One day later.
[Reverse Summoning System: Activated]
[Beginning Spiritron Conversion]
[Spiritron Transfer Initiating in...]
"5, 4, 3, 2, 1..."
[Full Transfer Complete!]
Accompanied by chanical prompts, Setsuna and his team of four landed on a mountainside.
Looking out, they could see a small town at the base of the mountain.
With enhanced vision and perception thanks to his starship-level modifications, Setsuna took in the entire town's details in seconds.
There were no high-rises—most buildings were wooden. Japanese signs lined the streets and shops, and a few girls in school uniforms walked along the narrow paths.
A typical Japanese town: Sorami Town.
The exact location where the events of Heaven's Lost Property took place.
"The timing is correct. This is 12 years before the original plot begins."
Belfast confird the current year.
"Good."
Setsuna nodded and led the group down the mountain.
By now, he was well-versed in using the combination of Spiritron Transfer and spaceti corridors.
He had placed a spiritron receiver inside the Eternal Snowstorm. Upon landing, they activated the device, and Observer and Purifier back at base had dumped hundreds of energy cubes into the spiritron calculator.
After calculating the proper mont, he simply led his team back into the past.
With just five people, they consud far fewer cubes than before.
The exact tiline of the original plot didn't matter.
Whether Kazane had died, or whether Tomoki had t Daedalus or Ikaros, was irrelevant.
He could solve all problems at the very beginning of the story.
Just like when he intercepted the Spirit of Origin.
...
As they made their way into town, the scenery was quite nice.
Sorami Town was a typical rural area with a population of around six to seven thousand. It was smaller than a single functional district of their capital.
A significant portion of the younger population worked in big cities; the town was mostly left to the elderly.
Fields crisscrossed both sides of the roads, and many elders were busy tending to rice paddies.
Upon spotting Setsuna's group, they stood up and stared in surprise.
This closed-off town rarely saw outsiders.
Setsuna had a distinguished aura, and the girls with him were clearly not locals—each of them impossibly beautiful.
Especially Belfast and Mio, whose long, silvery-white hair imdiately drew attention.
"Hmm..."
Setsuna manifested part of his rigging and used the targeting system to scan the skies.
He also activated radar to sweep several hundred kiloters around.
Nothing abnormal.
No sign of Synapse nearby.
According to the original story, Synapse's floating island seed to be wrapped in a black hole, drifting through the sky at an altitude between the stratosphere and outer space.
Arriving at the town center, the local street vendors mistook Setsuna for a visiting tourist and greeted him warmly.
"Hey there, young man! Visiting Sorami Town, are you?"
"Hmm, I guess we don't have any famous landmarks, but the hot spring behind the mountain is nice..."
The townspeople were welcoming.
Setsuna made small talk and bought so snacks and treats for the girls.
"Setsuna, I sense... sothing strange about so people in town..."
After dispersing the curious onlookers,
Mio closed her eyes and spoke softly.
A faint, almost imperceptible aura emanated from her body.
"Hm? What do you an?"
Belfast frowned and activated her radar to scan the area, but didn't detect any hostile targets.
"So of the people here aren't the sa species as the others."
Mio explained.
"Though they appear human on the outside, their spiritual energy is far more powerful. From the perspective of spirit energy, they aren't human."
Belfast, unfamiliar with the concept of spirit energy, shrugged to show she didn't quite understand.
Sniff sniff
Tohru took a whiff, then drew a magic circle in the air and nodded.
"Yes, so people's souls are different from the rest."
"They're Synapse citizens."
Setsuna thought for a few seconds and figured out what they ant.
Synapse residents use dream devices to project themselves onto the surface and live out an ordinary human life—from birth to death.
While dreaming, they retain no mory of their real selves in the sky. Their lives are completely indistinguishable from normal humans.
Their bodies are human, their minds are human, and they suffer the sa afflictions—illness, accidents, and all.
Ordinary ans couldn't detect them.
But a Spirit of Origin and a dragon could, through innate magical senses, catch subtle traces.
That gave Setsuna a new idea.
"Interesting. How many Synapse people are in this town?"
He asked with great interest.
"Not many. Maybe a dozen or so."
Tohru pointed toward a little girl buying candied fruit not far away.
"She's one."
"?"
A small girl with purple hair and a fine silk coat turned around and ran over.
Several attendants nearby, who looked like bodyguards, also kept a close eye on the situation.
"Who are you people?"
The little girl looked up at Setsuna and Belfast.
"Mikako Satsukitane?!"
Setsuna thought for a mont, and based on her hair color and status, guessed her identity.
Because they had arrived early in the tiline, this student council president from Sorami High School was still in her loli phase.
As expected, she too was a projection of a Synapse citizen.
Her behavior in the original story could only be described as absurd.
She was the daughter of a local yakuza boss and ruled Sorami Town like her own domain, acting as the town's unofficial protector.
She looked human, but had a grip strength of 400kg and almost supernatural instincts.
If she ran out of pocket money, she'd casually dig up a gold mine.
If she wanted control over key resources to force the governnt to kneel, she'd unearth oil.
If she wanted a hot spring, she'd just dig one up.
If that's supposed to be a normal human, then pigs fly.
Fortunately, at this stage Mikako was still just a little loli and hadn't started pulling off her outrageous antics.
"Mikako, co back."
A bald man in a dark kimono with several scars on his head pulled Mikako behind him.
This was her father—head of Sorami Town's yakuza.
"May I ask who you are?"
The man sized up Setsuna.
With his calm presence and natural air of command, he carried the unmistakable aura of soone in power.
It was the kind of presence the man had only seen from world leaders or generals on TV.
Though he didn't want to admit it, as a yakuza boss, he felt he was being overshadowed.
"We're here in Sorami Town for tourism. Sorry to trouble you. By the way... do you know Sohara Mitsuki?"
Setsuna asked.
"The girl from the Mitsuki family?"
The old man looked puzzled.
He didn't expect Setsuna to co here looking for soone so utterly ordinary...
"The Mitsuki household is straight down this street, third building on the right past the corner, across from the shop."
The yakuza boss pointed the way readily.
Assuming Setsuna was here to visit relatives, he didn't ask further.
With Mikako pulling him along noisily, he led her away.
...
Soon, the group of five arrived at a modest house with a sign labeled [Mitsuki].
A brown-haired, black-eyed little girl was playing on a swing in the front yard.
Upon seeing Setsuna and his group, she looked over curiously but shyly.
Life in Sorami Town was peaceful, and the locals were friendly. Children weren't wary of strangers.
"That's her."
Setsuna nodded.
Sohara Mitsuki.
Originally Tomoki Sakurai's childhood friend, she was also the human form created by Daedalus when she entered the dream world.
The girl in front of them was none other than the real-deal Synapse angel known as Daedalus, in her earthly body as Sohara Mitsuki.
She had no mory of being an angel, but was still subtly connected to Synapse.
If Setsuna wanted to communicate with Daedalus, this was the bridge to do it.
"Can you do it? I want to talk to Daedalus."
Setsuna looked at Tohru and Mio.
"Yes."
"I can send her consciousness back."
They both nodded.
Whoosh—
Tohru raised her hand and cast a cognitive barrier spell.
The world faded to black and white.
Mio activated her Territory and stepped in front of Sohara.
She gently extended a slender finger and touched the girl's forehead.
The girl closed her eyes, frozen in place.
At the sa ti—
In the skies above, on Synapse's floating island,
Inside a hidden chamber,
A complex stasis device sat in the corner. Inside it slept a four-winged angel with long blue hair, dressed in white robes.
She was deep in a dream, her breathing slow and steady.
Suddenly—
Whoosh!
The angel's eyes snapped open. She sat up abruptly inside the stasis device.
Like soone waking from a nightmare, she clutched her chest in panic and glanced around, gasping for air.
"Ha—ha—ha—..."
"What... is going on?!"
Daedalus panted hard, her face filled with disbelief.
She had only just entered the dream. Why was she awake already?!
Synapse citizens only woke when their human form died.
But Sohara was just a child!
"Did... did I just die prematurely??!!"
Daedalus scrambled to recall what had happened.
Synapse people retained all mory of their dreams.
She rembered that little Sohara had been playing on the swing outside her house when a few travelers approached...
And then—
Nothing. She had woken up.
"???"
"Did I run into a serial killer?!"
Daedalus was horrified.
Dying within just a few years of entering a dream was incredibly rare in Synapse.
Sorami Town, in her mory, was peaceful—barely a single cri per year. How had she ended up in this ss?!
Frantically, she activated the monitoring system to check what had happened.
On the screen, she saw a man in a black and red uniform smiling and waving at her.
"Yo, Daedalus. You're awake, huh? Mind having a chat with ?"
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