[27] The Root

At some point...

The personality of the girl beside him shifted slightly.

"What about the manga you mentioned?" After dinner, Shiki  casually said to Kazuya, "Last time, you said you'd show me the manga you drew yourself, didn't you?"

"Ah, that's right." Kazuya retrieved a stack of books from his backpack.

"This is it. By the way, do you need me to read it to you?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you're still quite young, so have you learned all the characters yet?"

"Snap." Shiki closed the book she had prepared to open and looked at Kazuya. "I see, it seems like my feeling was correct. Do you enjoy looking down on people?"

"No, no." Seeing Shiki seemingly annoyed, Kazuya chuckled awkwardly. "After all, you're only five years old, right?"

"I'm six."

"Yes, yes, six. But, generally speaking, kids your age haven't learned many characters, have they?" Kazuya gave an example.

"I'm different. I learned all the characters by the age of three. Now, I'm learning foreign languages." Shiki closed her eyes, her expression hidden.

"Wow, impressive! You learned them all by the age of three? Truly fitting of Shiki." Kazuya said as he patted her head, but he was quickly pushed away when Shiki opened her eyes and glared at him.

"So, what language are you learning now?"

"English." Shiki turned her head. "I'll probably be finished with them by next year."

Truly impressive... Shiki Ryougi was born in 1980, and according to the anniversary calculation, she had just turned five, and by next year, she would be six. She was already learning two languages at this age.

"Separated learning."

"Hmm?"

Perhaps noticing Kazuya's amazement, Shiki explained, "Shiki and SHIKI are learning separately."

"That's impressive too." After all, even with double the energy, there was still a limit to time.

Shiki looked at Kazuya and saw that he seemed to have misunderstood. Without saying anything more, she picked up JoJo's Bizarre Adventure from the side and started flipping through it casually.

Indeed, Shiki and SHIKI were learning separately.

However, one thing was inaccurate: she didn't enjoy combat, so she focused on studying cultural subjects. On the other hand, combat training was undertaken by SHIKI. Even though she had just turned five recently, she had already started her combat training.

To be more precise, she had started her training two years ago when Kazuya had first arrived. But her training intensity had been relatively low.

The Ryougi family was, after all, a family of demon hunters. Even though they had shifted away from that path now, they still needed to learn these skills to some extent. After all, people like them, who lived in the mystical world, would attract trouble from the supernatural, even if they didn't actively seek it out. Strength was necessary, and life had to continue.

Fortunately, they were a family of demon hunters, which gave them a decisive advantage over traditional gangs.

Although most of their demon-hunting techniques couldn't be used on humans, the remaining portion was more than sufficient.

Night fell...

Shiki took the manga back, and Kazuya prepared to sleep.

"It's about time." Checking the time, Shiki set the manga aside and turned off the lights to go to sleep.

About ten minutes later...

While lying in bed, Shiki Ryougi opened her eyes again. She looked around the dark room, smiled faintly, and sat up.

Slowly, after putting on her clothes, she left her room. Her footsteps made no sound, as if she were a ghost. She came to Kazuya's room and looked at Kazuya sleeping peacefully.

The next moment, she saw Kazuya's dream.

In his dream, Kazuya was leisurely sitting on an airplane, pondering where it would be best to land and whether he could survive until the end.

However, for him, the challenge in this dream had been diminishing. After all, this real-life version of the Battle Royale had no hacks, and other people's strategies rarely changed. Gradually, he had lost interest in the game.

"Well, if only the actions of others could change a bit, or if we could have a different group of people..."

Although he said this, everyone on the plane was still the same, all the people he was extremely familiar with.

However, in this era, there were few interesting games, and this real-life Battle Royale was one of the few things that still piqued his interest.

"Strange people." Shiki Ryougi opened her eyes and came out of Kazuya's dream. Throughout the process, he hadn't sensed anything while about to parachute.

"I told you not to come anymore, but did it only work for a year?" Shiki Ryougi sighed slightly and looked at Kazuya, who was sleeping on the bed. He remained silent.

She was Shiki Ryougi.

But she was different from the Shiki and SHIKI that Kazuya knew.

Shiki Ryougi was actually the true owner of this body.

In general, in the world before Kazuya, she was called the "Void Shiki."

Shiki could know what SHIKI did, and SHIKI could know what Shiki did. However, neither of them knew what the "Void Shiki" did. Their births were because of the "Void Shiki's" choice to sleep.

The "Void Shiki" was the starting point for Shiki and SHIKI, as well as their endpoint. It was because of her existence that those two could coexist.

Not only that, she could be considered the embodiment of The Root. The overflow from The Root created her.

She held considerable power in this Type-Moon world.

According to the descriptions in novels that Kazuya had read in his previous life, she might be considered something akin to omnipotent being.

"Shiki Ryougi" was The Root, but The Root was not "Shiki Ryougi."

This was Kazuya's understanding.

If the Holy Grail sought in the Fate series was to fulfill wishes, then Shiki Ryougi was essentially the Holy Grail herself.

"As long as it's a human wish, it can be granted." These were her own words.

With such great power, she naturally... could see the future.

And she discovered Kazuya's true nature, his origins, everything about him.

However, because of his arrival, the original fate had changed. Worldly destinies didn't matter to her at all.

That was Shiki Ryougi's fate... and it had changed.

The original fate, which she had thought was pretty good, had been altered, and she didn't know whether this change would be for the better or worse. So, she had left hints for Kazuya to stay away from here as much as possible.

But she didn't know why she had left these hints. They weren't complete, leaving behind a defect that could be broken through by someone with a certain degree of psychology.

So... a year ago, Kazuya had returned, and now he had come back.

This was because of the incomplete suggestion and because of Kazuya and his affection for Shiki Ryougi's character. He always wanted to come and see her.

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