Surprisingly enough what followed after my introduction into what apparently was the Japanese resistance, wasn’t some sort of celebration party or further information, but instead the room quickly emptied itself with most of the people respectfully bowing to me as they slid past me and away into the elevator.

After mere moments the room was empty except for my mother, the old man that had greeted me at the door, his bodyguards, and myself, and the old man soon walked towards me as well, once again looking me sternly in the eyes before saying “I’ll leave the rest to your family for now, I just want you to know that I have known your father for a very long time, and hope you’ll be able to follow in his honourable footsteps. We will let you know when things get started and we’ll have need of you…”

And with that the old man slightly bowed, nodded to his bodyguards who instantly flanked him, and left through the elevator as well, leaving me and my mother alone.

I turned around towards her and was about to burst out into a million questions, but my mother quickly rose her hand in a stopping gesture, then raised a finger to her lips , looking around the room meaningfully and then waved me to follow her.

We vanished into the elevator as well, but this time we ended up in an area with way higher security level apparently, as my mother not only had to let herself get scanned, but also enter an ID card, a password, a voice recognition sentence, and a drop of blood before the pitch black doors in front of us would open.

Behind the door lay another traditionally Japanese looking Tatami room which was completely empty except for some shrines on the walls, which I quickly realized contained pictures of dead family members of the Fuyu Clan, with even my father’s included.

My mother went into the middle of the room and then turned around towards me, looking at me with a very stern look in her eyes.

“Son, I know this is all a lot for you, and you most likely don’t understand half of what’s going on, even though you’ve always been a smart one…at least if you wanted to I guess…..anyways….”

I wanted to chuckle at the last part of my mother’s speech, remembering fully well all the troubles I had caused her in my youth and the horribly stupid things I did back then, and most likely to this day sometimes, but the look on my mother’s face told me that this wasn’t the time for laughter even though we both might have wanted it to be, and so instead I let her continue on undisturbed.

“As you know things are about to change for the Japanese citizens of Yu Jing, an Uprising is about to begin, and our family is going to be a part of this, by choice, but maybe not all the choices we would have liked them to be. I know you have always been a fan of the Yu Jing idea of a united Asia, and to be honest, so have I been and even your father to a lesser extent. But this dream is over now; Japan will rise against their oppressor and attempt to become its own nation. This will ruin the dream of a united Asia, but it’s better to stand divided on your own feet, than crawl on all fours in an oppressor’s dream world….or so your father used to say in those last few days…”

“Mother….could you please cut the Propaganda short? “ I interrupted her with a brash tone “You know I would have preferred things to end up differently, but I understand what is going on to some extent, and to be honest, I don’t think I have a choice to get back to my old reality, so you might as well give me the direct introduction to my new one….let’s just assume I am fully convinced by our glorious new agenda, it’s not like I have a choice really, and give me the details of how we are involved in this…”

My mother just sighed and turned around, moving her hand in a weird gesture as she replied “Fine, pragmatic as ever I see. I thought bolstering your pride would do you some good, it always did for your father, but I guess you come after me quite a bit as well nowadays…so let’s get straight to the point…”

With that she finished her hand gesture and all of a sudden the floor next to her in front of all the shrines opened up and a giant multi monitored console rose from the opening, taking up most of the dimply lit room and flashing it with multi coloured light as the system booted up and revealed a giant login screen.

“Our family has secretly worked towards this uprising as well, not so much for the glorified independence of Japan, we both know that unifying with Yu Jing in a better way could have achieved just as much for our people, but more so because we have a lot to gain from this. As you know we Kuge have lost a lot when Yu Jing took control of our nation, and state sanctions, taxes, horrible laws and general dislike for our people has made business and life harder for us than it ever was, and needed to be. Heck we had a glorious deal with some PanO merchants for combat Geists prepared just a few months ago, only to see it shut down by the government for “reasons of state security” even though we had already started production, leaving us with a big loss both in profit and opportunity….”

“Stop…just stop please….I know you love the business side of our family, much more so than father did, but please spare me the corporate details for now….it’s a rough day and I can do without tax return rates and whatnot for today…”

Turning around my mother seemed slightly saddened for a moment, having been stopped in what she enjoyed most, talking about the business tactics of our family which she was mostly responsible for, but she quickly returned to normal and then continued “Of course, sorry, you know I love this stuff…..I’ll give you the extreme short version then….for now at least…..”

With that she stepped aside from the terminal behind her and waved towards it in an inviting gesture.

“Getting to the point: With or without our family, the Japanese will rise up against their oppressors now, and this allows our family to gain a lot of influence as well as benefit our people and help make this uprising a success. As you well know our family is not only a warrior family, but like all Kuge families, also a corporation, and we have vastly extended our fields of expertise since you last cared for it….we no longer only produce and sell Geists to our customers, but we also expanded in Remotes of all sorts, weapons to some extent, security services, and some more minor things like consumer electronics, and even our own brand of tasty noodles, a stupid fluke of your father really, but it’s selling surprisingly well, anyways….we also intend to expand into space ship production in the future, mainly because should the uprising succeed, we’ll need to be able to develop spaceships on our own, but that’s for the near future really, and you don’t need to worry about that for now too much…”

Taking a break to catch some air and smirk at me a little she continued. “What you do need to worry about however, is that from this moment onwards, you are the head of the Fuyu Family, and even though we tried to prepare ourselves for the upcoming uprising, with your father’s death, it will fall into your hands to lead us to a better future, not only for our family but also for the Japanese people, if you allow me the Propaganda…”

No sooner had she said those words than the monitors started to change their displays and a Geist in form of a talking Mount Fuyi appeared and somehow managed to bow towards me. “Lord Yasashii Fuyu, it’s a pleasure to see you, if you’d be so kind as to create an account so I can give you full control over your company’s assets?..”

And once again, my day became rougher…..

---

 

What followed was another hours long tour into the debts of my families assets guided by my mother’s competent comments and data packages, which I’ll spare to mention the details of…

Suffice it to say that the Fuyu Clan Company has indeed acquired fast assets in different areas, most of which were somehow connected to the military however, and which even included a “household guard” which was more akin to an army really. Apparently all Kuge families had acquired similar forces over the last years under some disguise or other and these forces alongside the standing Japanese Military Ranks in the Yu Jing army would be the driving force for the Uprising if things went well.

It was precisely this reason that my mother had decided to bring me back into the family fold for and make me the head of the family…the business side she could easily have handled herself, and she would even continue to do so in the future, if maybe a little bit more from the backrow, but when it came to military strategy and actually leading our assets in the upcoming times, my talents where just what was missing now that my father was dead…..

I spent the next day or so studying and organizing my family’s assets and business plans, surprised that somehow the ISS hadn’t raided this place and murdered me and all…my….employees along the way, but apparently the sway of the ISS in Tokyo wasn’t big nowadays, and my exact whereabouts had been kept a secret even from the watchful eyes of the ISS, with the help of some Ninja Kagemushas apparently…a feat I would have been upset about was I still in charge of my ISS division…

However I barely had time to familiarize myself with what I had to work with, before the old man, whose name I now knew was “Furukoshima” sent me a message, proclaiming that “It was time”…..