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theamityelf · 2 years

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Okay, having given more thought to the Descendants Danganronpa AU idea, this is the alignment I've come up with:

Mal- Ultimate Dragon (in which "Dragons" is the name of her mother's criminal empire). Basically the rough equivalent to Fuyuhiko being the Ultimate Yakuza, in SDR2. (And character-design-wise, I see her having designs shaved into her hair, like Fuyuhiko. Her style of dress would be more Junko-but-with-leather.) She's the type to keep saying she'll kill someone, as a means of putting on a brave face, while really she's terrified because she knows she's not much of a fighter without backup.

She is right up there with Chad, as far as ruining any solidarity or group synergy is concerned. But she's more deliberately manipulative about it, in that she will use the lack of unity and trust to place herself in a kind of leadership role. Basically, feeding the idea that they will start killing each other if they don't have a leader to keep them in check, and that anyone who doesn't want her leadership is trying to start the killings (again). This doesn't really succeed in giving her control over them, but she is influential. She's able to sway most of them to distrust Harry.

Because she would be filling the role of Danganronpa Antagonist, it would be too obvious to make her a killer, so she would probably get killed late in the story. I feel like she would die screwing someone over, so maybe someone like Doug kills her in self-defense when she tries to kill him or Harry kills her for plotting to harm Uma.

Evie- Ultimate Fashionista. She is both a fashion designer and a model. I could see her having a hairstyle similar to Celeste's. (Maybe shorter springs, and more of them on each side.) Before they find out about the killing game, she's very bubbly and extroverted, but as soon as the first murder happens, she becomes very serious (but still kind).

She and Audrey became fast friends, and they remain so the whole time, but she is much more secretive and careful than Audrey. She and Audrey are often arm-in-arm, but she is also enough of a social butterfly to be friends with Jay and Carlos. (She thinks Jay is funny and sympathizes with Carlos's shyness, and she admires both of their talents.) As far as her role in the story, I could see her being kind of a mix between Kirumi and Kaede in DRV3. She is secretly plotting to kill the mastermind.

She would not get murdered, but she might murder and get executed. I don't think she survives the killing game.

Jay- Ultimate Gymnast; his backstory would be very similar to Akane's in SDR2, in that he comes from poverty and did parkour and other feats of athleticism to get out of trouble when he had to steal to survive, and ultimately ended up racking up accolades in gymnastics when he got discovered by the "right" people.

In the killing game and in life, he pretends to be less intelligent than he is, because things go better for him when he is underestimated. In the trials, he makes really astute observations, but he always phrases them as questions or jokes or otherwise obliquely prompts the other smart ones to get to the truth. His intelligence and his feigned ignorance are very effective at keeping him safe. I think he survives the killing game.

Carlos- Ultimate Technician. His skill set is a cross between Chihiro's and Miu's, in that he's talented in both hardware and software. He would be very shy, before they find out about the killing game. Once they do learn about it, though, he would go into self-defense mode, which for him is very stoic and determined.

He would try to trust the others at first, but after the first murder happens, he gets scared and desperate. Not necessarily a bad thing. He might hole up in his dorm room for a few days and then come out having created a device that would send out an EMP that disables Monokuma and all the cameras. As soon as he's done this, it takes Carlos like ten seconds to disassemble Monokuma entirely, and then he makes for the front door to see if he's succeeded in powering down the guns and locks. On the way there, though, all the lights in the building would go off. The mastermind is desperate to keep them from escaping, and Carlos has caused them a lot of inconvenience with these technical difficulties. When the lights turn back on, Carlos's EMP device is gone, someone has been murdered, and now they have to investigate and do a trial. (If we're going absolutely heartbreaking, maybe Evie knew that the mastermind would make a move once the lights were off and accidentally killed Carlos while trying to kill the mastermind.)

I don't think the mastermind would want him to survive, but he might make it maybe.

Uma- Ultimate Survivor, but she introduces herself as the Ultimate Swimmer because it's easier to explain and one of her survival skills is not attracting interest. Even before she knows she's in a killing game, she knows better than to entice potential murderers; someone known as the "Ultimate Survivor" would be like catnip to them. Really, she is a good swimmer, but she's also very good at making it out of bad situations alive.

She herself is not famous, but she's gotten out of a lot of famous catastrophes, to the point that the academy took note. (Maybe she fell into a shark tank as a kid and managed to swim to the edge and climb out without being eaten. And then as a preteen she went on a spelunking field trip, the cave collapsed, and she led her whole class to safety. And then as a teen she was cornered by the Ultimate Serial Killer and managed to talk them out of killing her. Etc.) They have studied her luck, since it's statistically weird that she has ended up in so many fiascos.

She bonds with Harry before they find out about the killing game, and before she finds out what his Ultimate is. She's able to get along with pretty much anyone, and she has her moments with most everyone in the group, but Harry she connects with on an unusual level. They're close friends, by the time Mal tries to turn the whole group against him.

Character-design-wise, she wears a lot of layers, to conceal survival tools. She wears her hair in turquoise braids, and they're all tied back out of her way. She wears a braided necklace that unweaves into a very long rope, if needed. Her belt has lots of dangling carabiners and such.

The fact that she expects danger at every turn can actually become comedic; whenever new areas of the school are opened up to them, she immediately learns incredibly specific things about each place, like which room is the best to hide in if there's an earthquake, or which is the greatest fire hazard, etc. She is very mocking of the mastermind and the ridiculousness of Monokuma. I think she survives, but also I could see a Danganronpa death in which the killer lures her to a particular room by making it seem like there's an earthquake or something. But narratively she probably lives, because the characters who lose someone close to them over the course of the game usually do. (Foreshadowing.)

Harry- Ultimate Assassin. Very similar backstory to Jay, but he got discovered by the "wrong" people, who found other uses for his talents. (Namely, hiring him to kill people. He is very good at it.) In fact, Harry and Jay used to be friends when they were children. They stole food together.

In the trials, Harry is an asset because of his real life experience. He can easily determine what would and wouldn't be an instant killing blow, etc. He can look at the blood-covered object left in the room and say, "That ain't the murder weapon. For that kind of fracture, the killer would have to swing it like this, and..." etc. He is also accused of murder in pretty much every trial, because...well...Ultimate Assassin.

Harry assumes a wild and carefree attitude as a defense mechanism. I think he dresses in dark colors, since he sneaks around for a living. Maybe his outfit is something like what Zuko and Katara wear in the Southern Raiders episode of Avatar. (Ooh, and his eyeliner is done like Mondo from the first Danganronpa game!) But he would also have a fair amount of bling: gifts from his employers.

He pretends not to remember Jay. He laughs/giggles at inappropriate times, out of stress. He gravitates toward Uma's stability and clear-headedness, and she enjoys his snarky and grim sense of humor. He gets really protective of her once things start to heat up. He also bonds with Gil and Lonnie, but he is especially close to Uma. He actually earns her trust.

I don't think he survives the killing game.

Gil- Ultimate Animal Caregiver. He could go so many ways, and I thought about lots of options, but I think I'm going to say he takes care of animals. His backstory can be that his dad taught him how to hunt but he could never kill animals without crying, so instead he takes care of animals. Feels like it's kind of stealing one of Carlos's main things, but Gaston does hunt and Gil does love animals; this alignment of talents feels right to me. Gil in this universe raises puppies and cats and mayhap some hamsters. It was this or Ultimate Archer or some other physical one. I like this one, okay?

He is not great at figuring out the cases, but he has a knack for running into important clues by accident or being told important things by the killer or victim, either because the killer underestimates him or the victim trusts him. In a normal Danganronpa game, I'm pretty sure he dies, since no one with a different body type ever survives those games. For this AU, though, I think he does survive the killing game. No one wants to try killing him, and he wouldn't hurt them unprovoked.

Chad- Ultimate Affluent Progeny. Like Byakuya, but way dumber. He would spend the whole killing game accusing people wildly and almost at random. I could see him being a victim, or getting a murder pinned on him, or killing someone in a panic and then trying so hard to convince everyone he didn't do it that he straight up cries in the courtroom. Of course, this is leaning into the Descendants franchise's steady Flanderization of Chad, so like I said, it could go plenty of ways. Maybe, hearkening to him getting Evie to do his homework for him, he convinces someone to kill for him. Probably not though. I don't think he survives.

Audrey- Ultimate Princess. Like Sonia in SDR2, she's an exchange student who is heir to the throne of her homeland. She is already a huge fan of Evie's work, and Evie is already a huge fan of her, so they become besties right away. (Maybe they're wearing practically the same outfit, but in different colors.) Audrey is more openly emotional than Evie; she isn't a very strong investigator, because all of the murders impact her very deeply. Evie's death especially hits her hard. This results in a degree of character development that pretty much guarantees she'll make it to the end of the game. I think she does survive.

Jane- Ultimate Lucky Student. She won the drawing to be a part of this class, and just in general stuff tends to work out for her. She has great organizational skills, but not the sort of talent the academy really looks for. General competency isn't an ultimate. She's pretty good at helping to solve the cases, though. I think probably someone tries to murder her but her luck causes them to fail and she accidentally kills them, meaning she now has to be executed. Or maybe she survives the whole game. Could go either way.

Ben- Ultimate Moral Compass. He gets this title partially by getting good grades and not breaking any rules, but also because he does a lot of charity work and vocally advocates for a lot of social causes. He would be ineffectually going "Wait! Guys! We need to get along! This is just what Monokuma wants!" the whole time. (Again, if we're bowing to his Flanderization in canon.) He might pull a Makoto and get absolutely decked trying to break up a conflict.

Some of the other characters would call him naive, but a lot of them are endeared by it. He wants to believe in Mal and ultimately suffers for it. He might survive the game, though. Or she tricks him into, like, holding a rope that sets off a Rube Goldberg machine of murder and he ends up getting executed, fully convinced that he deserved it despite it being her fault.

Doug- Ultimate Musician. He plays a lot of instruments. He'd be the character whose role is to point out when the other characters say something weird by repeating the thing they just said, but as a question. Maybe he and Mal would have Kokichi and Kiibo vibes, in that Mal would go out of her way to bully him for no reason. Anyway, I'm pretty sure he doesn't survive. I could see him in a class trial going "Wait! But that's not fair! I didn't mean to!" And it probably isn't fair and he probably didn't mean to, but that's how the game works.

Lonnie- Ultimate Swordsman. Sort of completely ignores all the social tensions; she doesn't care about who leads, she doesn't care that Harry is an assassin. She's basically cool with everyone unless they bother her. I feel like, in an actual Danganronpa game, she would die in a really stupid way for a really stupid reason. Like, she'd be a Chapter 3 murder (meaning one of two), and we find out that she walked into the kitchen while the killer was taping a bunch of forks together or something and got killed because she saw too much. And the killer bonks her on the head as a surprise attack and pretends she drowned in the sink. (Has Danganronpa ruined my brain? No, I'm sure it's fine.) Anyway, that being said, she would also be a cool survivor.

One of them could be the mastermind, or some throwaway character like Zevon or Ariana could be in the mix.

To recap, likely survivors are Jay, Uma, Gil, and Audrey. Maybe survivors are Jane, Ben, and Lonnie.

#disney descendants #danganronpa au #uma daughter of ursula #harry hook #gil legume #mal bertha #evie grimhilde #jay son of jafar #carlos de vil #chad charming #princess audrey rose #jane daughter of fairy godmother #audrevie kind of #huma #king ben florian

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fanfictwins · 2 years

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DRV3 - Halloween Special 2022

Summary: "As a young enthusiastic ghost hunter, you'd go to the ends of the earth in order to find proof of paranormal life. Luckily, you just have to go to a certain Ultimate Academy instead."

Word Count: ~15k

“Okay… just up and over, and-”

You launched yourself off of the cold metal of the fence, landing on your feet with a thump before immediately going to steady yourself, the heavy bag resting on your back threatening to tip you over if you didn’t.

“...I’m in.”

The area beyond the fence was dark — you were here in the dead of night, so that was to be expected — but it seemed like the moon above was giving you just enough light to let you see where you were going without the use of a flashlight; since waving one around out here would be a surefire way to bring attention to yourself and get yourself caught, you appreciated anything that helped you to stay under the radar of anyone who might be watching this place.

You weren’t sure what exactly the punishment for trespassing was, but since there were various “Do Not Enter” signs posted around the property and a tall fence with a locked gate, you knew that there was something awaiting those caught sneaking onto the grounds.

Shrugging your shoulders, you slid your bag off of your back and brought it around to set it on the ground in front of you before unzipping it. You shuffled through your items, eventually grabbing your camera — the battery fully-charged for the night ahead, with extra batteries packed just in case — and turning it on.

“Hey, hey, everybody!” You smiled, pointing the camera at your face. “I’m officially within the borders of the Ultimate Academy for Gifted Juveniles, and I’m ready to get hunting!”

You set the camera down next to you as you dug around in your bag again, this time grabbing one of the flashlights you had brought with you; while the outside of the academy was illuminated by moonlight, there was no guarantee the inside would be the same. You also strapped a pair of night-vision goggles to your head, an extra precaution should something happen to your flashlights, while the rest of your tools remained in your backpack for later.

After slinging your backpack over your shoulders again, you grabbed your camera from where it sat on the ground and pointed it forward. “Alright, let’s get going!”

You surveyed the area around you, comparing it to the map you had looked at beforehand and committed to memory after hours of staring at it in preparation for your trip; based on what you were seeing, you were currently standing in the area opposite to the actual school building. You would have been surprised at how big the property was if it weren’t for the fact that it apparently served as the grounds of a private academy for the crème de la crème of high school students.

The Ultimate Academy for Gifted Juveniles was supposedly some fancy school that exceptionally talented teenagers attended to hone and perfect their talents, securing them a successful future as adults after graduation, but, according to your research, the place only operated for a few years before it shut down. The remains of that promising place were left to the mercy of time, eventually breaking down into the decrepit disappointment before you now.

But you didn’t really care about that.

You were here to hunt for ghosts, not mourn a privileged educational facility that failed to survive; the depressing aura of broken hopes and dreams was actually what pulled you here — you would have preferred something along the lines of murder or other tragedies that ended in death, but your research unfortunately revealed a lack of anything like that — since that kind of aura would definitely attract something that would reside within the crumbling halls.

And you were going to find it.

- - - - -

“Okay, folks, the first place to check out is this building called the… “Shrine of Judgement”? I don’t know why it’s called that, but that’s what the map said the name was.”

Your pace was steady as you moved towards your first destination — the round building closest to where you had entered the property — as your gaze flickered between the uneven terrain you were walking on and the screen of your camera; the absolute last thing you wanted was for your footage to come out all shaky and unfocused when you reviewed it later, making all your ghostly video evidence unusable and making you waste an entire night of your life for nothing.

“Considering how run-down this place is, I was expecting to see, like… animals running about and stuff, but I haven’t really seen any signs of life yet… except for all these plants.” You panned the camera around as you spoke, letting it get a good look at the overgrown plants surrounding the cracked concrete pathway you had stepped onto. “Well, I think I did hear some bugs buzzing around, maybe, but that’s about it. That just means that any weird noises I hear are gonna have to come from one source: ghosts. Not, like, from birds or-”

The sound of a light thud behind you made you pause, your mouth snapping shut as your mind processed the interruption to your commentary; it was such a soft sound, something that would have gone unnoticed within the ambient noise of a normal situation, but in the presence of dead silence that only had your voice and the occasional buzzing of bugs to break it, that sound might as well be compared to the deafening crash of a rock smashing into the concrete behind you.

You swiftly turned on your heel, your camera poised and ready to capture the specter that had made that sound on video, but, to your disappointment, all you saw was a large wall.

The hand holding your camera fell slightly as a frown appeared on your face, before you came to the realization that there wasn’t a wall there previously; the thought of an object appearing out of thin air made a smile return to your face, and prompted you to take a closer look at it.

You took a step towards the wall, your eyes narrowing as you readied your gaze to inspect the potential sign of a nearby ghostly presence, and you immediately noticed that it looked… fluffy.

This wasn’t a wall; it was some sort of fluffy creature.

The low level of light made it hard to make out what exactly the creature looked like, but it was just enough for you to get a decent grasp on a few things about its appearance — namely, it had four arms, a massive wingspan, was incredibly tall, and… had striking red eyes that were staring right back at your own curious gaze, the pair of glasses on its face only amplifying its stare.

You continued to stare at the creature, you and it seemingly locked into an impromptu staring contest with each other, before you took your inactive flashlight and poked the creature with it.

It was tangible.

Darn.

Not a ghost.

The creature blinked and tilted his head, clearly confused. “You not scared of Gonta?”

“No.” You mirrored his actions, tilting your own head with a steady smile on your face. “Why would I be?”

“A-Ah… Gonta scary-looking. Most people run and scream when they see Gonta.”

“Well, that’s rude.”

You finally broke eye-contact with the creature to check your camera; all this standing around and talking about nothing important was wasting the battery, but you didn’t want to just turn it off in case something suddenly came up that you knew you absolutely needed to get on video. You had to return to your search immediately, making the most of this hopefully-haunted night.

“Anyways, nice to meet you. Goodbye.”

You turned around and started walking towards the “Shrine” again, readjusting your camera to get a good shot of the building as you approached its entrance.

“W-Wait…!”

Gonta — as he seemed to be called — followed after you; his footsteps were heavy, a complete opposite to the soft thud you had heard when he first appeared behind you.

You let out a hum, still continuing forward despite the creature following you. “What?”

“Gonta has never seen you before, so Gonta was wondering if you are new student-” His gaze was cast down to the side, appearing almost bashful in a way. “-and wanted to help you, like gentleman. Gentlemen always happy to help!”

“Me, a student? Of this school?” You said, letting your words hang in the air for a moment before you shrugged, “No, I’m just visiting… but you can still help me out, if you want.”

Gonta appeared to perk up at your answer. “Really? Then Gonta do his best to help!”

You just let out another hum in response, most of your attention captured by the building you were currently entering; after carefully going up the crumbling stairs and through the red doors that were basically falling off of their rusted hinges, you finally found yourself in the “Shrine of Judgement”. The round glass ceiling let moonlight into the interior of the building, though a lot of the inside of the “Shrine” was still shrouded in dark shadows, mostly beyond the center.

“Okay, this place is looking pretty spooky-” You panned the camera around, making sure to get a nice shot of the area, especially the rather fancy-looking waterfall-and-fountain feature — you weren’t sure why, but the fountain felt oddly empty, like there was supposed to be a statue there, though you just shrugged it off. “-but I don’t see anything too notable yet.”

“Huh? Who is new friend talking to?”

“Just my subscribers.”

“Sub… scribers?”

You pouted and furrowed your eyebrows as you brought your camera down from your face, your eyes flickering around the interior of the “Shrine”; sure, the spooky atmosphere was nice and all, but lack of good lighting was going to make it hard to capture decent footage of any ghostly activity that might take place here. The problem was solved when you clicked the power button on your flashlight, the beam of light helping to reveal what was hidden in the shadows.

The light revealed dozens of pink and white flowers growing within the “Shrine”, which hardly kept your attention for more than a second as you tried looking for anything of interest.

“That’s much better. You see anything, Gonta? …Gonta?”

You simply stared behind you at the space where the large gentleman had previously been, his sudden disappearance exciting you as you wondered if he actually was a ghost all along… only for you to return your attention to what was in front of you to see him now standing there. Even if your disappointment towards this was immeasurable, it wasn’t crushing enough to stop you from noticing that Gonta was staring intently at the flashlight in your hand, his gaze fixed on the tool.

You just stood there for a moment before moving the flashlight to the right, watching how his eyes immediately followed it; the exact same thing happened when you moved it to the left, and again when you zig-zagged the tool around in the air in random patterns.

“...huh.”

- - - - -

The “Shrine”, despite the promising name, showed no signs of any ghostly activity happening there — you had done everything you could think of, from begging to bartering, to try and incite any spirits that may have been residing there to do anything, but you got no response no matter what you tried — so you were forced to continue your search elsewhere on the school grounds.

You were also on your own again, having decided to split up from Gonta after his help held no results at the first destination; to thank him for his time, you ended up giving him the flashlight that you were previously using since he seemed really interested in it for whatever reason.

That wasn’t even close to the reason you packed extra flashlights, but you didn’t mind losing one if it was for something like that.

After that whole situation, you had tried to check out the buildings near the “Shrine”, but the weirdly-high-tech places were all inaccessible — no amount of force you used against the doors managed to open them, even when you slammed your entire body into them — and the dojo, as impressive as it looked, was found to be completely empty of life, both ghostly and otherwise.

That entire section of the school grounds was just a huge disappointment, but you still hoped that the rest of the property would have a few specters willing to interact with you.

You made your way up the stairs that led to a higher level of ground, once again making sure that your camera wasn’t shaking too much as you tried to not trip on the broken concrete steps, as a renewed sense of energy flowed throughout you at the sight of your next destination.

“Okay, folks, the next place on our list is… the dorms? Oh, this should definitely have something!”

As you approached the entrance to the dorms, you silently noted that it looked relatively nice compared to the other buildings you had seen earlier; it still looked pretty old and was probably not fit for human use, but given how long the academy had been closed, you expected to see a bunch of plants taking over the building or a wall having collapsed or just something other than a decent-looking building that could potentially be used again if someone cleaned it up a bit.

The doors to the building were wide-open, and you noticed that a thin film seemed to be covering the entrance — it kind of looked like invisible silk, the only hint of it being there being the way it reflected the moonlight to make it look like it was slightly glowing.

It was really pretty to look at… but that wasn’t going to keep you from entering the building.

You walked straight on through, shaking off the film from yourself once you were completely inside. The film was actually really sticky, but that didn’t stop you from thoroughly removing it from your clothes and equipment, tossing all of it onto the floor afterwards.

With a click of your new flashlight’s power button, you swept a beam of light around the area, and took a quick look around the interior of the lobby of the hopefully-haunted dorms. It had two floors, metal staircases and walkways allowing people to access the upper floor, and a total of sixteen doors that you guessed led to the actual dorm rooms; the smaller-than-expected amount of dorm rooms made you wonder if only sixteen students attended this school at a time, or if this was just a case of the people in charge stuffing their students into rooms like sardines in a can.

Neither of those options helped make the place look any better, and only served to make it more obvious on why exactly this place failed as badly as it did.

Your train of thought was interrupted by the feeling of a drop of water landing on your head, and you immediately looked up, the sight of a dark shape on the ceiling catching your attention. You moved your flashlight to where the dark shape was, revealing the shape to be a giant spider.

Its six legs were spread out over a decent portion of the ceiling, a variety of items — a few of which you noticed were a bucket of water, a spray bottle filled with some sort of blue liquid, and a cleaning rag — hanging from said-legs… and that was when you realized that it was missing a set of legs, meaning that it couldn’t actually be a giant spider and was a different kind of bug.

Unless you counted the two arms that were attached to the human torso sticking out from the body as “legs”.

The human half of the creature was dressed in typical maid attire — the professional kind of attire, not the type seen in anime — and was holding a sponge in one of her hands, the object clearly related to the rest of the things she was carrying with her on the ceiling.

You and her just stared at each other, your neck craned up to look at her as she craned her neck to look down at you, before you averted your eyes and puffed out your cheeks.

“Darn it, just a spider maid doing whatever a spider maid does.”

Your attention was brought back to the spider maid when she gracefully landed on the floor in front of you, especially due to how she managed to keep all of her cleaning supplies from flying all over the place in the process. She spent only a brief moment glancing at the entrance to the dorms, a hint of confusion on her face, before fixing her gaze onto you.

The expression on her face was serious, and you moved your flashlight to point away from her when you noticed that she was squinting from the beam of bright light being directed at her face.

“Pardon me, but…” Her voice was steady, her tone polite but not overly warm. “...could you explain why you’re here?”

“Oh, I’m just looking for ghosts. Have you seen any?”

“...ghosts?”

“Yeah. You know… ghosts, spirits, specters, phantoms-” You walked around the lobby as you spoke, keeping a smile on your face even as you discovered that every single door leading to a dorm room was locked, making them another area you couldn’t investigate. “-maybe a demon? But I’m mostly looking for the “used-to-be-a-human-but-now-they’re-dead” kinda thing.”

“I’m…” The spider maid hesitated, arms held together in front of her body. “I’m afraid I can’t say.”

You let go of the doorknob you were attempting to jiggle open, turning to the spider maid with a disappointed frown on your face. “Awww… you haven’t?”

“...my apologies.”

“Well, that’s alright.” You began heading towards the entrance to the dorms, a smile returning to your face as you mentally reassured yourself that you still had a lot of ground to cover. “Sorry for bothering you. I’ll figure it out on my own. You can just get back to cleaning.”

The spider maid jolted a little where she stood, reaching a hand out to you. “Ah, I’m sorry, but I don’t believe you’re allowed on the premises…!”

“Don’t worry, I’ll only be here ‘til sunrise, or until I find a ghost. I won’t break anything, promise!”

“I assure you, that is not my concern!”

- - - - -

The distance between the dorms and the school building was incredibly short, and you only spent less than a minute walking between the two locations before arriving at the once-grand entrance to the place where all those talented teenagers were taught all those years ago. The door closed behind you as you took in your new surroundings, an excited smile on your face.

“Whoa, this place looks like it’s straight out of a movie about, like, the apocalypse! Cool!”

You made sure your camera got a good view of the grass and flowers growing out of the floor, before moving it up to see the absolute mess the front hall was; it was hard to imagine what all of this had looked like when the place was still in operation, but it was probably less cool then.

“What are you doing?”

An unknown voice pulled your attention away from your camera, and your eyes darted around the immediate area to find a teenage boy standing a couple meters away from you. He looked to be around your age, and was wearing a plain black gakuran with white buttons; he honestly appeared rather unremarkable, if one were to ignore how unusually pale his skin was and how his white hair shone brightly in the moonlight streaming through the windows.

You shifted slightly where you stood, only one thought running through your mind as you took in how pale this otherwise-average teenage boy was.

“...ghost?”

“H-Huh?”

You took a step towards him, causing him to take a step back. “Are you a ghost?”

“Uh, n-no?”

You took another step towards him, causing him to take another step back. “No?”

“No!” The boy took yet another step back, appearing extremely nervous for some reason. “I am a robot, not a ghost!”

You stared at the boy with narrowed eyes for a moment longer, before eventually deciding to accept his claim of not being a ghost as true; as for his claim of being a robot, it didn’t seem to be true since he looked like a normal — albeit pale — human boy, but you weren’t really all that interested in wasting your time thinking about whether or not he could be one.

All that mattered was whether or not he was a ghost… and he wasn’t one, so that was that.

You turned away from the boy, and towards one of the hallways. “Then I’ll just have to keep searching.”

“W-Wait! Where are you going?!”

“To wherever the ghosts are! Goodbye!”

��H-Hey…!”

- - - - -

The basement gave off the exact vibes you were hoping for: creepy, damp… and, hopefully, haunted by a ton of ghosts of all kinds.

The boy from before — who you learned was named K1-B0, or, as he said you could call him, “Keebo” — followed you around as you inspected the library; it definitely looked like a place where a murder could occur, but, unfortunately, there wasn’t any evidence to suggest that one had taken place there. Even counting the cool door you found hidden behind a bookcase, which Keebo himself didn’t know was there, there wasn’t anything of interest to be found in that room.

It wasn’t until you entered the game room did you find any signs of life, though they weren’t the signs of undead life you were searching for.

There was a short man with cat-like qualities in the room, a pair of holes in his beanie to allow his cat ears to poke through it while his tail hung lazily behind him. He had something that resembled a cigarette in his mouth, but the lack of smoke suggested it was something else; you guessed that it was probably a candy cigarette due to it being nearly-identical to a real one.

The short cat man hummed, taking the candy cigarette between his fingers. “Keebo, who’s this?”

“Oh, this is… um…” Keebo looked at you, an unsure look on his face. “You… never actually told me your name, did you?”

“Why? Is that important?” You asked, your eyes choosing to wander around the room you were in instead of look at the possible-robot boy as you spoke — the machines looked to be in pretty good condition surprisingly, especially when compared to the rest of the school — before they stopped on the short cat man. “But I’m just a humble ghost hunter, looking for… well, ghosts!”

The short cat man raised an eyebrow. “They let a ghost hunter into the school?”

“I’m just visiting.”

“Right…” The short cat man turned his gaze towards Keebo. “I don’t think they’re supposed to be here.”

Keebo furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. “Huh? Are you sure?”

“I don’t think a school like this would let in a ghost hunter.”

“A-Alright. Then I’ll escort them off the premises immediately-” Keebo looked away from the short cat man and to where you were. “-so I’ll need you to please come with- huh?”

Keebo blinked a few times, staring at the spot where you used to be before looking around and realizing that you were no longer in the room with him and the short cat man.

“Oh no!”

The short cat man sighed, his shoulders falling slightly. “Guess we should go stop them.”

- - - - -

“So the basement was a bust, but there’s still plenty more to check out!”

You held the camera up to your eyes and looked through its screen at the hallway in front of you, your pace steady as you made sure to capture any interesting bits of deterioration that you saw on film to put in your video later. This place was probably one of the coolest places you had ever hunted for ghosts in, though actually finding a spirit or two would make it a whole lot cooler.

The stairs leading to the next floor were the first thing you stumbled upon after coming up from the basement, but you skipped past them in favor of checking out the rest of the first floor first — to no avail, it seemed. The gym yielded no results from any of your devices, the tower that forced you to walk up five floors’ worth of stairs just had a whole lot of nothing at the top, and now you were just making your way back to the stairs a little more disappointed than before.

It was only when you heard noises coming from somewhere on the right of you did you perk up, swiftly turning on your heel and rushing towards the source of the noises.

“Alright, where are the ghosts?!”

You kicked open the doors of the room that you heard the noises coming from as you yelled, revealing a dining hall to the camera that you held up in front of you; just like with the rest of the first floor, it had been overtaken by plants of all kinds, but, unlike the rest of the first floor, there were people present in the room — hopefully ghost people.

“Nyeh?!”

“Don’t worry, Himiko! I’ll protect you!”

There were two girls present in the room: one of which was sitting at the table with a plate of food in front of her and one of which was currently striking a fighting stance after having jumped up from her seat when you kicked the doors open. You noted that a plate of food was also sitting in the spot where the girl that was currently glaring you down had previously been.

You lowered your camera as you looked between the two girls, clear surprise written on the face of the one still sitting down and a protective glare on the one that looked ready to attack you.

“...are there any ghosts in here?”

The girl striking the fighting stance kept her pose as her multiple tails spread out behind her, an obvious attempt to make herself look bigger. “Hold it right there! You don’t get to ask questions!”

“Is that a no?”

“I said no questions!” The multi-tailed girl let out a low growl. “Now, apologize to Himiko for scaring her!”

You simply stared at the multi-tailed girl as she gestured to the one still sitting at the table, before eventually moving your gaze over. The moment you looked at the girl sitting at the table, you noticed that she seemed to shrink, her shaky gaze refusing to connect with yours.

“My bad, g.”

“What kind of apology is that?!”

“N-No, it’s fine…” The girl at the table — Himiko — spoke up, still clearly nervous. “Everything’s f-fine…”

The room fell into silence after she spoke, the girl sitting at the table still refusing to look at you as the multi-tailed girl continued to glare at you. You just let your gaze wander around the room instead of focusing on either of them, debating with yourself how much of the footage you had already captured would make it into the finished video, before your eyes came to a rest on the plates of food sitting on the table; the delicious scent of it made you a little jealous of the girls.

You only had a couple of water bottles and a few granola bars stashed away in your backpack, which helped you not starve during your trip here but still left much to be desired.

“Did you get that food here?”

Himiko jolted at the sound of your voice, before slightly leaning away from the beam of light you were pointing at her and her plate of food. “Mmm-hmm. I made it myself… with magic~.”

She let a smile onto her face as she said the last word, the tone of her voice indicating that she was talking about something she was really proud of; this was also when you noticed the pointy witch hat sitting atop her head, which helped make her claim seem a lot more valid.

“Cool! Say, could you use magic to find ghosts?”

“Depends on the spell. I don’t focus on that kind of magic, though.”

You pouted as your eyebrows furrowed. “I thought witches could do anything?”

“Nyeh… I could, if I really tried, but that sounds tiring…” Himiko scratched the side of her head, her smile falling into a lazy frown. “And I prefer the term “mage” more than “witch”.”

The multi-tailed girl put herself between you and Himiko, dropping her protective glare for a proud smile as she fanned her tails out behind her, still continuing to try and make herself look bigger than she actually was. “And I’m Tenko, her loyal fox familiar!”

“Eh?” Himiko looked at Tenko with her eyebrows furrowed. “No, you’re not.”

Tenko froze in place for a solid few seconds before her tails and ears drooped, the pride in her stance disappearing as she swiveled around to face the mage. “Aw, please, Himiko?! I’ll be the bestest, most loyal familiar in the world!”

“No, that’s gross.”

You just let out a sigh as you adjusted your grip on your camera and flashlight.

Darn.

Yet another room with nothing of value in it.

- - - - -

“Whoever chose the hot-pink polka-dotted pattern for these stairs gets a round of applause from me. A true genius in interior design.”

You were now on the second floor of the school building, ready to face whatever ghouls may be lurking up here, and the very first thing you noticed was that the state of this floor looked exactly the same as the first floor; plants grew out of every crack and crevice they were able to squeeze through, showing how much of a field day nature had with the school after it shut down.

The decrepit state of it all just raised your hopes for finding a ghost within the halls of this disappointment of an educational facility once again, one probably being mere moments away.

You just needed to proceed forward to finally find it.

The sound of multiple voices down the hallway made you perk up, your excitement rising as you headed towards the source to see three figures walking your way.

“Thanks for coming to help me choose a gift for her. I’m not exactly sure what she’d like.”

“Nonsense, it’s a hero’s duty to help his sidekick, right? We’ll get her something she’ll love!”

“Of course we will, but maybe asking him for help with things like this isn’t the best decision. He hardly understands Earth culture as is.”

“Aw, don’t talk like that, Maki Roll! I understand Earth stuff just fine!”

The three figures froze the moment you shined your flashlight on them, and you tilted your head as you took a step closer to inspect them better, a glint of silver flying through the air where your head used to be as you did so. You retracted your step as you blinked, glancing back to see that a knife was now sticking out of the wall, before returning your attention to the three figures.

There were two boys and a girl, all of whom looked to be around your age.

“...so, are any of you ghosts?”

“H-Huh?”

You leaned towards the boy who uttered that sound in response to you, nodding to yourself as you noticed how unnaturally pale he was — okay, yeah, the last pale boy you ran into wasn’t a ghost, but this boy seemed to be even paler than him — which was brought out even more from how dark his hair and school uniform were. He looked like a promising possible ghost.

“You’re really pale, so you must be a ghost, right?”

“No, I’m a…” The boy leaned back from you, squinting his eyes as he brought up an arm to block the blinding light you were pointing at his face. “...a vampire!”

You narrowed your eyes at him in suspicion. “You sure?”

“Y-Yes…?”

You let out a hum as you backed up from him and moved your flashlight away from his face, before turning your attention to the other guy in the trio; his skin was a bright green, the color clashing with his predominantly-purple fashion choices and making him hard to look at.

“You.” You pointed your flashlight at him. “Are you a ghost? You don’t really look like one…”

“No…” His posture wasn’t as timid as the vampire’s, and he was the only one of the three to have a smile on his face. “I’m what you guys call… what’s the word? An… “alien”? The name’s Kaito Momota, Luminary of the-”

You let out a small groan, cutting him off as you puffed out your cheeks. “Darn, I’m not looking for aliens.”

“H-Hey!”

With the two boys confirmed to not be the undead spirits you were searching for, you turned your attention to the girl. She looked relatively normal compared to the boys, her skin neither looking sickly nor radioactive, but on closer inspection, you noticed that some of her skin was stained a dark red color — those areas were her hands and a majority of her forearms, as well a pair of markings on her face that resembled tear streaks in everything but color.

“What are you looking at?”

You snapped out of your thoughts and focused on the entirety of the girl’s face, the expression she was wearing an excellent example of the phrase “if looks could kill”; her eyes seemed to be glowing as she glared at you, her sudden hostility actually managing to surprise you a little.

“...are you a-”

“No.”

“Huh?” The alien looked towards the girl, his smile dropping into a confused frown. “I thought you were-”

“Shut up.”

“But the whole “Bloody Maki” thing-?”

“Do you wanna die?”

The alien rubbed the back of his head with his hand, his eyebrows furrowed as he let out a small huff. “Geez, you don’t have to get all angry about it.”

“Um… guys?” The vampire spoke up, causing the two to look at him. “They left.”

The trio fell into a silence as they looked around at each other, the fading sound of footsteps in the distance as the source traveled further into the second floor all they heard before a group of much louder footsteps ascended the nearby stairs. The vampire looked over to see two more of his friends arriving, glancing between them as he took in the expressions on their faces.

“Keebo? Ryoma?”

- - - - -

The second floor turned out to be nothing but a huge disappointment, and to make matters worse, so did the third; you would be lying if you said you weren’t starting to lose hope in this place being haunted by now, that sour feeling even making it hard for you to find joy in all the non-haunted things of interest within the building, such as-

“Who puts an entire tennis court on the THIRD floor? Man, this place really was eccentric!”

-but your mood took a turn for the better once you entered the fourth floor.

The generic school setting was replaced by something straight out of a horror film, with a wooden floor that creaked with every little movement you made, walls with mysterious stains splattered upon them, and dim red lighting that seemed to serve more as an atmosphere-maker rather than an actual lightsource to let people see their surroundings; it felt like a place where a brutal murder could have occurred, a place where someone could have taken their last breath.

It was perfect.

You felt a smile replace the depressed frown that had settled onto your face as you surveyed your surroundings, your flashlight sweeping over everything as its beam flickered a few times.

And then it completely went out.

You blinked a couple of times as you stared at the darkness around you, your eyes clearly having not been ready for the sudden change in brightness, before you shook the flashlight in your hand and clicked the power button a few times, only for nothing to happen.

“This had new batteries in it… wait-”

You could practically see the glow from the imaginary light bulb that lit up above your head.

“Technology not working…”

You swiftly turned on your heel, only to see a wall — a real wall this time — that most definitely wasn’t there before; the staircase had completely disappeared, vanished into thin air.

“...and changing architecture! This can only mean one thing…!”

You turned to face forward once again, stars in your eyes when you saw that the hallway was now seemingly stretching out to infinity, no potential end in sight. It felt like you had entered into a nightmare, trapped with no other option than to proceed forward even if you didn’t want to.

But you definitely wanted to.

You let a few excited giggles escape your lips as you continued forward, your camera carefully held up to your eyes as you let it get a good view of your endless surroundings; you didn’t want your audience to miss whatever cool thing might happen here, the mere thought of being able to show them such irrefutable evidence of ghostly activity fueling your already-growing enthusiasm and making it all the more annoying to see the screen suddenly become engulfed in static.

The screen had never acted up like this before; something must be messing with your camera.

That wasn’t a very nice thing to do.

You shook your camera around slightly — hoping that you could somehow disperse the static covering the screen doing so, even though you knew it didn’t work like that — before you felt a chill run down your spine, your entire body tensing up from the sudden sensation. The air around you felt heavier as an invisible force squeezed your lungs, the lightheaded feeling from your inability to get enough oxygen almost distracting you from the feeling of being watched.

“Nee-heehee~!”

The strange laugh echoing in the endless hallway made you pause, before you puffed out your cheeks and continued to fiddle around with your camera a moment later; you didn’t like how the ghost wasn’t waiting until everything was okie-dokie with your camera to come out, but after all the disappointment you had dealt with tonight, you were just glad it finally decided to show up.

You could only let out a small gasp once the static on the screen cleared up, your difficulty breathing making you unable to say anything more, before you swiveled around to point your camera down the never-ending hallway. Through the screen, you saw the silhouette of a short boy — he wasn’t as short as the cat man from earlier, but definitely had a good few inches to grow to reach what one could consider an “average” height — standing a good distance away from you, completely cloaked in shadows in spite of the dim red lighting above him.

The figure just continued to stand there as you moved the camera to the side, your eyes narrowing as you brought up your flashlight and repeatedly clicked the power button until it flickered back to life.

The moment the beam of light poured out of the device, you pointed it at the figure to reveal-

“Aw, man… it’s just some kid. Darn.”

You could practically feel all of the excited energy that you had built up evaporate to leave nothing but a desert of disappointment in its wake; this had been the perfect moment for a ghost to show up, but instead all you had gotten was some boy who looked like an asylum escapee.

“Wha-? Who are you calling “kid”?”

The insulted look on the boy’s face only lasted for a moment before easily shifting into a mischievous grin. “You’re pretty bold to say something like that, you know.”

You moved your flashlight away from the boy as you checked your camera, holding in an annoyed sigh when you noticed that the screen was glitching out again; however, instead of static this time, it was just completely black, as if you were recording in a pitch black room.

“See, ever since you stepped foot onto these grounds, I’ve been watching you. You don’t seem to realize-”

“That’s creepy.” You stopped the recording before resuming it to see if that would fix the issue. It didn’t. “Don’t you have anything better to do?”

“Heyyy, it’s rude to interrupt someone when they’re talking.” The smile on the boy’s face dropped into a frown as he furrowed his eyebrows, his hands brought up in front of his chest as he clenched them into fists. “Didn’t your parents teach you any manners?”

You looked up from your camera and towards him. “Oh, sorry. Continue.”

The boy narrowed his eyes at you, you and him locked into a staring contest for a few moments before he appeared to deem your level of attention as acceptable, the mischievous grin that had been on his face before returning as he held his arms out wide beside him.

“You don’t seem to realize the danger you’re in… though, from my experience, humans typically aren’t that smart anyways.”

“Aren’t you a human?”

“Oh, no, no, no. Human I may appear to be, but human I am not.”

You narrowed your eyes at him. “Are you a-”

“-a ghost?” The boy cut you off before chuckling and holding a finger up his lips. “You’ve been asking that question a lot, haven’t you? But, no. Not that, either. I’m something far more powerful than some measly spirit. You see, I’m what you puny little humans call a- where are you going?”

You glanced back at the boy you had walked past as he rambled on about power or whatever, pausing for just a moment in your trek forward as you gestured at the endless hallway in front of you. “I’m off to find ghosts. Don’t you already know that?”

“Geez, don’t you have any patience?” The annoyance in his voice sounded superficial, and the fact that a smile was still on his face supported that. “Most humans would feel — SHOULD feel — honored to be in my presence, and here you are, walking right past me like it’s nothing. Were you dropped on your head as a child?”

“Bold of you to assume I was held.” You blinked. “...sorry, force of habit. I don’t think so?”

A hint of confusion flickered across his face, quickly covered up by the mischievous smile he was intent on keeping displayed. “Well, if anything, you’re not boring like most humans are. Your reactions are a lot more interesting than the usual scared ones I get.”

“Thanks.”

“It makes me wonder how you’d react if you saw how I really look, though I know I should probably just stay in this form.” The boy caught up to where you were, matching your pace as you continued your journey down the hallway. “You should consider yourself lucky that I’m not showing my true form to you, you know. Your mind would shatter from just a glimpse of it alone-”

“Weird flex, but okay.”

You paused for a second at the sight of a door located a little further down the hallway, before rushing towards it to see if it was real… and it was; before you could do anything with it, though, the non-ghost boy popped up into your peripheral vision, a carefree smile on his face.

“Anywayyys, I think I’ve held you up long enough.” He held his arms behind his head, his posture relaxed. “So feel free to go along now. Continue your little ghost hunt. I’ll just continue to watch you from the shadows, okay?”

You tilted your head, a smile also on your face. “Okay! But you should really find a better hobby. I can suggest a few things if you’d like.”

“Nope! Not interested! Bye-bye now!”

There was a sudden pressure pushing against your back, the source of it unknown to you as you clearly saw the boy still standing next to you with both of his arms visible, before you were shoved through the door that you didn’t remember being opened; you felt weightless for just the briefest moment as a loud slam echoed in your ears, and then everything went black.

- - - - -

You let out a small groan as you opened your eyes, the sight of a tiled floor greeting you; you simply stared at it for a moment before you pushed yourself onto your knees and immediately went to adjust the heavy bag on your back that had been knocked askew. With that settled, you picked up your camera and flashlight — which were both thankfully not broken — before getting onto your feet and looking at your new surroundings, your eyes widening at the sight of them.

The room you were now in had multiple floors within it, each one absolutely filled to the brim with relics of all kinds; whether or not they had actual value was debatable, but they looked to be covered in layers upon layers of dust, so you could tell that they must be really old.

And old stuff had a great chance of being haunted.

“Oooh, you think I should take a souvenir from this place? Maybe I’ll end up taking a new friend home too!”

“Please do not treat these objects like mere trinkets… or I’ll tear out your nerves.”

An unknown voice caused your outstretched hand to pause right above a display case, your fingers barely brushing against the glass, and you turned your head to see a man — correction, a person with the upper-half of a man and the lower-half of a snake — sitting less than a foot away from you; his human-half donned clothing that was very reminiscent of a military uniform, as well as a mask that completely covered the lower-half of his face and his neck.

You were surprised at how close he was to you; you had no idea he was even there before he had spoken. His snake-half was rather long, and was spread out across the floor in such a way that it seemed like he was using it as a makeshift wall to keep you from wandering around all willy-nilly. You were confident in thinking that you could just easily step over the smallest end of it — and hoisting yourself over the biggest end didn’t seem like too much trouble either — but it seemed rude to ignore his effort.

“Ah, sorry.” You pulled your hand back. “Are these yours?”

He hummed, gaining a look of thought. “To say that they are “mine” wouldn’t necessarily be the truth. I’m merely the caretaker of these objects at this moment in time. It’s like asking a security guard if they own the works of art they are guarding — I’m simply the one watching over them.”

“So… they’re yours?”

The snake man looked down at you for a few silent seconds, no discernible expression on his face — at least, from what you could see of the half that wasn’t covered by his mask.

“...yes, they’re mine, and I don’t appreciate having others touch them so recklessly.”

“Okay. I won’t touch them then, Snake Man, but-” You turned away from him as you brought your camera up, letting it get a good shot of the items in the glass case in front of you. “-could you tell me if any of them are haunted? Possessed? Carrying a spirit of the deceased?”

“You may call me Korekiyo. I assume you are specifically interested in “ghost”-related supernatural activity…?”

“Yeah! I’m a ghost hunter!” You flashed Korekiyo a confident smile as you held up your camera and flashlight proudly. “Or, as the professionals call it, a “paranormal investigator”!”

“You are… a ghost hunter?”

“Yep!”

He muttered to himself, his limbs close to his body as he rested his hand on his chin. “So, it really is like the others said…”

“Hmm?”

“Ah, it’s nothing important.” Korekiyo waved his hand dismissively, adjusting the position of his tail slightly. “But I’m afraid none of these objects are haunted, at least not in the way you’d like them to be.”

“Darn.” Any disappointment you felt was already gone by your next breath. “Goodbye, then!”

You stepped over Korekiyo’s tail, having to hop forward a bit when your back foot got caught, and headed over to the nearest door; you had no idea which door you came in through, your memory fuzzy between when you were pushed and when you woke up, but all of that wasn’t important to you as you focused on the hallway beyond the door you just opened — it looked exactly like the hallway you were trapped in before, but wasn’t an endless nightmare anymore.

The boy from before was also nowhere to be seen, but you hardly spared him a single thought when you realized you could finally resume making some progress in your investigation. There wasn’t much left of the school to explore, but you weren’t just going to leave a job half-done.

Korekiyo simply watched you leave the room, amusement in his eyes. “Kekeke… humans truly are such fascinating creatures…”

- - - - -

After skipping past the staircase that led to the fifth floor, you came upon another room on the other side of the fourth floor; opening the door to that room revealed an artist’s paradise, a white room filled with everything an aspiring artist might need — paint, blank canvases, blocks of wax, various crafting tables, a huge log for wood carving with chiseling supplies, brushes of all kinds and sizes… and, of course, an overwhelming creative atmosphere encouraging you to create.

You took a step into the room, noticing the splashes of black paint splattered on the walls and floor, before directing your attention to the wax statue sitting in the middle of the room.

It was clearly a work-in-progress, a roughly-carved humanoid shape, but was still impressive.

“Yah-hah! Who might you be?”

You jolted at the sound of an unfamiliar voice, immediately turning on your heel towards the source and scanning the area with a narrowed gaze before your eyes stopped on a painting that was hanging on the wall; it was extremely lifelike, the artist apparently a master at their craft.

The painting depicted a girl staring at the viewer, her body leaning to the side as a curious smile was on her face. You copied the action with your own body, locking your eyes with hers.

You and her just stared at each other as you waited for something to happen; it was a lot like a staring contest, except that you knew that you would lose this one since you were the only party who actually needed to blink. Even so, you still held out for quite a while before you gave in.

And that was when you noticed that the painting changed, the girl now leaning to the other side.

You adjusted your body to match the new pose, causing the girl’s expression to change to a closed-eye smile as she straightened her posture and clasped her hands together.

“Nyahahaha, how fun!”

Your eyes widened as you let out a gasp and raised a hand — the one holding the flashlight — to your mouth, your gaze now glued to the lifelike painting in front of you; while the background of the painting remained completely static, the paint making up the girl herself shifted around the canvas with each of her movements. She was so animated, so unnaturally alive.

“Are… are you a haunted painting?” You tried to keep your camera steady as you pointed it at the girl, your hands shaking slightly. “A spirit trapped within the frame?”

The girl hummed, gently rocking her head back-and-forth as she thought. “I guess so?”

You let out another gasp as a smile slowly began to make its way onto your face; finally, after encountering nothing significant within this school, you had found what you were looking for.

A ghost.

You quickly approached the painting, inspecting it from every angle you could as you held your camera up to your face; you needed to capture every single glorious moment of this on video.

“Okay, this is super amazing! Um… what do I wanna ask you first…?” Your voice rushed out of your mouth, matching the pace of your quickening heartbeat, as you tried to stop your hands from shaking so much; you needed this footage to be as perfect as possible. “Oh, I know! Does it suck being trapped inside of a painting? I imagine you can’t really do much in there…”

“No, no, Angie is not trapped. I can go between any of the paintings hung around the academy to my heart’s content!”

“Is that what those are all for?” You tilted your head, only barely recalling the objects that you had kind of just ignored before now; they had seemed out-of-place within the crumbling interior of the building, but that was about it. “I thought those were just a strange decoration decision.”

“But Atua says that it’s time for me to move up a level!” Angie let out a laugh. “I’ve earned enough points to ascend to the third dimension!”

“What does that mean?”

“You see that wax statue over there?” She turned your attention over to the wax statue sitting in the middle of the room. “Once it is finished, that will become my new body!”

“A spirit transferring from a painting to a wax statue…” You muttered to yourself, tapping your chin with your flashlight as you stared at the blocky humanoid shape, before turning back to look at Angie with a smile on your face. “That should be possible, yeah?”

“If Atua says it is possible, then it is possible! He is never wrong!” Angie clasped her hands together joyously, her smile seeming to become brighter as she continued speaking. “Oh, what joy! With a new body, Angie will be able to mingle with all her friends, playing and dancing and eating Kirumi’s delectable meals! Nyahahaha!”

You nodded, the girl’s enthusiasm proving to be quite contagious, before you furrowed your eyebrows as you thought a little more about what she said. “How exactly are you able to do that, though? Make a wax statue while trapped in a painting…?”

“Oh! It is not I who makes the art, but Atua!” Her arms wrapped around herself as she spoke and closed her eyes, her smile a bit more peaceful now. “Angie offers her body as His vessel, and He creates such beautiful things with it! That’s why Angie needs to be completely alone to do so, so Atua can create without distraction!”

“Ah, understandable.”

Not really, but you felt like questioning her more about it wouldn’t get you anywhere.

“I’m just glad I finally found a ghost!” You said, adjusting your grip on your camera as you let it get a good shot of Angie swaying inside her frame, “I was starting to think that there weren’t any around here, my search having been a complete bust until now.”

“Hmm? That’s strange.” Angie tapped the tip of a paintbrush’s handle on her chin — you spent only a moment wondering where it came from, before assuming that the haunted paint was able to shift into anything she wanted it to — as a look of thought crossed her face. “There may be no others exactly like Angie here, but there should be other ghosts around. I know at least two!”

Your smile dropped from your face as you blinked, your brain pausing for a moment. “...wait, really? But… but I’m almost to the fifth floor and haven’t seen any besides you…”

You shook your head, putting a smile back on your face as you looked at Angie.

“Anyways, I should probably get going. I’ve got one more floor to check, and, hey, maybe that’s where the other two are?”

Angie raised a hand, her smile brighter than the sun. “Okay! Bye-yonara!”

“Bye! Good luck with your art!”

The moment after you stepped out of the room and closed the door, you heard a soft click come from it; you paused before shaking the doorknob, revealing that the door was now locked. There was no possible way Angie had been the one to lock it, her new wax body not ready for use, but then you remembered that “Atua” person she kept mentioning — he must have been behind it.

“...man, he’s so lucky to be friends with that ghost.”

- - - - -

“Thanks again for helping me. I know it can be a plain bother…”

“Hey, it’s no problem.”

The two figures on the fifth floor had their attention suddenly shifted from each other as they heard something thump near the stairs, their smiles falling as they glanced at each other and rushed over to the source of the sound; there was a person they had never seen before spread out over the top of the stairs, breathing heavily as they grasped at the white tiled floor.

You were currently in such a position for multiple reasons, but it was mainly because you had been hit by an unexpected wave of exhaustion while ascending the final staircase; this must be your punishment for not getting enough rest and nutrition before heading out on this hunt, made worse by the heavy backpack resting on your back. You barely managed to crawl up the stairs on all fours before collapsing, arms on the fifth floor as your legs laid behind you on the steps.

You spent a moment more like this before looking up from the floor, taking in the decor of the final floor you would investigate on your never-ending hunt for spirits.

“This place looks religious…” You muttered, before noticing the two figures standing just a few feet away — the girl looked pretty plain, donning a simple school uniform and a pair of glasses, while the boy looked kind of like an e-boy, his skin having a green tint to it — with varied looks of surprise on their faces, “...are either of you guys a ghost?”

The girl and boy just looked at each other before the girl spoke. “N-No…?”

“Oh… well, have you seen anything that might suggest ghostly activity on this floor?”

The two glanced at each other once again, before both of them hesitantly shook their heads at you; you just let out a groan in response before dropping your own head onto the cold floor, one of your cheeks now smushed up against the smooth tile.

The plain girl leaned over to the boy, a hand cupped near her mouth. “Is this the one the others have been looking for?”

“Maybe, but… they don’t seem to be as big a threat as the others said they were.”

The girl flinched as the boy began walking over to you, her hand reaching out to him in slight panic. “Rantaro…!”

“Don’t worry, Tsumugi.” He looked from her to you, crouching down slightly. “Hey, you okay?”

You pulled yourself up, shifting into a sitting position at the top of the stairs, before looking at the boy; the green tint of his skin was more obvious up-close, and you noticed that his hands were webbed, thin skin connecting his fingers together. Your nose crinkled for just a second when you noticed a faint fishy odor in the air, before you gave a dismissive wave and averted your eyes.

“Don’t… don’t worry about me. I’ll be okay after I… after I catch my breath…”

Tsumugi held her hands close to her chest as she glanced between you and Rantaro, before hurrying forth when she saw the boy gesture to the stairs with his head. She quickly descended down the stairs as Rantaro stood back up, giving you one last glance before following the girl at a more normal and relaxed pace, leaving you completely alone on the fifth floor.

- - - - -

You spent the next few minutes sitting at the top of the stairs, regulating your breathing and devouring a few granola bars and a water bottle — you became even more jealous of that meal you saw Himiko eating earlier — before you found yourself feeling a bit better; it helped that you also got to use your little break to admire the atmosphere present on the fifth floor.

Your first impression of it was still highly-accurate, and you wondered why anyone building a school would decide to make the top floor resemble a church of all things. Your research didn’t bring up any information regarding the academy being religious, which was kind of disappointing since places of a religious background tended to be hot-spots for paranormal activity; it was due to the energy of the places or whatever — you didn’t really care about the details.

But besides that, from the weirdly-high-tech areas outside, the hot-pink polka-dotted-patterned staircases, the horror-movie-inspired fourth floor, and the church-like fifth floor, this place really made for an interesting trip; the people who designed it deserved a round of applause.

There was something bothering you, though.

You looked towards the stain-glass windows, ignoring the designs portrayed on them as you focused on the bright light coming through them; according to the schedule you had made for this trip, daylight should still be a few hours away — maybe even more considering the way you had sped through the second and third floors due to the lack of ghostly activity.

You whipped out your phone for the first time in a while, squinting your eyes at the screen once you looked at the time. “What the heck…? That doesn’t seem right…”

The clock on your phone was telling you that it was an hour past daybreak, and the light coming through the windows told you that it was an hour past daybreak, but you were sure as all heck it wasn’t an hour past daybreak. Your biological clock refused to let you believe that.

But all the evidence was there.

You let out a sigh as you turned off your flashlight, stuffing it into your backpack before you got up onto your feet and turned your camera to face you. “Well, folks, I guess this is the end of my search into the Ultimate Academy for Gifted Juveniles. It wasn’t a complete failure since we got to meet Angie, but I wish we could’ve found those other two ghosts she said were here.”

The sound of your footsteps echoed slightly in the empty halls of the academy as you began your long trek down the various floors, the light streaming through the windows giving the entire place a different atmosphere from before — it no longer seemed eerie, but rather peaceful.

That peaceful feeling was soon accompanied by the sound of a distant piano as you arrived on the second floor, the sweet melody making a smile come to your face. You were a little surprised to find out that there was a piano sitting somewhere in this school, but since you failed to search this floor thoroughly after running into that non-ghost trio, it became less of a surprise.

“Hey, folks-” You held the camera up to your face again. “-since we’re about to leave anyway, we might as well check out that piano, right? Maybe we’ll find one of the other ghosts there!”

That would be a great ending to your trip AND your video.

- - - - -

You bursted into the room where the music was coming from, a sudden cacophony of piano keys greeting your ears. Your eyes locked onto the girl sitting at the large instrument, a startled expression on her face as her hands sat on the keyboard.

“Darn, it’s just some regular girl.”

“H-Huh?”

“Sorry for interrupting your song. I’m just looking for ghosts.”

“You’re…” The girl blinked. “...looking for ghosts?”

“Yeah.” You gave a small nod to the girl before looking around the room, noticing how various music sheets covered the ground; most of them seemed to be near the grand piano sitting in the middle of the room. “I thought I could get in one last chance before I leave.”

The girl stood up from the piano bench, her gaze moving to the camera in your hands and the big backpack sitting on your back. “Oh! So you’ve been looking for a while?”

“I’ve been exploring the school all night to look for them. I was only able to meet Angie — the living painting — though.” You continued glancing around the room, raising your eyebrows at the large collection of CDs you saw on your left. “She said that there were at least two more around here, but I haven’t seen them anywhere yet.”

“Well, Maki’s not really a people-person, so I guess it makes sense that you haven’t seen her around…” The girl averted her eyes from you, a look of thought on her face. “And I know I haven’t seen you at all either. I guess we just missed each other? I was late to school today…”

“Hmm?” You tilted your head. “Sorry, I don’t see what that has to do with ghosts?”

She took another look at you, appearing to think for a moment before eventually nodding and letting a bright smile onto her face.

You found yourself blinking excessively and rubbing at your eyes as the girl suddenly became translucent; you were clearly able to see what was behind her, making the girl herself harder to focus on. However, your gaze was fully locked onto her as she appeared to get taller, your eyes darting downwards to see that she was now floating a good few inches above the ground.

“Wait…” You gasped, causing the girl to chuckle. “You’re a ghost!”

“Ta-da!” The girl clapped her hands together. “I’m a ghost!”

You immediately pointed your camera at her, stars in your eyes when you saw that she was appearing on the screen with no issues. She spun a little in the air as you filmed her, her hair and skirt flowing with her movements and creating a beautifully-haunting scene for you.

“Ah, I knew it was a good idea to follow the music!” You looked between the girl and your camera, a smile on your face. “That’s two out of three! I can now say this outing was a success!”

The girl let out another chuckle at your excitement.

“Say, could I ask you a few questions?” You walked around the girl, making sure to get some different — and appropriate — shots of her at different angles. “Just about some general stuff.”

She nodded, twirling around face you. “Sure!”

“Okay, so-” You went through the list of questions popping up in your head; the questions you wanted to ask this girl were extremely different to the ones you wanted to ask Angie, the types of ghosts they were so vastly different that it excited you to know that you got to see both. “-how easy is it for you to interact with material objects?”

“Oh, well… it’s kind of hard for me to touch things sometimes, except for the piano. I’ve never had any issues with that.” She wore an embarrassed smile on her face. “I know that’s a little bit stereotypical, though, for a ghost to play a piano.”

“No, it’s amazing!”

Her eyes widened. “I’m- I’m glad you think so!”

The room suddenly became a bit brighter as sunlight poured through the windows, the sight of which made the girl direct her attention towards it before she resumed looking at you.

“How about you ask me more questions as we head out? School’s almost over.”

You nodded, continuing to smile.

“Okay!”

- - - - -

Kaede — as you learned her name was — floated alongside you as you walked towards the entrance of the school. She had to remind you to pay attention to where you were going after you walked into a wall, your focus solely on her as you kept your camera pointed at her instead of on what was in front of you, but you hardly felt the pain in your face; it was nothing compared to the excitement coursing through your veins as Kaede happily answered all of your questions.

“I’ve never had someone so interested in me before,” Kaede said, floating backwards to face you, “At least, not like this. Most of the others are just “cool!” and then it’s over.”

“Well, I’ve never seen a ghost until last night!” You glanced away from the ghost girl for just a moment to make sure you didn’t trip over any of the plants spread across the floor; you didn’t care if you got hurt, but you didn’t want to risk breaking your camera right now. “They’ve just probably all gotten used to it because they see you all the time since you’re friends, right?”

Kaede hummed, putting a finger to her chin. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

You just smiled at the ghost girl floating beside you before you walked into another wall; after taking a step back and making sure your camera was okay, you noticed that it was actually the front door to the school building, but a small gasp from Kaede immediately pulled your attention away from it and back over to her to see that there was a look of realization on her face.

“Oh, I forgot to ask! You must be a new student, right?” She asked, swiveling around so that the two of you were both facing the front door, “I haven’t seen you at school before, and considering how you didn’t know how many ghosts were around here…”

“You’re not the first one to ask me that.” You pushed open the door, needing to do so since you, unfortunately, couldn’t go through walls like Kaede could. “But I’m actually just visiting-”

Your eyes didn’t even get a chance to adjust to the light outside before you were tackled to the ground, a strangled gasp escaping your lips as your body was harshly squeezed by some kind of thin binding. Your camera clattered to the ground a few feet away, and you hoped it was okay.

“Kirumi!” Kaede had an expression of confused panic on her face as she looked at the spider maid that had just tied you up with her web. “What’s going on?! What did you do that for?!”

“Ah, Kaede. Thank goodness you are uninjured.”

“Huh?!”

With your face pressed to the ground, you couldn’t see much of what was going on, and was only able to hear multiple pairs of footsteps heading your way, voices full of panic and confusion merging together into a cacophonic mess of sound… but you couldn’t care less about that.

You were just praying that your camera had survived its harsh fall onto the ground.

“W-Why is new friend in web?!”

“Ah-ha! I knew they were bad news the moment I saw them! They scared Himiko, after all!”

“Nyeh, I… I wasn’t scared! Just surprised!”

“Hmph, so they’ve finally been caught.”

“Thank goodness. I can’t believe I didn’t notice that they weren’t a student.”

“Well, I think it’s plain obvious due to their equipment, Keebo.”

You shifted your head to look upwards when a shadow cast itself over you, allowing you to see the boy from before — the one from the endless hallway, specifically; you had seen a lot of boys during your investigation of the school, but, unfortunately, none of them were ghosts.

“Aww… you got caught? How disappointing. I thought you were better than that.” The mock disappointment on his face shifted to a dismissive, and almost smug, smile. “I guess I helped you out for nothing, huh?”

The girl from the trio on the second floor — who you realized must be the final ghost by process of elimination, considering Kaede mentioned a ghost named “Maki” and the alien had referred to her as “Bloody Maki” before you had left — glared at the boy. “What did you just say?”

“Hmm?” The boy put his arms behind his head, an innocent smile on his face. “Oh, nothing important. I just messed with them for a bit on the fourth floor, that’s all.”

“Kokichi.” The vampire looked at the boy with a questioning glance. “Is that why we couldn’t find them when we followed after them? That was your doing?”

The short cat man adjusted his beanie, his ears twitching. “So that’s why it was like they disappeared…”

“I thought they were just able to slip by…” Keebo furrowed his eyebrows as he thought. “...but it was all because of Kokichi.”

“And it was a few hours after you informed me of them that they entered my lab,” Korekiyo added, a frame containing a painting with a concerned Angie in it in his arms, “So I’d say he kept them for… quite a while.”

“Hey, wait a minute!” You tried to adjust your position to glare at Kokichi. “I knew something felt wrong when I looked at the time! You took away precious time from my search, you jerk!”

“Wowww…” He didn’t look even slightly bothered, a smile still on his face. “You learn what I’m capable of, but you still insult me? You really are a bold one! At least you’re not disappointing in that regard… but you should know that I actually helped you. If I hadn’t done anything, you would’ve just been caught, and then you would’ve never gotten to meet Angie or Kaede.”

He knew he was right, you knew he was right, and he knew that you knew he was right, but you puffed out your cheeks in annoyance anyways.

“Can someone please tell me what’s going on here?” Kaede pleaded, glancing around at the others with a distressed frown on her face, “I have no idea what any of you are talking about! Why did you tie them up?!”

She looked at the vampire who came to stand beside her, a concerned expression on his face. “Shuichi?”

The vampire nervously smiled at the ghost girl.

“Sorry, Kaede… this person- they’re a human ghost hunter. We’ve actually been searching for them for hours, after Keebo and Ryoma-” Shuichi briefly gestured at the possible-robot boy and short cat man that were standing together at one edge of the group. “-told us about them.”

“Ghost…” Kaede blinked. “...hunter?”

Maki looked off to the side, fiddling with one of her twintails. “I could tell just by looking at them. These two idiots didn’t even realize at first.”

“H-Hey! Don’t say that about my sidekick and I!” Kaito was taken aback, his eyes wide as he looked at the bloody ghost girl standing next to him. “And how was I supposed to know what a “ghost hunter” is? I’ve never even heard of that before!”

“Please, there is no need for fighting,” The spider maid — Kirumi, based on what Kaede had said earlier — spoke up, “They have been caught, and everything is now under control.”

“Oh, oh! Angie has a question!” The girl in the painting raised a hand up, directing attention to herself as she continued to smile. “Um… what now? We can’t just keep them tied up, right?”

The group looked around at each other, waiting for someone to speak up; as time continued to pass by like this, with not a single word uttered, it became increasingly obvious that no one had thought about what they should do after they had caught you.

“What the fuck is going on over here?”

The sound of a new voice — this one oddly aggressive — caused everyone to look over at the source; you shifted where you laid to turn your head to see a girl wearing a pink school uniform that didn’t seem entirely appropriate in a school setting. She looked pretty normal if you were to ignore the horns, wings, and spiked tail she had — she must be some kind of demon.

“Are you all circle-jerkin’ without me?”

The demon looked around at everyone gathered in front of the school before spotting you on the ground, tied up tightly in Kirumi’s web, and looked at the spider maid with raised eyebrows.

“O-ho-ho! I didn’t know you were into that, Kirumi!”

Kirumi kept a calm expression displayed on her face, her hands politely folded in front of her body. “I assure you, this is a one-time thing. I do not enjoy trapping others in my web, but it is to ensure the safety of the group at this moment in time.”

“Safety of the group…?” The demon repeated, a brief moment passing before an annoyed frown appeared on her face, “Okay, I was joking the first time, but what the actual fuck is going on?”

The demon was answered by a mess of voices as multiple people tried to explain what was going on, the explanations prompting others to pop up with even more questions because they too, like the demon, had little to no idea what exactly was happening here.

You squirmed around on the ground during the confusion, trying to steady the weight of your backpack so that you could properly move around without being tipped over like a domino; your target to get to was your camera — if it didn’t break from its fall, it should still be recording since you never got to hit the pause or finish button before being rudely tackled. You wanted to make sure that the footage you got of Angie and Kaede — you hardly got any of Maki since you were fooled by her ghostly genius — was going to save properly. You knew that you would never get such irrefutable ghostly evidence like this ever again, this footage being your magnum opus.

You managed to wrestle an arm out the webbing, and reached out to grab your camera to-

“Yoink! I’ll just take this!”

The sight of your precious camera being snatched up by Kokichi made you freeze, before a burning fury erupted inside of you as you glared at the boy. “Hey! Give that back! It’s mine!”

He ignored you in favor of turning towards the demon.

“Hey, bitchlet-” Kokichi practically threw your precious camera towards her, your entire body tensing up and a small squeak escaping you the moment he let go of it. “-catch!”

“Wha-?!” The demon managed to catch your camera in her arms — to your great relief — despite her surprise; sure, her grip on it wasn’t the best, but it was better than seeing it crash onto the ground and break into a million pieces before your very eyes. “B-Bitchlet...?!”

You somehow managed to calm yourself down slightly by focusing on your breathing, trying to get yourself into a state of mind where you could think of something to do to save your camera, before your breath got caught in your throat at the sound of Kokichi’s voice deepening, the most unnerving and malicious grin you had ever seen taking its place on his face.

“Delete the footage.”

You began thrashing around in the webbing even before he finished speaking, trying to free the rest of your body as panic settled into your mind. “No-no-no-nooo…!”

The air was knocked out of you once again as you were pinned down, a gloved hand taking a hold of the arm you had already managed to free. You glanced up to see Kirumi standing above you as you struggled against her grip in vain, her strength far greater than yours.

The demon gave Kokichi an annoyed glare. “Geez, can’t you just do it yourself?”

“Well, yeahhh… but I can’t take away your only redeeming trait.” Kokichi put his arms behind his head, a simple smile on his face now. “Without the technology expertise, you’d just be a demonic prostitute, and that’s just too cruel. So get to it — chop, chop!”

The demon let out a “tch” sound, before she started fiddling with your camera.

“Fine…”

She clicked a button.

“There.”

And you just stopped.

Kirumi raised an eyebrow in confusion when you stopped struggling, your body now lying limp on the ground with an unreadable expression. You felt numb — an entire night of your life was just wasted; you had nothing to show for your time here. You finally got evidence of ghosts on camera, irrefutable proof that could have shown the world the truth, and it was just deleted.

It was gone.

Like it never existed in the first place.

You blinked, finding yourself no longer on the ground but hanging from someone’s grasp, the webbing strong enough to support your weight. You tilted your head, looking up to see that the spider maid was the one holding you up; her strength really was something.

“Okay, the human’s been caught and the footage has been deleted,” Tsumugi said, looking slightly nervous as she looked around at everyone, “That's the end of the problem, right?”

Shuichi also looked nervous, but had a serious expression on his face. “No, we’ve still got to deal with them.”

“They know too much.” Maki fiddled with one of her twintails. “It’d be dangerous to just let them go.”

“W-Wait, if we can’t let them go…” Keebo looked at the bloody ghost, a nervous frown on his face. “...are you suggesting that we keep them here?”

“There’s no way we can do that!” Kaede spoke up, floating a little higher to bring attention to herself as she did so; even though you had lost your drive to continue forward, you felt a hint of a smile appear on your face at the sight of her. “We can’t just keep them here! That’s wrong!”

“Mmm, yeah…” Kokichi looked at his hand dismissively. “And there’s no reason to. We’ve already got Kirumi, and I doubt they’d be able to do a better job than her.”

Ryoma took his candy cigarette between his fingers, a calm expression on his face. “Well, we need to figure out something. We can’t let them go because they’re a risk to our safety, but we can’t keep them here against their will either.”

“Easy solution!” The demon placed her hands on her hips, a proud smile on her face. “We just blackmail the shit outta ‘em! Make them not wanna talk about what they’ve seen here!”

“With what information?” Korekiyo held onto his face with one hand, the other still holding onto the painting with Angie in it. “We don’t even know their name… unless you’re suggesting a more violent method?”

“Oh?” Tenko perked up, her tails flaring out behind her. “I can do that!”

“Hmm? No, no, that won’t do!” Angie shook her head, a smile still displayed on her face. “The human has done nothing worthy of punishment! That’s what Atua says!”

“Gonta knows friends are scared, but…” Gonta hesitated. “...Gonta cannot allow new friend to get hurt either!”

Kaede nodded, a worried frown on her face. “Yeah, that’s insane!”

The air was quickly filled with more and more voices as everyone joined the discussion to try and come to a decision on what to do; a majority of them vetoed any idea of violence, but also didn’t agree with the suggestion of keeping you here. It eventually got to a point where the same ideas were starting to be recycled, just with different phrasing each time they came up.

“Hey, I might have an idea.”

The sight of a webbed hand in the air quickly gathered everyone’s attention, their voices quieting down as they all turned to look at Rantaro; a serious expression was on his face as he crossed his arms, the air now completely silent as everyone stared at him.

“What’s…” Kaede paused, uncertainty written all over her face. “...what’s your idea, Rantaro?”

“Well, we erased the footage, right? So… how about we erase their memory too? Making them forget everything will solve both our problems.”

It was quiet enough to hear a pin drop, though your shuffling as you perked up at Rantaro’s words went unnoticed as everyone continued to stare at him; the first thing to break the group’s silence was the clap of Kaede’s hands as she clasped them together, a smile now on her face.

“That’s a great idea! It’s perfect!”

“Well, shit. That’s so simple!” The demon looked annoyed, averting her eyes from everyone else. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

“Don’t worry, Miu-” Kokichi had a wide grin on his face. “-we don’t expect much from you anyways!”

Korekiyo shifted the painting in his arms. “Interesting… how will we be performing this feat?”

“Obviously Himiko can do it!” Tenko exclaimed, a smug expression on her face as her tails happily swayed behind her, “She can do anything!”

“Nyeh..” Himiko lacked the enthusiasm Tenko had, her gaze lazily cast downwards as she frowned. “I don’t know… I’ve never done anything like that before…”

Angie held a paintbrush up to her chin. “I could ask Atua to do it, but he’s actually pretty busy right now.”

“Kokichi.”

The smiling boy looked over at the vampire who had said his name.

“Yes…?”

“You should be able to do that, right? Make them forget?”

Kokichi let out a long hum, continuing to smile all the while. “Maybe… but why should I? That’s the most boring thing we could do.”

His smile just grew as almost everyone started complaining — all of which was directed at him, of course; irritated mentions of his name were thrown around within the mumbling and grumbling and arguing that you couldn’t otherwise make out the words of, though you did hear a “fucking shota prick” somewhere in the mix of angry comments.

“Well…” Kokichi dragged the word out. “...since you’re all asking sooo nicely…”

You jolted when his gaze landed on you, and immediately glared at him as he started walking towards you.

“Absolutely not!” You thrashed around in your silky strait-jacket. “You can’t do this! What’ll I tell my subscribers?!”

Kokichi tilted his head. “Subscribers?”

“Uh, yeah! My subscribers! Followers! Whatever you want to call them!” You kicked your legs, causing Kirumi to hold you a little further away from herself. “I can’t let you disappoint a thousand people by erasing my memory! I refuse! I’m supposed to bring them the latest and best in ghost news!”

“A thousand followers…” Kokichi mumbled to himself, before a cheeky smile appeared on his face as he let out a laugh, “How cute! Come back and talk to me when you’ve got ten thousand!”

“No, no, no!” You tried to lean away from him as he got closer. “You can’t do this!”

“Mmm… yes, I can-” He leaned in closer, raising up a hand. “-and I will!”

He poked your nose with his finger.

“Boop!”

- - - - -

You let out a small groan as you placed a hand on your head, your eyes cracking open slowly as you squinted at the bright daylight that dared to burn your retinas. “...wait, daylight?”

The sight of a bright blue sky was above you, a few white clouds sailing by on the breeze, and you stared at it for a moment before pushing yourself up into a sitting position — your gaze was immediately shifted to allow you to see that you were, indeed, outside. You were currently sitting on a patch of soft grass and dirt, a massive fence just a few meters away from you.

You looked down at yourself, cringing slightly at the dirt stains on your clothing and skin; they almost made it look like you had been tossed onto the ground from the way they were smeared.

That became more of an actual possibility when you noticed how achy your entire body was.

You just shook yourself fully awake and checked the backpack that was next to you — your camera’s battery was low, you were missing a flashlight, and you had a water bottle full of empty granola bar wrappers. “That’s weird… I packed all of this for my trip just yesterday…”

You paused.

“Wait… what day is it?”

You whipped out your phone, your gaze immediately locking onto the date that was displayed on the lock screen: it was the next day — as in, the next day after the day you planned to take your next trip. You blinked, before twisting around to look at the massive fence next to you.

The property beyond the fence was out of your sight from where you were sitting, but you already knew exactly what it was — the Ultimate Academy for Gifted Juveniles.

You had researched the place so thoroughly that you could probably pass a test on its history and prominence in society; not that it had much, but still. There wasn’t anything about ghostly activity occurring there in your research, unfortunately, but you concluded that was just because hardly anybody had set foot in there since its closure all those years ago. That had just made it all the more appealing to you, the fact that not many had dared to explore inside its walls.

But you dared to.

You were going to be one of the few to venture inside and- you were going to- going to?

But… didn’t you already go inside?

You winced, a sharp gasp escaping your lips as your hands grabbed at your head; a sudden pain struck your brain, making you fall over as your thoughts stopped in their tracks.

Images of a place you didn’t recognize flooded into your head: overgrown plants growing through cracked floor tiles, hot-pink polka-dotted stairs, an endless hallway straight-out of a horror movie, stain-glass windows that seemed like they belonged in a church…

…and a group of blurry figures standing around you, their voices muffled and echoing in the back of your head as you realized that you knew who they were.

The pain stopped as you gasped again, this time being a surprised gasp; a happy gasp.

Your hands slowly moved away from your head as you smiled and sat back up, the wetness on your cheeks ignored as you let out a small giggle. You soon got back on your feet, and turned to face the massive fence a few meters away from you before you hummed, turning away from it.

You grabbed your backpack, throwing your arms through the straps as you began walking away, home being your next destination.

Your footage may have been deleted, and you may have been thrown out…

…but there was always next time.

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