Seiji Haruta had been Visualizing for an entire night.

This caught Mai Houjou completely off guard.

She never antic.i.p.ated that her junior could Visualize to such an extent!

Not even counting the fact that this was apparently his first time, doing it for so long was already an incredible accomplishment.

As far as Mai knew, her master... Natsuya’s longest ever record for Visualizing was only slightly over two hours. Natsuya was already considered outstanding among the young generation of Yin Yang Masters.

But this boy from the Haruta family had already Visualized for an entire night, or more accurately, nine hours!

And he still hadn’t finished.

Mai felt shocked to her core at this.

She knew quite clearly just how difficult Visualizing was, and it had stringent talent requirements.

She herself was unable to do it.

At a very young age, she was appraised to have no talent for Spiritual Power. Although her Mana level was quite high, her Spiritual Power was almost non-existent, which meant that she would be unable to progress as a Yin Yang Master.

The younger Mai was quite despondent over this unresolvable problem, but later she managed to accept her lot and stop worrying about it.

She worked extremely hard to improve her Mana. Although she couldn’t compare with an actual Spirit-branded Retainer or legitimate ability users with high reserves of Spiritual Power, she was able to achieve the limits of her potential and surpa.s.s an ordinary person’s level.

As for Haruta-san... she inspected him from the very start with her Mana ability and saw that he had both low Spiritual Power and low Mana.

If one were to judge him by his innate spiritual talent, he could only be deemed as completely useless. It was easy to understand why he had been discarded by the Haruta family.

Mai felt a sense of sympathy towards him.

Although her spiritual abilities weren’t completely useless, she wasn’t much better than Seiji. It was merely the difference between low quality and terrible quality. Only someone like her master Natsuya was chosen by the G.o.ds.

Her sympathy turned into a favorable impression of him after learning more about his personality and way of life.

Supposedly, Seiji Haruta had become a completely depraved useless sc.u.mbag in the past but changed himself after experiencing something unknown.

At the very least, the person that Mai saw was an outgoing, gentle, and sunny tall and handsome boy.

She was moved by his sincere care for s.h.i.+ka Kagura and how far he went to help her.

Mai liked this type of boy and wanted to do something for him.

That was why she told him so much and even agreed to lend him the Spirit Image.

She didn’t think that he would be able to do anything with it, due to knowing how low his stats were, but she couldn’t help but have a feeling of expectation after seeing his self-confidence.

And as a result, she witnessed... a miracle!

An entire night of Visualization.

Mai inspected him several times with her Mana ability and discovered that his Spiritual Power was definitely increasing at a rapid pace!

Although he was still at a low level, if he was able to maintain this rate...

Just imagining it caused Mai’s heart to start pounding rapidly.

It was as if she had picked up a treasure!

Just walking normally down the street and suddenly discovering a piece of gold on the ground... No! It was more like discovering a huge, s.h.i.+ny diamond!

Mai had trouble grasping the full extent of Seiji’s transformation, but it was an indisputable fact... and after she finally managed to accept it, she felt delighted!

‘Calm. I need to calm down.’

First she needed to report this to her master.

And then she would recommend that her master should... form a closer relations.h.i.+p with Seiji Haruta by setting up a formal alliance with him.

Her master would be able to help him increase his power more efficiently. When he became truly strong in the future and returned to his family, he would repay Natsuya’s favors.

Yep, this was a perfect win-win situation!

Mai was quite clear that her master was direly in need of allies, as well as true friends that would help and protect her in dangerous situations.

Mai definitely wouldn’t let such a high-quality treasure like Seiji Haruta slip out of her hands!

Wait a moment... the two of them were the same age, and Haruta-san’s looks and personalities were both excellent, so after they both became adults, they could definitely become a couple!

Mai felt like she had been enlightened.

Many boys were in love with her master, but in Mai’s opinion, most of them were idiots. Haruta-san’s physical appearance alone would defeat half his challengers, and his personality would defeat half of those that remained.

After he grew more powerful, he could defeat half of the one-fourth that remained, and if he returned to his family, he could defeat yet another half of the one-eighth that remained with the power of his family. Those that could truly compete with him amounted to almost nothing.

So there wasn’t a problem with him, but what about Natsuya?

Her master’s appearance and personality were both excellent, and as for her family... perhaps it wasn’t as powerful as the Harutas, but it was still quite strong, so it wasn’t a problem at all.

Alright, both of them matched up perfectly, almost too perfectly, as even their names went well together!

Seiji and Natsuya—even the sounds of their names flowed smoothly in Mai’s mind!!

And the final and most important part were both parties’ feelings.

Er... this was rather...

Mai felt that there was finally a problem when it came to this step.

She understood her master perfectly. Haruta-san definitely had a chance with Natsuya, and the best evidence was the fact that Natsuya invited him to temporarily reside at her residence. However, her master was a bit prideful and awkward, which would obstruct her from developing any romantic relations.h.i.+ps.

Haruta-san had a problem as well, although he himself still hadn’t noticed it... but that was exactly why it was all the scarier: he was too skilled at attracting girls!

Perhaps it was because he was an otaku that he didn’t fall in love easily with girls in real life. At least that was what Mai inferred.

Handsome plus naturally skilled at attracting girls... He was basically a walking ladies’ man!

Mai’s face reddened as she thought back to how even she almost accidentally fell for him.

At any rate, there were problems here! For both of them!!

The maid kept wracking her brains. The more she thought about it, the more difficult she believed it would be.

At this moment, there was a sound from the sofa.

"Mmm..." It was a low groan.

The handsome boy stirred. A few seconds later, he sat up groggily and rubbed his eyes.

Haruta-san had finally returned to his senses!

Mai hurriedly checked the time.

It was 6:29 A.M. His Visualization took a total of nine hours and nineteen minutes!

This was undoubtedly an unprecedented feat.

On the sofa.

Seiji slowly opened his eyes after rubbing them.

Everything he saw was as he remembered it before entering the Visualization trance.

His head still felt a little dizzy.

He had just experienced such a strange dream... if it counted as a dream, that was.

His mouth arced slightly upwards as he recalled what he had just ‘experienced.’

In the dream, he was a Yin Yang Master. All his acquaintances and friends became his retainers, and all of them formed a raid party together to defeat a boss monster... What the h.e.l.l!!?

Even though it was quite interesting, thinking back on it caused Seiji to become rather embarra.s.sed.

Well, he had never expected that the Visualization would last until he defeated the boss, so how long did this dream take?

In that dream, he struggled bitterly together with his retainers against a demon and fought for a long while. When he finally achieved a difficult victory, every single retainer as well as himself was injured.

After that, his last memory was falling asleep on the horse-drawn carriage that was taking him home. When he fell asleep there, he woke up again here in the real world.

Seiji kept rubbing his temples as he thought more about what just happened.

When he was in that place... during that dream, he seemed to recall bits and pieces of reality, but he also forgot many things. It was almost like… he had fully transformed into a denizen of that world.

That type of feeling was completely unfathomable. 

‘Was it... truly just a dream?’