When Kojiro first found the email, he had intended to delete the suspicious-looking program on the spot. Even Kojiro, for all his lack of common sense, knew well enough what could happen if he carelessly downloaded a program sent by some unknown sender.
But the message attached to the program gave him pause. It was an explanation of the program called Brain Burst. More precisely, it was information about the game.
In truth, Kojiro had once tried using a virtual reality system, something easy to access in his surroundings, in hopes of resolving the imbalance between his body and mind. Unfortunately, contrary to his expectations, even the virtual reality systems that could be called the pinnacle of modern technology had failed to properly reproduce his sword aura, and they had not been much help in correcting the imbalance between his mind and body.
But if this email was real, then in the Accelerated World, where time moved one thousand times faster than reality, might his swordsmanship also be perfectly realized? Of course, it could just be a convincing scam email, but at the very least, it was worth trying.
His hesitation was brief, and his decision was swift. He did not even worry that there might be some kind of virus hidden in it. Kojiro immediately installed the Brain Burst program.
WELCOME TO THE ACCELERATED WORLD
With that blazing message, the program finished installing, and Kojiro spoke the command written in the manual.
"Burst Link."
Rumble-rumble-rumble! A shockwave shook the world. All colors vanished in an instant, leaving only a transparent blue spread out before him. Not only his surroundings, but Kojiro’s own body was dyed in monochrome blue. And then everything stopped.
Kojiro stared in wonder at the sight of himself sitting there with a cast on one hand. Seeing your own body through another’s eyes was not something one experienced often. In any case, judging by this frozen world, the explanation in the manual about the Brain Burst program must have been true. Then was the blue world he was seeing now footage captured by one of the countless social cameras installed in the school cafeteria?
As far as Kojiro knew, these social cameras, officially called Social Security Surveillance Cameras, were the government’s video surveillance network, installed densely throughout Japan for the purpose of maintaining public order. Their data was protected by a national-level barrier so strict that it was supposedly impossible for an ordinary citizen to look into it.
Kojiro lowered his head to inspect his own state. His avatar, dressed in an old-fashioned traditional kimono, was unmistakably the avatar he used on the school’s local network.
After spending nearly two years experiencing the wonders of modern civilization, he had thought he was no longer surprised by humanity’s astonishingly advanced technology, but this had surpassed his expectations in a very good way. To be honest, Kojiro had no interest at all in the difficult theories written in the manual about quantum connection or biological mechanisms.
It would probably take a great deal of education and time to fully understand it, but Kojiro was the kind of person who thought life was too short even to swing a sword. If this Brain Burst program, and the Accelerated World beyond it, could help him walk the path of the sword, that was enough. At once, countless uses for the program sprang to mind.
Of course, even if some half-baked swordsman came charging at him using this program, Kojiro was confident he could cut off the opponent’s head five times in one second, so it would not be much help in that regard. If the developer who made Brain Burst could see Kojiro planning to use such an incredible technology only for combat, they would probably be dumbfounded.
It seemed that even while accelerated, applications on the Neuro Linker could still be used, so Kojiro carefully read the manual attached to the email while in the accelerated state.
The manual explained, first, that installing the application granted the installer 100 Burst Points; that if the points ran out, Brain Burst would be lost; that one point had to be spent in order to accelerate; that the way to obtain points was to defeat another player in a duel; that the fight had to be carried out using a Duel Avatar, which could be called one’s own double; and that by collecting points and leveling up, one could go to a place called the Unlimited Neutral Field, and so on.
To be honest, Kojiro, who was almost completely ignorant of video games and the like, could barely understand any of it, but he at least memorized the contents. After skimming the manual once from start to finish, Kojiro spoke the command to cancel acceleration.
"Burst Out."
Kiiiiiing... A jetlike sound drew near from afar and broke the surrounding silence. The blue world gradually regained its original colors. To Kojiro, it felt as if more than thirty minutes had passed while accelerated, yet the curry rice in front of him was still warm.
Kojiro kneaded the stiff-feeling back of his neck for no reason and took a spoonful of the still-steaming curry rice. Even while enjoying the stimulating spice in his mouth, Kojiro’s mind was in turmoil over the sudden gift of this thing called acceleration.
**
That night, despite the discomfort in his arm, Kojiro bathed and prepared himself carefully. An extremely important ritual awaited him tonight: the creation of the Duel Avatar that would serve as his double in the game called Brain Burst.
More precisely, the manual said that while Kojiro slept, the Brain Burst program would independently create one by finely analyzing the installer’s desires, fears, and obsessions through the wounds of the heart, that is, trauma.
There was just one thing that bothered him: only God, or rather Brain Burst itself, knew what kind of avatar would be made.
All Kojiro could do was pray before sleeping that it would at least have limbs capable of holding a sword.
That night, Kojiro had a very long dream.
In the dream, Kojiro was swinging a sword.
That had been his previous life, and nothing more.
After the master who taught him the mindset of a swordsman passed away, he had swung his sword and nothing else until the day he grew old and died in the mountains, completely cut off from the world.
His skill may well have been unmatched anywhere in the world. If he had stopped training and gone out into society, his name would surely have been recorded on a page of history and passed down through the generations. But he had not done that. He had simply stubbornly clung to his training and died as an unknown swordsman, with no one ever learning his name.
He did not regret it. At least, that was what he had thought until now. As if reading Kojiro’s mind, a voice sounded in his heart.
"Is that really so?"
"You could have become the protagonist of history. With the tremendous talent heaven granted you, you settled for self-satisfaction and accomplished nothing before you died."
"Do you have no regrets?"
"You could have become eternal."
I do not regret it. It was my choice, and it was my path.
Even if I returned to that time again, my choice would not change. I certainly died without leaving my name in history. But I did not accomplish nothing. In my final moment before death, my sword had surely reached the truth. I had set foot in the divine realm I had long dreamed of.
Compared to that, eternity was nothing.
As he thought that and looked up at the distant black sky, he saw a shadow there. A swallow, dark as night and blue as the sea.
The reason he first began training in flying swordsmanship.
My one and only rival.
I want to reach you again. That rival.
"...Is that your wish?"
**
Kojiro jerked awake.
White light leaked in from the window, and the clock showed 6:30 a.m. His whole body was drenched in sweat, and the afterimage of the dream seemed to cling stickily to his skin. And yet, he could not remember the dream at all.
Was that the end of it? After a light stretch, Kojiro first washed the sweat off in the shower. Under normal circumstances, it would have been time to begin his morning training, but until his arm fully recovered, intense exercise was out of the question.
So instead of training, Kojiro sat cross-legged in his room and thought about his future plans.
According to the manual, if he was connected to the global network, he could use the matching list to duel whichever player he wanted among those currently standing in his area.
At the moment, Kojiro had disconnected from the global network just in case something happened. But to confirm whether his Duel Avatar had been properly created, it might not be a bad idea to reconnect to the global network and try a duel before going to school. In any case, the time required for a duel was only about two seconds. It was hardly enough time to worry about being late.
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