Chapter 1: Urban Despair Part 1 (Daily Life)
Remaining Citizens: 17
I checked the clock, it's been two hours since then, and I still can't believe it.
All of us sat around at an abandoned café, which was called Despairbucks and could be found on almost every corner of this area. The drinks were nice, but they didn't help with the fact that we're trapped here in a "killing game".
"Yo, this seriously can't be real, can it?" I heard Ryuji speak from the table next to me, "I've seen a lot of unbelievable stuff, but…"
"Yeah, I'd assume most of us are used to situations similar to this, but regardless it still feels like a nightmare." Espio spoke up as he leaned against the wall.
"That bear… we can't underestimate how strong a machine like him could be. Trust me, I know." Trunks said as he crossed his arms.
"Jeez, too bad Bazooka-Girl didn't know that sooner, or else she wouldn't have tried to destroy Robo-Teddirusa. Coulda been turned to ash when he used Self-Destruct." Gold bluntly stated as he put his arms behind his head.
"How was I supposed to know he'd blow up like that?! He looked just like a teddy bear, I couldn't tell there was a bomb!" Misato yelled at him, but he just ignored her and yawned.
Okay she just brought out A CANNON, spooking all of us, so she looks to be a little annoyed at the guy with the goggle cap.
"Oh yeah? Then I guess I'll fire back with Ex—HUH?!" Gold frantically searched his belt for some reason.
"Firing now, you stupid—"
"Hold on! There's no need for excessive violence!" I reluctantly stood in between Misato, the cannon and Gold.
Miles then stood up to try to help, "She's right, we need to find a way out of here. Now you two, say you're sorry, and don't blow each other up. Okay?"
The two just stared angrily at each other before walking back to their tables, where they continued to glare from a distance.
"(sighs), Okay, now that that's settled, we should now get to our search for an escape route." I told everyone.
"Hmph, while you idiots do that, I shall try to contact KaibaCorp so they may provide me with a helicopter out of this dump." Kaiba said as he approached the door.
"W-what's a helicopter?" Bernadetta asked and Emma shrugged.
"Dang, what an asshole." Ryuji muttered under his breath.
"Say what you will, you broke delinquent, your words don't mean a thing to someone like me. Farewell." I swear he said something like "Just like Wheeler" as he left.
"It doesn't look like he'd be any help even if he did search with us." Killua snarked as we all nodded our heads.
We took a look at our e-Handbooks, as I learned they were called, to take a look at some of the rules.
Rule #1: Citizens may reside only within the city. Going outside city limits is prohibited and is not encouraged.
Rule #2: "Nighttime" is from 10 pm to 7 am. Some areas are not active at night, so what's the point in going out?
Rule #3: Sleeping anywhere other than the Hope-tel is against the law and violators will be punished accordingly.
Rule #4: With minimal restrictions, you are free to explore Monocity at your discretion.
Rule #5: Violence against mayor Monokuma is strictly prohibited, as is destruction of surveillance cameras and vandalizing landmarks.
Rule #6: Anyone who kills a fellow citizen and becomes "blackened" will be exiled from our city, unless they are discovered.
Rule #7: Additional city laws may be added if necessary.
After overlooking all of it, we decided to split up into eight groups of two people and search until 10:00 pm. It was currently 1:00 pm, so we had nine hours to explore the city.
Bernadetta & I would search the park, Ryuji & Gold will look in the restaurant area, Killua & Miles (both apparently being able to get on top of buildings easily) are searching from the rooftops, Emma & Trunks would tour the shopping district, Ishigami & Shantae chose to observe the Hope-tel, Alice & Aoba decided to visit the back alleys, Sucy & Espio left for the office buildings, and Misato & Marty visited the city's square.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Man this was a lot harder than I thought. We walked all over the park for more than two hours and all we saw were statues of Monokuma, one of them was of him standing on top of a crying bunny girl version of him, and that girl we saw from that first statue. Sitting at the fountain that had a Cupid Monokuma on it, I pondered how everyone was brought to this city in the first place. Clearly, every single one of us are not from the same place or time, so how could that bear manage travel between different worlds? Also, the fact that other worlds existed is a lot to take in, Miles mentioned other dimensions when we met but….
"Hey!"
"Ah!"
Emma walked up to us from behind, after scaring both of us.
"Oh, sorry about that." She rubbed the back of her head as Trunks caught up with her.
"Finally, I was wondering where you went after we got done searching that area!" The blue-haired swordsman scolded her.
"Ha ha, this place is just too interesting for me to just stick to one single section! Plus it's better to check out areas others are in, just in case they miss something. So Ai, Bernie, did you find anything?"
"Not a single thing, I wish I could just go back to my room…" Bernadetta brings up her legs and puts her head down.
"We can't give up now! There's still a lot of this city we haven't seen yet." Trunks encourages her.
"Yeah! We saw this big metal wall with a sign in front of it at the end of the shopping district. It said 'Area under construction, please excuse the inconvenience.', which means that this city isn't complete!" Emma elaborated.
"So it looks like this place will expand as time goes on, though we're not sure how long it would take…" The thought lingered in my head until once again we were interrupted.
"Hold on! I know!"
Poor Bernadetta was frightened once again with the arrival of our mayor, Monokuma.
"What do you want?" I asked him, not willing to hear what crazy nonsense he was about to say.
"Hey! That's no way to speak to your mayor Ms. Mizuno! Ahem, so what I came here to say that the paths to new parts of the city will be opened…" He paused to build tension, I'd assume.
"When our first murder happens!"
What did I expect?
"Look, I can't speak for everyone, but there's not much you can do to force us into playing your sick game." I rolled my eyes at the black and white bear, who just chuckled.
"Upupupu~, there's a lot of things I can do to motivate you, but I'll just keep you in the dark for now. Don't lose your heads now! Though it might be harder to keep yours on Ms. Mizuno…" He just waddled away as soon as he finished saying that.
Ugh, this thing was getting on my nerves, even more so than Tatsumi, which I didn't think was possible. After that discussion, I checked the time and saw that it had been three hours, six hours left until night, so the four of us went back to our designated areas. Me and Bernadetta decided to go to the last area of the park that has not been checked yet.
.
.
.
.
.
After half an hour of walking around looking at signs of a red-eyed, black-haired guy in white saying "LITTERING IS NOT WELCOME IN A PARK ENVIRONMENT", as well as advertisements for Mondo Butter (Don't think I want to know where that came from, with that guy on the container), and we finally come across something out of place.
"Um, what exactly is that?" Bernie, she allowed me to call her that, asked.
"It's called an elevator, a machine that transports people up or down a building with multiple floors. But why is there one sitting outside?"
The two of us walk in front of it and the doors automatically open. It couldn't hurt to see where this leads, so we walked in and clicked the only button leading downwards. The doors open and we end up in a large circular room, checkerboard flooring, red curtains, blue walls, one large throne, and large wooden wheel-like structure in the center of it all.
Just what was this place?
"GOD DAMN IT!"
Monokuma popped up and landed on the throne, looking like he wasn't very happy.
"I knew I shouldn't have had the doors open during normal hours! Now the surprise is ruined gah!"
"Excuse me, Mayor Monokuma?"
"Hm? Oh, what's up Violet Hermit?"
"Um, where are we, exactly?" Bernie asked the bear.
"Where? Well, I was planning on showing guys later, but since you're here I might as well call everyone!" Suddenly he puts on a black and slightly grey wig, a small beard/mustache combo, a blue wizard outfit, and a red cape.
He holds out one arm in front of him and moves the other in a circular motion, and he SOMEHOW opens up multiple portals above the room. One by one everyone dropped in, Trunks, Miles, Killua, & Espio landed on their feet, while everyone else fell flat on top of each other.
"Citizens Assemble!" Monokuma cried out.
"Hey you stupid bear! What have you got us into this time?" Shantae pointed straight at him.
"Now then, everyone is here, so now begins the explanation! You all remember Rule #6, right?"
Most of us nodded our heads, except for Gold & Ryuji, who both tried their hardest to remember.
"It says that anyone who murders a fellow citizen will be removed from our city, unless they are caught. Now what could that possibly mean, hm?" He pretended to think to himself as he put a hand to where a chin could be.
Killua answered for him, "That in order to escape, a killer must cover up their tracks and prevent any of us from finding out they did it.".
"Ding ding ding! You are correct, kid! And the purpose of this room is for the latter, we shall hold a City Trial to find out whodunit!"
"Trial? You mean like with lawyers and evidence and all that?" Marty stepped up next.
"Correctamundo, McFly! All of you will meet up here and discuss what you've found, until you've chosen the culprit! Then you'll all vote for them and if you are correct, they get a very special punishment that I prepare…"
"P-punishment? By that, do you mean…" Ishigami shivered as he let the words out.
"If you were thinking of execution, then YES I mean that!"
Oh my god, this is insanity.
"If you are wrong however… the 'blackened' goes free, and the rest of you shall be executed! Upupupu~." This bear's laugh silenced everyone in the courtroom, and caused sweat to fall from a few of our faces.
We all took the elevator back up to the city, not in any mood to continue searching, even with five hours left until night time. We just decided to grab some food from some of the restaurants and head to the Hope-tel for some rest. The lobby was full of us, except for Kaiba who was once again trying to contact the outside, and Bernie who decided to go eat in her room. After a day like this, I'm going to need some yakiniku.
Alright guys. This is the last chapter of this fic, unless I see some feedback on whether or not people are interested in this story. I don't want to make the same mistake as I did with The Gauntlet and keep writing, despite the lack of attention. It's fun to write both that and Three Houses Saga, but lately I've felt like nobody wants to say anything about my fics. Hopefully you guys enjoy upcoming chapters of those stories, and I'll contemplate whether or not to continue this one. Thank you.