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To be in two places at once is a strange feeling when you aren’t used to it.
When you’re trapped in your body, you get used to the idea that that one space is all you’ll ever occupy. You don’t think about it as being a trap at all, because it’s all you’ve known. When you lose that, though, the idea that a whole spectrum of senses and possibilities has opened up to you can be overwhelming. Minato had felt that feeling only briefly, when he had the power of the universe at his fingertips and Death was inches away from him. He lost that feeling rather quickly, though. Not because he was still tied to his body - he wasn’t, not anymore. He still held onto it, though, like someone desperately holding onto their home while a tsunami attempted to sweep them away. Or, more like a dog chained to a leash who refused to budge from their spot while their owner attempted to pull them away. Minato may not have been tied to his body anymore, but he did have a new owner who yanked at his leash. And that owner was the Great Seal.
He eventually let the Seal win that battle of tug-of-war, though not until he managed to fulfill his promise to the others. But in all that time, he knew the Seal was winning, slowly and surely. He knew because part of him was already in that Seal. That was the part of him that tried to break his grip on his body. That tugged on his leash.
To be in two places at once is a strange feeling when you aren’t used to it.
He may have not been fully aware of what was happening, when he was holding onto his body for so long. You couldn’t expect him to be. After all, that’s a feeling no living soul ever experiences, nor have the capability of even imagining what that might feel like. But there was no doubt he sensed it, right there along with his body slowly decaying around him, right there alongside his exhaustion growing from the sheer strength it took to keep on living. The feeling of being in two places at once - half of his soul in his body, half of it in the Seal.
It couldn’t have been easy for anyone. It was no wonder Minato lost that battle. It only left him to wonder how it felt for Ryoji, when he was in thirteen places instead of just two.
To be in two places at once is a strange feeling, but Minato was used to it now. He’d been used to it for quite a long while. Because as soon as the second Wild Card manifested within another spirit, the tie that held Minato to the Great Seal didn’t seem so tight. Maybe that was because it was sharing its string with another.
Minato wasn’t just a wild card. Minato was the wild card. The one at the center of it all. The ultimate Fool. The Universe. It was inevitable that part of his spirit would be tied to the ones who came after him.
He would forever be tied to the Great Seal. That was the fate he had chosen, and he was content in that. But that was his fate. He was the dog chained to that place, forever guarding the world from meeting their own. As part of his spirit laid within his successors, he was drawn to them - just as he knew they would be drawn to him. The game of tug-of-war that he lost, he wouldn’t allow them to have to play. They never signed up for it, after all. Thankfully for them, they were still tied to their bodies. And Minato would make sure it would stay that way.
That was the crux of why he made his decision, though it wasn’t exactly a difficult choice for him to make. He was already used to being in two places at once. So, the part of his spirit - the part connected to the Wild Card that was held within the hearts of those who came after him - he allowed it to manifest. To walk alongside the people chosen to sign their own contracts and take responsibility for their actions, and help them in whatever way he could. After all, he had once had a good friend do the same for him. It was only right that he passed on that tradition.
Minato was used to being in two places at once. He had had a lot of practice. So as he stood alongside his Wild Cards, and watched as their journeys unfolded, he was never fully there - a part of him was still tied to the Seal, and he still sensed everything that happened there. Every soul that passed through his doors and allowed themselves to be swept up in Nyx’s embrace. It wasn’t a sad thing for him to witness. No, in fact, it simply reaffirmed what he had already believed - that life could end at any moment, and that the end was not something to fear. And yet, the other half of his soul, the same part that had held on so tightly to his hopeless body for so long, watched with ever-growing compassion over his Wild Cards. And through many ordeals and many encounters he came to the conclusion that if anything ever happened to them, he would tear himself out of the seal, knock Nyx upside the head with his evoker, kick Erebus in the balls, and then pay Igor’s boss a friendly visit for good measure.
And people say ghosts don’t bleed. His heart kept being slashed to pieces by these children. If he weren’t already dead, they would have been the death of him.
And you know something? He was okay with that. It felt pretty nice, caring about something for a change.
He would never let them know it, though.