Sinner System

I had Ai change the chant for summoning her, since she isn’t an Apostle.

It took me a while to come up with a chant I was satisfied with, before ultimately settling on Sinner’s Aide. I picked the word aide because it starts with Ai. Heh.

"So, done with your analysis?" I greeted her.

"<Yes, just finished. I’ll analyze that scroll later. For now, I’ll explain everything I’ve learned. To begin with, how all of you were summoned to this world.

When Ciel fired off her explosion, the sudden burst of Mana triggered the lingering instability in the area, which tore open a dimensional rift.

The effect of the summoning ritual seeped in through that rift, and the five of you got caught up in it. The lingering instability was so slight that even I overlooked it initially, but there was enough of it to be triggered by Ciel’s explosion>."

"Huh. In hindsight, maybe we should’ve stopped her from doing that," Aria sighed in exasperation.

"Yeah, but I don’t really blame her. Honestly, it seemed like a fitting way to cap off the day to me too. None of us could have had any way of knowing what would happen," I pointed out with a wry smile.

"<Most of everything else I discerned was already explained by those men you interrogated, but there is one detail that should interest you. It looks like Spiritual Magic is compatible with both of you, so-...>."

"Woah, does that mean we can summon our own Spirits too?" Responded Aria with a gleam in her eyes.

"<Well, no. Normally, you would, but between me and the Apostles, the two of you have no further room to link with other Spirits. The Apostles are effectively very similar to Spirits, and I myself could be classified as an artificial Spirit>," She explained.

"Oh. Well, that’s disappointing," Aria sighed wistfully.

"<I’m not finished. While neither of you can summon new Spirits, you should be able to use Spirit Fusion. In other words, temporarily fuse with the Apostles. I’m working on adding that function to the Sinner System, it just needs a bit more fine-tuning before it’s ready to be implemented>."

"Okay, I definitely like the sound of that. Wait, does that mean the others won’t be able to use Spiritual Magic?" I asked her.

"<I’m not sure about Cleo since I don’t know how her Monster System works in comparison to the Sinner System. But Ciel and Jaden should have both gained one of the types of the Elemental Magic of this world, as well as the ability to use Spiritual Magic.

When you were summoned, it felt like something was trying to get installed in you, but the Sinner System automatically rejected it before I could discern what it was. It seems the summoning ritual must have a function to give those it summons the ability to use this world’s Magic.

Cleo’s Monster System is quite likely to have rejected that effect too, and if that’s the case, that might be why they lost control of the ritual, resulting in the others getting teleported elsewhere in this city, the Systems’ rejection might have destabilized the summoning>," Reasoned Ai thoughtfully.

"Hm, interesting...yeah, makes sense, I suppose," I nodded after mulling it over.

"So, to sum up what we need to do...first, we gotta find the others and regroup. After that, we’ll try out Spiritual Magic and see how it works, while we wait for Ai to analyze the Summoning Ritual Scroll and hope she’s able to create the reverse effect to send us home. If that doesn’t work, we’ll have to head to the Demon nation and ask them to send us back," Remarked Aria.

"Yeah, sounds about right. This situation sucks, but at least we have a couple of leads on how to get back to our world. Let’s not get too far ahead ourselves, our priority right now is regrouping with the others. Hope they’re doing alright, wherever they each ended up," I responded with a concerned frown.

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Point-of-View: Cleo Nova

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What the...? Where am I?

I sat up and looked around in bemusement, as I found myself in a large, grassy yard, with a massive mansion in the middle of the area.

The yard was closed in with a tall metal fence, with a neatly-trimmed row of bushes along the fence.

Let’s see, Ciel launched an explosion into the air, and after that, cracks in space appeared, there was a creepy burst of energy, I felt my mind and senses getting overwhelmed, and then...the next thing I knew, I found myself in this place.

My ears perked up as I heard footsteps approaching, looking around frantically before scrambling towards a nearby tree and ducking behind me.

I glanced out as I hid behind the trunk of the tree, spotting a woman walking around the building with a basket of clothes, approaching a clothesline and setting the basket down.

A maid?

More importantly, where the hell am I? This mansion, its architecture looks super outdated, and that woman’s outfit looks really old-fashioned too, did I get teleported somewhere?

Like, is this the mansion of some rich person who’s into historic architecture or something? Also, where are the others? I’m the only one here.

Wait, will I get arrested for trespassing?!

Okay, just calm down, let’s first find out where this is...

I tapped on my I-Watch to bring up the display, and-...huh? I’m not getting a signal...but that should be impossible, especially inside the Sanctuaries.

Hm? Wait...uh, where’s the dome? I can see the sun, not to mention clouds. They’re definitely real, this isn’t the simulated sky that’s displayed on the inside of the Sanctuary domes.

What the actual-...?

Suddenly, I jumped in alarm as a shattered sound rang out, before several broken bits of metal fell off from around my neck, hitting the ground.

Huh? What is this? Was it around my neck?

Oh, shit...that maid is staring this way.

She looks nervous...crap, she must think I’m a thief or something. What do I do?!

She then slowly backed away, before rushing towards the mansion, presumably to alert the other people inside.

Shit, shit, shit!

I need to get out of here, NOW!!!