Chapter 681: You seemed just like a god

What felt like an eternity finally passed.

Seiji's petrified body began to crack open; as the dark and icy outer shell slowly fell off, something heavy, deep, and serene gradually disappeared, only to be replaced by light which slowly expanded, along with the bright and warm world...

Seiji slowly opened his eyes.

His body hurt... his head hurt... he felt heavy all over... this light was so blinding...

'Where am I? What's happened to me?'

"Brother!" Seiji heard Shika's voice next to him.

Seiji did his best to see what was around him and then saw his adopted younger sister's face.

"Shi... ka..."

"Brother... wonderful, you've finally woken up..." She showed off a delighted expression yet tears were also dripping down her eyes.

Finally?

'Have I been sleeping for that long?'

Seiji wanted to ask out loud, but found it difficult to speak right now.

He was in such a terrible condition... just why was his body in such a state?

He recalled his final memory—he had just drunk the modified Bloodwine.

For the time being, he couldn't recall what happened after that.

A while later, when his body's condition improved, Seiji finally recalled what happened.

After he drank the spiritual wine, he followed Yui's spellcasting instructions and successfully revived some of the tournament participants!

He collapsed right after that.

His memories were extremely hazy.

Seiji faintly recalled that he had used the save and load function during this process. However, he was completely unable to recall how often he had loaded, or how many times he had to try before he finally succeeded.

It was the same for the spellcasting process. He was unable to recall anything specific at all. Only a few hazy scenes remained in his mind.

What Seiji had a deeper impression of was that he had apparently seen all the souls of the dead during the revival process. He had seen their life memories and felt their way of thinking. Seiji had used this to judge whether or not to revive them.

His power was limited. Seiji abandoned trying to revive those with terrible past deeds or wicked personalities. He did his best to save those he felt were worthy of saving.

Still, that was all he could recall. He could no longer remember the specifics about each dead individual. It was as if this was an anime that he had watched when he was young. He only remembered the overall storyline, and rather vaguely at that.

As Seiji rested, he learned from Shika, as well as Kanna and Izawa who came to visit him, that his appearance at the time was rather majestic.

"Seiji, you seemed just like a god," Kanna exclaimed. "You were floating in midair and had your hands wide open. Black, white, and silver halos were circling all around your body. Three identically colored complex and large spell formations were in the air above your head. This gave you an incredible aura."

Kanna Fujihara even made various hand gestures as she told this story to add to the impact.

"Those three spell formations glowed so bright that they illuminated everything. You sounded like you were singing a holy song as you uttered your incantation. It also sounded like many people were talking at once... and every time you moved your hand, the ground... no, the entire area would tremble!

"Honestly, I was so shocked at the time, feeling like you had already surpassed humanity to become a godlike existence. I almost wanted to kneel to you."

"Master indeed ended up kneeling because she was so shocked that her legs became unsteady." Izawa unhesitatingly revealed this.

"Ryuuno!"

Kanna became angered as she smacked her overly talkative Spirit-branded Retainer.

'It would seem that I got to look really cool... it's a pity that I don't remember.' Seiji could only sigh.

Kanna and Izawa had been shocked and awed. Shika felt more worry than shock or awe.

Her adopted older brother had been asleep for more than ten days. She had stayed in his hospital room for almost all this time.

More accurately, it was for thirteen and a half days.

Many people came to visit Seiji while he was sleeping on a hospital bed for these two weeks.

They knew that Seiji had revived them from the state of death. They had come to visit out of gratitude, and left behind a plethora of gifts.

Some gave checks that Seiji could cash. Some gave spiritual weapons. Some gave medicine and other supplements. Some gave expensive gifts... and all of them left their phone numbers, indicating that Seiji could contact them at any time that he needed help.

Seiji was quite happy to receive their gratitude. Still, Kanna pointed out to him that these people were trying to suck up to him.

"You're the person who revived them! No matter how you did it, it means for certain that you're someone highly worth their time to get close to. Even an idiot would know to keep in contact with you."

That sounded quite logical.

Seiji had expended a great deal of the spiritual wine in reviving the dead. However, he still managed to increase significantly in strength thanks to the Bloodwine's effects.

First of all, his Spiritual Power stat massively increased. It was now over 1200. His Spiritual Power stat had been less than 400 before the tournament!

According to the hospital's precise measurements, Seiji was now a lower rank level 7 Spiritual Ability user.

Level 7 Spiritual Ability users were already considered among the highest rank of Spiritual Ability users in Sakura Island. They would all be the veterans of each faction! They would either be the bosses or high-ranked in each faction.

Basically, just Seiji's Spiritual Power alone now classified him as a high-ranked powerful individual.

Although Spiritual Power wasn't the same as combat strength, just the aura he could now release would be more than enough to intimidate lower-level Spiritual Ability users.

Seiji also gained new abilities...

[Soul World—Resurrection].

Just this ability's name alone made it evident that it was a [Soul World] ability which could revive the dead.

There were three prerequisites for using this ability. First, the target must have a connectivity rating of over 70 to him. Second, the dead individual must have died less than one hour ago. Third, Seiji must physically touch the body of the person he wanted to revive. The body also needed to be in relatively undamaged condition, especially the head.

This ability would consume Seiji's Mana, mental spirit, and more than 100 points of Soul Energy. How much Soul Energy was consumed would depend on the circumstances.

Revival from the dead! This was doubtlessly a powerful ability, although it was also one that Seiji would prefer not to use if it wasn't necessary.

[Soul World—Temporary Recharge].

This was an ability that could transform Seiji's Mana into Soul Energy. This ability would consume Seiji's mental spirit as well as 100% of his current Mana. He would then obtain a corresponding amount of Soul Energy. However, this Soul Energy could only be used for the next three minutes. It would then disappear.

Basically, using this ability would make Seiji's Mana reserves instantly go to zero. He would have to use the Soul Energy obtained within the next three minutes. Otherwise, the energy would be wasted. Just as the ability's name suggested, it was only a temporary recharge.

Seiji currently possessed a total of 287 Soul Energy.

Before the tournament, Seiji had used [Extradimensional Locator Spell] a total of three times, putting his total Soul Energy at less than 10. Now, not only did he get recharged, his new maximum Soul Energy reserve had increased from 100 to 287.

His 287 Soul Energy could be stored and saved, just like depositing an item into his warehouse. The Soul Energy obtained through [Temporary Recharge] was like a time-limited loan.

Now that he had [Temporary Recharge], Seiji wanted to try out his first ever obtained Soul World ability, [Howling Gale Slash]!

[Howling Gale Slash] required 100 Soul Energy to use. Seiji had only obtained 100 Soul Energy at the very beginning. Ever since he used [Extradimensional Locator Spell] to find Mika for the first time, he no longer had enough Soul Energy to use this legendary sword technique.

Now, he had [Temporary Recharge], so he was no longer as worried about using up his Soul Energy to experiment. Seiji wanted to see just how powerful this technique would be.

'I bet it's really strong...' Seiji looked forward to trying it out. Still, he would have to wait until he had recovered enough to leave the hospital.

Mika, Chiaki, Reo, Kaede, Nozomi, Natsuya, Hitaka, Rana, Mai... these girls that had all worried about him learned that he had finally woken up. They all arrived simultaneously, causing Seiji's hospital room to be ridiculously filled with beautiful women.

Kanna was astonished at this horde of girls. Izawa commented, "As expected of Haruta-kun."

"Seiji, are you actually the male lead of a harem story?"

"...Objectively speaking, I think I might be."

"What do you mean just 'might be'!" the Fujihara Family daughter retorted vigorously. "Everyone that came to see you is a beautiful girl. There's not a single man among them. This is a classical harem!!"

"I'm a man," Izawa interrupted.

"Shut up. You don't count."

Izawa was rendered speechless.