Neo thought these people were idiots?
Oh no.
It's much worse.
There's a kind of crazy infecting the town. Not the fun crazy, either. The important-figures are fighting over staying for some carnival in three days or fleeing while they can. A woman is missing her son, but instead of wanted posters she has a mask carved to look like his face. The kids are racists, there is a man in a green screen suit-like outfit watching the kids from above, and the soldiers around town are less than useless. The tree-like person is still hiding in a giant flower, though after the fish-people it's not all that surprising anymore, and there is a dog who's desperate for someone to play with it.
This is not even recounting the postman, jugglers, and literal honest-to-goodness fairy.
Science experiment gone wrong, Neo thinks surely (then where does that put her?) as she eyes the orangey-pink abomination hovering over the water. It's a fairy. Honestly, the next thing she knows magic is going to be real.
What's worse is that she doesn't immediately shrug off the idea. The crazy better not be infectious.
Neo brushes off the fairy's presence and continues to the hidden door. She politely knocks. When that doesn't produce results, she kicks it open.
Missing-boy with very distinctive purple hair – seriously, how lazy are these people to have not looked around the southern areas of town – tries to run past. Neo trips him and, while he's down, grabs the back of his shirt.
He fights the whole way. His little fox mask even falls off and he resorts to pleading. Neo easily holds him away from her, dumping the kid with his mother only because she's reached a dead-end on information from other sources. This turns fruitful, as apparently the boy is supposed to be a man. Some person named Skull Kid, who may be in charge of the moon falling but no one can confirm, magicked purple-hair-guy into a child.
Apparently, man-child is supposed to be getting married to the lady at the inn's front desk.
Neo's drawing the line and never dragging the kid back here again. She gets a sick feeling even thinking about that loose-cannon of a plot still going on.
Turns out her next clue comes from the kids, who won't let other species join their gang because of Skull Kid. That bundle of angst unwinds until Neo leaves with instructions to go to an observatory.
She kicks this door down, too.
The man working the telescope seems terrified, encouraging to her to use the telescope and even guiding her sight to where Skull Kid is hanging out on top of Clock Tower.
Skull Kid may be a leaf-tree-person, and the mask is strange, but Neo's interested in what his semblance is that may be causing so many problems. Also, she's going to do worse than a beating to him if he is the cause for all her three-day problems.
Brat doesn't know who he just made fun of through the telescope. Since snooping around Clock Town, Neo's been more than itching for a fight.
And… something just fell from the moon.
This science-experiment-gone-wrong just keeps getting crazier.
;;;
Neo takes a breather as the sun sets. All the time in the world. Not that dying is exactly fun.
(That brat had run off and when Skull Kid appears again he's going to be the test subject for the plans made against Cinder and Ruby and-)
Neo has reached another dead-end looking for information. She's sticking it out, because maybe Clock Town gets interesting before midnight. She cannot take another day of this. All the stealing is easy, and it isn't like they'll remember if she gets caught (they take Rupees – loose change – instead of lien). No, the materials aren't the problem. It's the people.
The multi-coloured hair woman sighs and gets to her feet. While there's still light, she returns to fairy trapped over running water. Neo resigns to using her umbrella as a net, scooping it out and blinking flatly when it flies in front of her face.
"Please, hear my plea!" the small, orange-ish thing begs. "The masked Skull Kid has broken me apart and scattered my pieces! Please find a way to return me to the Fairy Fountain in North Clock Town."
Then the freakish-experiment disappears inside Neo's chest.
"Ak," Neo chokes, frantically rubbing her front. The twerp is resting against her aura, what the heck is going on?
Nope.
No.
If she had any choice, Neo would call it quits now. She literally does not want this on her soul, so the woman trudges north. No one dares stop her, not with such a peeved expression twisting her face.
There's a cave with water she is seemingly guided to. Neo had thought nothing of it at first, but then the fairy flies out of her chest and into the middle of the fountain where it is then joined by dozens of similar fairies flying out of the walls.
What. The. F-
It gets weirder.
The fairies turn into a giant floating woman with leaves woven together to hide only the necessary bits. Neo falls back, legs crossing as she's just done with it all. If this is magic, actual real magic-
"It is," giggles the giant woman, orange hair flying freely above her. "Thank you for returning my broken and shattered body to normal. May I get your name?"
Neo narrows her eyes and doesn't dare think it. You can read thoughts?
"I can read what you mean to say," the giant's smile fades. "I am the Great Fairy of Magic."
That's not possible, Neo's fingers clench around the umbrella's handle to keep from shaking. Magic doesn't exist. Fairies are no more than unlucky insect Faunus. Who are you really?
"Oh," the giant breathes, eyes narrowing. "You've come from a place much different from Termina, haven't you?"
Neo pauses, because she gets the sense the woman isn't talking about Termina Field.
"Termina is the land we are in," the giant elaborates. "It is not in Vale, or Atlas. It likely isn't even part of your world, Remnant."
Oh, Neo swears a lot, making the fairy frown. I am dead.
"You're not dead."
No, no, it makes sense. Neo stands up and taps her umbrella on the ground. One does not just simply survive falling off an airship in the middle of the Grimm apocalypse. But if I'm here, then Roman's still alive, the bas-
"You're not dead," the giant is annoyed now. "Besides, even if you did die, you would come back after the moon crashes."
Neo swings her umbrella tip out to point at the other woman. Explain how you know that.
The giant actually rolls her eyes and uses jazz hands. "Magic."
The worst part, Neo may just believe her. Magic?
"I am the Great Fairy of Magic. Trust me, I know we're stuck in a time loop. I thought the masked child was helping me, and I grew careless. Someone has trapped this world in a three-day loop, meaning I return to my broken form. I am curious how you remember."
Neo blinks. You said I'm likely in another world.
A pause. "I guess that would do it."
An even longer pause. So, what now?
"Now, I give you something to help you since you returned me to myself." The Great Fairy of Magic halts, not even bouncing in her floating anymore. "I know you won't heal me every time, but if you could bring my scattered self together every couple of loops, I will grant you something extra special."
Neo shrugs. Not like I have anything better to do.
The giant lady cheers and claps her hands. "Alright then, colourful young Miss. I shall grant you magical power as a sign of my gratitude. Please accept it!"
Because this day couldn't get any weirder, the giant lady blows on her. Neo starts to float, and then gasps before the amount of pain she's in knocks her unconscious.
When she wakes up, all Neo feels is sore. She flips up a middle finger.
"I'm sorry. You don't have to be rude about it."
Whatever, Neo flips up another finger. Tell me where I should go to look for answers, and then goodbye.
The Great Fairy of Magic thinks about it. "There are four places. The swamp, the mountains, the ocean, and the canyon. You have already been to two, have you not?"
Neo thinks about the fish eggs.
"It's not them you should be looking to. Zora having children is nothing new. No, look for unnatural weather patterns or changes in the environment. There, you are likely to find a way to contact the giants. If they can catch the moon before it falls, maybe the loop will stop."
Neo thinks this is too convoluted for a three-day experience.
"You're not wrong," the giant lady chuckles softly, looking at the smaller woman with pity. (Neo knows there is more the fairy does not say). "Good luck, colourful Miss. I'll look forward to our next meeting."
I won't, Neo waves her middle finger in goodbye.
At this point, whatever the unbelievable being of magic is withholding can be revisited later. Neo has a start of a plan, though she still likes brute forcing her way through the barrier better than relying on strangers.
(Neo takes a break to recover from what just happened. By the end of her panic attack, she's managed to convince herself it was just some crazy semblance in effect. Maybe multiple semblances, if it turns out the giant lady can take them for herself.
Neo feels much better after seeing her own semblance still intact.)
No matter what leads she has, Neo made this loop a goal to search from the middle outwards. So, in the morning, that's just what she'll do.
Time to see what happens in Clock Town at night.
;;;
Don't break down the door to the milk bar. Don't break down the door to the milk bar. You may need to come back here, so don't break down the door to the milk bar.
Neo is very pissed off they think she's a minor, and any illusion she puts on is denied entry.
Don't break down the door to the milk bar.
;;;
There is a hand coming out of the toilet.
Neo lifts her umbrella up high.
There is a hand coming out of the inn's toilet.
She pauses. For all the pain and suffering she's inflicted on people, it would just be so unsanitary to stab a hand coming out of a toilet.
Neo backtracks and swears she will continue doing her business in nature.
What is wrong with this town?!
;;;
Working her way out means causing a few holes, finding a few holes, and seeing a ghost.
Between the rocks telling time after she hits them, musical notes carved into a cliff, and the ghostly hallucination (because when Neo stabs, people bleed) moaning about his dance, the woman is positive she was drugged, likely by the giant. Bathroom hand must have also been a hallucination. Thank goodness.
No wonder the bar turned her away. She probably seemed high out of her mind.
Neo begins to sweat, her aura working hard to try and rid her of the poison. Somehow, she was administered a drug without knowing. Even though nothing's changing from her place on the wall – no vision or thought problems, no hearing things or flashbacks – Neo does not move until daybreak.
She explores again and, even though everything else is the same, Neo is proud to find the hallucination is gone. A quick, curious check reveals no hand in the inn's bathroom.
Take that, Neo thinks smugly, turning to the south. She has a pretty good idea on what's wrong in the ocean, but she can't walk on water. Swimming or sailing through a cyclone also seems like a terrible idea. So, to the only other explored area.
The forest.
Time to stab some mini Nevermores.
A/N: Thanks for reading! A really big thank-you to KitsuneNaruto135 and Shadyside for reviewing! The support means a lot.
I hope everyone has an awesome day