Capítulo 40: Chapter 40: Kyoto School Trip (II)
"Who are you?"
I am sure that I have never seen her before, so why was she helping me, a stranger, out of nowhere?
Ahh...I know why now.
It's the plot.
Although I asked her the question, the mysterious girl just continued smiling, and, dodging my question, she explained what really happened regarding the accusations.
However, her statement still wasn't enough to prove my innocence because the woman continued accusing her of being an accomplice as well.
Having enough of this stupid little farce, I just showed my camera to undo their doubts and ended this silly mess. This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to go to Kyoto for free! But now, because of one (stupidly annoying) woman, minutes were wasted to deal with her when we could have continued touring Kyoto instead.
The woman who accused me just departed without saying anything. Still, an irritated, along with an embarrassed expression manifested on her face after I exposed my camera's content, which only showed different attractions together with Shouko and me.
The policewomen didn't leave after questioning why three children were by themselves in the middle of Kyoto's busy streets. Only after spending another five minutes trying to convince them that I was out on a school trip did they leave us alone.
"Hello, my name is Nishimiya Shouko. Pleased to meet you." Shouko just gently smiled as she introduced herself.
"Even though it turned out to be useless, thank you very much for helping a stranger like me. My name is Uesugi Fuutarou, pleased to meet you." I cheerfully introduced myself as I extended his hand to offer a handshake.
The girl's pinkish-white hair had successfully gotten my attention. Although this was an anime world, I realised that only important people had different coloured hair, like me with white hair, Kaori with blond hair, and Shouko with dusky, smoky pink hair. Most of the other people I had seen all had dark-coloured hair like black or dark blue hair.
Hell, even Raku had bluish-black hair.
Thus, anyone with brightly coloured hair would inevitably cause me to be more interested in them.
The girl got slightly flustered as she saw my cheerful cute face.
"N...n...nice to meet you, m...my name is N-Nakano M-Miku." She stuttered as she introduced herself nervously.
Her confidence seemed to have disappeared when facing against the policewomen, and she had become a stuttering mess instead.
She extended her own hand as she shook my hand but averted her eyes as she blushed slightly, but I didn't notice it as I continued smiling while thinking about how to repay her actions.
Although she technically didn't help me that much, the fact that she took the initiative to help me, unlike those bystanders who were just there to watch the show, was worthy for me to repay her a small favour.
As long as it doesn't require money, of course. My family isn't rich enough to help others. Yet.
Shouko noticed Miku's slight blush, though, and her excitement dampened a little.
'Another rival!'
"By the way, are you in the middle of a tour too?" I asked her.
"Um...um...well, something like that. It's just...I've got myself separated from my sisters." Miku scratches her cheeks embarrassedly.
"So you are lost?" Shouko asked.
Miku didn't reply, though she didn't look at us in the eyes with discernible guilt on her face.
"Seriously..."
Hmm...usually, I would have just walked away after sending her to the policewoman, but since I owe her a small favour, let's help her get back to her sister by ourselves. Maybe I can get to know her even better.
My feelings are ringing more than ever now, and my mind is still uncomfortable from the fact that I don't know what I'm missing.
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Now that we are done with the troubles, and all rested up, it was time to continue exploring Kyoto.
Although the Kyoto Station Area doesn't consist of a vast area, it still contained plenty of attractions for us to visit, especially with the number of temples present.
Higashi-Honganji Temple.
Japanese temples don't come much grander than Higashi-Honganji. It was one of the best sights near Kyoto Station. Five minutes of walking from the station and we could get there, though we took ten minutes since we went around it initially.
Everything about this temple is on a vast scale, starting with the main gate and continuing to the main hall (the Goei-do Hall), one of the world's largest wooden buildings.
The best part about this temple, and temples in general, was that we could enter the mains halls for free! So we did just that.
While the altars and Buddha images are usually hidden behind enormous sliding doors, we were greeted by the halls' spectacular sight. Gold leaf abounds, and we could sit quietly on the floor and soak up the atmosphere for as long as we wanted to.
I could go on and on about the temple's history, but I guess the readers wouldn't appreciate the extra word count, so I won't talk much about it.
Initially built in 1604, the Higashi Honganji temple buildings were destroyed four times by fire, the most recent conflagration being in 1864 during a time of political and civil turmoil. Most of the current buildings were rebuilt in the late 19th century and early 20th century.
Currently, we weren't actually in the original building, which was a shame as I was looking forward to visiting the older places. But I guess they managed to compensate for that by introducing a lot more than what the original temple should offer.
Apart from the usual things that temples could offer, various exhibits were placed around the temple, allowing us to better visualise the temple's history rather than just from texts.
On the north side of the temple is the Sanpai Setto-sho, or reception hall, which connects with a gallery and audiovisual hall. The gallery holds regular exhibitions on Buddhist-related themes. The gallery and audiovisual hall are housed in a futuristic building which, though mostly underground, is cleverly lit with natural light.
Pretty un-temple-like, huh? But Shouko and Miku seemed to enjoy the temple atmosphere. Since Shouko and Miku preferred a temple's peacefulness to the bustling streets, we decided to stay here for a while to relax.
"Uesugi-san? What are you doing?" Miku's voice rang out, and I immediately stopped whatever I was doing.
"Um...I was taking a photo?"
"Yes, I can see that. But why are you climbing the wall of the temple?"
"Because I need to get a better view?"
"..."
"..."
Seeing both Shouko and Miku stare at me expressionlessly, I sighed and climbed back down.
It seems like I'll not be taking some awesome pictures today...
After the small break at the temple, we decided to go to another temple.
Nishi-Honganji Temple is a large temple compound located northwest of Kyoto Station with many beautiful buildings of historical and architectural significance. It is one of two head temples of the Jodo Shinshu sect of Buddhism in Kyoto.
These temples are called Honganji and are distinguished by their location: Nishi Honganji being the western temple, and Higashi Honganji being the eastern temple. Since we were in the eastern temple just before, we decided to head west now.
Jodo Shinshu is the most mainstream and common form of Buddhism in Japan, so a visit to either temple will give you great insight into contemporary Japanese religious belief. Going to both temples is pretty redundant since they were very similar to one another in terms of decoration and statues.
Thus, we did what anyone else would do and left immediately after taking a picture of us together at the front door.
Having enough of the temples, we decided to go to the Toji Temple instead. Unlike the previous two temples that were located near the Kyoto Station area, Toji Temple was found in the suburban sprawl of southern Kyoto.
Toji temple, meaning literally 'East Temple', was founded at the beginning of the Heian Period, just after the capital was moved to Kyoto in the late 700s. Together with its now-defunct sister temple Saiji ('West Temple'), the enormous temple flanked the south entrance to the city and served as the capital's guardian temples. Toji Temple is one of Kyoto's many UNESCO world heritage sites.
The Kondo Hall, one of Toji's original structures, is the temple's main hall and largest building. I couldn't be surprised anymore after discovering that this building was burnt down in 1486 and reconstructed in the early Edo period.
It seems to be a trend that all temples must be burnt down at least once during their history.
Interesting. Too bad the girls didn't care much about the history of the temples. Their first thought about the Toji temple was that the Pagoda-shaped tower looked nice.
Across from the Kondo and Kodo stands Toji's five-storied pagoda, initially erected by Kobo Daishi in 826. It stands 57 meters tall, making it the tallest wooden pagoda in Japan, and has become a symbol of both the temple and Kyoto, as it can be seen from many places across the city.
The pagoda's ground floor is irregularly opened to the public and luckily for us, today was one of those days. In fact, we were allowed to go to the fifth floor today. How lucky~.
The moment we entered the five-storied pagoda, we could see four smaller Buddha statues. Apart from that, there were more descriptions of the pagoda's past.
Not really wanting to read more about it, we decided to go straight up to the fifth floor, skipping the second to the fourth floor.
Each floor was made exactly the same, only with different decorations and statues. The fifth floor was no different, but unlike the previous floors, we could get a fantastic view of the entire area.
[A/N: This is actually from canon. But since I couldn't find the exact building Fuutarou and Yotsuba (in canon) were exploring, I used the Toji temple's five-storied pagoda as a substitute. They are both tall, in Kyoto, and provide a good view of the environment anyway.]
""Wow..."" Shouko and Miku muttered together as they saw the landscape of southern Kyoto.
After hanging out with Miku, I realised that she was a lot like Shouko. They were both shy and relatively quiet, only exclaiming or shouting when necessary, though Shouko had become more outgoing over the years.
As for Miku, although her voice was slightly softer, she was pretty curious about new things as well, judging from her behaviour for the past one hour.
After one more hour, I realised that my camera was filled with too many pictures of Miku, Shouko, or the environment.
My camera was loaded entirely with our pictures together with the beauty of Kyoto, leaving no more space for more photos.
Although this camera was given to me by my father, the space available wasn't too big since having ample space would cost a lot more, which is something that our family couldn't afford to give a twelve-year-old kid who was going to use it only occasionally.
But it wasn't a bad thing either. At least, I could now know when to stop myself.
The evening soon fell, but we haven't yet had dinner. We decided to have dinner together since we haven't found Miku's parents or guardian yet.
"Woah, lucky charms! Let's buy some!" Walking past a shop that sold lucky charms, Miku suddenly exclaimed.
Miku used all her money just to buy five pieces of lucky charms. We got confused about it, so we asked her why she bought five pieces of lucky charms.
She only answered with a small smile, "This is to make me try five times harder. I'm going to become an example for the others."
I didn't know why she mentioned precisely five times, but I didn't question it. Whether she was buying this for someone else or was genuinely planning to keep all five lucky charms, it was Miku's business.
"Others?"
"Yes. My sisters."
'We understand how you feel.' Shouko and I thought together as we thought about our own dear sisters, Raiha and Yuzuru, regarding sibling topics.
Though we might not be very wealthy, we didn't care. As long as we had a family that we could depend on, a family that accepts us for who we are, and a family who can cherish us, that was all that mattered.
For these reasons, we decided to buy some lucky charms for our sisters -three pieces for our parents and two for our cute little sisters.
After buying the lucky charms, we continued our way to find a diner.
We were wandering around only to realise that we didn't carry much money around us, and Miku had already spent all her money on the lucky charms.
Hmm...now that's a problem.
Although money can't buy you happiness, it sure can buy you some food.
Sigh, whatever. Seeing that we were all hungry now, we just made do with some street stalls instead.
Three soba noodles plus two drinks didn't cost much. It wasn't the best, but it wasn't bad either.
As we continued eating, it had gotten so late that our surroundings were now engulfed in darkness before we realised it,
Thankfully, there were bright lights all around the place, making Kyoto much more beautiful during nighttime. As dusk fell, the sprawling metropolis of Kyoto transformed into a place of bright lights. Many observation decks in the towers and tall buildings provided a great vantage point for lovely night views.
After the small dinner, we decided to visit a shrine to pray. We knew that it was already dark and probably time to actually start finding Miku's guardian or parent, but being kids, I don't think they actually wanted to.
On the way to the shrine, Miku started to talk more about herself. It was a surprise, considering that she mostly avoided topics about herself earlier, only focusing on Kyoto's sights and attractions.
Like me, I found out that Miku's family was poor as well, and her mother needed to work hard all by herself to support their family, and she felt hurt seeing her mother push herself like that.
"Sometimes I wonder, if I wasn't around, would my mother's life be more comfortable?"
Hearing her words, I frowned a little. How could an innocent kid say these types of things? What hardship must she have suffered to have such thoughts?
"Nakano-san. You-"
"Hey, Uesugi-san." She interrupted me and faced us while wearing a smile on her face, together with teary eyes.
When we saw her, we were bewildered. As we looked at her with our eyes wide open, she continued talking.
"Say Uesugi-san, no. Fuutarou-san,"
Although I was a bit surprised to hear her calling my first name, I didn't bother about that and focused more on what Miku had to say.
"Am I a burden? Would it be better if I've never existed?"
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Alternate title: Miku Nakano
A/N: Not much action this chapter, mostly to set some ideas of Kyoto background and setting. If you plan to visit Kyoto, this is all taken from the official website, so all data would be accurate (probably). The next chapter would involve more character development, mainly for Miku and Shouko while they have a chat, so look forward to that next week.
One problem with following the canon as closely as possible is that it limits what I can write. The piano and violin competition was purely from my imagination. Thus, it was easy to write 4k words per chapter. But this here is from canon, and I had already outlined this a long time ago, only adding and elaborating whatever I already wrote a few months back. So if you see shorter chapters...well, there's nothing I can do.
Plus, I don't want to end the Kyoto arc too fast, so I'm already planned to separate the arc into a few chapters with 2-3k words each rather than 5k words in like 3 chapters.
As you can probably tell, I tweaked the original Nakano's personality to become more Miku-ish than Yotsuba, making her slightly more reserved. But during their childhood, it was inferred that the quintuplets had almost identical characters. So, I didn't want to tweak it too much now. This way, I could show the contrast now and later when they meet again in high school.
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