After joining World Serpent, Raiden Mei had picked up a lot of highly practical skills from Raven—things she had never been exposed to before.
Infiltration, espionage, reconnaissance, tracking, and counter-surveillance...
And... forging identity documents.
Over the past few days, she had discovered something that came as an unexpected, yet incredibly useful, surprise.
Namely: even though she had lost the power and mantle of the Herrscher of Thunder... ever since she strayed onto that unknown "Path" and acquired that eerie "blade"...
She could still wield the power of lightning.
Even stronger than before, in fact.
But also much harder to control.
Fortunately, through her past experience and recent solitary training, she had paid the necessary price to wield this brand-new lightning with a fair degree of proficiency. She could even use it to pull off feats normally reserved for top-tier hackers.
For instance: forging a digital footprint to facilitate her movements, ensuring she was no longer an undocumented ghost in this era.
Which was exactly how she was currently able to stroll right out the front doors of Nagazora International Airport in broad daylight.
Perhaps it was the sheer volume of the bustling crowd, or perhaps... some unexpected variable was at play. An unseen, third-party interference, for instance.
Whatever the reason, Mei—who was far from an amateur at shaking off tails—failed to immediately notice the white-haired young man closing in on her from a distance.
His pace quickened. What started as a light jog steadily escalated into a full-blown sprint.
Until, suddenly...
Thwack!
As the youth dashed past a public restroom, his eyes locked so intensely on the purple-haired girl ahead that he completely ignored his surroundings. A figure brushed past him, delivering a vicious, precise chop to the back of his neck.
The attacker—clad in a hoodie and a face mask that obscured his features—had closed in without making a sound. His movements were ruthlessly efficient.
The moment the youth slumped over, the hooded man caught him, seamlessly hooking an arm around his shoulders. To any casual onlooker, they looked just like two old friends, happily stumbling into the adjacent restroom together.
"Hm?"
Sensing a fleeting disturbance, Raiden Mei finally glanced over her shoulder.
But by then, the pair had already vanished into her blind spot. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, she merely faced forward again and continued her solitary walk toward the airport exit.
Meanwhile, inside that same restroom...
"..."
The mysterious hooded man pulled down his mask.
A closer look revealed a face identical to the white-haired youth he had just knocked unconscious. Only, far more mature.
"So the first Retrograde Descendant of Days Past to appear after me," he murmured, "is indeed Raiden Mei."
The hooded man—Kevin Kaslana—furrowed his brow.
He had already dragged the younger man into a restroom stall, leaving him slumped over the toilet. Kevin simply stared down at the boy. At his past self.
"Raiden Mei had barely arrived in Nagazora before she nearly crossed paths with 'me'... No, by some freak twist of fate, 'I' was the one who almost approached her."
Kevin raised his head. "This convenient little coincidence... Is this your doing, Ling Ke?"
In that moment, his gaze seemed to pierce straight through the ceiling and the building itself, locking onto a pair of unseen eyes.
Only silence answered him.
Kevin looked back down at his unconscious past self.
Suddenly, his eyes widened.
"Damn it!"
Remembering all of Ling Ke's past tricks... A feint! It was his absolute favorite tactic.
If today's incident really was his doing, then...
"His target was never me to begin with!"
Realizing this, Kevin didn't waste another second.
In a flash, he bolted out of the stall, pulling his mask back up to conceal his face, and sped out of the airport.
He left behind only the young Kevin of this era, who had inexplicably taken a heavy blow, slumped over the toilet seat with a pained frown.
A moment later...
"Tsk, tsk~ So ruthless even against yourself. Exactly what I'd expect from the Flame-Chaser of Deliverance—Kevin Kaslana."
A spatial rift linked directly to the Theater of Domination tore open inside the cramped stall.
From it stepped a twin-tailed girl in wooden geta.
Puppet of Domination: Sparkle.
Her eyes, patterned with cherry blossom petals, narrowed slightly as a sly, wicked smirk played across her lips.
"Kevin, oh Kevin. Once bitten, twice shy, hm? Have you finally racked up enough experience on how to deal with us?"
"It's a pity. Even though my original self does love a good feint..."
"Who ever said..."
"...that a feint can't be a Russian nesting doll?"
With that, the Puppet of Domination: Sparkle raised her right hand. Her slender index finger tapped lightly between the young Kevin's eyebrows. "Time to wake up, sleepyhead."
"You've still got a... 'part' to play, after all~"
The moment the words left her mouth, Kevin jerked as if someone had viciously flicked his forehead.
"?"
Kevin groggily blinked awake.
The Puppet of Domination: Sparkle was already gone.
"How did I... hiss—"
The moment he fully opened his eyes, a sharp ache flared at the back of his neck.
He reached back to rub it on instinct, only to be met with a freezing sensation against his palm. It felt like he'd been clobbered by a massive block of solid ice.
"What the... Did it hail indoors on a sunny day? And land squarely on my neck?"
Gritting his teeth, Kevin looked around. He froze, his face settling into an expression of utter bewilderment. "Where the hell am I?"
He looked down, realizing he was sitting on the closed lid of a toilet. He looked up at the half-open wooden stall door. "A bathroom?"
"How did I end up here?"
He felt like he'd completely blacked out after a bad bender.
He rubbed his head, struggling to drag up the last thing he remembered before blacking out...
But before he could think any harder, his phone buzzed in his pocket, the ringtone blaring against the bathroom tiles.
He pulled it out.
The caller ID flashed a single name: MEI.
Meanwhile, across the city...
"Phew—"
Outside Nagazora International Airport, MEI scrambled out of a taxi in a frantic hurry, clutching a stack of documents.
Nestled right on top was Su's passport.
She practically speed-walked toward the terminal, juggling the paperwork in one hand while pressing her phone to her ear with the other.
A little while ago, Kevin had called her in a panic, claiming Su had left his passport back in the boys' dorm at Chiba Academy. He was going to miss his flight back home if she didn't rush it over.
What else could she do? Hearing Kevin beg over the phone, MEI could practically picture him furiously bowing in apology. Resigned, she did the unthinkable and actually asked for time off during her favorite class.
Honestly, those two... You're supposed to double-check your bags before heading to the airport! MEI grumbled inwardly as she weaved through the crowd.
But to be completely honest...
The whole situation felt a little strange to her.
Kevin was one thing.
Su... was he really that careless? Was he always this forgetful?
And besides, if something like this happened, why wouldn't Su—a short-term exchange student traveling back with his group—contact Chiba Academy's administration? Why make a fellow student trek all the way out here just to drop off a passport?
Then again, considering Kevin was the one who had actually made the phone call... suddenly, it all made a frustrating amount of sense.
"Sigh..." MEI let out another heavy breath.
To think her perfect attendance record, completely untarnished since the day she started school, was going to be ruined over something like this.
Just then...
"Hey! MEI, are you—"
"Kevin, did you and Su—"
The call connected. Kevin and MEI spoke at the exact same time.
However, MEI barely got the first half of her question out before she froze.
!!!
In her line of sight, a profoundly distinct figure was walking straight toward her.
It was too familiar.
Because that figure... was literally her.
In that moment, driven by some inexplicable compulsion...
"Who are you?"
MEI murmured, staring at the approaching stranger. Without another word, she hung up the phone on Kevin.