At this moment, Kagami, fighting alone, was caught in an impossible dilemma.
Facing the ZECT Shadow Squad ZECTroopers who had come to support Kageyama, he couldn't bring himself to strike ruthlessly, mindful of their past battles together. This hesitation created an opening that Kageyama immediately exploited with a series of aggressive attacks.
Just then, Tendo, who had yet to appear, finally made his presence known.
The Kabuto Zecter flew through the air, repelling the ZECTroopers surrounding Kagami before landing in Tendo's outstretched hand.
"Tendo?!" Kagami looked at him with surprise and relief.
"Grandmother said..."
Tendo began his usual act. After uttering his daily catchphrase, he initiated the Henshin.
His arrival finally extricated Kagami from the siege. Tendo then immediately rushed toward Raven's location.
Although he didn't know the exact reason, Hiyori's sudden visit to this place worried him deeply. Even with Raven by her side, her elder brother felt uneasy. He had to see for himself.
"You've come."
Standing next to Raven, Hiyori looked at Tendo with an incredibly complex expression. According to Raven, this man was her older brother. However, she had been born to Native Worm parents. Furthermore, those very parents were the ones who had murdered Tendo's parents. Despite all this, Tendo still regarded her as his true younger sister. This made it very difficult for her to truly let go of her anxieties.
"If you truly want to know, then let's go see." Tendo told her.
With that, the group entered a subterranean research facility buried deep beneath the ruins.
After walking for a long time, they saw a door at the end of the corridor, emitting an eerie red glow.
"Why is there a door here?" Kagami wondered aloud.
"I'm going to open it," Tendo announced to the others.
As he turned the valve on the iron door, the tightly sealed metal creaked open, revealing the room inside.
It was a desolate, lifeless laboratory. The air still carried a faint smell of chemicals, like medicinal liquids. The room was cluttered with various instruments, cages, and petri dishes, remnants of past experiments.
"Are these... Worms?"
Kagami examined the fragmented cells contained in a glass vessel and spoke in disbelief.
"What exactly is this place?"
Tendo stepped forward and said, "It looks like some kind of experiment was conducted here."
"Experiment? What kind of experiment?"
"Well, for instance, the Kamen Rider Project." Tendo's gaze fixed on a document file placed on a bookshelf.
"That's impossible," Kagami said, his voice full of doubt. After all, the Rider Project only began seven years ago after the Worms arrived.
Picking up a usable hand-cranked flashlight discarded on the ground, he shone its beam onto the bookshelf. One of the documents clearly bore the title: Kamen Rider Project. The cover displayed the date 1971.
"That is..."
"Thirty-five years ago," Tendo stated.
"How could the Kamen Rider Project have started so early?" Kagami quickly flipped through the contents. He was shocked to find his own name written inside!
"No way..."
"What is it?" Tendo looked over.
"'The one chosen by Kamen Rider Gatack, Arata Kagami.'" Tendo read the text aloud.
"What are they talking about?" Hiyori felt confused, seeing Tendo and Kagami whispering amongst themselves.
"Don't mind them. Where do you want to go now? I'll take you, to see if we can recover some of your past memories," Raven told her.
Hiyori nodded. Disregarding Tendo and Kagami, she continued following her instinct deeper into the ruins.
At that moment, in another part of the ruins, Masato Mishima's figure appeared. He had deliberately come to monitor Kagami and Tendo, preventing them from taking any more of the secrets of this place outside.
It wasn't long after Raven and Hiyori continued downwards that a deep, beast-like growl echoed up from below. It sounded like someone was locked up and struggling.
They reached the end of the path, where another tightly sealed door stood, seemingly isolating two worlds.
"What is inside..."
Hiyori looked at the wall, experiencing a strange sensation.
Raven knew that the one confined inside was the Mimic Tendo. He possessed some of Tendo's memories, but his personality was vastly different; while the sister-complex attribute was the same, he lacked the "King" demeanor, behaving more like a child. He was a sacrificial victim ZECT used for the Rider System experiments. The latest development, the Hyper Zecter, seemed to have been first tested on him.
"This door looks like it won't open." Hiyori tried to pull the door handle.
"Since we've come all this way, we have to see what's at the bottom."
Raven stepped forward and with a single, effortless kick, the heavy metal door flew open.
At that moment, Tendo and Kagami arrived from the area above and witnessed the scene.
"What is that?"
A person was visible, wearing an iron mask over their head, their limbs restrained by heavy iron chains, rendering them completely unable to move.
"Ugh… Aah!"
Seeing people enter, he looked incredibly agitated and tried desperately to break free. His gaze soon fixed upon Hiyori. Because he had mimicked Tendo, he naturally possessed that part of the memory. However, he was currently unable to speak, only capable of emitting bestial growls.
"Why is someone locked up here?" Kagami asked, utterly perplexed. What exactly was ZECT doing in secret?
Tendo's eyes remained fixed on the trapped figure. He felt that the eyes peering out from the mask's slits were strangely familiar.
After entering, Raven's gaze immediately fell upon a safe marked with the ZECT emblem, located not far from the Mimic Tendo. The safe also bore a symbol identical to the Kabuto Zecter. He opened it.
What was revealed inside was a genuine, Bandai-quality Rider Belt and an unactivated Dark Kabuto Zecter.
"Chuu!!"
As the box was opened, the Zecter lying inside seemed to awaken with a soul, fluttering its wings to fly up. It circled Tendo a few times before flying toward the Mimic Tendo, who was restrained by chains.
"Isn't that... the Kabuto Zecter?" Kagami said at once.
"No... it's not."
Tendo was certain of this; after all, his Kabuto Zecter would not choose anyone but him. He then looked at the confined figure, wondering who this person truly was.
"Let's get him out first."
Raven walked up, gave a powerful tug, and with a crack, he ripped one of the iron chains directly apart.
This action instantly made Kagami's jaw drop. Is he even human?