They finally arrived in Japan. The fresh air they could breath rejuvenated their souls. When they set foot at the port, they saw with their own eyes 3 enormous sakura trees near the entrance. Yuri's eyes sprang with life the moment she saw them and ran towards one of them.

"Beautiful!" was the thing she said before leaving her dad's side. James said "Wait!" and went after her. He sat down next to her and told her a story about the sakura trees.

"Legend has it that long ago, wars between our ancestors and some other race frequently broke out in which many humans passed away. The people of that race derived from a land afar and it's said that some of them wore beautiful glossy cloaks, but their identity still remains a mystery...

One day, the remnants of the human race in Japan gathered together around a tree like this, a beautiful sakura tree, and then prayed to God for their survival. Much to their surprise, their calls were answered and that powerful race with unknown origins, stopped bothering them ever after.

From that point on, humanity has respected and honored the sakura tree or as it was then called the "saint" tree. A large amount of sakura trees have been planted since then and nowadays we can all enjoy their absolute beauty. Isn't it a cool story?"

James told this folklore descriptively and Yuri was not only able to understand it, but it also piqued her interest.

Even though it was supposed to cheer her up, however, it made her remember the bed stories her mother would tell her when she were little.

Interested or not, she felt an intense headache and then she realized she was crying. Her emotions had been mixed up and they overwhelmed her. Her dad hugged her for a moment and kissed the top of her head.

"We need to move on, Yuri. Don't forget, she'll always be with us in here. In our hearts. She wouldn't want you to be sad. She'd want you to keep moving forward and keep on living. Let's not mourn any longer. We must fulfill that last wish of hers"

Yuri wiped her tears and nodded. The two of them stood up and walked away from the port. Soon enough, they found themselves in the largest city in all of Japan. A city named Yonaga City.

The hustle and bustle of the endless roads of the city made Yuri feel a bit anxious and scared. They were looking for a safe place to spend their first night in this enormous metropolis.

The first hotel they found was unavailable. James sighed when he saw the sign "Closed" that was hung on the glass covered entrance door.

They had to travel for quite a bit in order to find the warm, safe place they wanted to go to.

They finally arrived at the hotel. It was almost nighttime and the outside breeze felt aggressive and spiteful as it pushed them away from the place forcefully.

They opened the marble door slowly, followed by a slight creaking sound. James saw a beautiful woman sitting on a chair besides a wooden counter. She was apparently the receptionist.

He told the receptionist their situation and she was eager to help. James asked for a discount, as his budget was really slim, and surprisingly the new offer was accepted without any objections by the receptionist.

Yuri didn't understand Japanese but seeing James smiling like that, she felt at ease and was excited about their new life.

They walked up the stairs to the second floor where their room was. James used the key he was given to unlock the door and go inside. The moment Yuri saw the interior of the room, she couldn't hide her excitement.

"The bed is so soft, dad! OH! Look! Look! What a huge television!"

"It's really warm in here, too, isn't it?"

Yuri nodded affirmatively two times.

James stretched a bit and then said:

"Alright, we need to sleep now to recharge our batteries. I'll sleep on the sofa, you take the bed—"

However, unsurprisingly, Yuri objected to sleeping on her own.

"But dad... I'm afraid of sleeping on my own... I don't want to be alone!"

"Okay. I'll stay with you until you fall asleep. How about that?"

Yuri refreshed the smile on her face and said "Hmph!" in acceptance.

James then grinned and went on to make her bed. He stayed with Yuri till she was asleep.

So tired was he that a few seconds after, he too fell asleep on the same bed leaving the couch unoccupied. He felt blessed to find such a nice offer at this hotel which had everything they needed and more.

They had a great sleep without the slightest worry in their face.

However, their sleep didn't last till morning. It was apparently interrupted by something that happened late at night.

James heard a peculiar sound coming from the same room they were in. Objects moving, cases and drawers opening, loud footsteps.

Someone was there. And whoever that may be, they didn't have any kind intentions.

James woke up and stood his ground.

"Who's there?" He shouted. The burglar stopped for a moment and pressed something on the Tv's controller. The next time James tried to open the lights, nothing would happen. Consequently, he couldn't make out who the burglar was or how to stop them.

"Get out of here, I'll call the police!" was his next threat.

The thief stepped back and then left the room at lightning speed.

Unable to catch up to them, James called the police as fast as he could. Nevertheless, the signal was somehow really weak and the call didn't make it to the police headquarters.

James shouted "Shit!" and it was careless of him as it made Yuri wake up.

He was in a tough spot. Attending to Yuri meant that he'd lose the chance to find the burglar. But as a parent, the obvious thing to do was to get back to Yuri. And so he did.

"It's alright, Yuri. Somebody paid us a visit but they've left now. Everything's okay."

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Paralyzed for a sec as she remembered the incident with her mother, Yuri started panicking.

James then embraced his daughter and tried to calm her down.

"I'm here Yuri. Don't worry about it."

Yuri said "I'm okay..." and James felt relieved after hearing that.

Letting it slide though wasn't part of James' character. Due to his great sense of justice, he decided to leave Yuri behind after reassuring her one last time. He went to the reception to inform them of the crime that had just occured and try to find the thief.

Panting heavily from using the stairs quickly, he arrived at the ground floor. There stood the pretty japanese woman, the one he'd met earlier that day that proposed the splendid offer. James raised his tone of voice and told her what had happened.

"Sorry to bother you this late at night, but somebody broke in our room and made a mess out of it while trying to steal from us. As soon as I tried to stop them, they left on the spot. I tried calling the police but I had no signal."

"I see, I see" the woman uttered.

"Have you seen them? They must have passed through here!" said James desperately.

"Yeah, Now that I think about it, I did see a woman hurriedly leaving the hotel a few moments ago... Do you want me to call the police for you?"

"Yeah, that must be the burglar. Thank you!"

"It's nothing. Return to your room. I'll inform the cops."

"Sure thing. Good night!"

" 'night, sir."

James backtracked his way to his room through the same stairs as before. The stairs felt endless and James thought they were mocking him for leaving his daughter behind to fulfill his sense of rightness.

"What if Yuri broke down again? This is a similar experience to that of Casey's... I need to be there for her. I shouldn't have left. She might return to acting robotically from the stress. I can't allow that to happen again!"

His anxiety was overflowing his heart. His heartbeat had gone insane. With each step he could feel his body more and more shaking and his fingers all the more sweating.

He made it the second floor. It was so dark one could misstep at any time. Carefully walking towards his room though, he made it to the door. He used the key to unlock the door and then...

He saw Yuri sleeping like nothing had happened. An ephemeral moment of relief was conveyed by a long sigh.

"Ah..."

At that moment, he saw a woman behind his back ready to attack him. She used a syringe of some sort withholding an anesthetic drug and penetrated his neck with it. A few seconds later he dropped down on the floor. With his hand stretched towards Yuri he finally succumbed to the drug and lost his senses.

"That's where you had your wallet then. Thaank you! Now let's see if you have anything else valueable..."

The woman resembled very much the one in the reception. Were he conscious still, James would ask himself "How did this happen?". "Didn't the burglar leave?"

But he couldn't think any of that. Paralyzed as he was, he couldn't protect Yuri if the burglar had intented to harm her.

Thankfully, she just wanted to steal everything she could. After searching the room once more she realized that they had only few valuables with them.

Disappointed as she was, the woman said "Damn it!" which sentence was loud enough for Yuri to wake up.

"Oh, did I wake you up, sweety? I'm sorry, I ll put you back to sleep in a sec. No worries!"

She injected the drug to the little girl as well and left the scene.

The next morning...

When the sun radiated its first rays of light, the room James had rented filled with life.

The sunlight fell upon James' and Yuri's eyes and woke them up. They were sleeping on the same bed as though nothing had happened.

James jumped out of the bed as if he had seen a nightmare. Then, he didn't expect to see this sight.

The room was cleaner than ever. Everything he saw was exactly the same as in the first time they had set foot in the room. Although not clearly remembering what had happened the previous night, suspicions arose in his mind. Something felt awry and he knew that well enough. He tried to remember but at no avail.

"Didn't something terrible happen last night? I— can't remember very well..."

After searching for something to be out of place, he finally realized something.

"Where's my wallet? And our clothes?"

"I had my wallet in my pocket and our clothes in the wardrobe... Where are they...?"

James saw Yuri waking up and told her about it. In conclusion, confused as they were, they decided to talk to the reception about it.

The woman at the reception noticed their presence and asked them

"Good morning you two, what's the matter? You seem a bit troubled."

"I don't really understand it either... My wallet and our clothes have gone missing this morning... Do you have any clue as to what might have happened?"

"So quiet was it yesterday that I don't believe a burglar broke in. Besides, nobody entered or exited the hotel at night after you came. Could you perhaps have lost them somewhere?"

"No, that's not the case! I'm well aware of my belongings and this money is very important to us right now Somebody must have stolen them from us!" said James infuriatingly.

Even though she didn't understand a lot about what they were saying in Japanese, Yuri told James something crucial to clearing out the case.

"Dad... I remember waking up a couple of times yesterday. I didn't sleep very well... Does this mean anything?"

At that moment, a memory came back to James. The scene of him making the choice between staying with Yuri or leaving her alone for a while to... stop the burglar.

After realizing that, a process of successive, reasonable assumptions was enough to define the criminal.

"Burglar? Who was it...? A woman... She.. used something to immobilize me. It was.. a syringe... Her face.. Before fainting, I got a quick glimpse of her face. What was it like? Who was the intruder...?"

Setting his eyes upon the woman looking directly at him, he found his answer...

The woman then said in a friendly way

"Don't worry though, I won't charge you for this first night since you lost your belongings. I'm well aware of how hard it is to lose one's own. Let's just—"

"You have the audacity to try and trick us again? Disgusting..." said James

"Huh?!"

"I remember everything now. Don't play dumb on me! You're behind all this!"

"He he he he... How amusing! Ha ha hahaha!"

James frowned at the sight of that reaction and Yuri closed her eyes. The aura around her changed completely as though a demon had captured her heart.

"So what? What are you gonna do?"

"I'll call the police and let justice prevail!"

"With what proof my dear? Hehehehe... What could the police possible find in a room as clean as the one you're in? They won't find any trace of evidence and then you'll be the one accused!"

"I— I''ll find a way..."

"I don't want to spoil it to you, but there's nothing to accuse me about. On the contrary, I have the strongest alibi one could have, my dear."

"You can't have an alibi! That's impossible!"

"Do you see this camera over here, above our heads? It's the only camera that monitors this hotel. And this camera shows explicitly that I never left this very spot since first talking to you."

"How could this be?!" asked James himself over and over again.

"I don't believe you! You're lying again!"

"Go ahead then, call the police. Do that... In ThE NaME oF JuStIcE!"

"I— I will bring you... Justice!"

His voice wavered with the answer he gave and his inner flame was flickering at the thought that he might end up in trouble.

The signal his phone had was powerful enough to call the police without any problem.

The police arrived at the hotel and James issued a formal accusation on the receptionist about her stealing their clothes and his wallet. He asked them to find evidence in their room, which was supposedly the crime scene.

They all went upstairs, went in the room and then the police officer in charge asked

"So, Eiko Tokiyama, you say that in this very room the woman downstairs broke in last night?"

"Yes, officer, I'm certain that she stole my wallet and our clothes. I remeber her face really well."

"It seems extraordinarily tidy for a crime scene, though. Either way, we'll have a thorough check."

"Thank you!"

"It's my job, sir. I'm not doing that to help you per ce."

The police examined thoroughly the place in search of hints, clues and some sort of evidence that the supposed crime James stated was true.

In the end however, their efforts were futile. It seemed as normal as any room could possibly be. They all went back to the reception to listen to the accused person's version of the story as well.

James' anxiety would soon skyrocket. As soon as the accused woman spoke up, everything started crumbling. James' sense of justice, his pride, his self esteem, his life with Yuri, everything...

"Officer, I need you to examine this camera footage. It gives me a valid alibi that burns this accusation to the ground."

The tape irrefutably showed the truth. The woman had never left her post, always sitting on the same spot for the entirety of the night.

Even after talking to James late at night, she didn't do anything. Therefore, the police concluded that James' accusation was invalid.

A false accusation to that extent was not permitted by law and the police needed to arrest james and issue him a fine. The police officer raised his tone of voice and talked more formally.

"Eiko Tokiyama. Your unfounded accusation won't be taken lightly and you will need to be arrested. Furthermore, a fine of a hundred thousand yen will be placed under your name. Follow me to the police station."

The fear both James and Yuri had couldn't be described with words. Their faces couldn't have looked more pale.

But at that moment, something changed, when the woman said

"Officer... Don't take them to the station and imprison them. That'd be too cruel, wouldn't it!? The fine serves them just right. Don't make a big fuss over it."

(Besides, having free food at the prison would benefit them in their current situation... right? Ha ha hahahahahaha!) The woman thought while putting on a long smile.

For better or for worse, the receptionist persuaded the police officer to confine the consequences of their actions to only the fine.

At first James was relieved a bit from that outcome. The "generosity" of that bitch *Ahem I mean that woman, felt too good to be true.

The police were about to leave the hotel and so was James and Yuri. Before leaving the place, the woman said in an ironic yet infuriating manner.

"You're free to visit anytime you like! Thank you for your... stay!"

A chill ran down James' spine while closing the sturdy marble door.

Just a few seconds later he realized why she was being this ''generous". Understanding the thought process of that woman made him want to puke.

The outcome? James and Yuri had no money, clothes, place to stay, yet they had to pay a fine of around a thousand pounds on top of that.

"Come Yuri, we need to leave this place..." said James quietly, as if his soul had left his body.

Yuri was really sad to see her dad so desperate. The despair they both felt wouldn't just go away overnight. For two whole years, their lives would be so dreadful that looking back at it now, I feel gifted for the life I was granted.

Yuri grabbed James' hand firmly and they walked away from the hotel, towards their unknown, frightening future...