Hidden Worlds: The Sheltered Princess

Case 1.11 - Reminisce

"This is a perfect time for a story!" Sonia declared as we kept on walking. "It's dark, it's cold, it's just the two of us casually strolling around the streets...at night."

I think it's more fitting to do that if we're in a cozy room instead.

"It was nighttime when it happened, right?" In a serious and slightly worried tone, I asked Sonia.

She glanced at me and simply smiled, "That time, your flames were as radiant as the sun's. But yes, it happened at night."

This world was finally engulfed by the darkness as stars shone from above.

Regardless, we were still walking further and farther from the center. It was so quiet that the beating of our hearts and the sound of our footsteps on dry roads tingled our ears. I could even hear Sonia's soft breaths when she's done being hyper from time to time.

To think I'd care about my past just now. It made me wonder how my train of thought was like back then, and how different it was from the way I think now.

But, like Sonia said, it is a perfect time for a story.

And with her story, she was able to fill the holes from the dream I had about that event.

That event...

It was fifty years ago — when the Ambrose afterparty came to an end, right after an exhibition of certain anomalous objects that were held in the Ambrose manor.

It happened that night.

To be exact, it happened at the dead of the night.

E.S.P.E.R. made their move after everyone has left the vicinity — everyone except for Cassia and me.

Back then, E.S.P.E.R. only had ten members. Sonia was the ninth member while Nora was the tenth.

Their numbers grew, but our focus is on the past group of E.S.P.E.R.

Even if Sonia was separated from the original world, she had her own ways to keep updated on what's happening — a collection of anomalous photos of places in the original world taken from her Polaroid, some from mine.

When the event took place, Nora was missing in action while Sonia refused to join the strike; she knew I was the one being targeted, so the least she could do was stay out of this.

After all, who in their right mind would attack the first person they fell in love with?

I, too, was shocked when she told me this, but I guess it took her awhile to muster up the courage to speak her feelings for me — well, her past shy self.

Though, without her, the group still managed to get the job done as they struck every possible point for a flawless performance assessing both what happened before, during, and even after the event.

Let's start with the eighth specialist, a clairvoyant. A kid that can see events in the future within a certain spatial radius. He was responsible for the successful execution of most of E.S.P.E.R.'s plans. He was most likely one of the guests that attended the exhibition, providing the other members intel on what happened and what was about to happen. Though, I still have no idea why the exhibition took place in the first place.

Then there's the seventh specialist, an incendiary. A girl that can manipulate fire and the person who was half-responsible for burning the whole household down to ashes. With how houses were built decades back, I bet it was an easy job for her — around half of the entire household was made of wood. If I knew I had these abilities back then, I could have turned the tide around. If only...