World's Intermission 2

The world began to fade away with the resolution of the story and a return of everyone back to the void. Yumi had to cut her emotions short as she looked around for their overseer once more. “We’re back again…what’s going to be the next world?”

“You’re in quite the rush for having just returned from a ten year expedition into space.” The woman that ran this trial, or at least knew what was happening, appeared before Yumi and her friends once more.

Seiji reacted immediately to the shocking declaration, considering how longer it had been and he had zero concept of the passage of time in the death state. “You mean Yumi’s thirty now?!” And his first question was about her age rather than anything else. “I mean she doesn’t even look older than the last time I saw her!”

“That’s because I’m only twenty-one.”

“Huh? Wha--?”

Like she had already put together, Yuki picked up on it immediately being the only one clued into what she experienced this time. “Yumi, you were—“

“Yes…longer than I guessed…”

“I did round up a little,” the overseer replied as though that was any comfort to the mental anguish that Yumi suffered during her trial.

The cavalier attitude that she had about the whole ordeal ruffled Yumi up a little, but she realized that there was little that she could do about it. Like before, she had zero control over what was happening. She was at the whims of her personalities and whatever their attempts were. “Can we just start the final test you’ve got in store for me.” Pushing forward was all Yumi could really focus on, especially since if things played out the way that they seemed she would have control over them when she finished their last world.

Chapter 497 – World’s Intermission 2

The next world didn’t come however, as she didn’t have that sort of control. It remained at the discretion of her frustrating personalities. “You should take a break.”

“This is the last one, I want to just get it over with.”

“You wouldn’t be trying to run away from your consequences again?”

“What? I’m not running. I’ve just lost 15 years of my life in this space. I don’t want to be taking more, wasting time on you.” Yumi crossed her arms having difficulty keeping her frustration in check with someone that was so casual about what she went through.

“Oh yeah! What the hell was that all about Yumi?”

“Huh?” she answered, tilting her head back towards Seiji, genuinely confused about what he was yelling about now.

Yuki stepped in trying to calm him down. He clearly knew something that she did not. “It’s fine, Seiji. Yumi wasn’t herself back then.”

“Yuki? What haven’t you told me?”

“What?! She doesn’t remember?”

“She was acting a little strangely, Seiji,” noted Saki. They hadn’t been able to ask her about what was going on during the time before they all died. As their last memories, it wasn’t a pleasant one that they enjoyed.

“That’s fine, I just want an explanation!”

Yumi found it surprising how understanding Seiji was being for whatever it was that she had done. The thousands of loops that she made completely blurred into an unrecognizable mess. She had no hopes of being able to piece things apart from one loop to another. However, as she thought more about what happened, she remembered that she started to care less about her friends and more on the objective of breaking the loop.

She pressed her hand up against her head catching faint images of the memories mixed up. None of it meant anything anymore and was likely not even the most recent from the last loop. ‘I knew that things were just going to loop, so I didn’t even give a thought to their safety since they weren’t going to remember any of it. Damnit…this isn’t how I wanted it to go…’

Clenching her hand into a fist, she knew that she had to accept things for how they played out. “I’m not running,” she said, not directed at her friends. “I can explain part of it, Seiji.”

Saki and Yuki stopped seeing that Yumi decided to take the lead. They backed away and everyone gave their attention to her. “I won’t make excuses for my actions. I’m sorry for all of the times I failed you, my friends.”

“All the times?” Seiji clearly understood that she had a deeper meaning to the choice of words she picked, but didn’t get it.

“The last world we were in I was caught in a loop that repeated about every two weeks. We were all caught in it, but I was the only one that could remember each loop.”

“Then those years…” he trailed off as it came together for him.

“Yes, I made a lot of mistakes and I shouldn’t—“ She was cut off suddenly by surprise to find that Seiji had walked over to her and grabbed her in a big hug that turned out to be quite comforting and easing. He didn’t have to say anything to her and she understood. Seiji understood clearly. Tears started to well up in her eyes before she even recognized it.

After about a good minute, Seiji stepped back giving her a warm pat on the head, that seemed a little out of place considering that she was older than him at the moment. “Thanks.”

“We’re friends. Forgive and support.”

“Still I should—“

He put out a hand to stop her quickly. “Yumi, it’s fine. I’m not angry. I just wanted to understand.”

“He’s just not always great with his words,” jabbed Saki.

“Hey!”

Yumi laughed a little happy to see them again and relieved to see that it hadn’t soured their relationship. When she was doing the loops, nothing about consequences concerned her once she realized that there was nothing lasting. In hindsight, the way that she acted scared her that she could become so focused to have ignored them. ‘I need to get better…I still have a long way to go…’

“With that mystery cleared up, what happened this time, since we missed a lot?” There was less for her to fill them in on what happened as she could easily shorten the loops down to a summary. She kept the high level technical details to a minimum, though they slipped through here and there.

She sat in the circle with everyone gathered in the end, excluding the continuing petulant Yori. Her brother’s quiet brooding aura made him easy to track. The fact that he had little to no time to actually process any of his emotions or thoughts so far did him no favors. She only hoped that once they left, they could have a proper conversation. In his current mental state, she wasn’t going to be making any progress with him.

“In the end, Sumiko was scared of failure and that it could mean that her whole life had been wasted on the pursuit of knowledge.”

“See, brain power isn’t everything, Saki!” Seiji exercised as the point of the lesson.

“That’s not something you should take pride in for not using your mind. Your battle would be easier if you applied some of this.”

“A real man fights with passion and strength!”

“A real man would use their mind when it was clear to change the battle!”

“You just don’t understand what it means to be a man!”

“Neither do you and your old fashion standards!”

While Saki and Seiji bickered over what it meant to be a man in the modern age, Yuki looked back to Yumi. “Things are only getting worse with these tests. This last one nearly left you broken and insane. I worry what the next is going to do.”

Yumi nodded quietly with his concern. It was something that she tried not to dwell on too hard as it made herself doubt the path she picked. “I admit I thought I knew what the risks were coming in here, but it’s changing me far more than I imagined. This wasn’t what I counted on experiencing.”

“How are you feeling right now?” asked Nerine, unsurprisingly aware of what mental fatigue was like.

“After the loop ended, things improved. But I can’t deny the draining effect this has. The years that are being compressed into me. I’m not sure how I’ll come out of all of this.” She could see Yuki’s worry for her plainly on his face. “But I’m not quitting now. We’re almost to the end.”

“You’re certain that this is going to be the last world?”

“Based on what all of you have said about my episodes and faint memories I have, there are three distinct personalities that have surfaced.”

“Rule of threes…”

“Seems that way.” Yumi stood up feeling a little better prepared for the last world. At least that was what she felt in the moment. Though nothing she could have known or done could have prepared her for the future that she faced. Yumi could only march towards it in confidence as the end approached. “Hey, you! Is it time now?”

Broken out of their arguing, attention returned to the overseer as she approached to take the main stage once more. “If you want to enjoy yourself a little longer you can. Partake in the bonds of friendship, it has been quite some time since you were all together again.”

Everyone gathered up behind Yumi in support, minus Yori. “We’re all ready to go! Come whatever you toss at us! Split us across the country or strip our lives away, nothing will break us! We’ll remain connected!”

The mysterious woman raised up her finger to the air for the group. “That’s definitely a fine attitude to have. You’ll want to make sure you remember what you said. You might find that tested in ways that you don’t know.”

“Make whatever ominous claims you want. The last world is going to be the hardest yet, right?”

“Aww, you're stealing my lines,” she feigned disappointment in Yumi. The false emotions disappeared quickly for her. “But you’re correct. What you approach will be nothing like what you’ve seen so far. So steel yourself.”

“I’ll pass your test and be back here to claim my mind and body for my own once and for all!”

“I look forward to seeing you again!” She clapped her hands together wiping away the void. The white light persisted for longer than she expected. It seemed like it was for dramatic effect with how long that she waited, but it finally started to disappear on her and bring her into the final test.

Awaking slowly, her body felt slow and heavy as though she had just been asleep and didn’t want to get moving. It made everything feel lethargic despite her alertness. Her eyes weren’t quite in focus making it difficult to see where she was just yet. Though in the distance she could hear the rhythmic and steady clacking of wood to stone spaced out at even and exact measures. Fresh air that wasn’t recycled ran through her nose and the sounds of animals rather than static hums of technology. ‘I’m back on Earth. After the sci-fi setting I sort of expected something more extreme than that.’

Yumi finally managed to pull her body up fighting through the sleepiness to get herself out of bed, though on the floor rather than a proper bed. She looked around in foggy eyes, noticing that everything had a very old fashion rustic feel like she was going through a history museum. ‘In the past again?’ Questions continued about her setting until she pushed herself to stand.

She looked around in confusion finding everything to be strangely tall and to the wrong scale. Things were out of reach of her as she stretched to open the door from the expected place. “What?!” It was then that she noticed it. “My hand!” Yumi looked down at her kimono clad body to find that it was tiny and frail. “I’m a child?!”