across his chest: "Your attack's over, right? Now it's our turn—no objections?"
"Ace, Multi-Guillotine!"
Incomparably sharp energy blades—wherever they passed, space let out an overburdened shriek.
Outer Cosmos Ice and Flame, and the Abyssal Wanderer, were dismembered before the dimming eyes of the sisterly duo.
"As long as any creature you've seen can be made into an Aether Spirit, then it's perfectly reasonable for me to bring an Ultraman to the Honkémon Championship, right?"
Facing the two stunned girls, Caelus said as much.
____
________________________________________
If you want more chapters, please consider supporting my page on (P). with 50 advanced chapters available on (P)
👻 Join the crew by searching Leanzin on (P). You know the spot! 😉