It was a long train ride to Hachioji castle, on the outskirts of Tokyo. Daniel thought he’d pass the time listening to the song he made for his ultimate’s directions, but Mr. Stone soon decided to share his research on Hachioji’s history.

For a while, it had been believed to be haunted, after the battle of Hachioji in 1590, but recently, the city tried turning it into a museum. Once the museum was halfway set up, they allowed a few visitors to see the few exhibits through its ancient walls. But, when two local business moguls left to explore the catacombs, they didn’t make it back to the tour.

It took two months of constant searching for their bodies to be found.

Even then, the officers who found them swore up and down that they’d seen the killer, or some man in ninja gear. They couldn’t find any evidence of anyone living there, let alone finding anyone who wasn’t too scared to investigate. By now, rumors had grown that the Zoner Daigo lived there, yet still, no one wanted to investigate.

Until today.

Reaching the castle grounds took a stroll through a thick forest, guided by distant chirping birds and critters scurrying between the tall, thin trees. The forest thinned out once they reached Hachioji castle. Between rubble and flattened, decimated foundations, three large main buildings stood the test of time, its stone walls whitened by decades of the finest bird poop.

“Are you ready for this, Daniel?” Mr. Stone asked.

“Ready to either win or lose us the entire program and thousands of dollars? Light work,” he shrugged, winking.

Mr. Stone rooted himself, sighing. “You do not have to challenge this opponent, you know. Choosing someone ranked lower is an additional option.”

“Not for me. If I go lower, I’m stretching out how long it’ll take for me to climb the ranks to get home,” Daniel said. “Beating this guy is my only option, whether I like it or not.”

“True. It saddens me to be reminded of your current predicament.” Mr. Stone pointed forward with his cane. “So be it.”

They continued through the wild growing grass, up to the front entrance of the castle. Daniel pulled on the locked door, checking that it was, indeed, locked. He raised a hand to knock.

They weren’t outside anymore.

A blink, and a sudden darkness swallowed every direction. Daniel flinched and lunged backwards, exclaiming, unable to even see where he was going. Wooden planks creaked below his feet.

“Daniel!” Mr. Stone harshly whispered, holding his cane against his back to stop him. “Calm yourself. We’ve been displaced by a teleportation technique.”

Daniel fumbled for his phone and turned the light on. Mr. Stone squinted against the light, but he swept the area around them. They’d been teleported deep inside of the ancient castle, with no windows in sight, only a dark hallway stretching out in either direction. A map on the wall showed their location with an X, marking them at the southwest corner.

Daniel gulped. Dust fluttered through the light of his flashlight. “How did you know?”

“I recognize the feeling. We must be careful. Your opponent is aware of our presence, and instantaneous teleportation is a dangerous technique.”

Daniel checked both directions down the hallway, and focusing on a distant, hazy light. “Should we follow that?”

“I am here for observation and security, Daniel. You must decide your path. But, yes, we should.”

Mr. Stone’s cane tapped against the creaky floors as Daniel took slow, measured steps, hearing the wind howl through the thin walls. They passed another map on the wall, but he didn’t spare it a glance.

“This isn’t so bad. I’m kinda used to waking up somewhere I don’t know, if you know what I mean,” Daniel chuckled.

“I do, though my experience comes from a less…existential threat. It makes me curious, however.”

“About what?”

Mr. Stone put a hand on Daniel’s shoulder as they walked, passing another map on the wall. “I’ve heard the way you talk about your life back home. Your parents. The place you lived. Your academic performance. Yet, when I see you so happy, it makes me wonder if you truly enjoy here more. Is that the case?”

The question intensified the dread deep in his stomach, as they continued down a hallway of only darkness. “I don’t know.”

“Is it a hard choice?”

“No, it’s just…I don’t want to answer.”

“I see. I will drop the topic, then. I would prefer not to intrude on your personal feelings.”

“It’s not that either. You aren’t intruding. Carmen asked me something similar, about if I thought our relationship was a mistake because I’m trying to leave here anyway.”

“And you said…?”

“Nothing. I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. I dunno how I’d answer!”

“Do you really not know? Or, rather, are you afraid of hurting her feelings by giving the wrong answer?”

Daniel buried his fist in his pocket, his flashlight reflecting from the glass of a map on the wall.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

“It would be constructive to decide and give her a clear answer, for both of your sakes. Communication is better than perpetual discomfort.”

“But what if I realize I like it back home, better? Won’t that break her heart?”

“Yet you will free yourselves of the uncertainty. Doubt is a debt life is better lived without. We need to stop, though,” Mr. Stone said. “This is the fourth time we’ve passed this map.”

Daniel stopped in his tracks, and turned his phone flashlight to the wall. Sure enough, the map of the castle on the wall was the exact same map they had first started at. Still at the southeast section.

He slowly backed away from the map, head spinning. “Whoa…! Okay, uh…how about we try the other direction?”

It didn’t take much walking to run into the same map once again. But, as Daniel voiced his confusion, he found no response. Mr. Stone was gone. He did a 360, checking both ends of the hallway — Mr. Stone was gone.

Daniel dropped his flashlight, readying himself for an attacker, but the nerves in his body jumped once again. A window appeared farther down the hallway. Now, lit by the sunlight, the map beside him said he was in the northwest part of the castle.

Daigo was playing tricks on him.

He took off in a sprint, but the nerves in his body flinched as he rounded the corner and returned to the same section of the hallway. Daigo had to be watching from somewhere to trap him in a loop like this. He paused, glancing around.

In a situation like this, Mr. Stone would probably get philosophical if he was still here. Was this just like his life? Teleported to an unfamiliar location, alone in understanding how it really felt to lose everything?

“Come on, Daigo. Are tricks all you’ve got? Come out! You know what I’m here for.”

“To fight me, right?” a gruff male voice called out. “Normally I turn away people like you, but…you aren’t from here either, aren’t you?”

A young man a few years his senior rounded the corner, with blue eyes, silver hair and a navy blue vest over a ninja robe, all tattered with dirt and scratches.

“You’re just like me.”

The castle responded, shocking every nerve in his body. Daigo teleported them to a wide, square room, split with support columns against the low ceiling. Along each wall, different dusty displays showed different things, the remnants of the attempt at creating a museum. Journals were on the wall behind Daigo, tiles and tables were on Daniel’s right, a larger, detailed map of the castle covered the wall behind him, and far to his left, a floor to roof window lit the massive basement.

“Like the room? I can’t believe they just left those journals here,” Daigo said, jabbing a thumb at the display of journals behind him.

“Where did you take my teacher? The man who came in with me?” Daniel said, clenching his fists, weighing whether or not he should skip the fight and force him to bring Mr. Stone back.

Daigo raised his hands. “Calm down. I put him outside. This doesn’t involve him. This is a party for us dimensionally-linked souls, only.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I can feel it. Your spirit’s entangled with the fabric of dimensions, just like mine. I’m not from here either. Tell me — were you pulled from home just when you thought you were going to die?”

Daniel raised his eyebrows, gasping. “My bus to school crashed.”

“And I was defending my village from an invasion. Just as someone put an ice spike through my heart…” Daigo gestured to the room. “Pulled away and ended up here, with no connections and this on my wrist,” he said, showing his System Menu indicator.

“What dimension did you come from?”

Daigo strolled to his side, towards one of the pillars. The instant he was out of view, the room flipped. Daniel blinked; it wasn’t a trick of the eyes. The floor to ceiling window was on his right, now, and as Daigo stepped out from the column, the wall map was behind him. Daniel turned, and ten feet away, he saw his own reflection in the journal display.

Daigo had swapped their positions.

“A place where magic like this is normal for ninjas of my level. But all this, these rankings, these fights, this System — this is all new to me, and I wouldn’t change a thing.”

“Seriously? This is new to me, too, but you know you like here more? Do you have a way back?”

Daigo strolled back towards the column, and again, their position flipped as he passed. The window was back shining into the room from Dnaiel’s left, and Daigo was pacing in front of the display of journals. “I wouldn’t even use it if I did. You tell me, though,” he said. “Which dimension do you like more?”

“I…”

The dreams flashed through his mind. He relived the sheer dread of learning his parents and friends were mourning him, yet then felt the sheer victory of winning the South City Beginner’s Tournament.

“I challenge you to a ranked fight, Chase!”

“Wait! You didn’t even—”

“I know what you’re here for. I recognize you from shooting that movie with the Fifties. But, if you can’t give me a good answer, you’re just an indecisive brat stuck in a bad situation,” Daigo spat. White lines drew in the air in front of them, expanding into floating menus showing the challenge. “And if you’re that indecisive, this’ll be an easy fight.”

“You think I’m gonna be easy just because I can’t tell some guy that lives in an old castle which entire reality I like more? Fine. Keep that energy,” Daniel said, looking down at the menu with Daigo’s stats.

image [https://i.imgur.com/TGILhNm.png]

Just as he thought, Daigo was a Zoner, but it was interesting that he had a higher Combo-Potential of all things. Most Zoners didn’t combo well at all. But, as he counted the stats, he noticed something off. He had two Low stats in Health and Damage, but only one High stat in Long-Range.

He had to have a Broken stat. If nothing stood out, it must’ve been his Meter Gain. They both had Broken Meter gain, though Daniel had higher Damage, Speed, and Close-Range stats.

Meanwhile, Daigo laughed at his stats. “You’re a literal Joke! And your stats are this screwed up? I can’t even understand why you came out here. This will be interesting.”

Daniel pressed the button to accept and shifted into his fighting stance as the referee spawned in. “Daigo VS. Chase. Best of three! Fighters, enter your starting positions!”

Three columns apart, he and Daigo were already in the perfect positions. Once the menu appeared to place bets, Daniel bet on himself, and Daigo did the same.

“Round one!”

He met Daigo’s strong blue-eyed glare with a challenge of his own. Zoners archetypally didn’t do well at close-range, and the projectiles would give him fuel for counters. Daigo didn’t have an Archetype to predict his abilities with; being a Joke character meant anything was on the table.

“Ready?”

To fix his image with the Jazz Hands insurance reps, all he had to do was win. A win would save their program, and earn him another flight.

A win would save the dojo and let him find out what Daigo was talking about.

“Fight!”