Morning light streamed lazily through the gap in the curtains, scattering across Koushi Hōoin's face.
Koushi groaned and rolled over, trying to bury his head in the pillow to block out the damned brightness.
Hmm... When did the pillow get so hard? And so cold?
He vaguely reached out to fumble around, but his hand met not soft fabric.
Instead, it was a strange, cold, hard texture with complex geometric edges.
"Huh...?" Koushi reluctantly opened his sleepy eyes, his vision focusing—
—He saw a dark gold dodecahedron cube and a crystalline cube, inside which countless blue data streams seemed to rush, sitting side by side on his nightstand, gleaming with an unusual luster in the morning light.
"???"
"Ah?" His brain crashed for three seconds.
The next second, as if doused in ice water, Koushi shot up from the bed, his sleepiness instantly vanishing!
"What the hell?!"
The absurd, thrilling, and heart-stopping memories from last night surged like a floodgate opening... "It wasn't a dream... Those things... They really weren't dreams!"
He cautiously reached out, picking up the two items as if they were bombs.
An extremely reckless yet incredibly tempting thought uncontrollably popped into his mind.
"...How about I try again? This time, I need some sense of ceremony!"
Koushi fiddled with the [all-encompassing drive] in his hand. The cold touch and the faint flow of internal data pathways reminded him that everything from last night was real.
A crucial question suddenly jumped into his mind, making his heart skip a beat.
"Hey, System?" He tried asking internally, "Are you there? Boss Aha? Miss Customer Service? Give me a sign?"
The air in front of him twisted slightly, and the gaudy system interface, adorned with a comical smiley face pattern, lazily popped up.
The background sound was faint, like someone yawning nearby.
「Ding~ dong~. Good morning, my little candidate of the Emissary. How was the 'Midnight Sprint' experience last night? Aha certainly found it very entertaining!」
The text next to the system was accompanied by a celebratory flower emoji, full of schadenfreude.
"Entertaining my ass!" Koushi couldn't help but retort, "I almost got turned into a sieve! I need to ask you something serious, extremely serious!"
He took a deep breath and lowered his voice, as if afraid of being monitored:
"Next time I transform... will it 'boom' again and cause a Spatial Quake? Then those AST guys will swarm over like sharks smelling blood?"
The smiley face pattern on the system interface twisted, turning into a wide-mouthed, mocking "don't worry" expression.
「Regarding this, please put your heart—right into your stomach, then make room for more fun!」
「The Spatial Quake triggered by the first transformation was a protocol conflict and energy overflow phenomenon caused by 'forced login to this world's server.' It can be understood as a one-time 'Newbie Gift Pack · Surprise Included.'」
「Now your 'account' has been successfully registered and bound to the local network (referring to the current world). As long as you don't actively, deliberately, and miraculously try to modify world parameters with great effort...」
The text on the system interface paused, and then the final line, bolded, enlarged, and with a flashing effect, appeared:
「Under normal circumstances, your daily transformations, posing, and even small-scale use of authority will adopt 'Silent Mode'! No more triggering that deafening public alarm!」
Just as Koushi breathed a sigh of relief, the system immediately added a sentence, its tone becoming highly seductive:
「Of course~ If you feel the scene isn't grand enough, the atmosphere isn't lively enough, or the enemies aren't numerous enough...」
「You can also manually increase the output power and select the 'Grand Entrance' mode! Guaranteed to once again bring you the city's 'warm welcome' and the 'enthusiastic hospitality' of the AST ladies! How about it? Doesn't that sound thrilling? ♪」
Next to the text, a virtual slider thoughtfully appeared.
The icon on the left represented the weakling [Silent Mode].
The icon on the right represented the confident and powerful [Grand Mode].
A small line of text was noted below: "Aha's Warm Tip: Highly recommend trying the right option occasionally, fun doubles!"
Koushi: "..."
He looked at the slider, his mouth twitching.
"Silent Mode! Absolutely Silent Mode! Who needs that kind of grand entrance?!"
Koushi roared his choice internally without hesitation, simultaneously swearing that he would never touch that dangerous option unless he was about to die.
「Tsk, what a conservative choice.」
The system's text seemed to carry a hint of disappointment, but it quickly returned to its cheerful tone. 「Alright, alright~ May it be as you wish.
I wish you a smooth and successful fun-seeking operation today! System Customer Service Aha (one billionth of a fragment) has finished serving you. I'm out~」
The interface flickered, shrinking into a tiny smiley face icon, hidden in the corner of Koushi's vision.
Although the system's explanation was as unreliable as ever, confirming that he wouldn't casually blow up the street again relieved a large part of Koushi's anxiety.
At least... future transformations wouldn't require a race against death or acting as a five-star good citizen every time.
Koushi took a deep breath, a smile mixing anticipation and wildness spreading across his face.
He dramatically raised the dark gold cube in his hand, his movement exaggerated as if displaying a peerless treasure!
After all, what man could refuse a transformation?
Even if he was about to die, he had to use the coolest pose to pull out the Evoltruster ✓.
"Cognition is authority, Understanding is existence! Hereby constructing all phenomena! Rationality Drive! Henshin!"
Recalling the feeling from yesterday, he held his right hand with five fingers together, as if grasping some authority, and firmly pressed the dark gold cube against his waist!
Then, he struck the transformation pose familiar from the neighboring Rider franchise.
"Clang!" A crisp sound, full of mechanical texture, burst forth!
The moment the cube touched his waist, the dark gold surface seemed to come alive, and countless intricate blue light pathways suddenly lit up!
Nanomaterials instantly [Extended] like a tide, wrapping around his waist, transforming, combining, and locking into place with clicking sounds!
In the blink of an eye, the silver-white all-encompassing drive, with its more aggressive lines, reappeared!
Immediately following, his right hand shot out like lightning, five fingers precisely grasping the humming, vibrating herrscher core of reason, eager for release.
Koushi didn't insert it immediately. Instead, he held it up to his eyes. The blue light emanating from the core illuminated half of his face, making him look incredibly mysterious.
"In the name of Understanding, weave all phenomena!"
Koushi recited the extremely chuunibyou line, then used his arm to drive his whole body to spin half a circle. Using the momentum of the spin, his arm traced a short, powerful arc.
He precisely inserted the core into the central slot of the driver! Then, he pressed down hard again, fully seating the core into the driver's core section.
"Core Registered!" A cold and clear electronic female voice immediately sounded from the driver!
"Rationality Sequence, Initiate!"
"Vwoom——————" A more passionate, electric-sounding mechanical male voice boomed, replacing the previous female voice!
It sounded like a massive engine ignition! A colossal pillar of azure data light, several times larger than before, spilled out from the driver like a giant dragon, instantly engulfing Koushi!
The entire room was submerged in blinding blue light, and the human silhouette blurred and twisted within the glow!
A massive holographic projection magic circle, composed of countless rotating gears, circuit boards, and mathematical formulas, unfolded simultaneously beneath her feet and above her head, spinning wildly!
A passionate, electronic symphony-like background sound arose out of nowhere, with a strong rhythm and heavy drum beats, pushing the atmosphere to a climax!
"Cognitive Scan! Theory into Practice! Rationality Rise!" The mechanical female voice quickly announced, each syllable accompanied by a palpable energy fluctuation!
"DECONSTRUCTION!!" The male voice roared!
Koushi's everyday clothes were instantly decomposed by the data stream into countless blue pixels and vanished! His physical body barely maintained a human shape, turning into blue light.
"BLUEPRINT LOADING!!"
Countless complex weapon and mechanical structure diagrams, shining with dazzling white light, erupted from her body like a storm, rotating at super-high speed around her, raising a whistling wind!
"RECONSTRUCTION!!"
Amidst the passionate music and roaring sounds, the various components of the Herrscher form manifested in the data stream in an even cooler (?) manner:
A stream of ethereal blue light flowed down like mercury, wrapping around her feet, instantly encasing her legs in a soft cocoon of light.
As the light receded, a pair of pure white stockings adhered tightly to her skin, outlining the smooth curve from ankle to thigh. The stockings were sheer like morning mist, faintly revealing the soft sheen of the skin underneath, emphasizing the long and elastic nature of her legs.
Blue-black combat boots then covered her feet, precisely shaped like liquid metal, perfectly fitting the graceful lines of the arch and the back of the knee. A segment of absolute territory remained between the boot opening and the edge of the stockings, appearing and disappearing. Azure particles erupted from the soles, lightly lifting the girl's figure, her skirt hem slightly raised, standing tall and graceful.
Near ten-centimeter heels further stretched the visual proportions, making her already tall figure appear even more graceful, the taut arch of her foot tracing an alluring curve.
A stream of iridescent light formed a tight-fitting top that adhered like a second skin, outlining a breathtaking curve of the upper body. The bodice was supported into a full and firm arc, slightly rising and falling with her breath, forming an eye-catching sight.
An iridescent ribbon tied around her slender waist, emphasizing the smooth curve between her waist and hips, with a large bow on the lower back gently fluttering in the wind. The front hem of the short combat skirt boldly exposed her long legs, while the back transformed into transparent chiffon, with data light subtly showing through, vaguely concealing her firm hip line.
Silver-white arm guards were elegantly segmented like wings, conforming to her fair arms, gleaming with a pearlescent luster under the light. Gauntlets encased her slender fingertips, and the occasional flicker of blue electric light added a touch of mystery and danger.
Simultaneously, her short black hair rapidly grew, turning into a cascade of ice-blue, pouring down, with stardust twinkling within the strands. Her facial contours became increasingly delicate and soft, a hint of crimson coloring the corner of her eyes, and her frosty eyelashes resembled butterfly wings. Her irises turned into clear blue sapphires, and the flow of her gaze naturally blended innocence with allure.
The Crown of Reason, composed of geometric light rings, appeared behind her head, slowly rotating. A pair of goggles, flowing with data streams, lightly rested on her bangs, adding a touch of intellectual brilliance to this look that was both soft and sexy.
All construction sound effects instantly reached their peak, then abruptly stopped!
Accompanied by a crisp and powerful "Clang!", like the final piece of armor fitting perfectly into place.
"The Herrscher of Reason!"
The mechanical female voice delivered the final, declarative conclusion.
Swoosh! All the dazzling data streams and rotating design blueprints instantly converged like rivers flowing into the sea, completely retracting and merging into the spirit dress on her body.
This caused the blue light pathways on its surface to change from dazzling to a steady, flowing state.
The Crown of Reason behind her head stably emitted a faint glow.
As all the light gradually receded, a Herrscher girl with ice-blue hair, clad in high-tech armor and a blue-and-white formal dress, gracefully appeared.
Her gaze naturally revealed a myriad of charms, her slender fingers lightly stroking the hair over her chest, and the corners of her lips lifted into a captivating smile that was both innocent and seductive.
When she parted her vermillion lips, the voice that emerged was a cool yet soft and feminine one: "This feeling... is so strange..." Her voice was like a spring breeze brushing across heartstrings, every syllable exuding fatal attraction.
The Herrscher girl in the blue-and-white spirit dress, with her tall figure, blending technological and mysterious aesthetics, had officially made her entrance... Koushi (in Spirit Form) looked at his brand new hands, snapped his fingers in excitement—and then the tragedy began.