Chapter 8: Magic Enhancement
Takumi took a deep breath, ready to start accumulating magic power.
His first plan was to enter 'Sora no Iro, Mizu no Iro', but there was one small condition—he had to conquer 'kankin shoujo [re:union]' first.
He raised the question once more.
"Can stuff from the real world be brought into 2D worlds?"
The system answered calmly.
Takumi nodded thoughtfully.
"Besides letting me travel to 2D worlds… what else can magic power do?"
Strength, intelligence, reaction speed, endurance, explosive power, movement speed—everything.
Spending magic points can instantly give you superhuman overall ability.
Unlike the massive consumption from dimension travel, these daily enhancements automatically recover after twenty-four hours.>
"What the hell?! Seriously?!"
Takumi's eyes practically popped out. "This is basically internal energy techniques, isn't it?!"
Before he could even finish being excited, the devil engraving sent another wave of information.
Once you get the chance to travel to worlds that possess real magic systems or super-powerful martial arts, and you learn those fantasy skills…
You can then use magic power to manifest those same techniques in reality—or in any other dimension.>
Takumi froze.
His brain short-circuited for a full three seconds.
Ninja techniques from Naruto…
Esper abilities from A Certain Magical Index…
comic-level martial arts…
He could actually use them in real life?!
This was straight-up broken!
He almost screamed out loud from sheer hype.
But then—cold water.
He suddenly remembered how much magic power it already took just to enter a relatively simple, low-worldbuilding hentai like 'Ane Haramix'.
If that was already terrifyingly expensive… then what about the three big shonen giants?
One Piece, Naruto, Bleach—worlds with insane popularity and continuous power escalation?
Just how astronomical would the cost be?
And unlike daily enhancements, that kind of travel consumption would not recover automatically.
Even if he somehow scraped together enough points to enter, he'd come out completely drained—basically a walking corpse.
Totally not worth it.
"…Haaah. One step at a time. One bite at a time."
Even though the road ahead looked brutal, just the basic physical enhancement was already enough to make Takumi's heart race like crazy.
He moved the cursor back over the 'kankin shoujo [re:union]' icon—
—and then a certain tyrannical little sister's voice exploded from downstairs.
「Onii-sama! Are you seriously planning to spend the entire Sunday jerking off in your room again?!
Get your ass down here and spar with your Empress! Too much fapping and you won't have any strength left!」
Takumi: 「...」
His little sister's chuunibyou was reaching dangerous new levels.
Afraid she might storm up here, discover his precious E: drive, and delete everything in a fit of imperial rage, Takumi hurriedly put the computer on standby and dashed downstairs.
The moment he reached the living room—
There she was.
Little sister, already changed into her taekwondo dobok, sitting cross-legged on the sofa like a throne, solemnly reading an extremely thick brick of a book titled 'Chronicles of Emperors Through the Ages'.
Obscure as hell. Just looking at the cover gave Takumi a headache.
And yet this girl had already read it cover-to-cover several times.
「Onii-sama. Accompany your Empress to the training chamber.」
She closed the book with a dignified thump, tossed a thick sponge pad straight at Takumi's face, and stood up.
The so-called "training chamber" was actually just the basement parking space that came with the house.
Since the Hoshino family didn't own a car and didn't feel like renting it out, the siblings had turned it into their personal dojo.
Of course—it was all her idea.
Takumi had spent several weeks doing back-breaking labor to fix it up.
He thought the suffering was over.
He was wrong.
Very, very wrong.
Now he was permanently stuck as her personal sparring dummy / human punching bag.
Takumi's face crumpled.
Still, he obediently picked up the pad and opened the door for Her Majesty.
As they walked through the neighborhood, several neighbors greeted them like this was completely normal.
「Oh, Her Majesty is heading to training again today?」
「Haha, the Emperor Brother and Her Majesty really have a wonderful sibling bond!」
Takumi covered his face in shame.
His sister's chuunibyou had been going strong for a full year now.
The entire neighborhood already knew her as "Her Majesty the Empress."
Last year she entered second year of middle school and became completely obsessed with the rare Chinese-popular anime 'Bow Down Before Your Empress'.
She started role-playing as the female lead nonstop—the class president of Class 3-5, the peerless Empress Xiao Hua.
If their parents hadn't stopped her, she would've marched straight to the police station to legally change her name from whatever it was to "Hua."
They finally reached the basement.
Simple scraped walls, wooden flooring, treadmill, punching bag, hanging tire, punch power tester, dumbbells…
A small but surprisingly complete home gym—all funded by little sister's pocket money.
Meanwhile, Takumi had blown all of his on the computer.
And yes—her pocket money were usually about five times bigger than his.
Modern society really does favor girls way too much…
"First—get on the treadmill. Ten kilometers per hour, ten minutes. Warm up that rotten, hollowed-out body of yours. I'll start with the bag."
"Yes, Your Majesty the Empress!"
Takumi didn't dare disobey.
Face full of suffering, he started jogging.
Thankfully, even though he was a shut-in, thanks to being constantly terrorized by this little tyrant, he wasn't fat or unhealthily skinny.
No muscles to speak of, but at least he had a reasonably healthy body.
Ten minutes of running wasn't actually that bad.
After warming up, he lifted the sponge pad.
「Your Majesty, I'm ready.」
She put down the dumbbells.
Takumi bent his arms, holding the pad in front of his chest like a shield-bearing soldier.
The little tyrant gave a sharp shout—
and her long leg snapped out like a released spring, like a whip made of rubber, tearing through the air with a loud crack!
BAM!!
A terrifying force slammed into the pad.
Takumi's whole body rocked backward. He instinctively took one step to bleed off the impact.
Before he could recover—
her legs spun like windmills.
One kick after another, relentless, shouting with every strike.
He lasted a minute.
Then both arms went completely numb.
Today's attacks were especially ferocious.
…She's definitely venting about the morning panties incident, isn't she?!
Takumi felt like a tiny seabird caught in a raging storm—about to be swallowed at any second.
But he also knew:
If he went down too quickly, her anger wouldn't be fully vented.
And then he wouldn't be a moving target anymore—he'd become a stationary sandbag.
So he gritted his teeth and endured.
Years of being her practice partner had turned her from a complete beginner into a black-belt monster…
and had also turned Takumi into a defensive freak.
If someone actually gave him a real shield, he was pretty sure he could become an excellent shield soldier.
BAM! BAM! BAM!
Her leg speed stayed constant. Power stopped climbing—but the rhythm could continue for a very long time.
She ate tons of high-calorie food and never gained weight simply because all that energy was burned through this insane training.
The more she trained, the more terrifying her kicks became… and somehow her figure kept getting better and better.
At thirteen and a half, she already looked like a sixteen-year-old high-school girl.
There was even that one time they went shopping together and a teacher spotted them—thought Takumi was dating a high-schooler—huge scandal.
After everything was cleared up… the weird rumors started anyway.
Incest lover, siscon, etc.
Takumi didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
Real siscons are the ones who don't have little sisters.
Anyone who actually has one usually ends up more like a servant than an older brother…
「I can't… I can't hold on anymore… damn it!
Just ten minutes ago I was locking a beautiful girl in a secret room in a 2D world… and now I'm getting absolutely brutalized by a real girl…
Is this karma?!」
His arms had gone from numb to burning with pain.
Suddenly—an idea flashed.
He focused.
The devil engraving immediately responded.
'Yes!'
A scorching heat instantly bloomed from his forehead.
It surged down into both arms.
The burning, numb pain vanished.
His arms felt like they'd just eaten ten cans of spinach—Popeye mode activated!
The little tyrant's wind-like, hammer-heavy kicks… suddenly felt lighter.
Weaker.
Easily blockable.
Takumi's body stopped rocking backward.
He planted himself like a mountain.
Letting the raging storm of kicks crash against him—
unmoving.
Unshakable.