To be able to know what events happened to lead to this, let's go back at the time where Reiko was left on her own at Edogawa High School.
"Yuuki-dono, and the others are in danger! I have to get some help!"
With that, she left the school and goes on to look for people who's most likely has a Soul Seal like her. She can easily go to them and activate her own Soul Seal, that way, she can also help.
But she figured that the opponent is strong enough to defeat the whole Deadly Sins, so her strength won't be enough. This things won't be a thinking process of a child, she's quiet the smart girl.
She walked and walked at the road and asked people the same thing:
"Do you know the Soul Seals?!"
Of course, normal people wouldn't even know about that. But if a person reacted to that word, she will know that the guy has a Soul Seal. So she kept on asking at the streets.
She continued to ask people but only found nothing. But she still walked on and continued to ask, until she encountered a man who wears a black jacket.
He walks at the street as if he's looking for something. He clicked his mouth as a sign of irritation. This guy has a very scary air around him, you don't want to get involved with someone like him.
But still, Reiko still asked this guy, because in the chance that he's a wielder, she missed a chance.
"Do you know the Soul Seals!?"
The guy was a bit shocked to the sudden appearance of the kid and what she said just now.
"Hey kid, do you even know what you are saying?"
"Of course! If you have a Soul Seal and has a depression, you will gain special abilities!"
The guy gave a smirk that's similar to his other smirks until now. His smirk is his trademark now. This guy that Reiko talked to just now is none other than... Kakuju!
+++++
"Where the hell did you learned that kid? You do know that you will be in trouble if someone other than me that has a Soul Seal will hear this, right?"
"Yes, I know! But Yuuki-dono and the others are in... danger, degozaru! I can't just stand here and watch!"
Reiko's own words made him shed tears and cry. Kakuju on the other hand, walked on his way and didn't said anything to the kid. Simply because, Kakuju can't stand crybabies. That's why he just left peacefully.
After some while, Reiko wipes his own tears and continued to walk on.
"That guy, I'm sure he knows the Soul Seals. I should have stopped him, he's my only lead, degozaru!"
Regret are now crawling inside Reiko's brain. But regardless, she still moved forward and continued to ask people but she found nothing similar or even close to Kakuju's answer.
After asking at least 15 people, she encountered another person. The girl has a shiny brown hair, that resembles coffee. Her porcelain skin is really shining through on this sunny day.
She's looking for something too, because she moves her head, left and right. Reiko decided to ask her next, as she walked towards the women, the woman immediately noticed Reiko.
The woman crouched down in front of Reiko and asked:
"Hey, did you met a guy with a black jacket earlier?"
Reiko nodded repeatedly. The woman just smiled and said to her.
"My name is Asugawa Kotori! That guy in a black jacket is technically my Master. He told me that you need help so I came here."
In reality, Kakuju came back to the hideout and sent Kotori to investigate the kid. She knows the Soul Seal so some investigating needs to take place.
Depending on Kotori's data, Kakuju will make his next move regarding this matter. In short, Kakuju didn't really sent her to help Reiko. Kotori is just sugarcoating Kakuju's words.
"Then, Big Sister! You have a Soul Seal and you can help, right!?"
"Of course! Now lead me the way!"
Reiko was about to cry again when Kotori wiped it off with her hands.
"You shouldn't cry. If you cry, that means that we already lost."
Hearing those words, Reiko wiped her own tears after Kotori did it.
"You're a strong kid, aren't you? I'm sure you'll grow up as a good person."
Reiko gave him a huge smile after wiping her own tears. After that, the two of them now walks towards the gates of the Deadly Sins.
+++++
While the two of them is walking towards the hideout, the two of them saw Chizuru standing not so far from the hideout. It seems she's really worried about Kazuya and the others.
Only a second has passed when they saw Chizuru, Reiko immediately ran towards her and gave her a big hug, but this time she didn't cried but you can really tell that she's happy.
Chizuru was a bit shocked at first but when she saw the face of the kid who's hugging her, she returned the hug while she's crying. After seven months, the two of them finally reunited with each other.
Kotori is happy just by seeing these two. She doesn't really know anything but from the looks of it, they didn't saw each other for a long time.
But Chizuru realized something when she's crying, that is...
"If you're here, then what happened to Kazuya-dono and Master Kanzai, degozaru!?"
"Big Sister Chi! My friend is inside of that hideout and he needs help too!"
To Chizuru, nothing makes sense. How the hell that Reiko would have a friend inside there? Is it a cellmate? Regardless, they decided to continue moving on towards the hideout, while Kotori in tow.
But as they grew closer to the hideout, they noticed that they're getting slower on their movements. Until to the point that Chizuru and Reiko completely stopped moving, Kotori included.
"We stopped moving? This is a very powerful Soul Seal! The power to make others stop moving, this is scary! But a power like this, have to has some kind of time limit, right?! It's perfect for my Soul Seal!"
While Kotori is being petrified, she activated her Soul Seal, called "Cronus". It's one of Kakuju's Soul Seal, the God Of Time, Cronus.
(I tried searching the net but a God Of Time at the Japanese Mythology doesn't exist, so this Cronus came at the Greek Mythology.)
With this Soul Seal, she can move forward time at the maximum of 10 minutes. She can do other things with this Soul Seal too, but let's aside that for now and focus at this one ability of her Soul Seal.
Since Pride's time limit is only 7 minutes, advancing the clock for 10 minutes will make the Pride disable It's effect. All of the people at the hideout are petrified so nothing seems to change much.
Except at the fact that the three girls are here right now. That answers the question to why the hell this three girls are here. Let's go back to the present time.
After all of them was able to move, Kazuya rushed in towards his Master and snatched the Tiger Saber. Then, he pointed the sword to his Master's neck and said:
"Please, back down from him."
The Master just closed his eyes and raised both of his hands. It seems he's smiling faintly despite what's happening right now.
Yukimura's eyes came back to It's own body, and approached Reiko. Reiko hugged him real tight in return.
When they found out that Reiko and Yukimura was friends, the misunderstanding was slowly getting cleared. The members woke up and they were asked to give their testimony and they confessed that they're helping the kid secretly.
When Kazuya found out that this is just a misunderstanding, he endlessly asked for their apology. The members also asked for his apology since they're the ones who thought that he's from the founder in the first place.
With this, all of the misunderstandings got cleared up and this long battle has come to an end.
+++++
"Okay, could we please talk about this founder?"
Kazuya suddenly got serious, and in return, all of them nodded and formed a circle. In the circle, there's Kazuya at the left, Yukimura at the right, Kotori at the north and Kenji at the south. The members, Chizuru, Reiko and the others are at the back of the circle.
Master was at the corner, he was tied up at the moment and they will hear his reasons later. In short, the founder is top priority. Just who is the founder? Yukimura's eye was being treated right now by a doctor at their gang, but It's only first aid.
"Yukimura, right? Please talk about what you know and I'll tell you what I know."
"I see. I'm alright about that."
Kenji and Yukimura talked about all of the information that they holds. Kazuya just closed his eyes while listening, Kotori was wide eyed, and the members are gloomy about reminiscing such a past.
After talking about all the things that they knew, Kazuya gave them information in return. Kazuya told them all about the Soul Seals. The fact that he's a samurai from the Edo Era, and got trapped at the modern society. His duty to collect the Soul Seal and finally, resolve everything, including Kakuju's case and go home.
"That's why... Yukimura, holding just one Soul Seal could lead to war. I'm not that worried before since the only holders I know is my Master and Kakuju. With that, Kakuju is my only opponent but this founder appeared..."
Kazuya can't really explain what's going on. The only Soul Seal he got for improving strength is the Berserk, but It's already on his possession, that's why It's impossible for the founder to have his Soul Seal. That means... the Soul Seal belongs to either his Master or Kakuju.
"Kotori, does Kakuju still has a missing Soul Seal?"
"Me? Are you talking to me?"
"Yes."
For some reason, Kotori is blushing. Her face was so red that It's like a tomato. At that time, the members, including Yukimura and Kenji have one line of thought.
"This girl definitely likes this guy."
I have to admit that I'm amazed how this guy can even think like that in front of the serious problem. After fidgeting for a moment, Kotori finally answered.
"Yes, from what I can remember, Kakuju has 10 Soul Seals."
"10, huh? If there's seven of you, including Aki, then there's still 3 Soul Seals that Kakuju has."
It's possible that the founder's Soul Seal came from Kakuju. But they don't have any proof to back it up.
"Regardless, It seems this founder guy is keeping low for now. I don't think that rading him right now would have a good result. We don't know the true extent of his strength, so It pains me to say this but... we need to have patience and train ourselves at the moment."
Everybody nodded in agreement. Now, a new task has been added to Kazuya. Collect all of the Soul Seals, defeat Kakuju and The Founder and save everyone. Yukimura stood up and clenched his fists, while thinking:
"I have to get stronger!"
With that, their meeting ended.
+++++
Kazuya quietly untied his Master's knot and talked to him:
"I'm actually thinking about what you said, Master. I won't blame you for what you've done, It's natural after all, It's me whose strange. But as long as I'm in this world, I don't want to kill anyone, If It can help even a little to preserve the peace that they have, then why not?"
"Geez, you're not even a resident of this world, yet you think like that."
Master stood up and patted Kazuya's shoulder.
"Kazuya, It's true that killing your enemies is the natural thing to do but... I tried to do that in front of you, who resolved to not kill anyone. From that, I apologize."
Master let go of Kazuya's shoulder and bowed to him as an act of apology.
"It's okay, please don't bow your head to me."
After that, Yukimura and Kazuya swore to each other that they will have an alliance to defeat The Founder and Kakuju. In short, Kazuya will help them defeat the Founder and The Deadly Sins will help them defeat Kakuju.
Yukimura also promised that he will never use Lust ever again. He himself experienced how dangerous it is. With that, Kotori left the hideout and came back to Kakuju.
Chizuru and Reiko came back to their respective homes and the Deadly Sins are resting now. All's well, ends well.
"It's kinda pitiful for Yukimura to sacrifice his eye just because of a misunderstanding. Well, that only shows how much he wants to protect Reiko."
Kazuya stirred up some conversation with his Master, but Master suddenly stopped on his way and the atmosphere became really heavy.
"Kazuya, I want something to say..."
"Yes, what is it?"
"I'm going to go on a journey and find all my Soul Seals, I think you won't see me for a while."
END OF CHAPTER 23
Author's Note: Hello! This is an arc where the Master leaves the story for a while! Another task was been added to our main character. Well, I have a bad news. I think I can't continue this story anymore. Because I think that this story is a failure. My views is so low, not much will actually read, based from my statistics. There's no reason for me to rack my brain and collect ideas when no one will actually read. I'm going to abandon this story for about a month, then visit this again. If you're interested to my story, comment down and I'll think about continuing this. But even if after a month, nothing changed, then I guess, I have to start a new. Please don't call me greedy for stones or comments. Imagine working for a job that doesn't even give you salary, are you going to get motivated working your ass when you don't have any salary? Of course, not! It's basically just like this. I tried various things to raise views and read statistics but nothing seems to work. Writing this is just my hobby but It's kinda sad if no one will read, so I thought about it for a while and decided to just stop writing for a while and let's see how many supporters I've got. If a whole month had passed and nothing seems to change, I will totally abandon it. It's sad that I have to end it like this, but if no one will read a book, It's useless. Because books are meant to be read. Okay, you will be the ones who'll decide if I'm going to meet you here or at my next work. For those of you future readers, thank you for reading until the very end. Thank you very much!