Chapter 1: Just a normal day

Author's note:

I've had this idea for a while. It started as just another throw-away idea that I threw into my story idea archive for maybe someone else to pick up, but I kept finding ideas to add to it until I decided to turn it into an actual story.

Readers of my previous dive into Blue Exorcist fanfiction will remember me promising this story in the final chapters of Stolen Child. It took me longer than expected to get to though, since I rarely had time to sit down and read the manga (and the art in the beginning also made it a bit hard to want to read), and because I wanted to focus on my other story, "On the Wings of Change" for a bit, since I don't need to read an entire series to make sure I have all the info to write it.

And just as a warning, don't expect any of the canon Magica cast, with the exception of Kyubey. Some of them may show up in brief supporting roles, but Rin isn't going to be moving to Mitakihara for this story, meaning that they won't have the opportunity to show up on the regular, if at all.
Similarly, don't expect any of the Blue Exorcist cast who aren't Rin's family to be part of the cast. Rin is starting the story as a nine-year-old, so we're a bit far off from when the canon characters outside of family would become involved in Rin's life.

The park near the Okumura siblings' home was not very big, little more than a swing set, a slide, some rocking horses and a seesaw.

Of the swings, there was currently one in use, as someone had decided to wind the other all the way around the top pole, leaving it unusable until someone reached up and unwound it.
And, unfortunately, since Rin and Yukio were only nine-years-old and with the height to match, there was no way for them to reach, and Yukio had already pulled Rin away from trying to climb up to do it herself anyway.

So, the siblings were left to share a swing between them.

"My turn, oneechan." Yukio said, giving his sister one final push from where she was on the swing.

"Ah, come on, Yukio." Rin complained, swinging her legs to prolong her height. "A little more."

"I counted ten pushes. So, now it's my turn on the swing." Yukio argued calmly.

Rin sighed, giving one last kick to get as high as she could before jumping off the swing at peak height, landing a short distance from the swing with a thump.

"Oneechan, please stop doing that." Yukio worried. "You could hurt yourself."

"You don't really believe dad that it damages your knees, do you?" Rin laughed as she moved to take Yukio's previous position.

"I'm more worried of you landing wrong and twisting and ankle." Yukio replied, sitting in the swing.

Rin rolled her eyes and grabbed the bottom of the swing seat and pushed with all her strength, sending Yukio high up on the swing.

Looking into the sky, Rin noted that it was now dark, even though the sun had been high in the sky when Yukio had been pushing her.
Rin just shrugged and pushed Yukio again, wondering if this meant that she and her brother would have to go home after Yukio's turn.

Something flickered in Rin's eyes and she turned to see lights rising out of the ground and floating into the sky, drifting through the park and the dark areas beyond.

"Pretty." Rin said, entranced by the light.

Completely forgetting about Yukio, Rin exited the park, smiling at the lights all around her.

As Rin walked, she came across people, or rather silhouettes of them.
They were all glowing different colours and shades, creating a cacophony of colour that made Rin's brain hurt.

Then, there wasn't a silhouette.
Looking through the crowd, Rin spotted an outline of a person instead. Though, there was still a colour on them, a strong glow placed where Rin imagined their hand to be.

*Meow*

Startled by the sudden noise, Rin turned to see a white cat sitting nearby, its red eyes staring at her.

"Hi, kitty." Rin smiled as she pet the cat.

Movement past the cat caught Rin's attention, another silhouette with a strong glow at their hand walking past.

Looking back down at the cat, Rin stepped back in surprise when she found a white rabbit in front of her instead.
It blinked its red eyes at Rin once before running off.

"Hey, wait!" Rin called after the rabbit as she gave chase.

The rabbit led Rin far through town, even though they only ran for a minute, until the buildings suddenly disappeared and Rin found herself in a void with no sign of the rabbit.

"Where…" Rin said as she looked around for any sign of where she was.

She blinked in surprise as an outlined person walked past her, considering there had been nowhere for them to approach from.

The outlined figure held up their hand, the glowing on it growing until their entire form was obscured, then the glow receded as quickly as it grew, settling on the figure's hip.
From looking at their outline, it seemed as though the figure changed their clothes in the light, now identifiable as a feminine figure.

Rin wasn't able to keep her focus on the transformed female in front of her for long, however, as her attention was stolen by the appearance of something in front of them. Or, perhaps, the thing had always been there and Rin was only now noticing it.

The young girl couldn't even comprehend what she was looking at, it seemed both big and small, colourful and a void that sucked in all the light around it, and everchanging in its form.
All Rin knew is that it scared her and that it wanted her.

The…thing began to draw closer and Rin tried to back away, only to find that she couldn't. Because the thing wasn't moving towards her, it was sucking her in.

Rin reached out a hand in desperation towards the outlined girl as she was pulled past.
The last thing Rin saw was the outlined girl reaching back to her before there was nothing.

Rin groaned as she came awake, sun shining into her eyes through the window that someone had already pulled the curtain back from.

Sighing heavily, Rin rolled out of bed and reached for where her clothes were already set out for her, her dream quickly fading from her mind.
Looking to the other side of her room as she replaced her sleep top with her uniform shirt, Rin saw that Yukio's bed was empty and made, like usual.

Yukio walked into their shared bedroom as Rin finished pulling on her uniform.

"Ah, the dragon wakes from her deep slumber." Yukio joked.

"It's not that late Yukio. Just because I don't get up at the crack of dawn like some people doesn't mean that I'm getting up late." Rin responded.

"Have you actually checked the time?" Yukio raised an eyebrow.

"…No." Rin answered after a pause. "Is it actually that late?"

Yukio laughed at his sister's expense.

"No, luckily for you, you're actually up in time to have a breakfast that doesn't require you to carry it out the door." He said.

Rin sighed in relief. "Don't act like it's a frequent thing." She scolded her brother. "And you're one to talk, that cram school that you've started to go to on the weekends has had you running out the door with food more than once."

"Well...my additional learning is very important if I want to be a doctor." Yukio shifted on his feet. "Anyway, do you have everything for school?" He quickly shifted the topic.

"Yes." Rin rolled her eyes as she picked up her school bag.

"Workbooks?" Yukio asked.

"Yes." Rin briefly took out her workbooks to show them off.

"Planner?" Yukio listed off the next item.

"Yes." Rin pulled out a ratty-looking planner that had seen better days.

"Recorder?"

"Ugh." Rin pulled out the case that contained the dreaded instrument that she was forced to learn for music class.

Yukio rolled his eyes but silently shared in the sentiment. He found the noise that the instrument made to be very annoying and didn't like learning it any more than Rin.

"Pencil case?" Yukio listed off the last thing Rin needed.

"Ye-" Rin rummaged around in her bag for the item. "No." She then had to admit.

Dropping her bag, Rin looked around her bedroom for where she could have left her pencil case.

"I think you were drawing on you bed last night." Yukio pointed out helpfully, showing a slight smugness that he had been right to question the contents of his sister's bag.

"Oh, yeah." Rin said, searching her bed for the case.

When she couldn't find it, Rin realised that it must have slipped down the side of her bed. So, she began to dig under her bed to try and reach it.

"How much have you just stuffed away under there?" Yukio questioned as an assortment of Rin's possessions spilled out from under his sister's bed as she dug through them.

Rin didn't answer, digging around until she emerged with her lost pencil case in one hand and a book in the other.

"Hey, look what I found." Rin held the book aloft proudly.

Yukio looked at the book, eyes lifting in surprise.

"I thought that dad donated that book years go." He said. "I don't think we'd be able to do that now, though. It's falling to pieces. It'll probably just end up in the bin."

Rin hugged the book to her chest protectively, being careful not to break the cover off of the spine more than it already was.

"We loved this book, why would you want to just throw it away?" She pouted.

"I think we're a little old for a kiddie book by now, oneechan." Yukio rolled his eyes.

Rin frowned. "Well, I'm not throwing it out." She proclaimed.

Yukio shrugged. "Do what you want with the book, I don't care." He said, leaving the room. "Come on, we need to get breakfast."

Staring after her brother, Rin hugged the book to her chest one more time before placing it on her desk and running after her brother.

"Ah, there you are." Shiro said. "I'm guessing that Rin didn't want to wake up."

"Actually, I was already up and dressed, old man." Rin scowled at her dad.

"Really." Shiro faked shock. "That is a surprise."

Rin swatted Shiro's arm as she walked past him and grabbed her toast for breakfast.

"Please don't start things so early in the morning." Yukio complained, knowing all too well that their father loved to tease the siblings.

"Ah, Rin knows that I'm only teasing." Shiro messed up Rin's hair.

"Dad!" Rin complained through a mouthful of toast as she pushed the messed hair from her face.

"I don't know why you're complaining, you haven't even brushed your hair yet." Shiro said, grabbing a spare hairbrush and beginning to fix his daughter's hair.

Rin let her dad brushed her hair as she finished her toast, slightly surprised when he grabbed some bands and tied it into pigtails.

"We'll need to cut your hair soon." Shiro commented as Rin stroked her pigtails. "It's getting to be that length again."

"No." Rin decided. "I like it long."

Shiro raised an eyebrow.

"But you've always liked it short." He pointed out.

"No." Rin denied. "I want it long."

"And what about when you start getting split ends, like last time?" Shiro asked.

"I won't." Rin insisted.

"Uh huh." Shiro said, not believing his daughter.

But it was Rin's hair and she could decide what she wanted to do with it, and it meant that she would start wearing cute pigtails again, so Shiro was happy to let her keep it long.

"We should head to school." Yukio spoke up, having finished his own breakfast during the conversation.

Shiro looked at the clock, nodded.

"You better be on your way." He agreed.

Reluctantly, Rin got up and followed her brother to the front door, picking up her school bag.

"I don't want to go to school." Rin complained loudly to her dad and brother.

"Tough. You need to go to school to learn things." Shiro replied unsympathetically.

"Uh, but I don't feel well." Rin tried to make up and excuse.

"I'm sure it will pass." Shiro smiled, putting Rin's school hat on her head.

Rin pouted as Shiro then pushed her out the door to where Yukio was already waiting.

"Have a good day at school." Shiro waved as he shut the door.

Shoulders slumping, Rin reluctantly joined Yukio is their short trip to their school.

Rin continued her slump at school, leaning heavily on her desk as she tried to listen to the teacher.
However, it seemed like today was one of those "bad focus" days, so Rin found herself continuously distracted, barely even taking notice that a new student had joined her class.

So, when the students were given a break before their next lesson, Rin was surprised when a girl she'd never seen before approached her desk.

"Hi." The girl smiled.

"Uh, hi." Rin responded, unused to being approached.

"What's your name?" The new girl asked.

"Okumura Rin." The young girl answered.

"That's a nice name." The new girl complimented. "I'm Yasuda Azami."

"Thanks. Your name is nice too." Rin felt awkward as she returned the compliment.

"So…I'm new to the class and would like to make some new friends." Azami said. "Would you like to get to know each other."

Rin's heart fluttered as her face lit up.

"Yeah. Yes, sure." Rin said.

It felt too good to be true. Other children usually stayed away from Rin once they heard everyone else refer to her as the "demon" and talk about how supposedly bad she was.

Maybe Azami hadn't had the chance to hear about her reputation yet.

"Cool." How about we meet up for lunch, at that tree next to the playground?" Azami suggested.

Rin looked outside with a slight frown. The sky was a bit dark and cloudy, meaning that it could rain.

"That sounds fine, but it might rain." Rin said.

"I checked the weather, it won't until after lunch." Azami assured.

"Okay." Rin shrugged.

Rin's sensitive ears picked up some laughter and her head instinctively turned to see a group of students laughing, some sneaking glances at Rin and the new girl. Said group of students were a major reason why Rin didn't like coming to school.

Yukio had told Rin before that someone laughing nearby wasn't instantly them laughing at her, but Rin was sure that was what they were doing now, laughing at the idea of the new girl trying to make friends with her.

"Is something wrong?" Azami asked, shifting on her feet.

"No." Rin quickly said, not wanting Azami to think she was weird.

"Alright then." Azami said, also looking over at the group of laughing children. "I need to do something at my own desk. I'll see you at Lunch, Okumura-san. Bye."

"See you then, Yasuda-san." Rin said, smiling as Azami went back to her seat, which was next to the group of laughing children.

Rin frowned slightly when she saw where her new friend was seated. She hoped that the other children didn't use their proximity to Azami to hassle her.

The lesson before lunch seemed to pass even more painfully for Rin than usual, but it was eventually over and Rin could now meet with Azami.

"Ready to go, Yasuda-san?" Rin walked up to her new friend as soon as the teacher released them from their seats.

"Uh…" Azami's eyes briefly flickered to behind Rin. "I have something that I need to sort out. New girl stuff, you know? I'll meet you outside."

"I could come with you and wait for you." Rin offered, wanting to seem like the best person to be friends with to Azami.

"No. No, it's fine." Azami denied, sounding awkward. "I'm meant to do it on my own. So, you can go to lunch and I'll come find you."

Rin looked at Azami, she looked a bit pale but Rin guessed that it was because of whatever Azami had to do.

"Okay." Rin shrugged. "See you outside."

Rin turned and left the classroom, picking up her school lunch before going out to the tree that she and her new friend had agreed to meet at.

Rin was actually banned from the tree by the teachers, technically. She had gotten in trouble for climbing it more than a few times last year, so now the teachers didn't trust her to go near it. But Rin had learned her lesson to not climb the tree, so hopefully the teachers wouldn't drag her away from it as she waited for Azami.

So, Rin sat at the base of the tree and waited.

…And waited.

…And waited.

Rin reluctantly ate her lunch on her own as she watched as all of the children out on the playground gradually moved towards shelter, the darkening sky making it clear that it would rain any second.

With a heavy sigh, Rin got up, brushed off her skirt, and moved to go inside herself, realising that Azami wasn't coming.

"Maybe she got caught up with what she had to do." Rin tried to reason with herself.

Once inside, Rin walked over to her locker to swap back to her indoor shoes.

Only to get a bucket of water spilling onto her instead.

Rin thankfully had the reaction time to start moving away before the bucket could fall out of her locker, so she was saved from getting soaked head-to-toe. But the water still ended up splashing down the front of Rin's skirt and all over her feet.

Then the laughing started.

Cheeks growing red, Rin angrily turned to face the perpetrators, only for her eyes to widen in shock.

The group of laughing students from earlier were there laughing at her again, which Rin had fully expected as soon as she had water splashed on her. But the group now had the addition of Azami among them.

"Good one, Azami-chan." One of the girls of the group said, deliberately showcasing her familiarity with who Rin thought was her new friend.

Azami smiled at her, thought wasn't laughing along with the others. Not that Rin cared now that she realised that Azami was the one to set up the bucket trap.

"You think this is funny?" Rin scowled, fist clenching.

"Very." The leader of the group, Kodama Hideyo, tittered. "I can't believe that you fell for it. You really think that Azami-chan would want to be friends with a demon, or a girl who wets herself in public."

The students around Rin laughed louder, it felt like everyone was joining in on her torment to Rin.

"Shut up!" Rin yelled at the students.

"Oh look, she's having a tantrum." Hideyo laughed. "Do you need a bottle on top of a new nappy?"

"I said shut up." Rin took a step forward.

"Oneechan!"

Yukio appeared, grabbing onto his sister before she could do anything more.

"Come on, let's get you dried off." Yukio softened his voice to try and sooth his sister's anger before she lost herself to it.

Unfortunately, the crowd didn't let the siblings just leave, the bullies insistent of prolonging their perceived position above them.

Which, of course, did nothing for Rin's anger.

"Could you please let us pass." Yukio tried asking politely.

"Um…no." One of the boys blocking their way pretended to think before denying.

"I thought that you wanted to hang out with your 'friend', Rin-chan." Hideyo taunted, spitting out Rin's name like it was something disgusting.

"Don't you dare call me that!" Rin pulled away from Yukio to march up to Hideyo at the informal use of her name coming from the bully.

"Why not? It's not like you've got any friends to call you that. So why bother reserving it?" Hideyo basically presented her face for punching with that comment.

And Rin's fist obliged.

"I can't believe this inexcusable behaviour." The teacher yelled at Rin.

"But-" Rin tried to defend herself.

"No! I don't want to hear it. Nothing should make you resort to breaking another girl's nose." The teacher cut her off.

"I didn't mean to." Rin argued.

She really hadn't.
In her anger, Rin's body moved before she could register what she was doing. She had tried to pull back after realising what she was doing, but that didn't stop the punch from connecting with Hideyo's nose.

Though, Rin doubted that the teachers would appreciate that she reigned in her strength enough to not give Hideyo more than a bloody nose.

"But you still did it!" The teacher didn't have any mercy for Rin.

Rin flinched back, unable to stop the tears coming to her eyes.
She was not among the nine-year-olds who could hold back tears when adults yelled at them.

The teacher finally stopped and sighed heavily.

"This will be discussed fully with your father, but you will most certainly be suspended for at least a week for your violent actions." He said.

Rin huffed.

She'd gone through suspension before and it wasn't the worst thing in the world.
Suspension didn't mean being barred from the school grounds, but rather confined to a single room throughout the entire school day, separated from her peers as she had to do all the same classwork, and break and lunch times were also spent entirely in the room.
Though, it was still a punishment since Rin didn't get to see Yukio while at school.

"What about the others?" Rin huffed, sniffing loudly.

"Don't concern yourself with them." The teacher told her.

"But aren't they getting punished to? They're the ones who started it." Rin wasn't placated to the answer, gesturing to herself.

The water that had been on Rin's skirt and feet had been a clear indication that something had been done to her before she punched Hideyo. Thankfully, the teachers had allowed her to change into her PE shorts and socks before they started yelling at her for her actions.

"The students will also be talked to about their behaviour and will understand not to do it again." The teacher informed Rin.

"That's all?" Rin asked angrily.

For humiliating her like that, all Azami, Hideyo and the other students in on the plan got was a talking to? While Rin got suspension for lashing out in response?

"That's not fair!" Rin exclaimed.

"We're not arguing about this, Okumura." The teacher told Rin. "Now, go collect your things and wait outside the office until your father arrives."

With an angry huff, Rin turned and left, knowing it was useless to argue.

Yukio was waiting for Rin outside of the office she was being lectured in.

"Suspended?" Yukio asked, walking with his sister as she went to collect her belongings.

Rin nodded, trying to wipe the tears from her eyes.

"I expected as much." Yukio said.

"What does that mean?" Rin questioned her brother.

"oneechan, you broke Kodama-san's nose. You can't just lash out like that." Yukio said.

"Well, maybe she shouldn't have gotten that bitch to fake wanting to be my friend and humiliated me like that." Rin sneered, marching into their still-empty classroom to collect the things from her desk.

All the other students, save Hideyo who was being sent home because of her bloody nose, were currently having PE.

"Oneechan, language!" Yukio gasped.

"Who cares." Rin dismissed her bad language.

"Dad will wash your mouth out with soap again." Yukio warned.

"Only if you tell him." Rin said.

Yukio pursed his lips as they left the classroom and headed back towards the lockers.

"You can't keep acting like this, oneechan." Yukio lectured. "You're going to get into real big trouble one day if you keep lashing out like that."

"It's not my fault." Rin denied, rounding on her brother. "What am I meant to do when they keep doing stuff like this to me? How am I supposed to 'just ignore it' when someone fakes wanting to be my friend?"

Yukio found himself lost for words.

On one hand, he knew that responding to bullying was violence was wrong because every adult said so. But he also knew that something as cruel as what happened to Rin couldn't just be ignored, especially by someone as emotional and aggressive as Rin.

Unfortunately, Rin took her brothers silence to be a condemnation.

"No one cares." Rin burst into a fresh round of tears. "All anyone cares about if what I do to others, not what they do to me first."

"Oneechan, that's not-what are you doing?"

Yukio watched as Rin pulled her PE shoes out of her bag and switched them with her indoor shoes, which she put in her bag.

"Shouldn't you wait until dad arrives to put them on?" Yukio asked.

"No." Rin sniffed.

Then, she headed to the door.

"Oneechan, where are you going?" Yukio put a hand on his sister's shoulder.

"Anywhere but here." Rin shrugged Yukio's hand from her shoulder.

"But you need to wait for-"

"I don't care!" Rin shouted as she took off running.

She ignored her brother's shouts for her to come back as she burst out of the front doors and past the gate.

Rin's vision was clouded heavily by tears as she ran.

She had no destination in mind, just the idea of wanting to get "away".
Away from the school who didn't care about her, away from the students who laughed at her, and away from the anger and disappointment that her dad would show when he arrived at the school.

Rin didn't know how long she'd been running when she ended up slamming into someone, knocking them both to the floor.

"Oh, sorry." Rin apologised as she got off the person she ran into.

"It's okay, accidents happen." The person, who was an older teen, assured.

The girl then looked at Rin red and teared face and frowned in concern.

"Hey, are you alright?" She asked.

Rin didn't answer, instead resuming her running, far too keyed-up to stop and talk.

"Hey." The teen called after her.

She stretched out a hand after Rin but stopped, debating internally with herself.
She then looked down at her hand and her frown deepened. Looking back the way Rin had come, the teen saw no one. So, she began to walk the same way that Rin had gone.

…

Eventually, Rin ran out of energy, coming to a stop in a park that she wasn't familiar with.

Collapsing on the group, Rin let out heavy sobs, slamming the ground with her fists.

"It's not fair. It's not fair." Rin cried to herself, repeating the phrase over and over again as if it would do something.

After it felt like all her tears were gone, Rin pulled her head off of the ground, kneeling upright as she wiped her face with her sleeves.

It took a few deep breaths but Rin eventually managed to calm herself down and look around the park, which was thankfully empty due to everyone else still being in school.

Now that her head was clearer, Rin realised the mistake she made.

"Dad's going to be even more angry now." She said, rubbing her arms.

Shrugging to herself, Rin decided that there was no use in heading back since she would already be in trouble for running off in the first place. So, what was the harm in walking around the park for a while? She had never been to this one, so it'd be nice to see what there was.

So, Rin began to walk around the park, taking in the sights.
It soon became clear why there weren't any adults around with their toddlers to see her breakdown, as the park looked like it hadn't received any upkeep in a while, and what little play equipment there was looked like what her dad referred to as 'tetanus traps'.

Rin almost didn't notice it at first, still too lost in her emotions to properly take notice of her surroundings.
But then the warping of the world around her grew more pronounced, the grass and sparse trees replaced by pink walls and wooden flooring.

"Huh, what?" Rin questioned, blinking as her surroundings were impossibly replaced.

She seemed to be in some sort of huge pink hallway, the walls lined with a lot of string with seemingly no purpose, but nothing about the hallway looked natural in a way that Rin couldn't describe.
And when Rin looked up, there was no ceiling, the walls just stretched on an on until they were obscured by bright lights, the string also crossing the walls above her.

"How the hell did I end up here?" Rin spun around, finding that there was nothing behind her but more hallway.

Frightened by her inexplicable change in surrounding, Rin began to run again, hoping that she could somehow find her way out of the hallway.

The hallway was lined with many things that would be found in the usual home, but far too many of them to belong to a single home. Draws, wardrobes, those seats for lying on that Rin didn't know the name of, screens, mirrors and many more things.

On top of some of the furniture where what looked like burlap dolls of some kind, not that Rin stopped to get a good look at them.

Then Rin saw something that had her stumbling to a halt.

A figure stood against the wall, its body a mismatch of huge doll parts and with a huge, disembodied eye on top of the neck instead of a head. It looked like some sort of nightmarish creature from a horror movie.

"What the fuck." Rin whispered to herself.

After just standing there for a minute, the huge, mismatched doll didn't move, despite it's huge eye seemingly looking right at Rin.

Cautiously, she approached it.
When the thing didn't move, Rin slowly began to make her way past it, making sure to keep her eye on it at all times.

When she was halfway past, Rin lost her nerve and ran the rest of the way past it.

Thankfully, the huge doll didn't move, seemingly inanimate despite whatever force suddenly transported Rin here.
Though, Rin swore that its eye was still looking at her.

Backing away from the huge doll, Rin eventually decided that it wasn't going to spring to life and turned around.
Only to be met with another huge, mismatched doll with a giant eye for a head, startling her badly.

"What is going on." Rin began to cry as she navigated her way past this doll too.

After passing by a few more large and creepy dolls, Rin became more confident that they wouldn't suddenly spring to life, so began to pick up the pace again.

Finally, the huge and long hallway came to an end, opening up into the biggest room that Rin had ever seen.
It looked like it could even be bigger than the football stadiums that Rin had seen on TV sometimes.

It seemed to be some sort of impossibly huge bedroom, completely with impossibly huge furniture of vary sizes.
There was a sewing machine that looked to be as big as Rin's school building, while the bed nearby was only as big as the school's football court.
It looked as if someone had taken the furniture for a small doll house and then stuck it alongside the furniture for one of those big dolls that Rin's family never had the money to buy her.

The walls of the impossibly large room were lined with mirrors and at the very centre was a huge vanity desk with a similarly large mirror that looked shattered, with the glass of the mirror somehow suspended around it.
And all around the vanity was scaffolding-like shelves, displaying more of those mismatched dolls.

Rin found herself at a loss for words, unable to comprehend what she was seeing.

Feeling something crawling over her feet, Rin looked down and shrieked when she saw that the burlap dolls from earlier were gathered around her feet and most definitely moving.

"Get off!" Rin kicked out her feet and moved further into the room to get away from the dolls.

Now that she was taking the time to look at them, Rin realised that some of the small dolls were missing limbs and that many of them also had various pins stuck in them.

The dolls all looked at Rin with button eyes as they moved towards her, causing her to back away.

When Rin's back hit something, she turned around to see another of those huge, mismatched dolls looking down at her.
And this time, Rin knew that it was actively looking at her, its pupil narrowing in focus and staying on her as she moved to the side of it.
Then, it raised up its arm towards her, showing that it was very much alive.

"Ah!" Rin shriek again, running away from it.

With nowhere else to go, Rin had no choice but to run deeper into the room, watched by hundreds of eyes from the shelves around the room.

"Where do I go?" Rin questioned herself as more and more of those burlap dolls swarmed around her.

Suddenly, something wrapped tightly around Rin's arms and legs, yanking her into the air.
She screamed in fear as she was brought up to be level with the smashed mirror at the centre of the room, more string wrapping around her from nowhere until she was tangled in a web of string and unable to move.

Rin took deep breaths to calm herself.

Through the floating shards of shattered mirror, Rin spotted a figure tangled up in the fame of the mirror similarly to how she was tangled up now,
Her heart briefly froze when she saw that the figure had no head and was missing limbs, then calmed slightly when she realised that it was another oversized doll.

Somehow, Rin didn't know how, she knew that this broken doll was different to all the other dolls in the labyrinth. And that it was staring at her even though it had no head or eyes to stare with.

From the corner of her eyes, Rin saw the burlap dolls crawling up the strings towards her.
Soon, they were crawling all over Rin, no matter how much she struggled to try and shake them off.

The dolls had done nothing to her so far, but Rin knew on an instinctual level that they were dangerous.

One of the dolls crawled to Rin's chest and put a non-existent 'ear' over her rapidly beating heart.
Then it nodded and signalled to the other dolls, which started jumping up and down on Rin's body and the strings in excitement.

Rin's heartrate raced even faster as she spotted a doll carrying a scalpel towards her chest.

"No! No! Stop!" Rin cried, renewing her struggles.

The doll didn't listen as it held the scalpel directly over her chest, raising it high with the help of another doll.

Rin screamed in absolute terror as the scalpel began to plunge down, screwing her eyes shut tight.

Then, there was a woosh and a slicing sound as wind brushed Rin's face.

After a couple of seconds, Rin realised that she hadn't been stabbed and opened her eyes to see that the dolls on her chest had been cut in half, their stuffed bodies disintegrating away.

The woosh returned and this time Rin saw some sort of a spinning disk cut through the rest of the dolls covering Rin's body.
Then, the disk returned, this time cutting through the strings holding Rin in the air.

"Ahh!" Rin cried in fear as she began to fall.

Only to be caught in someone's arms.

"I've got you." A voice reassured Rin.

Rin looked up at her saviour, vaguely recognising her as the teen that she had bumped into on the way to the park.

Rin and her saviour jostled slightly as they landed back on the ground, the teen somehow showcasing no sign of injury despite how far they had just fallen.

"Who are you? What's going on?" Rin asked her saviour as she was placed back onto her feet.

"Call me Melody." The teen answered. "And explanations will have to come later."

Melody stepped away from Rin, allowing the young girl to see that the teen's outfit had changed since they'd bumped into each other, Melody now sporting some sort of blue outfit instead of the school uniform she previously wore.

Melody held out her hands and Rin's eyes widened as two bladed disks appeared from thin air in them.
The teen then ran forward, slicing through small burlap and large mismatched dolls alike as they moved towards her, heading towards the central doll hanging in the shattered mirror.

Strings appeared from the endless ceiling and the shelve scaffolding, some shooting for Melody, which she easily sliced through, but others headed for Rin again.

Rin stumbled backwards away from the string, but Melody thankfully noticed and threw one of her bladed disks, cutting through the string to save Rin.

"Thanks." Rin called to her.

Melody flashed her a quick smile.

"Get down and hide!" She then instructed.

Rin nodded and ducked behind one of the large pieces of furniture.

Melody summoned another bladed disk to replace the one she'd thrown as burlap dolls swarmed her, hundreds coming down from the webs of strings above.

Looking around at the countless dolls, Melody opened her hands and let her bladed disks drop, revealing that they were now on their own strings that were attached to her wrists.
Melody then spun the disks around, moving her arms around to send the bladed disks swinging all around her and cut through the dolls.

"Amazing." Rin gasped in awe at the sight.

Her admiration was cut short as a shadow appeared over her.

"Ahh!"

Melody looked away from her fight to see Rin in the arms of one of the mismatched dolls, its arms seeming to squeeze the girl very tightly.

Grunting in annoyance, Melody ran back over to Rin, easily cutting through the doll holding her and pulling the younger girl into her arms.

"I'm not going to be able to get anything done while I'm protecting you so closely." Melody stated.

"Sorry." Rin apologised.

"I need to get you out of here." Melody said. "Hold on."

Picking Rin up in one arm like it was nothing, Melody ran back to the hallway that Rin had emerged from, holding a bladed disk in the other hand to fend of the dolls and string that continued to attack them.

Melody ran down the hallway until Rin spotted a glowing light that the teen ran straight into, causing the young girl to cover her eyes.

…

When Rin uncovered her eyes again, she was relieved to find herself back in the park.
There was still a rippling effect around the girls, but then it disappeared.

Melody, however, frowned when she saw that the rippling retreated.

"It's running away." Melody said.

"What?" Rin questioned.

Melody looked at Rin before placing her back on her feet and giving her a quick onceover for injuries.

"Well, you don't seem to be hurt, so that's good." Melody told Rin.

Melody looked at the dark-blue jewel on her hip and then back at Rin.

"I can't afford to let it go." Melody muttered to herself, sounding frustrated.

Melody quickly knelt so that she was at Rin's level, placing her hands on the younger girl's shoulders.

"Kid, listen to me." Melody instructed. "I need you to leave the park, head home or something. Just don't stay here. I'll find you later and explain things, but I need to leave now."

Melody stood and then took off running, disappearing before Rin could stop and question her.

So, Rin was left in the park, all alone after having just gone through a crazy nightmare.

"What the hell just happened?" Rin asked out loud, wondering if all that had just happened.

"You were just in a Witch's Labyrinth." A voice said.

Startled, Rin turned around, only to see no one.

"And now I'm hearing voices." Rin laughed to herself.

"Down here." The voice said.

Rin looked down to find some sort of creature.

At first, Rin thought it might be a white cat, but the face was all wrong and it had a second set of bunny-like ears coming out from its cat-like ears.

"Hello." The creature said without moving its mouth. "I'm Kyubey."

Author's note: Please comment

I expect that I will be doing a lot of character designing for this story, especially the Magical Girl outfits. So, keep an eye on my DeviantART and Tumblr for when I post these designs.
The Witch that featured in this chapter can already be found on my art pages, under the name of "Antoinette", with all the info on her included.

If you want to leave suggestions for Witch ideas, Rin's Magical Girl form or any other design suggestions, feel free.
I'll likely be posting a variation of designs for the same character as I workshop their look and theming, so feedback will be appreciated.

Also, tell me if I'm getting anything about Japanese schools obviously wrong. I'm currently going off of what I remember from Card Captor Sakura, though it's been a while since I watched it.