The treasure hunt is delayed due to an unexpected storm

Friday came with a storm. The raindrops fell on the alley, creating big puddles in the concrete. The window was closed, but still the sound of the raindrops striking the metal of the emergency stairway was very noisy. Mirena dropped the light novel she was reading on the bed.

—I can’t concentrate like this.

—Yeah, and I can’t even hear a thing —said Ken, who was trying to watch an anime in the laptop. Even with the headphones, the sound of the rain was too annoying.

—Why is people so scared of the rain? It’s just water. If it were for me, I would go to visit Alice anyways.

—You know what? I’m agree with you on this one. I mean, I don’t like wet clothes neither, but some people can be very exaggerated. Also, a good umbrella solves everything.

—Right?

—Actually, sometimes I like to walk under the rain.

The reason to that was very simple: the more it rains, the less people is in the street. Walking in the rain gave him the feeling that he was the only one in the city, and the feeling of freedom was great.

—Let’s take a walk! —proposed Mirena.

—You can go if you want. I don’t feel like going outside today.

—Oh, that’s fine.

—Take the umbrella just in case.

He liked to walk under the rain, but the thing he wanted the most was having some time alone in his apartment, like in the old times.

When she left, he felt like going back in time. For one second, all the past week seemed to be a dream, and just then he awakened. Alone in his apartment, a lifestyle he thought it would be forever the same. Everything was so normal just a second before Mirena incarnated in real world.

He needed that time alone. But then, just a few minutes later, he started to miss her. It was so annoying. He was uncomfortable at her side, but also so sad when she wasn’t there. It was too late to deny that he was crazily in love.

It was a love way beyond the one he had for the fictional character, a kind of love he actually never felt before. He was always so isolated, so far from everyone, that he never felt that emotion. Of course, during the school he found some of his classmates pretty, but that wasn’t love, just physical attraction. His feelings for Mirena were genuine love. And he had no idea how to deal with that.

His mind created tons of imaginary scenarios, illusions of a happy life with her. And he wanted to fight and achieve one of those dream worlds, but how?

He was too scared to confess. And even if he were to do so, there were a lot of probabilities to it to go wrong.

First one, the most obvious. She says no. She says absolutely no, and the next week would be completely uncomfortable for both.

The second one, she says yes. And that was painful too, because he would feel evil. After all, he’s the only one whom she had a relationship with during his new life in the real world. If she said yes, he would think that he was manipulating her, forcing her to like the things he likes, shaping Mirena to turn her into his ideal partner, which indeed she was.

And even if she said yes and he didn’t feel guilty, there was still another outcome: she leaves this world. In that case, would she choose her previous life or the new one? For Ken, it was very obvious: she would choose Mask. He was perfect, ideal. Not him, and probably any real human being could compete with Mask ever.

Even if she said yes, he would have to live with the feeling that he was just the second option, the consolation prize after she lost the real love of her life.

Too many negatives thoughts, as usual considering his overthinking tendencies, were filling his head with dark clouds like the ones that made it rain outside.

It was weird to see the streets of such a crowded city empty.

Only her shoes were wet; the umbrella did a great job keeping her body dry.

The feeling and the sound of the raindrops falling above the umbrella was very relaxing, and that brought up several thoughts.

8 more days and the anime convention would be held. “Am I going to be able to meet Yoriyuki Yamahito?” was her first fear. “What would happen then?” was the second. “Will I be able to go back to my world?” was the third one. And the last one: “Do I want that?”.

If those fears, insecurities or troubles, however you want to call them, weren’t enough, there was also Ken. Why was he still hiding his real self?

At the begging, she thought it would may be something of the real world. Something that happens to real people and she would end up doing sooner or later. But after meeting Eli and Arthur, she knew that wasn’t the case. Of course, she still hadn’t spent so much time with them as with Ken, but still there was something different about them. What they showed in the exterior and what the eyes were saying was congruent. That wasn’t the case with Ken. It felt like if he was constantly creating an invisible wall, saying: “you’re not going to penetrate in my privacy.”

Zack, Sean, Bobby, Alice and Colt. The reason why Mirena insisted so much about meeting them in person wasn’t just her silly adventuress hearth. He wanted to meet them and learn more about real people and their relationships with others. That was the only way to understand Ken better. But also, she expected to understand herself and her new feelings a bit more.

It was still raining, but at least the noise subdued a bit. Ken decided to watch anime, yet the noise in his head was still quite loud.

Now he was thinking about another thing: he was friend of a cosplayer. Well, maybe it was too soon to use the powerful word ‘friend’, but he was getting acquainted with her. And not only with her, but also with her circle.

Wasn’t that what he always dreamed of? To be friends with a group of people with similar tastes and complementary personalities? Yes, it was.

All this time Ken had been consoling to himself thinking that those ideal friends he wanted weren’t real. But they were. And they were there, very close to him. So maybe it was time to stop being so nasty and be a bit more open. But of course, it wasn’t as easy as just saying it.

He was very bad at socializing, and he was even worse when he was too afraid of screwing it up. Doing something embarrassing in public wasn’t ok, but it was manageable. However, doing something embarrassing in front of someone he really wanted to get along was catastrophic.

He tried to play videogames to shut up the voices, but the result was the same. Too busy overthinking all the possibilities of the future encounters with those 5 unknowns. The conclusion was: “just follow Eli and Mirena, don’t screw it up, and it should be fine.” A week conclusion, but a conclusion at least.

Timed with a thunder, the door of the apartment was opened, scaring the shit out of Ken.

—I’m back! —yelled Mirena—. Did I scare you?

—God dammit —he said, returning his breathing to its normal rhythm.

—I’ll take that as a yes.

—Did you have fun?

—Meh, it was just a walk. Nothing important happened.

—And what about the kid you were talking to?

—Eh? What kid?

—You know, the kid you were talking when you left. I thought he took the elevator with you.

—What are you talking about? —Ken sighed.

—When you left and closed the door, I heard the voice of a child coming from outside. I was confused because I didn’t remember any kid living on this floor, but I didn’t care too much about. I thought you’ll tell me who he was when you came back.

—No, I wasn’t talking to anyone. How strange… Maybe there’s a kid in the apartments of above or below?

—Mmmm I don’t think so. Well, there was a woman pregnant some years ago, but I heard that she lost the kid unfortunately. She went crazy after that.

Mirena had a shiver.

—You’re only trying to scare me, aren’t you?

—Of course not. I’m saying the truth.

“Yeah, sure, you saying the truth” she thought.

—Well that’s weird, because when I was walking and old woman with a raspy voice said to me from her window: “What a lovely child”. —Now it was Ken who had a shiver—. I smiled to her, thinking that she had confused me with a kid, or maybe she was treating me as a kid because of the age difference, you know? But maybe I’m just being followed by a ghost!

—Don’t say that kind of things with such enthusiasm! —exclaimed Ken. Maybe starting a war or horror tales wasn’t the best idea if your opponent is some adventuress that comes from a fantasy world. But in Sekaunmei there is no fiction, so Ken had the power of “imagination” on his side. Also, telling stories is technically a form of lying, so he should be kind of an expert.

That way, they spent all the evening and the night telling horror stories, watching scary videos on the internet, and horror movies. The imperishable rain was the perfect setting for that.

The result: they both couldn’t sleep very well that night.