Semblance of Remembrance

Chapter 1 - Awakening

Ayaka's Perspective

"Uhhhh, where am I? What happened to me?" I groggily groaned as I slowly pulled myself off the ground. I dusted my clothes and tried to remember what exactly happened before I woke up. After trying for a while, I found out that I had no clear memories of anything before I woke up, except my name. All of my memories were hazy and distorted, as if something was inferring with them, which prevented me from accessing any of them. In disbelief, I tried to vocalize everything that I could, hoping that my mouth somehow remembered even when my brain could not, but I only managed to say one sentence. "My name is Ayaka Komeiji......" Then I went silent.

"No way, I really can't remember anything except my name." I pathetically whispered as I fell to my knees, eyes full of tears. I continued to cry for what seemed to be hours before I eventually snapped out of it.

"No point in despairing about the past, I should focus on the present." I mumbled to myself as I slowly rose to my feet again. "Back to my original question, where am I?"

I looked around and saw that I was in some kind of enclosed space. Stone walls prevented me from moving to my left and right and over my head was a stone ceiling. It seemed that I was in some sort of cave. Behind me, the ground slanted upwards supposedly towards the surface, while in front of me the ground sloped downwards leading deeper into the cave. After looking at my surroundings for a while, I came to the realization that I could see everything perfectly, despite being in a cave.

'It seems like the only choice I have is to either move deeper in this cave or attempt to follow this cave to the surface. Logically, I should try to go upwards, as I have a feeling that it will likely lead me out of this cave, but I feel something resonating with me deeper in the cave.' I thought to myself.

The attraction to whatever was deeper inside the cave gradually grew stronger, eventually becoming a feeling of excitement and relief similar to returning to my house and family after being away from them for a long time. After a while, I was still hesitating between the two options, when suddenly...

BAANNNGGG

A loud sound echoed behind me, from where the path led upwards and the entire cave started to shake. Hearing the sound and feeling the tremors made me make a decision.

'I definitely do not want to go upwards after hearing that. There is definitely something strong and threatening up there, but I don't know what. Anyways, I am not risking my life going up and messing with something that could create such a loud noise. There could be something even more dangerous downwards, but I'm willing to take the chances as it is not guaranteed that something dangerous is deeper in this cave, highly probable maybe, but not guaranteed. Guess that means I'm going deeper into this cave then' I reasoned.

Just before I started to follow through with my decision, two books suddenly fell within a few feet of where I awoke. The two books were titled Myths and Legends Around the World and How to Best Learn from Observation. They looked oddly familiar to me and they landed near where I awoke, so I reasoned that they were likely with me before something happened to me. I grabbed the books and began to move downwards, deeper into the cave. A few moments later, a giant building appeared in my vision. The building itself had no front yard, a tiled pathway to the large double doors, statues of animals on top of the roof, stained glass windows that formed a mosaic of a rose, and several eyes carved into whatever material that the building was made of.

"What is this place?" The words flowed out of my mouth unintentionally. I was not expecting an answer because the place looked to be devoid of any people, but I heard a voice behind me.

"This is Chireiden, otherwise known as the Palace of Earth Spirits." The voice explained.

I hurriedly turned around to see who had answered my question. I turned around and saw the person who had answered my question. I saw a girl with long, bright red hair tied into a twin tails hairstyle with green two black ribbons tied to each side of her hair and had a ribbon tied on her left leg. She wore a forest green dress with a red band near the collar with black shoes. Most notably however, she had a pair of cat ears on top of her head. The edges of these ears were black, but the inside was red. In one of her hands, she was holding onto a two-wheeled wheelbarrow. In the other, she held a white rock-like thing that glowed with a weird bluish aura. I thought that she would have a composed expression on her face because of how calmly she answered my question, but instead it showed a look of complete shock.