“Ohhh look at all these interesting sweets! This festival is awesome!”

Yuri was running around excitedly while looking over the food at the stalls around her.

“The night is young, don't try to eat too many things at once and just eat one thing-”

Hikaru spoke while glancing at an interesting food item. Looking back at Yuri, he found her already stuffing her mouth with various fried sweet treats and snacks on sticks.

“-at a time...”

He gave up trying to convince Yuri and just concentrated on making sure she wouldn't choke.

“Ohhh they have a tournament for ball throwing!”

She said after swallowing the last bite of her food.

“Perhaps we can compete and see who wins the most prizes?”

Hikaru suggested while walking up to the stall with Yuri.

“Heh..a challenge..you finally show your true colours..you're on sword-boy!”

Rubbing her nose slightly in confidence, she went up to the stall that was fairly long compared to the others and slammed some coins on the table, buying herself a ticket in a dramatic manner. While Hikaru carefully opened his wallet and counted out his change before handing it to the stall owner.

It was finally their turn. The goal was to throw as many of the balls as possible inside the baskets, the further they were, the more points they would earn.

Hikaru threw the balls with casual throws, hitting all of them in the next best basket.

Yuri was trying her absolute best, yet despite putting all her strength into her throws, they wouldn't even reach the furthest baskets.

“What the hell is this! Why can't I. Throw. These damn. Balls!”

Getting frustrated with her failed attempts, she threw the last ball with all of her strength and to her delight it actually managed to reach the furthest basket. But instead of going in, the ball hit the edge of the basket and flew back towards Yuri, smacking her right between her eyes. “UGU!” She cried out pathetically when the ball hit her.

“I demand a retry..”

“I'm sorry miss but you only get one try per person-”

“I DEMAND A RETRY THIS IS RIGGED!”

She threw a tantrum until the stall owner reluctantly allowed her to have another go, if only so she would stop driving the other customers away.

This time, Yuri was not willing to lose, she drew a rune on the ground without anyone noticing. And before she threw every ball, she would activate the rune with her foot, making an unnoticeable gust of wind flow upward from it, lifting the ball she was throwing so it would easily reach the furthest basket with little effort on her part.

It took a little to get used to, but after she did, she hit almost every ball into the furthest basket.

“Hah! Look at that, The great Yuri wins again! I used to be a master of festival games! Seems I still am too! Haha!”

She boasted to Hikaru who pretended to not notice her obvious cheating.

“That's great Yuri, you might get first prize with that score”

He praised her.

“Might? There is no one who can beat my score, I remember when I used to visit these kinds of festivals with my friend, we would always compete and I would always win, every time it was my victory, he always got so upset! It was hilarious!”

She kept boasting while the stall owner announced the winners.

“Uh..third place..we got the mister with the sword over there”

He beckoned Hikaru forward and handed him some pretty badge.

“Third place? Come on Hikaru, I would have expected you to get at least second place, with me in first of course! Guess we can't all be winners huh”

Hikaru was patted on the back by Yuri.

“Right, well maybe I will have more luck next time”

Smiling at her, he was glad Yuri was having fun and relaxing.

“Second place..we have the young pretty lady in white”

He waved Yuri over.

“Huh? Pretty lady in white?”

Yuri looked behind her and couldn't find anyone that matched that description.

“No miss, I mean you”

He pointed at Yuri.

“Wait wait, first of all, I'm not a lady or pretty. Most important of all..what do you mean second place. Don't tell me you mixed up the scores, how embarrassing!”

“No..? It's all correct”

He handed her an ornate pin as her prize.

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“First place belongs to this guy. He got every single ball into the furthest basket without fail. It was amazing!”

He pointed at a nearby man who wore nondescript clothes. The only thing that made him stand out was the strange mask he was wearing which covered his whole head. It was a white pigeon mask, it also looked strange because the eyes looked so stale and lifeless.

The man walked up and collected his prize, before giving Yuri a peace sign while walking past her.

“That...smug little pigeon bastard..I'm sure he cheated! That's the only way!”

Small sparks flew out of Yuri's eyes while she glared at the disappearing back of the pigeon masked man.

(But you cheated too..did you forget..)

Hikaru thought. But didn't say anything in order to not ruin her mood further.

“Come on, let's find another stall, we were just unlucky with this one”

Pulling her away from her glaring, he took her to another stall where she could win first prize and get in a good mood again.

However..

“First prize goes to the man over there with the pigeon mask!”

Another prize handed over to the mysterious weirdo.

“I'm sure you will win the next one Yuri..”

Rubbing the head of the angry steaming Yuri, Hikaru pulled her away to another stall.

Yet no matter where they tried.

“First prize goes to the masked man!”

“The winner is the mystery pigeon mask!”

“Pigeon mask!” “Masked man! “Weird mask man!”

Each and every stall where a prize could be won was won by that strange nameless man.

“WHAT THE HELL IS THIS!? WHO IS THIS!? WHY DOES HE KEEP CHEATING!? HIKARU STAB HIM! SLASH HIM! SLICE HIM UP!”

Yuri was struggling against Hikaru's hold, which was the only thing keeping her from going on a murderous rampage.

“Calm down Yuri..I'm sure he was cheating like you said..”

He tried to comfort her but ended up only making the fire stronger.

“DAMN RIGHT HE CHEATED!!! I WILL SLICE HIM UP FOR IT! CHEATING AGAINST ME THAT FUCKING BASTARD!”

She continued to thrash against Hikaru's grip, her hands going for the dagger hidden beneath her clothes.

“Excuse me, Since you were first, I need to put in a name since you are the one who has the highest score”

A stall owner took down a wooden sign and erased the name on it before handing it to the pigeon masked man.

“.......”

The pigeon masked man, who had not spoken a single word so far, continued his silence. Taking out a pen, he wrote something on the wooden sign and handed it back.

The stall owner looked it over and nodded, slowly hanging it up on the top of the stall.

The single word written on the sign was...”Yuri”

“.....WHAT.”

Yuri blinked several times.

The pigeon masked man looked at the sign with obvious pride before nodding and slowly walking away.

“Ohhhh..so that mysterious champion is called Yuri..”

People murmured.

“I see...Yuri huh..he's so cool. So mysterious.”

Murmur murmur.

“I'm sure he's handsome beneath that mask too! Like a prince!”

There wasn't anyone in the festival who hadn't heard about the mysterious masked man taking all the high scores in all the stalls. So when they finally found out something about him, everyone began spreading rumours about the mysterious pigeon masked man that was supposedly called 'Yuri'.

“.....How are you feeling..?”

Hikaru asked carefully, extremely worried since Yuri hadn't said anything ever since the masked man put up that sign.

“....I'm fine...” She was shaking slightly.

“Yuri...are you okay..”

Reaching out towards her to make sure she wasn't crying, before-

“OF COURSE I'M NOT FINE DAMNIT!”

Yelling loud and clear, making everyone in the festival turn their heads towards the source of the noise, Yuri looked into Hikaru's eyes.

“That bastard. He thinks he can best me, the great legendary TRUE Yuri! Then he wants to steal my name too? Well you know what. I hate losing. And I hate him.”

Turning her back to Hikaru, she began looking around.

“Where did that bastard go. Let's find him and beat him...then unmask him..then beat him again! Literally!”

“Alright..”

They looked around all over the festival for him. One would think that such a strange person wouldn't go unnoticed, but it seems he had completely disappeared.

Until..

“By Asur! Someone stole all golden bells from the church!”

“Who would do something like that! That's horrible!”

“Someone also stole the fountain of the turtle guardian from the central plaza!?”

“How is that even possible!?”

“I hear it's the same thief who stole all the historically important books from the library..:!”

“How would you even know that??!”

“Apparently, the same message was left at each crime scene! A small word written in gold on the wall! I think it read 'Yuri'. Maybe the thief's name?”

“I also heard some people saw a man with a bird mask leaving the church right before the crime!”

“Wait..don't tell me! It can't be the festival Yuri! The one who won at all the stalls!?

Such rumours and heated discussions suddenly started to spread while Hikaru and Yuri were looking for the pigeon masked man that was also named Yuri.

“What...is this...”

Yuri stood still with shocked eyes in the middle of the moving sea of gossiping people.

“They say it's a pigeon mask.”

“What horrible string of crimes all in one night! That bird mask Yuri is incredible!”

“Incredible? More like horrible, why would you do that!”

“Ehh? But isn't that still kind of impressive?”

“I guess how he left his name in gold at the crime scene is very interesting.”

“I know right??”

Yuri stood completely still while people walked by her, each and every one of them speaking of the exact same thing.

“This....no way..”

Yuri felt the crowd of people crushing in on her even though everyone was carefully avoiding bumping into her.

Images of a stone archway with floating scenery of skyscrapers and painful images flashed across her mind. She wasn't sure what this meant, but it made her feel extremely light headed.

Humans find it difficult to exist in this realm.

A random sentence spoken by someone she did not remember.

She felt like she could sink in this sea of rumours and never see the light of day again.

“This....how...it's just like...”

“Yuri!”

She was brought back to reality by a comforting hand resting on her head. She slowly felt her worry and confusion drift away.

“Sorry Hikaru..But this is something..that shouldn't be happening..It makes no sense..”

“Then all we have to do is find out, right?”

He smiled at her.

“You're the only legendary Yuri right? There surely can't be room for two.”

“You're right..you're right!”

She felt her confidence returning to her.

“We just have to find out!”