[Act ii – Glitch]

Suta POV

"They say amongst Queen Lunara's hateful 8 offspring, it was he, the whose name was adorn in Golden, who she doted upon the most…and I tell you this, despite the humility and acts of love that graced his shadows. It was he, his kin all feared the most." – Hu'Jin the Forgotten one.

"..."

"Dear Mortal...Does one believe that the grace bestowed upon thee is one of grateful charity?

For even those touched by the perfect dawn had burdened an original sin...kukuku...I bid you good luck."

That voice, Suta had heard it whispering dark curses into his ears before. But at that time, he remembered that shadowy figure looming over him.

'It's him...the fishbowl head...Helvetios?'

There was a stir in the heavens, and Suta saw a gathering of pale clouds painted across an expanse with a strange, dullish-grey firmament. If he had to describe it, the word 'gloom' appeared to him as he wondered how a world filled with a swirl of colors streaking across countless veins could look like an expanse.

Then Suta saw the stars, but unlike how he ever remembered seeing them before, the stars were falling away like comets, one by one.

Suta felt incredibly strange. He knew he was lying down, but he was formless. His body was neither here nor there, and it filled him with a slightly hazy feeling.

It was hard to pinpoint things right now. Only one truth remained certain: he wasn't dead, most definitely alive in fact.

But he felt stuck somewhere.

Unable to understand where he was, Suta did the most logical thing at that moment. He closed his eyes and waited.

He waited in silence, with patience and expectancy.

Something would change, he knew that from experience - the night of Starfall, his subsequent encounter with Po, and then his sudden end with the fishbowl head and that dark oath he was forced to swear upon.

'Nothing was ever by chance, by now we both understand that...don't we, Raito Suta...these mysteries between us. They all serve a...purpose.'

Suta wasn't feeling that usual overwhelming presence he felt before. That pang of coldness crawling down his spine was no more than a slight arousal of pain at this moment.

Slowly, he began to find a steadiness within his heart. He was at least glad he had his thoughts; if he had lost control over everything else, maintaining his mind was the one thing he was glad for.

'Now we simply wait.'

Now and again, his heavy eyelids opened, but nothing changed but the formation of stars suddenly appearing before falling away into an orbit of oblivion.

Suta felt a stir of darkness creeping through his formless body again. This time, his vision went dark, and the horrible sensation of falling engulfed him in the blanket of a frigid silence.

Suta remembered the Fuji mountains.

'Why's the air turned so frighteningly cold all of a sudden...I can hear the sharp winds too. It feels so frigid, like I'm outside in the blistering winter,' he thought to himself.

Suta found himself stirring within a blanket of darkness. It was a very strange sensation, given he held no real memory of when he had fallen asleep under such rigorous conditions.

But one thing was certainly clear: something strange had taken place, and now, he was cold...very cold.

Slowly, his eyelids gently opened, and he found himself seated against a firm, sparkling ground, surrounded by layers of endless snow-white hills and a majestic floor layered beneath him made out of solid crystallized purple ice.

Suta almost immediately jumped away in fright, suddenly aware he was sitting on purple ice.

'Purple ice? That doesn't make any sense?'

He studied his newfound, disturbing surroundings a little more.

If this was a dream, he was surely hoping he'd wake up right about now.

But then he poured cold water over that theory soon enough.

'When have I ever been aware I'm inside a dream? Damn it! What's going on now?' He reflected inwardly, expecting the worst.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

With his torso raised, he felt a fuzziness clouding his thoughts for a brief moment. Something was wrong here. He smoothed his chin while instinctively folding his legs to make himself more comfortable.

'How did I get here? One moment I was sitting on a hill? It was my birthday, wasn't it, and then next...Demoria slept beside me. I remember having that recurring nightmare, and then...'

Suta took a careful look around again; a strange airiness clung to the skyward heavens above him.

Lowering his gaze, he beheld misshapen diamond hills scattered around him in the near distance, the morning light casting a whimsical glow against their surfaces, and a crystalline sheen oddly sparkled off them. In the far distance, a forest beckoned him, with leaves colored violet and grey bark. He swallowed harshly, slowly coming to grips with the dire situation at hand.

'Ok, so...this is definitely not Granny's farm anymore.'

Just when he was running out of speculative theories, a voice softly chimed not so far away.

His heart fluttered with relief as he twisted around to find her.

"Hm-ergh...what's going on...S-Suta, is that you?"

Suta followed the direction of her voice and found Demoria lying on her side as she seemed to stir herself awake.

Her dreary gaze took in her surroundings, and Suta watched her go through the exact process as he did moments ago.

"Wait! What the hell? Where am I?" Her eyes finally moved towards him. "S-Suta! You're here as well? Where are we? What did you do? Come clean right now di-di-di-did you do something weird."

'Why would I be the culprit? She's the one with the freakishly strong powers. But my track record of suddenly waking up in new worlds doesn't shed a positive light on things, I guess. Wait! This couldn't be another one of those instances? C-could it?'

That harrowing thought left a visibly shaken Suta staring aimlessly into nowhere.

'Is-is this the fishbowl head's doing?'

Demoria rose to her feet, dusting her dress down before she took a careful look around their very unfamiliar surroundings. Her narrowed gaze thoroughly took in the scene around her.

Suta could tell she was growing concerned the more she saw.

"Suta, this place is odd. Everything seems...backwards and strange." Her words were understandable; even he knew this wasn't a place they should be right now.

There weren't any immediate signs as to why or how they got here. But this clear, open space was unsettling.

"We should be careful, but we have to take a look around. There has to be some sort of clue here that will tell us where we are. Hm, over there, that forest, I can vaguely see a footpath there."

For Suta, who had experienced the sudden unpredictability of awakening inside an entirely new world, he felt less scared than Demoria was right now. Her eyes wouldn't stop darting around nervously as they made their way.

The grip against his hand was also tightening each time a rustle sounded from the unknown within this crowded forest.

Once they entered the forest, the leaves were a strange violet tint, whilst the crunchy ground layered beneath his feet was a mixture of blue, dark red and grey.

'And what kind of forest is this anyway?' he wondered, unsure if this place could be called a forest.

Everything his eyes met, down to the tiny, strange bug creatures he saw crawling against thin branches, looked weird.

And not the good weird, but the very strange weird.

Some of them were blue in color with orange underbellies and massive, bulbous heads.

The other critters he met were also of the weird variant. Tiny monkeys with white fur inspected both he and Demoria from a lofty perch above. Only they had three eyes and four arms.

'Thankfully, these strange things don't seem hostile. Tsk! But there's no telling what we might run into. Demoria is our only source of fighting power right now, but who's to say she won't freeze up in the face of danger right now?'

Suta was considering the worst-case scenario, judging by Demoria's very sheepish demeanor; he couldn't bank on her being ready to defend them both. After all, she was inexperienced and very much still a 17-year-old girl. He remained vigilant as he led them through the slithering grey road. More strange animals appeared but remained docile from a safe distance. He eventually noticed a small clearing up ahead and rather hastily shuffled his unsteady feet towards it.

After folding away a tussle of large blue leaves, they arrived at a small circular opening in the forest. A dark greyish boulder sat right in the middle, but the boulder wasn't the source of intrigue to both of their scrutinizing eyes.

For the creature or the thing they noticed nonchalantly seated atop it drew their attention rather quickly.

Demoria quickened her footsteps a little and slightly stood ahead of Suta; she cradled the top of her eyes while tilting her head slightly upward.

"Suta, wh-what is that up there?" She asked.

Before Suta could say a single word, the creature at the top seemed to have noticed their presence. It spun around swiftly before audaciously leaping from the very top and hurling downwards towards them.

Suta tapped Demoria's wrist and timely pulled her back as he took a step back himself.

But the falling being timed its jump well, gracefully landing a few feet away from the duo with little to no sound.

Once its silhouette finally appeared in clear view, Suta struggled for a few moments to carefully piece together what to call this creature.

First of all, it was a lion, but it was standing on its two feet, dressed in a spotted onesie with red, blue, and yellow polka dots.

Beneath its large paw was a black polished cane. Finishing the very out-of-place dress style was the fitted top hat placed on its head, covered in a dark brown mane.

Suta visibly rubbed his two eyes a few times just to make sure he was seeing things.

'Is that...a...l-lion?'