Welcome to Bugaria: Act 1

As if getting zapped to another world was bad enough, now Anne had to deal with this. The past half an hour or so was an entire whirlwind of chaotic events, and she was still struggling to process it all. ...As if spending the last few days in Snakemouth Den was already bad enough. 

Anne stayed near the back of the group, which now was a group of four instead of three. Vi was directly in front of her, the previous "conversation" she had with her quickly dying when it was going nowhere. Despite what Kabbu said earlier, Leif was walking right next to him rather than behind everyone else. Maybe Kabbu trusted himself to protect Leif, who knows. 

There wasn't much of anything happening right now, leaving Anne alone with her thoughts, the only sounds being everyone's footsteps and the occasional water dripping from somewhere. With everything that's happened, and with plenty of time to think, there was only one possible conclusion Anne could come to. 

... Something was definitely off about Leif. She didn't know exactly what, but there were a few oddities about him, even among this already bizarre world. As they all walked through this dark and dank place, Anne kept her eyes locked on Leif, watching him carefully, almost trying to analyze his every move. ...Well, she didn't think she could do that . 

And to be fair, she wasn't the only who had suspicions about him. Anne took her eyes off Leif for a moment to glance at Vi, the only other bug she was familiar with that shared her sentiments. However, Vi was also the one who ran away and nearly left her for dead, which even thinking about was almost enough to send her back into a fury. 

But it wasn't worth blowing up about again. Then there'd just be another unnecessary argument which Kabbu would stop and then things would calm down again, and everything would pretty much just reset. ...Just like with her two friends back home. But that was different. She'd known Sasha & Marcy for years. 

Anne shook her head, trying to get herself back on track. So, she wasn't willing to talk to Vi. AND she knew that Kabbu was a lost cause on this because he was extremely insistent on protecting Leif. Which meant she was alone on this. Fine, whatever. Her gut told her that she should be suspicious of Leif, and she wasn't going to drop this so easily. 

Even if she couldn't pinpoint what exactly, there were multiple things should make a basis from. Firstly, his general aura about him was... the best way to describe it would be flat-out cold . Like, literally. She could even see Kabbu shivering a little cause he was walking so close to him. Plus, there was that... what was it? Gibberish? And also how he referred to himself as "we". So many oddities, and no clear explanation for a single one of them. 

Despite everything, above all else... she still was worried about Kabbu and Vi, no matter her current feelings toward either of them. There was no telling what could happen now, which was why she had to keep an eye out, just in case. 

After a few minutes of nothing, Anne briefly wondered if she was being dumb about all this. ...No. It would be dumb to stop now, after she'd already committed herself to it this far. And it looked like it might pay off sooner than she expected. 

Before long, the four of them briefly stopped when they came across some kind of tablet surrounded by rocks and large grass. The tablet was taller than any of them, and on it was some kind of weird, unintelligible text that popped out thanks to the bright blue against the dark gray of the tablet. 

"What a weird tablet." Vi commented, looking up and down the tablet. "It's written in an even weirder language..." 

"So... can anyone figure out what this is supposed to mean?" Anne asked. If Marcy were here, she would've figured it out in a few minutes, tops. But yeah, she had zero idea how to approach this, and for all she knew it could very well be a clue toward how to get her home. 

"It seems to be an ancient script." Kabbu said. Well, that didn't help much. 

"Hmm..." Leif walked up to the tablet, taking a close look at it before turning to face the others. "These letters look familiar to us. We should be able to decipher this." 

"Oh, really?" Kabbu asked in surprise. "That's amazing! What does it say?" 

"Well..." Leif began, before Anne started zoning out entirely, returning to her own thoughts. Even if seemingly nobody else was taking any issues with it, Anne certainly was. All sorts of red flags were rising in her head; there was no way she was going to let this go. Leif could read that, but nobody else could? 

Yeah, definitely suspicious. And to make matters worse, whatever Leif was reading didn't seem to even be important in the slightest. Well, whatever. The group was already moving on from it anyway, but still. Now she had an actual basis to go off of. 

...Well admittedly, it wasn't much of a basis. Plus, what was she even going to do? Maybe she could wait until they were all out of here, but... no, that would take way too long at the rate they were going. 

Hm... one thing was clear: Leif was an unknown, and he needed to be dealt with before things could potentially get worse. But how was she going to do that? She needed someone else on her side... and although she didn't want to admit it, she already did. 

Anne audibly groaned out loud, earning her a few strange looks that she ignored. There was one option left, and unless she wanted to endlessly stew on this by herself then she needed some backup. 

Trying to make it look like she wasn't up to anything but also not being too obvious about it, Anne quickened her pace, trying to catch up with Vi. This was her only chance, and like it or not, she had to take it. 

Before she could even say anything to Vi, the bee already spoke up, talking in more of a whisper to avoid anyone trying to listen in. "Anne, we really have to do something about-" 

"Yeah, I know." Anne snapped, keeping her voice at a semi-whisper. She didn't make any effort to hide her attitude or how she felt. "That is clearly very obvious from everything that's been going on." 

Vi frowned, looking away from Anne. "You're sounding a bit... cranky right now." 

"Gee, I wonder why ?" Anne questioned, raising her voice a bit. It was frustrating that she was the only one at all now who acknowledged Vi ditching them earlier. Kabbu forgot all about it in favor of making sure Leif was safe. "Hm, whatever reason could I possibly have for not being in the-" 

"Okay okay I get it!" Vi interrupted, trying to get Anne to be quiet before she started outright yelling. Vi glanced ahead at Kabbu and Leif, making sure they weren't paying attention, before turning back to Anne. "I know I... might've... perhaps..." Vi tried, not finding the right words before she shook her head. "Look, is this really what you want to be talking about right now?" 

" What?" Anne questioned. Seriously? There it was again, Vi trying to avoid guilt and switching the subject entirely. It was something that she'd seen multiple times by now, but didn't care for at all. 

"Did you forget about..." Vi didn't finish her sentence, keeping her voice low as she pointed her head in Leif's direction. Almost immediately, Anne knew what Vi was getting at. It was a dirty trick, one that she knew was going to work due to the current circumstances. 

And Anne could choose to either focus on Vi's betrayal from earlier, or the more pressing matter at hand. A part of her wanted to spite Vi and go for the first option, even if it wouldn't be the most rational decision. But of course, if she did, then she'd be ignoring the other problem right in front of her. 

Her judgement, her view was split. On one hand, she could make an ally out of someone that ran off previously, someone that did share her same belief about Leif. On the other hand, she could go about this alone, which would have a higher chance of leading to disaster if something went wrong. When weighing her decisions like this, it was clear to see what was the better option, even if it burned her to do this. 

"...Okay." Anne sighed, knowing there was no other choice. "I'm with you." At this, Vi's face lit up with a smile for a moment before Anne continued. "But don't think this means we're all buddy-buddy." 

"Fine." Vi huffed, crossing her arms. She tried to hide it, but her mood noticeably dropped. "So, what are we going to do about him?" Vi kept her voice low. 

"Hm..." Anne racked her brain, but she had a hard time coming up with anything. Though, this train of thought did remind her of something, which got her to chuckle a bit. 

"What's so funny?" Vi asked. 

"Oh, it's just..." Part of Anne didn't want to engage in such a casual conversation with Vi, because that would feel like just ignoring what happened earlier. But then again, this was too funny to pass up. "Well, this reminds me of a game I played a few times back home. It wasn't really that popular." 

Vi stayed silent, waiting for Anne to continue. "A-And, it was nothing special, it was just about multiple people that were stranded somewhere, but one of them was secretly a monster in disguise trying to kill everyone else." Anne explained, remembering to the best of her ability. "I didn't really get to play it too much, though." 

"Why?" Vi asked, confused by this. 

"Well..." Anne said, starting to remember the incident from months ago. 

She was using her laptop to play the game in her room at her desk, her current session with Sasha, Marcy, and a few other players going on for at least multiple hours at this point. She was extremely invested, to the point where the game was the only thing she could focus on. 

"Hey Anne, can you take out the tra-" Her dad started to say as he opened the door to her room, but he never got to finish his sentence as Anne suddenly started screaming at the top of her lungs. 

"DON'T KILL ME!" Anne yelled, freaking out and grabbing the nearest object on her desk before spinning around in her chair and throwing it without thinking. To her dismay, the object was a full pencil case, and the target was her dad, who screamed in pain as the hard pencil case hit him in the face before he fell backward onto the ground. 

"What was that noise?" Anne's mom called from downstairs. Anne grimaced at she realized what she'd just done, as her character on the game screen got killed thanks to her no longer paying attention. 

Back in Snakemouth Den, Vi had an incredulous look on her face as Anne continued to explain. "My parents didn't let me play that game for an entire month after that, can you believe it?" Anne asked. There was a bit of a long pause after that, as the two of them stared each other, with only the sound of the group's footsteps. 

"I... really don't think this helps at all." Vi said. "Funny, but not helpful." She tried to get back to the topic at hand. "Now, if we could actually think of something, hmm..." 

Anne groaned at her attitude, but almost immediately an idea popped up in her head. "Oh, I got it!" This immediately got Vi's attention. "In the game I played, everyone had these tasks they were supposed to do, but the monster in disguise wouldn't be able to do them." 

"So you're saying he would be... an impersonator?" Vi asked, trying to understand. 

"Yeah, exactly!" Anne answered. By the current train of logic she was on, Leif, by all accounts, was not who he said he was. Who was he really, then? She didn't know. But still, she would get to the bottom of this. Even if she was going by the rules of some game, it still was her best chance. "All we have to do is try and catch him in trying to do something that anybody should be able to, but he can't! It's pretty genius if you ask me." 

"Hm..." Vi thought about it for a few moments. "Yeah, this doesn't have the best chance of working." She said, causing Anne's prideful smile to fall. "But I'm going to go along with it anyway, because I can't come up with anything better right now." 

Finally , she would be making progress. Anne and Vi decided that they should try and keep it on the down-low, trying to avoid suspicion from Kabbu or Leif himself of their true motives. After all, that would ruin the whole point of what the two girls were doing. 

The current area they were in was a bunch of large, mostly flat dirt structures with waterways below them, which allowed easy excuses to get away from the main group and go somewhere else, under the guise of "checking this area out". Anne and Vi did exactly that, going across platforms to some area to the side, leaving Kabbu and Leif to themselves. 

And now, it was time for the waiting game. The two girls didn't really have much of a plan at first, just pretending they were doing important stuff while secretly spying on Leif. Though, with a plan like this, there were bound to be things that went wrong, such as what Vi called a Zombiant suddenly attacking them. The two managed to fight the parasite-controlled ant off, but it distracted them from their real goal for far too long for their liking. 

But despite all the time they spent carefully observing him, while making sure to look inconspicuous and unassuming in the brief events that he did glance over at them. Kabbu was busy doing his own thing, making sure to protect Leif from the stray Zombiant that tried to attack him. Anne admittedly did get creeped out at the thought of a fungal parasite taking over someone's body, it brought up many questions that she didn't want to know the answers to. And the cordyceps stalk on top of the Zombiants' heads didn't help either. 

Even so, Anne and Vi continued watching, trying to stall for as much time as they could, trying to crack the code of what Leif could actually be hiding- 

"Okay, this isn't working." Anne suddenly said, stopping Vi in her tracks. The two of them were attempting to hide behind tall vines, peeking their heads through to spy on Leif without him noticing. But for the past several minutes, all they'd managed to accomplish was nearly falling off the side of one of the structures and listening to Kabbu try to get Leif to talk about himself, but to no avail. 

Vi groaned out loud, also realizing how much time was wasted with this. "Yeah, we really need a new strategy." She walked away, pacing while trying to think of something else. Anne walked away from her spot too, racking her brain to think of something. Clearly, this wasn't working, so- 

"I got it!" Vi said, her eyes lighting up with excitement. "We should bait him!" 

"Bait him?" Anne asked, confused but interested as to where this was going. 

"Like, if we try and get him to do stuff he can't on purpose!" Vi explained. "Because I'm tired of sitting around and waiting for him to something on his own, it's way too boring. And we'll finally have our proof!" 

While Anne still didn't know what she'd do after she got her proof, she did know that this was a pretty sound plan. As long as the two of them were careful about it, then Leif nor Kabbu should suspect a thing. And maybe once they got their proof, they could get Kabbu on their side. 

Although... was she going too far with this? It was a thought that briefly popped up in her head, as this plan was getting crazier by the minute. But then again, she'd already gone this far; she's too deep in to even think of backing out now. She had to see this through. She would see this through. 

Anne nodded as she looked at Vi, the previous anger she had toward the bee starting to almost be pushed to the sidelines. "Let's do this." 

Almost. 

With their new goal in mind, the two of them set back to work, this time actively and stealthily trying to get what they needed. They met back up with Kabbu and Leif, acting casual to avoid any suspicion. 

To their luck, Vi spotted another tablet ahead, similar to the one from earlier. She discreetly told Anne about it, and the two split up from the group yet again, with the excuse that they had to pee. Thankfully, neither of the guys noticed the tablet yet, so this would be a cinch. 

Once the two girls got to the tablet, Anne got a bright red marker out of her backpack, taking off the cap. "If this ran out of ink, I'm going to scream." Anne said, testing it out by making a small mark on her arm. There was a small red line where she'd pressed down. "Yes!" She cheered, before wiping the mark off to erase any evidence. 

"So, what are you going to do with that?" Vi asked, looking at the marker before glancing back at the stone tablet with the bright blue unintelligible text. 

"You'll see." With a smirk on her face, Anne proceeded to start writing on the tablet, the bright red ink of the marker overtaking whatever had been written on the tablet before. After a minute or so, she was finished, putting the cap back on so the ink wouldn't run dry before putting the marker itself back in her backpack. "And now... We hide!" 

Before Vi could say otherwise, Anne grabbed her arm, practically dragging her away and out of Kabbu & Leif's sight. The two girls watched from their hiding spot as the two guys walked by, unaware that the girls weren't really using the bathroom. 

It was only a few moments before the trap was triggered. "Leif, look!" Kabbu said, getting the moth's attention. "There's another one of those tablets, would you be able to decipher it? Although..." Kabbu took another look at the vandalized tablet. "It looks a bit different..." 

"We'll read it." Leif said, walking up to the tablet and taking a close look at it. He muttered to himself as he read it, but after several seconds he suddenly stopped, his face scrunching up into a mix of horror and disgust before turning around and walking away. "Yeah, no." 

"L-Leif?" Kabbu asked, confused and worried. "What did it say?" 

"We think it's best if you didn't know." Leif said, shaking his head. "Please, don't remind us of it again." His tone was dead serious, and Kabbu could only muster up a nod in response, completely taken aback by Leif's sudden change in attitude. 

From their hiding place, Anne and Vi looked at each other in confusion. "What did you even write?" Vi asked. 

"I dunno." Anne shrugged. "I just wrote random gibberish and tried to match it to the style of the tablet." There wasn't really much else to it. Gibberish is all what the tablet looked like to her, after all. 

Even with that done, there was still no tangible proof they could use. The two of them were quickly running out of time, they'd have to resort to even more desperate measures. They couldn't afford to do just random plans that may or may not work. They'd have to get more... direct. 

Anne knew she was edging the boundaries of this already insane plan, getting close to tripping over the line and falling over entirely. But that in no way meant she would stop; when she was back home she never backed out of anything with her friends. And that was the same mindset she'd use here. 

From there, Anne and Vi continued with plans that mostly were thought up by the former. The two of them met back up with the others, and Anne put her first plan into action. Yet again she sifted through her backpack, keeping it away from Vi's view to avoid her seeing the music box. 

Before long, Anne found something that would work; a half-opened pack of some off-brand mushroom gummy snacks she bought at the store a few days before she was sent here. As casual as she could be, she walked up to Leif, the bag in her hand. 

"Yo, want a snack?" Anne asked, getting his attention. She shook the bag of snacks in her hand, and Leif raised an eyebrow. "We've... been traveling around for a while, so someone's gotta be hungry." She hoped she was casual enough, otherwise everything could be ruined. 

Leif only stared at her for a few moments before shaking his head. "We're not hungry." Was all he said before he turned away, continuing ahead. 

"Uh... may I have some?" Kabbu asked, his stomach growling a bit. "I haven't eaten since yesterday." 

"Sure, go nuts." Anne said, shrugging before handing him the entire small bag of mushroom gummies." Kabbu took the bag, almost immediately beginning to scarf down on the partially stale snacks. 

Anne stealthily walked away, a new confidence arising in her. After all, she finally had some sort of lead. Why would Leif deny food, even if it was just a snack? Surely, he was bound to be hungry after everything he went through, right? Very suspicious... 

She made sure to quickly inform Vi of this, and though the bee was about to try and think of some way to continue down this opening they had, but Anne needed more. Sure, this was one thing, but it might not be enough. She needed multiple openings; multiple pieces of evidence before doing anything. 

So, Anne pulled out her phone, being mindful of the remaining battery life, which was... lower than she thought it'd be. Still, this would be quick. Anne opened the camera app, making sure to turn off the flash and noise before snapping a quick photo of Leif without him noticing. He did briefly turn his head, but didn't say anything. 

"Um, what was that for?" Vi asked, genuinely curious as Anne pulled up the photo on her phone. 

"Maybe there's something that weird that happens if he's in any photos; I've seen this sorta stuff in movies before." Anne explained. The two of them stared at the photo for several seconds, waiting for if anything strange or weird would happen. 

...It didn't. Not even when she waited an entire minute, and the photo remained the exact same. Anne scoffed, turning off the phone and shoving it in her pocket. Better to not drain anymore of the battery, anyway. 

"Well, even if that didn't work, uh..." Vi said, trying to think of something. The only thing that Anne would be able to work with was physical, solid proof. "Maybe..." None of what either of them were doing was working, even as they went farther and farther and farther- 

"Oh!" Vi said, as if she finally thought of something. "What if-" 

"I got it!" Anne said, snapping her fingers in realization, completely lost in her own focused train of thought. "If you want to get proof of something, what better way than..." She paused for dramatic effect. "A first-party source?" 

"...What?" Vi asked, not understanding the terms she was using. 

Anne sighed in exasperation, not wanting to waste any more time than she needed. "Just watch." Anne had a plan, after all. 

Thankfully, all the pieces already fell into place for this to work. Kabbu and Leif weren't near each other like before; Leif was off doing his own thing. Anne walked up to Kabbu, her overall mood casual and unassuming. 

"Oh, hey Anne!" Kabbu said, waving to her as he munched on the mushroom gummies. "What is it?" 

"Not too much..." Anne said, putting on an entire show of looking away from him with a frown on her face. Gotta make it look convincing, after all. "There's just... one small favor?" Anne looked back at him, raising a finger to emphasize her point. 

"You want the gummies back?" Kabbu asked, holding the nearly empty bag up. 

Anne shook her head. "No, it's... something kinda dumb actually, but if you'd do it then I would appreciate it sooooo much." She paused to give Kabbu a second to take it in, but then continued before he could respond. "Ever since... Leif... has joined us, I've been meaning to talk to him, get to know him better, but ..." She made sure to emphasize this in particular. "I just can't bring myself to do it! You know how it is, new world, new... bug people, I'm just too shy to ask." She closed her eyes and overdramatically sighed. "Would you do it, for me, please?" 

"Oh, Anne!" Kabbu exclaimed, easily taken in by this sob story. "I'll admit, when I've been trying to talk to Leif, I haven't been able to get him to say much... but for you, I'll definitely try harder!" His overall energy beamed brightly, willing to fulfill just about any request his friends gave him, which was exactly what Anne was counting on. 

"Thank you so much. " Anne replied, nodding her head. Kabbu nodded back as he turned away to walk to Leif, and Anne's faux sadness instantly shifted to a smug happiness the moment Kabbu turned around. With a new bounce in her step, Anne walked back over to Vi. "It worked!" She said with excitement, but not too loudly. 

"You know, I didn't expect... that, but it was still great!" Vi said as Kabbu walked over to Leif. "But now that I think about it, I think there might be a small problem with it." 

"What's that?" Anne asked, completely unaware. The slightest bit of fear crawled up her back at the possibility of her flawless plan somehow having a crack she didn't see. And, the problem presented itself as soon as Anne turned around to see what was about to happen. 

"So, Leif," Kabbu asked as he walked up to the moth, crinkling up the now-empty bag of gummies and tossing it to the side. "Anne wanted me to ask you a question about yourself." 

"Oh no." Anne said to herself, unable to stop this from unfolding, while also realizing the fatal flaw in the plan. 

"You should've told him to leave that part out." Vi said, making no effort to sugarcoat any of it. 

"I know!" Anne yelled, her previous anger returning to the surface. Those smart-alec comments weren't helping at, just like Vi ditching them all earlier didn't help either- 

After taking in what Kabbu had to say, Leif let out a long, exhausted sigh before turning to Anne and Vi, a hand on his forehead in exasperation. "This has gone on long enough. Can you two stop annoying us with..." He gestured to the girls. "Whatever this is? This weird thing you're doing, we don't get it at all." 

There was a brief, but tense silence in the cave. "He's onto us!" Anne yelled, pointing at Leif, causing him to retract his hand in surprise. 

"What the heck is going on?" Kabbu asked, completely lost as to what was happening. 

"Well..." Anne said, starting to sweat, her nervousness and fear at getting caught taking ahold of her as Leif raised an eyebrow. "There is a very good and well-thought-out explanation for all of this!" Said explanation she was trying to think of on the spot...even as the seconds ticked by, and nothing came to mind. 

Vi tried to keep her mouth closed this entire time, but she couldn't hold it in any longer. "Anne and I were trying to prove Leif was not who he said was so we were trying to trick him into proving he wasn't!" She said this as fast as possible, and at the same time, the entire explanation felt agonizing slow as the entire plan came crashing down on itself in one fell swoop. Leave it to Vi to ruin things yet again. 

Beat. 

"What." Leif deadpanned, not that it was much different than his regular tone. 

At this point, Anne had nothing left to lose. Practically everything was out in the open, so she needed to play her hand before it was too late. "Well, ever since we met you, there's been a bunch of weird and shady stuff surrounding you!" 

"Anne, I'm sure that there's-" Kabbu tried to butt in to ease the fast-increasing tension, but Anne wasn't having any of it. 

"Just listen to me!" Anne yelled, before beginning to list everything off, to both give her case and to try and get Kabbu on her side. "He can read some weird ancient text that nobody else can, he's so cold that I feel like I'm shivering, he has this weird manner of speaking, and just... all the strange circumstances surrounding him in the first place! How do we even know he was part of a scouting team; he could've made that whole thing up!" Once she was finished with her rant, she took several deep breaths, trying not to let her rage consume her. 

"Okay, this is just ridiculous." Leif said, calmly. "Children, we understand having wild imaginations, but we think this is going a bit too far. We can assure you we were part of a scouting team. We came here and-" 

"We don't have wild imaginations!" Anne argued. 

"And don't call us children!" Vi added. 

Kabbu was a little confused. "Er, but aren't you both-" 

"Don't interrupt!" Anne and Vi yelled simultaneously, scaring Kabbu into silence. 

"And we're not backing down on this!" Anne continued, focusing back on Leif. "There's something deeper going on with you!" She wouldn't back down, not for a second. She could feel it, she was edging closer to the truth the further she pushed. 

"No, there isn't!" Leif argued back. "And can everyone stop cutting each other off every 5 seconds? It's giving us a headache." At this, his expression turned sour, his patience starting to wear thin. Sometimes someone could let something slip in anger... "Ugh, what's even the point of this? You're just making us out to be someone we aren't, and it's going to stop now." 

Vi opened her mouth to argue back, but someone else beat her to it, even if said bug was scared into silence earlier. 

"Everyone, watch out!" Kabbu yelled. "There's a Jellyshroom!" 

Even if Anne didn't know in the slightest what that was, she did immediately get her tennis racquet out, ready to defend herself. In just a moment's time, she spotted what she assumed was the "Jellyshroom", a flying, brown, squid-like creature with a blue mushroom cap. 

It wasn't even near her, but it was heading toward Leif, and as soon as he spotted it out of the corner of his eye, he turned to it, thrusted his arm out from his wings, and... froze the Jellyshroom, encasing it in a block of ice as it fell to the ground. 

The four of them stood there in shocked silence, trying to process what just happened. Leif stood there, looking at his own hand. Kabbu was taken aback, his expression more in surprise. Vi stepped back a bit, her antennae and fur raised on end. And Anne... her mouth was agape, the gears in her head slowly starting to make sense of this. 

"What the heck?!" Vi yelled, saying the first thing she could think of. 

"By the great antcestors..." Kabbu pondered. "What kind of sorcery is this?" 

"We, uh, are unsure?" Leif tried to answer, putting his hand back under his wings and facing the others. "This is new." 

"You seriously expect us to believe that!?" Vi questioned, voicing Anne's own concerns. She wasn't able to say anything, the sheer shock overriding her ability to think properly... Shock that would quickly turn into anger and realization as she began to connect the dots. 

"We mean it, it's the truth." Leif defended, as if he wasn't just put under a lot of scrutiny a few minutes ago. 

"Magic's no common feat." Kabbu explained. "There are less than ten known sorcerers in history! This is astonishing!" Why was he so casual about this? About all of this? ...That was it. 

"Seriously?" Anne yelled before anyone else could make a remark, throwing her arms out in exasperation. All eyes were now on her, and right in that moment was when she reached her breaking point. "I knew there was something up with you!" She pointed at Leif with her tennis racquet, a piercing glare plastered on her face. 

This explained perfectly why Leif was so cold all the time. "And now we've caught you red-handed!" Anne exclaimed, the pieces all finally fitting together as she walked toward "...Or well, blue-handed in this case, but whatever! Also, there's just straight up magic in this world?!" That brought up so many more questions that she didn't think she would get the answers to anytime soon. 

"W-What if he's some kind of criminal with a huge bounty?" Vi asked in newfound fear, voicing her own theory. She started to panic, backing away from the group a bit... just like before. 

"Do you seriously believe that?" Leif questioned, trying to defend himself yet again. "We are nothing of the sort!" 

"Well, maybe you are a criminal!" Anne fired back. All of this, combined with her earlier frustrations about everything that's happened, caused her rage to skyrocket past her boiling point, leaving little room left for any logical thinking. "For all we know, you're some kind of dangerous criminal who tried to get artifact here for your own evil purposes, and then rightfully fell for the trap and got captured by the spider until we came along to rescue you!" 

"And what kind of inane logic led you to that conclusion?" Leif asked, before shaking his head. "You know what, we don't even want to know. This is just, ugh . Stop wasting our time. Nothing you're saying is true." 

"W-Well, why should I have any reason to believe anything you say?" Anne fired back, starting to falter a little at Leif's complete lack of response to her accusations. In turn, this made her even angrier, to the point where she was starting to see red. If this continued any further, she'd- 

"We believe we should be the one asking that question." Leif said out of the blue, staring directly at her. The new ice-cold tone and demeanor about him stopped Anne in her tracks, her white-hot anger quickly dissipating into worry and confusion as she tried to figure out the meaning behind what he said. 

"Uhhh..." Anne nervously said, starting to sweat as she looked to both Vi and Kabbu for help that they couldn't provide. "Clarify...?" She asked, not looking forward to the answer at all. 

"Oh, don't start acting so ignorant now." Leif said, his words like poison, breaking down her defenses one by one. "You really think we haven't seen it? The fact that you, Anne, came from 'another world' as you say, makes you very suspicious, and perhaps the one we should trust the least out of everyone." 

Anne froze. Leif's accusation confused her and at the same time got her heart racing, but when she reminded herself who was making these accusations, she steeled herself, ready to argue and fight back with whatever means she could. 

"Your explanation of randomly showing up here is highly questionable." Leif said, laying into her before Anne could get a chance to speak up. "Even with magic, that makes zero sense. There's definitely a reason you've invaded our world, admit it. Maybe you came here on purpose to try and take over the place, just to give an example." 

"What?" Anne spoke up, appalled by these baseless claims. Especially with Leif around, she didn't feel comfortable enough to tell anyone about the music box yet, and she wasn't even sure if it would help or hinder her case, so she played on the safe side for now... even if she couldn't come up with a convincing lie for how she was transported to this world in the first place. "It's nothing like that! I'm just..." 

"Just what?" Leif questioned; his eyes narrowed. "This is exactly how we felt when you started accusing us of everything under the sun. Accusation after accusation because we were different in your eyes." Leif scoffed, rolling his eyes. 

Accusing him of stuff because he was different... just like he just accused her of- Oh. A new realization clicked in her head; not one of anger or spite, but... of sorrow and guilt. She understood now. Because of her earlier and still understandable anger toward Vi, she let it consume her, turning her into an outright jerk and taking it out on someone that most likely didn't deserve it. 

Her rage blinded her, letting her see only what she wanted to see, instead of the entire picture, and instead of taking space from Vi to let it simmer and fade, she kept the constant reminder of why she was angry in the first place near her, dragging herself deeper and deeper into a pit of hatred. Anne couldn't see it before, but she definitely did now. Her expression was softened, stricken by the sheer amount of guilt she now had to bear. 

"You're-" 

"We're what ?" Leif questioned, cutting her off. Anne was taken aback by this, and she was about to try to speak up again before Leif continued to lay into her. "We know that we aren't going to take any more of this utter drivel and nonsense that keeps spewing out of your mouth." 

Anne could've sworn she heard a noise that wasn't Leif scolding her, almost like... a cracking sound. She looked past him, her eyes widening a little, seeing many cracks in the ice block that the Jellyshroom was held in, those cracks quickly increasing in number by the second. "Uh-" 

"No, you don't get to speak yet." Leif said, preventing her from saying anything, no matter how important it was. He looked down at her, his glare piercing right through her. "You are a child . We are an adult. We don't take kindly to completely idiotic accusations of criminal activity." 

The Jellyshroom broke free, and Leif was only paying attention to Anne, not anything else. "And while we know your accusations about us are wrong, there's still-" Despite Leif going on and on, refusing to give her room to talk, she couldn't stand in silence any longer. 

With her tennis racquet already in hand, Anne ran forward, pushing past Leif and swinging her weapon at the Jellyshroom, making a direct hit and causing the creature to go flying backward. Leif only stood there and watched in surprise as Anne came to his defense; the Jellyshroom flying away in pain shortly after regaining its bearings. 

Anne stood there for a few moments, breathing heavily as her adrenaline from her sudden rush started to fade. Then, she let out a long sigh of acceptance, storing her tennis racquet back in her backpack. "I'm sorry." 

At these words, Leif's eyes lit up, partially in confusion. Anne turned around to face him as she continued her speech, her eyes downcast, unable to meet Leif's eyes. "I'm just... I did get sent here all of a sudden, without any choice in the matter, and I'm still trying to adjust and adapt to this place. I'm... not always sure who I can or can't trust, when there's nobody I know around." 

Vi frowned a little upon hearing this, and Leif's expression softened. "You... saved us." He said, tilting his head a little. "We might've been able to handle the Jellyshroom on our own, but you decided to come save us anyway. Why? After all, we've only yelled at you, which... admittedly, was a bit excessive of us." 

"I deserved it." Anne said, before finally looking up, able to meet his gaze. "And... while you were yelling at me, I realized something. I started to see a lot of myself in you, and where exactly you're coming from." 

Though Leif was a bit confused as to what she was getting at, he allowed her to continue. "I don't have crazy magical powers like you do, but I do know that both of us are stuck in a weird place unfamiliar to us, and have no clue where anyone that we know are. I mean, I think my two best friends got sent here too, but I don't know if they actually did." Anne avoided talking about why she thought that, and she was lucky nobody pressed her further on that note. 

"And even when I did some really stupid things," Anne continued, remembering the few incidents she's caused so far. "The people, or bugs rather, who hardly knew who or what I was stuck by me; they forgave me and trusted me, so I was able to trust them back." She stole a glance at Kabbu and Vi, giving them both a smile, though it fell a little when she saw Vi's not-so-happy expression, which reminded her of the previous incident with her... which only brought Anne sadness this time. "And... I guess that means I should be able to trust you too." 

Leif stood there for a few moments, taking in everything Anne said. He closed his eyes, deep in thought...before he abruptly opened them again. "Anne." He said, snapping her attention back to him, as an awfully long silence began- "We forgive you." A small smile formed on Leif's face. "For now. Even if we do think you're still weird." 

"Right back at ya." Anne said, doing an over-the-top motion of pointing at Leif. "I mean, it's not like being weird is out of place here, amiright?" She added, shrugged. 

At this, both Anne and Leif started laughing, finally being able to share a real, lighthearted moment with each other. Even if Leif was completely different than Kabbu or Vi, he was still genuine . Not a liar or deceiver or any other unfair assumptions she'd made about him. A real, living, breathing person... or bug. Right, bug. She still couldn't get used to that. 

Once the two of them got it all out of their system, Anne wiped a tear of laughter from her eye. There was still a bit of uneasiness in her heart after everything that'd happened, but it'd all dissipate soon enough. Anne walked back over to Kabbu and Vi, about to say what she needed to. 

"Hey, I'm sorry about... all that." Anne said, not wanting to be super long-winded about it. "It was stupid, but I think I'm over it now." 

"As long as there hopefully won't be any further arguments between you and Leif, I don't see any more issues coming up." Kabbu said with a nod, which Anne returned. "If that's all settled, then let's move forward, team!" 

"Right. We don't want to stick around to see if that Jellyshroom has any "friends", after all." Leif said with a chuckle, unintentionally reminding Anne of the Seedling incident from some days ago. 

"Even if they did, I must say, Leif, your magic is no joke." Kabbu replied, as the group started to move forward. 

"It's pretty cool." Leif said, a knowing smile on his face. 

"If you truly couldn't do it before, this den is hiding more secrets than I first thought." Kabbu mused. He did have a point. Who knew what else this place was hiding... Eh, probably not too much. 

Before Anne could get too lost in her thoughts, she heard someone walking over to her, matching her pace. It was Vi, who's saddened expression hadn't changed much since earlier. She wasn't able to look at Anne directly, but she did say one thing that confirmed to Anne that, maybe, things would be getting better from now on. 

"Sorry." Vi said, her remorse and regret fully clear and understood through that one, singular word. Before Anne could say anything to her, Vi walked ahead, embarrassment written on her face. And then... Anne smiled.