When I first opened my eyes to this world, I knew two things.One: I was not who I used to be.Two: Tokyo had never felt like home.

  I don't mean that in the poetic, "city lights and loneliness" kind of way. I mean it in the literal, "I've walked the same street for four months and still couldn't tell you the name of it" kind of way.The skyline stretched endlessly across the horizon — tall buildings, crowded shops, people weaving past each other with the mechanical precision of people who had somewhere to be. A perfectly ordinary sight.

  And yet, as long as my memory served me, I had never once felt like I belonged in it.

  Even after all this time, the city felt like a backdrop someone had painted around me without asking. Every morning at seven, I passed the same streets, the same storefronts, the same blur of strangers. It was never different. Not once, in four months.

  It wasn't particurly interesting.

  The routine had carved itself into my days with a blunt simplicity: school, hours of sitting through csses, then the walk home with nothing worth recounting. No incidents. No complications. No reason to feel anything about any of it.

  Following the daily, unremarkable rhythm of a student's life wasn't something I was used to. My old life had never been like this.

  But even so, even after everything, I still felt it — a quiet, almost guilty relief. A boring life was anything but hard.

  That was the one lesson I had carried over from before."—finished with your deep thoughts, Rio?"

  I blinked.

  A girl stood at my side, wearing the same school uniform as me, staring at me with an expression that sat somewhere between amusement and exasperation. Her arms were crossed. She had clearly been waiting.

  I stared back at her bnkly.

  Who is she?

  Why is she talking to me like that?

  Then it hit me — again, for what felt like the hundredth time. The recognition arrived the way it always did, a deyed crash of familiarity that my mind refused to make automatic.

  My cheeks were warm before I even realized it.

  "Yes," I said quickly. "So — let's go, Sia. We're going to be te."

  "Hey." She pointed at me with narrowed eyes. "That's supposed to be my line. And why are you blushing? Don't just go around blushing in front of other girls like that. I'm your sister, but you should still have some manners."

  I nodded once. It felt like the safest response.She kept staring at me.

  Sometimes I thought she stared at me more than was strictly necessary for a sibling. But then again, I wasn't entirely sure what normal siblings were like. The concept still felt slightly foreign, the same way the city did.

  After a minute of back and forth that I mostly lost, we started walking toward school again.My name is Roh— sorry. Rio.

  And Sia is my sister, by blood. She can be impulsive, and she has a talent for making everything feel slightly chaotic, but she's dependable in the way that matters. I was still getting used to that.We were halfway down the alley when I noticed them.

  A boy in blue jeans and a green t-shirt stood pressed near the wall, shoulders hunched. Beside him, a girl with dyed hair, a white skirt, and a pink blouse was doing the talking — loudly enough that it carried. I didn't look directly. I didn't need to.

  I was fairly certain he was crying, or close to it.I walked faster.

  "Tsk." Sia's voice dropped low behind me. "These bitches.""Let's just get out of here," I said, steering her by the shoulder.

  "Don't worry, Rio." She flexed, completely unprompted. "I won't let anything happen to you. These bitches won't survive in front of my muscles — hehe."

  "Yeah, yeah. You can flex in your taekwondo club. Let's go."

  I wasn't afraid of her, exactly. I was afraid of her strength, if that distinction makes any sense.I had learned the hard way what happened when Sia decided to intervene in something. The first time I'd ever tried to tackle her — a decision I had made with complete confidence and absolutely no self-awareness — I ended up on the floor, wondering what had gone wrong. The ceiling had been very interesting to study from down there.

  How did this girl just destroy me had been the question that finally made the reality of this world click into pce. This wasn't just about Sia. This was the general situation for men here.

  My mother had scolded her for it afterward. "You're a girl," she'd said. "You don't need to flex your strength with a man."

  I had been more embarrassed than I admitted at the time. There was something uniquely humbling about being folded in half by someone a full head taller who happened to be your sister.

  The school gate came into view just as I finished reliving the memory.

  "See you after school," I said."See you after school," Sia echoed. Then, before I could take two steps: "Just don't be te talking to girls."

  I turned around. "What? What kind of accusation is that? I've never been te because of a girl.""Yeah, yeah." She didn't even look at me. "I guess Mia's a boy."

  "I wasn't te for that—"

  "Whatever." She waved me off. "Don't be te, or I'm going to spank the hell out of you.""Just go already."

  I pushed through the school gate as the morning crowd swallowed me whole, another dull and bmeless day stretching out ahead.

  It wasn't a bad life.I just wasn't sure, yet, if it was mine.

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  AnnouncementThe First chapter was a bit short. but i assure you upcoming chapters will be bigger and more exciting....