~ Third Person Pov ~
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An hour had passed since the constant driving. Ayano checked his phone for the time, "It's a bit past 1 PM... Wasn't this trip supposed to last until 8?"
Renji, being the only one other than Ayano that was awake, nodded, "Yeah, it isn't that much time bu-"
He stopped completely mid sentence. His focus shifting from Ayano to the outside... Ayano followed Renji's gaze, brow furrowing before he turned to look out the window.
And then, he saw it.
It was a wall.
A gigantic black-steel-like wall, so tall it stabbed into the sky and vanished into the thick cloud layer above. It wasn't some mystical barrier or illusion either—it was engineered, constructed. Purpose-built. And it circled practically everything.
Keiji realized that the entire ocean beyond this wall, and the island at its center, were completely surrounded—boxed in from the outside. In fact, the scale was impossible to ignore, easily being 100-200 meters high. It wasn't just guarding the sea people from the outside world… it was almost as if it was locking them in.
But, it didn't feel like it was made to trap them, rather it was the opposite.
Renji stopped talking completely, mouth slightly agape as he leaned forward in his seat.
...
"What... What the hell…?" Ayano muttered, more to himself than anyone else.
There weren't any openings. No visible entrances. The wall wasn't jagged or rusted—it was practically pristine. Maintained. Almost... oppressively clean. As if whatever was on the other side didn't just need to be kept secret. It needed to be contained.
'No wonder why I've found next to nothing on this place... No one could get in to even do much of anything.' Ayano thought.
Sekai stirred beside them, then Katsura, both blinking as they saw the others staring outside.
"What's going on—" Sekai began, then stopped.
Her eyes widened as she took in the sight. "That's… that's the border!?"
Katsura who also woke up leaned in closer across the aisle, her voice faint. "It looks as if it circles the entire ocean…? All of it?"
Ayano nodded slowly, trying to find words. "That thing doesn't feel a border... It's like a great wall."
None of them said anything for a long moment. Because what kind of country—what kind of people—needed something like that?
And more importantly...
Why were they being allowed inside of it?
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All the busses had stopped and parked uniformly to the side of the road... With every one of the students present more so confused than happy and go lucky like they were before.
The towering black wall loomed too close now, casting a long, suffocating shadow over the line of buses and the narrow road that hugged the coastline. It was less like a welcome—and more like a warning.
Every student that stepped out did so slowly, cautiously… like their instincts were telling them this place isn't normal.
Ayano stepped off his bus and felt it instantly.
That pressure in the air. That weight. Like the atmosphere itself had thickened. It wasn't just the wind being quiet—it was everything being quiet. No birds. No waves. Just the faint hum of machinery hidden somewhere behind that massive structure.
Sekai was right behind him, looking up in awe and unease. "That thing's taller than I thought…"
Renji stepped down with a frown. "And it goes on forever. I can't even see where it ends."
Katsura clutched her bag a little tighter, her brows furrowed. "Why build something this massive? To protect us from them… or them from us?"
Ayano didn't answer.
Because that was the exact same thought running through his head.
Then—clank.
The sound echoed, mechanical and hollow. All heads turned.
Far off ahead, on a stretch of cracked coastal road just before the wall, something shifted. Giant hydraulic arms moved, and for the first time, a section of the wall began to open.
No—fold. Like metal paper, unfolding in massive sheets, each several stories tall. And from within that yawning breach… emerged a procession.
Not people. Not yet.
Just shadows.
Long, sleek vehicles—like a cross between limousines and armored tanks—rolled out with silent precision. Each one matte black with glass windows that didn't reflect light. They coasted up to the buses like ghosts, stopping in perfect synchronization.
And then...
Doors opened. Figures stepped out.
Tall. Silent. Dressed in uniforms that didn't quite match any military branch the students recognized... But they moved with discipline—precise, calculated. And not one of them said a word.
Until a single man—slightly taller than the rest—stepped forward.
He wore the same dark uniform as they did, but with a white coat draped over his shoulders almost like a cape, and gloves so clean they almost gleamed. His expression was unfound, his eyes were sharp beneath a visor-like pair of black-lensed glasses.
He stopped at the center of all the buses, cleared his throat once, and then finally spoke—
"Welcome." he said, voice deep, steady and controlled, "To Kumano."
And just like that… the doors of the wall continued to part behind him. Revealing a long hallway that was slowly being lit up...
'That wasn't creepy at all...'
"Miss Chisaki!" One of them yelled.
A voice cut through the tense silence—clear, sharp, and confident—from the front of the escort group. One of the uniformed figures had stepped forward, holding a sleek tablet, and called her name like they were checking it off a digital manifest...
The group students instinctively turned to her.
Chisaki, who had only just stepped off one of the front buses, paused... Her face didn't change much, if at all—still calm, still quiet—but something about the way she held herself was different now. Straighter. More... official than before.
She gave the man a small nod. No words passed between them. No smiles either. No warm recognition. Just a regular gesture—acknowledgement. Formal. Almost rehearsed to an extent.
"Well, I'll be... She didn't even look surprised by it." Renji whispered under his breath. Though, even he figured this would be the case.
Sekai frowned on the side. "Did she… know she'd be called like that?"
Katsura clutched her bag again, lips parting as if to ask something, but she said nothing...
Ayano chose not to speak on it either. He was too busy watching the way the man in the coat nodded once in response, then turned sharply and began leading the group toward the glowing passageway.
Chisaki followed behind him without another glance back. The rest of the uniformed escorts began motioning for the students to move forward, one group at a time...
...
As they walked, Ayano realized just how odd this place was, and how backwards the architectural advancements in this reality really were. On the outside world, he knew that homes had a modern/olden time feel to them. Often built with material that lasted, and were more robust than the homes built in his original reality.
Regular vehicles didn't even exist either, not exactly, but bicycles did and so did things like motorcycles, but even those were rare... Not to mention that internet exists here too, with artists and songs that were near identical to his reality also existed here, but they were just, older. Much older.
Its like technology took a leap forward, and backwards in some areas...
'I think it'll take me a while to truly get used to this place.' He thought.
Tap~ tap~
"You, okay?" Sekai asked him.
Ayano blinked, snapping out of his thoughts as he turned his head toward her.
"Yeah, just… taking it all in, I guess," he replied, forcing a small smile. His eyes glanced back to the hallway around them, sterile lighting casting faint reflections across polished metal floors. It felt like something out of a sci-fi movie… and yet still somehow older than it should've been.
Sekai gave him a sideways glance. "You looked kind of spaced-out for a second."
"Sorry," Ayano rubbed the back of his neck. "It's just weird, y'know? This place… the tech here—it's quite advanced to be honest with you, but it feels like it's from another century. Like, retro-futurism or something."
She tilted her head slightly, lips quirking in thought. "I guess it does kind of feel like that, huh? It's not like anything I've ever seen before either."
He nodded. "Sort of feels like we're walking into another world entirely."
Their footsteps continued in rhythm with the low hum of the lights above them. The corridor ahead curved slightly, and just as Ayano opened his mouth to say something else—
—the light changed.
Not the fluorescent artificial glow from the hallway, but a natural, warm light that spilled in from the widening exit ahead.
And then they stepped out.
Ayano's breath caught.
"...Woah."
Stretching out before them was a city like nothing he'd ever seen—not in this world, or his own. Shioshishio. The town of the sea people.
Except... it wasn't quite underwater. Not in the traditional sense.
The city floated below the surface of a shimmering, crystal-clear dome—almost like an air pocket cradled by the ocean itself. Above them, a cerulean sky of rippling water shimmered, glowing gently with refracted sunlight.
And the city…
It was, stunning. No other words could describe it.
Pale, coral-like structures lined the stone walkways, glowing gently with soft blues, pinks, and purples.
Towering spires made of smooth ivory and glass curled upward like seashells, their windows glinting under the filtered light. The roads weren't even asphalt or concrete, but a smooth marble carved with swirling patterns engraved in them.
Instead of streetlights, glowing jellyfish-like orbs floated lazily in the air, casting a dreamy, otherworldly-esq illumination across, everything.
Ayano looked at the small streams of water which flowed through canals that wove between all the homes and buildings, with little stone bridges arching over them. Trees with translucent, sea-glass leaves gently swayed in a wind that shouldn't even exist underwater...
The entire city felt alive, and calm, like it breathed and moved in harmony with the ocean itself...
Ayano just stood there, absolutely frozen, his eyes scanning every inch of the landscape itself and engraving it in his mind. He hadn't realized Sekai had stopped too—until she gently bumped into him again.
"It's beautiful, right..." she asked again, this time with a slight laugh. "Plus, you look like you saw a ghost."
"I… I wasn't expecting, this." Ayano said slowly, still staring at it all. "I mean—I thought it'd be cold, metallic, maybe a weird lab or facility. Not… this."
Renji l was completely awestruck as well... "It's like something straight out of a fairytale."
Even Katsura, normally composed, looked momentarily lost in awe too.
And Ayano… just couldn't stop staring.
'How...? How is something this beautiful even real?'
Now Ayano could understand why this place was so walled off, and downright isolated from everyone and everything. If it were up to him, he'd do the same...
"Everyone, may I have your attention."
The group turned slowly, almost reluctantly, as if tearing themselves away from the view felt wrong. Ayano glanced toward the source.
It was the same man from earlier—the one with the coat draped over his shoulders like a mantle. He now stood on a gently sloping platform of smooth stone, overlooking the gathered students. Behind him, another small group of uniformed figures stood in rigid silence, eyes forward.
"I know many of you are a bit overwhelmed by it all." the man continued, his voice reaching them with perfect clarity, "but I assure you, this feeling is natural. What you see around you is Shioshishio—The heart of Kumano's inner region... You are among the first from the outside world to ever lay eyes on it in the past 200 years."
A few murmurs passed through the students. Ayano had felt a strange sense of weight settle in his chest when he heard that.
"You may refer to me as Shigure," the man said simply. "I'll be overseeing your stay during your time here..."
Shigure's expression didn't shift that much, but there was something beneath it… something guarded. Like every word he spoke was weighed before it was released. "You will be guided to your temporary lodgings shortly, but I ask that you remain respectful of the area and its people. Our customs may, differ. Our space… even more so."
Sekai leaned in slightly and whispered, "This guy's definitely got that mysterious vibe, huh…"
Ayano didn't respond. His gaze had flicked back to the city again, still stunned by the seamless blend of natural beauty and near impossible engineering behind it...
Shigure continued, "For now, we ask that you move in your assigned groups. There will be escorts provided for each section."
As if on cue, more uniformed figures stepped forward—this time less formal, some even smiling faintly, though the precision in their movements remained. One of them approached Ayano's group, giving a polite bow.
...
"This way, please."
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END