Name's Amellia, call me Am or Ame for short (suit yourself). This is my blog for Tokyo Debunker post. I can't promise to upload regularly. But if you still enjoy my blog, I'm glad.
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Rules:
I'm not actually picky; you could ask me anything. BUT I do have something that I don't want to write:
❣ LGBT+
❣ NSFW
I'm not being homophobic or anything, I just want my blog to become a safe space for all ages, and I hope you'll respect that. (My viewers comes from across many culture, so I'm trying to be respectful)
If you don't like it, feel free to block me.
ᰔ Oneshot; Have tag #am's oneshot
✎. List :
Can I trust my own eyes?;
Where MC might have a distorted reality from what she actually thought was real.
Unseen, Unheard, Still Here;
Where some entity could never really reach MC, but still prays for her.
Don't Believe Me;
A sudden realization hit MC about her curse, leaving a bitter taste in their mouth.
The Blooming Constant;
Edward watched MC reincarnate over and over again, but was never chosen by her. Will she look at him this time before the curse takes hold?
The Language of Small Things;
Some of the Ghouls finally see where MC got her habit of small actions as a way of love.
Sketches of You;
Subaru has difficulty being near people, but he still tries to learn with MC while playing with her hair.
Random Idea; [ (1) | (2) ]
A short idea I had on a random day.
ᰔ Series; have tag #am's series
✎. List :
Help Me, Will You? (suspended);
Sho | Subaru
See Through Your Eyes;
Part 1 (Hotarubi) | Part 2 (Sinostra) | Part 3 (Frostheim) |
Part 4 (Vagastrom) | part 5 (Obscuary)
Butter and the Melting Heart;
Where MC learns to cook for Sho as a thank-you for always helping her out during missions, and now that man is WHIPPED.
Ripple in the Ocean Surface;
Where MC stays calm even in the middle of a crisis, leaving her the only one who could calm the ghoul that should've helped her break her curse.
Served the Same Way;
Eating at Sho's food truck is nothing unusual. Leo makes sure everyone knows he doesn't care — until the food brings back memories he's spent years ignoring.
Take Me Home;
MC finally shattered when she got hit by a mental attack of the anomaly. Swept by her emotion, she finally lifted her own veil and was seen at her lowest.
Mismatch; (1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) | (7) | (8)
MC from Obey Me and TKDB were swapped during one of the missions. Only Lucas and Kaito know the truth, but could they even hide this fact for long when MC acts so differently?
My fyp page now full of obey me content while i write mismatch series. Like, wtf??? I didn't even search anything about obey me in tumblr but my feed now full of them. Did they have eyes on me 😭😭
─ I feel like I didn't picture Solomon's personality that well in here, and I'm also not satisfied enough with how I deliver MC's monologue in here and how they face the problem that arose, but I gave up this time. :P
"I'll be honest with you," he said quietly. "I already know you're not the MC we know."
Her entire body stiffened. For a moment, she genuinely forgot about the pain.
The words seemed to pass through her without meaning anything, and then their meaning caught up all at once, leaving her chest so tight that breathing suddenly required conscious effort. Her fingers released the blanket only to grip it again almost immediately, and she shifted backward on the bed as though creating another few inches of distance between them might somehow make the conversation less real.
"What...?"
Solomon didn't move toward her.
He didn't reach for her, didn't try to stop her when she instinctively shifted farther away, and didn't raise his voice when he continued. His expression remained stern enough to make it clear that he wasn't joking anymore, but there was still something unmistakably gentle beneath it, as though he understood that frightening her further would accomplish nothing.
"You—" Her voice caught, she swallowed and tried again. "You already knew?"
"Yes." The answer was so simple that it frightened her more than hesitation would have.
She looked toward the door. The movement was small, almost unconscious, but Solomon noticed it immediately. His eyes followed hers for only a second before returning to her face.
"You don't have to run."
She froze. "I wasn't—"
"You were thinking about it."
She looked back at him, unable to decide whether she should deny it or simply remain silent.
Solomon gave her a tired little smile. "Honestly, if I wanted to exposed you, I wouldn't have waited until now to tell you."
The statement made her pause.
He was right. If he had intended to expose her, he could have called Lucifer. He could have told the others. He could have asked questions in front of everyone at the House of Lamentation. Instead, he was sitting beside her in an infirmary room, speaking quietly enough that nobody outside could hear.
That didn't make her feel safe. But it made it harder to believe he was trying to trap her. "I don't understand."
"I know." Solomon's gaze softened. "That's probably the part you're having the hardest time with, all of this."
She lowered her eyes. He waited until she looked back at him before continuing.
"I wasn't completely certain this morning."
Her brows drew together. "This morning?"
"The first time I spoke to you in class, I thought something was strange, but strange isn't exactly rare around here." A faint smile touched his mouth. "People forget things. People get sick. People have bad days. And considering Asmodeus told everyone you'd been looking awful since yesterday, there were plenty of ordinary explanations."
She remembered that conversation. The joke and the magic lesson.
"But then you agreed." She stared at him, waiting. "The magic lesson."
Her breath caught. Huh?
"I asked whether you'd forgotten about our lesson later, and you said, 'Of course.'" His expression became faintly amused despite everything. "That was when I became suspicious."
She frowned. "But why?"
"Because you shouldn't have agreed." She stared at him in confusion. "Not because there was anything wrong with the lesson itself. There simply wasn't one scheduled."
Her thoughts stopped. "What?"
"There was never supposed to be a mentoring session that afternoon." The confusion must have shown plainly on her face, because Solomon's expression softened further. "I was teasing you."
She could only stare. "You were... joking?"
"Pretty much." A faint, almost apologetic smile appeared. "I wanted to see whether you'd remember enough to realize I was joking."
She had thought agreeing was the safest answer because refusing would reveal that she didn't know what he was talking about. She hadn't realized that the very act of agreeing had told him something was wrong.
Solomon watched the realization settle across her face.
"You didn't ask what time the lesson was. You didn't ask where we were meeting. You didn't complain that I'd forgotten to tell you the location." His voice remained quiet and matter-of-fact. "You simply agreed."
She looked down, the embarrassment barely registered beneath the fear. "So you knew because I answered wrong."
"Not exactly," Solomon said, shaking his head. "That only made me suspicious. The healing spell is what convinced me."
"Why?" she asked, her fingers tightening.
"It tried to heal you," he said simply. "And you already know what happened."
Her breath caught as the memory returned—the warmth of his hand against her cheek, the strange sense of relief that had spread through her body, and then the sudden, horrifying sensation of something twisting violently beneath her skin. She could still remember the way her entire body had seized around the pain, as though the spell had reached somewhere inside her and immediately been turned against her.
"My spell didn't fail," Solomon continued. "That's the important part. It took hold at first, which is why you felt better. But then something pushed it back."
She stared at him. "Like my body rejected it?"
"No." Solomon shook his head, his answer quiet but immediate. "It wasn't your body rejecting the spell. The magic itself was forced backward."
Her fingers tightened around the blanket. "Forced backward?"
"It went in normally," he explained, watching her carefully, "and for those few seconds, it was doing exactly what it was supposed to do. Then something inside you interfered with it. The spell was reversed before it could finish, and when the magic came back, it struck you instead."
Her hand moved instinctively toward her back. "But why would that happen?"
"That's what I don't have an ordinary answer for."
There was no teasing in Solomon's voice anymore.
"Magic has rules," he continued. "Different people use it differently, and there are certainly things that can interfere with a spell, but even unusual magic still exists within the framework of this world. A healing spell is meant to recognize the person it's being cast upon, enter the body, and restore what has been damaged. It can fail if the spell is poorly executed, if the injury is beyond what the caster can treat, or if something else is interfering with it."
His eyes settled on hers. "But it doesn't normally turn around and attack the person it's supposed to heal."
She felt a chill creep slowly down her arms. "So what does that mean?"
Solomon was silent for a moment.
"It means," he said carefully, "that whatever is happening to you doesn't seem to belong to the rules of this world."
Her stomach twisted. She immediately thought of the mirror. The room that had apparently belonged to her. Or rather, to someone who looked exactly like her.
She had spent so much time trying to convince herself that there had to be a simple explanation, even if that explanation was ridiculous. Perhaps she had somehow possessed another girl. Perhaps there had been an accident involving magic she didn't understand. Perhaps she had simply been mistaken for someone else.
None of those explanations had ever made complete sense.
But they had been easier to hold onto than the possibility that she herself had become something outside the rules of this place.
"Then," Her voice faltered. "Is that why my back hurts?"
Solomon's expression changed slightly. "Hurt? You feel pain, even now?"
She nodded. "It started before I woke up here. Or at least, I think it did. I remember being in pain before everything went dark, and since then it hasn't really stopped. Sometimes it's barely there, and then suddenly it becomes so bad that I can't stand it."
She hesitated, lowering her gaze. "It was already hurting even before you used the spell."
Solomon watched her for a long moment, his expression unreadable in a way that made her increasingly uncomfortable. "That’s—…, I don't think the pain is something your body simply happened to develop after you arrived here."
She looked at him through the lingering haze in her vision. Her breathing had finally begun to settle, although every deeper breath still brought a faint reminder of the pain waiting beneath her shoulder blades.
"Then what is it?"
"I don't know yet." The honesty in his answer caught her off guard.
He looked genuinely thoughtful as he considered her, his gaze occasionally drifting toward the place where she'd been clutching her back.
"There is something I'd like to check," he said eventually. "If you're willing to let me."
Her fingers tightened slightly around the blanket. "What?"
"Your back."
The request made her hesitate. Of all the things she had expected him to ask after everything she'd just told him, that had not been one of them. "My back?"
"The pain began there, didn't it?" His voice remained calm, almost conversational, but there was a seriousness underneath it now that hadn't been there when he'd first entered the infirmary. "And whatever I tried to do made it significantly worse. If there's something connected to the pain, I'd rather know what I'm dealing with before I try anything else."
She stared at him for several seconds, uncertain whether agreeing was actually the sensible thing to do.
The thought of allowing anyone in this strange world to examine her already made her uncomfortable, especially when she still couldn't decide how much she could trust Solomon. He had been kind enough, certainly, and he had asked permission before using magic on her, but kindness did not erase the fact that she had known him for less than a day while he apparently knew the person whose life she had somehow been dropped into.
More importantly, she had already reached the point where refusing every offer of help was becoming impossible. She needed to know whether there was something physically wrong with her before the pain became unbearable again.
"I think it might tell us something." There was something about the way he said it that made her nervous again, but she finally nodded.
"All right," she said eventually. "But, don't do anything."
Solomon's expression softened. "I won't."
Solomon moved around the side of the bed, giving her enough time to adjust herself before carefully asking her to turn. She hesitated again before doing so, pulling the fabric away from her back as much as she could without completely exposing herself. The movement made the lingering pain stir beneath her shoulder blades, and she instinctively winced.
"I'll be careful," Solomon said quietly.
She could feel his attention moving over the skin of her back, and despite herself, she became acutely aware of how quiet the infirmary had become. For several seconds, he said nothing. She could feel his stare moving over the marks left by the pain, and the silence made her increasingly aware of every breath she took.
"Have you always had that mark?"
She frowned slightly, glancing over her shoulder as much as she could without turning completely around. "What mark?"
"The one near your neck."
His tone was so casual that for a moment she thought he was referring to one of the faint marks left behind by the pain. She lifted a hand instinctively toward the back of her neck, fingers brushing over the skin beneath her hair.
"I don't know what you mean."
"Right there," he said, and this time she could hear something change in his voice. "Just below your hairline, a mole."
She hesitated before pulling her hair forward and touching the place he had indicated. Her fingers found nothing unusual. The skin felt exactly as it always had. "I don't have any mole there."
Solomon's expression was hidden from her now, but she heard the quietness that entered his voice. "You don't?"
"No." She turned slightly farther, enough to look at him properly. "At least, not that I know of. Why?"
He didn't answer at first. Instead, something seemed to click into place behind his eyes. He looked back at her face, then at the small mark on her neck, then back at her again. When he spoke, his voice had become quieter.
"Nothing," he said at last, though the word came with enough hesitation to make it clear that it wasn't really nothing. "I don't want to jump to conclusions yet."
She stared at him for another moment before finally asking, "Does that mole matter?"
"By itself? Not really." Solomon's gaze returned briefly to her face. "There are plenty of people with moles in places they don't pay attention to, and I wouldn't make a theory out of something that simple."
His tone remained deliberately casual, but then he added, "What matters is that you don't recognize it."
He could see that she was beginning to worry again, because his tone softened almost immediately. "Don't look so frightened. I'm not saying something terrible has happened."
"Then what are you saying?"
"I'm saying that I'm starting to wonder whether the problem is more complicated than you simply being sick."
She already knew that, but she still didn’t understand what any of that had to do with a mole—or with the pain in her back, or with whatever was happening to her now. Hearing him speak as if it all connected only made her feel more lost.
Solomon studied her for another moment before asking, "Can I see the rest?"
After a moment, she nodded and let him examine her back. Solomon waited until she was comfortable before looking more carefully at the skin along her back. His attention lingered beneath the nape of her neck, then moved lower.
The moment his eyes settled there, his expression changed again. This time she noticed. "Is there really something wrong?"
He didn't answer immediately. Instead, he looked at the purple mark beneath her nape.
It wasn't simply a bruise. It was too deliberate, too clearly formed beneath the skin, its shape resembling the petals of a spider lily. The edges seemed almost too precise to be something caused by ordinary injury, and the sight of it made Solomon's earlier confusion settle into something much more serious.
“Have you been under a curse?”
The question was so unexpected that she almost turned around. “I—”
She stopped herself, suddenly unsure whether answering honestly was wise. Solomon's voice hadn't carried any accusation, but the question itself was too precise to be casual. He wasn't asking whether she felt strange or whether something had happened to her recently. He was asking about a curse as though he had already seen enough to suspect one.
After everything that had happened since she woke up, another lie felt exhausting. The answer came quietly. “Yes.”
Solomon didn't respond immediately. She heard the faint rustle of fabric as he shifted his weight, but otherwise the infirmary stayed silent. His pause made her more aware of how exposed she was, sitting with her back turned to someone she had only properly spoken to that morning.
“What kind?”
Her fingers tightened slightly around the edge of the bed. “I don't know if it has a proper name here.”
“That wasn't what I asked.”
There was no harshness in the correction, but there was enough quiet firmness to make her realize he wasn't going to let her avoid the question simply because she didn't know how much she should reveal.
She swallowed. “It’s Kyklos.”
Solomon didn't interrupt, but she noticed from the slight shift in his posture and the way his gaze sharpened that he didn't actually seem familiar with Kyklos, even if he was clearly attentive and willing to listen as she explained it.
“Kyklos...,” Solomon’s gaze remained steady, though a faint crease formed between his brows. “I've studied a great many curses, including some old ones that have almost disappeared from common magical practice, but this isn't familiar to me. ”
That admission seemed to sit heavier than anything else he had said so far.
“Oh.” Her voice became quieter as she continued. “Well, I don't even know much about the theory behind it. I only know what it did to me.”
"Then I probably won't be able to explain it properly," she said quietly. "I don't know that much about it myself."
"Tell me what you do know."
For several seconds, she said nothing, trying to decide how much of her life she could possibly explain to someone who came from a world where demons, angels, and sorcerers apparently attended the same school.
Eventually, she let out a slow breath. "I was a normal person before all of this."
Solomon's expression didn't change.
"I wasn't born with some strange power, and I wasn't looking for anything supernatural. I was just going home one night when I got caught in something involving an anomaly." Her fingers moved unconsciously toward the purple mark. "That's when I saw Kyklos."
She paused, remembering the first time she had seen that eye and the terrible realization that had followed. "It cursed me."
"And what does the curse do?"
Her throat tightened. "It turns me into another Kyklos."
Solomon's expression became more serious.
"Eventually," she continued. "Not immediately. It happens gradually, and I have a limited amount of time to find a way to stop it before the transformation is complete."
She didn't need to explain every detail of the investigation that had followed, but once she started, the words seemed to come more easily. She didn't know why she was telling him, perhaps because Solomon had already discovered enough that hiding the rest felt pointless. Perhaps because, for the first time since waking in this world, someone was actually looking at the problem instead of simply asking whether she was feeling better.
"That's why I went to Darkwick. I became a student there because they had people who knew about anomalies, and I thought they might be able to help me find a way to break the curse before it was too late."
Solomon remained quiet, listening without interrupting.
"The mark appeared because of the curse," she added. "It's supposed to keep growing." His eyes moved toward it again.
"That explains why it's so deliberate."
She glanced back at him. "What do you mean?"
"It doesn't look like an injury." His voice had become more analytical now, but not detached. "It isn't behaving like a bruise, and it doesn't resemble a wound caused by physical force. Whatever placed it there intended for it to remain."
She nodded slowly. "That's what I was told."
"And you said the pain started before you arrived here."
"Yes."
"Then the curse came with you." The statement settled heavily between them.
She turned her head slightly, as if she only realized what her curse marks imply now. "I think so."
Solomon was quiet for a moment. "If this curse is attached to you rather than to a location, that would make sense."
She looked down at her hands. "That's what I've been afraid of."
Solomon's gaze returned to her. "Why?"
"Because I don't think I came here normally."
He waited.
"I was at Darkwick. There was a mission." The memory returned with such clarity that her chest tightened. "There was a place filled with mirrors. I saw someone standing on the other side of the glass."
Solomon said nothing.
"She looked like me."
His eyes narrowed slightly.
"Exactly like me."
She looked toward the infirmary window, though there was nothing outside that could help her find the right words.
"I thought she was my reflection at first, but the room behind her wasn't the same. She was somewhere else. Somewhere bright. There were people around her, and it looked like an ordinary place." Her fingers tightened around the blanket. "Then everything broke."
"The glass?"
"Yes." She closed her eyes for a moment. "I remember Lucas. I remember Kaito. I remember the explosion." Her voice became quieter. "Then I woke up here."
Solomon remained silent, and she continued before she could lose her nerve.
"Everyone here thought I was someone they already knew. They called me by my name. They knew things about me that I don't remember doing. There's a room prepared for me. There are clothes that aren't mine, photographs of a girl with my face, and people who apparently have memories with me that I've never lived with."
Her hand slowly moved back toward her neck. "And now you tell me there's a mole here that I've never had."
Solomon's gaze followed the movement. "Exactly."
She looked at him.
"That's why I thought maybe I'd somehow taken over her body." The words sounded absurd when spoken aloud. "I thought maybe I possessed someone who happened to have the same face and name as me. I didn't know what else to think."
A possibility he couldn't immediately dismiss, given what she had just described—less like simple possession, and more like displacement between two identical lives.
"I don't know whether that's possible," Solomon admitted. "I'm not even sure what mechanism could have caused it. But you've given me two separate pieces of information that don't fit a simple possession."
He gestured faintly toward her neck. "Her physical body has something you don't."
Then toward the curse. "Your curse, meanwhile, remains attached to you."
She felt a strange chill move through her.
"I think we should consider the possibility that what crossed over wasn't merely your consciousness."
She looked at him, unable to make herself speak.
"The soul," he said quietly. "If the soul is what remained attached to the curse, then it would explain why the curse followed you even though the body you're occupying belongs to someone else."
Soul.
A soul meant there was another person involved.
Someone who wasn't merely a body she had accidentally occupied, but someone who had her own thoughts, her own memories, her own relationships, and her own life that had continued somewhere beyond the moment when everything had gone wrong.
She slowly lowered her gaze toward her hands. "They're not just memories, are they?"
Solomon watched her carefully. "What do you mean?"
"The people here." Her voice was quieter now, but the more she spoke, the more the thought seemed to solidify inside her. "Their memories of me. The room. The clothes. This school. Everything."
She swallowed, her throat suddenly dry.
"If this were just some illusion created by whatever happened in that mirror hall, then none of it would have to be real. But it is." Her fingers curled against the blanket. "They actually know her. They remember things she did. They remember things I never experienced. I thought this is a simply hallucination that mirror trap me inside."
Solomon didn't interrupt.
"And this place..." She looked toward the infirmary window, though she couldn't see much from where she sat. "It's real too, isn't it? As real as my own world"
"From everything you've told me, there's no reason to assume otherwise."
The answer should have reassured her but it made something inside her chest sink even further. Because if this world was real, then the girl who belonged here had to be real too.
She remembered the mirror, the impossible room beyond the glass. The bright streets and the people moving through them as though nothing strange had happened.
She had thought the girl standing there was simply another version of herself trapped behind a reflection that refused to behave properly. She had never considered what it meant for that version of herself to actually belong somewhere.
Her breathing gradually became shallower. "So if I'm here..."
She stopped, the words suddenly felt too frightening to finish.
She looked at him, her expression tightening with the realization that had begun forming before she could stop it. "If I'm here right now," she whispered, "then where is she?"
Solomon's expression became still.
"If our souls really switched, then she didn't just disappear, did she?" Her voice trembled despite her attempt to control it. "She would have ended up somewhere too."
Her stomach twisted. "She would have woken up in my world."
The thought struck her with such force that she had to look away. Darkwick—the familiar academy, the corridors she knew by memory, the people she trusted, Lucas, Kaito, and the others. Her world was still there. It had to be. And if the other MC had somehow been thrown into it—
Her chest tightened painfully. "What if she woke up at Darkwick?"
Solomon remained silent.
"What if she opened her eyes in that broken mirror hall and everyone thought she was me?" The words came faster now, each possibility feeding the next before she could stop herself. "What if Lucas found her? What if Kaito was there? What if they tried to talk to her and she didn't know who they were?"
Her fingers began trembling again. "What if she thinks I disappeared and she trapped in my place forever?"
The room suddenly felt too small.
She could picture it too easily. A girl with her face waking up in a world she didn't recognize, surrounded by people insisting they knew her, being asked questions she couldn't answer, expected to remember a life she had never lived.
The exact same terror she had been experiencing since opening her eyes.
Only now she was imagining someone else suffering through it in her place. "She'd be just as frightened as I am."
The realization came out almost broken.
Solomon's expression softened. "Probably."
She closed her eyes. For the first time since waking in this world, the fear inside her shifted into something else.
Guilt.
Because somewhere, possibly right now, there might be another girl wearing her face and standing in her world, looking at Lucas and Kaito with the same confusion she had felt when Lucifer and the others greeted her that morning.
Someone who might be asking the same questions.
Who are you?
Why do you know me?
Why does everyone think I belong here?
Her eyes opened again. "And she would be me."
Their lives had been exchanged.
She looked down again, her thumb rubbing unconsciously against the edge of the blanket. "I thought I wanted to go home."
Solomon's gaze remained on her.
"I still do." Her voice became quieter.
"But if this is really what happened..." She hesitated, struggling to put the thought into words. "Then going home doesn't mean leaving someone else's life behind anymore."
The realization settled heavily inside her.
"It means getting her back too."
For several seconds, Solomon said nothing. Then his expression softened into something almost thoughtful. "That's a much more complicated problem."
A weak, humorless laugh escaped her. "Of course it is."
She looked toward the window again, imagining a world she couldn't see from here and another world that suddenly felt impossibly close.
Two lives, two girls, the same face and the same name, but different memories and different people waiting for them, and somewhere between them was the invisible boundary she had crossed without ever knowing it existed. A line that now felt less like a mistake and more like something deliberate, as if both of them had been placed on opposite sides of a world neither of them was meant to see at the same time.
For the first time, she stopped thinking of this place as somewhere she had been accidentally trapped. It was a real world, a real life.
And there was another version of herself living in it.
The thought frightened her more than any demon she had encountered that morning.
Because monsters were easier to understand than the possibility that somewhere beyond this room, another girl had opened her eyes in her world and was now living her life just as unwillingly as she was living hers.
She slowly drew a breath, though it did little to ease the tightness in her chest. "I need to find a way back."
Solomon nodded, seeming intending to help her until the end. "We'll find out what happened to both of you."
She stared at him for several seconds before giving a small, unsteady nod.
For the first time since waking in the House of Lamentation, the thought of returning home no longer felt like the only answer. Now there was another question attached to it.
Who was going to bring the other girl home?
⊹ ࣪ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ࣪ ˖ .tbc
Warning: Tbh, I'm still not finished with all the episodes up to the latest update, so I actually have little information to go on while making this (please forgive me if there's any OOC; have mercy).
Word count: 4.667
The moment they stepped beyond the gates of the mansion, the world expanded into something she no longer knew how to comprehend.
Until now, every strange thing she had encountered had remained contained within those towering walls. The unfamiliar people, the room that somehow belonged to someone wearing her face, the impossible architecture that surrounded them—all of it could still be dismissed as part of whatever enormous estate they lived in. It had been terrifying, certainly, but terror at least possessed boundaries. It had walls. It existed inside a place she hadn't chosen to enter.
The streets beyond those gates stole even that small comfort away.
She found herself walking almost automatically, keeping pace half a step behind the group because stopping now would have meant being left behind in a city whose language, customs, and people she understood no better than a child dropped into the middle of a foreign country. No one instructed her where to go. No one checked whether she was following. They simply assumed she would, just as they assumed she had every other morning before today.
That quiet assumption weighed on her far more heavily than suspicion ever could.
The others fell naturally into conversations as they walked, so effortlessly that it became painfully obvious this routine had repeated itself countless times before. Mammon complained loudly about having to wake up early, insisting that any academy requiring students to attend morning lectures clearly deserved bankruptcy. Lucifer didn't even spare him a glance before replying that if he had spent less time trying to avoid homework the previous evening, he might have managed to sleep at a reasonable hour.
Mammon immediately protested that those were completely unrelated issues.
"They're absolutely related!"
"They ain't!"
"You stayed awake until three in the morning."
"I was busy!"
"You were playing Devil Kart."
"That—... is busy!"
Leviathan snorted without lifting his eyes from the D.D.D. in his hands. "Imagine losing sleep over Devil Kart. Amateur."
"Oh, shut it! At least I don't spend my entire life locked in my room!"
"You literally came to ask me for tips yesterday."
"I did not!"
"You absolutely did."
"I was askin' hypothetically at that time! Not asking for ya’ help!"
The argument dissolved into another chorus of complaints before Satan quietly turned another page of the thick novel he had somehow managed to continue reading while walking through crowded streets.
"You did ask," he remarked without looking up.
Levi smiled victoriously. "There."
Mammon pointed accusingly. "Whose side are ya on?!"
"I'm on the side of objective truth."
"Traitor."
Their exchange continued around her with the comfortable rhythm of people who had repeated the same arguments for years, each interruption anticipated before it arrived, each complaint answered almost automatically. She watched them from the edge of the conversation, uncertain whether she ought to smile, speak, or simply remain invisible.
Being invisible seemed safest. Because every sentence they exchanged reminded her of one unavoidable reality.
She didn't belong among them.
The realization followed her attention elsewhere, toward the city unfolding beyond the sidewalks. She had expected—Honestly, she wasn't sure what she had expected. If someone had asked yesterday what the home of demons might resemble, she probably would have imagined ruins, endless darkness, or perhaps the sort of abandoned villages occasionally discovered during Darkwick investigations, places left to rot after some magical catastrophe had rendered them uninhabitable.
Instead, people were buying breakfast.
A woman balanced several paper bags beneath one arm while scolding someone over the phone. Two students hurried past carrying identical uniforms, apparently arguing over who had forgotten to finish an assignment. A café near the corner had already opened, customers occupying nearly every table while conversations drifted comfortably into the street.
It looked… Normal. Painfully, impossibly normal. Only the details refused to cooperate with that conclusion.
Someone ahead laughed, and a long tail flicked lazily behind them before disappearing beneath the hem of their jacket. Another student's hair shifted in the morning breeze, revealing a pair of black horns curling backward from either side of his head.
A delivery worker descended from somewhere overhead, folding enormous wings neatly against his back before continuing across the street as though nothing about them deserved a second glance.
She quickly lowered her gaze before anyone noticed.
They're... really demons.
Darkwick had never denied their existence. Entire semesters had been devoted to studying demonic contracts, the dangers surrounding summoned entities, and the countless incidents left behind when humans underestimated them. Yet every lecture shared one unspoken assumption: demons belonged somewhere else. They appeared through anomalies, cursed artifacts, unstable rituals, or disastrous bargains. They were exceptions.
Here, they were simply people walking to school.
The thought unsettled her far more than she expected. She had spent years learning how to investigate the traces demons left behind in the human world. Nobody had ever prepared her for a world where demons complained about homework.
"MC?" Her thoughts snapped back immediately.
Beelzebub had slowed enough that he now walked beside her instead of several steps ahead. Unlike the others, he hadn't spoken very much during the walk, though she occasionally caught him glancing toward her before quietly looking away again.
"You've been looking around a lot."
Her heart stumbled. Had she stared too obviously?
"I—" She searched frantically for an answer that wouldn't invite more questions. "Everything just feels—" She stopped herself. Different? She couldn't say that. "Busy."
The excuse sounded ridiculous the moment it left her mouth.
To her surprise, Beel only scratched the back of his neck. "I guess it is."
There was no suspicion in his expression, only simple acceptance, as though her answer had made perfect sense. Somehow that made lying feel even worse.
He looked toward the paper bag she still carried beneath one arm. "You didn't finish breakfast."
She blinked. "What?"
"You only ate a little." His tone remained as straightforward as ever, absent of accusation or judgment. "You should've eaten more."
The concern caught her completely off guard. "I'm... just not very hungry."
"You weren't hungry yesterday either."
Yesterday.
The word tightened something inside her chest. Yesterday, whoever this girl truly was had been here. Walking these same streets. Talking to these same people. Laughing at these same conversations.
Yesterday belonged to someone else.
Beel frowned slightly. "You'll get sick."
The irony nearly escaped her as bitter laughter. I already am.
The words never reached her lips. Instead she forced another smile, smaller this time because maintaining the larger one had become exhausting.
"I'll eat later."
He didn't appear convinced, but she chose to ignore his stare for now. Ahead of them, the road widened into an enormous square filled with students converging from every direction. Towering beyond them stood a building so vast that she instinctively slowed to take it in.
The academy dominated the skyline.
Dark stone walls stretched farther than she could immediately comprehend, rising into elaborate towers crowned with gargoyles and stained glass that caught the strange crimson daylight. Massive staircases led toward intricately carved entrance doors, while students streamed through the grounds in every direction without the slightest hesitation.
She had barely finished taking in the building when the atmosphere around her shifted. The conversations nearby quieted almost imperceptibly.
Students stepped aside of their own accord, creating a clear path through the courtyard. She followed their gazes instinctively.
A striking red-haired man crossed the courtyard with an easy smile that somehow commanded attention without demanding it. Beside him walked a dark green-haired man dressed impeccably in black, every movement measured with almost unsettling precision.
Even without knowing who they were, she immediately understood why the crowd moved aside. Authority radiated from them so naturally it barely needed announcing. The red-haired man noticed their group first.
"Good morning." His smile broadened as he approached, warm enough to erase much of the distance his presence created. "I'm glad to see you're feeling better, MC. Lucifer mentioned yesterday was... eventful."
Every instinct screamed that she should know this person. Instead, all she could manage was a small, careful smile. "Good morning."
Before panic had the chance to tighten her throat any further, Lucifer answered smoothly, drawing the conversation toward something involving student council business that she couldn't begin to follow.
Relief washed over her so quickly she almost swayed. She hadn't ruined it, not yet.
While Lucifer answered Diavolo, her attention drifted almost involuntarily toward the man standing beside him. Unlike the prince, whose warmth naturally drew every conversation toward him, the dark green-haired butler remained perfectly still, hands folded neatly behind his back, as though content to disappear into the background.
Yet somehow, despite barely moving at all, she couldn't shake the feeling that he had already taken in every detail around him.
His gaze met hers only briefly. There was no curiosity nor a polite smile.
Simply a calm acknowledgement before his attention returned to Diavolo, as though she had never occupied it in the first place. She told herself she had imagined the moment.
Yet it strangely left an inexplicable chill settling beneath her skin.
Before she could dwell on it, the red-haired man laughed warmly at something Satan muttered under his breath, the moment dissolved, and the flow of students resumed as though nothing had happened at all.
She found herself glancing back once. The dark green-haired man had already turned away.
For some reason she couldn't explain, she had the uncomfortable feeling that, out of everyone she had met since arriving in this impossible world, he had looked at her the longest.
"...MC." Mammon had already started walking again. "Quit standin' there or we're gonna be late."
"I-I'm coming." She hurried after the others, lowering her eyes before anyone could notice how openly she had been staring.
The corridors were already crowded. Students filled every corner of the academy, talking between classes, exchanging books, laughing loudly enough for their voices to echo through the cavernous halls. Had it not been for the occasional pair of horns, a flicking tail disappearing into the crowd, or wings folding neatly against someone's back, she almost could have convinced herself she was simply walking through another school.
Almost.
A group of students passed carrying textbooks thicker than anything she'd ever seen, speaking animatedly about an upcoming practical examination. Another complained about forgetting homework. Someone farther down the corridor was arguing over borrowed notes. Ordinary conversations, ordinary worries.
She found herself listening to them more closely than she should have.
Darkwick students spoke constantly about stigma control, cursed artifacts, dorm competitions, field assignments, and practical evaluations. Even their casual conversations inevitably drifted back toward investigations and supernatural incidents. Here...
Nobody spoke as though demons were extraordinary. Because they weren't, they were simply students.
The realization continued unsettling her in ways she couldn't properly explain.
They rounded another corner before Mammon suddenly stopped. "Oh." He scratched the back of his neck. "Guess they're already here."
She followed his gaze. Two figures stood talking near the classroom entrance.
One of them she recognized immediately. The red-haired man from earlier greeted someone with the same easy warmth she had seen outside.
Beside him stood a young boy carrying several books against his chest.
She almost smiled. For the first time since arriving in this impossible place, she saw someone who looked… Normal.
He couldn't have been older than middle-school age, blond hair neatly combed, bright blue eyes following the conversation with surprising seriousness. His white uniform looked immaculate despite the stack of books threatening to slide from his arms.
For a fleeting second, seeing someone so young eased the knot in her chest. At least there was one person here who didn't immediately remind her that she'd been thrown into a world she couldn't understand.
"Luke." The name came from somewhere beside her.
The young boy turned. "Oh! Good morning."
He smiled politely toward their group before bowing with practiced manners. Then another student passing by laughed lightly. "The little angel's carrying half the library again."
Angel.
Her thoughts stopped. She stared before she could catch herself. The word echoed through her mind with almost painful clarity.
Luke puffed out his cheeks. "I told you these books aren't that heavy."
"They're bigger than you are."
"They are not!"
A few nearby students laughed. Luke crossed his arms indignantly before continuing into the classroom with surprising determination, still balancing the impossible stack of books without dropping a single one. She watched him disappear.
An angel attending school, arguing about library books.
Her understanding of the world, already fractured beyond recognition, seemed to shift once again beneath her feet.
The contrast left her strangely unsteady, as though every familiar rule she had relied upon had quietly stopped applying the moment she arrived here.
"MC?"
She startled, realizing everyone else had already resumed walking.
Lucifer had stopped several steps ahead, his composed gaze resting on her with quiet expectation rather than suspicion. Behind him, Mammon leaned sideways just enough to peek around his older brother.
"What're ya standin' there for?" he asked. "We're gonna be late."
"Right." She hurried after the others before anyone could notice how badly she'd fallen behind.
Every movement had become calculated since waking in this place. Every glance, every answer, every expression carried the same exhausting question.
Would she have done this?
She didn't know. She didn't know this world's MC.
She didn't know how she spoke, how often she smiled, whether she walked beside Mammon or behind Lucifer, whether she greeted other students first or waited for them to greet her.
Every ordinary decision had become guesswork.
The contradiction left her feeling strangely detached, as though every certainty she had built her understanding upon had quietly stopped applying the moment she stepped into this world.
The classroom wasn't much easier.
It resembled a university lecture hall far more than any classroom she'd ever stepped into, its high vaulted ceiling supported by dark stone pillars that disappeared into shadow overhead. Sunlight—or whatever passes for sunlight in this world—filtered through enormous stained-glass windows, scattering shifting colors across polished floors already filled with students.
Except none of them looked entirely human.
She chose the nearest empty seat without knowing whether it actually belonged to her. The decision alone made her heart race.
What if someone else normally sat here?What if this world's MC always sat beside someone?Would that be enough for them to realize something was wrong?
She had barely managed to place her bag beside the desk before another voice interrupted her thoughts.
"Morning."
She looked up automatically. A young man with white hair and striking black opal eyes stood beside the neighboring row of desks, offering her an easy smile that carried the effortless familiarity of someone greeting a classmate he saw almost every day.
He wasn't wearing the academy uniform.
Among a room filled with identical black coats and neatly pressed ties, his long white coat stood out immediately, hanging loosely over darker clothes that made him look less like a student and more like someone who had wandered into the classroom from a laboratory. There was something unusually relaxed about him as well, an almost lazy sort of composure, as though nothing in the world had ever truly managed to hurry him.
Before she could return the greeting, another voice called from the doorway.
"Solomon."
The white-haired man turned at once.
A tall man with deep bronze skin approached, several books balanced neatly against one arm while Luke hurried after him with another stack almost large enough to hide his entire face. Despite his obvious effort, the younger angel still somehow managed to keep every book perfectly aligned.
"You forgot these." The bronze-skinned man held the books out with the practiced patience of someone who had performed this exact task many times before.
Solomon blinked once before letting out a small laugh. "So that's why my bag felt lighter."
Luke sighed with theatrical disappointment. "You said that last week."
"Clearly I'm a victim of a mysterious phenomenon." Solomon accepted the books without the slightest embarrassment. "Objects simply enjoy wandering away from me."
"They don't wander," Luke muttered. "You leave them everywhere."
The conversation flowed so naturally that she found herself quietly watching it. It reminded her, unexpectedly, of watching Lucas and Kaito argue over paperwork after missions. Different people, different personalities. Yet somehow the atmosphere felt unexpectedly familiar.
She almost smiled.
"You're staring."
Her attention snapped back toward Solomon. He had already turned toward her again, one hand resting casually against the books he had just retrieved, the faintest trace of amusement appearing in his expression.
She straightened immediately. "Sorry."
"Don't be." Solomon's smile widened, apparently finding her reaction more entertaining than offensive. "I was just wondering whether you're trying to figure out why everyone looks familiar."
Her stomach tightened.
She hadn't realized she'd been staring that obviously. "I wasn't—"
"There's an old saying about that, you know."
Solomon leaned one shoulder casually against the edge of the desk, his expression taking on the look of someone about to tell a story he had no particular reason to believe but enjoyed repeating anyway.
"Something about there being seven people in the world who share the same face."
Luke immediately looked up from his books. "That's just an old superstition."
"I know."
"Then why are you telling her?"
"Because it's interesting."
Simeon smiled faintly. "I believe I've heard that one before. Although I've also heard versions where the number changes."
"See?" Solomon gestured toward him. "Which means I'm not making it up."
"I didn't say you were."
"You were thinking about it."
"I was thinking that you enjoy finding excuses to say strange things."
Solomon looked pleased rather than offended. "That's also true."
She barely heard the rest of their exchange.
Seven people.
The number itself didn't matter. Neither did the old superstition behind it. What mattered was the image that immediately rose in her mind despite everything she'd done to avoid thinking about it. The girl beyond the fractured mirror, staring back at her with the exact same face.
Her face. The same eyes, the same features, the same expression of confusion.
For one horrible second, the memory became so vivid that she could almost hear the roar of the mirrors breaking again. She lowered her eyes quickly.
"Are you alright?" Simeon's voice was gentler this time.
She looked up and found him watching her with quiet concern rather than suspicion. "Yes." She forced a small smile. "It's nothing."
Solomon's gaze remained on her for another second. Then, mercifully, his expression became playful again. "Don't worry. I'm not seriously suggesting you're secretly one of seven identical people."
A nervous laugh escaped her before she could stop it. "That would be strange."
"Exactly." Solomon nodded solemnly. "Imagine having six other people walking around with your face. You'd never know which one was you."
Her smile faltered. For some reason, the joke wasn't funny anymore. She could still see the other girl. She could still remember the way they had stared at one another through the fractured reflections, neither of them understanding why the other existed.
And now Solomon was casually talking about people sharing the same face as though it were nothing more than an old superstition.
She forced herself to look away.
"Although," Solomon continued, apparently unaware of how close his joke had landed to something she was desperately trying not to think about, "if that happened, I imagine you'd at least remember which one was you."
Her fingers tightened around the edge of the desk. She wasn't even sure anymore what exactly had happened in that mirror hall. She remembered Lucas and Kaito. The shattering glass, the girl, then the explosion.
After that, everything had become impossible.
Solomon's expression shifted slightly when she didn't answer, only for a moment. His smile remained easy, but his eyes lingered on her face with a fraction more attention than before.
Then he deliberately changed the subject. "Speaking of remembering things, you haven't forgotten about our magic lesson later, have you?"
Her entire body went rigid.
Magic.
She forced herself to breathe normally. She had no idea what kind of lessons Solomon gave this world's MC. She didn't know what she was supposed to have learned, what spells she was supposed to know, or whether she had ever even been good at magic in the first place.
There was no safe answer.
So she chose the one that sounded most natural. "Of course."
Solomon blinked. It was such a small reaction that she might have missed it if she hadn't already been watching him. His eyebrows lifted by the slightest fraction, and for one brief moment the easy amusement in his expression seemed to pause, as though her answer had landed somewhere he hadn't expected it to.
Then, just as quickly, it was gone.
"M'kay, good." he said lightly, as though nothing about her answer had struck him as unusual.
Something about his tone made her stomach tighten. Had she said something wrong?
She resisted the urge to take back the answer or ask what she was supposed to remember. Doing either would only make things worse. If she suddenly admitted that she had no idea what lesson he was talking about, she would have to explain why, and there was no explanation she could give that wouldn't immediately reveal how completely lost she actually was.
Instead, she kept her expression as neutral as she could manage. Solomon, however, seemed perfectly content to leave the matter alone.
"Although," he continued, casually shifting the books beneath his arm, "if you're feeling as poorly as Asmodeus claimed yesterday, perhaps we should postpone it."
Her shoulders loosened before she could stop them. "Postpone?"
He smiled. "You're looking at me like I just suggested something terrible."
"I—no..." The answer came out too quickly again.
Solomon's smile widened by the smallest degree. "I'm only teasing."
She wasn't sure whether that was reassuring. Before she could respond, Luke appeared beside them with the expression of someone who had been listening to the conversation for long enough to become suspicious of where it was going.
"Solomon, you shouldn't tease her when she isn't feeling well."
Solomon looked down at him. Luke's cheeks puffed slightly. "What?"
"Nothing. I was just wondering when you became so understanding."
"I have always been understanding!"
Simeon laughed softly from beside them, the sound warm enough to ease some of the tension that had begun gathering around her. "Luke has been trying very hard to take care of everyone lately."
"Someone has to," Luke replied with great seriousness.
Solomon placed a hand over his chest as though wounded. "And here I thought I was doing an excellent job of taking care of myself."
"You forgot your books."
"That is unrelated."
"It says a lot about yourself, actually."
Their exchange continued naturally, and whatever strange attention had briefly appeared in Solomon's eyes seemed to disappear beneath his usual relaxed expression.
She wasn't sure whether she had imagined it.
Perhaps she had simply become too nervous, too alert to every glance and every pause because she had spent the entire morning trying to avoid revealing that she didn't know any of these people.
That had to be it. There was no reason for Solomon to suspect anything.
The professor entered soon afterward, and the remaining conversations gradually faded into silence as everyone settled into their seats. She lowered her eyes toward the notebook in front of her and tried to imitate the rhythm of the students around her, opening the page when they did, picking up her pencil when they did, and copying the writing from the board whenever the rest of the class began taking notes.
For a few minutes, the routine was almost convincing. Almost.
She could pretend she was simply another student sitting through another morning lecture, surrounded by people she happened to know. She could pretend she understood what the professor was explaining, even if the terminology sounded unfamiliar enough that she couldn't determine what subject they were actually discussing. She could pretend the strange academy, the demons walking through its halls, the impossible city outside, and the room waiting for her back at the House of Lamentation were all things she could somehow make sense of later.
Most importantly, she could pretend that her body was fine.
That lasted until the first sting returned, it was so faint that she almost ignored it.
A small, sharp sensation beneath her shoulder blade made her shift slightly in her chair, assuming she'd simply moved awkwardly. The discomfort disappeared after a few seconds, leaving behind nothing more than a vague soreness that reminded her of the aftermath of a particularly exhausting mission.
She continued writing.
At Darkwick, pain was rarely enough to stop her in the middle of something important. Bruises could wait. Scratches could wait. Even injuries that should probably have received immediate attention could wait until the mission was finished if there was still something left to do. She had learned, sometimes willingly and sometimes not, how to separate the part of herself that hurt from the part that needed to keep functioning.
So she treated this the same way. The relief lasted less than five minutes.
It spread so gradually she almost didn't notice at first, sliding upward along her spine before curling around her ribs with slow, relentless patience. Every breath felt just a little shallower than the last, forcing her lungs to work harder for the same amount of air. She inhaled carefully, then lowered her pencil again. The professor had already filled half the board. She hadn't finished writing the first line.
A bead of cold sweat slipped slowly down the back of her neck. Time continued moving for everyone else. For her, it seemed to narrow into the slow, relentless rhythm of pain spreading one pulse at a time.
She lowered her pencil again. The line she had started several minutes earlier remained unfinished.
Her handwriting, usually neat enough that Lucas had once jokingly accused her of writing mission reports like printed textbooks, had become visibly uneven. The letters trembled slightly toward the end before dissolving into an aimless stroke where her grip had faltered.
Nobody noticed that the world around her had begun shrinking.
She looked back down at her notebook. The page blurred, she blinked hard. When her vision cleared again, she realized she had been staring at the same unfinished sentence for nearly a minute.
She stared at it for several seconds before forcing herself to continue.
Her fingers closed around the pencil until the joints turned pale, and she lowered her head farther so that the movement could be mistaken for concentration. The pressure beneath her shoulder blades had become something more insistent now, no longer something she could simply categorize as soreness. It felt deep, almost buried beneath the muscles themselves, and every time she inhaled it seemed to pull tighter across her back.
Another pulse tore through her back.
She bit down gently against the inside of her cheek, forcing herself to ignore the heat gradually creeping across her face. If she could simply remain seated until the lecture ended, she could leave before anyone had the opportunity to stop her.
That was all she had to do. Stay seated, pretend and then leave.
She had always been able to concentrate when she needed to. Even during exhausting missions, even when she was frightened, there had always been some part of her mind capable of observing what was happening and storing the details for later.
Now she couldn't even remember the last few minutes of a lecture.
Across the room, Solomon shifted slightly in his seat. Her eyes flickered toward him before she could stop herself. He wasn't looking at her. At least, she didn't think he was. He was writing something in his notebook with the same relaxed posture he'd had before the lesson began, apparently paying attention to the professor.
She looked away almost immediately. Good.
She didn't want him noticing, not after the strange conversation they'd just had. She lowered her head and tried to continue taking notes. The pain sharpened so suddenly that her breath caught.
A bead of sweat gathered near her temple. She quickly wiped it away beneath the cover of her hair and glanced around. Nobody seemed to be watching. Simeon was still focused on the lesson. Luke was writing with almost absurd concentration. The students around her were absorbed in their own work.
She couldn't do this here.
She had already spent the entire morning trying to imitate someone whose life she didn't know. She had smiled at people whose names she was still learning, answered questions she didn't understand, walked through a city she'd never seen before, and sat at a breakfast table surrounded by demons while pretending that nothing about the situation was terrifying.
She couldn't add this to the list. She couldn't have everyone looking at her again. Her eyes drifted toward the classroom door, it wasn't far.
If she could wait until the professor turned toward the board, she could leave quietly. She didn't need to tell anyone where she was going. She didn't need to explain anything. She could find an empty corridor, sit down somewhere, breathe, and wait until the pain eased.
It had to ease eventually. It had to.
She kept her head lowered, hoping no one would notice. Her fingers finally gave out, the pencil slipped from her hand and rolled quietly across the stone floor before coming to rest beneath the neighboring desk.
The sound itself was insignificant, barely more than a soft tap. She crouched quickly, reaching beneath the desk before anyone else had the chance to retrieve it for her. The movement was a mistake.
The instant she bent forward, agony flared violently through her back, white flashed across her vision. For one terrifying heartbeat she forgot where she was. She remained frozen beneath the desk far longer than she should have.
No. She couldn't keep pretending. She waited until the professor turned toward the board once more, then carefully pushed her chair backward. The movement sent a violent flare through her back, her entire body stiffened.
For one terrifying second, she thought her knees were going to give out right there.
She caught the edge of the desk before anyone could see. Her head remained lowered as she breathed through her teeth, pretending she had merely stood too quickly.
Nobody said anything, she took that as permission. Probably this is normal here, for all Demon could ever do worse. She really doesn't know if it's true, but she is thankful that no one shot a suspicious look on her.
She gathered her notebook, tucked it against her side, and quietly made her way toward the door. Every step required more concentration than it should have.
She didn't look toward Solomon, Simeon, nor Luke. The less attention she drew, the better. The corridor outside was considerably quieter. The moment the classroom door closed behind her, she finally allowed herself to breathe properly.
It didn't help.
The pain was still there, even worse now.
She pressed one hand against the wall and began walking, not toward anywhere in particular, only away from the classroom and the people inside it. She had no idea where the infirmary was, no idea where the House of Lamentation stood in relation to the academy, and no idea whether she could even find her way back if she wanted to.
It didn't matter.
Right now she needed somewhere empty, somewhere she could stop pretending.
She turned down a corridor without checking where it led, then another when she heard distant voices ahead. The halls gradually became quieter as she moved farther from the central areas of the academy, and with every empty stretch of stone beneath her feet, some of the tension in her chest loosened.
No one was following her. Good.
She could finally stop smiling. Her expression fell immediately. She leaned more heavily against the wall as another wave moved through her back, closing her eyes for a moment while she waited for it to pass.
It didn't pass. Instead, the sensation spread farther.
It moved downward along her spine and then outward beneath her ribs, tightening until breathing became an effort she had to consciously remember to make. She opened her eyes and the corridor had begun to blur.
She blinked.
The walls remained where they were, but the edges of everything seemed strangely soft, as though she were looking at the world through water. She tried to take another step but her foot landed incorrectly. She stumbled and caught herself against the wall.
"Come on..." The words escaped as little more than a breath.
She wasn't sure whether she was talking to herself or her own body. She just needed a few more minutes, a place to sit, anything. She pushed herself away from the wall and continued walking.
The pain followed her.
It was no longer a series of separate pulses. It had become almost continuous, a deep burning pressure that seemed to occupy her entire back while sharp flashes cut through it whenever she moved. Her body was beginning to feel strangely distant, as though her mind were struggling to keep up with everything happening beneath her skin.
She couldn't think. That was becoming the real problem.
All of her thoughts were still there somewhere, but the pain had become too large for her mind to hold anything else beside it. She stopped walking. Her hand reached for the wall again, but this time she missed. The floor shifted beneath her.
No.
Her knees buckled. She tried to straighten herself, but another wave tore through her back so violently that white light burst across her vision. For one fractured instant, she was back in the mirror hall.
Glass everywhere.
Lucas shouted.
Kaito reached for her.
That girl standing on the other side of the fractured reflections.
The same face. The same eyes. And then—
Nothing.
Her body finally gave out.
She collapsed onto the cold stone floor, her notebook slipping from her arm and landing several feet away as the pages scattered open across the corridor.
She never heard the footsteps approaching from somewhere farther down the hall. She never heard anyone call her name. The darkness swallowed her before she could even wonder who had found her.
.
.
.
When consciousness returned, it did so slowly.
First came the awareness of warmth beneath her body, then the faint medicinal smell lingering in the air, followed by the quiet rustle of fabric somewhere nearby. Her head felt heavy, and for several seconds she kept her eyes closed because opening them seemed like more effort than she could manage.
The pain was still there. But distant.
She breathed carefully. Her back still ached beneath her shoulder blades, though the unbearable intensity had finally subsided into something dull and persistent.
She opened her eyes.
A white ceiling greeted her. For several seconds she simply stared, then the events of the morning began returning one by one. When she turned her head slightly. Someone was sitting beside the bed. White hair, black opal eyes.
Solomon.
He was leaning back in the chair with one arm resting against its side, looking far too relaxed for someone sitting beside an unconscious person. A book rested loosely in his other hand, though from the way his attention was fixed on her, it was obvious he hadn't been reading for some time.
The moment their eyes met, his expression softened into an easy smile.
"Well," he said, his voice quiet enough not to disturb the stillness of the infirmary, "there you are."
She stared at him. Her mind was still too foggy to form a proper response.
Solomon tilted his head slightly. "You gave everyone quite a scare."
She swallowed, her throat dry. "What happened?"
"You collapsed." His answer was simple, but his gaze remained on her face.
She didn't know whether he was complimenting her or teasing her. With Solomon, she was beginning to suspect the distinction wasn't always important. She tried to sit up. The moment she moved, pain pulled sharply beneath her shoulder blades. Her face tightened before she could stop it.
"Careful." He reached for the glass of water sitting on the nearby table and held it toward her. "You should probably start with this."
She hesitated before accepting it. Her hands were still unsteady. Solomon waited until she had taken a sip before speaking again.
"You know, I was beginning to wonder whether Asmodeus had exaggerated when he said you looked terrible yesterday."
She looked at him. "He didn't."
Solomon smiled faintly. "No. Apparently he didn't."
There was something different about the way he said it this time. She lowered her eyes toward the glass in her hands.
"How long was I unconscious?"
"Not very long." Solomon's tone remained reassuring, but his gaze never quite left her face. "You were lucky someone found you before you hit your head."
She looked away. Lucky, she wasn't sure whether she felt lucky at all. If anything, waking here only reminded her that she had somehow managed to become even more trapped inside a world she didn't understand.
Her gaze dropped toward her hands, they were still trembling slightly.
Solomon followed her gaze, he didn't comment immediately. Instead, he leaned back slightly and studied her for another moment before speaking in a quieter voice. "How's your feeling?"
She hesitated. "Better."
The sensation beneath her shoulder blades was still there, lingering like an injury that refused to settle, but compared to what had happened in the corridor, it almost felt manageable.
Solomon seemed unconvinced. "you've been looking pale since yesterday."
Her stomach tightened. He said it casually, but the words reminded her of Asmodeus mentioning the same thing at breakfast.
She lowered her gaze. "I'll be fine."
Solomon gave her a look that suggested he had heard that answer far too many times. Then, unexpectedly, he smiled. "That's a very familiar answer."
She glanced at him. "What?"
"Nothing." He stood from the chair and moved closer to the bed. "I could try something, though."
She immediately stiffened. "What kind of something?"
"A healing spell."
The words made her hesitate. Magic.
She still didn't understand what magic in this world actually meant, despite having heard the word repeatedly since she arrived. Darkwick's magic was tied to stigmas, artifacts, contracts, anomalies, and abilities she had spent years learning to identify. But this place seemed to treat magic as something far more ordinary, something people casually discussed over breakfast and apparently learned from one another.
She didn't know what Solomon could do. She didn't know what this world's MC could do, she didn't even know whether refusing would seem strange.
Solomon seemed to notice the uncertainty in her expression, because his expression softened. "You don't have to accept. I thought I'd ask first."
The offer was simple enough. She looked down at her hands again. Part of her wanted to refuse, the other part remembered the pain from the corridor and knew she couldn't keep pretending she was fine. If there was even a possibility of reducing it, refusing seemed foolish.
So after a long moment, she gave a small nod. "Okay."
Solomon's expression changed almost imperceptibly. He reached toward her slowly enough to give her plenty of time to pull away, then gently cupped one side of her face with his hand.
His palm was warm. The sensation caught her off guard.
She had expected something stranger, perhaps some obvious sign that magic was being used. Instead, the first thing she noticed was simply warmth spreading gently from his hand into her skin, soothing in a way that reminded her of standing beneath sunlight after spending too long somewhere cold.
Her shoulders loosened before she could stop them, the pain beneath her back began to recede. For the first time since waking in this world, she felt her body relax without having to force it.
Her eyes slowly closed. Maybe, maybe this could help. Maybe she could finally breathe. Then something inside her twisted.
The pain returned with such sudden violence that her entire body jerked.
Her breath vanished. She barely had time to open her eyes before the sensation tore through her back like something had violently pulled a thread buried beneath her spine. The warmth from Solomon's hand disappeared beneath the sheer force of it, replaced by a crushing pressure that spread outward beneath her ribs.
She lurched forward. A strangled gasp escaped her throat. Solomon immediately pulled his hand away. The pain only intensified.
Her fingers clawed into the blanket as another wave seized her back, forcing her body to curl inward. Her stomach twisted violently, nausea rising so quickly that she had to swallow hard to keep herself from being sick.
"MC?" Solomon's voice had lost its casual amusement.
He reached toward her again, then stopped himself as though uncertain whether touching her would make things worse. Another violent tremor ran through her body.
Her breathing came in broken, shallow pulls while she fought desperately to keep herself upright, but her muscles seemed to have stopped listening. The room blurred around the edges of her vision, and for one terrifying moment she thought she was going to pass out again.
"I'm sorry," he said, and there was genuine concern in his voice now. "I didn't expect it to hit you that hard."
She forced herself to lift her head.
The room was still swimming slightly, and she had to blink several times before Solomon's face settled properly into view. He wasn't smiling anymore. His expression had tightened with concentration, his eyes moving briefly over her face before dropping toward the hand she'd pressed against her stomach to keep herself from being sick.
"Hit me?" The words came out weakly. Solomon hesitated, that hesitation frightened her more than the pain did. "What did you mean by that?"
"I meant the way your body responded."
Her stomach tightened.
Solomon seemed to realize immediately that his choice of words had made things worse, because he leaned back slightly and deliberately lowered his voice.
Solomon was quiet for a moment.
Then, instead of softening the question further, he let out a slow breath and leaned back slightly in his chair, his expression settling into something far more serious than she had seen from him since they first met.
"I'll be honest with you," he said quietly. "I already know you're not the MC we know."
⊹ ࣪ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ࣪ ˖ .tbc
Warning: Tbh, I'm still not finished with all the episodes up to the latest update, so I actually have little information to go on while making this (please forgive me if there's any OOC; have mercy).
Word count: 7.085
─ Hmmm.... why can't all my fav parts be written in one part? But I guess it would be too long, and I don't want people to be bored by reading for so long in one sitting, so yeah... here we are with more continuation. Yayyyyy!!!!
─ I think my procrastination keeps getting worse (5k words)
─ Edit: Once again, I missed some names to be added in the taglist. I don't have any defense, I'm so sorry. I already added all I could find, being hiatus for long messed up my memories :-|
The last thing she remembered was the loud noises.
Not simply breaking, but erupting all at once, as though every mirror inside the abandoned mansion had chosen the exact same heartbeat to shatter. Lucas had shouted something she couldn't hear beneath the roar swallowing the room, Kaito had reached toward her through a storm of fractured reflections, and somewhere beyond the countless splintered pieces of glass, another girl had reached toward her at exactly the same moment.
A girl with her face.
Then everything disappeared.
The force that tore through the mirror hall seemed to tear straight through her as well, leaving behind no sensation of falling, no awareness of her own body, not even the certainty that time continued to exist. Darkness stretched endlessly in every direction, heavy and strangely muted, until she almost believed the world itself had been swallowed whole.
Somewhere beyond that silence, voices began to bleed through.
At first they were nothing more than distant echoes, overlapping so completely that none of them formed recognizable words. Someone sounded impatient. Someone else laughed. Another voice answered with the lazy sort of confidence that only close familiarity allowed. They were speaking to one another, yet the sounds slipped through her grasp before they could become language.
Her head pounded.
A wave of dizziness rolled through her so violently that it felt as though the ground had vanished beneath her feet, only to return a second later with enough force to make her stomach lurch.
"...Oi." The voice came again, closer this time.
She frowned instinctively. Light forced its way through her eyelids, bright enough to sting. She tried opening her eyes only to squeeze them shut again immediately, her head protesting the movement with another sharp throb before she forced herself to try a second time.
The world slowly drifted back into focus. The first thing she searched for was Lucas. The second was Kaito.
Neither of them were there. Instead, two complete strangers were leaning over her.
One had silver hair and striking blue eyes, the worry on his face poorly disguised beneath an irritated scowl that reminded her vaguely of someone pretending not to care. Beside him stood another young man with soft pink curls and a smile so warm it almost seemed impossible for it to belong to someone she'd never met.
The second she looked at them, relief crossed both their faces.
"Oh, thank goodness." The pink-haired young man let out a quiet breath before gently cupping her cheek as though checking whether she was hurt. "Darling... you gave us quite a scare. You don't look well at all."
Darling?
She blinked slowly, neither of them looked like anyone she knew. Her lips parted in confusion, yet no sound came out. His fingertips on her face were cool, gentle. Too familiar that she instinctively leaned away.
The tiny movement made both of them pause. "...MC?"
The name struck her strangely.
It wasn't because it felt unfamiliar, but because they spoke it with effortless familiarity, the kind that only came from knowing someone for a very long time. She didn't know either of them. Her eyes moved quickly from one face to the other before drifting past them, desperately searching for someone—anyone—she recognized.
There wasn't a single familiar face.
None of them wore Darkwick's uniform. None of their faces belonged to any dorm she'd memorized over countless missions, assemblies, or ordinary days crossing campus. She searched anyway, instinctively trying to fit each of them somewhere familiar, but every attempt came up empty.
Where—?
The question never reached her lips. Because as she looked beyond the crowd, she realized the place surrounding her was just as unfamiliar as the people inside it.
She wasn't standing outside the abandoned mansion.
Towering buildings rose around her in elaborate Gothic architecture unlike anything she'd ever seen, their stained-glass windows glowing beneath a crimson sky that made no sense at all. Strange storefronts lined broad streets filled with people who walked past as though none of this were unusual.
Even the air felt wrong.
It carried a density that settled against her skin like invisible water, heavy enough that every breath felt unfamiliar. Panic arrived all at once.
The questions came one after another, each more frantic than the last, yet before she could hold on to a single answer, agony exploded across her back.
Where am I?
What happened to the mission?
Where are Lucas and Kaito?
Did everyone else make it out?
Her breath caught, the pain arrived so suddenly that every thought disappeared beneath it.
It felt as though something unseen had driven itself between her shoulder blades before slowly twisting deeper, the sensation spreading through her spine in relentless waves that stole the strength from her legs almost instantly. She had returned from enough missions to know what broken bones, cuts, and bruises felt like.
This wasn't any of them.
It wasn't the sharp sting of an open wound or the lingering ache of exhausted muscles. The pain seemed to come from somewhere much deeper than flesh itself, as though something hidden inside her body had suddenly begun resisting its own existence.
Her vision blurred, the street tilted violently. She barely realized she was falling until firm hands caught her shoulders.
"...Oi!" The silver-haired young man reacted first. He caught her shoulders before she could slip sideways, the confidence he'd worn only moments earlier disappearing completely. "Hey, hey—what's wrong with ya?!"
Around them, several nearby pedestrians slowed, concern flickering across their faces. She hadn't realized how pale she'd become until she saw the expressions looking back at her.
The world lurched again. She tried to straighten herself, determined not to collapse in front of complete strangers, but the moment she shifted her weight another violent pulse tore through her back, stealing the strength from her legs before she could stop it.
"I'm—" She swallowed hard. "I'm fine."
The lie sounded weak even to her own ears.
The curly-haired young man reached out almost instinctively, his expression softened into unmistakable concern. "Darling, you're pale as a sheet."
She wanted to deny it, wanted to ask them who they were, wanted to demand where Lucas and Kaito had gone, wanted to know why nobody here looked even remotely familiar. Instead, another surge of pain swallowed every question before it could reach her lips.
"Mammon," the curly-haired one said quietly, "let's take her home."
The white-haired nodded immediately. "Yeah."
He looked back at her with an expression she couldn't understand—one so naturally worried that it only made the situation more surreal. "You don't look like you're gonna make it if you stay out here."
She should have protested, she should have told them they had mistaken her for someone else, she should have demanded answers before allowing herself to be taken anywhere.
Instead, all she could do was nod weakly as they supported her between them, speaking with the quiet ease of people escorting someone precious home, while she remained a complete stranger wearing a face they somehow recognized.
The journey that followed dissolved into disconnected fragments she could barely hold onto.
She remembered movement. The unfamiliar vehicle carried them through streets she had never seen before, its windows framing a city that seemed determined to become more impossible every time she looked outside. Buildings climbed toward a crimson sky in elaborate Gothic silhouettes, while strangers walked the streets as though everything surrounding them was perfectly ordinary. She tried to memorize landmarks, intersections, anything that might help her retrace her steps later, but every road looked equally foreign, every building equally impossible.
The two young men never left her side.
Every few minutes one of them would quietly ask whether she was feeling any better, whether the pain had eased, whether she wanted something to drink. Their concern never felt forced. If anything, it was so natural that it became unsettling, because they weren't treating her like someone they had just rescued. They were treating her like someone they had worried about a hundred times before.
She answered whenever silence became too suspicious.
Short replies and carefully chosen, just enough to avoid drawing attention. The less she spoke, the less likely she was to say something wrong.
Most of her concentration remained trapped beneath the relentless ache spreading across her back. The pain no longer came in violent bursts, yet it refused to disappear entirely, pulsing beneath her shoulder blades with slow, steady persistence that made it difficult to think about anything else.
Eventually the vehicle slowed, towering iron gates opened before them. Beyond them stood an enormous mansion.
Ancient stone walls stretched higher than anything she had expected, broken only by towering stained-glass windows that scattered colored light across polished floors visible through the entrance. The building looked centuries old, grand enough to rival some of Darkwick's oldest structures, yet it lacked the familiar atmosphere she associated with the academy.
It wasn't Darkwick.
It wasn't anywhere she had ever been. Several more unfamiliar faces greeted her the moment she stepped inside, they smiled, and asked if she’s okay seeing how pale she is right now. One ruffled her hair before another immediately scolded him for bothering someone who was obviously unwell.
Every single interaction made the knot in her stomach tighten.
"I—." Her voice caught before she forced a small smile that felt painfully unnatural. "I'm sorry... I think I'd like to rest for a while."
Concern crossed several faces almost immediately, yet nobody questioned it.
"Get some rest, alright?" She looked up just in time to see the silver-haired young man rubbing the back of his neck, trying very hard to sound casual despite the worry written all over his face. "If you're still feelin' awful later, we'll figure somethin' out."
Before she could think of a response, the curly-haired one smiled at her again, warm enough to make guilt settle heavily in her stomach. "Sleep well, darling."
The door closed with a quiet click.
Silence settled over the room almost instantly yet she didn't move. For several long seconds she simply stood where they had left her, one hand still wrapped tightly around the doorknob as though opening it again might somehow return her to Darkwick instead.
It didn't.
The only sound came from the faint ticking of a clock somewhere deeper inside the room and the uneven rhythm of her own breathing. Her back still hurts.
The pain had retreated into a dull, persistent ache that pulsed beneath her shoulder blades every few breaths, never strong enough to force her to her knees anymore, yet never quiet enough to let her forget it existed. It was manageable now, but only just.
She pushed herself away from the door. The room spread out before her, impossibly unfamiliar.
It was clearly someone's bedroom, not a guest room prepared for visitors. Guest rooms were impersonal by design. A bed. A wardrobe. Perhaps a desk if the owner happened to be generous. This wasn't that, someone lived here.
Someone had spent years living here.
Books had been left open across the desk as though their owner fully intended to continue reading them later. A jacket rested carelessly over the back of a chair instead of being folded away, the sort of absent-minded habit people only developed in places they considered home. Small ornaments decorated the shelves beside framed photographs, handwritten notes, and little trinkets collected over time, every object occupying a place that had undoubtedly made perfect sense to the person who arranged them.
It was unmistakably someone's life, it’s just that it wasn’t her.
A strange uneasiness crept beneath her skin. Those people downstairs hadn't been searching for somewhere she could rest. They had brought her here, to this room, as though this was where she belonged.
The thought made something cold settle in the pit of her stomach.
"Whose room is this?" The whisper barely left her lips.
No one answered, of course.
She took another cautious step forward, her eyes wandering slowly across the room. Everywhere she looked, she found traces of someone she had never met. Someone had worn these clothes, someone had written these notes, someone had laughed here, cried here, fallen asleep here, and woken countless mornings believing this room belonged to them. Or rather—
It belonged to the girl they believed she was.
Almost absently, her fingers brushed against a framed photograph resting near the edge of the desk. She lifted it without thinking, her attention drifting toward the smiling girl inside. Then everything stopped.
Her breathing, her thoughts, even the pain gnawing quietly beneath her shoulder blades seemed to disappear beneath the weight of what she was seeing. The girl in the photograph wasn't merely similar to her. She wasn't someone who vaguely resembled her.
She had her face.
Every feature matched with impossible precision, from the shape of her eyes to the tiny scar near her wrist where the sleeve had slipped back ever so slightly. Even the smile—one she rarely wore herself—looked unmistakably as though it belonged on her own face.
No. No, that wasn't possible.
Her fingers tightened instinctively around the frame as memories surged forward with startling clarity, not because she had been searching for them, but because her mind had finally found something that connected the impossible pieces together.
The mirror hall, the shattered glass, Lucas shouting her name, Kaito reaches toward her through countless fractured reflections, and then—
Her.
A girl standing beyond the broken mirrors, wearing the exact same face now smiling back at her from the frame.
She remembered how both of them had frozen at exactly the same moment, equally bewildered by what they were seeing. Neither of them had looked frightened of the other. If anything, they had simply looked confused, as though each had become an impossible reflection in the other's world. She remembered lifting her hand almost without thinking, watching the other girl do exactly the same until only a sheet of cracked glass remained between them.
Their fingertips had almost touched, but then the mirrors exploded.
The photograph slipped slightly in her trembling hands. "It wasn't a hallucination."
She hadn't imagined that girl, she hadn't mistaken another reflection for herself inside the chaos. She had been real, as real as Lucas, Kaito, or as real as she was.
Almost mechanically, she lifted her head.
Across the room stood a full-length mirror, polished so perfectly that it reflected every corner of the bedroom with unsettling clarity. Her own reflection waited patiently inside it, watching her with the same pale face and increasingly frightened eyes.
She found herself walking toward it before she consciously decided to move.
Each step felt strangely distant, muffled beneath the frantic pounding of her heartbeat. By the time she stopped in front of the glass, she could already see her own breathing beginning to tremble. Slowly, almost hesitantly, she lifted one hand.
The reflection answered immediately.
Her fingers hovered just above the surface without quite touching it, as though some irrational part of her feared another hand might reach back from the other side.
Nothing happened.
Only her own reflection remained, yet somehow that ordinary sight unsettled her more than anything else had since waking up. Because the face staring back at her no longer felt like proof that everything was normal.
It felt like evidence.
Evidence that somewhere—whether in this world or another—there truly existed another girl who shared her face, her voice, perhaps even her life.
Those people downstairs hadn't mistaken her for someone else after all. They weren't calling the wrong name. As far as they knew, she was already home.
The thought hollowed something inside her chest. Darkwick suddenly felt impossibly far away.
The familiar academy corridors, the constant noise of students crossing the courtyard, Lucas's patient smile whenever Kaito rushed into trouble before thinking, Professor Hyde's dry lectures that somehow always became relevant during missions—those memories no longer felt like places she could simply return to. They felt like fragments of another life, separated from her by something she couldn't even begin to understand.
"I have to go back..." The whisper escaped before she realized she had spoken aloud. "I have to."
She didn't know how, she didn't even know where she was. All she knew was that this wasn't her world and this wasn't her room.
This wasn't her life.
Her breathing became uneven again, almost instinctively, she reached into the pocket of her clothes.
Nothing.
Not her student ID, not her phone, not even the notebook she always carried during missions. Everything familiar had disappeared. Another sharp stab exploded across her back. She doubled over before she could stop herself.
It was worse than before. Much worse.
The pain spread through her spine in slow, burning waves that refused to stay in one place, crawling beneath her skin until it felt as though something invisible was winding itself tighter and tighter around her from the inside.
She bit down hard on her lip to stop herself from crying out.
No, not now. Please...
She didn't understand what was happening, she didn't understand where she was, she didn't understand why everyone here knew her, she didn't understand why the girl in the mirror had her face, and now even her own body was beginning to betray her.
She remained curled forward until the wave finally receded, leaving her breathing heavily into the silence of a room that still didn't feel like hers. By the time she managed to crawl onto the bed, exhaustion had become stronger than fear.
Still wearing clothes that weren't hers, surrounded by a life that wasn't hers, she closed her eyes for what she told herself would only be a moment.
She didn't know how long she had managed to sleep.
The pain never truly disappeared.
.
.
.
It couldn't have been more than a few restless hours. The darkness outside the windows had long since faded into a muted crimson glow by the time consciousness reluctantly returned, leaving her caught somewhere between exhaustion and wakefulness. For a brief, blissfully empty moment, she lay perfectly still, her thoughts mercifully quiet, until the unfamiliar scent lingering in the room reached her.
Her eyes flew open.
She pushed herself upright a little too quickly and immediately regretted it as a sharp ache tugged across her back. It wasn't as unbearable as it had been yesterday, but neither had it disappeared. The pain lingered beneath her shoulder blades like an unwelcome presence, dull and persistent, flaring every so often without warning. It felt less like an injury and more like something patiently reminding her that it was still there.
For several long seconds, she simply sat on the edge of the bed, trying to steady her breathing while staring blankly at the floor. Nothing had changed. The room was still unfamiliar. The clothes folded neatly over the chair still weren't hers. The photographs still belonged to someone else's life.
Last night hadn't been a nightmare after all.
A quiet knock interrupted the silence. She froze, every muscle in her body locked before another knock came, slower this time.
"MC?" A voice. "We're eating."
She instinctively held her breath. Silence settled between them. She prayed—irrationally—that whoever stood outside would simply assume she was asleep and leave. Instead, the voice came again, carrying the same calm patience.
"You've been in there since yesterday." Another pause. "Are you feeling any better?"
She swallowed. What was she supposed to say? That he had the wrong person? That she had never met him before yesterday? That she had somehow awakened inside someone else's life?
Every possibility sounded equally impossible.
"...I'm alright," she managed at last, forcing enough strength into her voice that it wouldn't immediately betray how shaken she was.
The silence outside the door lasted just long enough to make her wonder whether he believed her.
"...Okay." His answer came without suspicion. "But you should still eat."
Footsteps retreated down the hallway. Only after they disappeared completely did she allow herself to exhale. "He believed me."
The realization should have been reassuring. Instead, it only made the knot in her stomach tighten. He hadn't questioned her because, to him, she wasn't a stranger making implausible excuses.
She was someone he already knew, someone he trusted enough to take at her word.
The thought settled heavily over her as she slowly stood. If everyone here believed she belonged, then every conversation carried the risk of exposing that she didn't. She glanced once more around the room before reluctantly approaching the wardrobe.
The clothes inside were unmistakably hers, or rather, they belonged to the girl with her face.
She hesitated before reaching toward a simple uniform folded neatly on one shelf. It looked nothing like Darkwick's black blazer or the academy crest she had worn almost every day since enrolling. The tailoring was different. The colors were different. Even the fabric felt unfamiliar beneath her fingertips.
She changed as carefully as though handling evidence at a crime scene, painfully aware that she had no idea whether she was putting everything on correctly. By the time she finally opened the bedroom door, she had already rehearsed the same plan countless times.
The corridor beyond was quiet, stretching farther than any ordinary residence had any right to. Portraits lined the walls in ornate frames, while sunlight—or something that resembled sunlight—filtered through towering stained-glass windows, scattering crimson and gold across polished floors. It felt less like a home and more like an old European manor preserved inside a museum.
Don't talk unless someone talks first.
Answer as little as possible.
Smile.
And try to find a way home.
Nothing about it resembled Darkwick.
Darkwick's stone corridors always carried signs of life. Students hurrying between lectures. Professors discussing missions beneath their breath. The occasional argument drifting from one dorm representative to another. Even during quiet mornings, the academy never truly slept.
This place was different. It was too grand, too silent, too... foreign.
She followed the faint sounds of conversation downstairs. The dining room was already occupied. The silver-haired young man from yesterday noticed her first.
"There she is." Relief crossed his face so naturally that it almost caught her off guard before he quickly looked away, rubbing the back of his neck. "Thought maybe ya still felt awful."
The pink-haired young man looked up immediately afterward, offering the same gentle smile she'd seen yesterday. "Good morning, darling. How are you feeling?"
Every pair of eyes in the room turned toward her.
Her heartbeat stumbled. They were all looking at her, waiting. Expecting an answer only someone else could give.
She forced herself to smile. "A little better."
It wasn't entirely a lie. The pain had dulled, the fear hadn't.
"That's good." The response came from another unfamiliar voice farther down the table. Someone slid a plate toward the empty seat waiting for her as though this happened every morning.
As though she belonged there.
She lowered herself into the chair as carefully as she could, hoping no one would notice how tightly she clasped her hands beneath the table. The meal looked perfectly ordinary. Nothing that should have made her hesitate. Yet the moment she lifted her fork, her stomach twisted violently.
She wasn't hungry. She wasn't even sure she could swallow.
Every bite felt impossible beneath the weight pressing against her chest. She could feel conversations flowing naturally around her, laughter rising and fading as though yesterday had never happened. They teased one another like siblings who had shared the same roof for years, finishing each other's sentences, arguing over trivial things, occasionally directing a question toward her with effortless familiarity.
Each time someone looked her way, she answered with the shortest response she could manage before quietly lowering her gaze again.
It was exhausting.
If they ever realized she wasn't the person they believed she was, what would happen then? The thought had barely crossed her mind when one of them stood to leave. As he stretched, a pair of black wings unfolded behind him with casual familiarity, disappearing again almost as quickly as they had appeared.
She stopped breathing.
Her eyes instinctively followed the movement. No one reacted, not a single person. As though there had been nothing unusual about it at all.
Then someone laughed. "Quit showing off."
"I'm not."
Another voice answered just as casually. "They're cramped."
Her fingers tightened around the fork until her knuckles whitened. Wings, not an illusion, looks like not a stigma, and definitely not a curse. It’s real and matches with a lingering lesson she had in her first day on Darkwick.
Demons.
The word surfaced on its own, carried by everything Darkwick had ever taught her. Not monsters from bedtime stories. Not rumors whispered by frightened civilians.
The very beings whose contracts had shaped countless case studies, whose influence lingered behind disasters and anomalies, whose existence Darkwick acknowledged with enough gravity that entire lectures had been devoted to understanding the consequences of dealing with them.
She slowly looked around the table again.
Seven strange men that called each other brothers. Living beneath one roof, laughing, arguing, sharing breakfast. As though this were perfectly ordinary. A chill quietly settled beneath her skin.
Where... have I ended up...?
She lowered her gaze to the plate in front of her. The food looked perfectly ordinary. Bread still warm from the oven, eggs prepared with practiced familiarity, fruit cut into neat slices. If someone had placed the same breakfast in front of her back at Darkwick, she wouldn't have thought twice before eating.
Now, simply looking at it made her stomach tighten.
She picked up the fork anyway. The movement drew no attention. Around the table, conversation flowed with an ease she couldn't begin to understand. One brother complained about something that had apparently happened the previous evening, another answered with obvious exasperation, while the silver-haired young man—Mammon, she had heard someone call him—argued back without the slightest hesitation.
It sounded exactly like an ordinary family. That, more than anything else, unsettled her.
Darkwick's records spoke of demons with careful precision. They were dangerous beings capable of entering contracts that could alter the course of a person's life, sometimes ending it altogether. No lecture had ever mentioned demons arguing over who had eaten the last piece of toast.
"MC?"
Her hand jerked. She looked up so quickly that several pairs of eyes turned toward her.
The pink-haired young man smiled apologetically. "You've barely touched your breakfast."
She instinctively glanced back at the plate. She hadn't realized she'd been staring at it for nearly a minute. "I'm sorry."
"You don't have to apologize." His expression softened. "You still don't look well."
"I'm just—" The lie caught in her throat.
Tired? Sick?
Neither explained the way she had been looking at everyone as though meeting them for the first time. "I don't have much of an appetite."
No one questioned the answer. Instead, another brother—tall, broad-shouldered, with warm orange hair—simply reached across the table and slid a glass of water toward her.
"Then at least drink something." His voice was gentle, carrying none of the suspicion she kept bracing herself for.
She hesitated before quietly accepting it. "Thank you."
He smiled. "Don't mention it."
Again, they were kind to her. Every quiet gesture only made the weight in her chest grow heavier. She wasn't the person they thought she was.
Every smile they gave her belonged to someone else, every worried glance, every casual conversation, every act of kindness. They all belonged to the girl whose photographs still sat upstairs beside the bed.
She lowered her eyes before anyone could notice the guilt creeping across her face. The first sip of water settled uneasily in her stomach. The first bite of bread nearly came back up.
She forced herself to swallow anyway. You have to eat.
Even if she couldn't keep thinking straight, she still remembered enough to recognize the warning signs. She had no idea where she was, no idea how long she might remain here, and no idea when she would find a way home. Refusing food because panic had stolen her appetite would only make whatever came next harder.
She tore off another small piece of bread. Chewed. Swallowed. It felt like forcing down sand.
"You really don't look good." The comment came quietly from Mammon this time.
She looked up. He had stopped arguing entirely. Instead, he was studying her with an expression she couldn't quite read, somewhere between concern and uncertainty.
"Ya sure you're okay?"
"I'm alright." The answer came too quickly.
Mammon frowned. "Ya keep sayin' that."
Before she could think of another response, the pink-haired young man—Asmodeus—leaned forward, resting his chin lightly in one hand.
"I think she's pushing herself." His tone remained light, but there was genuine concern beneath it. "You've been awfully quiet since yesterday."
Her heartbeat skipped. "Yesterday?"
"Mhm." Asmodeus smiled. "You suddenly looked so pale while we were shopping. I was worried you were about to faint right there."
Shopping.
The word struck her like another piece of a puzzle she hadn't known existed. So, before she had opened her eyes… This body's owner had been with them. Whatever had happened, it hadn't happened here.
It had happened somewhere in the middle of an ordinary day.
The mirror hall, the girl beyond the fractured glass, the explosion. Her fingers tightened almost imperceptibly around the fork.
Then... where is she now?
The thought arrived so suddenly that it stole the rest of her breath. If she was here…, then where had the girl with her face gone? Had she—
No. She couldn't think like that. She didn't even know whether what she remembered had actually happened.
"MC?"
She blinked, everyone was looking at her again. "Sorry." She forced another smile. "I was just thinking."
Asmodeus tilted his head, studying her for another second before smiling back. "Well, don't think too hard this early in the morning."
A few soft laughs circled the table, she laughed as well. Not long afterward, chairs began sliding back as everyone stood. The conversation shifted effortlessly toward something called RAD, discussing classes, assignments, and complaints about professors as naturally as Darkwick students grumbled about mission reports.
She quietly rose with them.
She had absolutely no idea where they were going, but one thing had become painfully clear. Whatever this place was, whoever these people were, pretending had only become more difficult. And somehow, she had the sinking feeling that leaving the safety of this house would make it harder still.
⊹ ࣪ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ࣪ ˖ .tbc
Early warning: Tbh, I'm still not finished with all the episodes up to the latest update, so I actually have little information to go on while making this (please forgive me if there's any OOC; have mercy).
Word count: 5.085
Your family's history is interwoven with ties to the supernatural. Sensitivity to cursed energy and the ability to see spirits runs in your family, and many of your ancestors made their living as spirit mediums. You've spent your whole life seeing ghosts as if they were normal people, and are familiar with your family's practices, but have no interest in following in their footsteps as mediums and exorcists. Your parents haven't pressured you into their line of work (for now?), but did insist you join Darkwick Academy. Your family has a multi-generational legacy there, and your parents wanted you to experience the same school life they did. So here you are!
Best friend: Kotodama Zenji
This pairing just makes sense to me. You're more of a wallflower/observer type, so someone social like Zenji would be a great friend for you! He has no problem striking up conversation and making you feel comfortable with his warm personality. He is also emotionally intelligent and attentive, and would never make you feel unwanted or ignored. The both of you would bond over your shared love for reading and writing!! Zenji is always happy to share his WIPs and finished works with you. If you're comfortable with sharing, Zenji would love to read your writing and give his comments (mostly positive with some constructive criticism only if necessary!!). Also~ Since you like listening to music, how would you like to listen to Zenji play the biwa?
Relationship with:
Kagami Subaru
Zenji introduced you to him! With an extrovert around, the both of you were able to participate in the conversation until you both warmed up to each other. You both are quite similar in personality, so it's no surprise to everyone else to see the both of you getting along so well. Subaru is always so happy to see your expressive and more energetic side. He feels honored to be one of the few that gets to see this side of you. He is the same way, but still gets embarrassed when people point out how excited he becomes when he talks about anomalies for example, so seeing you express yourself encourages him to be more comfortable with doing the same. At some point you had a massive crush on him, but he didn't feel the same way. Or maybe he was too scared of acknowledging his feelings... By the time he realized he has a crush on you too, it's already too late. So he remains as one of your close friends who also has a crush on you.
Kusanagi Haku
The both of you didn't cross paths until he transferred to Hotarubi. Once again it was Zenji who brought you two together. For a time you both were the only ones in Hotarubi who could perceive his ghost, so he stuck to the both of you like glue. At first Haku was just a friend of a friend to you, but you warmed up to him over time and felt comfortable enough to express yourself! He was so shocked because he thought you were chill like him, but turns out you can match Zenji's energy when you get excited. In turn, he stopped flirting with you. It's a sign of him getting comfortable with you as a friend~ When you get caught in an unfamiliar and/or crowded situation, Haku is the one you cling and complain to. He's good at comforting you. His side hug is the perfect balance of respectful and reassuring.
Mizuki Rui
You've known of Rui since the both of you entered Darkwick in the same year. He was so popular before his curse after all. So it's kind of funny that he and you are only getting to know each other now in your third year. He got curious about you after seeing you hang out with Haku and Jo. He even hears about you from Lyca sometimes, stories about you when you occasionally spend time with Lyca and Subaru. Before you know it, you've been adopted by an extrovert. You're not sure what to do with him when he catches you with your friends and tries to engage you in conversation, but you know he's being friendly, so you try your best to reciprocate. It'll be easier for him if you came to Obscuary to hang out. Won't you consider following Lyca over for a night? He'll fix you something good!
Kongoza Jo
Mio doesn't get close with many people, so seeing him bring you over to Dionysia was a surprise. A good one! Jo was quick to welcome you with open arms, whether it be guiding you to the front row for a show or inviting you to dinner. If you ever did take them up on the dinner offer, they made sure to sit you next to Mio (they were lowkey you and Mio's #1 shipper since day one). As you can guess, Jo is another extrovert who adopted you, but they're less chipper compared to Rui so maybe you felt comfortable with them faster? They like to include you in activities (especially when Mio is there too), but they also know how to make you comfortable despite the other people around. Gently pushing you out of your comfort zone to hopefully make friends. Hotarubi would be better for finding people with similar interests as you, but they hardly leave their rooms...
Shion Genkai
You didn't exist to him until you started dating his favourite family member. You had no problem with that. In fact you wish you still didn't exist to him. Because now he'll pop up when you're spending time with Mio, claiming he wants to join you both before announcing that he's bored 30 seconds in and decide flicking cards at you is the best way to pass the time. He doesn't have much interest in you outside of you being his little brother's girlfriend, so you're able to avoid him most of the time. Just make sure to walk the other way if you see him on campus. Quick, before he spots you.
Your lover is… Mio Susuhara!
I know, I was surprised when I made this match too. But now that I see it, I can't unsee it. First of all, Mio is literally your ideal type. Kind, gentle, patient and emotionally aware? Check! He's straightforward with his communication too (unless it's about feelings that are hard to express, but he'll get there). He isn't exactly the assertive type, but he isn't adverse to it either, and would do his best to protect and guide you. Anything to make you feel comfortable. What you said about being depended on feels really significant to me too. Mio is very independent, so he doesn't depend on you. But that's not a bad thing! He wants to be with you because he likes you, not because he needs you. That's healthy. He has no expectations for you, no secret tests to pass. He only wants to enjoy your company and make you feel happy. So don't ever worry about disappointing him. A relationship with him is all about mutual support and comfort.
♡ I can see you both meeting while he was making some repairs to Hotarubi's crumbling infrastructure. You bumped into him when he needed an extra set of hands, mostly to help with his tools, and that's how the both of you started talking. He asked questions in between bursts of silence when he had to focus, but the conversation didn't feel awkward, rather calm and comfortable. Mio and you are often overlooked, hidden behind a sea of other colourful personalities, so the both of you would feel a sense of kinship. That's what makes him curious to know more about you. So he keeps coming back to look for you.
♡ Mio's personality remains pretty much the same no matter who he's with, so your switch to showing your more energetic side was a welcome surprise to him. For him, seeing you expressing yourself so energetically is a gap moe... He's used to the chaos in Dionysia, so your joking and teasing would hardly phase him. He has no problem teasing you back! And when you're feeling overwhelmed, he's quick to stay close and ready of offer a hug whenever you want. He'll take your complaints and whining in stride too, unnaturally good at knowing when to comfort you and when to join in your complaining to validate your feelings.
♡ While the both of you don't have the same hobbies, you could bond by sharing about your hobbies with each other! Mio would love to listen to you talk about the manga you read recently or a story idea you have while working on a project. He doesn't listen to music while working, but the silence can get dull sometimes, and your voice is the perfect thing to fill it~ As for him, he'd love to show you WIPs and finished products alike. It's exciting to point out the little details or tricky things he had to work out since they wouldn't be noticed by anyone unless he pointed them out. And maybe he likes showing off a bit...
♡ The both of you have acts of service as (one of) your main love language! Mio loves taking care of you, which he usually shows by jumping at the chance to fix anything for you or make something you need. He'll make you a whole washing machine if you want one. He also refuses to let you pay whenever you both eat together. He doesn't know what to do with the money he gets from the circus and repairing stuff anyway, please let him spoil you with it. As for him, it's obvious he doesn't take care of himself enough. Always eating late or forgetting to eat (he would be so grateful if you brought him a packed lunch...), rushing off to the next job (want to be his second set of hands again?), not getting enough sleep (he has definitely fallen asleep on your shoulder before while listening to you talk). He gets sheepish when you do something to help him, but he's obviously grateful~
♡ Mio rarely gets to take you outside of Darkwick for a date, so he really wants to make it special when he gets to do it. One of the places he took you to was an escape room. You like mysteries and he likes tinkering with things and figuring out how they work. An escape room has both of that. In the room, he did his best to focus on solving the mystery, but you heard him muttering to himself about the lock mechanisms sometimes. (He didn't pick a basic escape room, he made sure to go for one with special effects and props). The both of you managed to escape the room with time to spare and then went for ice cream to celebrate!
Relationship tropes:
head in the clouds (you) x feet on the ground (him)
innocent bean (you) x normally calm but if someone hurts you, it's over for them (him)
Ok, wow... Subaruuuuuuu!!!! I hate this trope to be happening in my real life. Please god, don't manifest this one 😭😭😭 its bittersweet yet i perfectly understand how's this happen.
Also, mio???? Wow, this is the first time. I haven't read that far until dionysia so i didn't know much about them. But maybe, mio did match with myself. He kinda reminds me of artem TOT and Lars LBC
I think i have type here (emotional mature man who spoiled me, ehem...)
Not because they don’t remember you. Everyone remembers you. Your classmates remember studying with you. Professors remember grading your assignments. Friends remember conversations stretching late into the night. No one questions your existence because, to them, you’ve always been part of their lives.
The problem begins when someone asks a much simpler question.
“Where did you come from?”
The answers never match.
One document states you transferred into Darkwick halfway through the semester. Another records you as having been enrolled since your first year. Some professors are certain they met you only recently. Others would swear they’ve watched you grow for years.
Every answer is supported by evidence. Every answer contradicts another.
No matter how thoroughly someone investigates, every trail ends the same way—with records that exist, memories that feel genuine, and a history that somehow refuses to become a single, coherent truth.
Strangely, no one considers this unusual for very long.
The contradictions are noticed. Discussed. Questioned. Then, almost instinctively, everyone moves on.
As though the world itself quietly convinces them that the uncertainty isn’t worth dwelling on.
You never thought much of it either. As far as you’re concerned, your life has always been ordinary. You have memories of childhood. Favorite books. Embarrassing moments. People you care about. Dreams for the future.
If someone asked you where you came from, you’d answer without hesitation. The only problem is that the answer changes depending on which memory you reach for. It isn’t a lie. It’s simply... true.
At least, it feels true.
Darkwick eventually notices. The professors search for a logical explanation. Medical examinations classify you as perfectly healthy. Your magical aptitude resembles that of a ghoul.
Yet every investigation into your origin collapses beneath its own contradictions.
The deeper they look, the less certain they become. Officially, you are registered as a ghoul. Unofficially...
No one believes that answer is complete. No theory has ever been proven.
Years later, your file remains one of the few at Darkwick marked with more questions than conclusions. No one—not the professors, not the academy, not even you—can confidently answer the simplest question.
What are you?
Perhaps the strangest part is that, despite all the uncertainty surrounding your existence… You’ve never once felt out of place. After all… As far as you can remember—
You’ve always been here.
(I thought choosing you as either human or a ghoul would just simply... too normal. So I made your background an unknown entity who slowly forming its own consciousness and taking place in daily life without anyone, even yourself, knowing it into Darkwick)
POWER .✦ ݁˖
Mnemonic; You can temporarily cause a person to overlook a single thing they are already aware of.
You can’t erase or change reality. Instead, it interferes with how the mind processes what it perceives. The chosen target still exists exactly as it should, but for a brief moment, the person’s brain simply stops acknowledging it.
You could cause someone to overlook the pain from an injury, the sound of approaching footsteps, the fear they feel, or even the person standing directly in front of them. They can still see, hear, or experience it, but their minds fail to recognize its significance, leading them to unconsciously ignore it.
The more abstract or mentally demanding the concept is, the shorter the effect lasts and the greater the strain it places on you. You also cannot affect something the target hasn’t already perceived. If they never noticed it to begin with, there’s nothing for your stigma to make them overlook.
Special Artifact: Bookmark.
When placed inside an object or touching a person, it acts as an anchor against your innate nature, making it significantly harder for reality—or your own power—to “omit” them. It’s most commonly used to stabilize allies who are affected by prolonged use of your abilities.
(Since you're not a ghoul or anything beyond what a human could comprehend, your power isn't bound by any rules they set or know. It's purely and uniquely yours. But since you don't want to be different, you adjust and make it look like just another stigma ghouls usually have. And yes, I accidentally found out this term when I was looking for your power, a little different in meaning, but I twist it either way :P)
ROMANTIC MATCH .✦ ݁˖
Rui Mizuki
You first became acquainted through Obscuary’s bar. What started as a place to quietly read or escape the noise of campus slowly became somewhere you found yourself returning to more often than you realized. Rui never questioned why you came so frequently. Whether you wanted silence or conversation, he seemed to know which one you needed before you said a word.
Rui was one of the few people who never seemed bothered by the way you observed others. While most students eventually grew self-conscious after realizing you were quietly analyzing them, Rui simply found it amusing. More than once, he’d catch you studying someone’s behavior from across the room and ask, “Well? Have you figured them out yet?” before listening with genuine interest to whatever conclusion you reached.
Your conversations rarely begin with small talk. They usually start with something oddly specific instead—books, psychology, poetry, personality theory, or a character one of you happened to be thinking about. Hours have passed without either of you noticing, simply because one topic naturally led to another.
You tend to ramble whenever you’re excited about something, and Rui never interrupts you. Even during the busiest evenings at the bar, he’ll continue preparing drinks while quietly listening, occasionally asking thoughtful questions that encourage you to keep going rather than changing the subject. He remembers details from conversations you barely recall having, often bringing them up weeks later.
Acts of service come naturally to him. If he notices you’ve been buried in books for too long, a cup of fruit tea and something to eat somehow appear beside you before you even realize you’re hungry. If you’ve had a particularly exhausting day, he’ll gently steer you toward one of the bar's quieter corners without making it obvious he’s worried.
Rui understands that you sometimes need time alone with your thoughts. He never mistakes your silence for distance or assumes something is wrong simply because you aren’t talking. Likewise, you’ve learned to recognize the moments when his smile is more for everyone else’s comfort than his own. Neither of you feels pressured to explain every emotion immediately.
Rui rarely plans dates in advance. Instead, he simply invites you to stay after closing time. He’ll brew a pot of fruit tea, set out a small dessert he experimented with that day, and the two of you end up talking until the candles burn low. Before either of you realizes it, the sky outside has begun to lighten, and you’ve spent the entire night together without ever leaving Obscuary.
Rui quickly learns that gifts are one of the ways you express affection. He treasures every bookmark, trinket, blind box figure, or small object you give him, no matter how inexpensive it is. In return, he develops a habit of bringing you little things that remind him of you during the day—a new blend of fruit tea, a book he thinks you’ll like, or a flower tucked between the pages of something you’re reading.
You’re one of the few people Rui willingly talks about himself with. He has a habit of listening far more than he speaks, but with you the conversations become balanced. Your curiosity encourages him to open up little by little, and over time he finds himself sharing stories and thoughts he'd normally keep to himself.
Although neither of you is particularly fond of public displays of affection, your relationship isn’t a secret. It simply isn’t announced. Most people realize you’re together because of the small, unconscious habits you’ve developed—Rui saving the seat beside him before you arrive, setting aside your favorite drink without asking, or instinctively looking for you whenever something catches his attention.
YOUR TROPE .✦ ݁˖
I feel like the trope defining the two of you isn't just a single one; rather, it's a combination of several tropes that capture the dynamic.
It starts as a Friends-to-Lovers trope.
Neither of you went into the friendship expecting anything more, but spending so much time together slowly turned being around each other into a habit neither of you wanted to break.
From there, it naturally became a Slow Burn.
There was never one life-changing moment or dramatic confession that made everything click. Instead, your feelings grew through countless quiet conversations, shared routines, and all the little moments that slowly became irreplaceable.
The funniest part, though, is that despite how well the two of you understand each other, your relationship is held together by Mutual Pining.
Rui convinced himself you simply enjoyed the atmosphere at Obscuary, while you kept telling yourself Rui was only being kind because that’s just who he is. Meanwhile, everyone around you had already figured it out.
WHO'S YOUR BFF??? .✦ ݁˖
(This one's pretty hard since I need to analyze 24 ghoul over and over again since I can't just choose one so I settle with them T_T)
Haku Kusanagi ⭑.ᐟ
You somehow became Haku’s designated discussion partner without either of you realizing it. It usually starts with one innocent question before the two of you disappear for hours talking about folklore, psychology, books, or whatever fictional character you’re currently overanalyzing. Haku never makes you feel like you’re talking too much. If anything, he’ll ask another question just to hear where your train of thought goes next. He’s one of the few people who can actually keep up with you, and somehow the conversation always ends with both of you questioning your own conclusions.
Towa Otonashi ⭑.ᐟ
You still don’t understand how you and Towa became such good friends. Logically speaking, it shouldn’t work. You spend way too much time trying to figure out why people do the things they do, while Towa just... does them. Somehow, that makes him one of your favorite people to be around. You can ask him the most random questions imaginable, and he’ll answer every single one with complete sincerity. You keep saying you’re “studying” him. Towa insists you’re just hanging out.
Shohei Haizono ⭑.ᐟ
If you ever complain about not getting enough work done, Sho is probably the reason why. He has an almost supernatural ability to find you the moment you’ve settled down with a book or started writing, immediately deciding that whatever he’s doing is now your problem too. You complain every single time. You also end up following him every single time. Somehow, Sho always knows when you’ve been stuck inside your own head for too long, even if he acts like he just wanted someone to bother.
YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH OTHERS .✦ ݁˖
Taiga Hoshibami ⭑.ᐟ
Taiga has absolutely no concept of personal space where you’re concerned. The first few times he threw an arm around your shoulders or casually pulled you onto his lap, you froze long enough for him to realize getting a reaction out of you was incredibly entertaining. Unfortunately for you, that only encouraged him. He loves teasing you just to watch your deadpan expression somehow become even more deadpan. Despite all the flirting and shameless affection, Taiga knows when to stop. If you genuinely look uncomfortable, he'll back off without making a big deal out of it. You're one of the few people he enjoys bothering simply because your reactions are subtle enough that everyone else misses them.
Leo Kurosagi ⭑.ᐟ
You and Leo have an unspoken understanding to never trust each other completely. Conversations between the two of you feel less like casual chats and more like carefully disguised games where you’re both trying to figure out what the other is actually thinking. Leo finds your habit of figuring people’s nature is amusing, especially when you try it on him. You insist he’s impossible to read. He insists you’ve almost figured him out a few times. Neither of you has ever admitted who won, and neither of you trusts the other completely.
Elias Pratt ⭑.ᐟ
There’s an odd sense of familiarity between the two of you that neither of you can really explain. Elias never asks what you are, only whether you’re doing alright and keeping an odd, comfortable distance from you. You and Elias don't really need long conversations to understand each other. Most of the time, it's enough to sit in the same room doing your own thing. Whenever the questions surrounding your existence start becoming overwhelming, Elias has a habit of reminding you that not having every answer doesn’t make your life any less real.
Yuri Isami ⭑.ᐟ
Yuri frequently asks you to help review psychological observations or anomaly reports because, despite refusing to admit it outright, he values your perspective more than most. Neither of you has figured out how conversations with the other stay civil for so long, considering they usually involve arguing over psychology, anomalies, or whatever research Yuri is obsessing over that week. If someone overhears the two of you, they’d probably think you're about to start a fight. You’re not. This is just how the two of you talk. The closest Yuri has ever come to saying “good job” is muttering “…that’s actually useful.”
Romeo Lucci ⭑.ᐟ
Romeo swears you enjoy showing up to the casino just to make his life harder. You swear you’re just like watching the activity in the Casino, and what’s people doing here. He doesn’t believe you for a second. Every time he catches you quietly watching everyone from the corner of the room, he’ll point at you and ask who you’re trying to figure out now. The worst part—for him—is that you’re usually right. He’ll complain the whole time, tell you that your presence is bringing no profit to the casino, then immediately ask what you noticed about the guy sitting three tables over. Neither of you will admit it, but you’ve become each other’s favorite person to argue with.
While im still on my final term and mismatch series in on progress, could any of you explain obey me lore to me?
I didn't really understand how it works when belphie kills us in chapter 16, i think??, and after that voila! We came back to life by barbatos power???? I don't know, i don't play that far. Please can anyone kindly explain to me how that works.
─ The next part would be my favorite, so I lost control a bit in here (3.6k words). And probably would be worse in the next part that I've been waiting to write since I started this series ( 〃● ₃● ) ~
─ Ooooh, finally the other pov!!!!! (and I'm on my final term, so yeah... I don't know when I will have time to write the next part. Please be patient, my dear) <3
"I should just obliviate all of them." The words exploded out of her before either of them could stop her.
Actually, that wasn't entirely true.
One of them tried. "No."
"Absolutely not."
"I wasn't asking." She was already moving.
By this point, she was fairly certain she had earned at least one magical breakdown. Maybe two. Possibly three.
Her patience had been stretched, folded, stomped on, set on fire, and then somehow expected to continue functioning normally afterward. Every day brought another conversation she wasn't prepared for, another person noticing something was wrong, another situation she had to navigate while pretending to be somebody she had never met.
And somehow everyone kept expecting answers. Expecting reactions. Expecting her to know things.
Do things. Be things.
At this point, she was honestly considering whether wiping a few memories counted as self-defense.
"That's not self-defense!" one of them snapped.
"I didn't say it out loud."
"You absolutely did."
"...Oh."
That explained why both of them looked alarmed. Unfortunately, their concern arrived approximately ten seconds too late.
Magic was already gathering beneath her skin.
A familiar warmth spread through her fingertips. Ancient syllables rose automatically to her tongue. The spell came easier than it should have. Which honestly felt like a warning sign.
A glowing circle began forming beneath her feet. "Wait, wait, wait—"
"Nope." She pointed accusingly at absolutely everything. "I'm done."
The circle expanded. Symbols ignited one after another. The air crackled. Both boys lunged simultaneously, one grabbed her left arm while the other immediately wrapped both hands around her shoulders.
"Stop casting."
"No."
Lucas tightened his grip on her arm "MC."
"I'm serious."
"So are we."
The spell circle flared brighter.
Kaito immediately looked like he was on the verge of collapsing under the weight of his own stress. "This is a terrible idea!"
"Do you have a better one?" she shot back
"Yes! Literally anything else!"
"Wonderful. Let me know when you think of it."
The argument would've sounded more convincing if she hadn't continued chanting through it. Magic pulsed, the circle brightened.
"She's serious!"
"Of course she's serious!"
"Why is she serious?!" Kaito went rigid so fast it looked like his soul had tried to evacuate the premises while clinging to her shoulders.
"I don't know!"
"Maybe because I'm losing my mind!" she shot back. "Has that possibility occurred to either of you? Because it feels pretty relevant right now!"
She tried lifting her hand, Kaito immediately shoved it back down. She tried continuing the incantation, a hand clamped over her mouth.
"Mmph!"
"No."
"Mmph!"
"No."
"MMPH!"
"Still no."
The three of them nearly toppled sideways. For one brief, ridiculous moment it looked less like a magical intervention and more like three students collectively losing a fight against gravity.
The spell circle flickered. Then brightened again.
"Oh, come on!" she shouted the moment her mouth was free. "Do you have any idea how exhausting this is?!"
The words escaped sharper than intended. Not angry, not really. Just tired, so unbelievably tired. The frustration had been building for days.
Every suspicious look. Every strange conversation. Every moment spent wondering whether somebody had noticed. Every moment spent wondering whether she'd made a mistake. Every moment spent missing people she couldn't contact.
Missing home. Missing certainty. Missing the ability to simply exist without calculating every sentence before she spoke it.
The magic wavered.
For a second her voice cracked. The two holding her immediately went quiet. Which was unfortunate, because silence gave her room to continue.
"So yes," she said, lifting a trembling hand. "I think wiping a few memories is actually a very reasonable response."
For a second her voice cracked. The two holding her immediately went quiet. Which was unfortunate, because silence gave her room to continue.
"So tell me," she said, lifting one hand despite the fact that both of them immediately tried pushing it back down again, "what exactly is the better solution here?"
Neither answered.
"Because from where I'm standing, I've spent days pretending to be someone I'm not, getting interrogated by people I walk on eggshells around, and every morning I wake up wondering whether today's the day this entire disaster finally explodes."
Her fingers twitched. Light flickered across the half-finished spell circle.
"I'm tired."
The admission came out smaller than everything else.
"I'm tired of watching every word that comes out of my mouth. I'm tired of guessing who knows what. I'm tired of feeling like one wrong answer is going to get all of us caught."
For a brief moment, neither of them spoke.
"We know," Lucas said quietly.
"No, you don't." The response arrived immediately. "You really don't."
Because they couldn't.
They had their dorms. Their friends. Their classes. Their lives.
She had none of that.
She had a borrowed face, a growing list of mistakes, and absolutely no idea how to get home. The thought made something inside her snap.
"Honestly, at this point I'd settle for making everyone forget the last two weeks ever happened."
"No." The answer came so fast it was almost impressive. "Because it's a terrible idea."
"It's an excellent idea."
"It is objectively not."
"It solves at least three of my problems."
"It creates about fifty more."
"That's future me's problem."
Kaito looked horrified. "You can't just decide future you can deal with magical crimes!"
"Why not? Future me already has terrible judgment. Look where she is."
For one awful second, Kaito looked like he actually considered the argument. Then his expression somehow became even more distressed.
The spell circle flared.
Both boys immediately reacted. "Oh no. She's doing it again."
"I'm not even doing anything!"
"MC."
"Maybe the spell is casting itself."
"Your magic could do that?!!!"
"Maybe??!"
"WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT LIKE IT HELPS?!"
The circle expanded another inch. And that was precisely when a voice spoke from behind them.
"I don't think that's a very good idea."
Everything stopped, instantly. The spell. The shouting. The struggling. Even the air seemed to still for a moment.
All three of them turned around at once.
For one disorienting second, she genuinely thought she had imagined it.
Because there was absolutely no reason for him to be here.
The narrow space behind the school building wasn't exactly a popular gathering spot. Most students didn't even bother walking through this section of campus unless they had a specific reason. It was quiet, tucked away, and far enough from the main paths that conversations could remain private.
Which was precisely why they used it. And yet there he was.
Standing a few feet away as though he'd always been there. As though finding three students wrestling over an active spell circle was the most ordinary thing he'd seen all day.
"...Edward?" Kaito's voice came out an octave higher than normal.
The spell circle beneath her feet finally sputtered out.
Not because she'd dismissed it. Because surprise had completely knocked the concentration out of her.
Edward looked exactly the same as always. Relaxed posture, sleepy smile.
The kind of expression that made him seem perpetually half-asleep, as though existence itself required more energy than he was willing to spend. Which was precisely the problem.
Because Edward never came here.
Obscuary's vice-captain practically lived inside his dorm. If he wasn't asleep, he was usually trying to become asleep. The amount of effort required to get him moving from one location to another was apparently significant enough that Rui and Lyca always complained about it.
Yet somehow he was here.
Standing in the exact place where they'd been discussing her situation for days.
Her stomach dropped.
Lucas moved immediately. A subtle shift that placed himself slightly between Edward and her. The motion was so natural most people would've missed it.
She didn't. Apparently Edward didn't either.
His eyes flickered briefly toward Lucas before returning to her. Still smiling, still calm. Still entirely unreadable.
"Edward?" Lucas's smile appeared a little too quickly. "Well, that's unexpected. Though I must admit, you've chosen a rather curious moment to appear and say a rather ominous thing when all we're doing is having a conversation."
Edward blinked once. Then tilted his head slightly, as though genuinely considering the statement. "Did I?"
The question sounded innocent enough.
Lucas let out a quiet laugh, masking the tension quietly settling beneath it. "I suppose that depends entirely on what you meant."
"Hm." Edward considered that for a moment, looking for all the world like someone trying to decide whether continuing the conversation was worth the effort.
Beside her, Kaito looked like he wanted to throw himself into the nearest grave and remain there permanently. She wasn't doing much better.
Eventually, Edward's gaze drifted downward toward the fading traces of the spell circle etched across the ground. His attention lingered there for a second before shifting to the place she'd been standing moments earlier.
Then his eyes returned to her.
"Oh." The sound escaped him quietly. Almost sounds like absentmindedly. "I thought we weren't pretending anymore."
The words settled over the group like a stone sinking into still water. Nobody spoke.
For one horrible second, she genuinely wasn't sure whether she'd heard him correctly. The smile on Lucas's face remained exactly where it was, it simply became very, very still.
Edward seemed to notice the silence only after it had stretched for several seconds. His gaze moved between them with mild curiosity, as though he couldn't quite understand why everyone suddenly looked so alarmed.
Then his attention returned to her. "Guess we are."
The words should have been harmless. Instead, the temperature seemed to drop all at once. His posture remained relaxed, his expression gentle, yet something in his eyes made every instinct she possessed flare into alarm.
It was like standing beneath deep water and realizing, too late, that something enormous had been watching from the dark long before she'd noticed it.
Edward let out a small sigh, as though the realization had only just become mildly inconvenient. "You don't have to keep hiding it from me."
His voice stayed gentle, matter-of-fact, the sort of tone someone might use while mentioning that it was about to rain.
"Because I already know she's not MC."
Her stomach dropped. For one horrible second, she could only stare at him. Edward, meanwhile, looked mildly inconvenienced by the entire conversation.
The contrast was so absurd that it almost made her question whether she'd heard him correctly.
It felt like Edward had glanced at the situation once, arrived at the answer almost immediately, and then simply never bothered mentioning it because it hadn't seemed important enough to interrupt his nap schedule.
Kaito stared at him like he was trying to determine whether this conversation was actually happening or whether stress had finally caused a complete break from reality.
"...Wait." His voice came out strained. "You've known?"
Edward blinked slowly. "Hm?"
"This." Kaito gestured vaguely between her, Lucas, himself, the extinguished now non-existent spell circle, and apparently the collapse of his mental stability. "All of this."
A small flicker of understanding crossed Edward's face.
"Oh." The sound was almost embarrassingly casual. "Yeah."
The answer landed with enough force that Kaito physically recoiled. She couldn't even blame him. What was she supposed to do with that response?
Edward had just admitted to knowing one of the biggest secrets currently tying the three of them into knots, and yet he sounded like someone confirming he'd seen rain in the forecast. Across from him, Lucas remained remarkably composed.
Edward, meanwhile, seemed completely unaware that he'd just detonated what remained of the group's emotional equilibrium. Or maybe he was aware and simply didn't consider it important enough to comment on.
The casual response nearly gave her emotional whiplash.
Because how was he acting normal right now?
How was any of this normal?
He had just admitted to knowing one of the biggest secrets currently circulating between exactly three people. Four now, apparently. A secret that had been responsible for most of her recent anxiety, several near-heart attacks, and at least one ongoing magical breakdown.
And yet Edward looked like someone discussing the weather.
The discrepancy was honestly impressive.
"Edward," he said after a moment, his tone remaining pleasant through what was undoubtedly an extraordinary act of self-restraint, "while I appreciate your remarkable ability to introduce alarming information with complete composure, I believe there are several details that would benefit from clarification."
Edward considered that, then nodded. "Probably."
The answer did not inspire confidence. Lucas's smile strained almost imperceptibly. Kaito looked ready to passed out in the spot. She was beginning to sympathize this two ghouls who clearly care too much about their MC.
"How long?" Lucas asked.
Edward looked thoughtful, more because he seemed to be trying to remember than because the question itself was difficult. "A while."
"A while isn't a timeframe."
"Hm..." Edward glanced upward. "I guess since the beginning?"
The world collectively got worse.
Since the beginning.
Not recently. Not after she slipped up. Not after she made a mistake. The beginning. The realization hit with enough force that she almost forgot to breathe.
All those days spent worrying about every misplaced reaction, every accidental slip, every conversation that felt slightly wrong, and Edward had apparently looked at the situation once, arrived at the correct answer immediately, and then simply... kept it to himself.
Because apparently that was a thing people could do. Or perhaps it was simply a thing Edward could do.
His gaze shifted toward her and, for the first time since the conversation started, some of the amusement faded from his expression.
"You don't have to look so worried." The statement should not have been reassuring but somehow, it was. "You're actually lucky."
"What?"
"Because it was me." Edward yawned, covering his mouth with one hand before continuing. "If it had been someone else, things probably would've gotten complicated already."
His gaze drifted briefly toward her. This time there was no coldness in it, only concern, a genuine one.
Kaito shifted beside her, looking as though he had been wrestling with the urge to speak for several seconds already, and then finally blurted, "Edward-san... if there's anything you can do about this, or if you can help with—"
"Not really," he cut in to admit it, looking genuinely apologetic. "I can tell something's wrong, but I don't know enough about what actually happened to fix it."
The atmosphere immediately grew heavier. Because that was the problem, wasn't it? Nobody knew enough.
Every theory led nowhere.
Every attempt ended in more questions.
Every day passed without answers.
Edward looked at her for another moment before his expression softened slightly. "But you need to figure it out soon."
The words landed harder than everything else he'd said. There was no joking hidden underneath it. No teasing. No casual indifference. Just quiet certainty.
Edward lowered his gaze briefly, as though searching for the right words. "Your soul doesn't feel right."
Nobody moved, and nobody spoke, because the weight of what Edward had just said seemed to settle over all of them at once, even dragging Kaito out of his panic long enough to stare at him in stunned silence.
Edward, meanwhile, frowned slightly, the expression so small and so thoughtful that it almost looked like he had just noticed something unpleasant rather than alarming.
"The longer you're here, the more unstable it feels. I can't really explain it properly, but…" He hesitated before continuing. "I don't think this is only affecting you anymore."
The words settled heavily over the small group. Nobody spoke, nobody even seemed entirely sure how to respond to that.
For days, all of their attention had been focused on one problem. One missing person. One impossible situation. The assumption had always been that the danger belonged to the person trapped in the wrong world.
The possibility that it might be affecting both of them had somehow never been discussed aloud.
"I don't know enough to tell you what's happening," Edward rubbed the back of his neck. "But souls aren't supposed to be in places they don't belong for this long. Especially not if there's another soul occupying the space they're supposed to return to."
A cold sensation crawled down her spine. Lucas's expression grew noticeably more serious. Kaito’s expression tightened. Edward glanced between them before continuing.
"If I'm wrong, then great. I'd actually be pretty happy about that." His smile returned briefly, though it lacked most of its usual laziness. "But if I'm not..."
He didn't finish. He didn't need to. The unfinished thought hung there anyway.
If he wasn't wrong, then every day they spent without a solution wasn't simply delaying a reunion. It was making the situation worse.
For everyone.
She lowered her gaze toward the ground. For one fleeting moment, a familiar thought surfaced again.
The brothers.
If she could just contact one of them. Even one.
Mammon would probably charge into the problem headfirst without thinking. Lucifer would somehow force an answer out of reality itself. Barbatos might actually understand what was happening.
Any of them would be better than sitting here blindly guessing.
But the thought died almost as quickly as it appeared. Because no matter how hard she reached, her magic kept slipping just short of them, close enough to feel like she was standing a single step away from contact and yet still trapped behind something she couldn't break through.
And if they tried crossing dimensions themselves... The consequences could be catastrophic.
No.
As tempting as it was, she couldn't take that risk. Not yet. Not when she still didn't understand what had caused any of this. Not when she could potentially make it worse.
Mammon,
She thought desperately, the name rising inside her chest before she could stop it, as if saying it quietly enough might somehow carry across whatever impossible distance had been forced between them.
.
.
.
A faint pulse.
A familiar feeling. It lasted less than a second. The sensation brushed away before vanishing again.
Mammon stopped mid-sentence. "...Huh?"
Several pairs of eyes immediately landed on him.
The living room of Purgatory Hall had become significantly louder over the last few days, mostly because seven demon brothers had collectively decided that being denied access to their human was unacceptable.
Mammon frowned.
For a moment he could have sworn he'd felt something. Something familiar. Like hearing a voice through a wall before it disappeared. The sensation was gone before he could grab hold of it.
"What?" Satan asked.
Mammon blinked. "Nothin'."
Lucifer's eyes narrowed slightly. Mammon ignored him. Whatever it had been, it was already gone. And honestly, he had bigger problems.
Namely the sorcerer currently responsible for every bad mood in the room.
"Quit changin' the subject!" Mammon pointed dramatically across the room. "Give MC back already!"
"Must you phrase it like I kidnapped them?" Solomon asked.
"You DID kidnap 'em!"
"I really didn't."
"Ya absolutely did!"
Around him, the others immediately joined in. The argument restarted with alarming speed.
Leviathan was complaining.
Asmodeus was offended.
Beelzebub looked worried.
Belphegor looked annoyed.
Lucifer was somehow managing to sound calm while being visibly one inconvenience away from homicide.
Meanwhile, standing near the doorway, Simeon offered the group a patient smile while continuing his increasingly impressive effort to redirect the conversation away from several extremely important questions.
Questions that would become very difficult to answer if the brothers discovered what Solomon had actually been hiding.
A few minutes later, Solomon quietly slipped away. The noise of the argument faded as he walked deeper into Purgatory Hall. When he finally stepped into the room he'd been using as a temporary hiding place, his expression immediately softened.
The girl sitting on the edge of the bed looked up the moment he entered. Her shoulders had been tense before. They became even tenser now.
"Still arguing?"
He nodded. The answer didn't surprise her anymore. It would've been more surprising if they weren't arguing.
"The distraction is working for now," he said as he closed the door behind him. "Simeon deserves a medal."
A small smile tugged briefly at her mouth before disappearing again. He crossed the room before sitting beside her.
For a moment neither of them spoke.
Then Solomon leaned back slightly and stared at the ceiling. "You know," he said eventually, "we can't keep doing this forever."
Beside him, she went completely still.
Her fingers tightened around the fabric of his sleeve almost immediately. The girl lowered her head. And for the first time all day, she couldn't think of a single argument against what he'd said.
Because he was right.
Sooner or later, somebody was going to find out. Sooner or later, the truth would stop fitting inside the spaces they'd created to hide it.
And when that happened, neither of them knew what came next.
The thought settled heavily inside her chest. Without realizing it, she moved closer. Not because she expected Solomon to magically solve everything, but because ever since she had arrived in this impossible situation, he had been the only person who understood how terrifying it was.
The only person who had known from the beginning. The only person who had stayed. The one who's been helping her since she's been swapped.
The only one who knows she's not where she supposed to be
Solomon glanced down as her hand tightened slightly around his sleeve. He didn't comment on it. He simply rested a hand lightly on her head. And for the first time since the conversation began, neither of them said anything at all.
Outside, distant voices continued echoing through Purgatory Hall. Inside, the silence felt much heavier.
And neither of them could shake the feeling that time was beginning to run out.
⊹ ࣪ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ࣪ ˖ .fin
Early warning: Tbh, I'm still not finished with all the episodes up to the latest update, so I actually have little information to go on while making this (please forgive me if there's any OOC; have mercy).
Word count: 3.620
For anyone, if you see me post something before right after my Mismatch series....
NO YOU DID NOT
you didn't see anything, nothing. okay?!!!! swear to me!!!!!
I accidentally posted my draft, which is still half-finished, and some of my attachments and notes. I'm half asleep, okay? I didn't even realize it until someone's comment notif pop out. Somebody dug my hole please....
A wild idea that I write in 4 am. I imagine a scenario where we have a kind of deranged MC type.
Somewhere far away...
.
.
.
You work as a historical linguist and are studying a foreign language in an old book that you found years ago. finally you can decipher it but, what a shame, it turns out that the book is just a diary from someone who knows where. not wanting to waste all your hard work, you try to read it.
entry 3 :
Leo called me useless today. I don't think he meant to be cruel. That's just his nature and he's pissed cause I'm not helping much on the mission.
The strange thing is that it didn't hurt as much as I expected.
Maybe because I already knew.
You: Well, that's depressing.
I don't even know you and I'm already concerned. And this is just the first page I randomly opened.
entry 7:
Professor Hyde told me I should stop apologizing so much. I apologized for that too.
The investigation went well. Nobody died.
I think that's enough to call today a good day.
You: ...Huh?
"Nobody died" wasn't supposed to be the standard for a good day.
What kind of life was she living?
entry 12:
I forgot what day it was.
I think I've been counting time by investigations instead.
Maybe that's why the deadline the curse gave me doesn't feel as close as it should.
You: ...Excuse me?!!!
You can't just casually mention a curse with a deadline and then end the entry there!!!
You kept flipping through the diary.
Not because you understood any of it. Investigations, curses, strange names—it all sounded ridiculous.
But the girl writing it didn't.
You only meant to skim. A few words here, a few sentences there. Yet every page seemed to leave behind another small reason to worry.
A sleepless night.
An injury she brushed off.
A fear she never fully admitted.
The more pages you skipped through, the more she felt real. Tired. Lonely. Trying very hard to be okay. Before you realized it, you weren't looking for answers anymore.
You were looking for proof that things got better for her.
Then you reached the last page. And you froze.
Aww... bummer. You actually opened this page.
That means one of two things.
Either you're heartless enough to skip straight to the end. Or you didn't care enough to read everything.
Honestly? I'm not sure which one is worse.
I put more effort into this diary than I'd like to admit. Every miserable detail. Every embarrassing confession. Every little thing meant to make a stranger feel sorry for me.
And since you're reading this page, you made it all the way through. Which means one thing.
The spell never took hold.
Oh, right. I should probably explain that.
There's a little soul-swapping spell attached to this diary. Nothing too complicated. It just uses sympathy as fuel. The more you pity me, the stronger it gets.
The idea was that, by the time you reached the end, you'd care enough for it to swap our places.
A Pity. Looks like you didn't.
Honestly, good for you. I mean, if I were you, I wouldn't want to trade places with me either.
It's just that I'm, let's say, not in a stable mind when I'm making this gamble and making this diary, lol. Anyway...
Congratulations on being emotionally unavailable, I guess.
It probably saved your life.
You: ........... *sweating a bucket*
...
...
...
Is this girl even sane right now?
⊹ ࣪ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ࣪ ˖ .fin
I don't even know how i could think of this, I'm on the toilet and voila!!! How about we make this?
That one place strangely makes the most absurd or great idea, i swear 😭
Hey so ur mismatch fic forced me to redowland obey me again to remember the plot(and the way u described how om!mc missed 'em😭) so i hope ur gonna take responsobility for writing that good😤(or is short: hi u write very good great job🤗💗)
*gasp* =͟͟͞͞(꒪ᗜ꒪ ‧̣̥̇)
*proceeded to run away from the responsibility*
Lmao, jk. I'm glad you took a liking to my fics. Thank you, hope you're staying for my next writing
For those I've already replied to, to add you to my taglist in your direct reply box, please contact me again. I lost all my notes, and now I can't find you. T_T
I'm really sorry (btw, part 5 of Mismatch is being half done :D )
I found this one in tiktok that decodes what kyklos says in the train, im not gonna be excited or overthinking alone. Like, oh my god!!!! Another twist?!!! This makes me have SO MANY ideas for fic 😭 helpppp
You guys must watch it in @/writhorfic !!!
Here's the link
(If this is not allowed regarding credit or anything else, i'll delete it if you guys warn me, tyy)
─ Yesssss, another post not long after the previous one. I'm too sleep-deprived now, any error, mistakes, or inconsistency (you name it) would probably be edited after I have enough sleep. goodnight!!
─ Today's fic: OM! MC still tries to blend in to Darkwick without anyone noticing, but it seems very hard, and no one wants to really point it out directly to her, which makes her more agitated in fear and anxiety. And what's worse than that? Leo
─ Taglist; @gulaaren-123 (please dm me to be added or removed, ty)
Unlike most people she'd met at Darkwick, Leo gave her the distinct impression that noticing things wasn't a skill.
It was a hobby. A hobby he enjoyed far too much.
"Interesting?" she repeated carefully.
Leo smiled. Immediately, her level of concern doubled. "You looked startled."
"I almost walked into you."
"You almost did something else too."
Oh no. Her heartbeat immediately sped up.
Not visibly. Years of surviving Lucifer's scrutiny had trained that out of her. Internally, however, every alarm she possessed began activating simultaneously.
Did he notice? No. Impossible.
The spell hadn't even formed. The magic barely manifested. Nobody should have sensed anything, especially not someone from this world.
Right?
Unfortunately, confidence became difficult to maintain when Leo continued staring at her like she'd just become the most interesting thing he'd seen all day.
Which, given this was Leo, wasn't reassuring.
She folded her arms. Mostly because it gave her something to do. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Hm." That single syllable somehow communicated complete disbelief.
Wonderful. Absolutely wonderful.
The conversation had existed for less than a minute, and she already wanted to leave. Unfortunately, Leo seemed perfectly content keeping her there, which she doesn't understand. Actually, now that she looked closer—
He seemed unusually cheerful.
This immediately made her suspicious because she didn't know Leo particularly well. What she did know came mostly from observation. And one conclusion had become abundantly clear.
Leo in a good mood was probably bad news for everyone else.
The same way Mammon smiles near expensive objects. Or Belphegor smiling near unsecured plans. Or Solomon smiling in general. Nothing good ever followed.
"...Why are you smiling?"
Leo blinked, then smiled wider. Mistake, that was a mistake. She should not have asked. "I didn't realize that bothered you."
"It concerns me."
Leo snickered, which somehow confirmed every concern she had. "Maybe I learned something interesting recently."
Her stomach tightened immediately. Not because of what he'd said, but because of who had said it.
Over the past week, she'd learned enough about Leo to understand that information wasn't something he merely collected. He enjoyed it. Pulled it apart. Examined it from different angles. Poked at it just to see what happened. The man treated secrets the way some people treated puzzles.
Which would normally be irritating. Right now it’s terrifying.
The panic arrived first. Logic followed several seconds later.
Because Leo's stigma existed.
And she knew that.
She knew enough about Dark Wick and the ghouls by now to understand that Leo wasn't simply observant. His stigma let him hear things ordinary people couldn't. Snippets. Fragments. Hidden details. Information people weren't supposed to know. Information like—
Her pulse jumped again. No. Stop.
The panic immediately started losing ground the moment she forced herself to remember.
Every conversation, the important one, the dangerous one. All of their conversation, actually. She'd been using concealment spells, Leo shouldn't have heard anything.
Nobody should have. Which meant she was panicking over nothing. Probably. Hopefully.
Leo continued watching her. The silence itself felt deliberate. Like he was waiting.
For what?
A flinch? A mistake? A confession?
The realization settled unpleasantly in her stomach. He was looking for a reaction.
"...Interesting?" she asked carefully.
"Alan came back in a terrible mood yesterday," Leo hummed, a very annoying noise. "Apparently, he'd gone all the way to Frostheim for something. Next thing I know, he's stomping around looking like he wants to punch a wall. I heard Jin was involved somehow."
Another baited hook. Which was exactly why she refused to react.
The mention of Jin had caught her attention. She knew it had. The memory of that argument she'd witnessed while following Lucas and Kaito surfaced immediately.
Jin looked angrier than she'd ever seen him. Tohma is looking equally unwilling to back down. At the time, she'd only caught fragments. Enough to understand they were fighting. Not enough to understand why.
Was that connected?
Her stomach sank. Leo was watching her again, watching far too closely. And suddenly she understood.
Oh. Oh, he was fishing.
The realization hit with enough force that she almost laughed. Not because it was funny, but because it was irritating.
The annoying part? It was working.
Because she genuinely wanted to know what happened between Jin and Tohma. Unfortunately, wanting to know and letting Leo know she wanted to know were two completely different things.
"That sounds unfortunate," she said.
"Hm." That was all he said. Just that single syllable. And somehow it was infuriating. "You know, I couldn't hear much."
His tone seemed to imply that it was bothering him, but the expression on his face didn't match his tone of voice. If anything, he seemed entertained. Which was exactly why she didn't trust it.
"I hate when my stigma cuts out at the interesting parts. And that Himbo was no help. Every time I asked, he got annoyed. Which is rude." For someone supposedly complaining about Alan's mood, Leo looked far too pleased with himself.
She stared at him. "You were literally trying to listen to something that wasn't your business."
"Exactly."
The answer came immediately. Without hesitation. Without shame. Without even a hint of self-awareness. She honestly didn't know why she expected otherwise.
Leo crossed his arms. "I was gathering information."
"That's called eavesdropping."
The problem was that Leo said it with the same tone somebody might use when explaining basic arithmetic. Completely unbothered.
As if the distinction between "gathering information" and "eavesdropping" existed only for people who enjoyed making life unnecessarily complicated.
For a moment, he looked genuinely confused by her objection, then he shrugged. "You know what, I think eavesdropping sounds cooler, actually."
Of course he did.
She should've known arguing with Leo was a waste of energy. The man would probably argue that gravity was optional if it annoyed enough people.
"You know," Leo continued, seemingly abandoning the topic entirely, "I was expecting something way more interesting."
Immediately suspicious, she narrowed her eyes. "About what?"
"You."
Every conversation involving Leo felt like accidentally stepping into a trap you couldn't see. The worst part was that half the time she wasn't even sure he knew where the trap was either.
He just enjoyed throwing things onto the floor and seeing what somebody stepped on.
"What about me?"
Leo hummed. A long, thoughtful sound.
The kind people make when deciding whether or not they should say something. Unfortunately, Leo had never seemed particularly burdened by such decisions.
"You've been weird lately."
Her heart dropped. There it is. The thing she'd been waiting for. The thing she'd been dreading. The thing that apparently every person in Darkwick had collectively decided to notice.
Fortunately, panic has become familiar territory recently. And familiar territory was easier to navigate.
"Everyone keeps saying that."
"See?" Leo pointed at her immediately. "That's weird."
"...What?"
"Normally you'd ask who."
The response came so fast she almost missed it.
Leo looked pleased. Like he'd found an unexpected piece while assembling a puzzle. She felt a flicker of alarm. Small. Sharp. Dangerous.
"You remember stuff like that?"
"NPC, I remember everything."
The nickname somehow sounded less insulting and more matter-of-fact when it came from him. Which honestly wasn't better. But considering Leo's personality, maybe that made sense.
The original MC had spent years helping everyone. Showing up whenever somebody needed something.
Fixing problems.
Running errands.
Supporting people.
Being available.
Being reliable.
Being there. Always there.
The role itself practically encouraged becoming part of the background.
The person everyone relied on. The person nobody really questioned. And she supposed from Leo's perspective—
Someone suddenly developing stronger opinions probably would seem strange. But the realization didn't make her feel better.
Leo leaned slightly against the wall.
Not blocking her path. Not trapping her. Yet somehow making it impossible to leave naturally.
"I mean, usually you'd ask."
"Ask what?"
" 'Who said that?' " His voice shifted slightly as he mimicked the conversation.
" 'When?' " Another gesture.
" 'What exactly did they say?' " Another.
" 'Why do they think that?' " He dropped his hand.
"You skipped all that." The smile returned. "You accepted it really fast."
For one horrifying second she wondered if she'd actually made a mistake. Then she stopped herself.
No.
Because the more she thought about it, the more obvious the pattern became. Leo wasn't presenting evidence. He was collecting reactions. The same thing he'd been doing since the conversation started.
He noticed something. He said it. Then watched.
If somebody reacted, great. If they didn't, he moved on and found something else.
She'd spent enough time around manipulative people to recognize when somebody was deliberately steering a conversation like this one.
Solomon did it. Asmodeus did it. Diavolo occasionally did it while pretending he wasn't.
Leo was doing it now.
The difference was that Leo wasn't trying to guide the conversation toward a specific conclusion.
He was watching. Testing.
Dropping pieces onto a board and seeing which ones made people react.
And suddenly she understood why he made her nervous.
Unlike people such as Romeo or Jin, who approached problems directly, Leo seemed to enjoy circling around them.
Leo tilted his head. "You could probably get replaced and nobody would notice."
She stared at him. "...Excuse me?"
"I'm serious." A little smirk tugged at his mouth, the kind that made her want to throw something at him. "If Sho suddenly closed his food truck because he got bored of it, everybody would notice."
She hesitated for a second. She wasn't entirely sure how to respond. "That may be a little concerning."
"Exactly." Leo pointed at her. "See? You're getting it."
She wasn't getting anything.
"You disappear for a week, people ask where you went."
A shrug.
"You disappear for a month, people get worried."
Another shrug.
"You get replaced by some weird clone?"
He paused.
"Honestly, I think half the school would still ask you for favors."
Her eye twitched, not because the comment was particularly cruel. Because it wasn't, and that was the problem.
Leo had managed to summarize months of the original MC's existence in a few careless sentences, reducing her to the person everyone called when they needed something.
God, she hated that.
Hated how casually everyone seemed to accept it. How normal it was for people to take and take and take, then act surprised whenever MC wasn't immediately available.
And the worst part? Leo wasn't even wrong.
Leo immediately perked up. "Oh, there it is."
"what is?"
Leo leaned back against the wall. "You never used to look annoyed when people said annoying things."
"I absolutely did."
"No."
The answer came immediately. Like he'd already decided she was wrong before she opened her mouth.
"You looked tired." The correction landed so casually she almost missed it. "You know how old phones look right before they die?"
"...What?"
"You had that vibe."
She blinked. "What does that even mean?"
"It means you looked like somebody running on a three percent battery." The grin returned. "And now you don't."
She hated that comparison.
"Actually, that's what was bothering me."
"Bothering you?"
"Yeah."
His gaze narrowed slightly. "You actually react now."
She frowned. "I reacted before."
"No." The answer came immediately. "You tolerated things before."
A finger lifted.
"You'd smile."
Another.
"Nod."
Another.
"Fix whatever disaster somebody dumped on you."
Another.
"Then disappear."
"Now you look annoyed, you actually push back" His grin widened slightly. "And honestly? It's way more interesting." He looked far too entertained.
Her stomach tightened. Immediately. Because he wasn't wrong. And because he sounded entirely too pleased about it.
Leo gestured vaguely between them. "The old you would've escaped this conversation ages ago."
That caught her off guard. "What?"
"You would've done the polite thing." A hand gesture.
"Smile."
Another.
"Then leave."
His eyes flicked over her face. "But you're still here."
The words weren't accusatory and that's the problem.
If Leo had been accusing her of something, she could've denied it. If he'd been suspicious, she could've laughed it off. If he'd been trying to prove something, she could've picked apart his logic.
But he wasn't doing any of that.
And every casual observation felt like another finger pressing against a bruise she was desperately trying to hide.
Her shoulders locked. Her pulse thudded unpleasantly against her ribs.
Don't react.
Don't react.
Don't—
"Huh." The sound left him suddenly.
Her pulse immediately spiked. "What?"
Leo blinked, then laughed. "Oh wow."
"What?!!"
"You did it again."
Her stomach dropped. "Did what?"
"That face."
"What face?"
"The one where you look like you're trying really hard not to panic."
"..."
"..."
Leo snorted. "There it is."
She hated him.
Leo pushed away from the wall. Still grinning. "You know..."
His voice turned thoughtful. Or at least Leo's version of thoughtful, which mostly sounded like trouble preparing itself.
"The old you was easier." The statement landed strangely. "The old you would've nodded by now. Way less fun, though."
Her stomach tightened.
"You make me sound boring."
"You were boring." The answer came immediately, without hesitation.
Leo grinned. "You were useful."
Somehow that felt even worse.
"You just showed up, solved problems, and disappeared."
That...
Actually sounded disturbingly accurate.
"You didn't argue."
Another point.
"You didn't roll your eyes."
Another.
"You definitely didn't look at me like you're doing right now."
His grin widened. "There it is."
She hated this conversation. She hated it so much. Mostly because she couldn't tell how much of it was nonsense and how much of it was genuine observation.
With Leo, those two things seemed to overlap far too often. Fortunately, she'd already reached her limit.
Lucas. She needed Lucas. Or Kaito. Either one.
Immediately.
Preferably before Leo decided to continue whatever bizarre social experiment he was currently conducting.
So she took a step backward. "I have somewhere to be."
"Frostheim?"
The answer came too fast. Her eyes narrowed immediately.
Leo looked delighted. "Wow."
"..."
"That was a really good reaction."
Damn it. Absolutely damn it.
He laughed again, like the conversation had confirmed something entertaining.
"You're impossible."
"I get that a lot." Leo looked pleased by the response.
Of course, he did. At this point, she was beginning to suspect he treated irritation as a form of positive reinforcement. It's only strengthened her desire to leave.
Preferably before he found another conversational landmine to throw in her direction.
A hand caught her wrist.
The movement happened so suddenly that her body reacted before her mind did. Her muscles tensed. Magic threatened to surge instinctively beneath her skin. For one dangerous second she nearly twisted free on reflex.
"Hey—!!" The word died halfway out.
Not because Leo was holding her particularly hard. Because he wasn't smiling anymore. Even the lazy, careless attitude that seemed permanently attached to him had disappeared.
Leo had leaned slightly closer, his fingers remained loosely wrapped around her wrist. "You know, if somebody ever does replace you..."
Her entire body went cold. For a second she genuinely forgot how to breathe.
"...tell them not to."
Silence.
Her pulse slammed against her ribs. The hallway seemed to disappear. Every sound. Every voice. Every movement.
Gone.
"What?"
She hated him.
Hated how often he stumbled dangerously close to things he shouldn't know. Hated how easily he kept holding on details that everyone else probably tried hard to miss. Hated how impossible it was to tell whether he was joking.
Because he couldn't know.
He couldn't. Nobody knew. Nobody was supposed to know.
Then why did it feel like he was staring directly at the secret lodged inside her chest?
"If somebody steals your spot, puts on your face, starts pretending to be you..." A small frown appeared, like the hypothetical itself offended him. "...they should give it back."
Her heart nearly stopped. "What the hell are you talking about?"
The question came out sharper than intended. Leo ignored it. Or maybe he simply didn't care. Both were equally possible.
His gaze remained fixed on her face. Then, finally, the corner of his mouth lifted. "Because if I find out somebody actually replaced you..." His voice softened. "...I'd find out what happened to you."
A pause.
The smile on his face didn't reach his eyes. "And if they're hiding you, I'd drag you back."
Another pause.
"If they're pretending to be you, I'd make them slip." His fingers tightened ever so slightly around her wrist. "And if they still refused to leave..."
The words came out almost thoughtful. "...I'd stop being nice about it."
Silence stretched between them.
"Actually, scratch that." His grin widened. "I don't think I'd be nice about it at all."
Something cold crawled down her spine.
The words should've sounded ridiculous. They should've sounded like another joke. Instead they sounded horrifyingly sincere.
Not because he knew anything.
Because he sounded like he'd already decided what he'd do if it happened.
The thought terrified her. Because Leo wasn't looking at her like somebody making a joke. He was looking at her like somebody imagining a scenario. And deciding he didn't like it.
Then suddenly he blinked.
The moment shattered. Just like that. The strange intensity vanished, his grin widened. And Leo was Leo again.
"Oh." He laughed. "There it is."
"What is wrong with you?!" The outburst escaped before she could stop it. Several students glanced in their direction.
Leo looked delighted. "See? This never gets boring with that face."
She yanked her wrist free immediately. "You're insane."
"I've heard that one before too." Leo shrugged, completely unconcerned.
Like the last thirty seconds hadn't happened. Like he hadn't just reached into her worst fear and squeezed. She couldn't tell whether he'd meant any of it. Couldn't tell whether he was joking. Couldn't tell whether he was guessing.
The uncertainty followed her even as she turned away. Fast.
Because for the first time since arriving in Darkwick, she wanted only one thing. Find Lucas. Find Kaito.
Immediately.
Before she had time to think about the fact that Leo had just described her exact nightmare without having any possible way of knowing it existed.
⊹ ࣪ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ࣪ ˖ .fin
Early warning: Tbh, I'm still not finished with all the episodes up to the latest update, so I actually have little information to go on while making this (please forgive me if there's any OOC; have mercy).
Word count: 3.034
─ The original script has 6,2k words, so yeah, off into two parts we go!!! I'm enjoying this too much. Yeah, probably would expand WAY MORE than I originally planned to.
─ Today's fic: OM! MC still tries to blend in to Darkwick without anyone noticing, but it seems very hard, and no one wants to really point it out directly to her, which makes her more agitated in fear and anxiety.
─ Taglist; @gulaaren-123 (please dm me to be added or removed, ty)
Not the loud, explosive kind she was used to back home.
No screaming brothers. No property damage. No Lucifer threatening someone's allowance while Mammon argued his innocence with increasing volume. It's just—
Constant movement.
The kind that never seemed to stop.
By the time lunch was over, she had helped move three crates of feed, helped clear a large grass field, and spent fifteen minutes holding a rabbit that looked like it had four eyes while Haru checked the bandage on its back leg.
The creature had tried to bite her exactly once. After that, it had decided her lap was acceptable.
Which, apparently, was normal.
"See? They like you." Haru sounded entirely too pleased about that fact.
Haru continued to examine the anomalous creatures roaming freely in the Jabberwock area, carefully inspecting their feeding grounds while continuing an uninterrupted conversation. She still couldn't understand how he managed to do it.
The man never stopped moving. Or talking.
Mostly talking.
It was actually impressive. The man could maintain a conversation almost entirely by himself. Not that she minded.
Compared to some of the conversations she'd been forced into over the past week, listening was significantly safer than talking. Talking required pretending. While listening mostly required just nodding.
"Oh, right! Ren skipped morning duties again."
Of course he did.
"And you let him be." Haru frowned as if her words had offended the Jabberwock's code of ethics, but he didn't try to deny it at all.
She was starting to suspect Haru enjoyed being overworked.
Nobody could possibly volunteer for this much responsibility otherwise.
The entire Jabberwock grounds felt less like a dorm and more like an ecosystem desperately pretending to be organized. Creatures wandered through designated areas.
"Ren says he's being oppressed."
"Is he?"
"Absolutely." The answer came immediately, and then Haru grinned. "By responsibility."
She almost laughed. Almost.
The last thing she needed was another person noticing she wasn't acting like their usual MC.
"Y'know..." He tilted his head. "You're kinda different lately."
Oh.
Oh, that's bad.
That is very, very bad.
For one horrifying second her mind immediately supplied every possible mistake she'd made during the past week.
Maybe she'd answered something wrong.
Maybe she'd forgotten something important.
Maybe she'd been acting completely unlike their MC this entire time and nobody had said anything yet because they were all waiting to compare notes before confronting her.
Internally, every alarm bell she possessed began ringing at once. Externally, she forced herself not to react.
Years of surviving Lucifer's interrogation face were finally paying off.
"Different how?" Her smile stayed perfectly intact.
"Mm..." Haru actually thought about it. Which somehow made it worse. "You still feel like you."
Not reassuring.
"But also not."
Not reassuring at all.
Her heartbeat sped up immediately. Keep smiling. Act normal.
Do not panic.
Do not panic.
Do not—
Haru laughed.
The sound immediately knocked several catastrophic scenarios out of her head.
"You know," he continued, crouching beside another creature that looked vaguely rabbit-shaped if someone had designed rabbits while actively misunderstanding how rabbits worked, "it's hard to explain."
She maintained a smile. Internally, she was preparing contingency plans. "I feel like there's a problem behind that."
"I mean it in a good way."
Somehow that was even worse.
Haru reached forward to adjust something on the creature's harness before continuing. "You've seemed lighter lately."
"...Lighter."
"Yeah."
That was not what she'd expected.
"You used to look tired all the time."
The statement caught her off guard enough that she nearly missed her next response.
"You still help everyone. Still show up when people ask. Still do all the same stuff." He smiled slightly. "But before, it felt like you were carrying something."
His hands moved absentmindedly through the creature's fur.
"Now it feels like you're breathing a little easier."
The words settled somewhere uncomfortable. Because he wasn't entirely wrong. Not for the reasons he thought. This body wasn't hers. This life wasn't hers. These people weren't hers.
But neither was the burden. The responsibilities. The expectations.
The invisible threads connecting this world's MC to seemingly half the student population of Darkwick. She was only carrying fragments of it. And even those fragments were exhausting.
For the original owner? It must have been overwhelming.
The realization sat strangely in her chest.
Before she could answer, movement caught her attention. Or rather, a stare. Her eyes shifted across the enclosure. And immediately met Towa's.
The ghoul wasn't particularly close.
Actually, he was far enough away that nobody should reasonably be paying attention to him.
Yet somehow she kept noticing him.
Or maybe it was because he kept noticing her.
Towa stood near one of the fences, partially obscured by the wooden structure beside him.
Watching. Not approaching. Just watching. His expression wasn't hostile. That would've been easier. Hostility she understood. Suspicion she understood. This felt different.
Like a dog that had caught a scent it couldn't identify.
The comparison immediately reminded her of something Kaito had said earlier in the week.
"Towa's kind of a liability."
At the time she'd assumed he meant dangerous. After meeting him?
She suspected Kaito meant something else because danger implied predictability. Towa felt unpredictable. And unpredictability was significantly worse.
Especially for someone currently pretending to be another person.
Her stomach tightened slightly. Does he notice something?
No. Impossible.
He couldn't know. Nobody knew. Lucas and Kaito only knew because they'd witnessed the swap happen. Everyone else should be seeing exactly what they expected to see.
The same face.
The same voice.
The same body. And yet—
Towa kept staring. Like he was waiting for something. Like he was trying to solve a puzzle.
A puzzle she very much did not want solved.
Thankfully, unlike several other people she'd met recently, Towa never actually approached.
For that alone she was grateful.
Because if there was one thing she'd learned from Kaito's increasingly concerned explanations, it was that Towa operating on instinct tended to create problems for everyone involved.
So if his version of suspicion involved remaining twenty feet away and silently staring?
She would happily accept that arrangement.
Unfortunately, Darkwick seemed fundamentally opposed to giving her nice things.
The moment she finally finished helping Haru and escaped what felt like her fifth unexpected responsibility of the afternoon, another problem immediately appeared.
Freedom sat only a few steps away. She could practically taste it. The plan was simple.
Find Lucas or Kaito. Preferably Lucas.
Lucas was difficult to deal with, but at least conversations with him usually involved information instead of surprises. Kaito, meanwhile, tended to bring surprises.
She had barely made it halfway across the grounds when a loud metallic groan echoed somewhere behind her.
Across the field, Haru stood near the large anomalous bus. Or rather—
He stood near a bus that appeared to be having some kind of emotional breakdown.
The massive vehicle shook violently. One side lifted several inches off the ground before slamming back down. Windows rattled. Something inside the engine made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a growl.
A growl. From a bus.
At this point she wasn't even surprised anymore.
She was beginning to suspect Darkwick had the same relationship with logic that Mammon had with financial responsibility.
Meaning none whatsoever.
"H-Hey, hey, calm down!" Haru sounded genuinely worried. The same way he'd sounded earlier while treating injured creatures.
The same way Luke used to sound whenever Cerberus sneezed. The comparison surfaced unexpectedly.
So did the memory.
For a brief moment she remembered kneeling beside Cerberus while all three heads tried demanding attention simultaneously. One head wanting food. One head wanting praise. One head wanting absolutely nothing except to start problems.
Honestly, the bus wasn't that different. The thought nearly made her laugh. Then the vehicle slammed against the fence again. Her amusement disappeared. Haru looked increasingly troubled.
And despite everything, she felt a small flicker of sympathy.
The poor guy was probably going to spend the next several hours trying to figure out what was wrong. Assuming the bus didn't eat anyone first.
She glanced around. Nobody was paying attention to her. Good. Very good. Because she was beginning to have an idea.
A stupid idea.
Which unfortunately didn't stop it from being an idea.
Her fingers shifted slightly against her sleeve. Magic had always felt different depending on who taught it.
The brothers' power felt overwhelming. Like standing beside a storm. Solomon's magic had always felt quieter. Less force and more control is needed to be more effective.
A whisper slipped past her lips.
Soft enough that nobody could hear it from where she stood. The words dissolved into the air before they fully formed.
Magic followed.
The same kind of calming spell she'd used countless times before on nervous magical creatures. A gentle nudge. Nothing more, yet the effect was immediate.
The bus stopped.
"...What?" The confusion in Haru's voice carried all the way across the grounds.
She immediately looked away.
Nope. Not her problem. Absolutely not her problem.
On his spot, Towa stood motionless. His gaze wasn't on the bus. It was on her. Even after the bus stopped, his attention never shifted. On the contrary, it became more focused. More intent.
Unlike Haru, his attention had shifted the moment she'd murmured the spell. Not because he'd heard the words, the distance made that impossible.
But he'd seen something.
The subtle movement of her hand. The timing. The way the bus had calmed almost immediately afterward. His brows slowly pulled together. A faint frown formed as he watched her retreating figure.
Yet strangely, he didn't move.
Didn't approach. Didn't call out. He simply remained where he was, standing beside the fence with his eyes fixed on her back. As if he couldn't quite decide what he'd seen—or what he intended to do about it.
Yet fortunately, she was already gone before anyone could act on it.
And for the first time since arriving in this world, a small amount of tension eased from her shoulders.
At least her magic still worked.
Which meant she wasn't completely helpless here. The thought was reassuring. Until she remembered she still had absolutely no idea how to get home.
Then it became significantly less reassuring.
Her next objective was finding either Lucas or Kaito. Preferably before another socially complicated situation found her first.
Naturally, fate interpreted that as a challenge.
"MC."
She stopped. Immediately suspicious. The voice belonged to someone she didn't recognize. Which automatically lowered her confidence in the next five minutes.
A student approached from the opposite path. Well-dressed. Confidence. The sort of confidence she'd started associating with people connected to Sinostra.
Which usually meant trouble.
"You need to come with me." The student didn't even hesitate. "Romeo is looking for you."
Of course he was. Of course. Why wouldn't he be?
At this point she was honestly surprised multiple dorms weren't scheduling appointments.
Something about the expression on her face must've slipped through because the student frowned slightly.
"You forgot?"
No. She absolutely had not forgotten.
The problem was she had no idea what she was supposedly remembering. Which was becoming an alarmingly common problem.
Several responses immediately came to mind.
Most of them involved leaving. One involved running. Another involved pretending she suddenly had class. Unfortunately, all of them collided with a very important realization.
Their MC probably wouldn't do that. And that was the issue.
Every interaction had become a balancing act. Not what she wanted to do but what their MC would do.
A distinction that grew more exhausting every day.
She suppressed a sigh. "...No problem."
The word physically hurts to say.
The student nodded immediately. "Good. Follow me."
Wonderful. Absolutely wonderful.
She changed direction and followed.
Internally, however, she was already preparing herself for whatever new form of nonsense awaited her inside Casino.
.
.
.
The trip to the Casino somehow managed to be exactly as unpleasant as she expected.
Which, considering her expectations had already been catastrophically low, felt almost impressive.
Students moving through the halls with the kind of confidence normally possessed by people who either owned several businesses or had successfully committed tax fraud.
Possibly both.
She was still trying to determine whether there was a difference.
The moment she arrived, she was ushered through several corridors and deposited directly into Romeo's office.
By the time she entered the office, Romeo was already seated behind his desk, looking as though the entire world had personally disappointed him before noon.
A stack of documents sat nearby. Several more were spread across the desk. He didn't even look up immediately. Which somehow felt more intimidating than if he had.
"You're late."
She had arrived exactly when his underling found her. Somehow, that still counted as being late.
"You should've anticipated I would need you."
Her eye twitched. Slightly.
Years of surviving Mammon's nonsense prevented the reaction from becoming visible.
Romeo finally looked up. "Help me with tidying some of the Casino's financial documents this month."
Wonderful. Absolutely wonderful.
The meeting had somehow become worse within thirty seconds.
For the next two hours, she found herself trapped in what could only be described as administrative hostage-taking.
Romeo reviewed schedules. Romeo reviewed reports. Romeo complained about reports. Romeo complained about the people responsible for the reports. Romeo complained about people who failed to follow correctly.
By the end of it, she was honestly beginning to suspect complaining might be one of Sinostra's official dorm activities.
The truly horrifying part?
He was actually competent. That was what made it difficult. If Romeo had simply been difficult, she could have dismissed him.
But buried underneath the arrogance, the impossible standards, and the constant criticism was someone who somehow kept an entire organization functioning.
A moment ago, she'd considered arguing. Then she remembered that their MC probably wouldn't. And given this man's competence, that made arguing much more difficult.
The desire remained. Unfortunately.
Eventually, after what felt like several geological eras, Romeo finally set the documents aside. For one glorious moment she thought she was free.
Then he spoke again. "Find Kaito."
The hope died instantly. "...And then?"
"Bring him here."
"...Why?"
"He owes me something."
That was not an answer.
Unfortunately, Romeo appeared perfectly satisfied with it. "You know where he usually disappears."
No, she actually didn't.
Kaito seemed to exist according to rules known only to himself.
Half the time she was convinced he materialized from nearby walls whenever the plot required him. The other half she suspected he simply enjoyed causing confusion.
Neither possibility helped her current situation.
Romeo returned to his paperwork. Conversation over. Dismissed. Just like that. She stood there another moment. Mostly because she was considering her options.
Option one: Find Kaito.
Option two: Don't.
Frankly, option two was significantly more appealing. The problem was that option two required explaining herself later. Which would inevitably create more work.
A terrible cycle. She hated it.
With a sigh, she turned toward the door. Already trying to think of ways to delay the inevitable.
Maybe Kaito was busy. Maybe Kaito was in class. Maybe Kaito had fallen into a dimensional anomaly. Actually—
That last one felt surprisingly plausible at Darkwick.
The thought followed her into the hallway. So did her growing determination to avoid everyone for at least fifteen minutes. A completely reasonable goal.
One that immediately became impossible.
Because the moment she stepped around the corner, she saw Taiga.
Of all people. Why.Why him.
The tall red-haired ghoul was walking down the corridor ahead, hands shoved into his pockets, looking thoroughly uninterested in everything around him.
Normally, that would've been fine.
Unfortunately, "normally" did not exist anymore. Because over the past week she had learned several important things.
First, Taiga's temper possessed the same stability as a lit stick of dynamite. The second was that Taiga seemed capable of creating problems through sheer existence. And the third—
The third was that she absolutely did not have the energy for whatever conversation fate wanted to force upon her today.
No. Absolutely not. She refused.
Her fingers shifted slightly inside her sleeve. A familiar spell formed almost automatically. Subtle.
The magical equivalent of encouraging people's attention to slide elsewhere. Just enough to make herself difficult to notice. The sort of thing Solomon had taught her years ago when discussing concealment.
The spell settled over her immediately. Then she started walking.
Keep moving. Don't look nervous.
Don't make eye contact.
Everything is fine.
Everything—
Taiga's head snapped up.
Her stomach dropped. Immediately. Violently. For one horrifying second, his eyes locked directly onto her position.
Not through her. At her.
The reaction hit so fast she nearly stopped walking. Don't stop.
Keep moving.
Keep moving.
Keep moving.
But something about the look made cold unease crawl down her spine. Because those weren't confused eyes or distracted eyes. They weren't even suspicious eyes.
They looked aware. Dangerously aware that she's near him.
The feeling reminded her of standing near demons at their most dangerous. For a brief second, she felt almost exposed, as if the spell had failed.
As if he'd somehow looked directly through it.
Impossible.
That was impossible.
She had used variations of this magic before. The brothers barely noticed it. Solomon even praised her for it. Even demons with absurdly heightened senses usually needed a reason to look first.
Yet Taiga's gaze followed her movement for one long second. And something about it felt wrong.
Her pulse jumped. What the hell?
Nobody should be able to—
The thought died immediately when Taiga frowned. The expression looked almost irritated, almost disappointed. Then he glanced around the hallway.
"…Thought I saw Kitten coming out of Lulu's office." His gaze swept the corridor once more. "Where'd she go…?"
The words sent another unpleasant shiver down her spine. She didn't wait to hear more. The moment his attention shifted elsewhere, she increased her pace. Then increased it again.
The corridor disappeared behind her. Only after turning two separate corners did she finally allow herself to breathe.
Okay. New conclusion. Very important conclusion.
Taiga was going on the list.
The list of people she absolutely did not want discovering she wasn't their MC.
She needs to search for Kaito or Lucas, who knows what they're doing right now, rather than searching for a way for her to go back home. When she took a turn, her shoulder clipped another person's arm.
The contact lasted less than a second, a second that was somehow more than enough.
Her body reacted before her mind did.
Years of instinct. Years of training. Years spent around demons, sorcerers, curses, magical accidents, and brothers whose definition of "normal day" often involved some form of catastrophe.
Power surged automatically.
Her fingers twitched inside her sleeve. The beginning of a spell rose instinctively to her lips. A defensive one. Yet the magic never fully formed. The realization hit just in time. Stop.
Her pulse jumped. The spell collapsed immediately.
Thank every realm. Nobody noticed. At least—
She hoped nobody noticed.
"...Interesting." The voice immediately destroyed that hope.
Her stomach dropped. Slowly, she looked up. And discovered the universe had apparently decided she hadn't suffered enough today.
Leo stood directly in front of her.
For one terrible moment, she considered simply turning around and walking away. Unfortunately, that would've been suspicious. And if there was one person she absolutely did not want becoming suspicious—
It was Leo.
Damn it!
⊹ ࣪ ﹏𓊝﹏𓂁﹏⊹ ࣪ ˖ .fin
Early warning: Tbh, I'm still not finished with all the episodes up to the latest update, so I actually have little information to go on while making this (please forgive me if there's any OOC; have mercy).
Word count: 3.233
