After a long period of time.Seiji finally left s.h.i.+ka"s room and told her to take a good rest.
His current mood was a joyous one.
It was almost as if he had succeeded in a love confession.
No, no, they just promised to be good friends… no wait, to treat each other as brother and sister, the pure kind of relations.h.i.+p!
…Really?
Really! s.h.i.+ka was only a second-year middle school student! Even if… even if their relations.h.i.+p became even deeper in the future, it definitely wouldn"t happen now!
Seiji suddenly came to his senses as he commented on himself.
He forcefully suppressed the emotions in his chest by reciting the numbers of pi again.
"Yep, okay, I"ve regained my composure."
Seiji had a fresh and bright expression on his face as he returned to the main hall.
He poured himself a cup of tea and sipped it slowly as he opened up his system.
In his personal statistics, he saw the new stat of [Spiritual Power] just as his system had informed him.
[Spiritual Power: 0]
The system didn"t even leave a quirky comment next to it.
Even more unexpectedly, Seiji didn"t have any options to increase his [Spiritual Power]!
Seiji"s brows furrowed.
[Academics], [physical ability], and so on all had options to help Seiji increase his stats from the very beginning, but there was nothing for [Spiritual Power].
How was he supposed to increase it then?
It wasn"t really important that the system didn"t even comment on this stat, but what did it mean for it to be so different from his other stats? It seemed rather mysterious.
His biggest priority was to increase this [Spiritual Power] stat. If there was no way to increase it, then…
After remaining silent for a few moments, Seiji opened up his new [Spiritual Abilities] menu.
After opening it up, it was blank inside.
Blank… what the h.e.l.l!!?
Seiji was in a state of shock now.
Hey, hey, system, just what do you mean by this?
"Didn"t you just tell me something about [Spiritual Abilities] being able to grind for points and items as well??"
What was with all this blankness!? Was there a bug in the system!?
Of course, the system didn"t respond to anything that Seiji said or thought.
After finis.h.i.+ng his stream of comments, Seiji opened up his [items] menu to check what he just received.
[Character reward card "s.h.i.+ka Kagura"—from now on, I"ll always be with you.]
[This card will have an everlasting pa.s.sive effect. This card cannot be used or disappear.]
[All basic stats increased by a bonus of 3 points.]
[30% increased resistance against ice-type spiritual magic attacks.]
[30% increased attack against ice-type spiritual magic defense.]
[??? (Prerequisite conditions not met. Currently inactive.)]
[??? (Prerequisite conditions not met. Currently inactive.)]
[Additional ability 1: ??? (Prerequisite conditions not met. Currently inactive.)]
[Additional ability 2: ??? (Prerequisite conditions not met. Currently inactive.)]
[Additional ability 3: Brother and Sister Drawing (Drawing prerequisite met.)]
[Drawing improvement ability: 65% increase in ability to draw brother or sister characters and improved visualization technique. Mana will be consumed while using this technique. "The distance between a brother and a sister might be the closest or the furthest apart in the world."]
[Additional ability 4: ??? (Prerequisite conditions not met. Currently inactive.)]
[Additional ability 5: ??? (Prerequisite conditions not met. Currently inactive.)]
[Additional ability 6: ??? (Prerequisite conditions not met. Currently inactive.)]
Seiji was speechless for a good long while.
He felt as if he had just received some G.o.dly equipment, but he was too low-level to equip it.
Just what the h.e.l.l was all this!?
He didn"t even feel like imagining the system as a fairy and beating it up anymore. He merely felt drained of all energy.
Well, at the very least, there was still one more reward.
He inspected the [Spiritual Ability activation card] that he had received. It was called [Spiritual Ability—Spiritual Power Transference activation card]. It would activate the [Spiritual Power Transference] option.
That was all that the system told him.
This explanation… it wasn"t any type of explanation at all; it was just increasing the word count!
System, you might as well have left it blank as well if you wanted to act cool!
It had already left two blank sections for him.
Was it simply because it didn"t want to use blankness three times in a row, so it forcefully added a few words in!?
Seiji energetically kept up a stream of commentary on his own system.
After he had nothing more to say, Seiji sighed.
"I might as well use it and check out its effects."
Seiji had a sudden epiphany right before he was about to activate the card.
Wait a moment! Perhaps this was all some devious scheme?
The character reward card aside, it seemed rather abnormal that his [Spiritual Power] and [Spiritual Abilities] were blank, and the activation card was basically a reiteration of its name as the explanation.
Seiji imagined the system as a fairy chuckling at him evilly again.
He felt as if activating this card would be like opening up a jack-in-the-box which would have something strange pop out at him. There was a chance that some unusual situation would occur.
He shouldn"t use it so casually in the main hallway.
Seiji closed his system, finished his tea, and went back to his temporary room in Natsuya"s residence.
He closed the door and lay down on his bed before opening his system again and choosing the activation card.
He mentally prepared himself and activated it!
The [Spiritual Ability—Spiritual Power Transference activation card] broke up into six flashes of golden-red light. The six flashes of light proceeded to shoot into his head, chest, both hands, and both feet.
Seiji felt a strong sense of soreness from his entire body; it was akin to the sensation of dissolving!
His mind went completely blank as he was no longer able to concentrate or make conscious thought.
He witnessed countless scenes, heard countless sounds, breathed countless smells, and touched countless items in a dream-like state. After experiencing infinity, everything became nothing again as he forgot all his experiences.
…
Seiji slowly opened his eyes.
He reflexively tried lifting his hand, but when he tried doing so, he felt an incredible sense of soreness.
It was a feeling similar to having exercised for far too long after not exercising for a long period of time. It was a type of intense muscle soreness.
What just happened?
"Oh, right, I used that activation card, then…"
Seiji slowly recalled what had happened.
He tried moving his hand one more time, then his feet, and then his body. He discovered that every inch of his body was incredibly sore!
His head also felt rather numb, and his thoughts were dull and sluggish. Just what the h.e.l.l happened!?
This [Spiritual Ability] activation card was just too much! In comparison to this, the discomfort from the [fighting], [writing], and [drawing] activation cards was nothing!
Seiji sighed to himself before realizing that the sunlight entering the window had become rather dim.
Was it already dusk?
Just how long had he been unconscious for?
His body screamed in pain as he took out his cell phone and checked the time…
"Well, that"s a relief. At least I don"t need to go cla.s.s anymore as it"s already over!"
Seiji inwardly praised himself for returning to his room before activating the card. Otherwise, if he collapsed in the hallway for such a long time, Houjou-senpai would definitely notice and that would inconvenience him.
His system was really toying with him this time around.
Seiji"s face twitched as he opened up his system again.
"You better have given me something really good for all you put me through, b.a.s.t.a.r.d!"
Upon first inspection, he noticed that his [Spiritual Power] stat had increased to 5 points!
An increase from 0 to 5… still seemed rather… pointless.
The important part was still how to further increase his [Spiritual Power] stat!
He then opened up the [Spiritual Abilities] menu and, as expected, he saw the new option of [Spiritual Power Transference].
Apart from this, there were one, two… three new options!?
Seiji was stunned at the sight. "Hey, hey, didn"t I only use one activation card?"
Was the system being generous today? Impossible! There must have been a bug!!
"Calm down. Resist the numbness in my brain, and check over everything carefully."
The three new options were [Spiritual Power increase], [Mana increase], and [Contract with a Spirit-branded Retainer].
So this was how to increase [Spiritual Power]!
As for [Mana], that was probably something akin to increasing MP.
As for [Contract with a Spirit-branded Retainer].
Contract!?
Seiji"s eyes widened in surprise.