Shinobu woke up an hour after she was knocked out by Reiko and Rinji. As she stumbled to her feet, she looked on the ground and found her butterfly hair pin lying neatly near where she had laid. She quickly picked it up and redid her hair, tying it back together with the pin. She took a deep breath and told herself, "I need to study swordplay more. It's clear I'm not good enough." As she looked around, she saw that the two had completely disappeared. "They're gone."

As she turned around to return to the Butterfly Estate, her mission technically finished, she reminisced about her older sister and Kanao, reminded of them by the Spider Siblings.

…

6 Years Prior, 1907

As a 12-year old Shinobu and a 15-year old Kanae walked along a bridge in the middle of the day, the two talked about a mission they had recently finished, one of Kanae's first as the new Flower Pillar. "For a second there," Kanae remarked to her. "I thought we were gonna be killed, but that poison thing you did was really helpful."

Then, Shinobu noticed a man in front of them that was pulling on something with a rope. "Hey, nee-san, what's that?" As they both looked around, they saw that the thing the man was pulling on with a rope was in fact a little girl, no older than ten years. Shinobu expresses in disgust, "Oh my God, that's fucked."

"You're not wrong," Kanae replied. "I don't feel comfortable just letting that girl be dragged around like that." She then quickly walked up to the man, who was bald, and asked him, "Hey, sir, I don't mean to bother you, but why is that girl tied up like that? Did she steal something from you?"

"She's all dirty and flea-ridden," the man scoffed, annoyed by her. "Plus, I don't want her escaping from me."

Kanae then approached the girl, who just stared at them with a blank expression. "Hello there," she greeted her. "My name is Kocho Kanae. Tell me, what is your name, child?"

The girl did not reply at all. The man instead told them, "Isn't it obvious? Her parents didn't give her a name. Now, get lost. I got important shit for her to do as my slave."

The man tried to push Kanae away, but Shinobu slapped his hands away from her. With a stern tone, she warned him, "Please, don't lay a hand on my sister again, asshole!"

"What the fuck is your problem, bitch?" The man was now deeply angered by Shinobu telling him off. "If you want her that badly, why don't you just buy this slave yourself?"

"That can be arranged," Shinobu replied. "Tell me, is this enough to own another person?!" She then reached into her haori and tossed out a large amount of yen notes and coins, startling the man as she then ripped the rope out of his hands and ran, with Kanae following quickly behind her. "I'd pick that money up right now before the crowd and the wind get it, prick!"

"Wha… Hey!" The man then quickly grabbed up as much of the money off the ground as he could. He warned the shocked crowd around him, "Hands off, fuckers! This is my money!"

Kanae could only chuckle to herself. "Shinobu, are you sure this is a good idea?"

"We'll be fine," Shinobu assured her.

Kanae, not wanting the man to follow them, turned around and told him, "Sorry for the mess!" She then turned back towards the front, remarking to herself, "My, oh my!"

As the three of them ran, a police officer approached the man, asking him, "Okay, okay, what's going on here?"

"Those two girls stole my fucking sla-," the man began to tell him before he stopped himself, realizing he was talking to a cop. "Uh… I mean… They kidnapped my daughter…?"

A voice in the crowd told the officer, "I'm pretty sure I heard him refer to that girl as a slave!"

"Yeah, I heard it too!"

"Me three!"

"Fuck that guy! Slavery sucks!"

The cop sighed. "Sir, I'll have you know that slavery is very illegal, and I'll be taking all that money from you." He then ripped the cash the man had picked up out of his hands and stuffed it into his coat. As his partner came up behind the man and restrained him, the first cop told him, "And I am placing you under arrest for engaging in slavery."

"This is fucking bullshit!" The man was enraged over how badly his day was going. "First my slave is taken and freed after I bought and paid for the fucking thing, and now I'm going to jail! Fuck this shit!"

…

June 30, 1913

As Véro walked down a hallway in the Butterfly Estate, she had the upcoming Final Selection on her mind. She was concerned that she was not advancing fast enough with her training under Sanemi, and was worried she would not be able to fend off demons successfully during the test. As she pondered to herself, she suddenly was jolted from her thoughts by bumping into someone. "Hey," she shouted in French. "Watch it, assho-!" She then paused and looked up at a young man around her age, who was blushing madly upon running into her. She quickly switched to Japanese and told him, "My apologies. I didn't mean to run into you."

"Me neither," the young man quickly replied. "I haven't seen you before, uh… What is your name?" He then tried to fix his hair, which was mostly buzz cut with only a small bit of hair on the top left.

"Véronique Renaud," she replied, looking him over. "What's your's?"

"Genya," he muttered, still rather shy towards her.

"I must ask," she said to him, noticing his eyes and seeing a resemblance to her teacher. "Are you in any way related to Shinazugawa-sama?"

That question seemed to cause concern for Genya, as he took a deep breath and closed his eyes. "Yes, I am. I'm his brother. Are you his Tsuguko?"

"Soon I will be," she replied, bowing to him. "I am learning the Breath of Wind right now. I'll be taking the next Final Selection in the 1st District soon."

"I wish you luck," he proceeded to stammer out before turning away. "Uh… Again, my apologies for bumping into you!"

Véro could tell he was incredibly shy around women. "It's fine. It was nice to meet you, Genya-san. You don't have to be so shy around me."

"I… I know," he replied with a stammer. "

…

Meanwhile, in the Dimensional Infinity Fortress, Enmu, Akaza, and Patrick were beginning an experiment to show off Enmu's abilities to Akaza, who was still somewhat skeptical of them. As Enmu scribbled away at a piece of paper with a pencil, he asked Akaza, "Would a busy city street in New York be too much for you?"

Akaza, deeply confused, asked in response, "Why?"

"Because that's what I'm architecting for your dream," Enmu explained. "While I am powerful enough to architect my own dreams without the risk of getting lost, you, on the other hand, aren't used to this kind of dreaming, so if you were left to your own devices and designed your own dream, you'd run the risk of getting lost and being unable to tell reality apart from your dream." He then held out his picture to him.

"Sounds unbelievable," Akaza scoffed as he then took Enmu's picture. "Anyway, let's get this over with."

"Okay," Enmu replied as he held his left hand out and a mouth spawned from it. "Blood Demon Art, Whispers of Forced Unconscious Hypnosis!" Immediately, Akaza fell to the ground, fast asleep in an instant. "Okay, now we just gotta make that connecting rope out of my flesh."

Less than two minutes later, as Akaza stood in the middle of a busy New York City street in the middle of the day, a thing only possible in a dream for him, Enmu and Patrick suddenly appeared before him. "Enmu," he asked him. "Where the fuck are we? Why aren't we burning to death in the sun?!"

"In a dream," Enmu explained. "Anything is possible. Now, since me and Patrick are intruders in your dream, your subconscious, which populates this place with people and animals and whatnot, may start to attack us if we start doing something weird." As soon as he finishes his sentence, every single person in view of all of them suddenly turned their heads to him and Patrick before turning away after a few seconds. "See what I mean? Now, unlike me, you don't have a weaponized subconscious as of now, so intruders are not automatically attacked by subconsciously-generated soldiers or police officers. I can easily get that arranged for you, though."

"So when everyone stared at us, that was…"

"They were staring at me and Enmu," Patrick explained. "Now, let's walk around a bit." The city streets were lined with signs in English, a language that Akaza was unfamiliar with, and a language that Enmu was only just beginning to understand. "If you have any questions about the signs here, feel free to ask so I can translate."

"Good, because I got no clue how to read or speak English." Akaza was amazed to see all the sights around him, from the tall buildings of stone and brick to the mix of horse-drawn and motor vehicles. "So this is New York, huh? This is amazing!"

A paperboy cried out on the street near them in English, calling out with, "READ ALL ABOUT IT! THE TITANIC HAS SUNK!"

"April 16, 1912 is our date," Patrick told them both in Japanese. "The day news broke that the Titanic sank."

"Interesting date," Enmu could not help but comment. "Hard to believe it's already been a year since then."

Akaza, who had never concerned himself with human news, was confused. "What happened with the Titanic?"

"It struck an iceberg," Enmu explained to him. "And it sank with 1,500 deaths and only 700 survivors, give or take. It was news all over." He then pulled out his drawing notebook and a pencil, and began to sketch a completely different scene. "Once I'm finished with this, we'll jump into the second level."

Fascinated, Akaza asked him, "A dream within a dream?"

"Correct," he replied. "I have Nakime in the real world setting a Kick Event for us to wake us up, but it has to be timed just right once we go to the second level. Patrick will stay behind here to help kick us awake." Once he was finished with his rough sketch, he presented it to Akaza. "Take a good look at this setting. It's a Buddhist temple. I'll be the one dreaming this time." He then once again held his left hand in front of Akaza. "Blood Demon Art, Whispers of Forced Unconscious Hypnosis!" Everything then went dark for Akaza.

When the two woke up again, they were standing in the middle of a field of grass and flowers, with a stone path leading to a Buddhist temple nearby. The calm and soothing atmosphere around them was a sharp contrast to the bustling American city streets of New York. Amazed by Enmu's abilities, Akaza told him, "It's completely different! Holy shit!"

"You got that right," he replied. "My abilities have improved even more ever since Master Kibutsuji gave me more of his blood."

…

On the same day, at the same time, a Sinhalese man emerged from a passenger ship terminal in Tokyo in the evening. He bore a black suit and tie, and held a briefcase in one hand. He looked around and sighed, telling himself in Sinhala, "This will be my most difficult journey yet. I just hope they won't kill me or see me as a threat. Vijay Anula, this will be your greatest undertaking yet." He then noticed a British man standing nearby on the street and decided to ask him a question. Switching to English, he asked him, "Good sir, do you happen to know where I could find Yoshiwara?"

The man, surprised to see him ask so bluntly to go to the Red Light District of Tokyo, replied, "Well, um, it's… It's in Chuo. It's north of the port here."

"Thank you," Vijay gracefully replied with a bow. "I shall be on my way."

"I'd be a bit careful," the British man told him. "Get yourself checked out! Who knows what bloody diseases are over there?!"

"I'm not going there to have sex with a prostitute," he rather bluntly replied. "I'm going there to seek answers."