While he has been enrolled since his birth in Darkeas, the school of supervillains, Uchiri Nanaya ends up by mistake in Aitori ... the school of the Magical Girls.
Nanaya rushed into his childhood friend's locker room. He didn't even pay attention to the different announcements for the next fight.
There he found Kōtarō, lying on the bench, an ice pack on the bruise that appeared at his jaw.
"Kot-chan!" He exclaimed as he approached, "is everything okay?!"
"A little groggy," Kōtarō muttered, "but it's okay. Damn, he hits hard..."
"But you won!"
"Yeah... looks like you really brought me luck, my guardian angel."
Kōtarō smiled, grimacing immediately as he put the ice back on his bruise.
The others entered in their turn, while the fight between Zakara Emiri, the invisible magical, and Booth Morgan, of Ravenwood, began.
"With such a demonstration," remarked Enko, "you will soon receive requests for cards."
"Don't tell me you're playing that..."
"Of course I do ! And there's even one of the kiosks outside that sells them."
"Oh no, we don't have enough money," Jun complained.
"We barely have five cards for both of us," Haru added, annoyed.
"What are you talking about ?" Nanaya asked.
Enko slapped her forehead. They had tried so hard to help Nanaya catch up on books, films and video games, but they had forgotten the rest. She reached into her bag and pulled out a small box decorated with the image of a famous heroine, Fortuneia.
"Wow ! You even have a limited edition box!" Mineko exclaimed.
"My Christmas present," Enko proudly affirmed, "my mother knows that I love these games so she saved all year. When she bought it there was only this edition, but that suits me."
She opened the lid and took out some cards. They were perfectly square, 76mm by 76mm, made of rigid, laminated cardboard. On each side was a number. The one Enko presented to him featured the picture of the heroine Fortuneia, as well as her name. At the top of the card was a ten, at the bottom an eleven, to the right an eight and to the left another ten. A small shiny circle seemed to decorate the top-right corner and an embossed pellet was placed on the bottom-left corner. The pellet was purple and had what looked like a pink potato drawn on it. Nanaya had already seen them, with pellets of different colors and designs. Many people had been playing with it in the playground since primary school and he had even seen adults trading it in the street or playing games at a café table.
"These are the cards from 'Battle of the Giants,'" Enko said. "That's the original name, because all the greatest heroes, villains and magical girls, but also some celebrities, are represented there."
"What is the UC chip used for?" Nanaya asked, pointing to the small circle at the top.
"Did you immediately recognize that it was a chip?" Rakko choked.
"Of course, it's an invention of Uchiri Corporation. Knowing all the creations of my predecessors is part of my training."
Tomeo cleared his throat. He often forgot that they were dealing with the future CEO of the greatest multinational in the world. Enko just smiled.
"There are a whole bunch of video games," she explained, "that use those cards. It seems to me that you downloaded one to the ChimeraCast 3 but you haven't played it yet. There are some on phone, computer and other consoles. Chimera's one is an open world fantasy adventure game and you can't start the game if you don't have at least one card. There are fighting games, racing games, action games and even romance games, I think. The chip allows you to obtain the character in the game with which you scan it. Several people can use the same card, otherwise there would be no point in exchanging them. Some people buy the cards, scan the chip and resell them because they only want to play video games."
"...but I don't have any cards," muttered Nanaya.
"They're not hard to get, and I'll let you scan mine if you want. If you have the same character several times, scanning it again allows you to increase its virtual statistics. Well, you will see. Wait a second."
She began to rummage through her cards. She really had a lot. She managed to find what she was looking for, collecting two, she removed the pellet, which was magnetic and handed them to the magical Boy. Nanaya took them to look, surprised to see his father there.
One of the cards featured "Experion." And the other "Uchiri Nakamara". Both cards had the same numbers. Fifteen, seventeen, twenty and nineteen.
"I have at least four Experion cards," Enko explained with a shrug, "and three of your father. So you can keep this one. To play directly with the cards, you need tokens."
She showed him the pellet previously removed.
"You can buy them almost anywhere and you customize them yourself. This is to indicate that the card is yours during the game. We play by laying down the cards."
She took one of hers, a simple actor's card, with the numbers five, six, three and two, and placed it in front of her.
"See, his stats are low because he's not a hero, villain, or magical. Sakuruno Rifumi is a simple actor without anything in particular and it seems to me that he is also powerless. So his stats are low."
She pointed to the four numbers. Nanaya glanced at those of his father's cards. The difference was enormous. Enko noticed his gaze.
"Experion and Uchiri Nakamara are some of the most powerful cards," she explained, "and they're pretty rare, really. It's just that I bought so many packages, and I was also given a lot of them, I was lucky enough to get several."
Haru and Jun pouted as they thought about their five miserable little cards. They had Fishy's, but the others were just celebrities.
"To fight," Enko continued, drawing another card, "you choose a card with at least one higher statistic, which you place next to a lower one, like this."
She put down a Bunny card, with the numbers twelve, eight, nine and thirteen. She was spoiled for choice and placed it next to it, Bunny's eight placed opposite Rifumi's six. She pointed to the two.
"See, eight is more powerful than five, so I capture the card. Well, both are mine, but in a battle against someone else, I would remove their token and put one of mine in its place and indicate that I captured it. Also, we are limited to five cards per game, so you have to choose carefully. At the end, the loser gives a card to the winner. It's simple, right? Want to see some of it? Anyone have cards?"
"Mine are at home," Tomeo said, shrugging his shoulders.
"We left ours in our locker," Jun muttered.
"We wouldn't have a chance of winning anyway," Haru added.
"I only have one," Mineko whispered, "and it's at my house. I don't even have any token."
"They're in the dorm," Rakko explained.
"Same," Monaka said.
Rena made a few signs to indicate that she didn't have many, because there weren't enough people who spoke sign language to play with her. Yūto stuttered a few incomprehensible words. She managed to make it clear that she had only just started having them since she lived with her father, because her mother forbade her to have some.
"Seriously," Kōtarō growled, "hey, Bulldozer! Get my bag!"
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