Part 3: Search Party

Anyway, I sat down next to Cherry who didn’t seem too fazed. She had been listening to the ruckus that was Aoki and Miri. They were teasing Hiroto about his possible love obsession with Cherry.

“C’mon Hiroto, just say it.”

“No Aoki. For the last time, I wasn’t looking at Cherry. I was staring outside the window.”

“Oh sure. Nothing beats a logical explanation than just telling someone, ‘I was just looking outside the window.’ Your desk is literally two desks away from the window itself.”

Miri butted herself into the silly conversation immediately after Aoki said this.

“Exactly! Like you could be in the corner and that would be a fine excuse. Of course, not exactly the best since… You weren’t focusing on the lesson! Animearth to Hiroto! We are in a prestigious school. What could be so important about staring outside a window?”

Hiroto began to stutter which was immediately slammed by Miri’s rebuttal once again.

“Hahah! Caught in a lie! What did I say? You love Cherry. Case closed. End. Of. Discussion.”

“What? Hey no, that’s not fair! You didn’t give me the chance to finish.”

“Well if you didn’t stammer, or stay quiet for more than two seconds, I wouldn’t have came to that conclusion.”

While they were going on about their gag routine, I decided to ask Cherry politely about if she had ever played Candiere’s Cafe. She didn’t necessarily seem comfortable with the question. The glare in her dark crimson glasses and lime key-colored eyes told me everything I needed to know. Now was not the time.

I walked away admittedly a bit frustrated. I wondered why she just stared at me like that. Suddenly the bell rang early out of nowhere. What could this possibly be? The announcement speaker began to answer that question shortly after.

“Attention all faculty and students of Dream Academy High, three missing students have not been found as of yesterday. Their parents request that if you see them located around the school’s premises or anywhere at all, that you contact us when you have the time. Thank you and have a good rest of your day.”

Oh no. Not again.

While I had figured for awhile that the superstition behind Candiere’s Cafe could have ties to what I was hearing, there are many conspiracies from students that came to their own conclusions.

Some believed that a mysterious event called “The Day Of The Dark Sun” cursed our school. This was real. Essentially what happened was the solar flare activity from our sun went at an all time high and sucked out the remaining energy it seemed to have left. In other words, we experienced a day’s worth of barely any outside light. What was left? A white dwarf star. It caused an emergency wide response where we had to stay sheltered in our homes for that long. It was like living in an arctic zone. Our world slightly moved away from orbit and at that point, everyone was truly scared.

Out of some sort of strange occurrence however, it was restored back to its original state and we now orbit our sun farther away than usual. They say a star brighter than anything recorded in history created this huge explosion that reached our world and reversed the solar flare emissions in under roughly 27 hours which is how long a day is in Animearth.

Ever since that day, one to three students go missing on The Day Of The Dark Sun every 8,748 days. Our calendar is really different since for us, that many days is equal to every 36 months which is also equal to a year. The point being is that it has been that way for a long time. The school tried making that day a holiday to avoid any problems. Still, the issue at hand ensued with merciless intent.

Just recently, yesterday was that holiday. No one still attends the academy on that date. While very likely that the date in itself could be cursed, it isn’t the only rumor floating around.

Other students say a strange creature inhabits the school during closing hours. No evidence has been found except for dead bodies in random places which have been discovered at least once every year. Usually, it’s either a group of students trying to unravel the mystery surrounding what happened the previous year or an individual alone in the building by themselves. We do try our best to warn them about it. Even with all of the strict rules in place, they somehow remain there after everyone is gone. Then they end up missing. News did spread fast, but when a death or missing report occurs only once a year it doesn’t have much of an effect on the reputation of this academy.

That, in my opinion, is what makes the entire institution both unique and problematic.