[Verde Survive]

In the Mirror World, which is exactly like our world, except mirror-reversed and filled with monsters, Dr. Worm was sitting in the office of the president of the HEROS organization. It was in the same location as the SHORE building back in our world, except distorted like a funhouse. He stood over a glowing altar that bore the magical symbol of the Jamanga, and knew what he must do. He pulled a deck of cards from his pocket and placed one card into the pot.

“BEREKE!” he chanted aloud, “BEREKE!” He kept chanting this word, “Bereke!” until the image of a spider materialized from the pot. It was the size of a normal spider, translucent, and rotating about above the green mist. “Madan Card Demon Spideross, I have summoned you! Go and eat the humans! Their bodies shall be converted to Minus Energy for our great lord, DaiMiraOu-sama!” He pointed his wand at the elevator and opened it to reveal something hideous and grotesque suspended inside the shaft.

It was a giant egg, a sickly green in color, that had the body of a creature unknown forming in it. Blobs of Minus Energy were racing up the shaft to the egg to give it form. “Minus Energy!” Dr. Worm Kanzaki gasped, “It is the primitive human emotions that DaiMiraOu craves! Fear! Sadness! Worry! Distrust! Anger! Go forth, Spideross, and create these in humans so that we Jamanga may rule the world!” Dr. Worm laughed to himself in great delight. His plan finally had a chance to go into action – all these years of waiting were done with.

Back in Akebono, in our world, Shinji was wandering the streets trying to get to know the town. Police cars drove past, heading to places where people had mysteriously vanished. He thought he saw a pair of lady cops in one of them. Shinji had been so distracted by the sirens that he didn’t notice anything when he bumped into a woman walking down the street and fell to the ground.

He looked up. She was dressed in a beige jacket and a white jacket. She had short, dark hair and innocent blue eyes. “Sorry about that,” he said nervously, “I must not’ve seen where I was going.”
“You need to,” replied the girl, “I’m Yui Kurihara.”
“Yui,” Shinji said, “Shinji Narukami.”
“Were you present at the battle on the street a few minutes ago?” asked Yui.
“Yes,” Shinji replied, not knowing where this was going.
“Then there’s something I want to give you,” Yui reached into her dress and produced a Madan Card Holder like the one GunKnight had been using. It was about the size of a deck of cards. Shinji took it into his hands and looked down.
“What’s this?”
“A deck of Madan Cards,” Yui explained, “You should be meeting your Contract Monster soon. Your presence at that battle was meant to be. You have been chosen to fight as a Madan Rider.”
“Madan…Rider?” Shinji asked.
“Sorry to tell you this,” Yui replied, “If I stay here any longer, people will think you’re crazy. As of now…you’re the only one that can see me.” Yui vanished in a burst of white light. Shinji looked at the deck in his hands.
“What to do?”

He barely had time to consider that thought before Spideross landed on the street. It began stomping around, its spider-feet leaving impressions in the ground wherever it stepped. Shinji saw the people running away in fear, Minus Energy rising from them. He reached for a small metal rod he had found on the street and began to bat Spideross in its eyes. “You’re not going to hurt them!” he screamed, “I won’t allow it!”

Shinji kept pushing Spideross back until it was pushed through a mirror. It was as if its body had jumped into the mirror like a person jumps into water. He could see it on the other end, still stalking around, and followed after it. Shinji didn’t know how to make it through the mirror. He kept slamming his head against it, but nothing happened. That was when they came.

The first was a man with spiky black hair and a pair of sunglasses riding on a motorcycle. Riding behind him on the cycle was a girl in a casual reporter’s outfit bearing the shield of the SHORE Journal. “Who are you?” Shinji asked.
“Ren Fudou,” replied the man, pulling out a Madan Card Holder Shinji could swear he’d seen somewhere before.
“Reiko Sakyou,” the girl answered, “I’d step out of the way if I were you.”

Fudou stood before the mirror and summoned a silver belt with a spot for his Madan Card Holder. He inserted it in. The Batwolf symbol shone brightly, and then faded. He pulled a card from the holder – one showing the image of a very familiar helmet. Around his belt, a compacted version of the Gun Visor from before materialized into the full weapon. Fudou flipped the card towards the mirror before speaking his call.

“Henshin Vent!” he put it in the Gun Visor, “Slide In!”
“Change GunKnight,” echoed the voice of Kouru.
“GoUru Henshin!” Fudou pressed the gun towards the mirror; a gray bat-wolf shot out of it and spiraled around his body, suiting him up in the armor of GunKnight. Ren Fudou was GunKnight, and GunKnight was he. Shinji was not surprised that a man this cool and calm was able to wield the powers of such a fighter.

GunKnight ran through the mirror, charging in to chase after Spideross.
“Wait! WAIT!” Shinji yelled, “I have one too!” He showed Reiko his Madan Card Holder. She gasped in amazement.
“Where’d you get that?” she asked.
“I found it,” Shinji lied, “It was lying on the street.”
“Strange you’d find it there…” Reiko said, “But you lack a Visor.”
“No, he doesn’t,” said a male’s voice over Reiko’s phone, “We’ve found our man.”
Reiko turned in Shinji’s direction. “Watch out.”

SHORE’s offices were small, and located on the lowest level of the Akebono News Building. An elevator had been installed to the bottom floor. A pedestal, not unlike Dr. Worm Kanzaki’s, was currently glowing bright in the corner of the SHORE offices. Something – a compact sword in blue, red and silver – was rotating rapidly around it. Daisuke Amachi rushed in to make sure the transfer was going successfully.

Amachi was a man in his early 30s, and wore a jacket similar to Reiko’s. The same could be said of the Magic Researcher that was standing at the pedestal now. Nanako Setoyama, her hair tied in pigtails and her glasses about to fall off her face, was struggling with the sword that bore a dragon guard. Amachi grabbed her arms and told her to stay focused.

“Transport…NOW!” Reiko let a burst of magical energy fire from the wand and strike the sword. It vanished in an instant. She turned to Amachi, her boss here at SHORE, and asked if what she had done was the right thing.

“The Ryu Visor has chosen him,” he said, “It is what needed to be done.”
“Sir, we barely know him,” Nanako replied.
“Then we’ll have to let Fudou-san show him the ropes,” Amachi said, “He’ll learn fast enough.”

SHORE: Super Hero Occult Research Evolution. A newspaper dedicated to demon sightings around Akebono so that the people could be informed. People had said Amachi was insane and that such a thing would never take off. It was only “sensationalist news.” The events of recent, though, had forced that to change. SHORE was gaining respect – and two new staff members. The first one had been with them for at least a month now. The other had just walked right up to them. The world was in their hands now.

Shinji could see the Ryu Visor shooting out of the sky and grabbed it just in time for it to propel him backwards into the Mirror World with Fudou. He looked around. “What kind of funhouse is this?” The world was exactly as he left it – same street, except right was left and left was right. He could see Spideross patrolling around and GunKnight fighting it. Spideross shot a web from his mouth that GunKnight tried to block, but couldn’t. The web left him suspended from a telephone pole with no way to get down. He couldn’t even power down.