truth

It is pitch black and Sylvia is in a state of panic, surprise, shock and fear. Who wouldn’t be after being dragged into a liquefied train by a boy with wings in a parallel world?

White suddenly replaces the darkness. Sylvia scans around: white everywhere but no Jensei. She waits a few minutes. Nothing changes. The sterile white is starting to get to Sylvia.

What to do, what to do, what to do, Sylvia repeated in her mind over and over again, pacing around, biting her thumb nail. What COULD I do? It is a question that Sylvia ponders. If she starts walking, she would not know where she is walking to. If she starts talking, she would not know who she is talking to. And just walking to nowhere and talking to yourself doesn’t seem very sane.

Wait! Sylvia pats her left fist on her right palm. That’s it! The only effective thing to do is keep sane. Sylvia then sits down and waits. But she realizes she has nothing to wait for. Then what? What will be her reason to keep sane? Reality struck her.

"How will I get food?"

Those seem like the magic words. The scenery changes from pure white into a laboratory of foreign machinery. Sylvia was in the middle of a glowing circle. Surrounding her is a glass dome. It is as if she is in a giant Christmas globe, without the snowflakes and cardboard display of course. She suddenly sees Jensei right outside, his pose slumping in awe. His mouth is moving. Either the glass is sound-proof or he can’t get his words to come out. Jensei then shakes his head ferociously and presses a button beside him. The glass dome seems to melt away, no longer forming a barrier.

Good.

Sylvia runs toward Jensei with such speed she surprises even herself. It did not, however, distract her from trying to punch the daylights out of him. He blocks the attack easily with his free hand. Sylvia starts to strike with her other hand but stops in midair when Jensei interrupts her train of thought.

"W-whoa! No need to get so energetic, Miss Sylvia. Save the energy for later training."

Sylvia blinks away her eyes of anger and says, "Wait a minute. Training?!"

Jensei nods ferociously and gives nervous glances at her fist in midair. Sylvia quickly recoils, blushing in embarrassment. She bows deeply.

"I am terribly sorry for trying to hurt you."

"I wouldn’t blame you." Jensei mutters.

She looks down at her clothes. They changed from her school uniform to a formal black velvet dress that went below her knees. Her eyes widen. The skirts are lined with beautiful white lace and embroidered on the dress stomach are two white flowing wings. She then studies the rest of her body to see her arms in long matching black gloves. The back palms also have the wings symbol. She slowly looks up at Jensei.

"What happened?"

"Congratulations!!" Jensei says, spreading his arms out wide. "You have officially entered training to defeat the wizard who created the Air Reality!"

"…"

"Sylvia? Did you hear what I said?" Jensei waves his hand in front of Sylvia’s blank expression.

"Oh is that all? Well I—what do you mean training?! ‘Is that all’ my butt! Can you PLEASE tell me what the heck is going on?! Like, the entire story, PLEASE!! I know until the part where our ancestors got sucked into this world by some wizard who created it."

"Okay, okay! Just calm down."

Jensei takes a deep breath. "Our ancestors soon arrived in the new world and all they could see was blue. Now, they wouldn’t be healers of the insane for nothing, but they only lasted maybe twelve hours until they started to lose their sanity in this world. You lasted for 2 minutes, ha ha, but you got out of that training dome pretty skillfully.

Anyway, the wizard was watching all along, and as soon as the slightest drop of sanity slipped their minds, they were cursed. The wizard wasn’t that bad, so he informed our ancestors about it.

‘Because you didn’t pass this test, you and your children’s souls will never rest in peace until they defeat me or my children after me. For exactly 13 years of your life, I will let you live in the real world only to deliver you back to this world of transparent reality with a gift. After their arrival, another will be born. Defeating me is the only way to shatter this world and free your souls, but I’ll let you have fun. You can create different places in this special world with your imagination, but only one per person. You will use your imagined place to battle me if you think you’re ready. Be aware, however, that this world contains none of the reality you once knew.’

With that he disappeared."

"Cool! So that’s why I had the same birthday as father. Wait a minute. Then why’s dad so old? He can’t be 13-years-old."

"Because he found out about the gift somehow and managed to avoid it in time. That didn’t stop the wizard’s curse though. He was soon in this world at exactly age forty, avoiding the curse for twenty-seven years. It’s a record!! He’s like a celebrity here. No one else managed to avoid it that long. Maybe three or four, but twenty-seven? But, for those like us who couldn’t avoid the curse the first time, well, here we are." Jensei’s eyes are painfully sad, so Sylvia tries to cheer him up.

"Don’t worry! Forget about that. I’ll train hard, defeat whoever and release everyone’s soul from this world! This’ll prove how 13-year-olds have power, too!!" Sylvia’s eyes are flaring with determination.

Jensei perks up a little. "You got it! Time for our next training course: combat-training!"

Sylvia gives a nervous expression. "Shoot! I sucked at P.E.," she thought. Giving a small sigh, she says, "When do we start?"