Looking up at the giant walls blocking off the inner sanctum, Matsumi took a step back, peeking down at his crumpled up letter.
"I really should have asked for directions somewhere..."
He'd just been skating around the outer sanctum for hours now trying to find his way in the kingdom as he had a small shopping list in his hand.
A young girl, probably around Matsumi's age walked around the sanctum. Most Likely, just as lost as Matsumi was. She wore designer garments as her long black hair flowed in the wind. She looked on. "You would think that this place would be easier to navigate..I suppose not."
"Huh?" He turned around to face the voice. "You got lost too? Whoa, what are those fancy clothes you're wearing? Are you important or something?"
"I-Important?..No. I wouldn't say so..I'm sort of just a normal girl..and Yeah..I'm lost...You would think they'd give people maps or something right?" She looked down in embarassment from his comment.
"You'd think!" He gave a very goofy and energetic laugh at her sudden reaction. He moved closer to her and skated around her in a circle. "So, you looking for something too?"
"My mother just got me an apartment here in the city. She wants me to attend school for a while here...Unfortunately." She rolled her eyes at the thought. "So i'm looking for my house and something to eat. More specifically something to eat right now."
"Oh! You're not from here? I was sure you were a local. Where are you from?" He was still examining her in circles like a bug, definitely being overwhelming. "I'm looking for a place to buy some tea leaves for Mr. Moon! That old fart."
Vermelha didn't particularly mind the examination. Strange? Absolutely. But uncommon? Not much. She was always admired by men, and if it wasn't men it was her peers, and if it wasn't her peers it was her parents making sure that her clothes were to their liking. "Monte Carlo. I come from there. Sorry. I don't know anything of a 'Mr. Moon'. I'm quite sure he's a great guy. Tea sounds lovely right about now."
"Monte Carlo? Is that far? I don't know where that is." He stopped circling her and stopped in front of her. "I'm from Leordoba, it's a small boring town west of here! All the way out there. In the outer lands, not in Ashina or the other kingdom close by."
"Monte Carlo is a small city. It's not too far from here either. Leordoba..? I've never heard of something like that. Perhaps i'll visit one day, though I don't know how much interest i'd take in a boring town." She chuckled to herself about the idea of it.
"I can show you around, but I'll warn you there's not much to see. You said you were gonna start school, right? That means you can do magic?"
"Yeah. I've been using it my whole life. Since I was three or four. Normal people attend school as well though."
"I knew it! Can you do it? Please! I wanna see it!"
"Do what?..Use magic?"
"Yeah, duh! Lemme see it"
Vermelha smiled and flicked her finger, a small flame danced on her hand. "This is one of the first spells you'll learn. It's beautiful. It represents what Mana is to the world. A new flame of hope."
His bright red eyes widened in amazement. "Wow! That is so awesome! Haha! It's like…Crazy! Can you do tricks with it?"
"I guess." She placed her fingers on the ground. Soon after a small person made of fire started running around, almost the size of an action figure.
Matsumi looked down to it. "Make it do a flip! A triple helix jump!"
The little fire man did a flip and started to do a bit of gymnastics, leaving small sparks on the ground, as Matsumi requested.
"Go little dude, go! Haha!" In the heat of the moment, Matsumi swung his leg backwards to generate some momentum before kicking it forward and do a sideways backflip, landing again on his roller blades. "Okay okay, you said you wanted tea? I don't know what's so great about it."
"I guess it calms the nerves. That's really it to be honest."
"You know where to go? Maybe we can help each other! How about that?"
She smiled at his enthusiasm. She at least knew he was friendly which was what mattered to her. "I have an idea of where it can be. I think it can work out."
"Really? Okay! Two minds are better than one, right?"
"That I can't disagree with. I guess you can tell me more about this 'village' too. I can use a great cup of tea. Who knows maybe you'll like it. Though I prefer coffee." The little fire man dissapeared as she looked down on it.
"I never really have it, but I don't hate it! People say that Mr. Moon makes the best tea ever, so this mission i'm on is life or death!"
"Sounds a bit extreme. I don't know if I want to try his tea now!" She messed around with him, sarcastically poking him. "Alright so, we're going to a tea shop?"
"That's the idea, then I can buy everything that's on this list, see?" He pulled out the letter right up to her face suddenly, it was dirty and crumpled up since he'd fallen on it before.
She slowly pushed the letter away from her face, at least far enough away to where she could actually make out what exactly it said. She looked on silently. "I see. Maybe we can get you some new clothes as well. That might be beneficial for you. Just to clean up you know? A lot of your things are rusted or dirty. Not that that's a bad thing or I'm insulting you. I'm just putting it out there." She let his hands down, getting the paper out of her face completely.
"What?! What I'm wearing is awesome! No way can I jump around in what you're wearing."
"So what are you trying to say about what I'm wearing? That i'm not awesome?"
"Hmm. Your clothes have at most four and a half awesome points, too fancy." Again he laughed like a total buffoon.
"Four and a half out of what? Ten? That's failing by a longshot. If I went and took a test and got a four and a half I would flunk out of whatever subject you'd be referring to."
"I don't make the rules!"
He very clearly does.
"Uhh...hey, what is your name?"
"Vermelha..and you? What's your name mister rule maker?"
"Matsumi Ryokō! You don't have a family name?"
"I dropped it before I moved. I figured if I'm starting fresh why not go all the way? I don't like going half on things. I either am or I'm not you know? I decided that i'm me. Not anything that has to do with my family."
"That's a solid eight awesome points!"
"If the max amount of points I can get is one hundred, I am still only at twelve. Which might be worse than before."
"No use in thinking about it! Come on, we have some tea to catch!"
"Alright Alright.." She put her head down and began walking the city of Ashina, passing the citizens. She didn't run as if she did, she would get even more lost than she was now. She looked around, admiring how clean and pristine the city was..though sooner or later that wouldn't be on her mind as all she thought about was the tea she could try. Whether it was back home, or here she needed something to calm her nerves.
"I assume you don't carry one of these since you're from a smaller town?" She reached in the back of her black jean pocket, a pair of pants that was probably equally as expensive as the garments she wore on her top. She pulled out a small phone, one of the newer models that had released recently.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, Matsumi was skating, well, everywhere. Maybe even being seen as rude as he danced in between the people but never losing sight of Vermelha or letting her lose sight of him. His head turned to her question. "Hm? No, I don't. I get told I should get one but, whatever."
"I think it's pretty much vital at this point. How are you going to contact anyone without a phone?"
"I yell out! Or find them myself."
"What a strange way to interact with the world." She shook her head but couldn't help but laugh. She continued to walk until she saw a small poster. More specifically for an event. "Look at this. Are you going? It's for the school. A series of matches it seems."
Matsumi rolled over, planting his face right next to Vermelha's to see it. "What is this? A dodgeball game? It looks fun! Aw man, look." He pointed at some bold text at the bottom. "Only people from the school can attend. Pfft, that's lame."
"So you're not going to school? Either way we can still watch. I think that works out for us. Sounds like it's later tonight. Maybe we can grab some tea and then check it out."
"It would've been so fun to play in it. But, there's no way I'd get accepted!" If we did though, you and me? We'd go all the way, just like you said!"
"Hey who knows? Maybe you might get selected. You never really know in this world now."
"Well, the school is for people who wanna fight, right? There's no way I'd get in since I've never fought!"
"I don't think so. The school is for anyone who wants to learn how to control their mana. Some people who don't fight are there because they're going to use their mana in Law, or health practices. You could still join."
"I've never been good with school or listening to teachers, gets boring. I'd rather just play."
"Who says something new wouldn't be more fun than playing? You don't know until you try."
"Can I do the things you do? The magic?"
"Yes, that's just the basics. That's not even a spell out of the spell book. You could learn all the spells and even create your own."
"Ok, I'll go and join only if you join! I want my own little dudes too!"
"Well my mom sent me here to join. So I guess you're joining too."
"No promises, though. Every teacher hates me for some reason."
"Maybe the teachers here are different. Maybe they'll view you in a light that you haven't been viewed before..in a positive way."
"I'm still gonna do the same things though! Mr. Moon got off easy. Come on, after the tea, let's have some fun!"
"Sure. I'm interested anyways. I'm not sure how things work around here."
With a giggle he started to move down the street again, skating backwards for a few moments to motion her to follow. He didn't really have any idea of where to go but he trusted that Vermelha and him would find it eventually.
She sighed and continued to move, faster this time. She stepped right and left through the crowd, effortlessly stepping around them without running into each other. She looked around, spotting all the shops and pop ups that people had on the street.
Matsumi was almost about to miss the ship entirely by being distracted, thinking of any new tricks to do but luckily he crashed into someone on the street. This person just so happened to have just bought some tea and Matsumi had spilt it everywhere, even a little on himself. "Hey!" The person exclaimed, before Matsumi looked to the side to see the small tea shop. He completely ignored the person he had crashed into. "Hey, look! Verme! It's here!"
She stopped in front of the store. Vermelha carefully reached into her pocket and compensated the person for their lost tea with a few dollars before they walked off in anger. "Alright. Do you know what you're ordering?"
"Everything on the list! Some tea leaves and other stuff I don't remember. It'll be a piece of cake."
"Can you even afford everything on the list?" She scratched her head looking at the menu, not really sure about buying everything on the list. "You don't even know your ingredients."
"It'll be fine, it'll be fine." He waved his hand in dismissal. "Order what you want, I'll just get a-" He squinted his eyes at the paper. "Whatever that says. We won't take long. Then we'll go sign up for the game wherever it is!"
Verme ended up just ordering a green tea, looking on at Matsumi and his paper.
It took Matsumi close to 30 minutes in getting everything he needed, not because it was alot, but because he didn't really know what was actually written on the paper given to him.
He ended up having to ask other customers to tell him what everything was, bothering customers so much, the owner even came out for a second. After that whole thing, Matsumi still had a smile on his face, all the things in the list neatly put in a bag, or at least he hoped it was everything. "See? Didn't take long!"
Vermelha at that point was sitting at a table. She already finished her tea while it was hot and she was scrolling on her phone, rolling her eyes at the madness and his final statement. "You're quite the character aren't you?"
"Nah, that went well! Everyone was really nice, so I had to thank each of them, although I did get bored halfway through."
She scrolled on her phone for a bit before showing him a post on one of the many social media teens their age used. "Look. It seems like it's going to be a long event. Come look at this."
He shuffled over toward her. "What does it say?"
"Seems like the event itself is actually a best of three. Dodgeball is only one of the games. Seems like they've got more for the event than actually implied. Dodgeball is just the main event. Says here whoever wins will get home turf advantage in the upcoming exams..and the ability to pick the exam type itself."
"Upcoming exams? For what?"
"In this city you're not allowed to use Mana past a certain level unless you have a ManaLicense. If you don't have a Mana License, then you could be arrested. I suppose it's a rite of passage into becoming serious here. They hold exams annually to decide who should and who should not get one. It's also a grades thing. One of the final exams worth most of your grade involves the exams. So if you lose and fail the exam you fail your classes. Then from there they see if you're eligible to even stay in the school."
"Sounds intense. You want to get one of those too, right?"
"I think I need it if I actually want to do any learning about this place..unless I want to be average and boring."
"Average and boring?! I can't think of anything worse."
"That's why you should get your license. So your life isn't that."
"Then, let's go! We don't have time to waste!"
Vermelha grabbed her things and got up. "I think we can catch a train to Yoshiwara...they have direct openings for their schools now."
"Come on, go, go, go! I'll follow!"