Kakorrhaphiophobia

Chapter 2

It was official.

Either Lily died and went into purgatory or everyone in Japan was straight up abducted and seeing the seven short red vertical lines on her right wrist was only adding onto her already bad anxiety.

She did what her therapist advised her to do in these kinds of situations and took a deep breath to calm down.

...

After a few more minutes of silence Lily was this close to losing her shit.

"Okay, so I woke up this morning..." Lily began listing things off with her finger that she did that morning, "...fed my fish and then I went to bed."

She paused, and for a moment she felt the familiar burn in her eyes.

Was she crying?

Lily touched the side of her cheeks.

Oh she was definitely crying.

FUCK.

Eventually the girl passed out in the middle of the streets.

-

----

Much later after getting her much-needed senses together and throwing anything trashing her optimism into her mental trashcan to deal with later, Lily finally found other people.

Lily couldn't read the name of the school but in all honestly the girl was just happy to find other people.

A voice chimed.

[THERE ARE CURRENTLY SEVEN PARTICIPANTS.

Please wait for the game to commence.

Three minutes until registration closes]

At this there were looks of confusion, fear and determination.

...Why does this seem familiar?"

She decided to ask one of the few who look like they wouldn't shatter her bones.

"E-Excuse me? Do you know where we are? What did it say?"

They gave her a confused look.

"Does anyone know what she's saying?" his friend shook his head in pity and muttered "Probably a Tourists."

Grabbing a phone from the table, one of the two gave it to her and Lily was confused when it scanned her face instantly.

[Registration has closed.

There are a total of EIGHT PARTICIPANTS.

THE GAME WILL NOW COMMENCE.

Difficulty, Six of Clubs.]

The moment the game was announced, Lily heard the faint chimed of a bell and suddenly she was able to understand the language around her perfectly, but this fact was lost to her because with a sinking feeling of dread, Lily had a feeling about where she was and was close to tears again.

"I'm in the Borderlands, aren't I?"