New Year's Eve was always hectic in Japan, and Yuzoraku City was no exception to that. The liveliness of its people during the day couldn't compare to the insanity that was at night, though; with festival stalls lining the path to the Koumi Shrine (which had been erected who knew how long ago), Ren couldn't help but let out a sigh as he was bumped around like a pinball inside a machine.

[i]"...Why am I even here right now?"[/i] he sighed to himself as he slowly moved through the crowd to get somewhere with notably less congestion. While he [i]had[/i] been here to help man a stall, the abnormal amount of people (coupled with a lack of foresight by the owner) caused them to be done before 9. That was fine and all for him, given the yen that was now lying comfortably within his wallet, but because of how many more people were entering rather than leaving, the young man was, for all intents and purposes, stuck here for at [i]least[/i] a few more hours.

Thank the heavens he had his phone charged before he came.

With music now attempting to drown out the chattering of the crowd in one ear, Ren slipped his way back into the crowd and began to walk towards the shrine itself. Though it wasn't the only shrine in the city, it was certainly the largest; this, in turn, made people tend to cluster here more often than anywhere else. But hey, a job was a job... And since he was already here, he may as well get his prayer out of the way.

The line for the shrine's donation box was longer than he would have liked, though, but as he stepped up to the donation box (after however long that took), something weird seemed to catch his eye--something that looked like a skeleton's arm stretching out behind the shrine. THe scene caused him to take a double take as he looked around for a moment to see if anyone else had noticed. He couldn't tell if anyone actually [i]had[/i], though, with the chaos of the crowd, but when he looked back to where the arm had been, there was now nothing.

Weird.

Shaking that thought out of his mind, Ren quickly finished praying and walked down the steps, only to notice the skeletal arm again.

...

[i]"Okay, that's--I'm checking this out,"[/i] he affirmed himself internally as he once again slipped out of the crowd to walk off to the side of the shrine. As he drew closer, though, the arm seemed to draw back behind the wall, which... Irked him, to say the least.

When he arrived, though, there wasn't a sign of anything like a skeleton--no arm, no bones, nothin

"Maybe I'm just tired. Yeah. That'd make sense," he sighed, shaking his head as he massaged his forehead with his right hand. Right as he turned around, though, the feeling of something firmly grasping his left shoulder took hold.

Then his right.

Then his waist.

Legs.

Before he had a chance to break free or even see what had taken hold of him, Ren was dragged backwards, his vision fading out as the sight of the foliage behind the shrine faded away past a distorted crimson tear in the air.

[hr]
"Nngh... Ah, damn, my neck..." Ren groaned as he came to, slowly pushing himself off of his back and into a bit of a seated position as he massaged his shoulders and rolled his neck around a few times. "What the hell was that about?"

With his whole body feeling stiff and sore, the young man struggled for a moment to shake his body out before dragging himself up with the aid of a nearby metal ba-

"...Wait a second."

With a quick look around, Ren's eyes widened as he noticed that everything around him had changed. Instead of being near the back of the shrine as he had been, Ren was now standing in the middle of what was the steps up to the shrine, complete with the railing and everything.

Well, that's what he [i]would[/i] have assumed, had the sky not been painted an eerie shade of red and there being absolutely no sign of any life nearby whatsoever.

[i]"...Okay. This is just... Wait. No. Don't freak. Calm yourself. Calm down. Caaaaalm down."[/i]

With a few deep breaths, Ren walked off to the side and took a seat on the railing. Given how he could still [i]feel[/i] things, the young man was assured that the current situation definitely wasn't a dream.

But... What was it, then?