Chapter 7: Chapter 2 - Fall to Despair
"Man that was intense."
I sighed to myself as I looked at the ending credits scrolling across the screen of my PlayStation Vita. I had just finished the final chapter of one of my favorite games that I had been putting off for a few weeks despite my desires to play it. I had been busy with both work and collage, plus I had wanted a chance to play through the entirety of it at least a few times before the inevitable requirement of work reeled its ugly head again.
The game in question was called, "Dangan Ronpa 1.2 Reload." A game that merged the two games "Dangan Ronpa: Academy of hope and High School Students of Despair" and its sequel, "Dangan Ronpa 2: Farewell Despair Academy", into one with higher quality graphics and a few other features added as well. I had been wanting to play through them myself after seeing a play-through online for the two games and their pre-sequel, "Dangan Ronpa another Episode", quite a while back.
Despite this spoiler filled way of doing things, I had been wanting to experience the games for myself to see if I could figure out how to beat the trials faster and better then the person I had only seen struggle through them. As I played though, I couldn't help but wonder something.
"What would make her want to do that?" As I pondered this aloud, I ran my hand though my short brown hair before adjusting my black plastic framed glasses back into place on the bridge of my nose. I let my green eyes wander around with that question on my mind.
Of course the "her" in question was the main antagonist of these games; one Junko Enoshima, the mastermind behind the two games. From the word go you could tell she wasn't all there. Going on and on about despair with an almost perverse glee, the constant switching between personalities at the drop of a hat, the fact that she willingly broke the minds of people around her for her twisted goals; and this was the icing on the preverbal cake. This crazed loon could only enjoy herself when others were either drowning in despair or dying from someone who had given in. Heck, she instigated several events so terrible that the world just went to all sorts of hell in response.
It was said by the creator of the game that she had been basically designed from the ground up as a person who would do such horrible things without remorse, not because of a tragic backstory or any such traumatic experience, but because they just wanted to. But, people are extremely complicated creatures that need a form of reasoning to give them the motivation to act on some things. Even something as simple as breathing has a motive, even if it's just the body's instinctual necessities at work.
And so, I couldn't help but wonder something. What kind of event could drive a person to become such a twisted individual as that? I knew that at one point it was implied that she was raised on the streets at one point and that her twin sister eventually left for a military organization called Fenrir, but that didn't explain where the obsession with despair originated. If anything you'd think that she'd want to get away from such terrible things, but I guess there are some things that can't be easily explained.
My thoughts were interrupted with the clattering of plastic on the floor as the game system fell off my lap in my distracted state of mind. A curse half passed my lips as I quickly went to grab the PS vita to check and see if there had been any damage done to it.
However, as I picked it up a strange sight welcomed me on the screen. Thankfully there weren't any new scratches or, god forbid, cracks on the glass surface, but that wasn't what concerned me the most; though I was thankful for it. What held my attention was the title shown on the device, one that was radically different from the game I'd been playing for the past few hours.
"'Dangan Ronpa: Life of Despair,' what?" I questioned aloud. And why wouldn't I? I had never heard of such a feature being implemented into these games anywhere before now, so it shouldn't be a surprise that I'd be curious to the implications of such a thing going unreported. Then there's the concerning fact that, unlike the title screen of the other two games, this one had noticeable pink splatters all over the text, the characters usually found on the front were missing, and the red bullet chamber that rotated around the 'press start' indicator had what appeared to be a loaded bullet in one of the usually empty chambers.
In hindsight, I should have taken that ominous sight as my first warning to restart to system or even simply turned off the game entirely. After all, pink is the color of the blood in these game that was acting as a sort of implied censor, allowing them to show gruesome murders to investigate, without the effect of the more disturbing qualities and implications of actual blood.
And then there was the bullet. A common feature of these games were the 'truth bullets', personifications of key words and phrases to help break through lies and misconceptions during the class trials. Normally the chamber was empty so that you could choose from the provided bullets. Yet this one had one slot filled.
In any case, my curiosity won out against my trepidation and I decided to go along with it, hoping it could have something more for the story that had never been seen before. The minor desire that I could brag about finding this feature first didn't hurt either. So, with curiosity inspired glee, I started up the new mode.
Immediately, I was brought to a new screen that showed the pixilated portraits of the entire cast of both games and a line of text appeared asking me to "Choose your life". An Interesting way to bring up a character selection screen, but far from the weirdest I've seen. I assumed that this would actually let me play the game again, only through the eyes of a different member of the cast, an idea I could truly get behind. But as I looked at these, I couldn't help but wonder something.
"Why are Mukuro and Junko on this list?" And it was true, in addition to the younger sibling that perished in the first game while disguised as the other, the mastermind behind it all was also among the list of people who made a showing in either game. But that didn't make much sense, Junko never technically joined in with the others till the final chapter of both games, relaying through the animatronic bear, Monokuma when she was interacting with the students. What possible contributions could playing as her grant?
Now granted, I wasn't originally going to start with her. Any of the others would have been interesting to try out, and I really wanted to see how their mental processing could add to the enjoyment I had interacting with them through the respective protagonist. But that insistent pondering would not let me be, and so I brought the cursor over to the crazy bleached hair girl, and told it to accept.
"Besides," I thought out loud, "if I don't like it I can always just start over. Right?" Famous last words.
Immediately after accepting her as my choice, I felt a massive shock of electricity pass through my body quickly and then leaving just as quickly, taking with it my balance and most of my consciousness. As I began to black out though, I could have sworn I heard a voice come from the game as it clattered uselessly next to me.
"Well," The voice said in a heavily garbled tone that prevented me from telling if it was male or female. "At least this should make things interesting." That was the last thing I heard before finally leaving the waking world for what would be the last time. Or at least, the last time in my world.
You ever find yourself in a situation where the first thing you wake up to is the sensation of falling? I don't mean having a dream revolving around the sensation, I mean, actually waking up to see the world miles below you as if you fell asleep on a plane during a sky diving excursion and only returned to the waking world after leaving the plane. Well, that's kind of what I was experiencing, only without the added benefit of having a parachute to slow my fall. Believe me that was the first thing I checked for after I finished screaming my lungs out.
Unfortunately, it seemed that for some odd reason I had instead been given a new white dress shirt, a pair of black dress pants with matching belt, and a pair of dress shoes; not that that was very important; seeing as I was falling at near terminal velocity towards the ground at the moment, though it was appreciated.
As I fell I couldn't help but wonder what I'd done to deserve this of all things. I had never been a bad person, even if I would never have called myself a saint. I had decent grades, maybe not the best but never truly near failing. I had been nice for the most part, even though there were plenty of times I would let my emotions get the better of me. I was mostly charitable with my money, though my hoarding of various items could be, seen as, a bit unhealthy.
Bottom line, while I could be very good or bad most of the time, I was for the most part in the Neutral good standing. I could be better, but I could also have been far worst. It all depended on the situation. Though this sort of thing, however, seems like something reserved for a person who was at least neutral evil.
Shaking my head to remove the mental cobwebs, I quickly dragged forth what knowledge I had about falling and air resistance and then did my best to level myself in a way to both slow my fall and to, with any luck, allow myself to be able to angle my descent towards something soft. Immediately though that plan briefly left my mind as I took in the sight of where exactly I was heading.
Hope's Peak Academy. I didn't even have to think about it being a building, that just so happened to look similar, to the place. Even with the fact that I may not have the best of memory retention, I'd be a fool not to notice the massive plate showing their coat of arms with the name pasted right into the framework, the massive bolts on either side holding it on to the top of the oversized school building. There was no mistaking it anyway you look at it.
Lost in my questions of just how this was possible or what this could mean, I had honestly almost forgotten about my original predicament. Snapping back my focus on the quickly approaching ground, I tried to angle myself towards a grouping of trees in the hope of breaking my fall. I knew it would hurt a hell of a lot to fall through the many branches that made up a majority of the tree, despite what the deceptively cushy pounds of leaves covering them would imply, and that there was an astronomically high chance of at least one case of wood to flesh impalement. But compared to the much higher chance of outright fatality of slamming into the pavement at my speed, I was willing to just take that chance.
Sadly, I had made my attempt just too late to reach the massive fauna, so with a feeling of resentment for what I was about to attempt, I aimed for the next best thing. Just below me was a person with their strawberry blond hair styled up in a pair of high ponytails that seemed a bit familiar to me in a bad way. I didn't have nearly enough time to properly warn them, nor did I feel particularly excited for the knowledge that I would likely end up taking them to an early grave alongside myself, but it couldn't be helped. So, with the last few moments I would likely have, I decided something.
"Somebody stupid get in my way!" I cried at my unwanted and unwilling target. If was going down, it'll be on a joke. Granted, by the completely shocked look on her face as it snapped up towards me and the confused gasp that escaped past her lips, I'm fairly certain she didn't appreciate my sudden arrival or reference. Everyone's a critic.
Regardless, the tastes of this poor girl, or the lack there of, were ultimately irrelevant. For the second that she realized what was about to happen, my body slammed into hers with a powerful impact that caused us to crash into the cold, unforgiving ground. Several sounds reminiscent of snapping bones and pained gasps of air being forcibly expelled from crushed lungs rang forth as a veritable rainbow of pain blossomed and racked our bodies. I was unsure seeing as my eyes had slammed shut on impact, but I was fairly convinced that there was a fair amount of blood around us both considering the moist feeling that had quickly developed on my head and cheeks.
As the pain quickly overwhelmed my senses and I agonizingly slowly began to lose the battle to remain awake, I could only barely recall shouts of the standard "Are you okay!?" screams of panic, and at least one cry for someone to call a hospital. I would have probably appreciated the attempt more if it hadn't been overshadowed by the unyielding agony. As it is, the only thing I was thankful for at the time was my mind falling into blissful unconsciousness.
It is a widely-believed fact that the person who invented the alarm part of the alarm clock was ether a masochist who enjoyed waking to the insufferable ringing that could drive a man mad if given enough time, or they were a sadist who thought others would appreciate the sounds of torment that could raise the dead. I personally fall into the later belief, considering the insistent beeping of a default battery clock that was doing it's hardest to wake me up whilst also driving both my sanity and temper out of the window.
"If I wasn't sure I was alive," I growled, my voice scratchy from dehydration from likely sleeping with my mouth open…again. "I'd swear I'd died and gone to hell." Raising my head up from a surprisingly soft pillow, I slowly opened my eyes to view my surroundings. Immediately, several alarms when off in my head as several facts came to light.
The first of which was the room I was in. it was a small room barely large enough to hold the single person twin size bed and the overly large closet that was across from me as well as the other bits of furniture around the room. On one side of the room was a dresser with a mirror with a noticeable amount of makeup and cosmetic supplies lined up carefully on it, as well as several strangely familiar bows and ribbons of various shades. Strangely, there was a filing cabinet on one side of the room filled to near bursting with papers and files, though the contents of them I wouldn't learn till later. Most noticeable of all though was the fact that instead of an actual door, there was a ladder in the center of the room that climbed straight up to the ceiling where what looked like a metal hatch led out of the room.
The second of these alarms was from the fact that, I was alive. Not only alive, but aside from a mild headache I was perfectly fine. Yes, you would think this would have been my first concern considering that the last thing that I recalled was crushing a person into the ground at terminal velocity. In all accounts, I should be ether dead, dying, or at the very least in massive amounts of agony. But no, I was alive and well, which should have been far more concerning then the décor.
I guess I'm just weird like that.
The third thing that concerned me the most, was my vision. See, I've been slightly nearsighted for a few years now and while I can see well enough to make out some details, I can't read anything farther than ten feet away; kind of a problem when you're driving and you can't read the signs. Now though, my sight was crystal clear, to the point where I could make out the grain in the wooden body and frame of the wardrobe across the room without a problem. Which, in itself was a problem; handy maybe since it meant I no longer needed to be wearing glasses anymore, but a problem nonetheless.
Glancing down slowly, I hesitantly raised my hands into my view, and was immediately taken aback by what I saw. Instead of the hands belonging to one of the male demographic that I am quite use to seeing, a pair of pale, slender, and most of all feminine fingers with well-manicured nails had replaced them. My arms, no longer slightly toned from years of heavy lifting and moderate fighting were thin and nearly hairless. I was ready to panic. My eyes snapped over to the dresser and the mirror mounted to it as a single desire forced its way to the forefront of my mind.
I needed to see myself.
Quickly throwing off the blankets, I attempted to rush over to the mirror, only to get one of my feet caught up on the edge of the sheets in my haste and falling on my face with a very high pitch yelp. Down, but certainly not out, I angrily kicked off my clingy offender and scrambled over to the mirror. I ended up knocking a few bottles and containers over when I grabbed the edge as I nearly slid past, but that was ultimately swept from my mind as I was far more concerned with the person staring back at me through the reflective surface with growing horror plastered on their face.
Staring back at me through the glass was a tall woman, roughly six and a half feet tall, with an hourglass like figure covered by a rather lose black V-neck tee-shirt barely covering the black-and-red bra cupping her…generous assets. She wore no pants, just a matching set of panties that showed off her legs, and had I been able to see below her thighs, I would have bared witness to a pair of white knee socks covering her feet. Her heart shaped face would have probably been something I would call cute, if it wasn't looking so horrified, at the moment, and her thick, strawberry blond hair that reached down to her knees would be something I would consider impressive, if it wasn't currently disheveled from sleep.
For a moment, I was confused about her ruby red eyes that stared into my own, but upon catching sight of a case for some form of contact lenses out of the bottom of my peripheral vision I quickly put the pieces together. 'Colored contacts.' I believe they were called, made for disguises or, in this case, faking your eye color.
But that wasn't my main concern. No, the fact of the matter was that, I was someone else now. This was a body I didn't want to be associated with, a face that didn't belong with my mind behind it. I couldn't stop my next reaction. There was too much happening at once and my mind simply couldn't keep up. With widened eyes, and expanding mouth I followed through with the only action I could.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
I screamed
Weekly Power Status
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Ranking 
-- Power
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