The bright flash faded, and before any of them could understand what had happened, Yuta, Maki, and Toki stumbled out of thin air—straight into something moist and sandy.
The first thing they all noticed wasn't the buildings further away or the humming lights above, but the cold splash that greeted them from below.
"…Please tell me that wasn't another bleach," Yuta muttered, staring down at his soaked shoes.
Maki groaned, dripping wet, her expression twitching with barely held rage. "Yuta. I swear if this is your doing again, I'm throwing you in front of Kaido's dragon breath myself."
Enough is enough—she couldn't take it anymore. She didn't mind getting teleported to god knows which next world was on the author's wishlist, but this…
"Why it's always a bleach. Why?"
'I don't know, okay? I'm not the one putting the destination before world travel,' Yuta wished to shout, but seeing Maki's annoyed face, he held back.
Even Toki, usually calm and graceful, looked stunned as she wrung her long sleeves. "Such strange water… why does it smell like medicine?"
Yuta sighed, looking around the narrow street with flickering neon lights and strange signs. This world was not as pure as the One Piece world in terms of quality.
He couldn't smell any medicine from the sand, but he could understand why Toki might think that way. For someone who had never come across pollution, she would take some time getting used to this place.
As for why he thought that… well, because it wasn't Toki who teleported them.
"Okay… this isn't Wano."
Maki folded her arms, glaring. "Then where are we this time? And don't tell me your stupid physique glitched again." She didn't have to be told to know that this wasn't Toki who teleported them. If it were, then they would have been in Wano, not wherever this was.
Yuta winced. "About that…"
Before he could finish, Toki looked between them, confused. "Excuse me… what are you talking about? And how did we come here? I didn't even use my powers?" she asked in confusion.
Toki had been planning to send the kids into the future, twenty years ahead of her time, while secretly staying behind. After thinking, she ultimately decided to end her journey, sticking to her original plan. But before she could even use her Devil Fruit power, they were here.
Maki's glare once again snapped toward Yuta. "Explain!"
"Hey—hey! Calm down!" Yuta raised his hands quickly, backing away from her murderous aura. "It wasn't on purpose! You know how it goes, right? It just happens, I got no control over it!" Yuta could only raise his hand in defense.
For a second, Maki looked like she was about to really throw him into the sea, but then she just sighed. There really was no point acting like that. Whether it was Toki who took them out of that place or Yuta, ultimately what mattered was that they were out of that situation where the entire country was breathing down on them.
However, by now she had realized the nature of this world travel. Time didn't change when they traveled, meaning the original problem—where they were running twenty years behind their original time—still existed.
If they were to go back to Wano, they would still be twenty years in the past. It still fell onto Toki to help them return to their time.
Toki blinked, utterly lost. "Another world? What are you two talking about?…"
Yuta nodded awkwardly. "Yeah, so… funny story. We're kind of… travelers. Between worlds."
"Between… worlds?" she repeated softly, her brain trying to understand the concept of what the world was. Surely it isn't the world she knew.
After all, the entity who sits on the empty throne was also called 'The World'.
"You mean there are other worlds beyond the seas of Wano?" she asked hesitantly.
"More like in terms of there are other worlds where no sea can take you," Yuta said, scratching the back of his head. "And right now, we seem to have landed in one of them. It's my homeland, in fact."
Maki frowned. "Wait—hold up. If we were twenty years in the past in Wano… does that mean…?" She knew the answer, just needed a second opinion.
Yuta's expression turned grim. "Yeah. We're twenty years in the past here too."
'Sigh… well, at least we're back here. That's a win, right!' Maki deflated. Just like she thought, ultimately it fell onto Toki to send them back in time.
"So not only are we in another world, we're stuck twenty years before everything we know!" There was a moment of silence. Then Toki, in her attempt to understand the situation, summarized their condition until now.
Yuta sighed. "You're welcome."
Maki looked ready to strangle him.
Toki, meanwhile, tilted her head thoughtfully. "I must say… this 'Hero' world is quite strange. The lights shine without fire, and the air smells… different."
"Yeah, it's called pollution. Good stuff once you get used to it," Yuta said with a smile, earning a smack from Maki.
He glanced at the street corner where a billboard displayed some hero commercial. Twenty years past was still almost like his own time.
It was rather unspoken, but after Quirks took over the world, the scientific progression of humankind kind of halted. Even twenty years before his time, the level of technology wasn't that different from the MHA original timeline.
Sigh…
"Wanna eat something? We might be here for a while," Yuta offered.
Maki snorted. "Speak for yourself. I'm finding the first hot bath I can."
Toki smiled gently, despite the chaos. "No matter where we are, perhaps fate simply wants us together." She said she didn't care—she was ready to die already; her fate after that didn't matter to her.
"Or maybe," Maki muttered darkly, "it's just some jackass with infinite power playing games with us, making a joke of dimensional travel like it was Gen Z relationship status."
'Damn… that almost felt personal.' Yuta tactfully avoided Maki's eyes and kept going. Though going back to their time was important, they could rest for a bit, right?
xxx
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