Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Earth 2015

A door opens.

Its old, rusty hinges groaning in protest. A hand emerges from the opening and hovers over the wall to its left. The dim light spilling out from behind could barely illuminate the dark room, so the hand struggled to find the light switch for a moment.

With a soft click, the room was flooded by a bright white light.

A young man stepped into the room, wearing a t-shirt with the slightly faded image of Madara Uchiha from the Naruto manga, staring at the viewer with an awakened Rinnegan. His monochrome shirt was complimented by a set of plain blue shorts and black flip-flops

If his Japanese parents saw him now, they would have scolded him for wearing footwear inside the house, but Ritsuka Fujimaru stopped caring about such things some time ago. After graduating early from high school and attending university, he was now seen as a fully fledged adult by the US government. So he could do what he wants, especially since he wasn't living in his parent's clean, 2-story house anymore.

No. He lived by himself in a run-down suburban home in California. He wore flip-flops because he was wary of stepping on any pests that had invaded his home.

Some of you may be wondering how a university student in his late teens is able to afford a home in one of the most expensive states in America. And the boring answer is, he can't.

He was no homeowner, just a simple renter who pays below the market rate because his parents owned the place. Even so, his parents did not believe in "handouts" and were charging him rent as he attended university.

From what his dad told him, this house was one of the assets his great-grandparents had owned and passed down to them. It was, by some miracle, not seized by the government during World War 2 because of the compassion and kindness of their next door neighbor who bought the home before it was taken and returning it to them after they were released from the internment camps.

It was a neat little house, and despite the cracked paint and old home smell, it was perfect for him.

He walked towards his high-end gaming computer and pressed the power button, the soft hum of cooling fans and the strange computer noises he could not describe displaced the silence of the room.

Compared to the shabby foldable chair and the folded-up futon near his wall, it stuck out like a sore thumb as the most expensive thing in that room.

Ritsuka didn't mind it much, as this was still his room. Slipping his turtle beach headset over his spiky black hair, he turned on his monitor and got to work.

After logging in he was greeted by his desktop background, an image of skull kid from The Legend of Zelda wearing Majora's Mask in a dark forest, followed by their trusty fairy companion. He took a moment to appreciate the art before opening the necessary programs that he needed to start his livestream.

Oh yeah, he was a Twitch streamer; did he forget to mention that?

Ritsuka opened his account and went live, and his animated pre-stream title card showed up. It depicted him in chibi form, marching in place as three dots followed behind him in a rhythmic jumping pattern. It was a far cry from the simple PNG he had commissioned from an artist years ago. He barely had the money to afford anything this nice back in the day, but thanks to various unique circumstances, he was finally able to upgrade his stream.

As soon as the title card dropped, hundreds of people joined the stream. Many of them already having conversations while waiting for him to start. Unfortunately for them, he still had some things to take care of before he could do so. Putting on his usual gaming headphones, Ritsuka did his pre-stream sound and visual tests. He also opened some necessary tabs on his browser that he would need, just in case he needed to do a quick google search.

After a few minutes of making sure everything was perfect, he nodded in satisfaction to himself before dismissing his title screen.

"Hey everyone! Welcome back to my stream! Hope you guys had a great day today!" It was a rather mundane and stereotypical intro for his streams, but it was too hard to come up with anything original that stood out amidst the thousands of his competitors on the platform. However, despite his rather average and dull intro, his chat, on the other hand, was anything but. In fact, despite the single brain cell they share at times, they were more special than the average Twitch chat.

And he didn't mean it in the mean way.

[ Gible_Archeologist: Hi Gudao!! |˶˙ᵕ˙ )ﾉﾞ ]

[ Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): Helloooo!!! My day was great. ♡ ]

[ PerfectlySaneHex: Bonjour Gudao! My day is going great so far now that you're here~ ( ˘ ³˘)♥︎ ]

[ PsychicMoostache(MOD): What's on the agenda tonight, Gudao? ]

[ KicksYouIntheFace193: Wanna Smash? ]

[ MalasadaMayhem: @KicksYouIntheFace193: ayo? ]

Ritsuka, or rather, Gudao as his Twitch username was called, rolled his eyes at one of his many regulars. "Kicks, I just got here. Can you at least wait 5 minutes before you start asking me to play Super Smash Bros?"

[ KicksYouIntheFace193: If you wish to surpass me, you will have to work hard everyday to avoid getting rusty. ]

Ritsuka sighed, while he was proficient at playing Super Smash Bros, he was nowhere near competitive levels. Sure, he tried getting into the meta, but he always got his ass handed to him on a silver platter whenever he attended the nearby local events. Chat poked fun at him for it, well, everyone but Kicks, who seemed to be uncaring of his lack of skill and encouraged him to keep playing. In fact, Kicks is considered one of the top players of Smash where she is from, and she took it upon herself to declare him his pupil.

It has even gotten to a point where they have become annoyingly insistent on him playing Smash at the start, in the middle, and at the end of the stream. It was as if Kicks lived, breathed and ate Smash. The only reason they didn't get banned was because aside from Smash, she actually had a solid understanding of Kinesiology and had helped him plan an effective workout routine and balanced diet he could follow to get in shape. That, and they were also one of the few who actively donated large sums of money to his streams.

"Kicks, even if I somehow get better at the game, there's no way you and I will play together one day. Different universes remember?"

If anyone else outside his Twitch chat had heard him say this, they'd think he was crazy. But he was not lying, nor was he crazy. His chat is from another world, a world that Earth is intimately aware of but only as fiction.

[ KicksYouIntheFace193: That's quitter talk. It's true we can't play now, but one day, I believe that the mysterious force that connected our worlds will connect us completely someday. And when it does, my Machamp and I will be ready for you. ]

Fat chance of that happening. It's been three years and so far, everything in his stream has remained more or less the same as it has been since that fateful day happened. "No, I'm not playing Super Smash tonight. I was thinking, it's been 3 years since the first time we met, and so I thought it would be nice if we would go back to our channel's roots and play some Minecraft."

Chat was excited to hear that piece of news. Ritsuka hadn't played minecraft in over a year, not since the lava chimney incident. Seeing their enthusiasm only added to his own, and he opened the minecraft launcher. It was completely different from how he remembered it, but that was to be expected given how long had passed since he last played the game.

He pressed the play button. The nostalgic menu of Minecraft appeared on his screen. After taking a second to admire the menu, he came up with a generic name for his new world and jumped right in.

"Ooh, a Jungle Biome. Lucky!" Jungle biomes were his second favorite spawn point, next to the snowy slopes biome. Sure, it took a lot of work to terraform the sprawling wilderness, but, it was always satisfying to tame a wild area and drag it into civilization.

And so, Ritsuka got to work. He talked as he worked, engaged in conversations with his chat about small things. About his day and about his plans for his base. He landed in a jungle, therefore he was doing some forest clearing to make some room for a home. The sounds of trees being chopped and grass blocks breaking put him in a nostalgic mood, and looking at his chat scroll made his mind wander.

Three years is not a long time, but with how eventful it was, it felt like it was ages ago. He vividly remembers the day when his life changed. Back then, he was not doing so well in terms of views due to the fact he was a male streamer. As everyone knows, if you aren't a female streamer, you are going to have a harder time drawing in, keeping and growing your audience.

He was aware he'd never become the next Pewdiepie or Markiplier, but he was happy with the handful of 11 people he had watching his streams.

Then one fateful day, his viewership of eleven people abruptly dropped to zero.

Seeing his audience just metaphorically stand up and leave during the middle of his stream hurt, a lot. Even the most unpopular people on Twitch had at least someone watching them.

But at that moment, he had no one. He wanted to believe his chat just got accidentally kicked off due to some Twitch glitch, that somehow the people who he had been growing close to were still there. Unfortunately, after an hour of streaming and restarting the stream once or twice, he finally came to accept reality. They had abandoned him.

It was one of the darker times of his life, seeing people just give up on him. What was the point of playing for an audience if no one wanted to watch him?

Ritsuka had decided at that moment to call it quits; however, just as he was about to end the stream, he saw the zero turn into a one.

At first, he thought it was a returning viewer, but in truth it was actually a new one.

Electrical★Streamer_Iono

Out of the pit of despair, she had brought him back from the brink of ending his streaming career early with a single question.

"What'cha playing?" Was what she said. Which was weird since it was Minecraft. Everyone knew what minecraft was due to its popularity, but it would seem there were still people like Iono who had no idea what it was.

Not wanting to lose this viewer either, Ritsuka held his tongue and informed her about it. Somehow, someway, she saw something in him and she stuck around. And from there, he decided to continue his streams, even for just a bit, even if his audience consisted of only one person. As time passed, more and more people started to show up again. More than had ever attended his stream before. All of them were just as clueless about minecraft as Iono was. Well, used to, now it seems they think they are better at playing the game than he does, even when they haven't even played it themselves.

Ritsuka emptied his full inventory inside his chest. Seeing that he had harvested enough stacks of wood to build his home, he stepped outside his small cobblestone mini bunker, and he sealed the room with dirt blocks.

Now it was time to speed up his deforestation efforts.

He selected the flint and steel he had crafted earlier. Then he carefully lit strategic areas around him on fire. The small blocks of fire quickly engulfed the surrounding forest, creating a massive wall of flames that destroyed every wood, vine and leaf block it could latch itself onto. Looking at his handiwork, he smiled in satisfaction.

[ Fyre&Flamez: YES!!! BURN BABY BUUUURN!!! ৻(  •̀ ᗜ •́  ৻) ]

[ Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): there he goes again, Mean looking us with that signature trademark Gudao smile while he commits warcrimez. ]

[ Ranger75: a destructive but practical way to clear land. I would have arrested you if you did this anywhere near my jurisdiction, Gudao. That is, if the local alpha pokemon didn't get to you first. ]

[SeeDotbyTheSea: Wow, Gudao actually learned from the last time he played with fire. ]

[ Ranger75: Well, cobblestone is fireproof, so good luck trying to burn THAT box down. ]

[ Fyre&Flamez: IS THAT A CHALLENGE?!!  ]

[ PsychicMoostache(MOD): even the smallest embers can become raging infernos. Take heed of this psychotic display of arson you budding fire type trainers. Do not mimic what our beloved streamer is doing in game. ]

[ The-Undefeatable: I'm ashamed to admit, I had a few close calls with my charizard when he was first a charmander. Thankfully it never got anywhere near this bad. Lol. ]

Ritsuka shook his head at his chat's banter. Even after all this time, he occasionally still had a hard time believing that his chat was not trolling him. At first, he thought his new chatters just loved Pokémon so much that they all collectively role-played, or RP, as people who lived in a Pokémon world.

Iono herself proclaimed that she was a fellow streamer and an electric type gym leader of some OC region called Paldea. He, of course, didn't break the immersion because she was nice enough to bring her own followers into his stream. If he was not as desperate for viewers as he was back then, he would have told them to cut it out, but he was starved for an audience, so he played along.

Besides, he didn't see any harm. He loved Pokémon, and they were not being freaks about it, so he let them have their fun. And it went great for the first few weeks.

But all good things come to an end.

One day, he decided to have a surprise stream for his Pokémon role players and played the game Pokémon White version on stream. He could have chosen any other Pokémon game, like the original Red, Blue or Yellow, but at the time, Pokémon Black 2 and White 2 were just around the corner, and he thought it would be fitting if he played the original BW before he bought and played the sequels. As he played the game, his viewership spiked from 100 to 1000. And it kept growing.

Though, his audience was not growing due to the reasons he had hoped for. After he got past the first gym, without warning, his chat suddenly turned on him when someone who claimed to be the female game protagonist, showed up in his chat. Soon, more chatters claiming they were characters from the game started jumping in, and they were making demands of him. Demands to know who he was and why he was playing a game about their lives. The meta role-play was fun at first, but that train of thought quickly derailed when they started to throw personal jabs at him and his stream.

But the straw that broke the camel's back was when the chatter who claimed to be the protagonist threatened to report his channel and sue him if he didn't stop playing the game. He could have done as they asked and quit stream right then and there, but that would be submitting to their ridiculous demands. Despite how much he had loved his new audience, he also wasn't a wet noodle who let people walk over him. So he just decided to break their immersion, by just stating facts. That Pokémon were not real, and that they should know when to stop pretending and harassing people on the internet for the sake of their own fantasies.

Looking back on it, his actions could have easily gotten him in actual danger. He was basically one guy fighting against thousands of what he thought were delusional people at the time, but the increasing viewer count and the abuse thrown his way just got him worked up. He never noticed anything was off until he logged onto his Twitter account and taunted his chat to try and unload their grievances there. With the amount of viewers logged onto his stream, he had aimed to start a shitstorm that would grow to such epic proportions that it would very likely reach a popular drama channel. Then they could shame these people for what they were doing to him.

That had been the plan, except, no one could access his Twitter account, his other social media accounts, or the websites like Bulbapedia, even when they entered the URLs manually.

This revelation only made the idea of his chat being bots even less likely, given that technology wasn't advanced enough to allow a bot to hold intelligent conversations like he had been doing with them the past few weeks.

The situation was a giant mess, but by the end of it, he and chat came to an understanding. Pokémon were real, and so were the people from the Pokémon games, yet at the same time, Pokémon were also fictional, but only in his world.

They all hypothesized that some higher power had connected their worlds using Twitch as a medium. Now, he serves as the sole representative of Earth to a parallel earth that he once thought was fiction. Which is a crazy sentence to say.

After everyone had time to calm down, apologies were exchanged both from himself and from chat and things just miraculously started to go back to normal. His audience was surprisingly forgiving, to his shock, even the people who he had "doxxed" had stayed behind as regulars.

That only made the knots of guilt twist tighter in his gut.

Now that he knew the Pokémon world was real, he had vowed never to play any mainline Pokémon games on stream from then on, out of respect for the privacy of people in his chat. He still played every new Pokémon game in his own time, and he still shared his opinions of said Pokémon, alongside the music from the games and the spinoffs. Despite the rough start, they mended their scars and became his precious community.

People from the world of Pokémon even went as far as to volunteer to create and maintain social media sites for him on their world and moderate his chat. One of them being Iono, the person who started kicked off this massive clusterfuck.

Since then, he tried his best to diversify his stream away from just games and occasionally did "Earth Tour" streams where he went on trips to the park, the nearby woods or zoo to show off the local animals.

Chat loved those streams the most due to seeing so many exotic creatures, and his audience only continued to skyrocket.

Unfortunately, he doesn't make a single cent from this stream since the bits transfers and subs seem to have stopped working properly for some reason.

By the grace of whatever made this connection between worlds happen, the subs, bits and donations were not in vain. They still converted into something called "Stream points," which were being displayed as a bar at the bottom of the screen at all times. Every time his channel reached a threshold of stream points, they would gain random custom emotes, art, or music for his streams.

Ritsuka was curious and contacted Twitch on his side to ask about a possible hack on his channel, but they could not identify anything off about his connection. Twitch on Pokémon's side; however, had noticed his stream's anomaly. Thankfully, they decided to let him keep his channel since he technically hadn't broken any rules. Whatever hijacked the connection to his chat was something beyond their power. The fact he had not broken TOS, minus the accidental doxxing, was a plus in his favor.

In any case, it was a rather neat time and money saving feature because he didn't have to look for artists to do commissions for him nor pay any money for it, so he chose not to look the gift horse in the mouth and question it.

Alas, this streaming career is just a hobby. Aside from his IRL tours, gaming, watch-a-longs, and Biology Book Flipping ASMR streams, his channel was mostly just so he and his community could hang out and have fun. But fun doesn't help pay the bills, so he had to look for a job.

[ Ranger75: So how goes the job hunt? ]

Ritsuka deflated a bit. "Not too good, I'm afraid. A lot of jobs are asking for way too much nowadays." Not having a college degree on top of lacking experience was also a big factor.

[ Ranger75: That sucks. (◞‸◟,) ]

"Yeah, I'm getting rather desperate, too. I even applied to this flyer I found pinned on a wooden electrical post on the way home the other day."

[ PsychicMoostache(MOD): And pray tell, what is it about? ]

Ritsuka furrowed his brows, "Dunno. It didn't specify, but the listed pay was amazing and required no experience to join. The name of the employer was listed as: 'Chaldea Security Organization.'"

[ PsychicMoostache(MOD): Gudao, it pains me to say this. Despite your current efforts to improve your bulk, your body type and lifestyle would still hinder your ability to effectively work as a bodyguard. ]

[ Ranger75: :Nodding pikachu emote: ]

[ Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): :Nodding pikachu emote: ]

[ MalasadaMayhem: :Nodding pikachu emote: ]

He crossed his arms and gave a dry response to his chat's bluntness, "Wow. Thanks for your vote of confidence chat."

[ PerfectlySaneHex: Don't worry Gudao, skinny, fat, or muscular, you'll ALWAYS be my type~ ♡ ]

[ Junior_Researcher: @PerfectlySaneHex geez, thirsty much? ]

[ PerfectlySaneHex: Like a Vaporeon stranded in Haina Desert at noon. And proud of it! (˘ ˘ ˘) ]

<message deleted by moderator>

[ PerfectlySaneHex has been timed out for 20 seconds. ]

[ Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): (ꐦㅍ _ㅍ) Hex. You know the rules. Vaporeon is sacred. Do not taint the blue with white!! ]

[Junior_Researcher: ( ô ‸ ō )....????? Do I even want to know? ]

[ Ecruteak_Gal: No. You don't… (⊙ _ ⊙ ) ]

Ritsuka chuckled nervously when he saw PerfectlySaneHex got timed out, again. Hex was infamous for being the thirstiest chatter in his community. She was so dedicated to him that she actually founded his official fan club, which now has thousands of members. Or so people tell him, considering the fact he couldn't access their internet either.

It was a bit off-putting at first to have someone obsess over you as much as Hex did, but he had gotten used to it by this point.

Of course, there were limits; he still had rules for the sake of decency. Despite how dedicated she was to him, that didn't make her immune from the hammer of the mods when she did cross a line.

[ Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): @Junior_Researcher Bonjour! Hi hi and Alola! Welcome new guy! That is Hex, our local SIMP. Please do not feed her; she will bite anyone and everyone who isn't named Gudao. ]

[ PerfectlySaneHex has rejoined chat ]

[ PerfectlySaneHex: @Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD) yup yup! :animatedLickyLicky emote: :GudaoHoldingHeart emote: ]

[ Ranger75: Don't pay her any mind. You get used to her… eccentricities after a while. ]

[ Junior_Researcher: I came here because I wanted to see exotic species of Pokémon from another world, not thirty hoes going gaga over an average-looking streamer on the internet. (¬_¬) ]

[ Junior_Researcher: *thirsty ]

[ GudakoBot: Gudao's world does not have pokemon. Only boring, mundane animals without magical powers. They are still cool to observe however, so do not let this discourage you from enjoying stream. ]

[ KicksYouIntheFace193: @Junior_Researcher Nerd. ]

[SeeDotbyTheSea: bro, what world are you from? That's like, the entire point of the internet. ]

[ PerfectlySaneHex: @Junior_Researcher How dare you! Gudao is not average, he is perfection! ( ｡ •̀ ᴖ •́ ｡) ]

[ Junior_Researcher: @PerfectlySaneHex yeah, perfectly average. ]

[ PerfectlySaneHex: *gasp* you take that back!! ( ◺˰◿ ) ]

[ Gible_Archeologist: Well, I'm glad to hear you are trying to be a responsible member of society. It's a shame we can't help you financially due to the whole isekai situation. :sadPikachu emote: ]

"Guys, it's fine. You don't have to feel responsible for my financial situation. It is what it is." He tried not to bring it up on stream. He didn't want to come off as needy; he just wanted to have fun. So what if his streams didn't make revenue? He can always find other ways to pay his bills.

He decided to try and change the Chat's attention back to the game.

The once lush and dense forest was now a small grassy green hill.

The fires he set had eaten through a large area of land. Enough that he had room to build a medium-sized mansion.

"Looks like we made a good enough clearing. Now we can move out of our cobble box and make ourselves a proper home." Ritsuka selected his shovel and continued to terraform the area. After cleaning up a decent plot of land, he started to build his house.

Suddenly, a sharp knock on wood caused him to flinch in surprise. His headphones became crooked, exposing his ears to the outside world. Almost as if by fate, Minecraft decided to play one of its random, unsettling sounds at the worst time.

Another knock, this time much more audible than the last. Ritsuka furrowed his brows before glancing at his clock, his eyes widened in disbelief and indignation. Who could have the audacity to knock on someone's front door at 12 AM?!

Another knock, this time much clearer than the last.

Ritsuka was considering ignoring the person, but curiosity beat his annoyance. With a sigh, he decided to stand up and check whoever was at the door, despite his chat's protests. Unbeknownst to him, as soon as he got up to make his exit, the camera on stream did not stay fixed in his room.

It started to follow him.

[ JigglyWiggly: What the heck? ]

[ MalasadaMayhem: Spooky… ]

[ GroundHippowdon: Holy crap! Gudao got a floating camera and didn't tell us?!! ]

[SeeDotbyTheSea: I thought Gudao broke his GoPro camera???? ]

[ Gible_Archeologist: He did. That's why he's been working hard to find a job recently . ]

[ Ranger75: Oh SHIT. The stream's resolution just jumped to 4K at 60 fps?!!!! ]

[ GroundHippowdon: Nice. I've never seen such a clean, high quality stream before. Look, you can even see that tiny brown, hairless Joltik crawling across Gidao's carpet!! ]

[ Gible_Archeologist: iirc, Gudao called that bug a cockroach. Its a pest who eats his food and spreads disease. ]

[ GroundHippowdon: oh… ugh. (·•᷄‎ࡇ•᷅ ) well, at least he doesn't have to worry about a joltik infestation. Those are THE WORST . ]

[ Ranger75: What the... I can't switch back to 144p. Resolution is still 4k. ]

[ Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): Lol. Bro, what? Why are u watching Gudao on potato? (>▽<) ]

[ Ranger75: I am a ranger working in a remote wild area. The Internet is limited here. If I go beyond 144p, the video stutters. But it seems like that isn't the case anymore. The stream is running smoothly at the new resolution, even out here. Any option below that is greyed out.

Which is weird since on any other page I try to load, aside from Gudao's stream, it's as slow as usual. ]

[ Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): That's IS weird. O _ o ]

Ritsuka entered his sparse living room.

The warm glow of a nearby lamp barely illuminated the small space, and the comforting sounds of minecraft from his headphones grew distant as he approached his front door.

Another knock. This time, for some reason, chills ran down his spine. His gut was telling him something was off and that what he was doing was a stupid idea, but he pushed past those feelings and continued to walk to his door.

Ritsuka was too distracted by the eerie feeling of having someone knock on his door this late to notice the floating chat box trailing behind him.

[ JigglyWiggly: This looks like a scene straight out of a horror film. ]

[Junior_Researcher: Are we sure that Gudao doesn't have Pokémon in this world? I can't find any explanation as to how this is possible without the aid of a Rotom or Poryphone. ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): @Junior_Researcher Yes. Yes, we are. He went on a few trips outside with his old GoPro, RIP btw, and gave us a tour of his world. No Pokémon in sight, only animals. There's no denying it. ]

[SeeDotbyTheSea: Huh. So this is what the rest of his house looks like. ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD): This is the first time he's shown his house aside from his usual bedroom, except it seems like it's without his consent. ]

[Junior_Researcher: Can't blame him for it. This place looks like a dump. ]

[DragoonRuleZ: Sucks that he can't cash donations. He could have used those to fix up this run down home or move out! ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: My Oshi's living conditions are worse than mine. And that's saying something because I live in a swamp because the rent is cheap. 

(˶ㅠ︿ㅠ) ]

He neared the front door of his house and peeked through the peephole.

There was a hooded man outside his door.

He decided it was in his best interest not to open the door and ask him what he wants.

"Who are you? Why are you knocking on my door late at night?"

The figure outside didn't speak for a moment. As if it was gathering its thoughts. Then, it spoke.

"I am with the Chaldea Security Organization. We are looking for the applicant that goes by the name of Ritsuka Fujimaru."

Chaldea? The guys from the job application? What could they want at this hour?

This was too suspicious and it was obviously a trap. While his home was a bit run down, it was still located in a safe neighborhood, in a safe town. So he never had to live in fear of any drive by shootouts or running into tweaking homeless people when he took his nightly walks to the park. Though that point is now moot considering he was responsible for bringing danger to the neighborhood. He cursed at himself for not being more careful about what shady place he applied to. Now he had to figure out a way to get out of this mess.

"Sorry, but I don't trust you. Please leave, or else I'll call the police."

Silence.

The hooded man stood there, motionless, not making a single sound. Ritsuka tried his best to memorize every detail about him, but even at this close distance, it was difficult to see the man's face due to the unnaturally dark shadow his hood cast over his face.

Ritsuka watched as the man lowered his head, then slowly moved it in a circular motion, as if inspecting the door for weaknesses.

Then, the man shifted his gaze toward the peephole. Ritsuka nearly stepped back in fear as their eyes met, his hood made it impossible to see his eyes but Ritsuka could still feel the intense stare piercing through the shadow and through the tiny opening of his door. The man spoke again, this time his voice carried a heavier weight than when he last spoke.

"Please open the door, Mr. Fujimaru; we don't mean any harm."

[PerfectlySaneHex: Said the creepy guy knocking on someone's door at 12 AM. ]

[Junior_Researcher: That guy can't be serious, right? What kind of idiot would be gullible enough to open the door to a complete stranger this late at night?! ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD): ????!!!! ]

If Ritsuka could read his chat right now, he would agree with them. And yet, despite the overwhelming sense of danger, something deep in his subconscious urged him forward, like an invisible force compelling him to act.

Before he even realized it, his body moved on its own, his words slipping out before he could stop them.

"Okay."

With a quiet click, he unlocked the door and pulled it open, leaving his viewers in disbelief.

[Junior_Researcher: … I have no words… except two. Fucking moron. ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): GUDAO, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!!! Σ(°△° ꪱꪱꪱ) ]

[: pikachu shock emote:] x10

[PerfectlySaneHex: NOOOO!!! DON'T DO IT!!! ]

[Ranger75: Dude, I know it's tough to find a job in your world, but you shouldn't be risking your life for the possibility of a paycheck!! ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD): Gudao, SNAP OUT OF IT! ]

Light returned to Ritsuka's eyes, he felt the sensation of a spring breeze caress his face and suddenly, the fog that clouded his mind had been blown away, "Wait. Where am I?"

"Tch." He heard a click of the tongue from the guy that was standing in front of him. Wait, wasn't he the sketchy guy who had knocked on his door earlier?

Before he could gather his bearings, the man blurred from existence.

An aggressive hand grabbed him by the collar of his anime shirt.

"Eh?!"

And yanked him out of his house.

The abrupt motion was so fast that his mind barely had time to process it. By the time it did, it was already too late.

The figure had already flipped him around and locked him into a full nelson.

His heart hammered in his chest, his brain in a state of panic.

"AAAHHH-Mph!"

Suddenly, a third hand emerged from nowhere.

It forcefully clamped a damp, chemical-soaked cloth over his mouth and nose, cutting off his scream for help.

The sheer force being exerted on his face caused his teeth to creak, it felt as if they were one moment away from falling off his gums.

Ritsuka had seen enough action movies to recognize what was happening.

He was being kidnapped.

Instincts kicked in, he held his breath and thrashed, twisting his body, trying to break free.

But it was useless.

His captors held him tightly and no matter how hard he tried to overpower them, he was only one guy.

He tried kicking the one in front of him.

!!!

Pain coursed through his lower foot as he felt he had just kicked a solid concrete wall.

Then, his gut exploded in pain.

A fist had struck him in the stomach.

His pained gags released precious oxygen from his lungs, and by reflex, they tried bringing in more air.

But instead of fresh oxygen, he inhaled the fumes from the rag, they reeked of a strong cleaning detergent. Ritsuka's lungs tried to push the toxic chemicals out, but they harder it tried to, the faster it depleted what little precious oxygen remained in his system.

His vision blurred, and his limbs grew heavier as a fog of darkness pulled him closer into its embrace.

"Congratulations. Your application has been approved."

This was the last thing Ritsuka Fujimaru heard before he went limp, and was consumed in the drowsiness the chloroform had induced upon him.

The hooded man looked at his accomplice and gestured to the road with a quick tilt of the head.

One man grabbed Ritsuka by his legs, while the other released the full nelson and readjusted his grip to help carry their unconscious victim to the street.

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): OhCrapOhCrapOhCrap  \(˚☐˚")/  ]

[HippityHoppip650: Hey, this is an act, right? Right?!! Please tell me it's an act!!! ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: MY OSHI IS BEING KIDNAPPED!!! SOMEONE DO SOMETHING!!!! ( ˶óᯅò) !! ]

[Junior_Researcher: Don't look at me! It's his fault for opening the door! ]

[HippityHoppip650: Someone contact the league!! ]

[MalasadaMayhem: WHICH 1?! ]

[ HippityHoppip650: Any1!! EVRY1!! ]

[ SeeDotbyTheSea: WE CAN'T!! OTHERWORLD REMEMBER?!! ]

[ Junior_Researcher: He's fucked. ]

[ MalasadaMayhem: Guys, you hear that? ]

The roar of an approaching engine cut through the silence of the night, its rumbling grew louder and louder as it came closer. A bright light washed over the two men holding Ritsuka, then, the wheels of the vehicle screeched like a banshee as it came to a halt beside them.

It was a white, windowless van.

Its side door violently swung open, revealing two more figures lurking within the pitch black interior.

They helped the other two carry their victim inside.

The door was slammed shut, the inertia of the door shaking the van slightly.

The driver wasted no time.

The van's tires screeched as the driver stomped on the accelerator and gunned it toward the nearest freeway.

All the men inside the van believed that their mission to retrieve the 48th Master candidate had gone off without a hitch. Completely unaware that the entire operation was recorded live, in front of an audience of thousands of people.

Chapter Text

UNN Headquarters, Unova Region

The musical jingle of a news intro starts playing. A giant Pokéball glides into view, its appearance translucent, allowing the blue-colored background to shine through it.

Enclosing the sphere is a rotating ring etched with the words "Unova News Network" in bold letters.

The ring and Pokéball came to a stop, allowing the viewers to see the logo and the news station name in full focus.

The scene transitions away from the news station's intro into a modern newsroom.

A Drowzee could be seen operating a nearby teleprompter for a brief moment before the scene zoomed closer to the stars of the show until the studio equipment was no longer visible. A blue-haired man with azure eyes dressed in a black suit sat next to a blonde-haired woman with amber eyes dressed in a short-sleeved v-neck red blouse behind a long desk, both their expressions serious and ready to do their job of delivering news to their region.

The Drowzee that sat just behind the camera's point of view gave the duo their cue that the broadcast had started.

The music playing in the background slowly faded away as they began to speak.

"Good morning, Unova. I'm Amy Schmidt. The pretty blonde anchorwoman said, though her face was prim and proper, her eyes held exhaustion in them. Her partner showed a much brighter but still stoic professional demeanor toward the camera.

"And I'm Dash Daxter, and you're watching the Unova News Network."

Amy spoke first, her professional tone burdened with the somber weight of her words, "Our top story this morning: the dearly beloved Twitch streamer Gudao, real name currently unknown, was viciously kidnapped by two unidentified brutes last night during an unexpected Minecraft anniversary livestream." Dash raised an eyebrow when he heard the venom in Amy's voice as she described the two suspects but said nothing as she still conveyed the message written on the Teleprompter.

"That's right, Amy. Gudao is someone who has been covered by UNN on several occasions in the past 3 years. But for our older audience members who don't go online unless they have to and for those too busy to keep up with the times: Twitch is an internet site that allows people to host their own broadcasts, much like a news station like ours, for the world to see, and similar to TV, these livestreams are hosted by individual channels. There are currently thousands of channels that host livestreams on Twitch, which have a wide range of topics from cooking to Pokémon battles and so much more.

So what exactly separates this one person from the thousands of others? What makes him stand out among the sea of competitors?

And the truth is, he's actually from an alternate, parallel world. A world that exists without Pokémon.

As hard as that might be to believe for the few of you in the world who haven't heard of him yet, many respected individuals and organizations like the Aether Foundation and Professor Burnet respectfully have confirmed the legitimacy of these claims.

Because of his special circumstances, Gudao is currently one of the top streamers on the platform, only losing to Paldea's IonoZone and many official Pokémon league channels that regularly host live Pokémon league matches and tournaments from across the known world."

Once more, the cue called for Amy to speak next, and unlike last time, her chest was puffed up in pride as she continued where Dash left off, "Not only that, but his streams have also contributed massively to our scientific community. And in this humble reporter's opinion, his ASMR book-flipping streams are some of the most informative and comfy streams on Twitch. His soothing whispers do an excellent job of transforming the dry material he shares about his world's "animals" for our scientists to study into a relaxing experience that even non-scientists can enjoy!"

Dash gave Amy a look; she had blatantly disregarded the teleprompter's words as she gushed over the victim's streams. He needed to bring the train back on track before it derailed.

"Which made last night's incident all the more horrifying to witness for the people of our world, isn't that right, Amy?"

Amy's smile turned into a professional frown once more. "The following footage we are about to present contains graphic imagery of a kidnapping, so viewer discretion is advised."

The sound gets cut off abruptly. The camera lingered on the show hosts until the scene transitioned to show the recorded video of Gudao being violently dragged out of his home, assaulted, and then thrown in a van that took him to places unknown.

The camera shifts back to the two very disturbed-looking news hosts.

There was a brief silence between the two hosts, clearly unsettled by what they had seen. Amy in particular was holding back tears, but her professionalism persevered, and she was the first to recover to deliver her lines.

"That was horrible, my poor Gudao."

Dash chose not to acknowledge the latter half of her comment and nodded, "Indeed it was." Dash stared at the camera. "Unfortunately, critics and skeptics have dismissed this event as a very elaborate prank done in poor taste." The papers in Amy's hands crinkled as she spoke her next lines, yet her face remained composed and measured: "Here at UNN, our commitment is to the truth. It is our duty as journalists to provide you, our viewers, with nothing but the facts. However, we also understand many of our viewers are distrustful of the media. And we here at UNN can respect that.

However, I want to be absolutely clear so our viewers have no room left for doubt. This is real. Video analyst experts from across the world have confirmed the authenticity of the footage shown on stream. To those who believe this is some sort of act or staged event, it's not. An innocent, living, breathing person's life is in serious danger. So stop spreading conspiracy theories and misinformation about this incident.

Dash coughed into his fist, causing Amy to slacken her hands. "Well said, Amy. In any case, the investigation on our side is not fruitful. Unfortunately, our side cannot push past investigating video evidence, given the limited information and the wall of separation between dimensions. However, authorities are trying their best to work with the limited information available to see if they can come up with a solution.

We here at Unova News Network all wish him luck and pray for his safety. And-" before Dash could continue his lines, he was cut off by Amy.

"And a personal message to those who kidnapped him."

"Amy…" Dash tried to say something, but he sunk into his chair when a hateful glare was directed his way.

Amy turned back to the screen, her anger clearly visible to everyone watching.

"I know the kidnappers will not be able to see this message, but it still needs to be said. Don't think you can escape justice just because you are in another world. You may think that just because we can't reach you doesn't mean that you are safe from the hammer of justice! Justice has a way of finding people. And if you harm him more than you already have in any way, I'm going to—"

Amy's mic was cut, allowing Dash to take back control of the broadcast.

"Alright! Thank you, Amy! Our next story: Bouffalant mating season! How you can keep yourself, your family, and your Pokémon safe. Coming up after these messages."

✦✧✦

WELCOME TO THE POKÉMON WORLD FORUMS

Logged in as ShortShorts_QUEEN (verified member of the Comfy Shorts Club)

♦ TOPIC: GUDAO KIDNAPPED LIVE ON STREAM!!!

In: Forums ► Twitch ► Streamers ► Gudao ► Kidnapping

► Slur-Puffin69 [Original Poster] (verified sweet tooth):

*Shows a screenshot of the end title card of Gudao's last stream. The image of a chibi Gudao inside a Memorial picture frame could be seen, captioned by the words "Gudao is not dead, he's just resting" at the bottom of the image.*

Press X to doubt.

► Giraffiggy: X

► SilphSIMP: X

► Miini^Munchet: X

► PerfectlySaneHex (unverified Gudao's Wife): SHUT UP! HE'S NOT DEAD!!

► IonoZone (verified Gym Leader): You guys shouldn't be joking about this. They TOOK GUDAO.

► ShortShorts_QUEEN (verified member of the Comfy Shorts Club): I missed the stream because I had a rematch with a close friend. Lost track of time and came back home late for dinner and went to bed. I woke up the next morning and saw the news. WTF HAPPENED?!

► SeedotByTheSea: @ShortShorts_QUEEN Well, long story short, Gudao's stream got an upgrade. His streams are now in 4k 60fps, even to those with shit internet.

So his kidnapping was LITERALLY caught in 4k.

► Junior_Researcher (verified Intern): @PerfectlySaneHex

X <- That's what happens when you open your front door to a stranger at midnight.

Just accept the facts. He's gone.

[PerfectlySaneHex (unverified Gudao's Wife): has been banned from thread. Reason: Threats of violence against another. ]

► PsychicMoostache (verified Elite Level Pokemon): I would not be so quick to judge @Junior_Researcher. I was watching the stream as well, and as a psychic-type Pokémon, I was able to pick up on something a lot of non-psychic humans and Pokémon may have missed.

As many of you know, powerful psychic Pokémon like myself have the capacity to read a person's mind like a book, yet even we have limitations. We CANNOT interact with the minds of people in recordings or via live broadcast.

The same was the case for Gudao's stream. I have been watching and moderating his streams for years at this point, and it's only when the camera shifted into its new state that I gained the capability of feeling his mind.

Mind you, I am aware of the law, and I know how sensitive and controversial the issue of mind reading is, so out of respect for both the law and Gudao's privacy, I didn't delve deeper. Though even if I wanted to, I wouldn't have been able to because I could feel the connection between our worlds was severely hampering abilities, and I could only delve as deep as his surface emotions.

However, despite that limited capability, it was enough for me to notice something was off when he encountered that man… I felt his mind had gone blank. His fear, anxiety, and caution went mute.

Somehow, that man had used a psychic move on Gudao, forcing him to comply with his demands. I nearly gave myself an anerysm after using every bit of power I could muster to be able to disrupt the move. Though as soon as I successfully dispelled it, an unknown force pushed my mind back, and I was unable to interfere again for the remainder of the stream.

These phenomena, among other things, should be impossible. I even confirmed this with several other Pokémon and psychics I have connections to; they all had similar experiences when this happened.

Which means… the connection that first formed between Gudao and our world all those years ago had merely been dormant until this very moment. Whatever allowed this to happen was able to turn every monitor into literal portals across dimensions.

These facts lead me to believe that this is the work of a powerful Legendary Pokémon.

► Junior_Researcher (verified Intern): You had me in the first half, but the last sentence ruined it. Really? Going straight to using legendaries to explain what is happening? I respect Alakazam for their high intelligence and contributions to science, but you've somehow managed to disappoint me.

► IonoZone (verified Gym Leader): Hey! That's rude!

► Junior_Researcher (verified Intern): Call it what you want; it's the truth. This is obviously the work of some alpha Porygon-Z or Rotom.

Perhaps both.

There's a study that explains how Pokémon like Rotom and the Porygon family interact with dimensional energies that—

[Expand to read more]

► IonoZone (verified Gym Leader): Yawn.

► PsychicMoostache (verified Elite Level Pokemon): @Junior_Researcher Apologies If I sounded "unscientific," however, there was no need to be so crass. Whether you deny it or not, legendaries are a VERY real part of our world.

► MalasadaMayhem (verified Malasada Connoisseur): You know, for someone who is a "researcher," you seem to be pretty close-minded.

► Junior_Researcher (verified Intern): @MalasadaMayhem, I AM NOT CLOSE-MINDED!!

Though I admit I did come across as a bit condescending in my previous post. My apologies, Moostache.

► MalasadaMayhem (verified Malasada Connoisseur): Well, at least you're not a complete lost cause.

► Junior_Researcher (verified Intern): That being said, that doesn't change the facts.

People should stop jumping to the easy conclusion of "it must be a legendary Pokémon" when they see something they don't understand.

► SeedotByTheSea: (－‸ლ)

► MalasadaMayhem (verified Malasada Connoisseur): *pinches eyebrows in frustration*

Dude. You should have just ended the conversation on a high note, but I see you just love to be a stick in the mud, so I will educate you.

I am from Alola. Our island is well known to have been protected by the Guardian Deities (the Tapus for you non-Alolans) for millennia. While most of them are recluses, they still participate in some way or the other with our island challenges.

We have all heard, felt, and occasionally seen our protectors when they deem it necessary to show their presence. Everyone, and especially those who have taken the island challenges, can attest to that.

It's your word against an entire region, my guy.

► Junior_Researcher (verified Intern): Hmph, it's all mass hallucinations.

I am a man of science. And I won't be easily swayed by legends and myths. They are just old stories with no basis in science or reality!

► MalasadaMayhem (verified Malasada Connoisseur): Ok, let's just ignore the centuries of peace that the resource-rich Alola benefitted from the protection of their legendaries while the rest of its neighbors squabbled over petty issues no one cares about nowadays.

Or the countless generations of eyewitness reports from invaders who claimed to have seen the guardian deities and had their armies reduced to only a handful of survivors.

"iT's AlL MaSs HaLlUcInAtIoNs"

► Junior_Researcher (verified Intern): Oh, I'm so sorry I offended you when I presented you WITH FACTS. Come back when you have actual evidence, beyond faulty eyewitness reports and grainy photos and videos taken by a "terrified" Rotom or Poryphone.

Maybe then I will believe you.

► MalasadaMayhem (verified Malasada Connoisseur):

Yeah. No. I'm not going to waste my breath with you anymore.

No amount of evidence I provide will convince you.

► Magnet_King (verified MOD): Sorry for playing Giratina's advocate, but @Junior_researcher does have a point. Government officials and highly accredited Pokémon researchers alike from all across the known world, sans Alola, have all made public statements denying the existence of legendaries after Gudao's revelation.

But while the possibility exists that it could all just be a massive cover-up, we should not be so quick to jump to conclusions.

Unlike those in Gudao's world, we can trust in our experts and our government officials.

► Lab-Pichu: We must also not forget that Gudao's world didn't get everything about our world 100% correct, like the existence of entire regions like Alola, Galar, and Paldea; the various regional wars; and other historical and scientific achievements and the ones behind them all.

► Guy_1n_Desert: (－‸ლ) some people, I swear. They are games made FOR CHILDREN, so of course they wouldn't have that level of detail included in the games!!

► SeedotByTheSea: It's also important to note that at the time the connection was made, Gudao's world only knew about Indigo (Kanto and Johto were separate games), Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Unova, while Kalos was still unknown. Yet, in only a single year, Kalos was introduced to their world. Which means it's only a matter of time until his world reveals the last three major regions.

Have you forgotten the multitude of betting rings and forums speculating on which region gets revealed next?

And that's not mentioning the fact that for the most part, Gudao's world still manages to depict major events that have happened in our world to a downright scary degree. The most infamous of these depictions being Red and Ethan's takedown of Team Rocket and Neo-Team Rocket respectively.

Your point is moot. LAB-Pichu

► Lab-Pichu: Even so, we should take the information we know with a grain of salt. There are still a lot of inconsistencies between our world and his media.

Like how Giovanni was just allowed to run free, seeing as how HE PARTICIPATED IN A WORLD TOURNAMENT in the Unova sequel games. Meanwhile, in our world, he was arrested and sentenced to life in prison and still remains there to this day.

We shouldn't use Gudao's world as a be-all and end-all for what is and isn't real.

Heck, based on what PsychicMoostache is claiming, it's possible there's stuff about Gudao's world even he has no idea about, you know, given how someone used a Pokémon move on him.

► Giraffiggy: Well, I know one thing for sure, Gudao's world definitely got Ghetsis's character accurate, 100%.

► I_$hniff_Glue: Speaking of Ghetsis, if he did have a Kyurem, like how Gudao said he did in the games, that would explain how he was able to freeze Opelucid City all those years back.

► Slow-Poker: I thought we all collectively agreed to call him Dennis the Menace?

► Giraffiggy: Lol. I forgorr. That maniac doesn't deserve such a kickass theme song.

► Don'tTouchMyBuns!: Guys. STOP. Or else I'm calling a mod.

► Slur-Puffin69 [Original Poster] (verified sweet tooth): Bruh. How did my post devolve into people having arguments about Ghetsis?

► MalasadaMayhem (verified Malasada Connoisseur): Welcome to the PokeNet. Where arguments always end up involving Ghetsis in one way or the other if they go on long enough.

► Junior_Researcher (verified Intern): @I_$hniff_Glue I want to say I'm not surprised by your comment, given your crude username, but I'm not. Seriously, people actually died in that attack, yet here you all are making conspiracy theories about that tragedy!

It's a well-known FACT that Ghetsis used illegally captured Ice-type Pokémon to fuel his monstrosity. Anyone who claims otherwise is just spreading lies.

You people disgust me.

► Gible_Archeologist (verified Archeologist): You guys!! Gudao's stream is live!!

✦✧✦

Somewhere in Antarctica

The pitter-patter of tiny feet echoed in the vacant grey and white corridors.

A small white animal, wearing a cute miniature cloak tied off with a red bow, had picked up on an interesting scent and went to follow it. It had ignored the protests of his chosen caretaker and ran towards his new destination. Eventually, the scent led it to a young human dressed in a white outfit the staff of Chaldea wore, a white jacket with black pants.

He was currently lying on his side, eyes closed and chest rising and falling as he slept on the cold, hard floor. The creature tilted its head, curious about what this human was doing here. "Fou?"

Chapter Text

Ritsuka felt a warm and wet sensation on his face.

The feeling reminded him a lot of when his auntie Sayaka's chihuahua got too close to his face.

"No, Chi-chan, no kissies."

"Fou."

The unfamiliar noise caused his eyes to shoot open, and his vision was met not by a tiny dog whose breath reeked of hot dog brine but instead by a blue rabbit-dog-squirrel?

"You're not Chi-chan."

The small animal huffed as if it was dismissive of being compared to his aunt's tiny dog, then leapt off his chest and sat next to his head.

Ritsuka got up from his prone position and immediately noticed his clothes were different.

Instead of his t-shirt, shorts, and flip-flops, he was now wearing a white coat with a stylish belt on his chest. He also saw a belt buckled over his pure white jacket. Ritsuka wasn't a fashion guy, but weren't belts supposed to go under jackets and shirts?

He quickly got over the odd designer choices of his outfit and took note of his surroundings.

He looked to his left, then right, and saw that the gray and white corridor was completely identical on both ends. Observing the windows, he was shocked to see a snowstorm raging outside.

He tried to rack his mind as to how he got here.

He was playing Minecraft with Chat.

Then someone knocked on his door, and he went to answer it.

That was a mistake, and now he was here.

Chaldea? Yeah, the Chaldea Security Organization—that's the name of the company that kidnapper said they belonged to.

He put a hand on his chin, closed his eyes, and strained himself in an effort to clear up the fog in his head.

Remember… Remember!

Earlier in the day

Ritsuka stood on a hyperrealistic grassy field, but he was incapable of appreciating it as much as he would have due to the inexplicable feeling of jetlag that he felt at the moment.

He did his best to check his surroundings, and he concluded that he had no clue where he was.

"Your orders Master?"

He heard the voice of a young woman, rubbing his eyes to clear away the blurriness from his vision, he saw a young, blonde haired female knight in armor, next to her was a man in spandex holding a lance, his blue hair tied into a long, thin ponytail. Finally, there was a bishonen bowman, he smiled and waved at him.

The trio of what looked like heroes, combined with the fact that he was now on a plain in who knows where? It could only mean one thing.

He got isekaid into Fire Emblem.

Shit, he sucked at playing those games, yes he loved the story, worldbuilding and characters but still, there's a reason he played in casual mode. He hopes the ROB who placed him in this world didn't set the difficulty to Lunatic.

What's worse, he doesn't recognize these guys, so he couldn't rely on metaknowledge to carry him through the story.

He looked ahead of the trio of people and saw a massive, hulking figure made of literal solid rock. Its jagged spikes and edges combined with its piercing yellow eyes made for a rather intimidating presence.

That's not a bandit. Weren't Fire emblem stories supposed to start with routing bandits?!

Also, holy shit Geodude got a glow up, Bro looks like he started going to the gym and went from Geodude to just Dude!!

Maybe he was actually in isekaid into pokemon? Is that what the robot lady was saying when it called him a master? 

"Master! Your orders!" The woman said, her voice laced with urgency. It was to be expected, the hulking Dude was charging straight at them!

Oh crap, he forgot what weapon was effective against what! Lances beat swords, swords beat axes? But that Rock Guy has no weapons equipped.

'What do I do?!!'

"Um, um… " He looked around in a panic before his eyes stopped as they fell upon the sword lady's beautiful gleaming sword. 

Memories flooded his brain, childhood memories of him sitting on his couch, playing the game of a young fairy boy wielding a divine forged blade that could fire lasers.

Maybe it can do the same?

With the hulking berserker closing in, he made a decision.

"Sword lady! Use SWORDBEAM!"

The Sword lady looked utterly bewildered at his command but she quickly composed herself and started to charge up her attack. The blade was bathed in a golden light and particles of the same golden color danced around her form.

Holy shit he was right?!

Looking back towards the battlefield, his eyes widened with horror when he saw that the hulking Chad-Dude close the distance faster than he had expected.

With its built up momentum, it shoulder tackled the lancer guy.

His ears, even at this distance, caught the sound of bones snapping as the lancer guy was ragdolled into the stratosphere and land  unceremoniously on his neck a few seconds later.

Ouch, that looked like it really hurt.

The rock man skid to a stop.

Then after holding his running pose for a second, it stood up and turned its head towards him.

Ritsuka saw ominous glowing pupils glaring at him, his body shook in fear as the giant in front of him reminded him of a certain armored titan just before they broke a wall.

Plink.

The bowman had not been idle as he shot an arrow towards the rock man. The arrow somehow managing to embed itself on solid rock like it was made of normal clay.

The rock man got into a running pose again and gunned it towards him.

The bowman retreated, peppering the rock man with arrows so much that it now looked like a pincushion.

"EXU…" He heard the sword lady say behind him and woah that is a huge sword of light!

Unlike him, thebowman saw the same awe inspiring scene before him with a look of sheer horror on his face and threw himself to the side-

"CALIBAHHH!!!"

A golden light slammed into the boulder from above, like the judgment of god, then after it hit its mark, it returned to the heavens as a towering pillar of light. It was so bright he had to squint his eyes. 

When the light died down and Ritsuka blinked the spots from his eyes, all he saw was the archer guy, lying just a few feet from where the light beam carved the earth, holding his chest like he was having a heart attack. Meanwhile, lancer was lying on the ground, facedown and was disintegrating into what looked like fireflies? 

He looked next to him and saw a trench.

He followed the trench and saw it ended in a crater, it looked like a street that led to a cul-de-sac.

There was nothing there, so safe to say that the roided up geodude has been vaporized. The Sword Lady, meanwhile was nodding to herself with a hint of pride in her hums. Her cute ahoge somehow defying the laws of nature and bouncing in place like a Spoink, completely ignoring the strong breeze that was still blowing as a result of her attack, The EXU-CALIBAH.

Ritsuka looked back towards the crater, then to the trench and shivered.

He had nearly suffered the same fate.

[WE HOPE YOU ENJOYED YOUR 180 SECONDS AS A MASTER IN OUR SIMULATION, YOUR APPLICATION PROCESS HAS BEEN COMPLETED. WELCOME ONCE MORE TO THE CHALDEA SECURITY ORGANIZATION, 48TH MASTER CANDIDATE, RITSUKA FUJIMARU. ]

Back to the present

Hmm, nope.

No matter what he does, he can't remember much; all he recalls is that he was commanding people like Pokémon.

…

Wait.

Pokémon?

His chat!!

His chat must be so worried that he hasn't come back from the front door!!

Oh god, nevermind the stream, where was he, and what time was it?! He left his lights on; his light bill is going to be huge if he doesn't head back to turn them off.

That is, if someone doesn't walk into his house and steal his stuff.

Like his really expensive computer, God, he really hoped whoever kidnapped him was nice enough to at least close his door, or else—

Ritsuka's panic was cut short as he was startled by a screen popping up in front of his face. His eyes shot wide open when he saw a holographic Twitch chat floating in front of him.

And it was not just any Twitch chat; it was HIS Twitch chat.

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): GUDAO!! YOU'RE ALIVE!! ♡⸜(˶˃ ᵕ ˂˶)⸝♡ ]

[ He's alive!!  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: I thought I lost you, mon amour. ]

[ Praise be to Arceus, he's not dead!!  ]

[KicksYouIntheFace193:  Good. Now he can't use death as an excuse to not play Smash.  ]

"Chat? Is that you?" He rubbed his eyes, believing himself still asleep. Yet when his eyes refocused, the screen was still there.

"How are you even like this? Do you guys know what happened? And how are you seeing me? Oh, wait, never mind." Ritsuka gawked at the translucent orb that had a camera icon etched in its center hovering near him.

After a moment of observation, he remembered that he had asked Chat some questions and that he shouldn't keep them waiting. He looked at the screen, and for a moment, he hesitated before he placed his thumb over the box and actually felt the cool sensation of glass. With the flick of his index finger, he scrolled through the responses in chat.

To summarize the events leading up to his awakening:

He was kidnapped and was taken somewhere far, far away; based on the weather outside, he was either in the far north or far south.

His Twitch chat is obviously not reliant on his computer camera anymore, as it now has a brand new 4k 60fps camera that has been recording his streams like a professional cameraman with years of experience. Or so his chat claims, given how much more cinematic the shots have been.

They also have no idea where he was, due to his stream abruptly getting cut off during his transport; at the same time, his end title card was replaced.

Apparently it said, "Don't worry, Gudao is not dead. He is just resting."

Which didn't bring comfort to any of them, and soon, the Pokémon world was in a state of panic as a consequence of last night's events. Everyone was anxious and worried about his safety.

For the first time since the big revelation that Pokémon were fictional in his world, his face was once again plastered all across the world after getting kidnapped live on stream.

Finally, his stream didn't come back online until two minutes ago, and he confirmed that he had no idea that this even happened.

[ Lol, what's with that Aether Foundation getup?  ]

[ I was wondering that too. Its so bizzare to see you in anything but anime themed merch and stuff from the pokedollar store.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: Well, I for one think you look rather dashing in white, Gudao~ ]

Ritsuka blushed at Hex's compliment. "Thanks, Hex, though I have no idea where I got these from—"

"Fou?"

His musings came to a halt when he remembered there was an elephant in the room he had been ignoring. Or rather the blue cat/rabbit thing now sitting comfortably on his lap.

[Mighty1Oak:  Who's that pokemon?!!  ]

[It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu:  IT'S PIKACHU!!  ]

[Gible_Archeologist:  Awwwww its so cute <3<3<3<3  ]

[JuniorResearcher:  finally! Actual honest to science foreign pokemon!!!  ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  Gudao, did you lie to us? You told us you had no pokemon in your world! Explain yourself!  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  Top 10 anime betrayals.  ]

[IliekQTthings:  WHY WOULD YOU KEEP THIS ADORABLE BABY FROM US GUDAO?! WHY?!!!!  ]

[KicksYouIntheFace193:  Cute.  ]

"Guys, it's not a Pokémon; it's a…" Wait. What even is this cute little guy?

[ Yes? ]

"Uhh… It's probably just an unidentified species of animal that science hasn't discovered yet."

[ Bruh.  ]

[Junior_Researcher: * Raises finger then puts it down* Huh. He's actually got a good point.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem: @Junior_Researcher Of coarse you of all people would think that wouldn't you? ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  Stop trying to gaslight us Gudao. We know what a pokemon looks like when we see one!  ]

Ritsuka gave Chat a look.

"You guys said the same thing when I showed you a platypus for the first time."

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  T-That was different!!  ]

[Yeah! You can't blame us for thinking that thing was a 'Mon. It's a poisonous mammal that lays eggs! ]

"Come on, guys, if this little guy was a pokemon like you guys claim it is, then it would be saying its name."

"Fou?"

Oh, right. He forgot.

[ SEE IT SPEAKS!!  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  Come now, Gudao, there's no shame in admitting you are wrong.  ]

He wasn't ashamed about being wrong.

In truth, Ritsuka just didn't want to get his hopes up, only to later find out it was just a normal animal.

"Well, there's only one way to find out."

He offered the little guy his hand, an invitation for it to get comfortable with his scent.

The creature sniffed his hand, and to his surprise, it leaned into it. Safe to say that this guy actually liked him.

Then, he gently scooped the small animal with his hands and raised it to eye level. To anyone with experience handling animals or Pokémon, this action would have been seen as reckless, but the small animal didn't seem bothered by it.

The little thing cutely tilted its head, confused by the action rather than offended.

Ritsuka leaned in closer to the colorful animal and asked, "Can you understand me, little buddy? Nod your head once if you can."

The "Fou," as it called itself, just stared at Ritsuka unblinkingly. This went on for what felt like hours, and at some point he wasn't sure if the creature was messing with him or if he was making himself look like an idiot for trying to talk to a blue, unidentified animal in hopes that it would be a real-life Pokémon.

Maybe it was both.

His jaw hung open when the creature responded with a nod, confirming chat's suspicions.

[ SEE!! WE TOLD YOU. ]

[ You shouldn't underestimate our ability to identify unidentified pokemon Gudao.  ]

Chat continued to brag about getting one over on him, but Ritsuka didn't care. He wanted to deny it, but the facts all point towards this 'Fou' being a pokemon.

"Huh. Well, what do you know, Pokémon are real here too."

The "Pokémon" seemed to frown at his statement and viciously attacked him with its soft paws.

Heh. That tickles.

He put the little guy down, and while he had stopped his onslaught, he still looked rather annoyed at him. To appease the creature, Ritsuka reached over and scratched the back of its ears. The small creature leaned into his hands, eagerly enjoying the scritchies he was giving it.

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): D'aaaw ♡ ]

[__Red__: ...  ]

[ You know… on second glance, it kinda reminds me of an eevee.  ]

[Ecruteak_Gal:  Oh my Ho-oh, You're right!! The ears, the body shape, it just SCREAMS eevee!! o(≧ᗜ≦)o  ]

[Mighty1Oak:  This is a truly groundbreaking discovery! A possible convergent evolution that looks like an Eevee!! o(≧ᗜ≦)o  ]

[I wonder what type it is. ]

"Fou is not a Pokémon."

Suddenly, an angelic voice brought his scritchies to an abrupt end, much to Fou's displeasure.

Ritsuka turned to the voice, and he caught sight of something rather amazing.

'Woah...'

For a moment, he had looked up from his lower vantage point and was able to take a glimpse at Nirvana. He saw a daring set of black lace panties, completely visible through the semi-transparent black stockings.

Ritsuka had never seen a sight like this before.

He was actually a bit mesmerized for a while before he realized he was being a perv. He abruptly stood up and looked away in shame. His beating heart was flooding his cheeks with blood, uncaring for his attempts to relax himself.

'She didn't notice... did she?'

He didn't have the heart to look at her, so he decided to pay attention to something else to ease his anxiety.

However, this proved to be a mistake as he stared at the comments in front of him in horror.

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  I'm disappointed in you, Gudao.  ]

[ Pervert.  ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  seriously Gudao?! You just met her. You should at least invite a lady for dinner before you start gawking under her skirt you perv. (ꐦ¬_¬)   ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Damn, Cameraman is putting in work with these shots. ദ്ദി ˉ͈̀꒳ˉ͈́ )✧  ]

[ You lucky bastard.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: (≖_≖ ) ]

Crap, he just acted like a creep in front of... 50,000 people?!!

He hasn't had an audience this huge since he revealed Pokémon was fiction in his world or when he was doing Pokémon-related streams.

"Senpai? Are you okay?"

He barely had time to gather his thoughts, and so his monkey brain went on overdrive and took over control of his mouth.

He decided that he preferred talking to the girl he just ogled rather than the thousands of people calling him a pervert.

"Ah. I'm okay, I—" Ritsuka paused when he saw the cute girl with lilac hair. She wore a black shirt with a skirt underneath a gray hoodie.

Her glasses added to her charm, but the same couldn't be said about her lavender eyes. They looked despondent, almost lifeless and lacking hope.

What has this girl gone through?

[ShortShorts_QUEEN: Gudao. You're staring again. ಠ_ಠ) ]

[ Dear me, did we just witness a real-life example of love at first sight?!  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Damn. Gudao is down bad.  ]

[Gible_Archeologist:  Gudao…  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): TᴖT our little Gudao has finally grown up. ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN ME! NOT HER! IT'S NOT FAIR!!! (˃̣̣̥ᯅ˂̣̣̥) ]

"Erm, uh, so why did you call me senpai? Usually that's a term reserved for someone with more experience than you in a school or workplace setting. And as far as I know, I just barely got here."

"Oh, you shouldn't worry about that. Everyone in Chaldea is my senpai."

"That's weird; you don't look much older than me. If anything, I should be calling you senpai since I just joined."

The girl frowned at his statement, "No. Age doesn't matter. Everyone is my senpai."

Ritsuka furrowed his brows as his mind tried to understand the bizarre statement the weird but pretty girl in front of him made.

Suddenly, he felt a cold breeze blow in from his left.

Turning his head, he could see his chat moving at a pace that was hard for his eyes to follow.

Wait, why are people spamming the Officer Jenny and Hypno emotes?

Oh.

Oh no.

He needed to put a lid on that grease fire before it caught the ceiling on fire, FAST.

"By the way, how old are you?"

'You fucking idiot!'

Ritsuka could see chat was now scrolling at an accelerating pace the longer this awkward conversation kept dragging on. Fuck, what did he do to deserve this?

The girl seemed taken aback by his blunt question, but that was replaced by a cute frown and one of her cheeks puffing out.

"You know, senpai, it's not very nice to ask a lady her age." He has no idea how, but this girl had managed to replicate the same look his mom gave him whenever she caught him doing, or in this case saying, something stupid.

This familiarity activated his neurons, which forced his body to go into autopilot. His knees gave out, and in one smooth, swift motion, he slammed his forehead to the ground as his body moved into a seiza position.

"I-I'm really sorry!"

The girl seemed to be caught off guard again, as she let out a cute "whah" at Ritsuka's dramatic display.

"Please raise your head, senpai! You don't have to apologize so profusely over a simple question. I-I wasn't being serious!"

The older teen, feeling embarrassed for his display, got back up from his seiza position.

"Sorry about that. I went too far."

"Ah, it's ok. I don't mind. But if you really want to know my age, then for the record, I'm 18."

'Oh, thank God!!'

[ Phew, Gudao just dodged the Hypno allegations. ]

[ GroundHippowdon: I believe all of us just did. ]

[ Heart-of-Gold: Phew.]

[ Phew ]  x10

[ ShortShorts_QUEEN: raises eyebrow Yeah, keep telling yourselves that, you weirdos.

Ritsuka, after going through a rollercoaster of emotions, decided to try and change the subject before it got any more awkward. "Oh, by the way, you said Fou was not a Pokémon, so do you happen to know what he is?"

At his mention of Fou, the girl's eyes lit up slightly. "Ah, he is a privileged lifeform who roams Chaldea as he pleases.

[ IliekQTthings: That's a mouthful, and it's also not very cute.]

[ Malasada Mayhem: Look, lady, it looks like a Pokémon,  and  it sounds like a Pokémon. It even behaves like a Pokémon. I'm calling it a Pokémon!

[IronMunchkin:  Ah, so he's like my mom's Meowth. He likes to take naps EVERYWHERE, and it's ALWAYS in the most inconvenient places. Like my favorite spot on the couch, my bed, or even my keyboard. 

And nothing short of Arceus themselves descending from the heavens can make him budge from his spot.

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  you people are  m ad! That's no Pokemon! That's the most cruel and foul-tempered rodent you ever set eyes on!!!

[IliekQTthings: @Frisky1ntheFlowers STFU 凸ಠ益ಠ)凸 ]

[SeeDotbyTheSea:  What is with that username lol? ]

The small creature, without warning, gracefully leaped and jumped onto Ritsuka's shoulder and immediately chose violence. He felt the animal's soft paws softly swiping at his cheek.

Ritsuka got the message and continued to scratch the back of his ears.

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  Look!! I warned you! That  b east has a vicious streak a mile wide! It's a Killer!

<message deleted >

<message deleted >

[ Frisky1ntheFlowers has been timed out by Electrical★Streamer_Iono (MOD) for 1 hour. ]

[IliekQTthings:  lol. Get wrecked ,  loser.

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): New chat rule! No Fou Slander! (◣_◢) ]

"That's… Fou has never done that with anyone before."

"Do people here not like petting small, cute animals?" If that was the case, then the people working here are colder than the literal snow desert outside.

"No. What I mean is, Fou doesn't go up to people and ask them to touch him, quite the opposite, he avoids everyone aside from me, and now you." The girl smiled at that last statement of hers, confusing Ritsuka.

"Congratulations, senpai, you are officially the second caretaker of Fou."

[PsychicMoostache(MOD): My, my, big shoes to fill. Be sure not to disappoint your new crush, my friend. (≖⩊≖)]

Ritsuka felt a shift in the weight on his shoulder and noticed Fou had jumped down from his shoulder and was now on the ground. He watched as it ran down the corridor. The girl sighed seeing the little Not-Pokémon run away from them.

"There he goes again, off to wander where he pleases."

[Gible_Archeologist: No, wait! Come back! (˃̣̣̥ᯅ˂̣̣̥)

[ShortShorts_QUEEN: (˃̣̣̥ᯅ˂̣̣̥) I want a Fou of my own so bad! (˃̣̣̥ᯅ˂̣̣̥)]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): uuuuuuuuuwooooooh, me too! I don't care if it's an electric type or not, I just want him! (˃̣̣̥ᯅ˂̣̣̥)

[Ecruteak_Gal: A soilless Diglett. Given a chance to roam free. Sealed forevermore (╥‸╥).

"What a strange creature Fou is." Ritsuka looked at the strange girl.

"By the way, what is your name?"

"Ah. I don't have a name, or rather, I don't have a name that's worth remembering."

Ritsuka didn't seem to know how to respond to that. The girl seemed to catch what he meant and just looked down in shame.

"Sorry. Mash. My name is Mash Kiryelight. Nice to meet you, senpai."

"Nice to meet you, my name is—" Before Ritsuka can introduce himself, he is interrupted by the voice of a strange man.

"Ah, Mash. There you are."

Both heads turn to look at a man in a green suit and top hat.

[Top-Hat-PSY: Well, it's nice to FINALLY see someone with great fashion taste for once. While I would never be able to pull off green, he's definitely rocking that outfit! 10/10 ✧ദ്ദി( ˶^ᗜ^˶ ) ] 

"The director is waiting for us to be at the control room. You know how upset she can get about lack of punctuality."

"Ah, sorry. Fou found someone and led me to them."

The mysterious man turned to Ritsuka and hummed.

"Who could you be?"

Ritsuka was about to introduce himself but the man didn't pay attention to him as he looked down at his wrist and pushed a few buttons from a holographic keyboard projected from his wristband.

So it seems like his floating chat box wasn't as special as he thought it was.

Another hologram emerged, this one showing what looked like an identification card.

"Ah, Master Candidate #48. Ritsuka Fujimaru, one of the public applicants. A third-generation Japanese American born in the United States of america. No magus lineage whatsoever… "

[The-Undefeatable:  Did—did that guy just doxx Gudao?  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Name reveal, LET'S GO! Now tell us his banking account information, funny hat man!  ]

[GroundHippowdon:  Bro, you ain't gonna find any cash there. Gudao or rather Ritsuka is poor as dirt.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  I know. I just want to wire money to him. He really needs it.  ]

[JigglyWiggly:  Its not gonna work. We've never been able to send money to Gudao.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem: I know, but its the thought that counts :> ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD): … what in the name of Arceus is that thing?!!! Σ(O_O) ]

[Gible_Archeologist :  ???   ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  @PsychicMoostache(MOD) U good?  ]

"Ah. Forgive my rudeness. I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Lev Lainur, and I am an assistant to the director of sorts. Nice to meet you." Lev extended a hand in greeting towards him.

"Nice to meet you as well."

Ritsuka shook the eccentric-looking man's hand with a firm grip.

"Hmm?" For some reason, the man's ever-present jovial smile was gone.

His eyes, which had been closed the whole time he had talked to him, suddenly opened to reveal cold, brown pupils focused to his left.

Ritsuka furrowed his brows, wondering why Lev got serious and scary all of a sudden.

Ritsuka followed his gaze.

It was chat's camera.

"Is something the matter, Mr. Lev?" Mash, seeing Lev abruptly stop talking, interjected with a question towards the man.

The man's smile returned, though it looked more like a smirk.

"No. It was just my imagination."

Wait, he can't see it?

Actually, now that he thought about it, Mash hasn't brought up the giant floating glass ball either. Or his chatbox.

Which means…

The sound of an alarm went off, cutting off Ritsuka's train of thought.

Lev looked at his watch and winced. "Oh dear, we must be going now or else the director will really be in a foul mood. Please join us Mr. Fujimaru; we can talk as we walk."

The man walked ahead; he and Mash glanced at each other before they followed after him.

Ritsuka, Mash, and Lev were walking through the corridors of Chaldea on their way towards the control room for the debriefing.

On the way, Gudao explained how he arrived at Chaldea, much to Lev and Mash's shock and horror.

"How peculiar. Our agents aren't usually that… violent when they are sent to retrieve our public applicants," Lev sounded apologetic, but Mash looked genuinely upset.

"Retrieve?! Senpai was assaulted and kidnapped from his home! That's not something you can make light of, Mr. Lev!"

Lev actually stopped and made a pleading gesture of apology. "You're right. I'm terribly sorry we kidnapped you, Mr. Fujimaru!"

[ JigglyWiggly: that's right You tell him Gurl!!  ]

[ HippityHoppip650: Shame him some more!!  ]

[ ShortShorts_QUEEN: wait, why is Gudao even following them like nothing happened?! He has every right to demand they send him home for abducting him and then sue them for their unlawful hiring practices!   ]

"Ah, it's ok. It's all in the past." Ritsuka told them without a hint of anger in his voice.

[ ShortShorts_QUEEN: EXCUSE YOU?!!!  ]

[ :shock emote ] × 100

[ :animated huh meowth emote:] ×1000

[MalasadaMayhem:  hold on! Let him cook.  ]

The duo looked perplexed by his answer, so he decided to clarify.

"I mean, sure, at the moment it was scary and stuff, but I'm still alive. You guys clearly had an urgent need for my help, and you couldn't wait for the morning. And seeing as how I'm now in Antarctica of all places, I might as well just stick around and see what you guys have to offer."

The duo stared at him in surprise, completely caught off guard by how blasé Ritsuka was after being kidnapped.

[MalasadaMayhem: facepalm I'm revoking your cooking license Gudao. ]

[ :facepalm emote ] x784

[ ShortShorts_QUEEN: You know what? I give up! Give me back my feelings of worry you stupid dunderhead!   ]

[:nodding emote] x1584

"Ah, but I would appreciate it if you had someone go confirm the state of my house. I didn't really have time to close the door before I got here, and I don't want to return to an empty, ransacked home."

What Lev did actually pissed him off a little. He laughed.

"Please take this seriously; I have a few expensive items in that house I don't want to find stolen."

"I apologize, Mr. Fujimaru; I was not laughing at your request. I was merely surprised and amused by your reaction. Rest assured, I will make sure to have a word with the American branch of our organization. You will find everything as you left it when you return."

"Well, in any case, we have arrived. Please follow me."

Ritsuka and his group had arrived in front of a door that had a very fancy letter "C" etched on its surface. The sliding doors opened, revealing a fancy, futuristic elevator. Its furthermost wall was made entirely of glass, so Ritsuka could clearly see the interior mechanisms that would normally be invisible on a normal elevator.

Ritsuka followed Lev and Mash towards the elevator, and the group of three went to the lower floor. Mash and Lev were having a private conversation, so he decided to tune them out as he browsed chat.

[GudakoBot: Stream goal reached!  Discrete chat has been UNLOCKED!  ]

[ Nice.  ]

[ Ooh, I wonder what discrete chat means.  ]

[ One on one private messaging with Gudao perhaps?  ]

[ Twitch already has that.  ]

[ Aw man, I wanted a new emote.  ]

[Forget the emotes. Gudao, Aren't you worried about your fam bro? ]

[His PC is his family too. ]

[Gudao: I really want to type something into chat, but it seems Mash and Lev can't see chat and the camera. I don't want them to think I'm a lunatic. ]

[Gudao: And my parents… meh I'll call them later. If anything, they would be glad I actually got a job for once. ]

[ Uh…  ]

[Gudao:  Wait, I didn't type that into chat… so why is it showing up here?!  ]

"Is something the matter, Senpai?" Mash asked with concern on her face.

"Sorry, it was nothing."

Mash didn't seem to believe him, but since she didn't know him very well, she didn't press him for more answers.

[ Dude. How did you do that?  ]

[Gudao:  Dunno. I just… thought about it and now my thoughts are comments.  ]

[Bro. That's freaking scary. ]

[Mighty1Oak:  Gudao, I know you are having an episode right now, but I would advise you notify your university of your absence as soon as possible to avoid any black marks on your record.  ]

[Gudao:  Oh. University… I completely forgot about that… right, kind of like how I forgot Mighty1Oak was Professor Oak. Of coarse he'd care deeply about education.  ] 

[Mighty1Oak:  I would make for a poor pokemon researcher if I didn't.  ]

[Gudao:  wait, how did you- oh right… mind reading… chatting… thing…  ] 

Ritsuka rubbed his eyes, which felt like they were starting to weigh heavier the longer time passed.

[ U ok?  ]

[@PsychicMoostache(MOD), we could use some psychic expertise here. ]

[ Speaking of Moostache, where is he? Did he go afk?  ]

[ idk. ]

Ritsuka yawned, his body still struggling to stay on his two feet after last night's event.

[Gudao:   ugh… how do I turn this off?! This is getting annoying!!  ]

[GudakoBot:  Disable Discrete chat? Think or say: YES / NO.  ]

[Gudao:  YES.  ]

Ritsuka said a few safe thoughts in his head to ensure this annoying feature was truly gone. To his relief, it was.

It was around this time when the elevator shaft disappeared, catching Ritsuka's attention.

He couldn't help but get closer to the glass wall and stare at the huge, blue room filled with giant, futuristic-looking constructs in front of him.

Reaching the bottom, Ritsuka followed after his temporary companions out of the elevator and towards another door, one similar to the one he saw earlier, but much larger.

The doors slid open, and the first thing that caught his eye was the rather complicated-looking globe with rings orbiting around it. In front of the construct was a large gathering of people sitting in fancy chairs that reminded him of a university classroom.

Lev directed him to sit in the back row, as all the seats were currently occupied by 47 other people, the other "Master Candidates," as Lev and Mash called them. He felt a little nervous seeing the entire room of people sending annoyed glares towards him.

The most intense glare, by far, was coming from a beautiful, white-haired young woman standing front and center of the assembled masters.

Her golden-amber eyes were boring holes in him, clearly offended that he had arrived late.

[GroundHippowdon: Well hello there. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)  ]

[IliekQTthings:  Cute Girl detected!! ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  Another potential love rival for @PerfectlySaneHex?!!  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: Ugh, I hope not… (¬`‸´¬) ]

The young woman's eyes shifted towards Lev and softened a bit. That only lasted for a moment as she refocused her attention back towards him.

"From now on. If I see any of you arrive late, I'll lock you outside and have security throw you into the ice and snow with the penguins."

Though it sounded like she was informing the whole group, in truth, it was a message meant solely for him. He nervously shook nodded in understanding.

The woman huffed dismissively before she returned to address the rest of the room.

"I am the director. Olga Marie Animusphere. Welcome to the Chaldea Security Organization."

"Before I begin the debriefing, I know some of you enjoyed taking advantage of what little status your family back in the Clocktower before arriving here. Some of you are likely excited to find out you are one of the Fourty-Eight special "chosen ones" that stand over the billions of other humans on this planet to become a master candidate.

Some of you may think that fact will give you authority to throw your weight around.

I am here to tell you that is not the case.

Chaldea is my lineage. My workshop.

And most importantly, it means that despite my young age and whatever abilities I do or don't have, I am in charge.

You are all tools. Precious tools, but tools nonetheless. And your purpose is to preserve and ensure humanity's survival."

The masters in the room erupted in whispers, a few concerned about being referred to as tools while others were incredulous at the audacity of her dehumanizing statement.

"Silence!"

The room quieted down.

"While it's true we need every precious master we can get our hands on, that doesn't mean we will take everyone.

If you have a problem with keeping your head down and following orders, you are more than welcome to leave, otherwise, my word is absolute. Insubordination will NOT be tolerated if you step out of line, master candidate rarity be damned."

[ShortShorts_QUEEN: Geez, what a bitch. ]

[Mighty1Oak:  While the lass's words are harsh, I can understand why she would say these things.

It must be hard to be the leader of an organization with a goal as ambitious as preserving humanity's future. So we should not judge a book by her, admittedly very rough, cover.  ]

[:Nods in approval emote :] x282

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  I still don't like her.  ]

[JigglyWiggly:  uh guys, Gudao is nodding off.  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  Of course he is.  ]

[Ranger75:  Uh oh. Maybe she won't notice?  ]

Gold eyes stared at the sleeping figure of Ritsuka in incredulity.

[Ranger75:  Nvm, she zeroed in right away  ]

Olga Marie was by Ritsuka's side in a heartbeat.

She loomed over him, her fingers moving with fury over her holographic keyboard on her wristband. Her frown deepened with disdain as she reviewed his information presented over the holographic display.

"Of course it had to be a public applicant," She glared at the peaceful, soft snores coming from Ritsuka.

Hearing him snore with a peaceful smile on his face made a visible vein appear on her temple. Unclenching her fist, she raised her arm as high as she could, then using every bit of her non-enhanced strength….

SMACK

She slapped him across the face with enough force that it echoed across the entire room.

Ritsuka abruptly woke up, his face marred by a red mark that matched the director's dainty but perfectly manicured hand.

"Agh! What?! Who?! Where?!"

[El_Kukui: whistles that wake up slap was super effective. ]

[SeeDotbyTheSea:  Bruh, look at Gudao's face lol.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem: Gudao's face looks like that of a man who got caught cheating on his wife with another woman. ]

[The-Undefeatable:  Ouch. I felt that. No seriously, my cheek is tingling rn.  ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  Geez, was that slap really necessary?!   ]

[KicksYouIntheFace193:  Slapping someone is the fastest way to get them awake. I should know, I own a Machamp.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: ( ◺˰◿ ) ]

"Kyrielight. Get this peasant out of my sight."

The disdain in her voice when she said 'peasant' was palpable.

[ShortShorts_QUEEN: And she's a classist too. Why am I not surprised? (◔_◔) ]

"Y-yes, director."

Mash looked at him with sympathy clearly visible on her face. "Come on, senpai."

Ritsuka stood up from his seat and followed his self-appointed kohai outside the room.

A dark silhouette of a young woman sat alone inside a dark room.

The harsh glow of a computer screen was the only light source illuminating the place.

The woman's hair was disheveled and was so long it could easily reach the back of her knees if she stood up.

In her arms she held a large, homemade plushie of Gudao, one she painstakingly made by hand and with love.

She was currently hugging the thing so tight to her ample chest that if it was alive, it would have suffocated due to its head being engulfed in her cleavage.

Her sunken eyes were currently filled with rage as she saw Gudao, her Gudao, hanging around another girl.

A pretty girl who wasn't her.

The flash of excitement she felt when the girl revealed that the supernatural world was a very real thing in Gudao's world wasn't enough to distract her from her burning feelings of jealousy.

Her gut twisted in envy when the screen focused on the light-colored-haired girl who had captivated her Gudao so.

Twirling a lock of her own hair, she stared at it in contemplation. Does Gudao prefer girls with short hair?

The sound of an automatic door sliding open brought her attention back to her beloved.

Her jaw slackened open in shock when she saw a fluffy, ponytail-haired man, slightly bent over in front of her screen.

The man stopped, his pants mid-leg, and stared at Gudao in horror. It was a small mercy that most of his butt was covered by the long coat he wore.

What the heck did that hussy lead Gudao into?

Chapter Text

Chaldean Usernames:

Gudao = Ritsuka Fujimaru, Gudao came from "Guda", which was what his baby cousin called him when she first learned to speak because she couldn't say "Ritsuka."

GudakoBot = The auto mod bot that is named after the moniker Ritsuka gave his baby cousin as a comeback to his nickname "Guda."

Frisky1ntheFlowers = Merlin, I forget what lore of FGO video it was, but again, kudos to OtakuDaikun for the username lol.

Named Pokemon NPC Usernames (links are to bulbapedia, you don't have to click em if you don't want to. Highlight + right click + search is your friend): 

Don'tTouchMyBuns! = Rosa (Female player character from B2W2). She doesn't like it when you do. Careful. Her mons became VERY protective of her after the events of B2W2, so don't try it.

DragoonRuleZ = Claire Ibuki, Blackthorn Gym Leader

Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD) = Iono (SV Electric Type Gym Leader). Some of her fans have been complaining that she's been having too many "collabs" with Gudao as of late. There are even some rumors that she has a crush on him and is in a three way love triangle with PerfectlySaneHex, but in truth she's just the unofficial mom of chat.

Also, she's addicted to his content.

El_Kukui = Professor Kukui from SM and USUM. Alola's pokemon professor who specializes in pokemon moves.

Ecruteak_Gal = Kuni the Kimono Girl from the games. She owns a male Vaporeon that she loves very dearly. The day the Pokémon world was graced with THE VAPOREON COPYPASTA MEME, she went to the top of Bell Tower and screamed to the heavens her vow to never forgive the Anon who posted that meme on 4chan.

Gible_Archeologist = Cynthia, The Champion of Sinnoh

Heart-of6old = Ethan Gold (Player character from GSC/HGSS, name is a mashup of two default names for PC).

KicksYouIntheFace193 = Bea (Galar Gym Leader from Sword and Shield).

MalasadaMayhem = Hau from SM & USUM, hanging around the player character from SM and USUM has eroded away his naivete and cheerful rival personality. He has gotten used to being poked fun at, not being treated seriously, and sarcasm. Hau is infamous for loving Malasada, to the point he could be seen as a worthy rival to Beni from Legends Arceus and his love for his Potato Mochi.

Mighty1Oak = Professor "You can't ride your bike indoors" Oak 

PerfectlySaneHex =  Helena, a Composite Hex Maniac from XY, Pokemon Masters and some doujins.

PsychicMoostache(MOD) = Sabrina's Elite level Alakazam, who is also her starter.

He is happily married(with offspring) to one of Sabrina's Gardevoirs who doesn't like battling.

ShortShorts_QUEEN = Hilda (Female player character BW). She is a proud member of the Comfy Shorts Club.

__Red__  = "…" Need I say more? Apparently yes I do, because Red exists in the story, Ash cannot. They have a platonic Curse of Separation thing going on(they can't be in the same plane of existence together). He's the former Champion of Indigo, and is still seen by many as THE strongest champion in Indigo's history. The only reason he stepped down was because of a lack of challengers aside from Lance, and he also got tired of being around cameras and fucked off to train in the wilds among the Alpha pokemon surrounding lands in between regions. He prefers to communicate via emotes-only in chat but they are almost exclusively all Ash ketchum/ pokemon anime related in some way. There's no shortage of them in Gudao's channel so he takes full advantage of it.

The-Undefeatable = Leon from SWSH, Champion of Galar and a major Charizard SIMP.

Top-Hat-PSY = Avery from Pokemon Sword and Shield Isle of Iron DLC. He is a psychic, but not really good at it compared to his family or other psychic trainers. Honestly, looking at his info, his family and backstory make him the closest thing the pokemon world has to a Magus in canon. A third rate Magus from a long lineage of magi, but still a magus, but nicer and less... well, nasu.

OC character Usernames (AKA NPCs)

Fyre&Flamez = OC Fire type specialist

GroundHippowdon = OC from Sinnoh

Guy_1n_Desert = NPC(undecided region but as his name suggests, he lives in a desert. Orre maybe?)

HippityHoppip650 = Celadon Gym Trainer

It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu = A guy who watched one of Gudao's clips on pokemon world's youtube and saw the "IT'S PIKACHU" meme and decided to make that his entire personality when he signed up for twitch.

IliekQTthings = A petite Fairy Type Girl trainer class OC in her mid-twenties. She never outgrew her adoration of the cute things as a child and to this day still dresses up like she did when she was 10.

JigglyWiggly = OC from Johto, I might have accidentally yoinked this username from another fic. I forgot the name, but I will update when I find it.

Junior_Researcher = Scientist Trainer Class from Kanto. If you haven't been paying attention, he doesn't believe in legendaries. He has spent much of his time with his face glued to a computer screen or a book to bother with going on twitch and social media until recently.

Ranger75 = OC pokemon ranger(undecided region). He is one of Ritsuka's more infrequent chatters due to his shoddy internet connection. Well, at least used to. Gudao is now his only reliable form of entertainment due to him being in the wilds and his stream is the only thing Ranger can watch without seeing a loading bar.

SeeDotbyTheSea  = OC from Hoenn, specifically from Petalburg city.

Cameo Usernames that reference other fanfic characters

IronMunchkin = reference to Vicky Ferrous from Pokemon Trainer Vicky by Seras.

Chapter Text

"Will you leave Chaldea?" Mash, the girl he had met earlier, asked Ritsuka. She was currently escorting him to his room after Olga kicked him out of the briefing.

Ritsuka took a moment to gather his thoughts; thanks to his livestream, he knew that trips to Antarctica were logistically challenging. It could be days, weeks, or even months before the next shipment of supplies arrives and could take him back home.

"I haven't decided yet."

[ShortShorts_QUEEN: What do you mean you haven't decided yet?! ]

[Dude, they assaulted you, kidnapped you, sent you to one of the poles of your planet, called you a FUCKING TOOL, and then they had the gall to reject you for being tired and jetlagged?!! Fuck these guys! Go home! ]

"Hmm, well, if you do decide to stay, you might still get a chance to help after the first mission." Ritsuka looked at Mash and noticed her eyes were a bit less dull than when they first met.

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  Again. Why should he!?  ]

[[IliekQTthings: Gudao! For the love of all cute things in this world, LISTEN TO US. You don't owe these people anything! Go home! ]

[ Gudao go home.  ]x 5660

[#GudaoGoHome. Let's make it trend, people!! ]

"I hope so; while I don't know how you guys will accomplish the grand mission of 'preserving humanity's future," I'd still feel like a bum if I didn't help out in some way. Even if it means I have to be a janitor and clean some toilets while on my stay, then I will do it."

"You don't need to do that, senpai; you are still hired as a Master Candidate, so putting you to work as mere labor will be a waste."

Ritsuka released a sigh of dejection. "Man, there go my hopes and dreams of taking over Chaldea by becoming its head janitor. Oh well. Guess I'll have to climb the ranks the boring way."

Mash was taken aback by his words, then she couldn't hold back a giggle. "Pfft… what even is that? You can't become Director of Chaldea by cleaning toilets."

Seeing Mash smile and laugh at his antics made Ritsuka's stomach flutter. He felt his face getting warm, like he had a fever, but he didn't feel discomfort.

This was nice.

"You look really cute when you smile, Mash." Ritsuka told Mash with genuine sincerity in his voice. Mash, once again caught off guard by his words, suddenly looked away from him.

[ Oh wow, get a room, you two.  ]

[ I mean, that IS where they are headed.  ]

[ Oh right… say, you don't think they'll actually… you know?  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  SHE BETTER NOT THAT'S MY MAN!!  ]

[ Hex, I don't really think it's a thing we will have, or should have, any control over. Though, I am a bit worried about Gudao's privacy. In the past, he could just stand up and walk to the bathroom while we waited for him to come back, but now… the camera is following him everywhere he goes…  ]

[ I like Gudao, but I don't think I can look at him the same way if we saw him taking a poop on the toilet or when he has to take a shower, which would require him to remove his clothes.  ]

[Yeah, we got lucky with Romani's incident, as his lab coat covered most of his butt, but full-on nude Gudao in the shower with his junk hanging out for ALL of us to see? Yeah… Twitch mods are not going to be happy if they see that happen. ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  O//// v ////O ]

[ Or when he inevitably ends up Cu-Boning Mash.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: (ಠ益ಠ) ]

[ Oh yeah, there's no saving Gudao from the ban hammer if he and Mash decide to spend the night at the daycare couple's house and the camera doesn't fade to black. Not that I'd blame him. Mash is rather gorgeous, and she seems to have a mutual affection towards him. Its not a matter of IF but WHEN, that is especially the case the longer Gudao stays in Chaldea.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: Gudao… Please go home ╥﹏╥ ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  Well, you know what they say, you can't spell Smash without Mash.  ]

[KicksYouIntheFace193: @Frisky1ntheFlowers you stole my line. (ಠ_ಠ )]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  you are 10,000 years too young to beat me in the ancient art of making crude innuendos towards and about innocent maidens.  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  you're on thin ice @Frisky1ntheFlowers  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers: psshh, I've been a professional thin ice skater for most of my life. I can even give you a private little show if you want to Iono-chan. ♡~(・ω< ✿) ]

<  message deleted by moderator  >

[ Frisky1ntheFlowers has been timed out for 3 hours.  ]

[IliekQTthings: :Vomit emoji: ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  Ugh. Gross. In your dreams.  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  Alright Iono chan, it's a date then ~  ]

[O_O ]x100

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): @Frisky1ntheFlowers  Wha the? Frisk?!! I timed you out!!   ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  come now Iono-chan, Frisk isn't a very cute pet name. Mi amor.  ]

<  message deleted by moderator  >

[ Frisky1ntheFlowers has been timed out for 9 hours.  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  Gonna have to try better than that.  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): PUTA MADRE!!! (╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻ ]

[ Oh no.  ]

[ Iono is cursing in paldean!! Everyone run for your lives!!!  ]

[IliekQTthings:  don't give up Iono!!! BAN THE MOTHERFUCKER!!   ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  I'M BRINGING OUT THE TINKATON HAMMER!!

█▬▬ ＼(｀0´)／] 

[Frisky1ntheFlowers: ꒰ঌ(˶ˆᗜˆ˵)໒꒱ ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers has been banned. ]

[ Is he gone?  ]

[ I think so.  ]

[IliekQTthings:  hip hip horray!!  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  hip hip horray!!  ]

[ hip hip horray!!  ] x390

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  hip hip horray!!  ]

[ Oh no… he's back.  ]

[ Bro… wtf…  ]

[IliekQTthings:  WHY WON'T YOU JUST DIE?!!!!  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  Wha… but… HOW?!!  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  Magic.       

 ∧＿∧

(｡･ω･｡)つ━☆・*。]

[IliekQTthings:  IMPOSSIBRU!!  ]

[The-Undefeatable:  Is there a way to learn this power?  ]

[Junior_Researcher: *eye rolls* Is the internet filled with nothing but charlatans? Magic isn't real! This guy somehow hacked Twitch and can undo timeouts and bans. ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  Do you guys… not know?  ]

[Ecruteak_Gal: I Swear to Arceus, if you mention Vaporeon IN ANY WAY in your next comment. I swear I WILL FIND A WAY TO TRAVERSE SPACETIME AND STRANGLE YPIU!! ]

[ Yikes. Ecruteak_Gal made an obviously jarring spelling error and didn't immediately correct herself.  ]

[ If you value your life, stop dancing around the subject and get to the point ASAP Frisk.  ]

 ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  Sorry but, I'm too lazy to type out the specifics, so I'll let Mash do the honors. ]

[ ???  ]

"Wait… Magic is real?!"

Mash looked to Ritsuka, her eyelids slightly touching her forehead, exposing the surprise in her eyes.

"Do you really not know, senpai?"

[Ecruteak_Gal: Oh come on Mash! Not you too. ಥ╭╮ಥ  ]

Ritsuka scratched the back of his head.

"I never got the pamphlet."

Mash gained a pensive look on her face before she came to a realization, "Oh… that's right. I forgot you were a public applicant. Of course you wouldn't be familiar with the moonlit world."

Mash started to fidget with her fingers. "But, I don't think we have enough time to cover the intricacies of how the mystical side of the world works in our walk, so I will have to give you the SparkNotes version of it, if that's ok with you, senpai."

[Is she being serious? ]

[ She's got to be pulling our leg isn't she? I mean, magic can't really be real… can it?  ]

[I don't know… Gudao was adamant when he claimed pokemon were not native to his world. Yet he was caught completely offguard when we met Fou for the first time. His world clearly has more stuff going on in the background than it seems, so I'm willing to believe. ]

"Sure. Go ahead, I'm all ears." So far she has been really nice and helpful towards him when he has no idea what he's doing, so she gained enough of his trust to hear her out.

"Very well, so… to start, the correct term is not magic, but rather magecraft. True Magic is a completely separate thing."

Suddenly, Mash's tone of voice became much more serious. Her lips pressed in what seemed like worry. "Incidentally, senpai, please refrain from using magic and magecraft interchangeably while roaming the halls of Chaldea."

He raised an inquisitive brow at her statement, "And why is that?"

"Most, if not all the older noble families of mages are sticklers for terminology; a lot of them would take offense to your ignorance."

He searched her face; seeing the genuine concern and seriousness in her voice stopped him from making light of the situation. He gave her a nod. "I got it. I'll be careful."

Mash sighed in relief, then she straightened her back, her steps a bit more confident as she raised a finger in a pose that reminded him of one of his high school teachers.

"In any case, Magecraft. In simple layman's terms, it is the ability for a person to recreate science via supernatural means."

"I see…"

[That makes no sense! ]

His vague answer didn't trip Mash up as she decided to try a different approach. "Are you familiar with the scientific method, Senpai?"

"Oh yeah, I remember." How could he forget? He has been dealing with scientists badgering him about details of his world for years now.

"If I recall correctly, the scientific method is a method of procedure that allows scientists to understand the universe by following a set of steps." Ritsuka showed Mash his closed hand and, one by one, began to list off the steps that came to him by unfurling his fingers.

"Ask a question, develop a hypothesis or prediction, test the prediction, analyze the results, and record the results for and against the hypothesis. If the results do not align with the hypothesis, you form a new hypothesis and restart the experiment, rinse and repeat, and finally you can come to a conclusion."

[Mighty1Oak:  Correct, although the method can be modified depending on the chosen field of science one decides to pursue.  ]

Mash blinked in surprise at Ritsuka, completely taken aback by the detailed response. He felt a sting of pain in his heart seeing Mash look at him this way.

Ritsuka scratched his head. "Erm… So how does this relate to magecraft again?"

His question brought Mash back to her senses. "Ah, right! Apologies for my rudeness, senpai. Yes, you are correct. Now, while magecraft works similarly, the key difference that separates science from magecraft is that magecraft allows its practitioners to skip or outright ignore the steps scientists need to come to the same conclusion."

[ B-but how?!!  ]

[Huh? ] / [What? ] x17,394

[Junior_Researcher:   Lol. That was such a funny joke! For a second there I thought you were being serious.  ]

"In order for Magecraft to achieve these conclusions, it utilizes a fundamental rule of our universe that we call Mystery to fill in the gaps. And when I say mystery, I mean what I said. Mystery holds meaning because it's a mystery. If you come to understand it, it's no longer a mystery."

[IliekQTthings: Mash-tan is so cute when she goes into tutor mode. ]

[ My head hurts… ]

[Junior_Researcher:  Wait… you're serious? Cheh, and here I was thinking you'd say something intelligent. You're nothing but a fraud polluting our beautiful world of facts and logic with falsehoods!  ]

"Take the spell Gradiation Air for example: it's a type of magecraft that, by using magical energy to fuel the spell, allows a user to materialize an object from nothing by purely using their imagination."

[Junior_Researcher:  TAUROS SHIT!  ]

"I wish I could show you a physical example, but I can't really use any spells at the moment."

[Junior_Researcher: Excuses. Nothing but excuses! It's always the same story with you so-called magicians! ]

[Dude… Chill… ]

"It's alright Mash, you don't have to push yourself for my sake. I'm ok with just explanations."

[Junior_Researcher:  Well I'm not!  ]

[This Researcher guy is really starting to piss me off. ]

[Top-Hat-PSY: @Junior_Researcher Stop being a stick in the mud and just accept the magic!! ]

[Junior_Researcher:  NEVER!!  ]

[MalasadaMayhem: @ Top-Hat-PSY The dude has lived under a rock the past 3 years and barely joined our community yesterday, just let him live in denial, trust me, it's not worth the energy. ]

"So if you want to, say, create a wooden statue, a magecraft practitioner only needs to visualize the image of what they want, then channel their magical energy and project a copy of the image in their head as a physical object into the real world.

Ritsuka widened his brows in disbelief, "How is that not considered magic?!"

"Because, you can also create the same statue using a block of wood, a hammer and chisel and some arts and crafts knowledge."

[Mighty1Oak:  Ah, I see. So that must mean Magic, Apologies, True Magic, is the power to recreate phenomena which is impossible to replicate through mundane means. Simply Fascinating.  ]

[Junior_Researcher: Professor Oak. Please do not tell me you believe this Emboar-wash D: ]

[Mighty1Oak:  Mr. Junior Researcher, as someone who studies science, you should always keep an open mind to the possibilities of the multiverse. If you close yourself off, you will only stagnate and regress as a researcher rather than bring out your full potential as a scientist.  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  I.. But…   ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Yes! Finally someone managed to humble him! Thank you professor!  ]

[Mighty1Oak:  Hold your horses bucko, I didn't say we should accept everything young Mash has been presenting us at face value. This kind of revelation is still barely a few minutes old to our world, a far cry from the amount of experiments and testing such claims need to be verified and understood… if what she is claiming is real.  ]

[ But didn't she say that not understanding this stuff is what allows it to work?  ]

[Mighty1Oak:  Hmm… that is quite the dilemma…  Well, let's hear her out a bit more, this is another world after all. For all we know, the moon could actually be made of cheese here!  ]

"Another thing to note senpai, projections like the statue we talked about are seen as an inconsistency by the natural world, Thus the world will erase it after a certain amount of time has passed. So if you want the projection to last longer, you need to have a more vivid imagination and visualization before you project the image."

"So if I got this right, I can make an item spawn from my imagination, and after a while it will go poof after its timer hits zero?"

For the first time since the lecture started, Mash looked confused. After a moment of silence she responded, "In very, very simple terms, yes senpai, the items go poof."

"Huh. Cool. "

"Yes it is. Now, in order to use magecraft, you must have these things called Magic Circuits. They are metaphysical organs that come from the soul and connect the spiritual and the physical realm, in other words, your body. And you're in luck, I can actually show physical proof of what I am saying."

Mash pulled up her sleeve, exposing pale, but silky smooth skin.

[ What is she doing?  ]

Suddenly, intricate glowing blue patterns that resembled computer circuits climbed up from her elbow up until they reached the tip of her fingers.

"Woah…"

[ (⚆ᗝ⚆) ] x1,825

[ Souls are REAL?!!!  ]

[ I KNEW IT!  ]

[Mighty1Oak:  Remarkable!! Simply remarkable!!  ]

[ @Junior_Researcher Try and explain that with your science!  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  Obviously, it means that, if what she claims about "magecraft" holds water, then Earth and our world discovered the same or a similar type of energy, but are referring to it using different terminologies. Like Mash has shown, these "magicians" have adapted a means to channel their equivalent to Type Energy through the special organs in their bodies similar to pokemon, to perform their special moves. However, that doesn't mean it's connected to the soul like she claims. 

The existence of souls has always been a controversial subject, and the consensus among the scientific community is split half and half on the likelihood of them existing. I sit on the nonbelievers side btw.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Don't worry, we believe you.  ]

[ Then what about ghost typez?!  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  I'm not your preschool teacher, go look it up yourself.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  It's like talking to a brick wall I swear.  ]

Completely unaware of the arguments in chat, Mash continued her lecture, "A practitioner of Magecraft is known as a magus, magi is the plural term. There are also various other classifications that are used to identify what most mundane people inaccurately refer to as 'Wizards' or 'magicians.' Again. For your own safety please do not use these terms loosely senpai."

Ritsuka was a bit transfixed by the sight, but he quickly responded in affirmation.

Slowly, the glowing magic circuits went back down her elbow. Mash let out a sigh of relief.

"By the way, how come I haven't heard of this stuff before?" Ritsuka asked, a wonder and excitement in his voice.

"To expand upon my previous crude explanation of Mystery, the more science understands the natural world, the more mystery declines and the weaker magecraft becomes. The same principle applies to normal people learning about magecraft as well.

If too many people learn about the supernatural, then performing magecraft will become difficult, and in the worst case scenario, it will be rendered useless."

[ Wait, there are over 50,000 people watching right now, does that mean that now that we know it exists… does that mean we just killed magecraft?  ]

[Oops? ]

[That's too bad. It looked really cool. ]

[ That is a very glaring weakness. How were they able to prevent security cameras and normal everyday people from taking out their phones to record them doing their magic?  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers:  There's no need to worry, you people don't count. You're all foreigners whose only influence in our World Line is via Gudao. So long as you guys behave and don't cause any trouble, all should be well.  ]

[ ???  ]

[ How do you know these things Frisk?  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers: @ The-Undefeatable Not from a Twitch mod. ]

[The-Undefeatable:  ??? Oh, I see what you mean. Why did you take this long to respond to me?  ]

[@Frisky1ntheFlowers Don't ignore me asshole!  ]

"To prevent the decline of magecraft, various magi families in the past formed organizations like the Clocktower in London to ensure the secrecy of magecraft as an art to maintain it, by any means necessary. "

"Oh."

"Yes oh, which is why you need to be careful who you talk to about the moonlit world senpai. To be a magus is to walk with death, you'd be dragging innocent people into danger for trying to reveal these secrets."

[That's blatant Evil Team territory. ]

[ Now the matching uniforms and the fancy  letter "C" they have plastered everywhere make sense.  ]

[Did Gudao join a Magical Evil Team?!! D: ]

[ Gudao has fallen to the dark side…  ]

[Good thing they deemed him worthless eh? He can avoid getting dragged into their misconduct and live out his normal life in piece. ]

[ *peace  ]

[Yeah… but that will only happen if he decides to go home. And seeing how infatuated he is with Mash… I don't think that's gonna happen anytime soon. ]

"Don't worry Mash, you can count on me!"

Mash nods at him then smiles, "While I would love to continue the lesson, we are out of time. Your room is just around the corner so that will be all for today. "

[ Huh, that was quick.  ]

[No wait! I must know more! ]

[ Hmmm, I still don't get it but the trick she did was really cool!  ]

[ Geez. And this is just a simple explanation. Just how complicated is this magecraft stuff anyway?  ]

"Well in that case Mash, thank you so much for explaining this stuff to me. I really appreciate it."

"N-no it was nothing. While I received a formal education in all forms of magecraft, I still pale in comparison as a tutor.  "

[Mighty1Oak:  Do not worry young Mash. You did a wonderful job of explaining a complex topic in the limited time you had.  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  But professor, we can't verify if what she is saying is true or not.  ]

[Mighty1Oak:  Regardless, she was clear and confident in her presentation of what she could. That is a merit all on its own. Be sure to let her know Gudao, the ladies love when you give genuine compliments. ]

"Don't say that. You did well. "

Mash's cheeks redden in embarrassment and she looked away from him again, "T-thank you senpai… "

Mash for some unknown reason, abruptly stopped walking. Ritsuka stopped a little ahead of her, then when he saw her looking out the window, he followed her gaze to see what could have drawn her attention away.

 He furrowed his brows when all he saw was the raging snowstorm outside.

"Everything ok Mash?"

Mash didn't respond to him at first, due to how transfixed she was but after a moment, she gave a response.

"You can't see the sky from here. "

He couldn't help but blink his eyes in confusion at her statement. This was not something he had been expecting from Mash, but he decided to just roll with it.

"Hmm, well, we are stationed in Antarctica. Snow storms are rather common here, so I guess it would be hard to see the blue sky at all over here. "

"Hn… " Mash barely paid him any mind as she stared longingly at the cloudy, snowy sky.

[ Is she ok?  ]

[ Dunno.  ]

[ She kind of reminds me of my mom's Furfrou whenever she goes on a long vacation.  ]

"Ah. I'm so sorry Senpai! I got lost in my thoughts! I'll take you to your room!! " the girl said while bowing her head in apology. Wait… why is she bowing her head like she is japanese?

Putting those thoughts aside, he said, "It's ok. Just lead the way. "

"Would you like another pocky?"

Ritsuka looked down at the offered box that the fluffy-looking doctor, Romani Archaman, was offering to him. There weren't many sticks left in the box, and Ritsuka, being who he was, did not want to take advantage of the man's generosity since he already ate a few.

"Thanks, Doctor, but I'm good for now."

Romani shrugged, completely unbothered by his refusal, "Suit yourself. More for me~" He took out a stick from the box, took a bite of the chocolate end, then took a sip of his drink.

Romani let out a satisfied exhale that strongly smelled of coffee.

It's hard to believe that he was pleasantly hanging out with a man who he had literally caught with his pants down just a short while ago.

Life is strange sometimes.

Anyway, Romani had mentioned that he had also been kicked out of the briefing by Olga. With nowhere else to go, he had decided to crash here, in his room, because it had been unoccupied for so long until he arrived.

Currently, they were having a serious discussion about a very important subject.

"Anyways, you were saying?" Ritsuka asked, leaning a bit into his chair.

"Hmmm? Oh, right. Ugh, it's so annoying! I know it's called "Infinite Tsukuyomi, but can't Toei just get started on canon already?!" Romani complained to him, not that he blamed him since it was a valid point he had made.

"Yeah, it has been a while since Filler Hell started. Personally, if I were you, I'd just give in and read the manga already. You might not live long enough to see the end of the anime." Ritsuka was being completely serious.

"And as I said, I already do a lot of reading at work! I much prefer watching the anime with cool visuals, music and sound effects over reading a book! But it sucks since I am at the mercy of the greed of anime companies wanting to make bank on stretching out the story beyond what is necessary."

For those wondering, yes, they were discussing Naruto filler arcs. The reason why they were even in this topic of conversation was because Ritsuka had asked Romani about where the people who dropped him off had left his original clothes. The company uniform was nice, but that Madara Uchiha shirt was his favorite!

Romani understood how he felt and told him that his old clothes should have been washed, dried, and hung in the closet provided in his room. Sure enough, when he opened his closet, he was met with the sight of his trusty old shirt. What surprised him, however, was that it no longer faded or felt old; in fact, it looked exactly like when he had just bought it from Hot Topic years ago.

It was then that Romani noticed his awesome shirt design and recognized the character on the front of the shirt. He looked excited to see it and started fanboying about how cool the character, Madara Uchiha, was.

From there they just started to go into a lengthy discussion about Naruto.

Chat, unfortunately, could not follow their conversation since he never bothered to show Naruto to them aside from clips. Currently, Naruto Shippuden is in its 20th season. The original Naruto anime has 154 episodes, while Shippuden has more than double that number of episodes long. He was NOT going to subject chat to marathoning Naruto from part 1 all the way to up to the current episode of Shippuden.

While it was tempting to see what their reactions to various concepts from the show, he doesn't want to ruin the experience of Naruto for them if the time came when their worlds fully connect like some people were predicting.

He had made a lengthy checklist of what earth shows, movies and anime he would show the pokemon world on stream, but there was honestly too much to cover and so little time to cover it. Showing any full-length shōnen anime would actually be detrimental to his stream's goal to educate the masses about his world. It also didn't help that Naruto loved to mix filler with canon, so he would be forced to watch stuff he didn't like and it would kill Chat's enjoyment.

Shorter anime series and cartoons were his go-to. He could cover so much more ground in terms of earth culture that way, but he always tried his best to reserve the best of the best just for chat.

He felt a paw hit his cheek, and his hand automatically went to pet Fou's fluffy ears again.

Oh yeah, apparently Fou knows teleport.

Chat had freaked out about that fact when they saw Fou just appear on his shoulder during his and Romani's Dub vs. Sub debate.

Ritsuka had not been paying much attention to chat, as he genuinely found a friend in Romani and really liked having some familiarity after the ordeal he had just gone through.

He still occasionally checked Chat to make sure they were behaving. He was rather surprised that chat was still debating about whether Fou was a psychic type, a dual type, or if he was not a psychic type at all and could just learn psychic-type moves.

He took a moment to look at the clock on the wall. Oh wow, they've been at it for half an hour. Fou really is popular, isn't he?

"Are you listening, Ritsuka?"

"Oh, sorry, Romani, got distracted by the floof."

Romani sighed, "Actually, I apologize. I went on a bit of a rant there. We just met, and you have been very accommodating towards me. Let's change the subject, shall we? Do you like anything else besides Naruto? Any games?"

"Hmm," Ritsuka took a moment to ponder; he was starting to feel bad for leaving Chat out of their conversation. So to make sure they won't get bored just sitting and watching him talk anime with a fellow fan, he said the one thing that he knew would attract his viewer's attention like bees to a pot of honey: "Well, I like Pokémon."

Hearing his response, Romani's smile widened in childlike wonder and nostalgia.

"Woah, really?!! You're a fan of Pokémon too? Nice. So, who's your favorite Pokémon?"

Chat, after having ignored their conversation for the past 20 minutes, finally decided to become engaged in what they were saying once Pokémon got involved.

All according to keikaku.

[It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu: It's Pikachu ]

[We know. ]

[Romani was asking Gudao @It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu. Not you. ]

"Vanillite." And suddenly, the good mood of the conversation soured as he saw the disgust in Romani's face.

It was at this moment, Ritsuka realized he probably should have lied.

"Seriously? Why?"

[Gible_Archeologist: *narrows eyes* What is THAT supposed to mean? ]

Ritsuka was actually a bit offended at his statement but held himself back from making a snappy comment at him.

"It's cute. And I like his little stubby ice nubs".

"It's an ice cream cone, Ritsuka."

[ I don't think I like this guy anymore.  ]

"Well, who's your favorite Pokémon, then?"

"Charizard. You can never go wrong with the OG. It's much cooler than some ice cream cone. "

[The-Undefeatable:  Ey! A fellow Charizard fan!  ]

[Gible_Archeologist: @ The-Undefeatable >:( ]

[The-Undefeatable:  Oh uh, I mean, it's so cool you like charizard but you shouldn't put down other pokemon for it.  ]

Ritsuka made a face, "its not very nice to talk smack about someone's favorite pokemon to their face Romani. "

Romani scratched his fluffy hair, "Hmm, I suppose you are right. Sorry. "

Ritsuka sighed, "apology accepted now-"

"At least it's not Trubbish."

[ShortShorts_QUEEN: Hey! Leave Mr. Trubbs alone!! ]

[Gible_Archeologist: Yeah!! He did nothing wrong! He just wants to teach the boys and girls of the world to love all Pokémon no matter what they look or smell like!! ]

Oh right, Mr. Trubb and friends. He had forgotten that was a popular kids show in their world. From what chat mentioned, it sounded like a mishmash of Sesame Street, Barney and Mr. Rodger's neighborhood, and it was equally iconic in its own right in the Pokémon world.

Seeing his chat suddenly turn into a hornet's nest, he tried his best to defuse the situation, "C-come on, Trubbish isn't that bad. "

Romani gave him a flat look of disappointment. "Ritsuka, I am really enjoying our budding friendship, so please do not nip it by defending the literal bag of garbage as good game character design."

Dammit, he's got a point.

[Arg!!! I wanna be mad at him but I keep forgetting people in Gudao's world don't see pokemon as real!! ]

[For someone who complains a lot about being bullied, he sure likes to bulli things doesn't he? ]

Before Romani could continue to piss off chat any longer, their conversation is interrupted by ringing on Romani's wristband.

"Excuse me Ritsuka, I have to take this. " He pushed a few buttons and the holographic image popped out of his band. Ritsuka has seen this tech used a few times, but he can never get over how cool it looked.

The familiar voice of Lev Lainur came on,

《Romani. We're going to start the Rayshift soon. Your presence is needed.

The A Team's in perfect condition, but B team on down is less experienced and they are displaying some slight abnormalities, likely anxiety. 》

"Hey Lev, I'll be right over, just give me a minute."

《Yeah, hurry up, will you? If you're in the infirmary, then you can get here in two minutes.》

[IliekQTthings:  snitch on the Trubbs hater Gudao!  ]

 "This isn't the infirmary, is it?"

"Whoa… " he looked at Ritsuka while placing a finger on his lips, "Please don't mention that… It's going to take five minutes from here no matter what… Well, I think they'll forgive me for being a little late. A team has no issues anyway. "

[0ffDoodyJoy: Honestly, how did this man even graduate Medical school with such a bad work ethic?!  ]

[ That guy… Gudao, can we really trust that Lev Lainur guy?  ]

[Gudao:  What do you mean?  ]

[ That Lev is giving me bad vibes… I don't know how to describe it but he feels… unnatural.  ]

[Gudao: ok…? I'll ask. ]

[ Just be careful… ask in a roundabout way to not draw suspicion.  ]

"Hey, uh, Romani? That guy, Lev Lainur was it, who is he? I don't think I had the chance to ask last time I saw him."

"Lev? Oh, he's the mage who helped the founder of our organization by creating the Near-Future Observation Lens, Sheba. It's a telescope used to observe that pseudo-planet, Chaldeas. "

[ Oh great, more new words that we have no idea what they mean.  ]

Seeing the constipated expression on Ritsuka's face caused Romani to let out a nervous chuckle, "looks like you really have no idea huh? Don't worry, I'll be sure to have someone bring you some books to read about our side of the world at your leisure. Trust me, the longer you go without understanding this stuff, the more confused and vulnerable you will be to the few bad actors who prowl these halls. "

[Scary. ]

[So Chaldea is an Evil team theory confirmed then? ]

[ Not yet. We still don't know if they like to steal people's pokemon in this world. So we will have to wait and see.  ]

"Well, long story short, It's pointless for an ordinary doctor like me to be with them, but if I'm summoned I must go. " Romani got up from Ritsuka's bed.

"Thanks for chatting with me, Ritsuka! When you get settled in, come by the infirmary. Next time I'll treat you to a yummy cake."

Ritsuka blinked, now there was darkness, the only thing Ritsuka could see was the glowing square of his chatbox and the camera floating nearby.

[ Who turned out the lights?!! ]

[ Power outage? ]

[ The storm likely took down something important.  ]

"What's this? The lights are out. Did something-"

A loud explosion knocks both Romani and Ritsuka off their feet and into the ground.

The dark room became illuminated in an ominous red glow, while an alarm blared at full volume.

What the hell was happening?!

New Chat members shown in chapter:

0ffDoodyJoy: If its wasn't obvious, this is an off duty pokemon nurse from the Joy Clan.

Chapter Text

Chaldea was in chaos.

One moment everything was fine, and then the next, an explosion knocked out the power, and alarms started ringing all over the place.

Ritsuka's chest burned as he pushed himself to run as fast as he could to the control room. Alongside him was Romani, who was equally desperate to reach the same location. Ritsuka was running slightly behind him, as he was still new to Chaldea, and he could not remember the exact location of the control room.

In his peripheral vision, he could see chat was scrolling at a breakneck speed, but he barely acknowledged them because now wasn't the best time for distractions.

Mash.

She was in the control room, the same room that had exploded and caused the power outage.

Part of him wondered if she had survived at all, but a feeling tugging at the back of his head was screaming at him to see if she was okay.

He felt that if he chose to accept the evacuation orders like Romani advised him, then he would come to regret it for the rest of his life.

He needed to see her.

[ So remind me again, why is Gudao ignoring the evacuation orders and running TOWARDS the danger?  ]

[Don'tTouchMyBuns!:  Because, he's a reckless idiot.  ]

[ Worse. He's a reckless idiot in love.  ]

[ I really hope Mash is Ok.  ]

Finally, after what seemed like hours of running, they stopped in front of the door that led to the control room. Even at this distance, he could feel the heat emanating from the metal slabs in front of him.

Romani winced as he got closer to the door, the heat causing a trickle of sweat to pour down his temple.

The automatic doors opened, and a wall of intense heat slammed into their faces.

The once pristine, sci-fi environment now lay in ruins, its calm blue coloring now engulfed in red-hot fire.

"Shit. Stay here, Ritsuka; I have to go check for survivors!"

Romani takes some time to inspect the various bodies strewn around them.

[Horses-R-Lame:  what in the name of Arceus is going on here?!!  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  Oh shit its Horse!  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  erm… i mean… Nothing to see here, officer.  ]

[Horses-R-Lame: 

Iono, I stepped out for less than 10 minutes to take a pee break and now there are sirens blaring at full volume!   ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  I uh… you see… this is uh…  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  dammit! I can't do it!! @Moostache!! Where are you?! HALP!!!   ]

[ @Moostache!!   ] x100

[ Seriously!! Where the heck is he?!   ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Don't worry guys. I got this.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Welcome back @Horses-R-Lame. Don't mind the red flashing lights. That's completely normal.  ]

[Horses-R-Lame:  Uh, I don't think anything being on fire can be considered NORMAL.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Fire type specialists would beg to differ .]

A piece of rubble from the ceiling crashed nearby, startling Ritsuka and everyone in chat.

[Horses-R-Lame:  Fuck, this place looks like the aftermath after someone pissed off a cluster of Electrode!  ]

[MalasadaMayhem: In the wise words of Cooking Mama, Do Not Mind.]

The camera, as if finding the interaction amusing, decided to zoom in on a woman's body nearby. She was wearing the standard uniform for female Chaldea staff, a dark gray uniform adorned with silver downward stripes that separated the darker color from the orange-colored area near the shirt buttons.

She would not have looked out of the ordinary in a normal setting if it wasn't for the blood staining her uniform. The poor woman's head had been splattered into a mess of blood and gore by a piece of concrete that fell from the ceiling.

Her fingers, much like a freshly butchered chicken, were twitching, completely unaware that the body it was attached to was already dead.

[HippityHoppip650:  Oh, I think I'm going to be sick.  ]

[GroundHippowdon:  Crap. We are so banned.  ]

[Horses-R-Lame:  IS THAT A DEAD BODY?!!  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  No. You didn't see anything. :Madagascar penguin meme:  ]

[Horses-R-Lame:  Dude. I have eyes. I can see very blatant TOS violations in front of me when I see them!!  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  There are no dead bodies in Ba Sing Se.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: P-Please don't ban Gudao Mr. Twitch Moderator, he is my life… please don't… ]

[Horses-R-Lame:  I-I'm sorry guys… But I can't let this slide…  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  …oh well. I tried.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: .·°՞(≧□≦)՞°·. ]

[JigglyWiggly:  It took 3 years, 3 long years of us being a wholesome channel and community with a bright future. Oh well, we had a good run. It was nice knowing you guys.  ]

Romani came back, a somber look on his face, "No survivors. Only Chaldeas is safe."

[ How awful…  ]

Frustration was now visible on Romani's face, his fists clenched in fury, "This was where the explosion originated. This was no accident. This was sabotage."

[ It was Lev wasn't it?  ]

[ Romani said there were no survivors. Lev was in the control room. He's dead. And so is Olga and… Mash..  ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  …  ] 

[PerfectlySaneHex: ... ]

Then, a woman's voice came to life through the speakers.

《 Generator operation stopped.

Power level critical.》

《 Switch to the backup generator, error.

Please make switch manually. 》

《 Containment wall will close in 40 seconds Those who remain in Central Area, evacuate immediately. 》

"Crap." Romani then turned to Ritsuka, a dead serious expression on his face. "Sorry, Ritsuka, this is where we part ways. Chaldea cannot afford to lose power. I'm going down to the underground power station; there's still a chance for you to evacuate. Please, do not be a hero; save yourself."

With that said, Romani left the control room, sprinting as fast as he could to the underground power station to stop the shutoff and leaving Ritsuka alone in the burning room.

[ Bro! If you won't listen to us, listen to your new friend! EVACUATE!  ]

《 System switching to the final phase of Rayshift. 》

《 Coordinates, AD 2004, January, 30th, Fuyuki Japan. 》

《 Laplace shifting protection established. Singularities additional factor slot secured. 》

《 Unsummoned Program Set.  Please start final adjustments. 》

Ritsuka clenched his fists, he can't just give up on her, he needs to look for Mash until the very last minute.

[ Oh no, I know that face.  ]

[Gudao for the love of… ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  Ritsuka... Please go home… I can't bear to see you in danger… please…  ]

Ritsuka went back on track and continued to search through the blazing inferno and rubble in search of Mash.

Jerry, or rather Horses-R-Lame, had been a fan of Gudao for a long time. Sure, he was technically assigned to monitor him to make sure he didn't accidentally leak someone's personal information again. Although, that fear became less and less of an issue as the years passed by, mainly due to Gudao's work ethic.

After the whole fiasco that happened where he inadvertently doxxed real people by playing his world's Pokémon games, he went above and beyond to ensure he always stayed Terms-Of-Service compliant. That incident had been a huge scandal back in the day, one that had caught the attention of the whole world, as Gudao had dropped a massive bomb on their world all those years ago.

It got so bad that even Interpol got involved, and they demanded that Twitch Inc. shut down his channel due to the fact that the very protagonists of the game he played were in their protective services.

If he were just a random nobody from their world, the company would have bent the knee, but luckily for Gudao, he was special. The CEO of Twitch himself had stood firm that he would not take the stream down, as this was a first contact case with an alien world that had already grown massively viral across the known Pokémon world.

Plus, the streamer was a teenager, a literal child who was only playing what he thought was a game with fictional characters. So he was also effectively immune to any penalties due to his age, thanks to a certain law that was passed in Galar a few years ago and was later adopted into the wider world.

Interpol, the so-called protectors of children they proclaimed themselves to be, backed off, but not without exerting their influence as bureaucrats and using their extensive legal powers to send a permanent Interpol agent to monitor not just Gudao's stream, but also everyone working at Twitch Inc. and their activities.

Gudao, after hearing just what kind of mess his stream revelations caused in their world, was compliant with the new restrictions forced onto his channel. Being the genuine guy that he was, he even issued a public apology for the mistake and promised never to play what he called the "mainline Pokémon games" or the spin-offs which include humans on stream again.

Everything went great afterward.

Just like he promised, Gudao stopped playing the game "Pokemon White" where he was and started to focus his channel on just sharing information. From that day on, he played games that weren't Pokémon-related, watched non-Pokémon-related videos and—undoubtedly the greatest peace offering he gave to their world— showed them the rich and extremely complicated biosphere of fauna, flora and other living organisms native to his world.

In their world, Pokémon and humans had been living side by side for generations.

This wasn't always the case, as humans had the habit of starting wars for petty reasons, while dragging innocent Pokémon into the mess with them and causing devastation and tragedy for all parties involved. These wars, while short compared to the ones Gudao described were like on his side, were still devastating to civilization and culture as a whole.

There are numerous instances in history where wars erased hundreds or even thousands of years of knowledge due to the scale of the conflicts. One of these missing pieces of knowledge was the origin of terms they used to describe Pokemon with. Take Ponyta for example, It was often described by both scientists and normal people alike as a "Fire Horse" Pokémon.

People know what the word "horse" refers to when they talk about it in discussions, but it has always been used to describe a Pokémon rather than an actual living organism.

Gudao's greatest contribution to their world was putting names to the faces of the descriptors used for Pokémon classification.

The book-flipping ASMR streams, alongside his "IRL Earth Tour" streams, as he called them, had single-handedly restored what many historians and scientists alike speculated was lost information.

Experts from all over the world, using the scraps of information that did survive the wars of the past and the information that Gudao presented to them, formed a hypothesis: that animals like those on Earth once roamed their world alongside people at some point in the distant past.

Yet despite these massive world altering revelations, the crazy thing was that all Gudao was doing was reading text off his college biology textbook, reading articles online and going to trips to the local zoo while pointing a camera at the animals on display.

Which was why it was also tragically ironic that the reason why this simple GoPro, which contributed massively to their scientific world, was broken by the very same creatures Gudao was observing. A gorilla, if he recalled its name correctly, had spooked Gudao during his last trip to the zoo. He had made the mistake of smiling at it when showing him off to chat, which was a bad idea since Gorillas saw that expression as a form of aggression, and so, the animal slammed into the plexiglass window, causing Ritsuka to drop the camera on the concrete floor, ending its life.

The tragedy and mourning of his GoPro aside; everything had been going well.

That was until the kidnapping incident.

Gudao himself wasn't breaking any TOS rules; as he was minding his own business when he was kidnapped live on Twitch.

If they had banned his channel for that, they could have actually hurt Gudao. They might not have been able to contact his world's police in time to save him, but some video evidence would still be better than nothing, and it could still be used against the perpetrators when their world made the attempt to contact Earth.

The technology existed, and the kidnapping incident caused every league in the world to work on a solution, possibly to find a way to present the evidence to someone from Gudao's world and help serve justice to the criminals who took him.

Thankfully, his stream came back online and showed him in perfect health. With his safety confirmed, many thought they would be back to how things were, but with a mobile set up. Unfortunately, this upgrade proved to be something that would test the patience of Twitch staff and the other entities observing Gudao's channel.

It began when Gudao walked into a room and saw someone in the middle of pulling up their pants after having finished doing something… intimately personal with themselves. Based on the events of the last 24 hours, Gudao didn't seem to be in control of the camera, so he was not at fault, but it was still concerning.

Emails were exchanged, and everyone collectively decided to turn a blind eye to the incident. Though they did send a Porygon to change the title of the stream to include the R18 rating.

They were being very lenient towards Gudao after years of great behavior combined with the cultural, historical and scientific significance his stream now held, but the graphic visuals of a real corpse crossed the generous line they drew in the sand.

Jerry really hated this part of his job.

Gudao was not at fault for any of this, but this level of graphic violence broke too many of his company's TOS. As a moderator of Twitch, he was now obligated by the company to pull the plug on Gudao's stream in order to protect the company image.

His phone rang. He grimaced when he saw it was a message from the Interpol agent assigned to Gudao's stream.

'Pull the plug.'

It was a simple and to-the-point command, as expected of a cop.

Jerry sighed and typed the message he would send to the Pory-Squad. Because of the special status of Gudao's channel, on top of being heavily restricted, his channel was also heavily protected from any bad actors attempting to take his channel down.

So there was a list of commands and procedures that only he and a few others had access to that would allow for Gudao's channel to be banned.

Jerry typed the last character of the simple command that would end his favorite streamer's channel.

It was done; now all that he needed to do was press the enter button, and it would all be over.

Jerry paused for a moment and looked at the screen once more, grimacing as he saw Gudao running through the hellscape he had found himself in. This was not what he expected to see when he imagined banning Gudao's channel all those years ago.

The strong weight of depression and responsibility weighed heavily on his shoulders as he took in what would likely be the last time he would see Gudao live. Jerry cringed, realizing that had been a very poor choice of words on his part.

"I'm sorry, Gudao, but my hands are tied. I hope you will understand. I wish you the best of luck, and you better get out of there alive, you reckless idiot." Jerry pressed the "enter" button; the deed was done.

"…"

Jerry looked at the bottom of his monitor and saw that a minute had passed, and yet, Gudao was still visible on screen. He repeated the process and pressed enter once more. He waited, and waited… Why hadn't the Porygon taken down the channel yet?

A message popped up on his screen, and reading it just made him more confused.

[OBSTACLE IN THE WAY. BAN IMPOSSIBLE.]

That… was odd. The Pory-Squad assigned to Gudao's channel were the best and most experienced Porygon in the company. It was led by an alpha Porygon 2, and it always delivered whenever it was given commands. What could have possibly stopped them from completing their jobs?

A buzzing noise startled him; it was his company-issued poryphone. Picking it up and unlocking the lock screen, he read the message that was sent to him.

The Interpol agent was bitching at him.

'Why is his stream still online?! Take it down now!'

Jerry rolled his eyes at the message that uptight suit sent him, then rolled up his sleeves and got to work.

However, he quickly ran into a problem.

His browser had become unresponsive.

He could move his mouse around, but he couldn't click or type anything on the Twitch tab he was on.

"What the hell is going on?"

Suddenly, a message popped up, and it was then that he realized things had just escalated beyond a simple Terms of Service violation.

[CEASE.]

"Ohhh no. Ohhh no." This was bad, this was very, very bad. Someone had hacked their servers and was actively preventing him from banning Gudao.

He took a deep breath to calm himself, "it's alright, it's alright, this is why we have procedures. "

Without wasting time, Jerry did all that he could to try and wrestle back control of the system, but despite his efforts, he got no results to show for it.

He tried to send a message to his coworkers, but his mail app, company message app and every other form of communication was bricked.

With all other options exhausted, he decided it would be best if he got up from his chair and let everyone know directly.

However, before he could, he heard a voice in his head.

[ENOUGH. ]

A sharp pain impaled his temples, his vision doubled, and fell back into his seat, the chair squeaking and groaning due to the inertia and weight of his boddy falling on top of it. The suddenness of the phenomenon caused his heartbeat to beat faster than a Yanma's wing flaps.

Gasping for breath, he looked around the room in a panic. His ears buzzed in pain, nearly causing him to faint.

Then he stared at the computer screen and he saw the ominous message from the hacker displayed in all caps.

[THEE AND THY ILK SHALT NOT INTERFERE, NOT THIS TIME NOR EVER AGAIN. ]

Jerry blinked, and he was no longer in his office.

He was now in a void.

Nothing besides himself existed for miles.

Then, he sensed a presence.

A strange white quadrupedal Pokémon appeared before his eyes. It didn't walk, float, flew or teleported to where he was. It just "appeared" like it had always been there but he hadn't taken notice of it until it wanted its presence to be known.

He had never seen anything like it.

Jerry blinked again, and he immediately regretted it.

His eyes widened in terror as he saw the unidentified Pokémon, who was previously about 3 feet small, was now equal in size to a mountain. Its colossal red eyes were looking down upon him like an alpha Rhyperior staring down a mere, singular Joltik that was abandoned by his colony.

Jerry could feel the immense pressure emanating from the titan before him.

He was being judged.

The void that surrounded him suddenly began to shift, it latched onto his arms and legs. Then they started to slowly crawl up his body.

He tried to scream but felt no words come out, was he in space?! Was he dead?! What was going on?!

The darkness crawled over him until, it enveloped him in a cocoon of shadows.

There was fire and rubble everywhere he looked.

Ritsuka carefully navigated the area and looked at each individual cylinder that held the Master candidates like him. Some were passed out, peacefully resting inside their pods, while others had very ugly bruising on their faces and leaking blood from their mouths and noses. A few were in such a horrendous state that it caused Ritsuka to gag.

[ How are we not banned yet? ]

[ Dude! Shut up! Don't bring attention to it!  ]

[ But its so weird to see Gudao's channel still up after 3 minutes of him navigating burning ruins filled with corpses, meanwhile, Twitch took down Yoguu's channel after she accidentally showed a bit too much sideboob when she was adjusting her camera in less time than I could blink.  ]

[ Maybe he got a "Charlie Horse", what Gudao calls a cramp, from working on a desk all day and can't ban us due to the pain?  ]

[I<3HorsePKMN:  It would be a fitting punishment for that horse hater.  ]

"MASH! WHERE ARE YOU!?" Ritsuka pushed his ears to the absolute limit in hopes of hearing her voice.

Nothing, or so he thought.

"Fou!"

Ritsuka whirled around and barely managed to see Fou run around some rubble.

[Oh no! Fou is here too?!! (ó﹏ò｡)]

[ Gudao! Take Fou and get out of there!  ]

Ritsuka didn't question it, he followed the small creature's path. He froze in place when he saw the grisly sight in front of him.

His face morphed with horror and anguish as he saw the cute, if a bit weird girl he had met earlier, pinned under a massive block of stone.

A large puddle of blood was leaking from under her body.

[Oh… oh no. ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): ∑(; °Д°) ]

[Mash noo!! ] 

[__Red__:  ]

"...Sen… pai…"

Mash's weak voice brought him out of his shock, and determination took its place.

"MASH! Don't worry, I'll get you out of here!"

[How?! That rock is huge! ]

"...It's All…right. You can't…save…me. Don't mind me, please… Run."

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  Listen to her! RUN WHILE YOU STILL CAN!  ]

Without hesitation, Ritsuka moved toward the giant boulder that was crushing Mash's body.

[Fyre&Flamez: Wait! Don't touch that! It's hot! ]

The warning from chat never reached him, as he had a single focus on his mind, save Mash.

His skin sizzled like bacon on a skillet, as his bare hands made contact with the scorching hot stone.

Ritsuka grunted in pain and pulled away his hands from the hot surface. He looked at his hands for a moment and was shocked to see the palms of his hands were covered in 1st degree burns.

[PerfectlySaneHex: ｡°(ᗒᗣᗕ)՞°｡ ]

[Fyre&Flamez: That's what happens when you try to touch a heated rock with bare hands. ]

He didn't care, powering through the pain. He covered his hands with his coat sleeves and desperately tried to lift the massive burning stone, completely ignoring the pain of his skin peeling off his hands.

[ He just won't give up…  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  This is asinine! That rock looks like it weighs actual tons! The human body cannot lift more than a certain weight without dedicating years of their life to temper their bodies alongside fighting type pokemon, something which Gudao lacks! He's just throwing his life away for a girl he just met! Unbelievable!  ]

[MalasadaMayhem: Ugh, I never thought I would find myself agreeing with @Junior_researcher, but he's right. It's impossible for someone like Gudao to lift this. ]

[Ranger75: And even if he did, what's that going to accomplish? Mash was crushed! Moving her safely out of this inferno is not possible without a gurney… she's not going to make it. ]

The voice of the woman from earlier blared all around the furnace that was once the control room.

《 WARNING ALL OBSERVATION STAFF. Chaldeas' state has changed.》

《 Now rewriting Sheba's near-future prediction data.》

《 Unable to detect the existence of mankind 100 years in the near future on Earth.》

《 Unable to confirm human survivors. Unable to guarantee mankind's future. 》

[ Dunno what the heck that AI lady is saying, but it doesn't sound good.  ]

"Ah. Chaldeas… has turned bright red. No nevermind, that- "

Suddenly, the sound of heavy metal doors slamming shut echoed inside the room.

《 Central Area sealed.》

[Welp… too late to evacuate now. ]

[Nooooo!! Ritsuka! why didn't you listen to us?! ]

"...They shut off, the area. …Now, we can't get out. " Mash turned toward Ritsuka, guilt shown on her face, "I'm sorry senpai…, it's all my fault… "

"Don't worry, we'll figure something out. "

[They are both fucking cooked. ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: Don't blame yourself Mash. You did nothing wrong… (◞‸◟,)]

Ritsuka sits down next to Mash, he might not be able to save her, but he can at least keep her company during her last moments.

After a moment of comfortable silence, Mash spoke.

"Senpai…"

'What is it, Mash?"

"You can't see… the sky… at all… from here… "

His brows furrow in confusion before, "Mash?"

"...I wanted to see it… "

[Has… Mash never seen a clear sky before? ]

[ How awful… I can't even imagine what that would be like.  ]

Ritsuka quickly realizes the gravity of her words, he looks at the ceiling.

"You're right! Because there's always a blizzard here. I want to show you the sky. Mash."

《 Coffin Vitals: Masters. 》

《 Baseline not reached. 》

《 Rayshift requirement not met. 》

《 Searching for qualifying Master… Found. 》

《 Candidate No. 48, Ritsuka Fujimaru

Reset as Master. 》

《 Unsummon Program Start. 》

《 Spiriton Conversion, start. 》

Suddenly, both Mash's and Ritsuka's bodies began to glow and emit particles of light.

[Woah What is happening!? ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  IDK!!  ]

[Their bodies are glowing!! ]

"Um… senpai. I'm sorry… but… Would you mind… Holding my hand?"

"Sure. Here." Ritsuka holds Mash's hand with both of his blistered hands.

[ Guys, that is very sweet but the room IS COLLAPSING ON YOU!  ]

[ Man, I'm gonna miss you Gudao… and you too Mash. Even if we only met you for a brief time.  ]

The ground shook beneath them, but they paid no mind to it. Because all that existed at that moment, was Mash and Ritsuka.

《Rayshift starting in 3… 2… 1.  》

《All procedures clear. First Order, commencing operation. 》

Suddenly the world shifted.

Ritsuka's eyes saw a swirling white portal and a felt a pulling sensation, like his soul was being pulled from his body, while at the same time, he felt like he was falling from a tall building.

Meanwhile, the Pokémon world collectively held its breath as all 50,000 of his viewers could visually see what Gudao was feeling. No one could talk, no one could type, or think. All they could do is observe the strange lights flashing on their screens.

The screen faded to black, leaving many wondering if this meant that Gudao was dead and that stream was over.

That sentiment only lasted for a moment as the following words displayed on the screen.

[h1]Singularity F: Fuyuki[/h1]

The screen changed again, and this time it showed a bewildered Gudao, sitting on his knees in the middle of a mangled asphalt road.

No one said anything at first, as they all were collectively taking in the new scenery in awe and horror.

Then, a message popped up, startling everyone who was watching the chat.

[GudakoBot: "First Rayshift " Achieved!! Gudao's Merch store is now unlocked!! Get your official Fou plushies for only 2,000 pokedollars!! First 100 customers get 25% off!! GET EM NOW!!]

Yoguu: A twitch streamer from Sinnoh who was also a part-time Pokemon Contest participant. [ISPOILER]She is the parallel, reverse gender version of the man who helped found one of the largest Vtuber agencies in our world in 2020.[/ISPOILER]

New Usernames introduced this chapter: 

I<3HorsePKMN: Username loosely inspired by protagonist of Pokemon Streamer's Nightmare by Bliblies.

Horses-R-Lame: A Twitch mod assigned to monitor Gudao's stream by Twitch. He used to dislike pokemon who were classified into the "horse" classification.

He was in Gudao's chat before I<3HorsePKMN, so naturally everyone came to know him as Horse, much to the chagrin of I<3HorsePKMN.

Chapter Text

The acrid stench of burning rubber assaulted his senses, which caused Ritsuka to cough as the pollution entered his lungs.

He looked around and saw a scene straight out of an apocalyptic movie. Asphalt roads were in disarray, uprooted from their normally uniform and flat surface. He looked up and saw a jagged skyline that reminded him of a shark's teeth, the crimson horizon painting a grim image that unsettled him. The skyscrapers bore shattered windows, and nearly all had a dull orange glow emanating from inside them. Many of them looked ready to collapse at any moment.

He observed the cars on the road, and they fared no better than the surrounding buildings.

Looking at the symbols written on the signs and the design of the blackened truck near him, he could immediately tell he was in Japan.

How was he in Japan when he was in Antarctica just a few moments ago?

[Guy_1n_Desert:  What in the name of Arceus happened here?  ]

[HippityHoppip650:  This is horrible.  ]

[ Did Gudao get teleported?  ]

[ Hmm, that seems to be the case. Though I will admit, the unexpected lightshow caught me off guard.  ]

"Fou!!"

Ritsuka blinked, looked down and was surprised to see Fou nestled in his arms.

[OMA, FOU <3<3]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  There's no need to fear! Fou is here!!  ]

[Gible_Archeologist:  I'm just glad Fou is ok.  ]

[ Speaking of Fou, I got my Fou plushie!!!  ]

[ Me too!! Now we can all have a fou!!  ]

[ Instant delivery too!!  ]

[IliekQTthings:  I got Four!!!  ]

[ No Fair! Leave some for the rest of us!!  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Guys!! What about Mash?!  ]

[ Who?  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Wow. We literally saw a poor girl bleed to death, crushed under a massive boulder of rubble and you guys already forgot about her because "oh look I got a cute thing." I'm disappointed in you guys.  ]

[I just joined stream. Idk who Mash is. (╥﹏╥) ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  …sorry. My bad. I'm just a bit high strung after everything that's happened.  ]

Ritsuka stopped reading the rest of chat when they brought up Mash. He swung his head around, looking for the cute girl who he had been comforting in her last moments just a short while ago, but she was nowhere in sight.

Ritsuka felt his heart ache at the memory of finding her crushed under that huge piece of rubble. The logical part of his mind knew she was gone, but he didn't want to make assumptions and leave Mash to die alone in this place if she was still breathing.

"MASH!!"

No answer.

She wasn't here.

What his ears picked up on instead was the sound of radio static in the air.

Ritsuka looked around in confusion, wondering where the sound originated from, and after focusing on it for a second, he was able to pinpoint the point of origin, his left arm.

He lifted the appendage up and pulled back his sleeve to get a better look. There was a dull gray wristband attached to his wrist, the same wristband that Lev and Romani had been using to communicate like a phone. How come he hadn't noticed he had this on until now?!

Taking a moment to collect his thoughts, Ritsuka decided to press a few buttons to see if he could get the static to stop. After a second of fiddling, he stopped when he heard a familiar voice.

《 "Rit..su…ka…alive?.... 》

"Dr. Roman?"

Ritsuka felt a weight of stress leave his body when he heard the comforting voice of someone he knew.

《 So…rry, there…'s…interference on… my side…. Ah there we go." 》

"Ah, I can hear you clearly now." The radio static was still there, buzzing in the background, but it was something he could ignore.

《 "Oh that's good…. Wait, now's not the time!! Ritsuka, you have to leave immediately!!" 》  Romani sounded frantic and desperate, did something happen?

"Romani? Is everything alright?" Ritsuka looked around at the surrounding landscape as he talked to Romani.

Then, his eyes landed on something.

He saw a giant, hulking shadow wearing a white mask, crouched like a gargoyle on a building in the distance.

Ritsuka felt fear rise from his throat, which he struggled to swallow due to the intense bloodlust emanating from the shadow who was staring right at him.

[ That is the beefiest duskull I've seen in my life.  ]

[__Red__:  ]

[It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu:  y'all are wrong. That's definitely a pikachu.  ]

[Heart-of6old:  In what world is that a pikachu?!!  ]

[JigglyWiggly:  I don't like the way its staring at us.  ]

[Ranger75:  Well, at least it's far away. GTFO there while you still can, Gudao!!  ] 

《 "We detected a hostile signature in your area. RUN!" 》 Romani yelled over the radio in his wristband."  》

Ritsuka saw the giant suddenly shoot upwards into the sky.

His gaze followed the being as it reached the apex of its jump and started to plummet towards his location, its massive fist cocked back and ready to smash him into a red paste.

Ritsuka's breath hitched.

His brain was screeching in terror, causing his heart to pump adrenaline-infused blood across his body.

His muscles moved before thoughts could even form in his head.

He heard Romani desperately call out to him, despite not being able to make out what he said due to the buzzing in his ears. Even so, his body still obeyed the words that Romani had said.

《 Run away!  》

The Thing violently crashed into the ground where Ritsuka had barely stood a moment ago, cratering the asphalt and dirt under itself, and with a loud bang that caused the buzzing in Ritsuka's ears to swell into a piercing ring.

He nearly stumbled and fell on the ground from the impact, but Ritsuka righted himself before that happened, and with Fou nestled in his arms, he ran as fast as he could, away from the danger behind him without looking back.

His Twitch camera, however, did not have that limitation.

It caught the massive shadow unnaturally jerk its head in Ritsuka's direction, its ominous mask unchanging, but the emotions emanating from it were enough to convey its lust for blood and death.

[Ranger75:  What has Gudao gotten himself into?  ]

Ritsuka ran faster than he had ever run before in his life. He didn't recognize where in Japan he was, despite having visited his aunt for years with his parents in the past.

He knew Japan's streets were always clean and well taken care of, completely the opposite of the mangled hellscape he was running through.

Romani was saying things to him, but he could barely pay attention to what he was saying as his heartbeat thundered in his ears.

His senses were heightened to the maximum, yet he could not hear the sound of footsteps following behind him, but his instincts knew that if he slowed down or stopped to look back, he would die.

So he ran.

He ran until his legs started to scream at him to stop due to the buildup of lactose, forcing him to seek a place to hide and recover.

He saw an abandoned mansion that was luckily not set on fire, and seeing no other place to hide, he went inside.

The place was surprisingly well intact despite the chaos raging outside, which did relieve his anxiety for a moment, but it returned with a vengeance when he heard the clanking sounds of bone hitting rock echoing behind him. Taking a peek through the peephole in the door, he could see silhouettes of skeletal figures marching in front of the house.

Ritsuka looked away from the peephole and tried his best not to make any noise from where he stood, even after the inhuman march had become a distant echo to his ears, he refused to make any loud movements. A beat of silence passed before he deemed it safe to move further into the house.

He didn't bother to remove his shoes, as he saw no point in doing so when he was in a life or death situation. He was sure the owner would understand and forgive him for dirtying the carpet in their home.

《 Did you catch that Ritsuka? 》

"Sorry, Romani, I wasn't paying attention." Ritsuka whispered to Romani, since speaking normally during this time would have been dangerous.

《 Well, I can't blame you for it. Sorry. You're running for your life yet here I am info dumping on you about stuff you probably thought were fairy tales just a day ago. 》

"It's ok Romani, there's no need to apologize. I'm sure that whatever you told me is critical information. Though I would appreciate it if you could repeat what you told me."

《 Very well, if you insist. I'll keep the magecraft lesson brief. To summarize: You were transported to the year 2004 in Fuyuki, Japan using a form of magecraft called Rayshifting. Do you remember Mash's brief explanation on projection that you told me about?》

"Yes… I do…" Ritsuka's heart still felt heavy from the memory of Mash, but it was more muted now due to the fear of death that clung onto him.

《 Good. Normal Rayshifting does utilize projection magecraft as well, except, it projects your soul into the past. 》

Ritsuka furrowed his brows, "Wait… since I am a projection, does that mean I'm going to go 'poof'?!"

《 No. You won't. Ray shifting requires specialized equipment to send you to the past. Those coffins, the tubes you saw the other Master inside, are like Schrödinger's boxes. They fool the world into believing that you're still "here" in the present, which allows us to send your soul into the past.

》

"Oh."

So apparently time travel was a thing in his world. If he had not encountered his stream before getting here, he would have been more shocked to learn this, but he knew the Pokémon world existed.

He wasn't sure if the humans in the Pokémon world developed time travel tech like in the games, nor could he confirm if the legendary Pokémon like Celebi or Dialga were actually real, especially since he knew that their world had been told Team Galactic had been stopped by the efforts of Cynthia, the Elite Four, Gym leaders and Interpol working together to stop Cyrus from achieving his ambitions.

But the idea that it could exist had always been something that was planted in his mind since the very beginning. A lot of his chatters liked to deny it, but he always attributed the stream's connection to be the work of a certain llama shaped legendary Pokémon, but due to the limited information he had access to about the actual history of their world, he couldn't confirm it.

Still, just because he believed something could exist did not mean he was still not surprised to see it in action, because it's one thing to know something exists, and the other to experience it with your own eyes.

《 Now, what you did is not the normal way of Rayshifting. You were outside the box, so your very flesh was converted to spiritons and transported into the past. 》

That didn't sound good.

"Is that bad?"

《 It means you got lucky. The odds of surviving Ray shifting outside a coffin are very low. 》

He wanted to ask what would have happened had he not been so lucky, but decided against it, and instead he decided to take a moment to read his chat now that he was in a relatively safe location.

[Junior_Researcher: If I understand this right... Gudao had his body converted to energy and sent back to the past. Time travel aside, It's a similar process to how Pokémon and items get transported across the GTS. ]

[ Does that mean Gudao is a pokemon?  ]

[But… where the pokeball? ]

[Junior_Researcher:  No, he's not a Pokémon.  @It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu  and NO he's not a Pikachu either, so don't start. ]

[It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu: (◞‸ ◟) ]

[ Why does it have to be so… complicated? Why can't it just be going from point A to point B?  ]

[I'mJustABill: yeah… time travel will ALWAYS be complicated no matter the circumstance or explanation, in real life and fiction. ]

[Lanette34:  In any case, the humans in Gudao's world are truly more advanced than we gave them credit for. To think they had been hiding a method to transport people across space AND time under everyone's noses!! Truly, whoever invented this "Rayshifting" deserves one of those coveted Nobel Prizes Gudao's world gives out!  ]

[ @Lanette34, they can't. Magecraft CAN'T be revealed to the public remember?  ]

[Lanette34: oh… right…  how annoying. (¬⤙¬ ) ]

[I'mJustABill:  you and I are in agreement Lanette. Such a marvel of technology Is wasted being hidden from the wider world. Even if it's not nearly as impressive as my Time Capsule, it's still an ingenious piece of technology that deserves praise!  ]

[??? ]x1406

[ Your what now?  ]

[I'mJustABill:  My Time Capsule… you know, the time machine that allows people from the past and future to trade and battle pokemon together?  ]

[ Wait… we invented TIME TRAVEL?!! Since WHEN?!!  ]

[I'mJustABill:  Oh, about 20ish years ago?  ]

[(⊙︿⊙)  ]x1350

[Lannette34:  The FUCK BILL?!! WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME?!  ]

[I'mJustABill:  Ah right, I forgot my invention got seized by the Indigo Government and is a classified piece of tech. Oops?  ]

[DragonMasterLance:  Bill, what the fuck?!!  ]

[I'mJustABill:  @DragonMasterLance  I mean, is it really that big of a deal? The cat is out of the bag now anyways thanks to Romani. So it should be fine.  ]

[DragonMasterLance:  You and I will have words later.  ]

'Well, that answers one of my questions.' Ritsuka was not the religious sort, but he still offered a silent prayer wishing for Bill's safety. When he was done, he focused back on the task at hand.

Survival, or rather, his rather miraculous survival from his unexpected time travel. Taking a moment to reflect on what Romani told him, he felt a weight of depression sit on his shoulders.

Why did he, of all people, get a second chance but not Mash? If there's anyone who should have gotten another chance to live, it should have been her.

Ritsuka shook his head and then slapped his face with his two hands.

'No. Get those thoughts out of your head. Mash would not have wanted you to waste your second chance at life sulking.'

"Romani… I might still not get what is going on, but thank you for your help. I will make sure I try my best to live, for your sake and for Mash's."

Romani seemed to pause for a moment over the magic intercom at his words, before he responded with a thankful hum of appreciation.

With that out of the way, Ritsuka decided to face the music. How the heck was he going to get out of this mess?

《 "Fujimaru, enemy signature approaching! Hide!"  》

The screech and groan of metal being ripped apart caused him to freeze in place.

The violent crash of the door as it slammed into a wall nearly caused him to piss himself.

Ritsuka looked at his surroundings and inwardly cursed at himself when he saw that he was inside a room with a massive glass sliding door that didn't provide ample places to hide. He had gotten complacent, and now it was too late to find a better hiding spot.

Ritsuka swallowed the dry saliva down his throat and slowly lowered himself to the floor, his back facing the transparent sliding door he was at. He knew that this was one of the worst and most moronic places to hide, but he wasn't going to risk moving and drawing attention with his footsteps.

He brought Fou closer to his chest and closed his mouth with his other hand.

Ritsuka heard the floorboards of the home loudly creak due to the immense weight of the Thing as it walked through the halls. It was meticulously checking every room for his presence, going inside each room and flipping furniture over, opening closet doors and occasionally smashing something before it moved on to the next room.

Then, after a few minutes of footsteps traipsing about all around the house, they suddenly stopped.

His heart thundered in his chest, becoming so loud he could hear it in his ears.

Was that thing gone?

A chill ran up his spine.

He jumped to the side from his position, just in time to avoid a massive fist crashing through the glass and collapsing the section of the tatami he was sitting on into splinters.

Ritsuka saw an opening and dashed outside the house.

He needed to get away.

He needed to get away.

He needed to-

All hope of him escaping with his life came to an end when, out of nowhere, a lanky, dark figure, wearing the same mask as the other creature, fell from the sky and landed right in front of him.

[GroundHippowdon:  OH SHIT!!  ]

[DragoonRuleZ:  NOOOO!! HE WAS SO CLOSE!  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): (ᗒᗣᗕ) ]

"No way."

That was all he managed to say before the figure came into his personal space and landed a sharp kick to his ribs.

Through some absurd feat of strength and acrobatics, the thing was able to hook his foot on the side of his gut and launch him towards a nearby shed.

His body crashed through the door with enough force to splinter and break not just the solid wood door, but the rest of his ribs his assailant hadn't broken already.

The very same bones that had evolved to protect his vital organs had now become hazardous weapons that ripped him up from the inside.

He felt a strong iron taste in his mouth; the sheer force of the kick had forced the air from his lungs with a wet croak. When he tried to take a breath, he felt like he was drowning and coughed. To his horror, red liquid splattered onto the ground.

[Gible_Archeologist:  Gudao Noooooo!!  ]

[Ranger75:  He's dead.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  Shut UP!! he's not!  ]

[Ranger75;  The fucker kicked him with enough force to smash through a solid wood door. Alive or not, the trauma his body has been subject to is enough that he would be incapable of running away now!!  ]

Ritsuka tried his best to get up, but the sheer agony his chest was in at the moment sapped away all his energy.

He could hear Fou calling for him in worry. Sadly, he could not reassure him by stating that he was alright, because he wasn't.

While he was groaning in pain, the two creatures stood together in unity. Their inhuman masks facing directly towards Ritsuka as they moved towards the shed, ready to finish him off.

Chat's camera was currently facing the door, so they could see death coming for their beloved streamer.

[SeeDotbyTheSea:  I-Is this it? Game over already? After all we've been through? ]

[JigglyWiggly:  It would seem so. Gudao is in no shape to run away from these superpowered freaks. ]

[FairyTypePrincess:  My heart aches hearing Fou like this. Poor little guy is going to be trapped in a hellscape with these monsters. ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  Everyone!! There's something up with Lev!  Psychic types and trainers, do NOT touch Lev's Mind!!   ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  wait… Gudao?!! What… what happened?!!   ]

[ Well, look who FINALLY decided to show up.  ]

[ Moostache, where the hell were you?!!   ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  My trainer was hurt. She read into Lev's mind and the bastard hurt her. I had to take her to the hospital. I was too distressed to join back in chat. 

Once the doctor gave the all clear, I came as fast as I could.  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  but seriously!! What is happening?!!  ]

[ Well, I'm sure you'll be glad to hear this, but Lev's dead.  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  …what?  ]

[ And so is Mash, and Olga… you don't know the other but she was his boss.  ]

[ Gudao got isekaid to another place, then he immediately got jumped the moment he arrived.  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  What?!  ]

[ He ran away and hid in a mansion, but that muscular, Duskull looking bastard caught up to him. He tried to run, but that string bean Duskull bastard kicked him through a wooden door. Now Gudao is hurt, and these bastards are going to finish him off.  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  ….AS IF I'D ALLOW THAT.  ]

The creature stepped into the shed, and as soon as it did, it froze when it heard movement nearby.

It got into a battle-ready stance when they noticed the shelves in the room shaking violently. Using its impressive bulk, it swung its arms in a circular motion, the shockwaves caused the shed around him and his victim to scatter into debris.

His action caused the shaking to stop, but the creatures were still wary of the unknown phenomenon.

Its eyes scanned the newly cleared area while bracing itself, as it could still feel an attack aimed at it.

Then, just before it thought it was in the clear, it was met with an aluminum can to the face.

The can ungracefully plunked to the ground, its attack completely ineffective.

The Duskull-looking monstrosity stared at the can for a moment, looked behind at its companion, who responded with a shrug.

Seeing the attack amount to nothing, the massive Duskull man continued its hunt, crushing the aluminum can into a flat disk beneath its feet as it made its way towards Ritsuka.

[PsychicMoostache(MOD): Curses! Even with the gate weakened on my side, it's still not enough!! ]

[Welp, you tried. You've done more than all 50,000 of us combined. ]

[ And it did Jack SHIT.  ]

The large creature was now standing over Ritsuka, his shadow looming over the slumped form of the Last Master of Humanity, who looked like he had accepted his fate.

The creature slowly raised his massive fist into the air, his gaze dead set on crushing Ritsuka's body into a red smear on the floor.

This was it.

This was the end.

[JigglyWiggly:  Well, ladies and gentlemen, it's been an honor.  ]

[Ecruteak_Gal:  I-I don't know if I can watch anymore….  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Not like we have a choice, this is Gudao's last stream.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: Please leave him alone! He doesn't deserve this!! What did he ever do to you!!? (ᗒᗣᗕ)՞ ]

[KicksYouIntheFace193: I swear upon Arceus that Machamp and I will find a way to cross dimensions and crush these assholes for killing my disciple. ლ(ಠ益ಠლ)  ]

[DragoonRuleZ: Let me come with! My Mega Gyarados would like to have words with them. ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  I am an elite level Pokémon. One who has faced many powerful opponents in battle and one of the most powerful psychics in the known world. And yet… I have never felt more powerless in my life. I'm sorry Gudao. Truly.  ]

[The-Undefeatable:  And to think we were all just having a fun time playing minecraft before this shitstorm happened.  ]

[GroundHippowdon: Fuck, I'm going to miss you, Gudao. (⁠╥⁠﹏⁠╥⁠) ]

[Mighty1Oak:  It was an honor knowing you, Ritsuka. You brought so much joy to not just myself, but our entire world for the past 3 years. I-I'm sorry we couldn't help you.  ]

[__Red__ : …so long my friend, I'll miss you. ]

[ Red actually sent a message instead of just an emote. This really is the end of the line…  ]

Just when all hope was lost.

Hope had returned.

The striking image of an angel arrived with a bang.

It was Mash, and she was wearing a more daring outfit, but that detail fell to the wayside as she was now wielding a massive fuck-off shield.

A shield that she had used to bash his would-be killer with enough force to launch the it into the air and land with a thump a dozen feet from where it had been standing.

Ritsuka's eyes widened in disbelief. The person who he thought had died, the cute girl who he was having his final thoughts about, had just arrived to save him.

Mash was not done yet as she dashed towards the creature's shellshocked companion and slammed her dense metal shield into its lanky figure.

Its body did not survive the high velocity impact from the metal shield, but even if that hadn't killed it, its corpse rag-dolling through several houses and fences would have definitely finished it off if it was somehow still alive.

To Ritsuka, seeing Mash in her new form left him in awe, while his chest fluttered as he witnessed the gentle moonlight cascade over her body.

[ She's alive?!!!  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  HOW?!!  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  I don't care!! She just saved my Oshi!!  ]

"I suppose I should make a proper introduction now." Mash said as she looked down at him, not in condescension or as a superior looking at a lesser, but with the warm, kind smile someone was relieved to see he was ok.

"Senpai, or rather Master. I am Mash Kyrielight. Your servant."

[ What does she mean by "I'm your Servant?!"  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): MASH KYRIELIGHT! Kinky play?! Really?! At a time and place like this?! I'm disappointed in you, young lady!! (๑/////๑" ) ]

[Don'tTouchMyBuns!:  I never knew Mash had it in her.  ]

[ It's always the meek, shy, quiet ones who end up being the freaky ones  ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  I want to say it's not like that, but her new outfit and calling Gudao "master" refutes any arguments I could make in her defense.  ]

[ Now the title of "Master Candidate" makes sense.  ]

[ Obviously, it means that she's his maid now.  ]

[Gible_Archeologist :  Guys. Gudao is still laying on the ground, bleeding and in agony. Focus.  ]

[What's the point? We can't do anything to help. We've tried, but every attempt to do so just ends up with the channel getting new emotes. (◞ ﻌ ◟ ) ]

[^this. Seriously, if we could help him, we would. It's not as if I can just wave my hand and cast Heal pulse on Gudao. ]

"Mash, is that you? What happened?" Ritsuka tried to get up, but his body was still in shambles, so he didn't have the strength to do so.

"I'll explain later, Master, but first don't move; I'll heal you in just a moment." Mash took a scroll from her shield and tossed it. The scroll flew towards Ritsuka, wrapping itself around him and, while emitting a bright light, healed his wounds.

Inside his body, fragments of bones returned to where they belonged and mended themselves whole once more. Damaged, bleeding flesh regenerated, while his newly invigorated body extracted the blood from within and outside his body and channeled it back into his veins. The blood that could not be recovered was replenished by his bone marrow, which had gone into overdrive to meet the demand his body had for new blood.

Ritsuka felt the pain from his injuries fade into dull aches. With a newfound strength, he stood up as if he was completely fine.

[( •͈૦•͈ ) ]x1671

[ That piece of paper just healed several lethal injuries in a matter of moments!!  ]

[0ffDoodyJoy:  My goodness! Even with our level of technology, such injuries would still have taken at least a few weeks to a month of recovery and physical therapy to completely heal! Magecraft truly is a wonder to behold!  ]

"I apologize if this is sudden, but it isn't safe here. We need to move".

"Lead the way, Mash."

"About that, Master…" Mash was doing her usual nervous fidgeting whenever she talked to him, "Since I achieved my new form, I am already beyond normal human capabilities. So you won't be able to keep up with me."

Ritsuka's smile dropped, a feeling of guilt washed over him, "Sorry, Mash, I've become a burden for you."

"No, no, it's ok. While you can't follow me… that doesn't mean we still can't leave this area quickly." Mash said while she nervously pressed the tips of her fingers together.

"But… how are we going to do that?"

Mash looked at Ritsuka, a faint blush coloring her cheeks, before she shook her head and marched right toward him.

"Uh… Mash… What are you…? WOAH".

He felt Mash sweep his legs with one of her arms, while the other supported his back. Ritsuka had abruptly closed his eyes during the motion, then when he opened them once more, he saw Mash looking at him with stars in her eyes.

She was standing proud as she carried him in her arms.

[ I never knew I needed to see Gudao held like a princess up until this very moment.  ]

[ Mash is not a tramp, or a delicate flower, she is a knight in shining armor!!  ]

[ This is a dramatic shift in their relationship power dynamic!! I approve 100%  ]

[ Sorry Hex, but I ship Mash and Gudao now.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex: I don't need your approval! She might have saved Gudao, but he's still my one true love! I won't give up! (￣^￣ ) ]

"Now, hold on, master…"

"Mash?" Ritsuka felt Mash crouch low to the ground, her legs tensing as they built up energy for what she was about to do next.

At the same time, inadvertently causing her boobs to touch his arm;however, Ritsuka would be unable to dwell on his perverted thoughts as he felt his heart drop when Mash shot high up into the sky.

Ritsuka looked around and gulped when he saw the glowing lights of the ruined city before him.

[PerfectlySanehex: Σ(°ロ°) ]

[ Woah!!!  ]

[ So cool.  ]

[ Mash is now my favorite pokemon!!  ]

Mash was scanning the area around them until she found a place suitably far enough away from the danger they were in, "That place should be good."

Suddenly gears materialized behind her, and in a maneuver that defied gravity, her black heels stuck onto the magical constructs. "Fixing shield in space to the rear, deploying shield catapult. Hold on Master!!"

"Wait, Mash my heart is not reaaaadyyyy!!"

The same shield she had used to smash the Duskull men earlier materialized where the gears were.

She kicked the shield with one of her feet and blasted herself off towards the location she was aiming at.

Meanwhile, Ritsuka was stress testing his newly regenerated lungs by screaming at the top of his lungs in absolute fear.

[(O_O)! ]x1605

 [৻(  •̀ ᗜ •́  ৻) ] x1493

[PerfectlySaneHex: Σ(°△°ꪱꪱꪱ) ]

"Master! Please close your mouth! You might accidentally bite your tongue off and die!"

Ritsuka heard her warning loud and clear, and closed his mouth, but even with his lips sealed shut, he couldn't stop screaming as Mash's body accelerated to the ground.

Mash landed on the asphalt road, both Ritsuka and Fou's eyes were spinning from the sudden stop she did.

She carefully placed both of them on the ground,

Ritsuka was dry heaving by this point, and he was trying his best not to puke in front of the girl he likes so much.

Suddenly, Ritsuka hears a loud whistle in the air.

His face morphs into horror when he remembers watching a military documentary that one time. This was the sound artillery made when it was flying through the air.

His suspicions are confirmed when a singular streak of red light in the sky splits into hundreds of small arrows.

Before they even had a chance to get close, Mash stepped between them and her master, with her shield pointed in the same direction as the attack.

The attack hits Mash's shield.

She grunts as the bombardment of arrows slam into her shield, doing her best to make sure none of them hurt her beloved senpai.

[ Geez, Can't Mash and Gudao get a break? It's been nonstop attack, after attack, after attack.  ]

[TheIcePryce:  Humph. In war, there's never a moment of rest. You have to stay on your toes or else it will lead to your early death. This inappropriately dressed lass has good instincts.  ]

The dust clears, showing Mash and Ritsuka standing unscathed on top of a platform of smooth stone, but the same could not be said about the surrounding ground, as it had been pounded into dust.

Mash glared in the direction from where the attack came from.

"M-Mash… What was that?" Ritsuka looked mortified at the sheer devastation the attack left in its wake.

"I will be sure to properly explain later, Master, for now, please stand behind me. There are more attacks coming!"

"Huh?!" Ritsuka heard the whistle again, and this time he scrambled closer to Mash.

Another volley of arrows rains on them, but Mash held string and was able to block them once again.

[ Wow… what is that shield made of?! It's tanking all these pokemon level attacks without suffering a single scratch!!  ]

[ I dunno, maybe Mash-sensei will give us a lecture about it in the future?  ]

[ That's assuming they survive this attack.  ]

Suddenly, chat gets a surprise shift in scenery.

They are now overlooking the city of Fuyuki from a high vantage point.

[ What the?  ]

[ Where's Gudao and Mash?  ]

Then the scene shifts once more, this time showing a mysterious white haired red archer overlooking the city. More specifically, he was staring at the dust cloud where the volley of arrows had fallen on Gudao and Mash.

[ Who the heck is this guy?  ]

[ Oh wow. Just look at the definition of those muscles. <3  ]

[ That bow looks so fucking cool…  ]

[ I don't recognize that material…  ]

The red archer focused on the figures of Mash and Gudao, once again completely unharmed by his attacks. He let himself smile at their struggle for survival, "Well, well, they survived. I'm surprised."

[ Oh my A even his voice is hot!  ]

[Wait a minute… this guy… he's the one who's trying to kill Mash and Gudao! (◣_◢) ]

[(◣_◢) ] x1241

"Well, let's see how well that shield blocks my next attack, Miss Shielder."

The red archer extended his hand and a sword materialized out of thin air, catching everyone in chat off guard since they are still not used to people having Pokémon-like powers.

Then he did the unexpected. The guy took the sword and loaded it on his bow like an arrow, and drew back the heavy metal string as if it were nothing.

[ Uh, does this guy know what he's doing?  ]

[Ecruteak_Gal:  His kyudo form is surprisingly perfect, in fact it's the most perfect, textbook example of what the archery clubs teach in our schools in Johto. There's also the fact that he's drawing a heavy metal string bow with barely any effort, which indicates that he clearly has had decades of training and practice using a bow. If it were not for the fact that he was using something absurd like swords as arrows, I would have called him a master bowman, but after seeing this, I can only assume he's been inhaling too many spore attacks from the local mushroom populations. ]

[DragoonRuleZ:  Lol, he thinks he looks all cool with his sword bow. But he looks like a dork.  ]

"I am… the Bone of My Sword… "

Then, much to chat's shock, the blade morphs into an angry red arrow.

[Ecruteak_Gal:  Σ(°ロ°) ]

[DragoonRuleZ:  Ok. I take it back. He actually looks fucking cool. But murder is still not ok, OKAY?! ]

[No way, is he going to shoot from this far? ]

[ Arceus…  ]

[ I don't think my Decidueye could even fire his arrows from this distance…  ]

The bowman released his shot, However, just as he loosened his fingers, he clicked his tongue in annoyance and jumped away from the crane he was standing on. He narrowly avoided a dark ball of energy headed straight at him.

At the same time, the arrow was thrown off course, overshooting Mash and Ritsuka's location.

Unlike the previous attack, this one did not split into multiple pieces. Instead, it exploded into a massive blue hemisphere of energy when it touched the ground.

The buildings in the immediate area were incinerated into atoms, the sheer force of the blast reduced the buildings that were further away to rubble and the wind generated from the explosion swept through the streets and causing a cloud of dust in all directions.

[(⚆ᗝ⚆) ]x1569

The shooting suddenly stopped, which allowed Mash some time to grab Ritsuka, this time like a sack of potatoes, and away from danger.

[ WE HAVE RETURNED!  ]

[ GUDAO! READ US! WE HAVE INTEL!  ]

[ Gudao: What are you guys on about?  ]

[The camera changed angles, and we could see the enemy!! ]

[ There was a red boner guy standing on some crane miles away who was shooting projectiles from a bow that turns swords into arrows!!  ]

[El_Kukui:  Actually, it looked more like he was the one turning them into arrows, not the bow.  ]

[Gudao: Red boner guy? What kind of name is that? ]

[ The guy who was shooting at you was a red archer. He was going on about something being "the bone of his sword". Hence the name, "Red Boner Guy"  ]

[Gudao: are you guys trolling me? There's a time and place for that, and this isn't it.  ]

[ We are NOT!! The Red Boner Guy is real!!  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers: You guys are a riot! I am saving that one for later use! ]

[Gudao:  Frisk?! Is that you?!  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): You know him?! ]

[IliekQTthings:  YOU KNOW THIS ASSHOLE?!!  ]

[Gudao: yeah. He was one of the 11 viewers I had back before I met you guys. ]

[(ʘᗩʘ')  ] x 5,000

[Frisky1ntheFlowers: Alola, hello and Bonjour Gudao! You've gotten quite popular since our last meeting haven't you? ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): HEY. THAT'S MY SHTICK FRISK! GIT YOUR OWN!!! ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers: Sorry I left abruptly, My internet reception went wonky, and I couldn't stick around. ]

[Gudao: For 3 years?!  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers: Yes. ]

"I want to say that I'm surprised, but I'm not. Never change Frisk. Never change."

[Frisky1ntheFlowers: Ehe. ]

Ritsuka shook his head; it was rather nostalgic to see Frisk again, but now wasn't the time.

Hearing his voice, Mash turned to look at him for a moment.

"Master, who are you talking to?"

Ritsuka then remembered he wasn't alone when he was talking to his chat.

"Oh. It's nothing. Just… talking to myself." He couldn't see Mash's face, but he wouldn't be surprised if her face showed emotions that she didn't believe him.

Before she could press further, the universe threw him a bone.

"Kyaaaaaaaa!!"

A girly shriek had interrupted Mash's sprint, forcing her to stop and look to the side, where the source of the noise came from.

"Master. Your orders?"

Ritsuka had to take a moment to adjust his senses, but even after he regained some of his bearings it took him a second to realize Mash was talking to him, it was awkward enough to respond to her when she called him her senpai but hearing her call him master was something he doesn't think he'll get used to. Even so, the situation required that he adapt.

So he did.

"Someone is in danger, we need to go help!"

Mash gave a nod in approval, "very well, hold on, I'm going to use a bit more speed."

"What? No, Mash, wait, you can go ahead; just leave me—"

She sprinted forward, and Ritsuka's stomach lurched forward once again. The sudden acceleration caused his stomach to move inside his body in ways it was not designed to move.

The sudden stop was worse, as he could feel the g-forces cause his eyes to spin in circles, however, even in this state of disarray, he could still spot a girl being cornered by a group of shadows and skeletons.

[ She's alive too?!  ]

[ Do people in Gudao's world not die when they are killed?  ]

[ Well, if ghosts specialists are to be believed, our world is no better.  ]

[IliekQTthings:  Oh no! A damsel in distress! Go forth and rescue her, fair knight Mash!!  ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  She's no damsel, she's a bitch.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  Agreed. But please still save her, Mash.   ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  Well, Duh! Just because I don't like her doesn't mean I want her dead! GO MASH GO!!  ]

Using every bit of his strength, Ritsuka gave the command, "Go, save her, Mash!"

"Yes, Master!"

She gently placed him down in a safe location, then in a burst of inhuman speed, she launched herself toward the shadows and skeletons.

Ritsuka, seeing Mash was no longer looking at him, decided he couldn't handle it anymore. He violently retched on the broken asphalt.

[ Ew.  ]

[ Can whoever is controlling the camera PLEASE look somewhere else?  ]

The camera decided to show some mercy and shifted away from the gagging form of Ritsuka, to the relief of Chat.

The camera zoomed in on the shadow person with a Duskull mask as it was about to kill Olga Marie.

"Save me Lev!!!!"

Lev did not show up, but Mash did.

 She crash-landed on top of the assassin, breaking its spine and killing it in the process.

Then, using her shield, she bashed another into a streetlamp.

Mash didn't stop and continued to take down the enemy targets.

[ Damn. Look at her go.  ]

[ Ikr? I never expected the shy and reserved Mash to be such a badass!  ]

Mash finished off the assassins, then she let out a roar as she swung her shield in an arc, cutting down the remaining skeleton mooks who were accompanying the shadows.

Mash sighed as she noticed she had defeated her enemies, and she momentarily let her guard down.

"Enemies neutralized. Are you hurt, Director?"

The director, Olga Marie Animusphere, was kneeling on the ground, her golden eyes red and puffy from the tears she shed after being chased. She stared at Mash with a look of recognition, but her eyes lingered on the different appearance she now presented herself with. This cause Olga to hesitate when calling her name.

"Mash, Is that you?"

Mash was relieved to see the Director was unhurt and smiled, "Yes, it's me. I know it may be hard to believe, but I am now a demi-."

"Why?" Olga's voice interrupted Mash's explanation, which caused the self-appointed kohai to pause in surprise.

"Huh?"

"Why did you succeed now of all times?!" The director was glaring daggers at Mash, which made Mash feel insecure about what she would say next.

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:   Ugh. I can't STAND this ungrateful, no good nepo baby! She should be thanking Mash for saving her life, 

not scolding her! ಠ益ಠ) ]

"Ah, it was because when the master of this servant died, the servant decided to make a contract with me before I died as well. Then, I made a Master Servant contract with my Master… over… there?!" Mash finally took notice of Ritsuka motion sickness, and without warning she rushed to his side, much to Olga's displeasure.

She crouched down and started to rub his back.

Olga stared at the person who Mash was comforting and looked aghast when she recognized it was the public applicant who had fallen asleep during her briefing.

Meanwhile, in the shadows, a figure lurked.

Olga was too preoccupied about the implications of a no name nobody being a master while Mash was too busy helping Ritsuka and completely unaware of the shadow lurking near her.

The only ones who noticed were the people watching the stream.

[ Hey, uh you guys see that right?  ]

[ Yeah, that Duskull fucker is trying to sneak up on Mash  ]

[ MASH! TURN AROUND.  ]

Chat was doing its best to get Mash's attention, but no matter how many caps lock words they typed, their warnings did not reach her ears.

[ Damn! She can't see the danger or hear us!!  ]

[ Gudao!! Stop puking for a second and warn her for us!!!  ]

[Gudao:  ]

[ Damn it!! They are gonna die for real at this point!  ]

[ If only we had some way of letting Gudao and Mash know of the danger!!  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD): Ok, I think you guys have been blueballed enough. Here, go nuts! (｡･ω･｡)つ━☆ ✶⋆.˚ ]

[GudakoBot:  TTS ENABLED. Please be responsible, or else you might hinder Gudao's journey~  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD): @Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD) HUH?!! (⊙_⊙) ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD): @Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD) Of course, you can make yourself a mod. "(ノ _ <,, ) ]

An abrupt and loud ping caused everyone, even the assassin lurking in the shadows, to jump in surprise.

[TTS: "KicksYouIntheFace193 donated 100 bits." ]

[TTS:  " MASH! TO YOUR LEFT! ENEMY! "  ] 

"Eh!?"

Mash let out a cute gasp in confusion due to the sudden disembodied voice, but she quickly composed herself when she processed what the comment said.

She barely managed to turn around and raise her shield arm fast enough to block a dagger aimed at the back of her neck.

"Cheh." The Black Shadow Assassin said after it saw his attack fail to land.

It quickly adapted and readied itself to kick off Mash's shield to get away.

Unlike last time, however, Mash anticipated this and tilted her shield in a way that prevented the shadow from having stable ground to move how it wanted.

The shadow's foot slipped due to the uneven surface.

It attempted to recover its momentum by using its other foot to kick the shield instead. But due to the awkward angle of the shield, it sent itself crashing on the ground instead.

It tried getting up but did not get a chance to flee as Mash slammed the sharp edge of her shield through the man's torso.

Metal cut through flesh, bone and made a clunk sound as it dug into the asphalt below, effectively bisecting the shadow in two.

Then, she tore away her shield, causing the masked man to let out a groan of pain as the only thing holding its body together was violently ripped away.

Blood sprayed from both halves of the man, staining Mash's shield and one of her cheeks with blood.

The creature let out a final groan before it died and quickly vanished into a flurry of light particles that were swept up by the wind.

New Usernames:

I'mJustABill: Inventor of many groundbreaking technologies. He more infamously known for developing the pokemon storage system, which made him the eternal enemy of every clan from every region who owns pokemon pastures for renting out to trainers.

It took him years to prove pokemon storage in PC was not pokemon abuse via implementing creature comfort upgrades and the like to his tech.

Lanette34: Bill's colleague in the pokemon storage system.

DragonMasterLance: The current champion of Indigo. He was defeated by both Red and Blue and is now considered the third strongest in Kanto, much to his annoyance.

TheIcePryce: The former Pokemon League Champion before he was dethroned by Lance.

He now serves as the Ice type Gym Leader of Mahogany Town.

Chapter Text

"Who said that!!?" Olga looked around frantically at her surroundings, her demeanor much more fearful due to hearing the disembodied, robotic voice of chat.

[ :shocked Pikachu emote:  ]

[ I forgot that we could use TTS ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  You guys didn't have it. I gave it to you.  ]

[ WAIT. So you're telling us that we can finally have a say in Gudao's journey, all for the low, low price of 100 bits?!  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  Yes, you do; you all do.  ]

[ Sweet.  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  Though, please remember, what the Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away. If you abuse my generosity and deliberately hinder Gudao's journey with nonsense, there will be consequences ~<3  ]

[ElectricalStreamer Iono(MOD):  Frisk, WHAT. THE. FUCK. DID. YOU. DO?!!  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  I just saved Chaldea a massive headache in the future; that's what I did.  ]

[ Uh... I tried to make a TTS donation rn, but when I hovered my mouse over the bits dono button, I felt a crushing presence glaring at me from somewhere. I—I couldn't bring myself to push it. ]

[ It felt like I got hit with the Intimidate ability of a freaking swarm of Gyarados when I tried to do the same.  ]

[ Me too. ]

[ Is Frisk truly magical?  ]

[ Frisk… Who the hell are you?  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  I am Iono Chan's Senpai.  ]

[ElectricalStreamer Iono(MOD):  The heck you are!!! You just became a mod less than a minute ago!!  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  I meant in age and as a viewer. I was here waaay before you were in both cases, so I double qualify.  ]

[ Damn it, he's out of line, but he's not wrong!  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  You! How did you become a MOD without Gudao's, Iono's, or my approval?!!  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  yeah!! That's Illegal!!  ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  to answer your questions, in order: 

1. Magic. 

and

2. Where I live, it's not a crime.  ]

Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  cheh.  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  …that makes no sense!!  ]

[ Oh right, @PsychicMoostache(MOD) missed the magecraft lesson. Go to the clips section on the channel and watch it. Mash does a good job of explaining that stuff more than we could. We'll fill you in on what happened in your absence when you come back.  ]

"I'm… not sure… Master?" Mash turned to look at Ritsuka, whose eyes were looking in the direction of his Twitch chat with wide-eyed surprise.

"Master?"

Ritsuka didn't respond to Mash; seeing him ignore her caused her to furrow her brows, then she tried again.

"Senpai?"

Hearing her call him senpai caused him to come out of his stupor, and seeing the expression on her face caused him to chuckle nervously, "Oh, Mash, I, uh… I have no idea what that was about."

[ Bro, you suck at lying.  ]

[ Look at Mash's face, her pursed lips and narrowed eyes. Those are the eyes of a woman who knows when her man is hiding something from her.  ]

If Ritsuka wasn't as nervous as he was, he would have noticed Mash's eyes weren't focused on him, but rather on something next to him.

"Senpai, what is—" However, before she could ask press him for answers, a beeping noise interrupted the awkward atmosphere.

Ritsuka looked down at his wristband and clicked the button that he had remembered opened up the communication channel earlier.

《Ritsuka!! It's me, Romani!! Please respond!! 》

[ Oh, hi, Romani. Nice of you to join our awkward conversation.  ]

Ritsuka felt relief wash over him at hearing Romani's voice, "Oh, hey Romani."

《Oh. Thank goodness you're alive. I was worried that the enemy had killed you! 》

[ Speaking of which, those enemy Duskulls… Does anyone have any theories on that?  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  More than likely they are regional variants, or they are a completely separate organism.  ]

[ Idk, they looked too human to be Duskulls or Dusclops. ]

[ It was probably just a coincidence. Either way, I'm just glad Mash took care of them, and I hope we don't run into more.  ]

"Hey, Roman. You know this amateur?" Olga Marie asked Romani, who went deadly quiet all of a sudden at Olga's words.

《"...Director, you're alive?" 》

The director in question looked at Ritsuka's wrist communicator in incredulity.

"That's not a very nice thing to say to someone, Doctor Roman." Mash said, in an admonishing tone of disapproval laced in her voice.

《"Mash?! I… no, you are right. It's rude for me to assume you were dead… 》

Mash, hearing Romani's tone of voice, softened her voice, "It's okay, Doctor. It's understandable that you would think that, because if it wasn't for the servant that lost its master in that explosion and made a contract with me at the last second, I would have been doomed to vanish."

《Hmm… I see, I see… Wait, did you say you made a contract with a servant?!"》

"Yes, and I fused with that servant and became a demi-servant. In return for the abilities and Noble Phantasm of a Heroic Spirit, he wanted me to find and eliminate the culprit responsible for this Singularity."

《"I see…. A demi-servant, huh? I can't believe Chaldea's sixth experiment succeeded. 》

[ Okay, now we got more magecraft words tossed in our direction.  ]

[ Again, what do these terms mean?!!  ]

[ I'm so confused…  ]

[JustaBill:  Well, based on the implications, Masters sound like Pokémon trainers of some kind, and Servants are Pokémon…. I think… we need more clarification.  ]

[ That would be nice, but these people are not talking with consideration for those with no knowledge of what they are sharing. We need exposition, dammit!!  ]

[ I wonder what sixth experiment Dr. Roman is talking about and how Mash is related.  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  Based on the context we have of Mash's survival, her drastic increase in power, the so-called "contract" she made with this servant and the look of disbelief that Romani gave her when she reported her becoming a demi-servant? More than likely, it's human experimentation of some kind.  ]

[(◣_◢) ] x1195

[(ﾟДﾟ ) ] x1375

[(◞‸◟) ] x1697

[ ... I-I don't know what to say to that…  ]

[ I really hope Junior_Researcher is wrong… I can't stomach the idea that poor sweet Mash got subjected to such an inhuman practice. ]

[DragonMasterLance:  If there is human experimentation involved, then there's nothing we can do. We are merely viewers, with no way to interfere in their practices aside from admonishing them via bit donations.  ]

[ Well, regardless, the implications of such a thing even being a possibility means that's another red flag raised against Chaldea.  ]

Suddenly, a holographic square popped up in front of them. The box showed the fluffy doctor in all his glory.

《Oh. The signal has finally stabilized! I can see you now! Ritsuka, Director and… 》

Romani's enthusiasm died when his eyes landed on Mash.

《Mash, by any chance, that Heroic Spirit who offered you the contract, does he still have consciousness?" 》

"No. He does not. He gave me his combat abilities and then vanished."

《"Tch. Lucky bastard. If he were there, I would have given him a piece of my mind! How dare he dress you up like a pinup doll!!? Seriously, Mash! I know you owe your life to this man, but you shouldn't let him dictate what you wear! Especially if what he picks for you is this shameless!! I raised you better than that!! 》

[ Woah. Romani is Mash's dad?!! ]

[ Mind blown.  ]

[ What a twist!!  ]

[ They don't really share any similarities, though. ]

[ Well, it could be Mash took after Mom more than Dad. And besides, adoption is a thing. ]

[ Yeah, we have no place to judge.  ]

[ Right. Sorry sorry.  ]

"Sorry, Doctor Roman, I needed to transform to protect Master, or rather, Ritsuka Senpai, and Chaldea's uniform just wouldn't cut it. You can tell just by looking at my status."

《Woah you're right! All your parameters have improved! Physical strength, Magical circuits, EVERYTHING. You really have become a servant… 》

"A servant who doesn't even know its True Name, and has no idea who the heroic spirit who inhabits her body is, nor know what kind of Noble Phantasm they are holding."

《Hey, look on the bright side. Not every Servant who gets summoned is cooperative. Now that you're a Servant, this is in our favor. After all, you're completely trustworthy.》

[ Ah. So Mash wasn't the one who dressed up like this; it was this servant guy who did it.  ]

[ That's sus af. This servant guy basically went up to a dying girl and promised her a new chance at life. All she has to do is go on a quest to resolve… whatever this singularity is, but not in her own damn clothes, no. He instead takes off all her clothes without her consent and puts her into risqué clothing, "fuses" with her, and then, and only then, does he grant her power beyond normal humans.  ]

[ Yeah, that definitely sounds like something a creep would do.  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  I am back.  ]

[ Welcome back, Moostache. How was Mash's lesson?  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  I will admit, it's difficult to believe, but it holds some logic. Therefore, I will choose to hold my judgment until more definitive proof shows itself.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  That is a sensible approach to it. Unlike some people I know.  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  speaking of young Mash, I was able to hear what Dr. Roman was saying. I will admit, as a father myself, if I saw one of my little girls come home dressed like how young Mash was because some man told her to, I would be beyond furious.  ]

[The-Undefeatable:  Same. If Mash were my daughter, I'd be upset enough that I'd go find the fucker who talked her into wearing that and sweep his ass with my Gigantimax Charizard. Then, when I beat his ass, I would wait for him when the cameras aren't around, and I would take a few friends with me and jump him in an alley.  ]

[ Geez… remind me not to get on your bad side.  ]

[ Well, at least she's alive. ]

"Roman. I asked you a question…. Do you know this amateur?! Also, what the hell are you doing?! You're the head medic; why are you in charge?!!"

《Oh, right. Sorry, director. Yes, I know him. We met up before the explosion happened. 》

Suddenly, Olga's anger fizzled out and was replaced by fear. "Wait… you don't mean…"

《Yes. I am currently the ONLY qualified and active member to lead Chaldea right now. Everyone else is either dead or heavily injured. 》

[ Oh. That is bad.  ]

[ Yeah, that sounds about right.  ]

[ I still can't get the image of that one headless lady we saw earlier.  ]

[MalasadaMayhem:  Don't remind me; I close my eyes, and I can still see her.  ]

"Wait…. Lev, is Lev ok?! Why isn't he in charge?"

《I hate to break this to you, director, but Lev was supervising the rayshift in the control room. He… didn't make it. 》

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  Good riddance. My only regret is that I didn't pay him back for the pain he caused Sabrina.  ]

[ Wait… Sabrina? As in Gym Leader Sabrina?! You're her Alakazam?! ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  Yes.  ]

[ Oh shit, is she ok?  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  yes. She's resting now, but whatever Lev did to her was enough that she will be hospitalized for a few days.  ]

[ Shit. Sorry to hear that. Hope she gets well soon.  ]

Tears start to well up in Olga's eyes; she covers her mouth, as if ashamed to show weakness to those around her.

[ Oh… she had a crush on Lev, didn't she? ]

[ That sucks.  ]

[ Who's going to tell her that her man is likely not what he seems?  ]

[ I don't feel the need to be an asshole today. She looks like she's going through a lot of stress.  ] 

[ Nah man. Frisk creeps the crap out of me.  ]

[Cowards. All of you. That includes me. (Ó﹏Ò)  ]

Olga remembered there were people watching and wiped away her tears. "How many survivors?"

《Only a handful, less than twenty qualified technicians left and around 50 facilities maintenance staff. 》

"A-And the master candidates?!! Are there any others who are capable of rayshifting!!?"

《Afraid not. Ritsuka is the only one left. Everyone else is in critical condition. We might be able to save a few of them, but the severity of their injuries means most of them will die.》

[ Oh shit, the situation is worse than I thought. ]

[ Yeah, fuck dude, I don't know how complex their hierarchy is, but if the medic is now the temporary director of an organization, then things truly are fucked.  ]

[ There is no way that few staff will be able to keep a facility as large as Chaldea running. ] 

[ Poor survivors are gonna be worked to death trying to pick up the slack.  ]

"All 47 candidates… no… nononono! I can't handle the burden of so many lives!!"

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  Well, well, color me surprised, the bitch has a heart.  ]

[ @ShortShorts_QUEEN, I feel like we shouldn't be hard on Olga anymore. She looks like she is on the verge of suffering from a stress-induced heart attack.  ]

[Mighty1Oak:  Indeed. Poor girl does not deserve to bear such a heavy responsibility. So let's not give her a hard time.  ]

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  fine, I'll lay off… for now. But if she acts like a bitch, I'm still gonna call her out on it.  ]

Olga glared at the communicator on Ritsuka's wrist.

"As director, I order you to cryopreserve them at once!!"

《Oh right, I forgot coffins had that feature.

Are you sure I should? Cryopreservation without prior consent is a crime in every country in the United Nations 》

"I know!! Just do it!! We'll worry about the legal implications later!! They cannot be allowed to die!! Do you hear me?!"

《Very well, I'll do it right away then.  》

[0ffDoodyJoy:  Good call. Preserving a person's life should ALWAYS be the priority.  ]

[ I mean, on the one hand, cryopreserving someone is illegal, but letting people who could be saved die is morally awful.  ]

Romani finally turned to Ritsuka, who was currently sitting on a large piece of concrete rubble and busy petting Fou's ears as he was reading chat.

《And Ritsuka, I'm sorry that you've had to go through all of this. To force you to go through this ordeal without any explanation on our end.》

"Its ok, I'm just going along for the ride for now. Though I would appreciate it if by the end of this mess, you could help convince my university not to drop me from my classes. My parents are going to be furious if that happens."

《I'll be sure to keep that promise, Ritsuka. And don't you worry, you won't have to go through this alone; you have humanity's most powerful weapon by your side. Mash.  》

[I'm sorry… what did he just call Mash?! ( ｡ •̀ ᴖ •́ ｡) ]

[ H-how could a father say such a thing about her child?!!!  ]

[ Romani, I thought you were cool man!!  ]

[ Mash is not a weapon. She's a gallant knight who comes to rescue fair maidens!!  ]

[ Ok, that's another red flag.  ]

[ First the possibility of human experimentation, then we have the chill Dr. Roman calling Mash, his daughter, a fucking weapon? Chaldea really is not bothering to hide their Evil Team tendencies.  ]

"Uh… about that… Can someone fill me in on what's going on? Why is Mash suddenly calling me Master? Why is she suddenly superhuman, and what the heck is a servant?!"

[ FINALLY!! Gudao actually asked what we all have been wanting to ask!!  ]

[ He's too blasé about all this. He needs to ask for stuff more often, instead of just getting dragged everywhere by someone.  ]

There was a pregnant silence that permeated the air. Only the sound of the wind howling could be heard.

"How do you not know this?!" Olga was looking at him in disbelief.

Ritsuka, with a calm face, repeated the same thing he told Mash: "I never got the pamphlet."

"...Chaldea does not provide pamphlets."

"Well, then you shouldn't be surprised when people like me come without knowing anything then. Before Mash explained it to me, I thought magic was just something wizards and witches in pointy hats did in fairy tales."

Olga cupped her face in frustration. "What did I ever do to deserve this?" The young woman dragged her hands down her face and then let out an annoyed huff. "Fine. Since you are the only current able-bodied master we have, I will overlook your previous transgression against my family legacy and give you a personal lesson on what you need to know."

[ Woah! Another Magecraft lesson!! Nice. *Brings out popcorn.*  ]

[Ms.Roxanne:  Hopefully Ms. Olga will finally shed some clarity into this fascinating but confusing magic system. We've been reacting blindly to everything with too little to go off of for much too long.  ]

[ Alright! I'm ready this time! I got my notebook!!  ]

[ But why? We have VODs for that? ]

[ So far only clips have been showcased in Gudao's channel atm. We don't even know if we'll get full VODs of this stream, especially if this stream never stops being live.  ]

"Kyrielight. How much did you tell him?" Olga demanded.

"I gave him a very simple introduction to magecraft and the moonlit world when I was escorting him to his room, and I even gave him a basic idea of how projection works." Mash responded.

《And I gave him a brief explanation on how rayshifting works, using what Mash had already told him to help him understand it. Hopefully it stuck. 》 Romani chipped in, all while taking a sip of coffee.

Olga Marie sighs, "Well, at least you're not entirely hopeless. Alright, Since you know the bare basics of magecraft, I will just answer your question. Heroic spirits are heroes of the past that have achieved great feats during their lifetimes and were recorded into the annals of human history.

Ritsuka had a skeptical look on his face. "Wait… So by heroes, you mean like Oda Nobunaga or George Washington? Is such a thing possible?"

Olga didn't seem bothered by his skepticism, as she continued to explain.

"As you might be aware, due to the decline of magecraft, it is considered difficult, if not impossible, to summon a heroic spirit by a modern mage without some systems in place. One such system is known as the Holy Grail, which summons heroes from the Throne of Heroes and places them in weaker containers that we refer to as 'Servants.'"

[ Interesting. So people in Gudao's world can become Heroic Spirits by committing grand deeds.  ]

[ That's actually pretty cool.  ]

[ Isn't the holy grail that cup that King Arthur guy was trying to find? ]

[Gible_Archeologist:  Yes, it was! Although most historians in his world have no historical records of King Arthur and his knights of Camelot's existence outside myths and stories.  ]

[ Wasn't one of King Arthur's legends the inspiration for Aegislash?  ]

[Gible_Archeologist:  That is precisely why we even know about him in the first place. One of Aegislash's inspirations from Gudao's world was from the legendary sword Excalibur. Which was the sword in the stone that selected a worthy person to become king.  ]

[SoniaYampers:  Fun fact for those of you who haven't watched the Aegislash stream, the myth of King Arthur is one that closely resembles the story of the two brother kings from Galar. It is a really fascinating case of our parallel worlds sharing common historical and mythological parallels.  ]

[The-Undefeatable:  Oh boy, those two are at it again. Girls, we appreciate the history lesson, but we are all here to listen to Olga, not you guys.  ]

[SoniaYampers: (•̀⤙•́ ) ]

[Gible_Archeologist: (•̀⤙•́ ) ]

Ritsuka saw the chat's question and decided to parrot it back to Olga. A lot of what they asked was stuff he was curious about too.

"While it does share the name, it's not the genuine artifact. The Holy Grail that we are talking about is the one created by three great mage families, the Tohsaka, Einzbern, and Matou. It's an artifact that was created for the sole purpose of reaching the Akashic records. It is also known as Akasha or 'The Root.'

It's a place that exists outside time and is the place where all souls originate, are recorded, and eventually return to when a person dies. " Olga said, her demeanor calm, collected, and completely engrossed in the lecture.

"Ok." Ritsuka felt a pulsing in his brain. He was learning, but his head was starting to warm up from the heat his brain was generating trying to keep up with all these new terms thrown in his face.

[ So… this Root is heaven?  ]

[ Well, we know souls exist; why not heaven?  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  Utter nonsense. But as much as I hate it, I will admit that so far, the explanations have at least made some logical sense, even if they are claiming outrageous things. Like the existence of an afterlife.  ]

[Ghost_Prince:  Have you not met any ghost types?  ]

[Junior_Researcher:  Again, those do not count. Ghost types are just a different flavor of Type energy. I did not name them, else I would have chosen something more scientific.  ]

"Many believe it to be so, but we are getting off topic. So, in order to obtain the Holy Grail, a master must summon a servant and participate in an event called a Holy Grail War."

At the mention of the word "war," many people in chat fell silent.

War was not something that was ever spoken lightly of in the Pokémon world.

"As you can imagine by the name, it's exactly what you think it is. Seven pairs of Mages and servants come to the location the Grail War is taking place in to kill every other competitor so that they can gain access to the Holy Grail."

[ Uh, pretty sure that what she is describing is not a war at all. It's a battle royale… to the death.  ]

[ Yeah, a war is something grand that occurs between countries and regions. This conflict is much too small to count even by our world's standards.  ]

[ One thing is for sure: it sounds just as ruthless as a normal war.  ]

"All for the sake of reaching the Root?" Ritsuka asked.

"In the case of most masters, yes, reaching the Root is the sole drive any real mage family has, and they will all stop at nothing to obtain it." Olga did not hesitate to respond.

[ All that bloodshed for a golden cup that will let them reach heaven. ]

[ Mages are weirdos who need to go outside and touch grass.  ]

"But for the servants, their incentive is just to have a wish granted."

"Wait… The Holy Grail can grant wishes?!"

"It's a byproduct of its intended purpose, but yes, it can."

[ Ok. Now it makes more sense why mages and servants would go through that turmoil. Anyone, even in our world, would do horrendous acts of savagery if it meant they could get any wish they desire.  ]

[KicksYouintheFace193:  Dangerous. This Holy Grail War is dangerous.  ]

[ You don't need to say that twice. Literally. Such a death game would be highly illegal to organize in our world… heck, even in Gudao's world too. The only reason it seems like it still happens is that mages cheat to keep it hidden.  ]

[ Not so hidden now, though, if the state of the place this Fuyuki city is anything to go by, their Holy Grail War went a little bit too far and spilled over into the mundane world.  ]

[ In summary, if I understand this correctly, a holy grail war is an event where mages and servants murder each other until their deaths, without consideration for the innocents unrelated to the "war" if they are harmed or killed. All for the promise of a single wish.  ]

[ Yup. Pretty much.  ]

[ So many innocent lives, men, women, and children… all over a stupid wish.  ]

[Ms.Roxanne:  Not the wish, the ability to reach The Root. Still despicable, but I felt the need to point it out.  ]

[ I don't like it either, but now that we are on the topic of wishes and ignoring the killing part… If I could wish for anything I'd want, I'd wish for a Silph co backpack filled with an endless supply of pies.  ]

̶[̶P̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶l̶y̶S̶a̶n̶e̶H̶e̶x̶:̶  ̶I̶'̶d̶ ̶w̶i̶s̶h̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶G̶u̶d̶a̶o̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶b̶e̶n̶d̶ ̶m̶e̶ ̶o̶v̶e̶r̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶b̶r̶e̶e̶d̶ ̶m̶e̶ ̶u̶n̶t̶i̶l̶ ̶I̶ ̶c̶a̶n̶'̶t̶ ̶w̶a̶lk s̶t̶r̶a̶i̶g̶h̶t̶ ̶o̶r̶ ̶s̶i̶t̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶a̶ ̶c̶h̶a̶i̶r̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶a̶ ̶s̶o̶l̶i̶d̶ ̶w̶e̶e̶k̶.̶  ̶]̶

[ Message failed to send.  ]

[ Oh. That sounds good. I'd wish for the biggest plushie in the world.  ]

[ I'd wish for people and pokemon to get along better.  ]

 ̶[̶P̶e̶r̶f̶e̶c̶t̶l̶y̶S̶a̶n̶e̶H̶e̶x̶:̶ ̶I̶'̶d̶ ̶w̶i̶s̶h̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶b̶e̶ ̶f̶u̶c̶k̶e̶d̶ ̶l̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶a̶ ̶M̶i̶l̶t̶a̶n̶k̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶G̶u̶d̶a̶o̶'̶s̶ ̶t̶a̶u̶r̶o̶s̶ ̶d̶i̶c̶k̶ until I pass out from the ecstasy. ]̶

[ Message failed to send.  ]

[GudakoBot:  (Visible only to PerfectlySaneHex) I know this stream isn't family friendly anymore Hex, but that doesn't give you the right to say shit like this. The rules still apply! Also, get some professional help. This kind of obsession isn't healthy.  ]

[ An endless, ever expanding library!!  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  I'd wish to have a happy, loving family with Gudao.  ]

[ Oh wow, that's surprisingly wholesome, but still in character, of you Hex.  ]

[Ecruteak_Gal:  and I'd wish that stupid vaporeon meme never happened, or better yet, I'd wish that the grail bring the anon who posted that meme to me in chains, so that he may stand trial for his crimes.  ]

Ritsuka almost rolled his eyes at Chat going on a tangent about wishes, but he stopped himself, remembering that Olga will take offense if he does.

Since chat wasn't feeding him questions anymore, he decided to ask one that had popped into his head earlier.

"But what if you summon a hero that doesn't agree with or like you?"

Olga points at his hand, "That's where command seals come into play."

Ritsuka looked down at the weird, V-shaped crest on his hand.

"I don't remember getting a tattoo…"

"You didn't, you receives that "tattoo" from the FATE system when you were designated as an official Master candidate."

Ritsuka hummed as he rubbed the surface of his skin where the mark was. It didn't really feel any different from his normal skin.

"Anyway, think of them as absolute commands you can give to a servant. The word absolute is not being used lightly; you can, if you wish, force your servant to commit acts they would normally never do; heck, you can even make them commit suicide if you wanted to. That is the power of a command seal."

The tangent that chat had been obsessing over, came to a halt when they heard that.

[ That's just… evil.  ]

[ Again, Chaldea is definitely putting in the work for earning the "Evil team" moniker.  ]

[ It's not just them. It's the mages of Gudao's world who also do this.  ]

[ Arceus, why do people in Gudao's world have to be so cruel?  ]

"Normally masters in a Grail war only have 3 available to them during the entire Holy Grail war, but due to the FATE system, yours can regenerate after a certain period of time."

[ Oh joy. So now the poor heroes who sign up with you guys now have no way of escaping their torment if their master is a piece of shit.  ]

[ Good thing Gudao is the only master left, huh?]? I mean, I don't mean to sound cold, but I trust Gudao not to be an abuser because I know him. He would never do such a horrible act. I cannot say the same about the 47 other masters.  ]

"I'm sorry, Director, but that sounds… cruel. If they are absolute commands, then that means a master with evil intentions can force an unwilling servant to do what they want."

"Meh, at the end of the day, they are just familiars we use as weapons or tools to do our dirty work. When they die, they aren't really dead per se. They just go back to the Throne of Heroes. If they get resummoned, whatever trauma they endured will be wiped from their memory, as if it never happened. I wouldn't worry too much about it."

Ritsuka wanted to argue, but he bit his tongue; he knew it was not the time to have a moral debate with her.

[ShortShorts_QUEEN :  And she's back to being a cold-hearted, bitchy, evil team boss. Still think I should let her "get off easy"?  ]

[Mighty1Oak:  Oh, no, by all means, go ahead. I can defend a lot of things, but justifying supremacy over another being and using a system of oppression to trample over their rights? This is one thing I can never excuse or forgive.  ]

[PsychicMoostache(MOD):  Justifying any form of cruelty against another being, living or dead, is not a healthy mindset. It is a slippery slope that always leads to the person who does the apologist of such ideals to eventually committing unforgivable acts.  ]

[ I don't like that these servants are being referred to as weapons.  ]

[ To a world filled with squishy humans, supernatural beings who could level homes and bring ruin to a city would be hard to view as anything but weapons.  ]

[ That is sad, yo.  ]

"Hmm, well, going back to servants, to make them easier to summon, the servant containers for the heroic spirit are separated into seven classes: Saber, Archer, Lancer, Caster, Assassin, Rider, and Berserker."

[ Wow. These servants even have their own typing system.  ] 

[ I wonder if they have type advantages like pokemon do.  ]

[ Perhaps it's similar to the weapon triangle from Fire Emblem? ]

[ Maybe, but we are getting too caught up in speculation. Let's hear what the Director has to say before we continue the discussion.  ]

"There are Extra Classes as well, but I can talk about them later. Incidentally, each class also has different skills and—

"Um, director… I don't mean to sound rude, but we are in enemy territory, and it would be for the best if we stop the lesson here."

"Aw really? I was just getting to the good part."

"Later. We need reinforcements. While I might be a Demi-servant, I am still a half-assed one. Having some backup would make it much easier to keep you both safe."

[ Oh come on, Mash, we wanna know more!!  ]

[ Probably best if they stick to the basics. Like Mash said, they are in enemy territory. It's not the ideal location for a lecture.  ] 

[ Skills? Isn't that just a synonym for abilities? Are we sure these servants aren't just Pokémon with different steps?  ]

[ If they are, then it's all the more reason to be furious about the barbaric way they treat them.  ]

Olga coughs into her fist, and then she looks at Ritsuka. "You are the last available master of Chaldea, so it's your responsibility to summon a servant to help our cause."

《While we can't go too crazy with the summons right now due to being on backup power, there's enough juice to keep 2 servants, not including Mash, to be summoned. 》 Romani chips in.

[ Gudao, for all that is good in the world, please do not follow their example!!  ]

[ No lie, I was going to stop watching your stream if you had agreed with Olga there. But seeing the disgust on your face has reassured me. Teach these fuckers a lesson about friendship!!  ]

"So, how would I go about doing that?"

"Normally a mage would have to get blood or special chalk to draw out the summoning circle, but thankfully for us, Mash's shield already serves as a perfect catalyst to summon servants."

"But first, we need to find a leyline. It will help us make the summoning easier. "

《Um… director? 》

"What is it, Roman?"

《You're actually standing on one. 》

"Standing on what?"

《A leyline. You're standing directly on top of one right now. 》

Olga looks down, then her face turned a deep shade of tomato red. "I-I-I knew that!! I was just testing the amateur to see if he knew."

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  Yeah, sure you did.  ]

"In any case, Mash, just start the ritual."

"Yes, Director!" Mash does what is told and places her shield down, then takes out three shiny, rainbow-colored crystals.

[ Woah… so pretty… so shiny  ]

[StevenLieksMinerals:  Ritsuka. Please ask the fine ladies what those crystals are.  ]

Ritsuka was surprised to see Steven in chat. Normally, he rarely chose to come visit as he was a busy man who had no time to keep watch over his streams.

He saw no harm in humoring him since the few times he joined chat, he was always polite and gave generous donations in the past. Then again, he was curious about what they were, too.

"Uh, Mash, what are those crystals you have there?"

Mash paused and looked at Ritsuka before she took one of those crystals and showed it off so he could see.

"These are saint quartz. They are crystals made of pseudo spiritrons; there's a lesson in that, but all you need to know is that spiritrons are the building blocks that make up the soul, akin to atoms for matter and cells for living organisms."

"So that means that pseudo spiritrons are artificial spiritrons, right? That means Saint Quartz are fake souls."

"Yes. That is what they are."

[StevenLieksMinerals: Crystallized souls?! That's possible?!!! ( •͈૦•͈ ) ]

[ That doesn't sound ethical. ]

[ Guys, I think I ran out of red flags to give. Chaldea took 'em all.  ]

[ Then it's official. Chaldea Security Organization is now an Evil Team. All in favor say 'Aye'  ]

[ "Aye"  ] x16,541

Mash puts the saint quartz on top of the shield.

"Alright, Senpai, go stand near the shield. Then say the following":

Ritsuka clears his throat before he gains a determined look on his face. He extends his hand, with an open hand, his command seal facing the moody, overcast sky.

[ Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy.  ]

[ Do you guys think this is going to work? ]

[ Dunno. Either way, this shit is getting clipped.  ]

Ritsuka gained a look of determination and focus.

"Heed my words!"

Ritsuka's commanding voice seemed to take every spectator aback, clearly not expecting the Last Master to have such a presence.

"My will creates your body, and your sword creates my destiny."

The mana-rich air around Ritsuka started to vibrate.

The shield, which had just been sitting there, suddenly glowed an intense light.

Meanwhile, Chat was freaking out and moving at a speed that could barely be followed by the human eye at seeing the spectacle.

"If you heed the Grail's call, then follow humanity's path and answer me!"

The light intensified; meanwhile, its complex design manifested into a bright, holographic platform.

"Seventh Heaven clad in the great words of stargazers…"

The holographic design began to spin, a ring of light manifested, which multiplied into three, forming a pillar of disconnected, spinning rings of light.

"Come forth, pass on your judgment, and punish my enemies…"

"Guardian of the Scales!"

The three rings collapsed on themselves, condensing into a small star at the center of the shield. Then, like a dying star, it went supernova, flooding the general area in a blinding light and blinding everyone nearby who didn't cover their eyes.

The light dies down, returning the place to the darkness and gloom it once was before the ritual started.

Ritsuka, who was standing at the epicenter of the explosion of light, took a moment to rub the spots from his eyes. Then, once his vision adjusted, he looked at the shield and was surprised to see that a figure now standing over the shield.

A small, dirty blonde-haired teenage girl stood proudly before him. She wore an expensive yet practical looking female armor. Every inch of her body was covered in ornate, silvery metal. All except her legs, which were covered in black stockings of some kind, and her head, which was currently unprotected and completely visible.

He blinked in surprise when he saw the rather odd, but cute set of dog ears on her head.

The girl, uncaring of his stare, gave him a toothy smile, clearly enthused to be here.

[ HOLY SHIT IT WORKED!!  ]

[ GUDAO SUMMONED A CUTE GIRL!!  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  damn it.  ]

"My name is Gareth."

"I am the Round Table's seventh seat...a knight who served King Arthur!"

"I look forward to joining your cause, master!"

[SoniaYampers: The Arthurian legends are real!!? (  ≧ᗜ≦) ]

[GibleArcheologist: ooooh, how exciting!! (  ≧ᗜ≦) ]

[ Does that girl have dog ears? ]

[ Another human/pokemon hybrid?  ]

[It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu:  Look at those red cheeks!! She's definitely a pikachu!!  ]

[ Holy shit… You're right. She has pika cheeks!!! ]

[It's-ALWAYS-Pikachu:  FUCK YEAH!!  ]

"Huh. Not bad. " Olga commented as she saw Gareth's summoning.

Meanwhile Mash looked at the gallant knight with respect, awe and a confusion.

"Wait, I thought Gareth was a man, why are you a girl?"

Gareth turned to Mash, an adorable pout on her face, "hey, you have no room to talk. You're a girl knight too. "

Mash's face turned red with embarrassment, "I'm sorry I didn't mean to offend! I-I"

[DragoonRuleZ: There's nothing wrong with being a female knight, or just a woman in a traditionally male role. ]

[ Come on Mash, you should know better!  ]

​

The knight gave her a grin, "it's ok. I get the confusion, I get it alot. History just depicts me as a man because the bookworms were told to make it so, ya know?"

[ Ah that makes sense.  ]

[ It seems ladies have always had it tough no matter the world.  ]

"Well, the gender of a servant is not important. So long as someone is willing to aid, we will welcome them with open arms." Olga said, completely unfazed by the gender reveal.

[IliekQTthings: I can't believe I am agreeing with Olga of all people, but she is right. Male or female does not matter. She is a proper knight in shining armor, and she answered the call. It would be rude to discriminate against her for defying their expectations. ]

《Well, gender reveal aside, it's still amazing that we pulled a knight of the Round Table!! That's some amazing luck you have there, Ritsuka… Ritsuka? 》Romani looked at Ritsuka, who looked in awe of the servant before him.

Then, he opened his mouth and said, "Cute."

Gareth's smile froze at hearing her master's words. Her smile turned wobbly, and her face reddened from the embarrassment.

Mash looks at Ritsuka with incredulity and a bit of jealousy for making such a bold confession.

[ Man, Gudao can't help himself, can he?  ]

[ He's become such a playboy. Poor Mash.  ]

[GudakoBot:  First Servant summoning complete!! Waifu Counter has been added to chat. Every time Gudao rizzes a cute girl, the Waifu Counter will go up.

Current Waifu Counter:  2 ]

[ Two, eh? That's Mash and Gareth. Gudao truly is living a man's romance.  ]

[ Just 2? What about Olga? ]

[ Olga hates Gudao's guts, so she doesn't count.  ]

[ Yet.  ]

[ Hot damn, even GudakoBot ships Gudao with everyone BUT Hex.  ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  I am the first wife. No toaster is going to decide whether I count or not.  ]

Seeing that he caused Gareth discomfort, Ritsuka tried to salvage the situation by greeting her with a friendly smile, "Nice to have you on board, Gareth. My name is Ritsuka Fujimaru; I am your… master, I guess. I still don't like using the term, so feel free to call me what you like."

"Ah! I-it's okay. Calling you master is fine. Then, our contract has been finalized!" She took his hand and firmly shook it.

Ritsuka was taken aback by just how much strength was behind such a handshake. This girl clearly was not one to be underestimated.

He decided to introduce her to everyone, "And this is Mash; she is also a part of the team, and over there is Olga; she's my boss and lastly the guy in the box is Romani, he's somewhere else at the moment, but he will be supporting us for now."

"Oh, I see." Gareth says as she looks at the assembled group in curiosity. "Nice to meet you all, I hope we can all get along!"

The group returned her sentiments.

"Hmm." Gareth nodded in approval, but then her gaze stopped when she caught sight of Mash, and her eyes widened.

Mash, suddenly being caught off guard by the look she was given, shifted in nervousness, "I-is there something you need, Ser Gareth?"

"No, no, I don't really have anything I need, but… uh, while I do have something to say, I don't think I'm allowed to say it." Gareth said with her own nervous chuckle.

Mash just gave her a confused look.

"In any case, I really am looking forward to helping you guys out. I may be the most inexperienced Knight of the Round, but I can still hold my own and will protect you to the best of my abilities!" the young girl seemed to have an aura that just exuded a resolute confidence that eased everyone's worries.

It was so potent that even the high-strung director seemed to relax a bit.

[ Wow. I love her already!!  ]

[DragoonRuleZ:  I've only known Gareth for less than a minute, but if anything were to happen to her, I'd kill everyone in this room and then myself.  ]

[ Same.  ] x1567

《Alright, Ritsuka, go ahead and summon the next one. Then, when you are done, we can start the investigation of what happened here. 》

Ritsuka nodded and was about to start his summoning aria again, but Gareth asked a question he had been dreading.

"Hey Master, what is that thing?" Gareth asked, her face tilted in confusion, much akin to a curious pug.

"What is she talking about?" Olga asked, clearly not expected the unprompted question from the Knight of the Round.

Ritsuka cursed inwardly at himself, he had not expected Gareth of all people to bring attention to Chat. He was hoping he would have a bit more time to come up with an explanation for their existence, but it kept getting pushed back by the constant life or death situations.

Now he was caught with his pants down, and he had to find a way to buy himself more time.

"What are you talking about Gareth, I don't see anything" Ritsuka responded, sweat running down his brow.

Gareth furrowed her brows before she pointed one of her armored fingers to the floating orb that was chat cam.

"That." Her finger then fell next to Ritsuka, "and that rectangular thing. What are they? "

[ Well shit. She can see us. ]

Mash took the moment to say something, "I didn't say anything because Dr. Roman interrupted me before I asked, but what exactly are those things, senpai?" Mash said.

《Mash, What are you talking about? I can't see anything near Ritsuka. 》Romani, asked over the intercom.

"Yeah, Romani is right, there's nothing there." Ritsuka tried to argue, but Mash wasn't having it as she walked over closer to Ritsuka and leaned in to get a better view of the box.

"It's a box of scrolling text." she paused when she read the contents of the box, "the words are saying hi to me."

Olga Marie looked at Mash and Ritsuka with bewilderment, "Mash. Are you hallucinating? You're pointing at nothing but empty air."

Mash looked at the director, "wait. You can't see it?"

"No. I can't. All you're doing from my perspective is looking at empty air." Olga turned to Ritsuka, "what exactly did you do to your servants for them to act this way?"

Stuck between a rock and a hard place, Ritsuka finally gives in, "Alright, I'll tell you. But before I give an explanation, do you guys know what 'Twitch' is?"

"Are you referring to an involuntary muscle contraction?"

"Not exactly…"

Olga's patient look started to shift to anger. "Then out with it! I don't have time for your stutters."

"Well, when I mean by Twitch, I am referring to the streaming website, Twitch."

"Should I know what this Twitch is?"

《Simply put, Director, it's a platform that allows creators to upload a live video feed to a wide audience of people… Wait, Ritsuka, are you saying that?! 》

Olga's expression turns serious when she finds out what streaming entails, and then she glares at Ritsuka.

"Explain yourself. Now."

Ritsuka gulped; he was already deep in shit creek without a paddle, so he decided to just confess.

He takes a deep breath and calms his nerves before looking at the director dead in the eye.

"I am streaming right now." He said.

Olga raised a brow. "Come again?"

He responded by pointing at the camera orb floating nearby, "That camera is currently recording everything that is happening as we speak, live on the internet." He pointed at the box. "That is my chat box, it seems that apart from me, only Gareth and Mash can see them, but they are there. There are a lot of people currently watching everything we say and do as we speak."

Olga Marie's expression starts in confusion, and then when the words finally make sense, her face starts to pale.

"Um… S-Senpai… And how many people are watching us right now?" Mash asked.

Ritsuka scratches his cheek nervously, then he looks down at his chat and checks on the viewer count that was displayed at the bottom of the chat.

"Huh, one hundred thousand people."

"Eh?!" Mash lets out a surprised kohai noise.

《Eh?!》 And l Iike father like daughter. Romani said the same.

Meanwhile, Gareth looked more impressed than surprised, "Uwah, that's more people than the population of Camelot."

"O-O-One… H-Hundred… THOUSAND!!!!???!!" Olga shrieked in horror.

"And growing." Ritsuka added.

Olga couldn't handle the stress anymore, and she got into his personal space before Gareth or Mash could stop her. Blue circuits of energy surrounded her arms and her legs.

"Woah!" Olga grabbed Ritsuka by the collar of his Chaldea uniform and lifted him into the air, and then she proceeded to shake him akin to an abusive mother shaking their baby.

"YOU BASTARD!!! YOU MADE ME EXPOSE THE EXISTENCE OF MAGECRAFT TO OVER 100,000 PEOPLE!!"

"Ahh!! I'm sorry!!" Ritsuka pleaded for mercy, but Olga Marie had run out of it. So she only shook him harder.

"EXCUSES AREN'T GOING TO UNDO THE SHITSTORM THAT YOU UNLEASHED!!! YOU FUCKING—" Before Olga could react, she felt her arms firmly gripped by a powerful set of delicate armored hands. The grip was strong enough that it easily caused her just enough pain to make her release Ritsuka from her grasp, but delicate enough to not shatter her bones.

She then felt the hands pull her backwards and readjust themselves to loop over the back of her neck.

The culprit was Gareth, the Knight of the Round who had been summoned by Ritsuka. She was now holding onto Olga Marie in a full nelson. Meanwhile, Mash stood in front of Olga, a mix of conflicted emotions warring for dominance on her face seeing the Director assault her senpai but at the same time understanding why she did such a thing.

[Shortshorts_QUEEN: :Rolling on the floor laughing:  ]

"LET ME GO!!! LET ME GO! I STILL NEED TO WRING HIS FUCKING NECK LIKE A TOWEL!!"

"Sorry, milady, but I am afraid that I cannot allow you to do that. He is my master, and I have pledged my banner to him. You shall not harm him."

"Director Olga! Please calm yourself!" Mash tried to placate Olga, and for a moment, it seemed like it worked, as she stopped flailing and shrieking profanities in Gareth's arms.

She looked like a cat being held by the scruff of her neck. Yet, her eyes bore holes at Mash for stopping her from delivering punishment to the deserving.

"Mash…. You know as well as I do what happens to people who expose the existence of magecraft to the public."

"Yes… I do."

[ It can't be THAT bad, could it? Surely we will be let off scot-free since we are not actually earth humans?  ]

"I don't think you do. The Clock tower is going to send Enforcers to my doorstep! This level of exposure is going to provide grounds for them to not just massacre everyone in Chaldea but level it and the foundations it's built on to the ground! You, me, and that fucking moron over there are going to have our necks slit open, and our heads mounted on pikes for what happened here!!"

Romani, as well as everyone in the control room, was cringing and making noises of discomfort at that news.

[ Ok. She MUST be exaggerating, right? This Clock tower wouldn't really do that to people just because of us… right? ]

[ She looks dead serious, no pun intended, and so do Mash and Romani. ]

"We can cross that bridge when we get to it, Director. For now, I think it's best if we just… try to focus on investigating Singularity F."

Olga balled her hands into a fist and grit her teeth in frustration before she relented.

Then she looked at the servant, "You can let me go now; I'm not going to kill your stupid, moronic master anymore."

[ Wow, if she didn't hate Gudao before, She DEFINATELY hates him now. ]

[PerfectlySaneHex:  that woman cannot see the grandeur that is Gudao, she clearly has poor taste in men.  ]

"I don't really trust you…"

"It's fine, Gareth; she's cooled off. You can let her go."

[ *rubs temples in frustration* dammit Gudao. ]

[ She literally admitted she wanted to kill you bro. Why you taking chances? ]

[ Well, Gudao is already shown to be completely uncaring for his personal safety. So it makes sense he would forgive her so easily.  ]

[ Though now he at least has two competent bodyguards to keep charge of him.  ]

[ Those poor girls…  ]

"But Master, I—"

"Just do it, please?"

"Very well, but if you try any funny business, I will really have to hurt you." Gareth dutifully followed her master's orders and gently placed the woman on the ground.

Olga, fully aware of the warning she received from the servant, just huffed before she fixed her hair, then calmly brushed the dust from her skirt.

"Well, since we now have an effective form of communication to the outside world, we might as well take advantage of it. No. 48, use your Twitch thing and have one of them make a phone call to +44 xx 7xxx xx6x, the code word is "I want to report a gas leak," then ask for a Lord Brishisan."

[ You heard the lady chat; do your thing. ]

[ Already on it! ]

[ Lol. That phone number is the EXACT same as the Macro Cosmos's official phone number. What are the odds?  ]

[Oleana_Macross:  Please stop calling our company to report Gas Leaks. You are interfering with our daily operations.  ] 

[Oleana_Macross:  I'm being serious. Stop. ]

[Oleana_Macross:  STOP CALLING US!!!  ]

[ Oh my Arc, my sides, they hurt. ]

[ I cannot believe it, Olga Marie just did the first interdimensional prank call in both world's histories.  ]

[ Truly a feat worthy of being written on the throne of heroes. lol.  ]

Olga then narrowed her eyes. "If you have any last regrets, come to terms with them, because once reinforcements arrive, your life… or rather, all of our lives will no longer ours."

 "Uh… about that…"

"Oh, what is it now?!"

"The thing is, while yes, I am streaming to 100,000 people right now, they aren't exactly from here."

"Stop being cryptic and just spit it out already!"

"Well, the Twitch stream is not actually being broadcast on Earth."

Olga gave Ritsuka a look of confusion, "Huh?!"

Ritsuka cringed as he realized that what he was about to say next was going to make him sound like he was out of his mind, but he swallowed the feeling and pushed forward.

"My Twitch chat is special; they are actually viewers from a completely different world."

The group fell silent at his confession, all of them wondering if they had heard him correctly.

Only Olga responded with a fitting "Hah?!" exclamation of disbelief to his ridiculous claim.

"Yeah, I know it's hard to believe, but that's not the wildest part; get this, my Twitch stream is actually connected to the world of Pokémon!"

Ritsuka told them, and immediately, the confusion and anger from Olga had changed into an emotion that Ritsuka hadn't seen the director emote at him yet.

Concern.

Looking at the faces of Mash, Romani, and Gareth showed that they too were giving him looks of bewilderment and concern. As if he had just dressed in a bathrobe, declared himself the Pope of Sundaes and threw ice cream at people's faces and called them blessings.

"What?"

[ They think he's crazy, don't they?  ]

[ Definitely.  ]

[ I'm sitting here, typing in his chat while chilling with my per litten on my lap and even I don't believe him lol.  ]

Romani decides to speak, 《Ritsuka… By any chance, when did you first start noticing your Twitch "chat" following you around? 》

Ritsuka ponders for a moment before he says, "Well, I'd say around yesterday. Chat told me that it was around the time the Chaldean recruiters kidnapped me."

Mash, Gareth, and Romani exchange looks.

Romani, meanwhile, muttered something about stress-triggered illusion magecraft.

Meanwhile, Olga just throws her hands up in the air.

"Great! Just GREAT! Our last hope for survival is a fucking delusional lunatic!! Useless!!"

Just then, the same ping noise from earlier rang from nowhere, causing everyone to shout in surprise, but the loudest of all was Olga Marie's.

[ ShortShorts_QUEEN donated 100 bits.  ]

[ "Who do you think you are calling him useless?! If it wasn't for Gudao giving Mash the order to come help you, you'd be dead right now. 

You should be thanking him!

Say, 'Thank You.'"  ]

Olga immediately sobered up from her fear when she heard the random, disembodied voice started to berate her.

"Who am I? WHO AM I?! I am the director of Chaldea, the heir of the Animusphere family! My family is thousands of years old! I'm not going to waste my breath thanking a lowborn public applicant who couldn't bother to take my family's goal seriously!!"

"Director, please calm down!" Mash tried to interfere, but the director glared at her, which caused Mash to stay where she was.

[ ShortShorts_QUEEN donated 100 bits.  ]

[ "Big whoop. So your family has been around for ages. Who cares?! It would have ended with you if it wasn't for that 'lowborn public applicant!' APOLOGIZE!"  ]

The words actually seem to have had an effect on the Director as she recoiled back slightly, but she regained her composure with a vengeance, "I'm not taking orders from some nobody! Buzz off!!"

[ShortShorts_QUEEN:  "Stubborn entitled bitch."  ]

"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME?!!"

"Director. Now is not the time to be arguing; we need to get a move on before more enemies show up."

Olga wanted to argue, but she held her tongue. "Whatever, I don't need to validate my decisions to some delusional mage's illusions!!"

Hilda tried to donate more bits, but her message failed to send.

[ ShortShorts_QUEEN has been timed out for "whenever I feel like it." Hours. ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  Alright, I think you got your point across, Hilda. I think it would be best if you go cool your jets for a few minutes, maybe an hour.  ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  Oh no you don't!! You might have made yourself a mod, but I'll be damned if I let you do what you want!! This is my stream, betch!!  ]

[ I thought this was Gudao's stream? ]

[Electrical★Streamer_Iono(MOD):  What?! Why can't I undo the timeout?!! ]

[Frisky1ntheFlowers(MOD):  Sorry, Iono-chan, but as your Senpai, I have certain authority and privileges above you. ]

[ Bruh.  ]

[ElectricalStreamerIono: (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻  ]

Olga glares at Ritsuka, "And YOU. Enough of your bullshit; hurry up and summon your second servant already!!"

Ritsuka was about to do so until he felt a wet patch on his finger. Looking at it, he saw leftover blood from his previous encounter with that thing.

He looks down at the summoning shield, and he gets an idea.

"Okay. Director, I know you are mad at me, but I have a question." Ritsuka raises his hand.

"Ugh, what?!" Olga responds in a snippy tone.

"Do I have to repeat that long aria each time I want to summon a servant?"

"No. You don't. The FATE system contains the aria for summoning, so you don't have to do it every time, only the first."

"So, I don't have to say anything anymore?"

"No. You still have to say a shortened aria to trigger the summoning from now on."

"And... by any chance, can it be anything?"

"Yes. It can. Are you done asking your stupid questions? Hurry up! We don't have all day to entertain your delusions!"

"Sorry, sorry, I'm on it."

Ritsuka looked down at the shield, and for the first time since they met him, the group saw him with a giddy looking expression on his face.

Then, in a decision that confused the spectators watching, Ritsuka brought his hands together then started to do hand signs.

Olga narrowed her eyes. "Oh, what is he doing now?!"

Gareth leaned closer to whisper in Mash's ear, "What is Master doing?"

Mash shook her head. "I have no idea."

It was only Romani who looked at the scene with shock and awe.

"No way, is he going to do THAT?!"

Olga was about to demand to know what Romani meant by thay, but by then Ritsuka had already finished.

The last master of Chaldea lifted both his hands high into the sky, then he slammed them on the shield with all his might, startling Mash, Gareth, and Olga.

"Kuchiyose no Jutsu!!!"

...

....

.....

"Oi… amateur… what are you are doing?" Olga demanded as she stared at Ritsuka with a judgemental look.

"Huh. I could have sworn that it should have worked. Maybe I should have used fresh blood?"

《 Um. Ritsuka…  I know you must be excited to live out your childhood fantasies, but this is a very serious, life-or-death situation, so could you please take things seriously? 》

Olga, hearing Romani's words, just groaned in frustration.

"Ah. I see. "

"What?" Gareth asked Mash, who looked like she had realized what the sound of one hand clapping sounded like.

"Senpai is just being a chuunibyou."

"Ah, I see… " Gareth nodded her head, but in truth, she had no idea what chuunibyou was.

Ritsuka felt his face warm up in embarrassment.

[NinJanine: :Rolling on the floor laughing:  ]

[Kohga:  Hmph. So the summoning methods of the orange buffon who proclaims himself ninja failed. As expected.  ]

[Blue-TheCHAMP:  He just embarrassed himself in front of three cute girls. What a loser!  ]

[ Clipped!! ]

"If you don't stop messing around, servant or no, I WILL kill you. " Olga warned him, which caused Gareth to tense her posture a bit.

"Sorry Director. I swear I won't do it agai-"

Just as Ritsuka got up from his position, the shield lit up once more.

[NinJanine:  wha?!  ]

[Kohga:  !!! ]

[ !!! ]

Just like before, the same sequence of events happened, but this time everyone got their faces flash banged by the light.

When the light faded, and the spots in everyone's eyes went away, they all stared at the servant standing on the shield, their mouths hanging open in shock at what they saw.

It was, yet again, another young girl standing before them, but in sharp contrast to the modestly dressed Gareth, this girl was the complete opposite. Instead of wearing armor, or normal clothing for that matter, all she wore to cover her modesty were multiple interlaced black straps over her body and a see through fishnet material under her straps over her chest and her thighs. One particular strap was wrapped over one of her eyes, serving a makeshift eye patch.

Her midnight black hair was so long that it was touching the heels of her feet. Which were also wrapped in the shape of a ninja's sandals, but with the bottoms of her feet left exposed to the cool metal surface of the shield.

"Assassin Mochizuki Chiyome, here to answer your call. I offer my loyalty to my new owner.

Order me as you wish, and I shall obey. " 

No one said anything, as everyone was at a loss for words at the absurdity of the situation.

Even chat halted as they stared at the girl before them, until someone finally broke the silence.

[Gudao… what the fuck, bro? ಠ_ಠ ]

New Chatters introduced in this chapter:

Blue-TheCHAMP: The main man himself, Blue. Grandson of the former Champion Oak and childhood rival/friend of Former Champion Red. Unlike in the games, Blue was too slow and Red beat him at becoming the Champion of Kanto first. Blue never became champion in his world's timeline but he's still considered an elite level trainer.

Ghost_Prince: Reference to Ghost King, one of AstoryForOne's OCs who is a ghost pokemon trainer from Kanto. Go read it, it's great! You can find it on Questionable Questing in ASFO's snippets thread.

NinJanine: Koga's daughter and current Gym Leader of Fuchsia city. She trained under her father for most of her life and is also an expert in poison types and ninjutsu like him. Unlike her father, however, she secretly likes what bits and pieces Gudao showed of Naruto. If she ever got her hands on the entire series, she too would binge watch the entire series from start to finish. Though, she tries not to show enthusiasm for it, nor watch clips of the series when her father is near.

Kohga: The former Gym Leader of Fuchsia Cuty and current member of the Elite Four. He was an espionage expert during the war and is very strict ande old fashioned when it comes to the ninja arts. Which is why he despises Naruto and his entire franchise staining the legacy of ninjas in Gudao's world.

Ms.Roxanne: Gym Leader Roxanne from Hoenn. She frequently uses some of Gudao's clips during her lessons.

Oleana_Macross: Chairman Rose's secretary, from Galar. She now has to deal with hundreds of phone calls from all across the world because of Olga marie's accidental prank phone call.

StevenLieksMinerals: Steven Stone, current champion of Hoenn. He has an obsession with minerals, stones, anything geology as a whole. He is currently obsessed with the idea of saint quartz and wonders if he could ever get a sample someday.

SoniaYampers: Sonia, the granddaughter of Galar's pokemon Professor. Childhood friend of Leon.

Chapter Text

"Yaaah!!" Mash swung her shield in a wide arc, creating an area of death that reaped the skeletons in front of her.

Bones shattered under her might until they left behind nothing but particles of light and, occasionally, just a singular, black bone.

Ritsuka didn't understand why that happened, but the director ordered them to pick these bones up anyway, saying they were materials they could use to aid their cause.

Ritsuka had no idea how Chaldea could use these bones to help save humanity, aside from using them to make bone meal to grow crops, but he wasn't sure if that was what they were going to be used for, nor would he want to eat anything that was grown using THAT as bone meal.

Mash picked up the nasty-looking bone from the ground and stuffed it inside her shield.

 The fact that Magi had figured out how to store items into a folded space didn't really surprise him; no, in fact, it actually annoyed him. He would have killed to have access to this kind of convenience during his high school and university days. Books were heavy after all.

But magecraft was magecraft, so it had to be hoarded. All he could do was mope about the injustice in his head.

 Mash looked exhausted from the constant battles they have been going through. Not physically, mind you, as he was told that her nature as a demi-servant made her more resilient to physical exhaustion. No, her eyes showed mental fatigue from the constant monotony of killing skeletons and shadows.

He couldn't blame her.

They had been ambushed more than five times by now, with barely any time to rest.

Most of the enemies were skeletons, with the occasional assassin servant that attempted to harm him or Olga, but none of them could get past the wall of cuteness and death that was Mash and Gareth.

Despite the fact that they just met, they easily got accustomed to each other and had an easy time coordinating their attacks.

Mash slashed and bashed while Gareth rushed the enemy and impaled them or smashed them with her massive lance. If anyone somehow got too close to him or the Director, the Chiyome would appear and cut them down before disappearing.

Then, Mash collected whatever materials the enemies dropped. Rinse and repeat.

And the few times they could take a breather, they could never truly be at rest. Walking through the rubble and seeing the once-living Japanese city in ruins was not good for the psyche.

The fires and overturned buildings were unsettling enough, but it was the clean, knife-like cut slicing through a large section of the city that truly shook and unnerved them. They knew that whatever had created it was still lurking somewhere within the singularity—and they would have to deal with it.

Gareth, however, stared at the devastation with the same haunted look Chi-chan made whenever his aunt brought him over after going to the vet. To those around her, it likely seemed like shock at the gruesome scene—but he noticed something everyone else missed. There was recognition in her eyes. Had she witnessed something like this before?

He decided not to ask, as it would only sour everyone's morale.

As for the former residents… Thankfully they hadn't encountered any non-skeletal corpses along their journey, but they did encounter various places tainted with hundreds of puddles of dried, red blood.

He even saw a stuffed bunny discarded on the ground, its white fur stained in the blood of what was likely its previous owner, with said owner being nowhere in sight.

So far, he's considered it a blessing that they hadn't encountered any child-sized skeletons. If they did, he knows that it would actually drive him insane.

Even the cold-hearted Director Olga Marie had taken the time to reassure them that these tragedies could be undone—so long as they got to the bottom of what had happened here and resolved it.

That had given him some hope, hope that they could save the people of this city from dying.

Still, despite that, that did not ease his guilt. He felt like he was not contributing anything to this operation.

 The Director had declared him to be her bodyguard, but it started to feel more like he was the one being guarded because even she threw the occasional magical potshot to help out Mash and the girls. Yet here he was, just standing by and watching.

'It's only to be expected. A lord is meant to command and to lead, and it is the duty of us servants to fight in their stead.'

Ritsuka winced, still not comfortable with having to talk directly in his head. He could see why there were laws against the abuse of such things in the Pokémon world. All your barriers for privacy are non-existent, and unfortunately, when he communicated those worries, Olga scoffed at him and told him to get over himself, as it was something he had to get used to due to it being an advantageous communication line between him and his servants.

 'I suppose you are right.' Ritsuka responded, his internal voice still disappointed by the reality of the situation.

 '...you are not wrong for having these feelings, my lord. War… it's an ugly thing. Only a monster would be able to see such atrocities without feeling anything. Do not belittle your contributions, my lord. You are our tether to this world, and without you, none of us would be here to fight in the first place.'

The knot of anxiety in Ritsuka's heart did not magically go away, but it did shrink by a good amount after hearing Chiyome's words.