In the real world, Kiana, Mei, and Bronya stared wide-eyed at one another.
A few minutes earlier, Gu Yu and the pink-haired girl with donkey ears, who had been preparing to fight on the battlefield, had simultaneously stopped moving as though time had frozen.
With the Kaslana bloodline flowing through her veins, Kiana could clearly hear Gu Yu's faint breathing beneath his mask.
From that alone, Kiana believed Gu Yu was still alive.
Thinking that her companion might be in trouble, Kiana repeatedly wanted to rush over and help.
If Raiden Mei had not promptly held her back out of concern that rushing in might interfere with Gu Yu's possible battle plan, Kiana might already have charged over and greeted Yae Sakura with her metal bat.
Thus, the three of them waited anxiously, and waited, until...
"What exactly did you do to Rin?!"
They saw a fierce glint flash through Yae Sakura's eyes as she rushed forward and grabbed Gu Yu, who had just released his transformation.
Just before Stigmata Space was about to eject Yae Sakura and Gu Yu, Yae Sakura had clearly seen Gu Yu fling a card at the soul of her younger sister, Yae Rin.
Then, amidst Yae Rin's shocked expression, her soul was directly sucked into the card.
As the space shifted, Yae Sakura's consciousness sank into darkness.
The moment she came to her senses, she grabbed Gu Yu by the shoulders.
"How is Rin?!"
"I just said it. Miracles and magic aren't free."
"But while they aren't free, they do exist."
After lightly brushing Yae Sakura's hands away, Gu Yu caught a card that popped out from the Rider Card Holder and placed it in Yae Sakura's hand.
"Think carefully about the past you shared with your sister."
Looking at the card before her, engraved with her sister's image, Yae Sakura froze for a moment before slowly closing her eyes.
Once she had calmed down, she could sense that the person before her bore her no ill will.
Combined with everything Gu Yu had done in Stigmata Space, Yae Sakura, who had already developed a slight favorable impression of him, felt that this young man was not a bad person.
Perhaps trusting him once would not be a bad thing.
With that thought in mind, Yae Sakura began recalling her past with her sister.
Their memories of playing together as children, the promise Sakura and Rin had made after Rin became gravely ill, the day they had decided to run away, and the moment Sakura had personally carried out the ritual.
Whether they were happy memories or painful ones, Yae Sakura replayed them again and again in her mind.
"Huh, what is that?!"
Kiana, who had originally intended to rush over and send Yae Sakura flying with a swing of her bat, suddenly stopped when she saw a small figure gradually materializing beside Yae Sakura.
Beside Yae Sakura, Yae Rin, dressed in a kimono, looked at the figure she had manifested with disbelief.
When she had said farewell to Yae Sakura in Stigmata Space earlier, Yae Rin had already prepared herself to fade away.
She had only been a fragment of a Remnant Soul sustained by obsession. If she had not been unable to bear watching her sister suffer under Hiyorimar's torment, she would have vanished immediately after death.
Once that obsession had ended, she would inevitably—and rightfully—have disappeared from this world.
And yet now...
"Rin, this is..."
The girl, constantly moving her hands and feet, looked in disbelief at Yae Sakura as she opened her eyes.
"Big... Sister?"
"Rin!"
Seeing her younger sister appear before her once more, Yae Sakura pulled Yae Rin into her arms.
"That's wonderful... It's truly wonderful..."
"Even if it's only for one minute... being able to hold you again is already wonderful."
Ordinarily, no one would interrupt a moment like this, when two sisters reunited after death.
But while the girls were all somewhat moved by this inexplicable scene, Gu Yu ruined the atmosphere by saying,
"Um... it definitely won't be just one minute."
"I used quite a bit of Honkai Energy to make that card. How could it be used up in a single minute?"
"Don't underestimate a Rider's history, hey."
Watching the two sisters, tears already streaming down their faces, have their reunion interrupted by Gu Yu, the three girls watching all had black lines appear on their foreheads.
This guy really had no sense of atmosphere.
Interrupting the reunion of two sisters at a time like this—was he a demon?!
"I... I truly do not know... how I should thank you, sir."
Thinking of how the young man before her had resolved every one of her troubles, Yae Sakura truly did not know how to face her benefactor.
"I told you, miracles and magic aren't free. Just consider it a favor you owe me, Yae Sakura."
"And one more thing: keep that card safe. Your sister's life depends on it."
After saying that, Gu Yu swept his gaze over the girls around him and suddenly felt that something was off.
Raiden Mei, the Third Herrscher.
Kiana Kaslana, the Second Herrscher.
Yuno, once a Pseudo Herrscher.
Yae Sakura, a Pseudo Herrscher.
Aside from Bronya and Yae Rin, his card holder even had Hiyorimar, the Twelfth Herrscher, sealed inside.
Why were so many Herrschers gradually gathering around him???
This situation felt seriously wrong!
So, an explanation of the mechanism behind Yae Rin's resurrection was necessary here.
First, based on the earlier plot, Decade's cards were designed to release things sealed in two-dimensional [flat] form into the three-dimensional [solid] world for battle.
Of course, they were not only used for fighting.
In the plot of Movie War 2010, Tsukasa Kadoya once gave Shotaro Hidari the card of Kamen Rider Skull, allowing him to summon Narumi Sokichi [Kamen Rider Skull] from another world.
Likewise, in that same work, Tsukasa Kadoya completely vanished after choosing to be killed by Natsumi Hikari.
But after all the worlds were restored, Natsumi Hikari, Daiki Kaito, and Yusuke Onodera relied on their longing for Tsukasa Kadoya, along with that of the Riders from the other seven parallel worlds, to bring him back to life.
Yes, resurrected. There was no so-called thought-form; that was merely fan speculation. The official explanation was that Tsukasa Kadoya had directly resurrected.
So, combining those two plot points, Yae Rin had a Remnant Soul, the Power of Decade could seal things away, and longing could bring someone back to life.
Then under such harsh conditions, bringing Yae Rin back to life should not be that much of a problem... right?
Yae Rin had suffered far too much since childhood. I figured it was not an important plot point, so forcing things a little to revive the poor girl was not such a bad thing, probably.
Well, there probably would not be another resurrection plot like this later, right? After all, like Dragon Ball, the plot would collapse every time this was used.
PS2: As usual, please vote.
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