Getting accused of assaulting a stranger on the sidewalk and being excommunicated from my hometown to live out my probation surprisingly wasn't the worst of my year, as was the immediate reaction (temper tantrum, if you asked biased people) that I'd done in front of my parents and their lawyer that probably contributed to me being excommunicated in the first place. I didn't mind so much after the initial rush of emotions. Traveling’s fun. Tokyo is a different beast than the little shanty town that I'd come from. It’s separated into districts that boggles the mind trying to fit all these little cities into the whole thing. Getting a free opportunity to travel, let my parents cool off, and leaving my mistakes behind sounded awesome. No more weird looks from my neighbors and former friends slowly blocking me online.

  "I don't even know what kind of person would serve Kamoshida! Like, do they think that they're lackeys to some kind of king!?" a scratchy voice screeched. It was slightly whiny, his blue eyes unfocused as he argued against a person he imagined. This is the type of person who would say 'lackeys' completely unironically.

  He was the prime display that traveling wasn't so luxurious once you were doing it, though my entire first week hadn't been star-crossed. The grouch who my parents saddled with me acted like I was there with a ski mask and burlap sack ready. Didn't make much sense really. Sure, I'd gotten in trouble but I'd inherited my mother's 'gentle beauty', or so said a ten-year old girl back when we lived next to each other. I had nowhere to go unless he expected me to return to the town that knew me as that 'kid who clocked an important guy'. It felt like I was an old wandering samurai with only pocket change to my name. Saddled with a heavy burden and an oath to forever follow my duty, I would walk into the sunset with all of Sojiro's precious belongings. What was there even to be paranoid about in his dinky coffee shop? The beans?

  "Eugh! That effen pervert just makes me so mad! Treating Shujin like his castle and he's the big stupid king!" the guy continued. Every so often it would crack as a reminder that we were just barely reaching the end of puberty. With the way that he was acting, I doubted that he had even started it.

  It had started raining when I was walking over despite the forecast saying that it was only a 5% chance. Then an older guy picked up the girl that was waiting next to me without offering me a ride. When it finally started letting up into a gentle spray rather than a coastal wash, yet another obstacle had to come from a guy with bleached hair having some sort of psychotic breakdown in front of me.

  This little saga started when he was implying that I had some kind of 'in' with Kamoshida. In his defense, I remained silent during his first accusations because I thought he'd get bored and walk away. Not that I should've expected much from somebody who broke the school's dress code with an insanely tacky yellow shirt that read "ZOMG" in bolded letters.

  He finally tilted his head, scratching it slightly. "Are you gonna say anything?"

  There was a tint of red that gathered on his cheeks. Probably realized that I never said a single word while he had too many words, enough to rant for an uninterrupted five minutes.

  "No," I said. When the silence got too awkward, I waved and walked past him. "See you, I guess."

  Or not. That worked with me too. Making friends with people who screamed on the sidewalk was probably the opposite of what my probation officer wanted.

  During the car ride for my first visit at the school, we used a different route. I wasn't paying much attention. When my guardian started moaning about how much it sucked that he was taking care of me, I started letting my attention wander to how I was going to get money for the movies that I still wanted to watch—also that I didn't have anybody to watch the movies with anymore. I resolved to be those weird people who sat in the front seats by themselves out of love for the theater. Then when I was supposed to be paying attention during the meeting with the principal, I got annoyed how all the faculty I'd seen treated me like I was a rehabilitated puppy and started lamenting all the game releases I'd be missing out on.

  It would've been fine if my phone's connection wasn't boinking out. Nudging it, smacking the side, and holding it to the sky for the mighty gods to strike it with a signal didn't charge the empty bars. Meant I was on my own towards finding the school.

  Cities in general are cool places that quickly became uncool, then became cool again once you got used to grit. The tall buildings that made me feel vertigo upon seeing them for the first time had lost their luster when I could only see their manicured feet of graffitied concrete, with the boring, gray brick walls so obviously blocking me from entering that they became tacky. Rain just made the whole place worse. Grimy corners became slimy when streaks of moss seemed to spread down just a little further. Dirt from planters was shrugged loose until flecks worked their way onto the sidewalk.

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  But the worst of all were any smaller street where trash bins were left outside and the occasional wrapper could be seen. I walked down an alleyway that could've been where Batman's parents were shot with winding pipes and dumpster bins taking up nearly half the width of the place. My thumb absently kept tapping on my phone. Somehow the shiny concrete made the place look worse, like it was leaking from the visible trash bags. What would happen if I were to slip? Splashing one of the puddles would manifest a million thousand germs that would get absorbed into my clothes. Rubbing elbows onto the wall may rub off some freak's germs. Or it could've even carried down the smog that lingered around the air and dragged it down into little cloudy prisons that happily splotched against my skin. Worms live in rainwater, right? That's what mosquitoes do, I think.

  It was with good guesstimates that I went towards the general direction of the school. It was on a street that stood parallel with the school's that I crossed into an alleyway, the opposite side blanketed in a thick mist. It made sense at the time. The next turn was far away, and I at least remembered that the school wasn't on a major street, and I was around 85% sure that my internal compass hadn't been confused yet; you need a good sense of direction when exploring the woods behind your house.

  My shoes splashed against the little sea that was gathering. Rushing water came from a gutter, creating a stream that followed alongside me as I nudged past the inert lights. It was comically dark, though a literal light at the end of the tunnel forced me to raise my arm to block it and cast long shadows against the bumpy floor. Wind billowed. With the droplets dripping down my sopping bangs, I shivered violently when the chill seemed to pick up even more at the alleyway's mouth. I could feel each individual tongue brush past the ridges of my eyebrows. Cold and dry. Each blink felt so good that I eventually kept my eyes closed while working forwards.

  At some point blind groping worked my fingers around the walls. A slick ridge between the bricks let my finger slide into the slimy niches that slid on like a glove. My normally curly hair had been matted down onto my scalp and reminded me that skipping bathing in the morning was never a good idea. The puddles evaporated at the mouth of the hair dryer.

  My eyes cracked open. There was a European medieval castle in front of me.

  I looked behind myself. Tokyo was still there. I patted down on the wall just to make sure it was real.

  "...huh."

  Hesitant, I crawled forwards until I was at the precipice of the drawbridge. Stomping my feet down made a wood-y. The hole in the tall walls was open yet I was hesitant to walk inside.

  "Hello? Anybody?"

  Shouting made my arms shudder. Suddenly, a clarity that was missing before came back. All the rushing cars and light trickle of gutter water sinking down into the sewers were gone. What was once the center of an urban city echoed my voice back as the only sound. Even the wind that had been buffeting so strongly had petered out until the air smelled like it was just released from a fifty year old sealed bag. Waving a hand in front of my nose, I warily walked closer. There were thingies on the top that looked like teeth and it was made out of rocky bricks. I don't actually know about castles. There was a moat around it. I think every castle has one of those though.

  The front door was bigger than the loading docks at supermarkets, the biggest doors that actually existed from what I know. A firm yank glided the metal rudder that floated above the ground. Pushing those things gave me less trouble than some house doors, and I was able to crack it open enough for me to sidle through.

  Inside only made the stench worse. Red carpets that were made of a material I couldn't identify were laid out everywhere. Black and white checkered tile made a very fun sound when I stepped on it, enough that I purposely evaded the cloth so that my shoes could make more tapping sounds. The ceiling was ludicrously tall, probably the tallest one that I'd ever seen. Dropping from the top would probably kill me, or not, considering that I've heard of people living through a malfunctioned parachute.

  It was opulent in the way that old things were. Every detail was chiseled towards perfection with somebody far away being contracted to come over and slave away for a year to manicure their masterpieces. The base of the pillars—far up and away they towered, where I just had to spend a moment looking straight up and pretending that I was standing at the end of a fancy bridge—each with little curves chiseled in them that made the place look Greek or Roman or whichever of those did the marble stuff. Doors that would need forklifts to get them moving made the place fit for giants to travel room to room. Chandeliers provided the light alongside brass candles affixed to the walls, but that was certainly the area needing the most improvement. Squinting didn't help pierce through the red-ness that seemed to cloud my eyes like tears. Fog or something else? I didn't know anything that would make the air look red.

  Straight ahead was a gigantic staircase where Snow White could’ve descended into the ball. Something was there. I hesitated calling it a man since 'men' weren't usually built like a Dorito. Those shoulders jutted out from his absurdly skinny waist, making the back wide enough that I could lay out a dinner on it. Gripped tightly in each hand were a sword and shield that added context why he was entirely made of metal. Obviously he was mixed up into the same madness that I was surrounded by, so ignoring him was better for my sanity.

  Checking outside the door, I saw that the city hadn't been replaced by a negative expanse or anything dramatic. There still was the alleyway waiting for me to escape the Disneyland attraction, the same place that had spat me out in this strange place.

  I didn't know much about Tokyo other than the quick searches online to learn about it, and the general osmosis that happened with it being the largest city in your vicinity, and having a stranglehold on people's imaginations where your plot was either held in the city or they made up a town much quainter than my own while being as small, rural, with all the same inconveniences like mosquitoes sucking your heart out during the summers; again, I am no expert, but I'm pretty sure there wasn't a castle stuck straight down in the center of the city. Something weird was going on.

  A wrong turn had to have been taken, or not. Maybe I forgot about where the school was, or not. Retracing my steps seemed more attractive than sticking around.

  Thunk.

  It felt like the back of my skull was introduced to the front. Like a shotgun blast, those pellets bounced and made me slam forwards into the door. That was the last thing I remembered before blacking out.