The familiar clang of bamboo swords echoed through the vast, subterranean training room. Sweat beaded on my forehead, stinging my eyes as I parried a swift thrust from the Copy Robot. He was relentless, his movements precise and powerful, pushing me to my absolute limit. This intense training had become my new normal, a grueling but strangely satisfying routine that honed my reflexes and sharpened my focus, a constant reminder of the unseen threats the Copy Robot constantly hinted at.
"Good," the Copy Robot said, his voice calm, yet tinged with a hint of approval. He wasn't panting like I was, of course. "Your footwork has improved significantly. Let's wrap up for tonight."
I nodded, wiping sweat from my brow with the back of my hand. "Sounds good to me. I'm starving. What do you think, instant ramen or those fancy fruit snacks you 'acquired'?"
We turned towards the exit tunnel, ready for a well-deserved break. The thought of heading back to the quiet familiarity of my room, perhaps even catching a late-night anime episode, was appealing.
"Definitely the fruit snacks," the Copy Robot replied, a faint smile on his lips, a rare display of something akin to human preference. "Nutritionally superior for post-training recovery. And perhaps I'll brew some of that artisanal coffee for myself."
As we approached the opening, a voice, clear and distinctly feminine, reached us from behind. It was a voice that held a strange resonance, a chime that seemed to vibrate not just in the air, but in my very bones.
"Wow, it's incomprehensible how you made all these."
We both froze, turning in unison. Standing illuminated by the soft, ambient light filtering down from the surface, was a figure that made my jaw drop. She was wearing a Perman suit, identical to mine in every detail. The same vibrant blue helmet, the same flowing red cape, the same distinctive red badge on her chest.
But there was one crucial difference. On her red badge, shimmering faintly, like a captured fragment of starlight, was a small, golden star.
Her helmet was pushed back, revealing a face so profoundly beautiful it felt unreal. Long, flowing brown hair cascaded over her shoulders, catching the faint light like spun silk, framing features so exquisitely sculpted they could have been drawn by the hand of a master artist. Her eyes, bright and curious, met mine, holding a confidence that bordered on mischievous. She looked to be about my age, maybe a little older, with a confident, almost impish tilt to her lips that hinted at secrets. She was, undeniably, captivating, a vision of beauty that momentarily eclipsed even my memories of Kirei.
A cold dread began to seep into my bones, chilling me to the core. Who was she? How did she know about the hideout, this secret sanctuary carved from the very earth? And what did that mysterious star on her badge signify?
The Copy Robot, for once, seemed equally surprised. His usual calm demeanor wavered just a fraction, a subtle tightening of his jaw, his eyes – my eyes – locked onto the intruder with an intensity I hadn't seen before. "Who... who are you?" he asked, his voice losing its usual detached composure, sounding genuinely taken aback, a rare crack in his perfect facade.
A Familiar Stranger
The girl's smile widened, an almost impish glint in her eyes. "Well, let's see. I am you," she said, her gaze fixed on me, a direct, unnerving challenge that sent a shiver down my spine.
My mind reeled. Me? How could she be me? She was a girl. And she was standing right there, a separate entity, breathing, smiling, observing me with an unnerving familiarity. My confusion must have been evident on my masked face, a silent scream of disbelief.
"What do you mean, 'you'?" I stammered, my voice sounding strangely thin even to my own ears, almost swallowed by the cavernous space. "I'm me! And who... who are you?"
She laughed, a light, musical sound that echoed slightly in the underground chamber, a sound that seemed to dance in the air. "Alright, no more riddles. My name is Mitsuo Suwa." She paused, letting that sink in, watching my reaction with an almost predatory amusement, as if savoring my disbelief. "My age is eleven. And..." she took a dramatic pause, her eyes twinkling with genuine delight, "I came here from another universe."
The words hung in the air, impossibly heavy, yet impossibly light, like a feather made of lead. Another universe. My mind, already stretched by the past few weeks of robot-enhanced reality, of secret hideouts and financial manipulations, threatened to snap. This wasn't just a new kind of hero duty; this was... incomprehensible. My own name, spoken by a girl who possessed a beauty that could rival Miss Sumire, perhaps even..., claiming to be from another reality. It was too much. The sheer absurdity of it should have made me laugh, but all I felt was a cold, creeping dread.
I glanced at the Copy Robot, expecting some logical explanation, some calm assessment of this utterly bizarre situation, a reassuring string of data points. But even he seemed stunned, his posture rigid, his gaze fixed on the girl with an intensity I hadn't seen before, an almost human bafflement. The silence stretched, broken only by the faint hum of the hideout's machinery and the frantic, pounding thumping of my own heart. The multiversal element was no longer a theoretical concept, a whispered possibility; it was standing right in front of us, wearing my uniform, and claiming my name, a tangible breach in the fabric of my known world.