I Won't Let Him

by thenextgamer

BadEnding!SUNNY goes to OMARI AU. After SUNNY jumps off the roof of the hospital building, he wakes up back in the past on the day of the incident. Not wanting to repeat the same mistake he did last time, he manages to save MARI and change everything, going into a coma for six years. MARI blames herself and becomes a reclusive shut-in with her own mental trauma of the event.

25. It Was All Rigged From The Start

OMORI let his eyes squint, concentrating on his target.

Holding steady on his hockey stick, he studied the moving plastic cutout of the velociraptor goalie while tapping on the hockey puck at his feet.

When the moment was right, he struck the shot. The puck glided smoothly across the slippery floor panel of the stand.

Aaaaannnd…!

BZZT!

The puck bounced off the plastic goalie with a thud.

Damn. It got blocked again.

"Don't worry, SUNNY! You're doing great!" HIKIKO cheered on behind him, remaining optimistic as ever.

A very false statement. This was his third consecutive failed attempt out of the five he was granted. As much as he appreciated his sister's encouraging words, they just felt hollow.

The plastic cutout of a raptor hockey goalie kept spinning around, mechanically taunting him with the speakers playing a prerecorded mocking laugh. The electronic board above it that was keeping track of points showed a total of zero out of five.

He could see KEL playing his heart out at a football kicking game a few booths over. With a mighty kick, the football went past a small field goal before landing directly in a small tiny hole worth one thousand points. Victory confetti launched as KEL ran around, whooping like a party animal.

Sigh...

OMORI admitted he was never good at sports anyway. Out of the six of them from the group, pretty much everyone else besides him had much more experience in some form of physical activity. MARI and AUBREY were good at softball. HERO was a good swimmer, despite his lack of endurance. KEL was practically good at everything, but mainly specialized in basketball. Even BASIL was more physically active in comparison to OMORI since he actually goes outside every day to do gardening work. If gardening was an Olympic sport, BASIL would be a national treasure.

OMORI? Pretty much useless at everything.

The fourth hockey puck spat out from the mouth of a velociraptor-themed dispenser, sliding smoothly towards his feet.

He had two shots remaining. Better make them count.

"Yeah, SUNNY! You can do it!" HIKIKO kept cheering on from behind.

Alright…

OMORI took a deep breath before concentrating again. His eyes were fixed directly at the velociraptor goalie in front of him, studying its movements and patterns.

Looking at the cardboard cutout's turning speed, he internally counted the seconds it passed by. One. Two. Three. The speed switched at semi-random intervals, seemingly at least three seconds each.

OMORI imagined himself. His strengths and weaknesses. How hard and fast he could hit.

If he timed it just right…

Holding his breath, OMORI felt a surge of confidence as he took the shot again.

For a moment, it seemed like he timed it perfectly. The puck was about to make a direct beeline into the metal net before the goalie could turn fast enough to block it.

BZZT!

OMORI blinked.

The puck bounced off again from the raptor's plastic feet. The speakers played the annoying sound of his mocking laugh again. The electronic board displayed zero out of five points again.

Damn it…

He really thought he had it for a second there. He hit the puck just as the speed switched to a slower setting, but then the turning speed picked up at the last moment.

That was really odd… Was it a fake-out, or faulty machinery?

Did it even matter which one it was? Maybe OMORI was just pathetic in general.

OMORI loosened his stance as another puck spat out near his feet again, his eyes giving it an uninterested glance.

Noticing his disheartened spirit, HIKIKO walked up to pat him on the back, "It's okay, SUNNY! You gave it your best effort, and that's what matters the most! I wouldn't ask any more from you!"

Best efforts are nice and all, but it still didn't mean anything if all it led to was failure after failure.

Whatever...

OMORI maintained a stoic expression as he looked away, wondering what else they could do instead.

Seeing that he still had one shot left, HIKIKO gave an inquisitive hum before asking OMORI, "Hey, how about I give the last puck a try? What do you say?"

Glancing over at his sister, OMORI shrugged indifferently and passed the hockey stick to her. Might as well.

He took a step back as HIKIKO got into position, lining up her hockey stick as she stared at the goalie.

With narrow eyes, HIKIKO steadied her breath…

And hit the puck as hard as she could.

What came next was an incredibly impressive display. The puck launched into the air and speeded towards the goalie so fast, it became a blur in his eyes. Despite the goalie slowing down to block the puck in time, much like a bullet, the sheer speed and strength behind the force of the puck practically annihilated the plastic cutout as a giant hole was cracked into the plastic frame.

The puck got caught by the metal net, and an air horn signaled that it was a goal. The goalie, however, was left with wires and circuits exposed in the middle of its plastic stomach.

…

Wow.

OMORI blinked at the impressive display, looking at HIKIKO to see her cover her mouth.

Turning around to face him, HIKIKO gave a small giggle in disbelief, "Uh… Oops? Did I do that?"

As if comedically timed, the plastic cutout proceeded to blow out sparks before falling apart on the floor. The machinery of the booth started malfunctioning as more sparks flew out, the speakers playing garbled noises.

All of a sudden, the points on the electronic display marked five out of five points before a congratulatory voice played on the speakers, "Nice shooting, kid! That was perfect! You should join the big leagues!"

Then long strews of tickets started dispensing as a reward.

HIKIKO and OMORI both awkwardly watched the tickets spewing out for them in large piles, both of them left in a state of shock.

After a while, HIKIKO smiled at OMORI as she tested her muscles with a quick flex, "Guess I'm stronger than I look, huh? How cool was that?"

If PLUTO was here to see this, no doubt he'd rave about it. Very cool.

OMORI nodded at her while giving a thumbs up. HIKIKO giggled with a proud smile in response.

---

OMORI walked among the stands at the main plaza, HIKIKO happily leading ahead of him with a bounce in her step. Either she was in a good mood from the lucky event earlier, or she was more excited about this than she originally let on.

Seeing her smiling and having fun made him feel better though. At least one of them was enjoying themselves.

"So, where do you want to go next, SUNNY? We still have a lot of tokens to spend here." She showcased this as She tossed the token bag up and caught it, letting the metal clinking of tokens ring out loudly.

His decision again, huh? Her lack of agency notwithstanding, OMORI didn't know what else to pick. He had mostly chosen the hockey booth on a whim, so it wasn't like he had any other idea what they should do next.

They had about an hour of free time to waste before they needed to check up on KEL. Some more games wouldn't hurt. Maybe a ride or two in between for breaks.

Not only that, but he would also like to do something to earn some tickets so that he could afford that DINO plushie. Even though he was sure that they almost had enough for it because of HIKIKO, he wanted to earn some of those tickets on his own instead.

It wouldn't mean much if he had to rely on his big sister all the time.

Stopping in front of a billboard displaying the map of the park, HIKIKO and OMORI took a glance at it to decide where to go next.

"We barely even scratched the surface. This place is sooo big!" HIKIKO whistled, "So many things to do…"

Lots of things were listed on the map, a wide variety of games and activities for them to play to their heart's content.

Hm.

Observing the map, OMORI made another decision on a whim and pointed at a random game, "How about that one?"

He ended up pointing towards something that looked like catching fish. That shouldn't be too hard for him, right?

HIKIKO gasped in delight, "Ooh! I love fishies! So cute and adorable, with their tiny eyes and little fins! Great pick, SUNNY!"

Seems like he made a good choice then if HIKIKO was this excited. Alright then.

---

"Step right up! Step right up! Come give a go at goldfish scooping! A longtime staple and tradition in any carnival or amusement park!"

OMORI gave a deadpan stare at the talking technicolored narwhal, clearly lying through his teeth.

Behind it, giant mutant goldfish that were the size of cat-cages leaped to the air before dropping with a messy splash. In OMORI's hand, rather than a small paper scooper for small fishes that came standard in games like these, it was a comically large scooping net that was about twice the size of his little twelve-year-old body.

There was absolutely nothing staple or traditional about this game. None at all.

"The more fish you scoop, the more tickets you earn! Only three tries per token!" The narwhal announced, "Catch the elusive rainbow goldfish for double the total payout! Careful not to let the scooper get ripped!"

HIKIKO leaned over the railing as she watched the giant gold-fishes swim about in their giant aquarium pool, smiling excitedly, "Don't they just look so cute, SUNNY?! Oh, I just want to pick one up with my bare hands and squish it to bits!"

OMORI cautiously came closer to the railing only for a giant goldfish to steal ten years off his lifespan, jumping directly in front of his face and startling him half to death.

Yeah, no. He'd be lucky if his tiny body didn't get dragged down into the giant tank with them and get mistaken as fish food. At least his former fear of drowning won't be bothering him while he was busy getting eaten alive.

Sigh… Too late to back out from the game now. Might as well get this over with and try to earn some tickets...

Shaking his head clear, OMORI steadied himself as he approached the railing again while holding out his comically large scooper into the water.

Even though everything was ten times bigger, the concept was still the same. He just had to catch fish in the net, right? He's done this before, so it should be simple.

Looking around for which goldfish to capture, he settled his eyes on a particularly calm one that was minding its own business. It wasn't as jumpy like many of the others, so that one would have to do.

OMORI carefully moved the scooper around to try to have the net catch it from behind. It seemed like all was going well at first, and he was about to get a surefire catch…

But he must have done something wrong to alert it. The goldfish suddenly got startled and ripped a hole right through the fragile net just as he was going to bring it up.

Bringing the scooper up, he stared at the damages with a small frown.

With a lighthearted chuckle, the narwhal told him, "Poor technique, kiddo! If you're too gentle, you'll give the fish plenty of time to get away! Don't be afraid to be quick and rough with these fish, they can handle it!" Handing OMORI another scooper, he took the old one back, "There! Give it another go!"

"You have two more tries left, Sunny! You can do it!" HIKIKO cheered on.

OMORI took a breath to steady himself, feeling the weight of the new scooper in his hand.

Alright, so he was just too slow the first time. Quicker and rougher this time. Quicker and rougher.

With this in mind, OMORI started his second attempt, lowering the scooper down into the water.

Another fish managed to catch his attention, gently swimming towards the corner of the pool. It seemed to be wandering around aimlessly.

Okay... Quick and rough.

Heaving the scooper in his arms, he quickly chased down this goldfish like a heat-seeking missile, doing his best to catch it as fast as he could.

The ripples in the waves alerted the goldfish that he was coming, dodging out of the way of the scooper before it got caught.

Undeterred, OMORI kept chasing after it as best as he could. But no matter what he did, it seemed like the goldfish was just plain faster than him. Every attempt to trap or corner it, the goldfish would smoothly avoid him like he was telegraphing his moves.

In the end, OMORI noticed at some point that he broke the net of his scooper before he could even catch it. The goldfish swam away from his grasp, leaving him to eat its dust.

Bringing the scooper up, he stared at the familiar sight of the torn net again.

"That can happen when you're too rough on the net." The narwhal pleasantly explained, "If you push the scooper through the water too fast, the water pressure can break it apart and tear a hole! You should be more careful next time and treat it gently!"

Which was it then? Be more quick and rough, or be more careful and gentle? It felt like the horned beast was feeding him contradicting information just to make him lose on purpose.

OMORI held back a frustrated scowl from forming on his face as he clenched his hands. Maintaining his stoic expression, he instead handed the broken scooper back to the narwhal.

Handing him his last replacement, the narwhal cheerfully told him, "Last one! Good luck!"

"Don't worry, SUNNY! Just do your best! I believe in you!" HIKIKO helpfully chimed in again. Unlike the narwhal, her tone at least felt more sincere to listen to.

Still made him feel like a screwup though.

Approaching the railing one last time, OMORI took another deep breath to calm down.

Then he focused.

Setting the scooper down to the water, his eyes carefully roamed around one more time for a fish to settle his sights onto.

…

There. One lone fish settled itself near the bottom of the pool. It almost looked like it was about to take a nap.

With a firm grip, he extended his arms out to reach down to the bottom. The scooper approached the goldfish from above very slowly and gently, so as to not startle it.

Laying the scooper right next to the fish, he waited… checking to see how it would react.

The fish did not respond. Oblivious to the world.

OMORI didn't hesitate to change gears and immediately pounced on it like a tiger before quickly carrying the scooper out of the water.

Hoisting the scooper up, he brought it over the railing and dropped the scooper on the floor before his tiny arms could give out.

With heavy breaths, he watched with a victorious glint in his eye the fruit of his success. One giant goldfish, flopping heavily on its side on top of a nearly broken scooper.

"SUNNY! You did it! I knew you could do it!" HIKIKO ran up to him from behind and squeezed him into a congratulatory hug, "That was perfect, little brother! You were great!"

OMORI relaxed in his sister's arms, feeling relieved for this small accomplishment.

"Nice job, kid!" The narwhal scooped the flopping goldfish with his tail before launching it back into the water.

The fish harmlessly landed back inside, curiously looking around as lost and confused by what just happened.

"You just earned a total of ten tickets right there! Amazing work!" The narwhal clapped its fins as it printed out the tickets from the stand it was sitting on top of.

OMORI grabbed the string of paper in his hand, staring at it with a disappointed frown.

All that time and effort just for a measly ten? Sheesh…

He remembered the plushie being worth over five hundred tickets. How was he going to afford it on his own at this rate?

"Keep these tickets in a safe place, SUNNY! We'll be using it to spend at the prize counter!" HIKIKO reminded him with a ruffle of his hair.

OMORI pocketed the tickets as the narwhal regarded him, "It's a shame you could only catch one though. Most kids are at least able to catch a few more in just three tries."

…

Whatever.

OMORI ignored the narwhal's comment, not wanting to engage with it any further. It was probably just a tactic to rile him up so that he'd spend more tokens to do better. He's not gonna take the bait.

HIKIKO didn't seem to want to let the comment slide though, noticing how it bothered her little brother.

"Hey, he tried his best! Catching at least one fish should be pretty impressive since it was his first time!" HIKIKO called out to it.

The narwhal smiled back, "Oh, of course! I didn't mean anything by it! I'm sure the little champ should be very proud!"

It seemed like such a harmless little comment, yet HIKIKO couldn't help but feel indignant about it.

HIKIKO released her hold on OMORI, walking up to the narwhal and tossing a token. OMORI looked on confusedly, wondering what she was doing.

"Give me a net! I'm gonna catch some fish too!" HIKIKO told it.

The narwhal nodded politely as it fished out a scooper, "Three tries for one token. Better not waste it!"

HIKIKO grabbed the scooper, giving it a firm hold as she looked out to the aquarium pool with a determined nod. She was gonna show this stupid narwhal a lesson for trivializing her little brother's hard work and efforts!

OMORI saw something in HIKIKO's eyes as she prepared herself next to the railing. There seemed to be this sort of giddy excitement rising within her that was threatening to explode at any moment.

It became more accentuated when she glanced over at him with a wink, "Hey, SUNNY. Watch real closely, okay? Big sis is gonna do something cool."

OMORI blinked back, still as confused as ever.

He watched as his sister took a deep breath and got into position. Instead of settling the scooper down to the water, she instead waited as she watched the fish swimming by. Her eyes were like a hawk, studying and waiting for mice to prey on.

When a few goldfish grouped up together near her, HIKIKO gripped tightly on the handle.

That was when she struck.

Diving the scooper net into the water at blinding speeds, she pulled it up just as quickly to hurl her catch on land.

Three giant goldfish were flopping around right beside her feet, taken unawares like a bear swatting salmon by the river.

She flicked the scooper around, letting the droplets of water fling off to make a circle of wet dots around her body. The net was still surprisingly intact and ready to pick up more fish, despite it all.

OMORI stared at the group of goldfish in surprise, watching them flounder around helplessly.

HIKIKO turned to the narwhal, its jaw opened with gobsmacked awe, "If I didn't break the net, does it still count as the first try?"

The narwhal looked at her, regaining its composure by shaking his head and answering, "Y-Yeah, yes. If the net comes back up from the water, with or without a fish, it counts."

"Okay then." HIKIKO nodded thoughtfully, "In that case…"

HIKIKO went ahead and dipped her scooper down in the water again as her second attempt. With skill and grace, she walked along the railing as her scooper swept across the waters.

OMORI watched at the mesmerizing display in the water, seeing the way HIKIKO somehow rounded up all the fishes together in one giant pile of a group. Like a sheepherder controlling their flock, she kept redirecting the goldfishes around as she collected more and more to join the group somehow.

Her handling of the scooper was so fast, able to prevent any goldfish from escaping. Underneath the water was the view of a giant gold cluster ball of goldfish, growing more and more in size as more goldfish were amalgamated into the group.

OMORI had to blink as the surface of the water was starting to get blurry by all the ripples and waves. It almost gave the illusion that the goldfish were practically swimming directly towards her scooper to join in on purpose.

When HIKIKO was satisfied with the size she made, she swept her scooper across the big golden ball of fish and scooped up as many as she could out of the water.

OMORI had to back away as a small rain of giant goldfish landed behind her. Flopping aimlessly across the floor of the park, about a dozen or so giant goldfish were stripped away from their home.

The net was still intact.

That was… impossible. That had to be impossible, right? He wasn't much of an expert in fish scooping games, to be honest.

"Oh dear lord." The narwhal muttered in terror as he counted all the fish she collected.

But HIKIKO wasn't done yet. Her eyes seemed to be searching for something across the water, darting around like a snake. Already, she got into a combative stance as she searched for her missing quarry.

There, in the corner of her vision, almost camouflaged within the decorative rocks in the water tank. A deep blue fish that sparkled all sorts of colors on its scales, like a beautiful optical illusion in the night. It was smaller than the other goldfishes, looking only about as big as her brother's cute little head.

She locked her eyes on it, going in for the kill.

With barely any effort, the elusive rainbow fish was carried away by her scooper before it could even realize what was going on.

Flinging to the air, HIKIKO made a show to catch it by the tail instead of letting it land on the floor. Turning to a narwhal with a smug smirk, she stated, "I get double the tickets now because of this, right?"

The narwhal was heavily sweating as it stared at the colorful fish with golden rainbow scales. It almost looked like it was on the verge of passing out.

It silently nodded to HIKIKO, accepting defeat with as much integrity as it could.

HIKIKO quickly turned to OMORI with a huge smile, "What do you think, SUNNY? Did you see that? Did you see how cool I was out there?"

OMORI didn't know what to say, honestly. His eyes occasionally glanced back and forth between HIKIKO and the narwhal as it tearfully printed out a long string of tickets from its stand.

Feeling the tickets in his pockets, the measly ten tickets that he earned from catching a single fish, he looked to see all the fish flopping on land before settling his eyes on the rainbow fish in her hand.

HIKIKO smiled expectantly, waiting for his response.

OMORI didn't know what else to do except give a thumbs up to her. Honestly, what else could he say?

HIKIKO seemed to really appreciate it, her smile widening as she giggled happily. With a happy bounce, she tossed her rainbow fish back into the water before going off to collect her tickets.

OMORI was left gripping his tickets with clenched fists.

Now that the shock and excitement wore off, all he could really feel was… numbed inadequacy. Like a disappointment. HIKIKO must've felt like she needed to do something to make up for his lack of talent and pick up his slack.

OMORI already knew that MARI was better than him. That has always been the case for the longest time now. Whether it came to school, instruments, sports, or any other talent, she was always ahead of him in many ways.

Still… It's not fun to be reminded of that. To be reminded how far behind in her shadow he always was. To be reminded that he was a burden.

If only he was more capable, he wouldn't have to rely on her all the time...

…

Whatever.

Let's just… Let's just find a different game, and move on. There should be something around here that he was good at.

---

The next game he chose to play was something more up his alley. Shooting Ducks, as they called it. It reminded him of one of his old zap games that he got on his birthday as a kid.

An open field where park-goers shot these little fake toy shotguns that shot beanbags at remote-controlled ducks. Hit as many ducks as you can before they fly away each round. You can't let three ducks escape or you lose. You only have a limited amount of bullets that you can only reload between rounds.

A simple and familiar concept. Should be a piece of cake for him, right?

Wrong. The guns they provided had such horrible recoil, he thought he nearly tore off his own arm when he tried to shoot one. He lost the game in the first round, all three ducks escaping before he could fire another shot.

HIKIKO excitedly grabbed a gun and told him to watch as she gave the game a try. She went on and proceeded to shoot down around fifty robot ducks, each progressively faster than the last. The engine of one of the ducks accidentally caught fire from moving around so quickly before it crashed in a fiery explosion. The host had to admit defeat and reward her with another strew of tickets, as HIKIKO looked at OMORI for praise.

The next game after that was a skeeball game, which they coincidentally met up with KEL there. He was in the middle of tossing skee-balls in a race against other skee-ballers, each ball going directly into holes that powered mini-race cars on a small race track. The hole with the highest points gave the cars a huge boost in speed, while the holes with little or no points barely moved the car at all.

OMORI had thought this was an appealing and simple enough game to try out. He was always pretty decent at skeeball, so surely he would manage to fare well in a game like this, right?

Wrong. For some god-awful reason, everyone else he was racing against were apparently world-champion skee-ball throwers who were able to severely outmatch him in every single way. His throws couldn't hope to match the near-perfect consistent landings of the other racers, and his pathetic little red car got in last place because of it. Adding insult to injury, he earned two consolation tickets to boot, bringing his total up to a whopping twelve tickets in total.

HIKIKO, on the other hand, relished the challenge of the game as she scored perfect landings whenever she threw the balls. The same red car he had been controlling before was now a speed demon on the race track under HIKIKO's care, somehow outspeeding every other car and easily managing first place with barely any effort. Even when the game was over and HIKIKO had stopped throwing skee-balls, the car was powered with so many points, it kept running lap after lap continuously before flying off its rails and crashing into the scenery.

The host had to set up an Out-of-Order sign as they tried to repair the mess, forcing all the racers to leave. KEL let out a disappointed groan as he moved somewhere else, lamenting his luck. HIKIKO waggled her eyebrows with a grin at OMORI as he watched the host pay her another heap loads of tickets, adding to her miserably high total already.

OMORI was doing his best to keep his disappointment and agitation with himself under wraps at this point.

The next game after that was a rail-shooter ride. The aim of the game is to strap yourself in this moving platform, where you're affixed with a stationary pie-cannon to shoot targets with. The targets themselves are live clowns that do their best to roam around and dodge from getting hit in the face with delicious pie. The more clowns they iced with pie, the more points they got.

Now this was a game that OMORI could get behind! No physical strength or dextrous motor skills required! He just needed to aim and shoot a stationary gun that won't tear his limbs off with recoil. It was basically like a video game! He was always good with video games. This definitely had to be the game that was meant for him, right?!

Wrong…

Despite his confidence going into the game, it was quickly dashed the moment they started actually playing. Perhaps it was maybe the pie gun machine being defective somehow, or maybe it was the fact that the clowns were literally ninjas in disguise. Whatever the case may be, the clowns were easily able to dodge each and every pie that gets thrown their way. He would occasionally get lucky with one or two hits, but just barely.

His score is just abysmally low, unlike HIKIKO, who was absolutely dominating the clowns on her side of the game. Despite her clowns being just as fast as his clowns, HIKIKO managed to land many consecutive chest shots and headshots, knocking out many of the clowns in the process.

Noticing OMORI struggling, HIKIKO quickly offered her help and switched the gun to aim over at his side. OMORI had to watch as she effortlessly decimated the clowns that were giving him so much trouble. Her violent pie-shooting spree was so relentless, many of the clowns held up white flags to surrender. HIKIKO continued to fire upon them, leaving no survivors behind.

When it came time to tally the scores and convert that to tickets, the host, who just happened to be one of the clowns participating in the game, disgruntledly gave them the stink-eye along with a roll of tickets as pie-cream rolled down his face.

HIKIKO cheered and raised her hands up for a double high five, "Great teamwork, SUNNY!"

Great teamwork. Great teamwork, she says. Even though she was the one who was forced to pick up his slack.

He barely did anything to help at all. Not in any of the games he played so far.

OMORI was only able to make up fourteen tickets out of the huge total that HIKIKO amassed. Nowhere near enough to earn the plushie… Not unless he used the tickets HIKIKO earned to get it.

Why was he just… so worthless?

It took everything in OMORI's power to stop himself from losing his composure. He was starting to get stressed out now. He felt sick in his stomach.

---

A roller coaster was just what he needed.

A small break from playing games, just to give his mind a chance to calm down. Something to keep him away from the negative thoughts.

Ever since he was a kid, he was always curious about what it would be like to ride on a roller coaster. This was back before he had gotten his fear of heights, of course. Hearing all the excited screams as a kid, it made him want to ride on one himself to see what made it so appealing. He was too young and small at the time to be allowed to ride one, however.

Since then, he hadn't been in any particular hurry to try to ride a roller coaster as he got older, mostly due to that whole fear of heights thing. But now that he had that fear under control, he had to admit that he was looking forward to the idea again.

"Are you sure you'll be able to handle it, SUNNY?" HIKIKO asked worriedly as they waited in line, "You know you don't have to commit to it if you don't think you're ready."

OMORI shook his head, "I should be fine."

OMORI had managed to convince HIKIKO to let him take a ride under the guise of wanting to face his fears. Although hesitant at first, HIKIKO ultimately warmed up to the idea and wanted to cheer him on.

"I'm really proud of you, you know that?" HIKIKO smiled as she grabbed OMORI in for another hug, "You're acting like such a big boy now! Facing your fears like this! I'll be right next to you every step of the way, so don't worry about a single thing! Okay?"

"Mm." OMORI nodded under her chin.

She squealed in response, cooing over him like a hen to her baby chicks.

By the time it was their turn to ride the roller coasters, HIKIKO and OMORI strapped themselves in as they prepared for the ride.

"Hello, passengers. Welcome to the Cretaceous–Paleogene Extinction Event. Please make sure safety belts are firmly connected, and keep hands and feet inside the cart at all times. Enjoy the ride."

"Oooh, this is gonna be so exciting!" HIKIKO bounced in her seat, turning to OMORI with a smile, "Remember to raise your hands when we go down! That makes it more fun!"

OMORI nodded as he patiently waited for the ride to commence.

There was this familiar feeling of dread rising within him as the roller coaster was slowly ascending to the top of the first hill.

Despite his control over his fear of heights, it seems a part of him must still be instinctively scared on some basic level.

OMORI knew how to deal with this, though. Just gotta relax… Take deep breaths… and CALM DOWN…

…

But my lungs fought to breathe.

He felt his breath hitch as his hands gripped onto the safety rails of his seat. Even though he was trying to calm down, he couldn't control his breathing for some reason.

It only got worse the higher up they went. Watching the height grow between him and the ground made this feeling amplify to another level.

What was happening right now? Why couldn't he- why couldn't he breathe?

A cold sweat ran down his brow, as he struggled to sit still.

When did they get so high up? He didn't remember the coaster being this high before.

What was going on?! What was happening to him?!

He thought- He thought- He thought-

There was little room for thought left in his head. His eyes widened in absolute terror as the roller coaster reached the peak of the first hill.

The decorative sign, "PREPARE TO BE EXTINCT," did not help.

For a moment, it was like time was frozen. He could see himself back on that statue by their favorite lake. KEL and HERO were egging him on to jump, but he was having second thoughts. A spider jumped onto his shoulder, startling him towards the edge.

The fall. That was what terrified him. It was the fall all over again. The fall into the cold deep waters of the lake.

It was the first time in his life where he truly thought he was going to die.

Why? Why was he reminded of this feeling now? He's not afraid of heights anymore. He's over that fear.

So why was he scared now? Why was he reminded of that terror?

This wasn't a natural feeling of fear anymore. It was like… this memory, this feeling was being forced onto him.

AFRAID.

HIKIKO turned over to flash him a smile, only to give a concerned, "SUNNY?"

But when the drop came, he could only give a silent scream.

---

HIKIKO was gently patting OMORI's back as he threw up in a trash can nearby.

The ride of the roller coaster lasted way longer than he could handle. HIKIKO gave him a look of pity as she comforted him.

"There there, Sunny…" She whispered gently, "Just let it all out, okay? Your big sister will be right here waiting for you."

OMORI gripped the trash can tighter as he continued to puke more of his stomach out.

Oh god… He could see the half-eaten cherry he swallowed earlier from the pie HIKIKO made for him.

Ugh…

UUUUUUUUUGGGGH!

What was wrong with him?! Why did this even happen?! He thought he got over his fear of heights already!

How?! Why?! Why did he freak out this time?! Why couldn't he calm down?!

Why couldn't he do anything right?! Why was he so unreliable and useless all the time?! Even now, he couldn't keep up his strength just to go on a roller coaster ride!

Noticing the way his body quivered, HIKIKO gently hugged her brother, "It's okay, SUNNY. Getting over your fears can be tough. Maybe starting with something extreme like a roller coaster was a bad idea. But I admire your bravery! It was a very good attempt!"

Uuurrrgggh…

He hated this… He hates this so much…

All he wanted was to win enough tickets so that he could earn that DINO plushie on his own, and give it to MARI… It didn't matter if all of it was just a dream, it would've given him some peace of mind… To repay his sister for what she did all those years ago…

Yet it was like the universe was actively rooting against him…

Was this a part of his punishment? Was he not allowed to do anything besides focus on his mission to get MARI to forgive herself? Was that it…?

Was that the reason why he wasn't able to do anything right in this dream? He couldn't be at least good with any of the games, just so that he could have the fulfilling moment of earning that DINO plushie by himself?

God, it was almost as if every single game they played, it was all purposely rigged against him! This entire park was rigged against him!

But that wouldn't make any sense... If it was actually rigged against him, then HIKIKO would be losing too, shouldn't she? Yet here she was, doing all the work like she always does because he was too pathetic to keep up with her…

If anything, with how perfect she was at everything, it was almost like every game was rigged in her favor-

…

…

…

Rigged… in… her… favor…?

Something clicked inside his head.

OMORI slowly recovered himself, regaining his composure as he wiped his mouth clean. Then he stared at HIKIKO as she smiled gently down at him.

"Do you feel better?" She asked.

OMORI blankly stared at her, wondering how to respond.

...

…

…

"Thanks, HIKIKO. You're the best." OMORI ended up telling her.

HIKIKO lit up again with a warm smile, cheerfully giggling, "Of course, SUNNY! You can always rely on me to help you out, no matter what!"

It was such a simple reply, yet she seemed genuinely over the moon once she heard it.

The games… All of his losses… All of HIKIKO's outrageously perfect wins… Every time she seemed to look towards him whenever she did something impressive, as if waiting for him to comment or react.

He was… He was going about this all wrong.

He… It wasn't his fault. He wasn't the reason why he was a failure at all. It wasn't because he was physically incapable, it was because HIKIKO wanted him to be like that.

It… it was all HIKIKO, wasn't it?

He should've seen this coming… The signs seem so much more obvious now. He had thought it was strange how she was seemingly so perfect at everything at first, but…

This was all just to… show off to her little brother. To make SUNNY think she was cool, wasn't it?

You can always rely on me to help you out, no matter what!

Rely on her. That's what she wanted. To feel that SUNNY relied on her.

Her dream was making him completely inept at everything so that he would find her more cool and reliable when she performs all these crazy stunts to impress him.

God, why was he so stupid not to see this before?! It seemed so obvious now…

Here he was, getting worked up over nothing… When it was all going exactly as she designed...

…

OMORI took a deep breath to calm himself down.

Was the fear he felt on the roller coaster also her doing as well? If so, was it intentional or just a subconscious action? Did she want him to be scared to give her an excuse to be his emotional pillar, or did she still believe he was afraid of heights because that was how she saw SUNNY?

More importantly, what else about him could she possibly manipulate in her HEADSPACE…?

If she could control his emotions and actions… there's no telling what else he could easily succumb to in her dream.

He'll have to be more careful from now on…

"Everything out of your system now? Are you good to go?" HIKIKO asked with an encouraging smile.

OMORI glanced up at her, giving a silent nod.

In a way, he felt better. He was relieved to know that the past half hour of him being terrible at games wasn't directly his fault, at least…

Still, the idea that the whole park was rigged from the start frustrated him to no end… He had been trying really hard to earn that plushie. If he had known earlier, he wouldn't have…

No, it was no use getting hung up about it any longer. What's done is done. He just needed to move on quickly from this whole mess and keep his mind focused on the mission. Let this be a lesson why he should have never gotten sentimental and strayed away from his original mission in the first place.

At least this whole thing resulted in him learning something new and useful.

Petting his head, HIKIKO smiled sympathetically, "My poor little brother… How about we take a breather for a bit and go check up on KEL before playing any other games or rides? Until you feel better?"

Honestly, that wasn't the worst idea. He could really do a nice relaxing walk right now. Plus, maybe KEL got lucky enough and finally won his ball or something. Then they could finally move on to continue this island adventure.

OMORI gave her a gracious nod, ready to leave as he reached his hand out for her to hold.

Instead of doing that, HIKIKO went ahead and actually picked him to carry in her arms, leaving OMORI a little surprised.

"Here, let me carry you around. You must be tired from walking around on your feet all the time." HIKIKO offered.

He could walk just fine, actually. But considering what he's just learned a second ago…

OMORI nodded instead, "Thanks, sis."

HIKIKO giggled again as she caressed his head, "Anything for you, little brother!"

---

It was strange… KEL was nowhere to be found.

HIKIKO carried OMORI around on her back, traveling around the park as they searched for KEL together. They've been repeatedly calling out his name, hoping that they were loud enough that he'd respond.

After a while though, it was clear that KEL just didn't seem to be around.

"I wonder where he went…" HIKIKO muttered.

The park was a big place. Maybe he was just playing a game in some far-off corner of the map. Maybe they should ask someone?

Her thoughts were distracted a bit as they crossed paths with a food vendor selling some kind of meatball on a stick that had this delightful smell. A flamboyantly colorful clown was doing all sorts of tricks right next to it, with a small crowd forming around them.

"Get your COCKAIGNEBALLS here! Fresh off the fryer! COCKAIGNEBALLS!" A mustached pink squid shouted to advertise its wares.

OMORI had to do a small double-take as he listened to the vendor shouting. What did it just say? OMORI didn't mishear that, right?

"COCKAIGNEBALLS! Get them while they're piping hot!" He listened to the vendor again.

No… No, it must've been his imagination then. The vendor is obviously just saying COCKAIGNEBALLS. Meatballs named after COCKAIGNE, obviously. It just sounded like something else for a second.

"Ooh!" HIKIKO looked over, "That honestly smells delicious. Hey, SUNNY, you feeling hungry?"

Not particularly, no.

His stomach growled, just in time to voice its disagreement. Suddenly, hunger pangs erupted within him right after.

He glanced down at his stomach suspiciously.

Hm… So this was why he got hungry the first time around too. If HIKIKO thinks he's hungry, then he was going to be hungry whether he liked it or not.

That was a crazy amount of control she had over him… At this point, he was going to have to assume that anything he did or felt could be influenced by HIKIKO to some degree…

At least his thoughts were still his own. Hopefully.

Going along with her whims, OMORI nodded timidly, "Mm… Yeah."

HIKIKO smiled back at him, "The roller coaster ride must've emptied your entire stomach out. Don't worry, I'll buy you something to eat."

Approaching the vendor together, the irresistible smell of fresh meat and barbecue sauce filled the air. OMORI breathed in the smell with a bit of mouthwatering anticipation, surprisingly finding himself looking forward to the meal. The small crowd around them were all munching on the meaty snack as they enjoyed the clown doing a juggling act with the advertised meatballs in their hands.

"Two please!" HIKIKO requested as they reached the vendor.

"Aye, coming up." The pink squid replied back, stabbing two meatballs with toothpicks before handing it over with its long-reaching tentacles. "Two sweet, smelly, musky, round COCKAIGNEBALLS. The secret ingredient? Blood, sweat, tears, and the seeds of love from a historic family recipe."

Passing one over to OMORI, HIKIKO smiled, "Eat up, SUNNY!"

OMORI blinked a bit as he cautiously held the meatball in his hand. Okay so… Hearing all of that stuff sort of… made the meatball less appealing to eat, for some reason.

Still, food is food. Nom.

…

Mmm! Not bad for a silly name like COCKAIGNEBALLS. Lots of meaty flavor from just a single bite.

HIKIKO went ahead and paid for the meal, holding the meatball in her hand as she also asked, "Oh, have you seen a small energetic boy in his pajamas around here? His name is KEL and he looks a little bit like us."

The squid gave it some thought before shaking its head, "Sorry. I haven't seen anyone like that recently."

"Oh, okay. Thanks anyway." HIKIKO nodded with a frown.

It was strange… How did they manage to lose a noise-maker like KEL?

"Care to stay and enjoy the show, though? Maybe your friend KEL might come around soon if you stick still long enough." The vendor offered as it gestured to the clown.

OMORI raised an eyebrow, wondering if this wasn't just a clever tactic of keeping them around so that they'd be hungry enough to buy more COCKAIGNEBALLS.

HIKIKO shrugged though, "Hm, well okay. Maybe KEL will show up sooner or later." Turning to her brother, she asked, "What do you think, SUNNY?"

No reason not to. Walking around in circles might be counterintuitive since KEL might be going around the park in circles too. There was a chance they might miss each other in that case.

OMORI shrugged as he continued munching on his meatball.

HIKIKO bent down to allow OMORI to step off her back before eating their meals. The two of them watched the impressive display of the clown using these COCKAIGNEBALLS in its act.

Balancing on three meatballs stacked on top of each other on the tip of a single foot, the clown had a showman's smile as it juggled and balanced a large number of meatballs together. Sometimes it would use its head as part of the act, other times it would almost slip and fall only to miraculously catch itself just in time without dropping a single ball. Good round entertainment to pass the time.

OMORI would let his mind wander off though, occasionally glancing around to check for any sign of KEL in the area.

He was in the middle of taking another bite, when out of the corner of his eye…

He noticed… a familiar… face pop into view.

OMORI froze as his eyes widened in shock, the meatball in his hand already forgotten.

That…

There was no mistaking that person.

The hat. The boots. The beard.

That jolly old smile.

That was MR. OUTBACK.

The old cowboy seemed to be observing the area around him with a weary smile, before walking away out of OMORI's view.

He didn't imagine that, did he? Was that truly the old cowboy from his HEADSPACE? What was he…

…

OMORI had to go meet him. Right now, before it was too late and he lost him again.

Glancing up at HIKIKO to see that she was still distracted by the clown juggler, OMORI saw this as his chance to slip away unnoticed as he quickly chased after the mysterious cowboy.

Sorry, HIKIKO… He'll be only gone for a moment. This was way too important.

MR. OUTBACK had always been a pretty mysterious figure in his HEADSPACE. He always somehow managed to know things about OMORI and the world around him, even when OMORI didn't know anything himself at the time. He was one of the only ones in the dreamworld that ever encouraged him to seek out keys to unlock BLACK SPACE, after all.

It was an unexpected shock enough to find out that he was somehow in HIKIKO's HEADSPACE too. He didn't think HIKIKO, or at least MARI, would know who this cowboy was to imagine him in here. But if he was here, then there might be a chance he could help OMORI out. There were tons of questions in his mind that he needed answers for, and someone like MR. OUTBACK was probably the only one who could provide him those answers.

Going around the corner, he saw the jolly old cowboy with his gloved hands on his suspenders, marching on his boots as he let out a dainty whistling tune.

Chasing after the old figure, OMORI was thankful to finally catch up to him before anything had happened.

"MR. OUTBACK!"

The old cowboy straightened up a bit as he heard OMORI shout from behind, before turning around to face him with a curious look.

OMORI came to a stop right in front of him, breathing slightly as he looked up to the towering cowboy in the eyes.

"How d'ya do, buckaroo?" He greeted the same familiar greeting OMORI was so used to hearing, tipping his hat off to the small boy, "Were you calling for me? What'd you say again?"

"It really is you…" OMORI mumbled with a gulp, shaking his head a bit to clear his mind, "MR. OUTBACK… Never thought I'd see you again."

"Hm?" The cowboy tilted his head confusedly, "Pardon me, little buck, but… Do I know you?"

Does he not?

Maybe not… Different HEADSPACE meant different rules. Even the same beings that he recognized here might not be the same people that he used to know back in old HEADSPACE. In any case, OMORI should've expected not to be recognized off the bat.

"My name is OMORI. You recognize that name, right?" OMORI introduced himself again, "Or at least you know me as SUNNY?"

Huh… This was the first time in a while since he ever referred to himself with that name. He's always responded whenever someone else calls him by SUNNY, but he hasn't really ever...

MR. OUTBACK looked down on him with an apologetic smile, "Sorry kiddo. I meet lots of kids with different names. Plus, add in my old age, and you understand that my memory ain't what it used to be."

Figures that it wouldn't be that easy…

OMORI rattled his brain around for a minute before saying, "I asked you how old you were once, and you told me that you were around 33000 years old. Do you remember that?"

The old man smacked his cheek in surprise, "33000 years old?! Sheesh, kid! Has it really been that long ago?"

That long ago? What did he mean by that?

"It's hard to imagine that I was ever that young once…" The old man recalled fondly, stroking his beard in thought, "Give or take a few decades, I should be around 44000 years old now. Time sure does fly."

OMORI blankly stared at the old cowboy in confusion.

44000 years old? How can that be? It had only been a few days ago since he last saw the elderly cowboy. That was back when he was saying his final goodbyes to the inhabitants in his HEADSPACE.

The elderly cowboy peered down on OMORI with a thoughtful glance, "Say… You age remarkably well for someone I apparently met eleven-thousand years ago. What's your secret, kid? No wait, lemme guess… Skincare products, right? I should've known they were real…"

"What? No-" OMORI shook his head from this train of thought, "Listen, the last time we saw each other was only a few days ago. You used to be-..."

...in my HEADSPACE before it all collapsed after I accepted the truth. OMORI wanted to say.

But should he? Would it even make any sense for him to say all of these things to him here?

MR. OUTBACK could only tilt his head again, "Is that so…?"

OMORI watched the old man hum to himself in thought.

It took a while before the old man shook his head, "I can't say I do remember you. I'm sorry to say that, kid. I truly am. But I reckon you might be mistaking me for someone else entirely."

...

"You… You're not MR. OUTBACK, then." OMORI slowly realized.

"An old varmint like me has gotten loads of names over the years. Many of them, I've forgotten through the sands of time during my travels. If I ever was a MR. OUTBACK, I wouldn't remember or know for sure anymore." Gesturing to a gold star pinned on his shirt, he reintroduced himself, "The name's SHERIFF BOYARDEE, buckaroo. I'm just an old man who keeps guard of EL DORA-DINO from troublemakers. Have been over the last five hundred years now."

"I… I see." OMORI mumbled disappointedly.

He should've realized. Seeing the old cowboy again made him excited enough to forget that, most likely, he was just another character in this imaginary world HIKIKO crafted. In all likelihood, MARI probably saw this cowboy somewhere in the real world just like OMORI did, and added the old man into her HEADSPACE as an inhabitant.

Thinking it over again, that theory seemed much more likely than MR. OUTBACK being this strange supernatural entity that could hop between people's HEADSPACES. He was wrong to have gotten his hopes up.

"Hm…" MR. OUTBACK- or SHERIFF BOYARDEE now, he hummed a bit as he studied OMORI. "I can see you must've been expecting something outta me when you called me out. Call me an old fool, but I always hated disappointing kids when they're relying on me." Kneeling to reach closer to OMORI's height, he tells him, "Tell ya what. Even though I ain't this MR. OUTBACK feller you thought I was, I can still try to help ya out with whatever problem it is you're having. Go ahead and tell the SHERIFF what's troublin' you, SUNNY."

OMORI wasn't sure if he was calling him SUNNY or just using the adjective sonny to refer to him affectionately.

Either way, it wouldn't hurt to ask questions to see how much this SHERIFF knew.

Even if he might not be the same MR. OUTBACK that he knew, he still had to know something, right?

Might not be safe to just outright ask where her BLACK SPACE was though. Maybe if he worded it carefully...

"I don't know how much you know, but..." OMORI breathed in deeply as he prepared to ask, "There's a place that I'm looking for, to help my sister. It might be closed off, in a sense." OMORI thought about it some more, before explaining, "Maybe you've seen some kind of suspicious black door? Or maybe some kind of shadow you can step into? Maybe an abandoned location somewhere here, like a haunted building that no one visits anymore? Something called BLACK SPACE?"

…

…

…

There was a long and awkward silence.

SHERIFF BOYARDEE sucked in his breath, heavily in thought as he stroked his beard, "BLACK SPACE…? Haunted buildings… Suspicious black doors… Doozy of a question you shot at me, kiddo. I wouldn't even know where to start…"

That statement alone was enough to answer any and all of OMORI's questions.

The old man truly didn't know what OMORI was talking about.

"BLACK SPACE, huh… That… That's uh…" He mumbled, "That's certainly not an amusement park ride that I've heard of… Have you tried asking the amusement park owner, DINO?"

…

Just like that, all of his hope had deflated. OMORI gave a sigh as he resumed a stoic expression to hide his disappointment.

"No… Nevermind. I'm sorry I bothered you. I don't think you can help me with this." OMORI told him.

BOYARDEE replied solemnly, "I'm real sorry about this, SUNNY. Wish I could help, I really do."

"It's fine." He shook his head as he turned around to return back to his sister.

Typical. Just typical. Of course the one lifeline he thought he had turned out to be unreliable.

He really was all alone in solving this after all…

Now what was he supposed to do?

Just before he could leave, however…

"Wait!"

OMORI stopped in his tracks.

Turning around, he saw BOYARDEE reaching an arm out to call out to him.

"From the sounds of things…" He said steadily, "It seems like you know an awful lot about this BLACK SPACE business. Have you ever been there or seen it before?"

"Y… Yeah, I have." OMORI mumbled back.

For him, more times than he could count. For HIKIKO? He was only able to see hers just once.

"In that case, you might know more than you think you do." SHERIFF BOYARDEE tapped his noggin encouragingly, "Recount the steps you took that led you to find it in the first place. Use your knowledge, and think more abstract-like."

Abstract? Like outside the box?

Not sure how much that would help… HIKIKO's HEADSPACE seemed to operate with different enough rules that his experience from his own probably won't be all that useful. Even if he did recount the steps he took, how likely would it be to help him at all?

Seeing the doubtful look on his face, SHERIFF BOYARDEE sighed, "I know it's not the best advice. Maybe it might be worthless phooey coming out of this old man's mouth. But at least think about it."

SHERIFF BOYARDEE quickly remembered something as he patted down his clothes before pulling something out from his pockets.

"Sometimes the best epiphanies come out of nowhere, when you least expect it. Take these tickets to watch the circus show later. Who knows? It might help stir something in your noggin."

He handed OMORI three colorful tickets to a fancy circus in the park. OMORI gave the tickets a curious glance.

Would these actually help him at all? It feels more like another distraction to waste time on…

Well… It was better than walking away with nothing at least. Couldn't hurt to try.

"That's all she wrote. Sorry I couldn't be more useful." SHERIFF BOYARDEE told him sincerely.

"No, it's good enough. Thank you." OMORI nodded back to the old cowboy.

The old man tipped his hat with a wink before standing up to continue his patrolling.

OMORI gave another glance at the tickets in his hand before pocketing it away.

Three tickets… Huh… How did SHERIFF BOYARDEE know to give him exactly three, actually? He never mentioned KEL, did he?

…

…

…

Freaky.

"SUNNY! SUNNY, where are you?!"

OMORI turned to see HIKIKO frantically running around the corner in search of him, visibly distressed and worried.

When they locked eyes, HIKIKO bolted straight towards him as she locked him in a secure hug.

"I found you!" HIKIKO shouted with relief, "I found you! Oh thank goodness, I found you!"

She clenched her eyes shut as she kept OMORI in her grasps, almost like she was shielding him from the world.

"I found you… I found you… I found you…" HIKIKO kept repeating softly, rocking back and forth with him in her arms.

OMORI felt a tinge of guilt, seeing her cradle him so protectively even though he was gone for only just a moment.

Perhaps it was a bad idea to have snuck away when she wasn't looking.

OMORI hugged her back in an attempt to calm her down. It seemed to work considerably, hearing her take a few deep breaths to steady herself.

When she finally released him, she had a stern glare on her face directed at him, "Where did you go?! I was worried sick! Why do you have this habit of running off without me?! You know how much I hate it when we're separated, SUNNY!"

OMORI wasn't surprised to see how upset she was, seeing how she was almost on the verge of tears.

"Sorry, HIKIKO… I didn't mean to scare you…" OMORI told her sadly.

"I just…" HIKIKO sniffed a bit as she wiped her eyes, "I can't afford to lose you again, okay?! So don't go anywhere without telling me!"

She huffed a bit before embracing OMORI in a tender hug this time.

"I hate it when we're not together. I just hate it so much... No more disappearing on me! Please promise that! I swear I'll keep you safe, so just promise never to leave me again… Please… Please don't ever leave me again..." She pleaded desperately.

…

OMORI forlornly closed his eyes, resting his head against her shoulder, "I'm sorry…"

If only she knew it was to save her…

It took a while before she got a hold of herself, finally calming down as she whispered, "It's okay… Everything is okay now. You're back. You're back and everything is okay now."

She gave one last deep breath before smiling back at him.

OMORI stared back with a heavy heart.

To think that she could become so emotionally weak so easily just for sneaking off… He was such a burden on her existence.

The moment passed by quickly as HIKIKO trailed down to see the colorful tickets in his hand.

"What's that you got there?" She asked curiously.

OMORI glanced at them before giving them to her, "Circus tickets."

"Oh, wow!" HIKIKO remarked as she flipped the tickets over to read them, "Tickets for the circus tent inside the park? How did you manage to get this?"

OMORI shrugged, "Cowboy gave them to me."

HIKIKO smiled at that before handing them back, "That was nice of him to do! Wow, I can't believe we keep getting free stuff all the time. First the game tokens, then this? Talk about lucky!"

Standing up to her feet, HIKIKO pulled out two large bags from her pockets and held them up for OMORI to see.

"Speaking of luck, guess what happened to me before I realized you were gone!" HIKIKO grinned excitedly, "There was this weird toy block person, right? He came up to me and told me that he needed all the game tickets we earned today! When he saw how much I had on me, he pulled out two huge bags of money and offered to buy them on the spot!"

Dropping the bags on the floor, she opened one up to reveal an overflowing amount of golden seeds.

"Check it out! We're rich!" HIKIKO squee'd, dipping her hands into the golden pile and letting it flow through her fingers, "We can buy anything we want now! Isn't that great?"

OMORI could only stare back at the hoard of golden seeds with a blank look.

HIKIKO sold all of her tickets for money instead of wanting to claim them at the prize counter?

...

The best word he could really describe his feelings with right now was… Numb.

There was this cold numb feeling that washed over him, practically sapping away any sense of enthusiasm that he could've had for this news.

This was how it was supposed to end up, wasn't it? The tickets were never meant to be traded in for prizes. He was never meant to win any games. The DINO plushie was just some sort of decoration within the background, an unattainable prize that had no bearing to the story HIKIKO thought up in her head.

It was all just… a waste of time.

A distraction.

OMORI… He was so stupid to think otherwise. So incredibly stupid.

"We should find KEL." OMORI suggested, wanting to move everything along so that they could finally leave this place, "Tell him the news."

He was so sick and tired of this whole park.

"Yeah, good idea!" HIKIKO nodded, bringing the large bags of money behind her as she pocketed them, "I think we should go by the prize counter and wait for him there. Even if he didn't earn enough tickets for the ball he wanted, I'm thinking this news might cheer him up a bit!"

Sure. Whatever.

---

KEL was sure taking his time…

The wait for him was starting to become agonizingly long.

When they arrived by the prize counter to see it unoccupied, and the prize cabinet having its curtains closed, they decided to wait nearby on a bench until KEL finally arrived.

It's been a couple minutes past the hour they agreed now.

HIKIKO had spent the entire time fidgeting around with OMORI's hair as he sat on her lap, waiting.

His sister didn't seem all that worried about KEL's prolonged absence, content with spending the time toying with his hair as she calmly hummed to herself.

On any other day, perhaps this would be relaxing for him. But he was too numb inside to really appreciate the moment for what it was. Wasn't like he deserved it anyway. It was more for HIKIKO's sake rather than his.

No, it was more like he was anxious to finally move on from here.

This place was tiring him out.

After another round of waiting for KEL, he was still a no-show. What gives? It wasn't like KEL was known for being punctual, but he never kept friends waiting around for him…

"Worried about KEL?"

OMORI turned to blink at his sister, seeing her give him a small smile.

"I could tell. You haven't stopped twisting your head around for the past several minutes."

"Sorry…" He mumbled.

His emotions were starting to get the better of him again. He was usually better at hiding away his discomfort.

Then again… MARI always had a keen eye when it came to him.

"It's okay." HIKIKO gently comforted him, "I'm starting to get worried about him too. Maybe we should ask someone for help?"

Just as she mentioned that, a familiar triceratops finally came into the picture. With a cute smile, he had a carefree skip in his step as he trotted towards his station, followed by a sleepy ankylosaurus moving slowly after.

Setting themselves up, BRETT took a seat and immediately began napping, while CHAD was clearing dust off his side of the counter.

"We should ask the ticket guy! He might've seen KEL if he's been storing his tickets frequently." HIKIKO suggested.

OMORI nodded, ready to hop off her lap so that they could head out to ask.

A sudden rumbling on the ground caused both of them to pause though, confusion settling in before they could move.

Sitting on the bench as the world beneath them vibrated, the source of the disturbance soon revealed itself in the form of some kind of mechanical carriage arriving into the plaza. Steam was continuously rising up from the engine, and loud sputtering noises filled the area like loud gunshots.

But while the car itself was an unexpected sight, what really widened OMORI's eyes in shock was the person riding on top of it.

Standing on her feet with a prideful smirk was a girl he didn't think he'd ever have to see again. The fancy frilly dress, the twin ponytails bobbing next to her shoulders, the extravagantly large bow…

"SWEETHEART…?" OMORI mumbled to himself.

…

No. On a second, more thorough glance, this girl wasn't SWEETHEART. The outfit and style matched, but the face belonged to someone else entirely. They looked similar enough that a young kid could probably mistake the two together though.

No… This was…

CANDICE? From the candy shop? In OTHERMART?

What…?

What was she doing here? And why did she look so young? The CANDICE that he remembered from the last time he saw her, she was practically in her thirties. This one looked like she could still be in her late teens, maybe even younger! Almost as old as HIKIKO, even...

He turned to HIKIKO to see her reaction, wondering if she recognized the candy shop owner. His sister ended up looking just as surprised and confused as he was, however.

The motor car eventually stopped, the last hiss from the engine steam blowing as CANDICE hopped off her vehicle with grace and style.

Approaching the counter with the same triumphant smirk, she announced, "I have returned with the exact amount of tickets to afford the orb, finally."

CHAD gave a big smile, "Oh wow! That was quick! Congratulations for earning enough for the big prize!"

She dismissively waved it away, "Yes yes- I don't need your affirmations. Quickly take these tickets off my hands so that we can continue doing business, please."

Raising her hands up, two loud claps reverberated across the plaza.

On cue, a sudden influx of strange wooden block creatures assembled together as they began crowding the plaza en mass.

OMORI and HIKIKO clung together in surprise, watching the BLOCKS crowding past them as if coming from the seams.

In a calculated and orderly manner, they formed a big giant line in front of the prize counter, one by one dumping huge piles of tickets for CHAD to collect.

"Oh boy…" CHAD muttered, feeling overwhelmed as he began his banking duties, depositing all the tickets as fast as he could before he would be overwhelmed with more.

"Hey… One of those same BLOCK guys came up to me earlier. They're the ones offered to buy all my tickets." HIKIKO mentioned.

OMORI wondered what sort of developments were happening to the story as he watched this all unfold. This didn't seem like it was going to be unrelated to them, somehow…

The BLOCK creatures that were crowding around CHAD reminded him of the same building block sets he would usually play with. He remembered HERO and MARI gifting him a big block set on his twelfth birthday. He remembered being more excited about the size of the present box itself than the actual building block set that was inside it.

When all the BLOCK creatures emptied their bags, CHAD kept continuously depositing the tickets with his mouth into his ticket machine. Eventually, the triceratops popped out the counter while giving a very tired smile, "You did it! Looks like you collected all ten thousand tickets like you said!"

"Not a ticket short or too much, naturally." CANDICE boredly glanced at her fingernails, before reaching her hand out expectantly, "Now... The MAGIKE Orb, if you'd please?"

"One Infinity Bouncy Ball, coming straight up!" CHAD nodded enthusiastically, much to her sudden annoyance.

OMORI saw her turn her head away to spit something harsh under her breath as the triceratops prepared to pull the curtains away. With his mouth biting on the cord, the curtains steadily opened up to reveal all the prizes sitting on their shelves.

Except one...

To everyone's shock and surprise, the expensive red ball that was originally sitting proudly at the top of the wall was no longer there anymore. All that was left was an empty shelf that had spotlights and the occasional fireworks popping to decorate it.

"Well, that's weird." CHAD innocently hummed, "I don't remember giving the prize away to anyone before I left for lunch. Oh well." He gave a quick shrug before resuming a smile to CANDICE, "Seems like the prize is unavailable. Do you want to trade your tickets in for something else?"

CANDICE turned back to the triceratops, indignant rage quickly overcoming her, "Unavailable? Unavailable?! What do you mean it's unavailable?! What happened to the MAGIKE orb?!"

"Well, usually, it just means that we either tossed it out because no one wanted it, or the prize was already taken by someone-" That was all CHAD managed to get out before he was roughly grabbed by the angry woman over the counter.

"You had better not thrown that priceless artifact away, or given it to a child to play with, you filthy neanderthal!" CANDICE seethed, putting her face right up into his, "I DEMAND TO KNOW WHAT YOU DID WITH IT OR ELSE I'LL RAZE THIS ENTIRE VILLAGE TO THE GROUND TO FIND IT MYSELF!"

A look of genuine terror flashed in CHAD's innocent face, causing him to become a stuttering mess, "Bu-bu-bu-bu-bu-bu-bu-but I was ju-ju-ju-ju-ju-ju-ju-"

"Now now, no need for shoutin' there little missy."

A familiar voice cut in between them, making CANDICE shout, "Who dares to be uncandid enough to call me something so disrespectful as-"

MR. OUTBACK, or actually, SHERIFF BOYARDEE arrived on the scene just in time before anything could happen.

But OMORI's eyes widened as the old cowboy was holding a cage that was carrying someone familiar inside.

HIKIKO bugged out with a shocked, "Is that KEL?!"

Holding tightly on the bars that were imprisoning him, KEL noticed HIKIKO and OMORI from afar as he gave a very guilty expression, like a kid who just got caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

This metaphorical cookie jar seemed to be much more serious than it implied, however, as KEL quickly called out with a desperate, "Hey guys? Um… Please help… I think I messed up bad."

Looks like they were gonna have to get involved after all.

HIKIKO and OMORI left their seats and hurried over to KEL, pushing past all the BLOCK creatures as they made their way to the prize counter.

Coming up to the old cowboy, HIKIKO shouted, "Hey! That's our friend! Why is he being locked up like this?!"

SHERIFF BOYARDEE turned to face her, only for his eyes to linger on OMORI in surprise, "This kid here is one of your friends? Hoo boy, you ain't gonna like what I have to say then…"

CANDICE released the triceratops she was threatening from her grasp, now paying her full attention to the sheriff.

Holding the guilty KEL up for everyone to see, SHERIFF BOYARDEE announced, "So, I found this little varmint sneaking around the prize counter after CHAD and BRETT left to go take their lunch breaks. I saw him climbing up the curtains and stealing this little red ball from the shelves before he tried to hide. I was following after him in a dark corner of the park, ever so sneakily to catch him unawares, before I caught the little varmint when he least expected it. If you're lookin' as to why the ball is missing, this little guy is the culprit!"

Sigh… Of course he was. Just when OMORI was ready to leave this place behind, of course KEL had to do something and screw up somewhere.

This news seemed to have brought a pleasant smile on CANDICE's face, approaching KEL with a haughty, "Well well well. So it was the work of a thief after all, then? Good show, guardsman, for being diligent enough to catch him before he could escape."

HIKIKO gave a disappointed frown as she asked, "KEL, is this true? Did you really try to steal a toy?"

"Wait, HIKIKO, I can explain!" KEL responded with a bit of panic, "I swear I'm not a thief! I didn't steal anything! It's all just a misunderstanding!"

"Desperate excuses from a common criminal who's about to get his just desserts, no doubt." CANDICE harrumphed, "We have no need to listen to it. Let the authorities decide what to do with him."

With a proud smile, she gracefully extended her hand towards the sheriff.

"I expect that you were able to recover the MAGIKE orb too once you had caught the thief? I believe I am the rightful owner now since I have paid the full ticket cost."

The old man solemnly shook his head, "No can do, little missy. I would give it if I could, but the fact of the matter is, I couldn't find it anywhere on him when I tried to search for it."

"WHAT?!" CANDICE snapped in anger before turning towards KEL, "What does he mean by that?! What did you do to the orb, you rotten thief?!"

"I told you, I'm not a thief! I promise I'm not!" KEL defended himself, "Listen! I'm sorry I took it without permission! It was just… I couldn't get enough tickets to afford the ball, and I already agreed with my friends that we would leave within the next hour. I knew that once we left, we probably won't be able to come here again. I just couldn't leave without at least playing with the ball for a tiny little bit to see how cool it could've been, you know?"

"Oh, KEL…" HIKIKO sighed disappointedly.

"So, yeah, I took it when no one was looking." KEL admitted, "But it wasn't so that I could steal it! I was planning to give it back after I finished playing with it! Honest!"

"In that case, where did you put the ball, kiddo?" SHERIFF BOYARDEE asked gently, "As long as you can return it intact, then we can put this behind us."

"Yes, yes! Where is the MAGIKE orb? Or the ball as you neanderthals keep insisting on calling it." CANDICE tried to hurry it along.

"Well… Um... Okay so…" For some reason, KEL was beginning to sweat as he chuckled nervously, "It's kinda funny… Um…" KEL scratched his head as he prepared to explain, "So basically… You know how CHAD, the dinosaur behind the counter, he told us that even dropping the ball from the smallest height could give it enough bounce to last for several hundred hours?"

"Oh dear, did I forget to mention that?" CHAD tilted his head in thought.

"So… Yeah… I thought, how cool would it be if I slammed it on the ground as hard as I could? Just to see how long it could bounce by itself, you know?" KEL chuckled nervously, "So I did that."

Oh god… OMORI could only cover his face with a palm as he listened to all of this.

"And it… Uh… It bounced once." KEL mentioned, "To the sky. And it never came back down. No matter how long I waited for it."

…

…

…

KEL was on the receiving end of many stares, slowly shrinking back before looking down on his feet to escape their glares.

"That's stupid." CANDICE stated, slowly growing in anger, "You're stupid! That's incredibly stupid! HOW CAN SOMEONE BE THIS STUPID?!"

With a heaping foot of fury, she slammed her heels down on the ground and huffed with rage.

"I don't believe a single word of it! The MAGIKE orb is a priceless artifact with untold amounts of limitless kinetic energy and power! It could literally run an entire kingdom for centuries on its own, and you're just telling me that you lost it because you wanted to see it bounce?! NOBODY IS THAT STUPID! YOU ARE A LIAR!"

"But I'm not lying! That's really what happened! Honest!" KEL argued back, before turning to HIKIKO, "HIKIKO! SUNNY! Tell her how stupid I usually am!"

"He is pretty stupid sometimes," OMORI admitted, having absolutely no doubts that KEL would do something like this.

"SUNNY, shush." HIKIKO chided lightly before turning to SHERIFF BOYARDEE, "So what happens to KEL now? How much trouble is he in?"

The old man sighed tiredly, "Considering the circumstances… Seeing as to how your friend is unable to return the prize, we have no choice but to enact one of our park's strict policies against thieves."

Handing KEL over to CHAD, the triceratops used his mouth to hold the handle as he went to attach KEL's cage on a piece of rope.

"Whoa, wait, what's happening?" KEL said in minor panic as CHAD proceeded to pull the rope up, bringing KEL higher on top of the prize cabinets.

With confident control over the rope, CHAD placed KEL so that his cage would sit on top of the shelf that originally housed the big red ball from before. Sitting in the spotlight with fireworks going off in his face, KEL could only make confused noises to show how uncomfortable he was with this new situation.

"Holding your friend as collateral, someone responsible for him must pay the park back the same amount of tickets the missing prize was worth. In this case, ten thousand tickets." The sheriff covered his eyes mournfully with his hat, "He'll be imprisoned by the park 'til the amount is paid… or 'til further notice."

"What?!" HIKIKO asked in shock, "Isn't that a bit excessive?! He's just a kid! I mean, what would happen to him if no one is able to pay back the tickets?"

"In that scenario, the park will have to force your friend to pay off the debt himself. He'll have to work under DINO as an employee for as long as it takes before he can buy his freedom back."

"But that's not fair!" HIKIKO argued back, "That's not fair at all!"

CANDICE slammed the counter loudly, bringing everyone's attention towards her.

"I'd say that's plenty fair! It gives me the chance to use the tickets I gathered to buy him for myself!" CANDICE announced roughly, "Horned neanderthal! I demand to trade my tickets for ownership of that thief! If he won't admit the truth of where he hid the MAGIKE orb, I'll string the truth out of him myself! Thoroughly and painfully!"

She cracked her hand into a fist as she said this, to really settle in how lunatically angry she must be.

"Hey, guys? I can hear everything you're saying down there. Please don't give me to the scary shouting lady!" KEL pleaded down from his high position.

HIKIKO was quick to cut in between CHAD and CANDICE, "Hey, wait! You can't just buy our friend and make him your prisoner! Why can't you believe that he's telling the truth and that he lost it?! Torturing him isn't going to help you get your stupid ball back!"

"The nerve of you, defending this thief!" CANDICE shouted indignantly, "I wasted precious time and money to come this close to acquiring the MAGIKE orb, and I will not let him wipe all that progress away for nothing! I will do whatever I please, and you are in no position to stop me!"

Unnerved by how heartless this stranger was, HIKIKO turned to the sheriff and pleaded, "Aren't you going to stop her? Didn't you say that only the person responsible for KEL would be able to pay for the debt?" Pulling out her two large bags of money, she offered, "Can't I buy him back from you first with money instead?"

The sheriff looked away with a regretful expression, "Sorry, miss. It's one of the park's policies that we can't straight up sell prizes for money. It's to provide everyone an equal competitive chance."

"But KEL's not a prize though! He's our friend!" HIKIKO tried to argue back.

"Be that as it may… He is now considered collateral 'til the prize he stole is paid back in full, as I've said." He recited emotionlessly, "As long as anyone is willing to take responsibility for him, we cannot stop anyone from taking him if they pay off the debt themselves."

"That's crazy…" HIKIKO muttered softly as she backed away.

OMORI watched the entire scene with a bit of fascination. This whole thing was starting to get really convoluted for such a small situation. What exactly was HIKIKO thinking up here? Were they actually about to lose KEL here?

CANDICE smugly remarked, "I'm glad to see people seeing it my way." Turning back to the counter she demanded, "Now, the thief, if you please!"

CHAD gave an apologetic shrug towards HIKIKO and OMORI, before preparing to ring the prize on his ticket machine.

That was, until…

"NOT SO FAST!"

The loud shout came out of nowhere, startling everyone as they looked around in bewilderment.

The sudden sound of an electric guitar being shredded echoed throughout the area once again, coinciding with the appearance of the same T-rex riding into the scene on a skateboard.

DINO came right at the group, hopping onto the side of the counter for an elongated grind, leaping off and jumping through a window, only to appear from a different window a few seconds later. Grinding to a halt in front of all of them, DINO hopped off his skateboard and kicked it up to his small hands with a flourish.

"Those tickets are NO GOOD." He announced all of a sudden, directed towards a shocked CANDICE.

It took her a second to snap out of it, pointing her glare at DINO with a frustrated, "What do you mean my tickets are no good?! Who even are you?!"

"The name's DINO. Founder of EL DORA-DINO." He cooly regarded her, "And your tickets are no good, because they were bought from other park-goers."

He did a quick glamorous spin around CANDICE before coming to a stop to set his arm against SHERIFF BOYARDEE.

"You see, I've been noticing that you and your entourage have been acting really suspiciously for a while now. It came to my attention ever since one of your BLOCK friends here directly asked me, the founder, if I had any tickets. It offered to buy however many I had for money, and presented me a bag of it on the spot." He pulled out the bag of money in question, letting it jingle for everyone to hear, "Of course, I ended up taking it. But that led me to wonder just how many other BLOCKs were doing the same thing, accosting park-goers and buying tickets. When I followed them around, they eventually led me back to follow the source. YOU!"

He pointed an accusatory claw at the woman, even as his short hands made it look slightly unimpressive.

"As the park founder, I must remind all park-goers of a very strict and important policy that remains upheld to this day! You cannot exchange money for tickets, or else it defeats the competitive nature of earning prizes! It's totally UN-DINO-TASTIC!"

Stomping over to CHAD, he used his mouth to grab the ticket machine from the counter and smashed it on the ground to bits.

CHAD wordlessly pulled a different machine out and set it on the counter, looking unperturbed despite the violent action.

"All your tickets are illegitimate and rendered VOID!" DINO announced proudly.

CANDICE gave the dinosaur a baffled, "But… But money is the golden standard!"

"It may be! BUT IT'S NOT THE GOLDEN RULE." DINO pulled out a pair of sunglasses, donning it on top of his already existing pair of sunglasses so that he now was wearing two sunglasses. For emphasis.

Wasn't the golden rule originally about No Refunds or something?

OMORI wondered what that was all about.

HIKIKO sighed in relief, "Oh thank goodness, someone was able to stop her."

CANDICE, however, could only fume after realizing she was being denied of kidnapping KEL for herself to take as prisoner. It almost seemed like she was about to blow a gasket, before she suddenly realized something and looked away in thought.

After a bit of thinking, she asked, "So how do I get tickets legitimately then?"

"The same way everyone else does. Buying tokens to spend at games, and having fun chasing for gold!" DINO flashed a toothy grin.

CANDICE pursed her lips at this with a thoughtful nod, before then asking, "So what if I got all my minions to play the games for me and collected tickets in my name. Would that still be legitimate?"

"Are you buying tokens directly from the park?" DINO tilted his head.

"Yes?"

"DIIINOOOOO-TASTIC!" DINO hollered, money signs appearing collectively on his giant double shades, "In that case, do whatever you want!"

"Very well. I will then." CANDICE harrumphed before clapping her hands again, "MINIONS! Buy as many tokens as you can from the park and play games until you earn ten thousand tickets for me!"

Mechanical voices surrounded them from everywhere, the BLOCK minions straightening themselves as they resounded collectively, "YES, MY LADY!"

One by one, OMORI watched the BLOCKs gathering up near BRETT on the other side of the counter, dumping golden seeds and requesting tokens.

CANDICE was already walking away to hop back on top of her motor car again, "I shall return with tickets legitimately next time! Mark my words, thief!" She pointed threateningly at KEL, "Once I get my hands on you, I will make you learn to regret the day you ever got in my way! The name SOURHEART will be forever etched into your brain to remind you of terror!"

Huh... okay. So it wasn't just OMORI who made that connection between CANDICE and SWEETHEART looking alike as a kid. Even MARI thought so too. Why the name SOURHEART though? Was that a character in the same TV show as SWEETHEART?

After that display, she kicked the motor car into gear, activating the engine as steam started exhausting itself to the sky and loud sputtering noises filled the area.

"SMILEY SMILEY!" SOURHEART gave a cheerful wink and made a heart-shaped sign with her hands as the car started backing away.

Soon after, her BLOCK minions collected as many tokens as they could gather before spreading out within the park, intent on playing games to earn their master as many tickets as possible.

All that was left was OMORI, HIKIKO, KEL, and the rest of the inhabitants of this place.

"Uh, HIKIKO?" KEL asked from the top of his shelf, "You're not just going to leave me here to be bought by that crazy girl, right?"

HIKIKO looked at her bags of money with regret, "I already sold all of the tickets I earned to one of her BLOCK things. If I knew that I would be needing it to save you, I never would've…"

To OMORI's surprise, there seemed to be genuine disappointment coming from HIKIKO here. It was as if she was seriously kicking herself over at the fact that she made such a grievous mistake, even though there was no way for her to know that this would happen.

He thought that HEADSPACE was supposed to be a place where it would distract someone from feeling guilty about things like this… Why would she purposely play out a story where she could even make mistakes to feel bad about in the first place?

It didn't make any sense… It was nothing like how his HEADSPACE functioned… Not at all…

Unless…?

"I gave you a competitive chance though, didn't I?"

DINO's words cut through the air and took them both away from their thoughts.

With a smile, he told them, "You're both starting off at zero tickets now. You both have an equal chance of earning enough tickets to win back your friend here."

"What?" HIKIKO mumbled confusedly, "But… But there are so many of them. With all those things working for her, won't she make up those ten thousand tickets in no time?"

"Those things? Pffft, I dunno about that." He shrugged, "They don't seem very smart. I doubt they would be able to get that many tickets so quickly, even if they all worked together. Don't know if you know this, but most of the games here are kinda hard to win at."

Oh, no kidding. OMORI was still feeling sore about that himself. In fact, he was giving DINO the stink eye the moment he mentioned it.

"You though? I've seen you playing the games. You're a natural at them! If you get started right now, I'm sure you'll be able to catch up in no time." He flashed an encouraging smile.

HIKIKO thoughtfully looked back at the bags of money in her hands again.

At first, there was doubt. But OMORI saw her doubtful face slowly morph into an expression of determination.

With a nod, she came up to BRETT and slammed both bags on the counter.

"Deal me in." She demanded, "I got a mistake I need to fix."

A mistake that she needed to fix... OMORI wondered...

BRETT slowly blinked his eyes open, collecting the bags of money and replacing them with equally sized bags full of tokens. Then back to sleep again, as if he hadn't even been bothered.

OMORI watched his sister pocket the bags away as she gave him a glance.

With a smile, she announced, "What do you think, SUNNY? Wanna help big sis save KEL from trouble?"

With how interesting things have gotten now? As if OMORI was going to say no to this.

He nodded, "Yeah. Okay."

"Alright then." She nodded as well, grabbing his hand and calling up to KEL, "WE'LL BE BACK, KEL! We're going to save you!"

"Please be careful!" KEL shouted back, flashing them a worried look.

"Onwards to adventure, SUNNY!" HIKIKO cheered on proudly.

Hand in hand once again, OMORI followed after his sister as she marched on to continue this sidequest of theirs.

Onwards, then.

…

…

…

Once they were alone, SHERIFF BOYARDEE gave an accusing look towards DINO, "You just tricked the lot of them into spending more money on the park, didn't you?"

"Yes. Yes, I did." DINO nodded unashamedly.

"You are one darned gold digger." The sheriff sighed defeatedly.

"Darn tootin'!" The dinosaur said back in the sheriff's accent.