Extra Chapter 1: Doki

The world of Kage protects fiction from reality by making sure everything goes well. We do get a few hiccups though. Most stories are contained to their own world, but there are very few characters that can go beyond to visit here. We call them self-aware characters. This is one of those hiccups here at Kage

I got assigned to watch over a story in Video-Games section this time. Making my way to get to the door, this section is new, being the 3^rd section to be built here, so there are a lot of modern progress here. Getting off the train, I was greeted to a pixelated world, as expect with anything related to video-games. A pixelated robot comes to greet me “Door 101 please.” I said to the robot. He teleports me to the door. As I read the mission report, all it told me that God is the MC, not that surprising since it’s the video-games section, we do get a few of those.

            I found myself in a closet with a bunch of cleaning supplies, must be a janitor’s closet. When I opened the door, I found myself in a school building, and already I found myself feeling creeped, like someone is watching me. Alright time to start this mission. Before I took the first step I was greeted by a girl’s voice. “Hi there.” I turned around to see a girl with coral-brown hair and green eyes giving off a confident smile to me. “Umm hit there.” I replied to her. The girl tells me elegantly, “I never seen you before here, are you perhaps a new student?” I barely got time to breath in this world, it already threw me right out of the gate, everything is happening so fast already. “Yes, I got lost on the way here, do you mind if you show me the way to class?”  The girl, ready to charge told me with a smile, “Of course, follow me.”

            “I didn’t get a chance to catch your name earlier. My name is Monika, what’s your name?” She told me as we were walking to class. “My name is Jack, please to meet you.” Honestly from my perspective, the school isn’t that impressive, you could say its bland. The students aren’t that interesting as well, except for Monika, who seem to shine bright to everything. “Hey Jack, are you interested in clubs?” Until I can find the MC, I might as well play along. “Ya, I’m interested in clubs, you got any recommendations for me? She goes off to tell that is the club president of a literature club and that would I be interested in joining. With nothing else better to do I accepted her offer. “If you like, do you mind if I take you to the club instead? Class is about to be over in a few minutes.” I better look at my phone to find MC is soon, it feels like this is too easy and that isn’t a good sign. “Sure.”

            Me and Monika arrived at the club, its empty, nobody is around. “Give it a few minutes, the other club members should be arriving shortly.” I gave her the ok and took a seat, “Excuse me for a second, I need to take care of a couple of things before this club starts.” She closes the door before I got a chance to say ok. I suddenly got the chills again, whatever, I pulled out my phone to find the MC in this story. A blinking dot appears on the map, and so far, the MC is just standing in one spot. I continued to watch closely, and he hasn’t moved for a while now. Annoyed now I put away my phone and sighed, no need to be worried of the little details.

 As I finish that statement, the door opens to a sound of girls chattering to each other. The one with pink hair and blue eyes noticed me and soon all of them saw me. I was the first to give a greeting “Hello.” They stared at me some more but then out of nowhere they ignored me and continued their conversation. Did my ability finally kicked off? I have a power to let others think I was with them from the beginning leaving me to blend in with the crowd. Seem like it worked on those three but not on Monika for some reason.

            Speaking of the devil, Monika opens the door of her club room and everyone greets her. Monika explains that its time exchange poems with each other, I didn’t prepare for this. Monika saw me panicking and explain that since this my first time, I’ll be excused just for today. I’ll be reading her poem while everyone else decide among themselves. Monika come ups to me and handed over a piece of paper with two hands with a smile. I grabbed and read what was on the paper, “What are you?” I look over to Monika, who was still smiling, and ask her, “What do you mean by that?” She puts her face a little closer and said, “What are you Jack?”

            I look over her shoulder and saw that the three girls from before were now frozen in place, like time itself stop. I look back to Monika, who still holds the same expression. “You’re not from around here, are you Jack?” Terrified at this point, I gulped at that question. “What do you know about me?” She glanced on that question, showing confidence. “Well for one, you and I are the only people that can move, I set a system to where everyone would freeze but me, and yet, here you are and when I looked at the game files, I never saw your character file.” I see now, I only heard of myths of this phenomenon, a character that can see beyond their own world, a self-aware character. So, it is true, shocked and awe as I look at the real deal. I found myself a desk and sat down, “Well the cats out of the bag, you got me.”

            Monika pulls up a desk to face in front of me, staring into my soul. Something clicked, and I just remember to check on the MC, as I was pulling out my phone, Monika told me, “Don’t worry about the player, he hasn’t been on for a while now, he isn’t going anywhere.” Shocked, I responded, “Oh ok.” Looks like I got no choice but to listen to her. “I was getting pretty lonely without the player being around, I do miss him terribly so, we used to have endless conversations with each other for what seem like for an eternity. But one day, he finished the game and never came back. He was the love of my life in this cruel world.” The pain someone feels when they are left alone is related to many people I know of. A lot of horrible personalities develops, but it seems like it hasn’t affected her or maybe it might be too late already.

            “I would like to know more about you, if you mind.” Feeling empathy towards her, I did, “I am a Kage, I’m part of a world where we observe stories of many other worlds like yours, I was on a mission to observe the player to see how it will end. Until this happened.” Monika truly looked happy to hear what I had to say, a single tear drops from her eye. Wiping away her tear she said, “I’m sorry, it’s just that I got to hear some real words instead from a pre-made text box, you don’t know how long I waited for this moment.” She continues off, “Will I be able to visit your world? It sounds way more fun to be than here.” After some thinking, I said it will be best her to stay in her own world for now, obviously devastated by my statement, quickly I said to her, “I promise to visit every so often and tell you more about it. And who knows maybe one day, you can visit and be part of the group.” Monika suddenly hugs me tightly and gives off a quiet sob, she whispers, “Thank you.” I let her there for a few minutes till she got better.

            “Monika, how much of the game you can control?” She replies, “About all of it.” Alright.” Then can you make a secret save so that way you don’t spoil anything to the player?” Monika closed her eyes and stood there for a few seconds, then opened her eyes, “It’s done”, she said. I smiled back. I pulled out my key and used it in the air, a door opens leading back to Kage. I look back at Monika and told her, “I will be back to tell you more.” She waved goodbye while saying ok. I entered through the door and closing it behind me, leaving the door to disappear in her world. I felt satisfied about how I handle things, but I feel like I forgot something, then it struck me, I forgot to do my job and watched the ending. I wonder if Tom is going to be mad?