Deep within...

She could sense her connection to it...

The world beyond the boundaries of ideology...

She could hear the sound of it...

The breeze billowing over a lush green plain...

She could smell the air of it...

The fresh air of a mountainside...

She could see the shape of it...

The shape of a shrine that stood guard over a village...

But when she tries to reach for it...

...There just isn't anything for her to touch...

...

"Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We will be landing at Gatwick International Airport in London, England, shortly. Please fasten your seat belts, and ensure that all your mobile devices such as cellphones, VR glasses and personal computers have been switch off. During the landing procedure, visits to the lavatories are strictly prohibited. Thank you for your cooperation."

She woke up.

Groaning, she wiped her forehead with her right hand before scanning her surroundings.

She finds herself seated in the cabin of a hoverplane which, going by the announcement just now, is about to land. Looking up, she sees that the "fasten seat belts" sign has been lit up. Looking around, she finds all the other passengers going back to their seats, fastening their seat belts, and switching off their electronic appliances.

She also finds a stewardess standing next to where she is seated.

"Ma'am," The stewardess told her. "the plane is about to land. Please fasten your seat belts and switch off any mobile devices you may have."

It took her a few seconds to respond. "Oh, thank you for the reminder." With that said, she fastened her seat belt, and switched off her mobile phone.

"Have a nice day, ma'am." The stewardess says before leaving.

With that, she sat at her seat, waiting for the plane to land at its destination. She took the time to recall what she saw before seemingly waking up.

"Was that a dream, or...?"

...

Gatwick International Airport; London, England, United Kingdom of Great Britain.

Before heading to the inspection counter to have her passport checked out, she made sure she has her passport and visa with her. Indeed she does, so she went to queue up, waiting for her turn at the inspection counter.

When it is her turn at the counter, she presented both her passport and visa to the inspector upon being told to have her "necessary documents" be inspected.

The inspector analyzed the visa and passport thoroughly, before he shoots her a glance. "This is your name?" The inspector asked, smiling a little bit as he found the name a bit funny.

She gets this a lot, so she just shrugged it off. "I'm an artist on my mother's side." She said. "Irish artist."

The inspector suppresses the urge to scoff, then quickly finishes checking out the passport and visa. "Welcome to London, Miss Hearn." The inspector says as he returns the passport and visa.

"You can call me Bella." She says with a smile, retrieving her passport and visa before proceeding past the inspection counter.

...

As she stepped into the airport terminal, Bella began to imagine how she'll be spending the next few years of her life in the UK. She'll have to begin by adjusting to British cultures, and probably have to "relearn" English (she is aware of the difference between British and American English). Maybe she'll be making new friends here in another country, while the friends she already have in the US will have to use social media to stay in contact with her. She also wondered what kind of facilities her university has.

And then she gets knocked over by someone running into her.

"Hey! That hurts!" Bella complained.

Picking herself up from the hard marble floor, Bella looks at the person who had just knocked her down. It appears to be a brown-haired teenage Asian-looking girl wearing a bowtie, a white suit and a brown dress.

"すみません!" The girl says, in what Bella believed is Japanese.

"Huh?" The girl's response went over Bella's head, as its in a language she doesn't speak.

"Oh, sorry..." The girl says again, this time in English.

"Its alright. This happens to me a lot." Bella says. She then notes that her visa and passport were scattered onto the floor, along with various books and papers which she believes belonged to the Japanese girl. "Do you need help gathering these?"

Only then does the Japanese girl notices the things scattered over the floor. "Oh, you don't have to trouble yourself." She says.

"It would trouble me to not help." Bella says with a smile. Then she kneels down to pick up the books and papers.

"Thank you..." The Japanese girl says before kneeling down to gather the items as well.

As there isn't too much stuff, the two girls are done collecting everything in less than a minute.

As the Japanese girl is about to pass Bella's visa and passport to her, she caught a glimpse of what was written on the passport.

"Birth date: 24th August, 2049... Hometown: Minnesota, USA... Name: Maribel Lutwidge Hearn..." The Japanese girl read the details silently.

Then she noticed something.

"Maribel Lutwidge Hearn?" The Japanese girl asks Bella awkwardly, in English. "That is your name?"

"My mother's an artist from Ireland." Bella explains as she gets her passport and visa back. "You can call me Bella." She adds.

"Oh, I see..." The Japanese girl remarks. "By the way, I'm Usami Renko. That's in last name-first name order."

"Nice to meet you, mi-" Bella was about to fully greet the Japanese girl, Renko, with a handshake, but stopped short of extending her right hand when she noticed something.

Looking into Renko's eyes, she saw something peculiar about her. Something mystical. Something she only ever saw in her dreams...

"Miss Bella?" Renko asked, snapping Bella back into reality. "Is something the matter?"

Bella blinked twice. That was strange. She thought. "Its nothing."

Renko then bows to Bella. "Then thank you for helping me. Perhaps we can meet again some day?"

"Some day..." Bella answers before walking away from the scene.

...

Outside Gatwick International Airport

With her luggage in tow, Bella attempts to hail a taxi upon coming out of the airport terminal. It didn't take too long for her to spot one that isn't hired yet, so she went to that one.

"Where are you headed, ma'am?" The taxi driver asks Bella.

"Y.G. International Academy." Bella answers.

The taxi driver seemed to cock his eyebrows at hearing that. Then he says, "That is a long way to Manchester. But can do, ma'am. Hop right in."

"Thank you." Bella says.

As Bella went to put her luggage in the boot of the taxi, she notices someone else attempting to hire the same taxi.

It is Renko.

"Um, Y.G. International Academy, please." Renko told the taxi driver.

"I just had someone who is also going there..." The taxi driver points at Bella. "So hop right in."

"Thank you." Renko says. As the Japanese girl isn't carrying any luggage with her, she went inside the taxi right away.

Bella enters the taxi from the other side. "Miss Renko, what a coincidence to meet again after just a brief moment."

Renko turns and notices Bella. She seems a bit surprised to see the American girl. "I would say the same, Miss Bella!"

...

On the way...

As the taxi driver said that the trip to Y.G. International Academy in Manchester will take a while, Bella and Renko decided to pass the time by chatting with each other.

"So you're a major in astrophysics, and you're going to Y.G. International Academy to further your studies?" Bella repeats what was told to her by Renko.

"Yes." Renko answers.

"And you are from Kyoto, Japan?" Bella adds.

Renko nods with a smile.

"I can see why you want to study astrophysics..." Bella says, as she glances at one of the books Renko placed on her lap, taking note of the author's name. "To continue the research on the secrets of the universe, from where Stephen Hawking left off."

"Yeah. Its a shame he passed away in 2018 before he could finish it..." Renko says.

"Shame indeed..." Bella remarks.

Bella suddenly found herself gazing into Renko's eyes again. Once again, she saw something peculiar and mystical.

Looking much further in, Bella saw what appeared to be the silhouette of a girl dressed in red and white with a large red ribbon tied to her hair. The silhouette girl seemed to resemble Renko a lot...

And once again, Bella was snapped back into reality by Renko.

"Miss Bella? Maribel Lutwidge Hearn? You are making that look again."

Bella blinked. Again, on Renko. That can't be a coincidence... She thought.

Renko has definitely noticed something. "Is there something you would like to share?"

Bella attempts to shrug it off. "Nothing. Its probably just me."

Renko puts a hand on Bella's shoulder. "Not to be rude, Miss Bella, but that doesn't look like its just you..."

Bella sighed. She didn't expect this Japanese astrophysics major to catch on so quickly. She might as well come clean.

"I...uh...see things..."

Renko raised her eyebrows. "You see things. As in, you see supernatural things?"

"More or less." Bella responds.

Bella is expecting her statement to get ridiculed by Renko, who as an astrophysics major, probably doesn't believe in this sort of thing.

So Renko's response to it totally surprised Bella.

"Maybe the saying that there will never be an American Esper is finally going to be proven wrong?"

Not only did that statement surprise Bella, its whole meaning went over her head too. "Esper?"

When Bella think of it, she does recall seeing and hearing the term "Esper" from the Internet and the news back home very often. From what she can recall, "Esper", derived from ESP which is short for Extra-Sensory Perception, refers to people who possesses all sorts of abilities, usually telekinesis, that scientists have been struggling to find a scientific explanation for for the past 200 years, all to no avail. Multiple historical figures have been Espers themselves, and perhaps the existence of Espers dates all the way back to the first civilizations of mankind. Espers could be found in just about every corner of the world, on every continent, in every country.

Every country, except for some bizarre and unknown reason, the United States of America.

There literally has never been any US citizens that are Espers in the recorded history of the country. It is the year 2063 already, and there still isn't any American Espers. And nobody knows why.

"Think about this, Miss Bella!" Renko tells her. "You are probably the first ever American Esper! You could become..."

"World famous?" Bella interrupted her. "Maybe not. I prefer to keep what I know to people I can trust."

"People you can trust?" Renko says. "I think I know the right person."

Bella raised her eyebrows. "Can I actually trust this person?"

"He's a pen friend of mine." Renko reassures. "We have been talking to each other through live video chat since secondary school."

"Is it actually right to go see him?" Bella wonders. "I mean, can we take a detour right now?"

"Y.G. International Academy doesn't start its next semester until next week, and he lives in Manchester anyway. So we have plenty of time to do this." Renko reassures again. "Hold on. I should call him and let him know."

With that said, Renko took her mobile phone out of her suit pocket. She dialed a number, then waited for the call to connect.

"Is this Adam Latency Junior? Oh, hello, Adam. I wanted to let you know that I am going to further my studies at Y.G. International Academy. You too? Didn't you graduate Harvard two years ago? Oh, your father didn't trust American education, so he's sending you to Y.G. International Academy. By the way, I will be dropping by at your father's pub in about...half an hour or so, with a friend who says she can see the supernatural. Do you have the time? Oh yes, thank you. I will be seeing you there, then. Good bye..."


Hello, readers, and welcome to Young Maiden's Chronicles: Mystical Knowledge, aka my adaption of the Sealing Club stories.

As you can see from this first chapter alone, the story is going to have lots of differences from the original Sealing Club stories. But can you call it a (fan) remake if its the same as the original?

You might be asking: why the UK? The answer is, I wanted a bigger and more ethnically diverse cast for the Sealing Club stories (as you can see with the OC/Original Characters tag), and keeping the story in Kyoto just wouldn't cut it. Hence the UK.

Those of you from the UK or knows its history well would probably point out that the UK's full name is "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland", and will probably cringe at how I didn't write "and Northern Ireland". I intentionally wrote it that way, because Northern Ireland by the time of this story has reunited with the Republic of Ireland. (That's some supplementary material stuff right there, isn't it?)

Also: aside from how Maribel is now called Bella (which is just short for Maribel), why Maribel Lutwidge Hearn? Firstly, I wanted to give her that foreign feeling (Irish in this case); secondly, I wanted it to be mystical-sounding at the same time; and thirdly, it also sounded like an embarrassing name for someone living in the 2060s, so she ends up getting ridiculed for it multiple times over the story (as in a recurring gag).

As mentioned earlier, there are going to be multiple OCs introduced in the future. But don't worry, Bella and Renko remains the main protagonists even if some of the future chapters focus on these OCs. Oh, and these OCs are my creations, so do not steal.

In addition, since most of the story is taking place in the UK, I'll have to remind you that British English is different than American English. For starters, an American cellphone and British mobile phone are the same thing. So if the usage of a noun/verb doesn't make sense to you Americans, that's because it is used in the context of British English.

Finally, this story will be establishing a lot of information over the course of its run. So for the sake of not confusing you too much, I'll take it steadily and slowly from this point on, which have the unfortunate side effect of causing the chapters to be much longer than the ones in Spirit Dream, and that new chapters will be uploaded very slowly.

Before I end it off, I started writing this chapter in the same week that Professor Stephen Hawking passed away. So this chapter will be my homage to him.

"And that, as they say, is that..."

Afterwords end here...

...

In memory of Professor Stephen William Hawking

8th of January 1942 - 14th of March, 2018