The next morning, Dad drops me off at school nice and early. I usually like to get to school earlier rather than later so I can spend the last thirty minutes before class starts actually waking myself up. I don’t really have anyone to hang out with in the morning, but there is a nice little room in the band hall nobody goes to which I like to use. Still, it gets kind of lonely… Why does everyone at this school have to be so bigoted? Ah well. No use crying over spilled milk.

I’m about to enter the band hall, when I happen to see that Ashley is being dropped off. This gives me an idea… I decide to wait by the door for her. I don’t know what she usually does in the morning, but it’s worth seeing if she might want to join me. Knowing her, though, she probably spends all morning practicing. Or doing homework.

Except… she doesn’t actually walk towards the band hall. She’s acting kind of strangely. She’s carefully looking around the school, as if searching for something. Then, she suddenly starts walking in the opposite direction, towards the athletic complexes.

Wait a second… I don’t think that Ashley is in any sports. What is she doing? I’m kind of curious now. I don’t have anything better to do, so I decide to go say hi and ask her.

After thinking it over, I’ve decided to check and see if there is a palace at the school. I know that Lucy said to find someone evil and then find the palace, but… Well, knowing whether or not there’s one at the school would help narrow it down. Or wait, would it? It’s not exactly clear to me where someone’s palace would actually appear. Would it appear where they work, or just like at their house? Well, whatever the case is, it’s easy enough to check while I’m here. I’ll just dip in real quick and check it out, and then go spend the rest of the morning practicing as usual.

I happen to know of a little spot where I can quickly go in and out without being seen. Next to the gym, there’s an indention in the school’s wall where a generator is, and there aren’t any doors or windows nearby. If I stand in between the generator and the wall, I’ll be completely concealed unless someone just so happens to walk back there, which is extremely unlikely.

I carefully step around the generator as it whirs away. I don’t know if it’s dangerous to touch or not, but I avoid doing so just in case. I get out my phone to get it over with.

However, in the few seconds while my finger is touching the app, I hear a voice speaking to me: “Hey Ashley! What’re you…” Unfortunately, it’s too late to undo it. God damn it.

When the world comes back into focus, I’m surprised to see that I am in the middle of what appears to be a dense jungle. That’s… quite the change from where I ended up last time.

According to Lucy, a palace can take any number of forms. Could something like this jungle be a palace? It is completely unique compared to the rest of the Metaverse, so maybe.

I turn around to survey my surroundings, and then I see…

“Anja!” I shout in surprise. “What the hell are you doing in here?”

She’s breathing very deeply a few feet away from me, seemingly completely overwhelmed by the sudden change in surroundings. “Oh my god… I think… I’m having a meltdown… What the FUCK is happening here?”

“Was that you who was talking to me before I entered the Metaverse?” I ask her.

She just gives me an incredulous look. “Before you entered WHAT?” She asks.

Somehow, she must have been dragged in here with me as I entered. Maybe if I take her back quickly enough, I can try and play it off like she just had a brief hallucination or something…

“Wait! This has something to do with that app on your phone!” Anja says, pointing at me. “I knew you were up to some freaky stuff.”

“You couldn’t possibly have known that,” I retort.

“I don’t like this place. I have a serious case of the creeps right now,” she whines. “Also, why are you dressed up like some sort of knight?”

I sigh. Okay, it’s probably too late to try and pass this off as her imagination.

“What I want to know is why the hell you happened to be standing around while I was coming in here,” I tell her. “Were you stalking me?”

“I wasn’t stalking you!” She replies indignantly. “I was just coming over to say hi.”

“And you followed me all the way around the school to do that?”

“Well… I was bored!” She defends herself, blushing.

I sigh again and return to surveying our surroundings. This place vaguely reminds me of pictures I’ve seen of the Amazon rainforest. The foliage is so thick that I can’t see five feet in front of me. Lucy said that a palace would have puzzles and enemies… but I don’t see anything like that. I might find something if I wander around… but it’s also probably best to not get tangled up in all of that right now. For the time being, I should focus on dealing with Anja.

“This place isn’t right,” she says, going back to looking around at the trees. “Don’t you just feel like… someone is watching you?”

I draw my sword. I find that I don’t need to actively draw the sword from a sheath; it simply appears in my hand the moment I think about using it. Odd, but convenient. Anyways, with the sword in hand, I begin circling around the area we’re in. No sign of anything yet…

“You never really answered me before when I asked where we are,” she asks me from behind, sounding calmer now that she’s recovered from the initial shock.

“It’s called the Metaverse,” I explain. “And I think we may be in the middle of a particularly dangerous part of it, so be on your toes.”

“How the hell did you learn about this?” she asks me.

“It’s… kind of a long story,” I say. “I found this old journal in my closet… and when I wrote in it, it started writing to me back.”

“A talking book?” She gasps suddenly. “You mean like Tom Riddle’s diary?”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought of too,” I admit.

Now she’s looking at me with a hint of her usual smugness back. “Huh. I never took you for a Harry Potter fan.”

I shrug. She returns to nervously glancing around at the trees surrounding us.

“And this person in the book told you how to get here?”

“Sort of. She kind of forced me to come in here, honestly.”

“Well, that’s rather rude.”

“It’s very rude. Still, afterwards, I was able to awaken my Persona. That’s why I have the armor.”

She gives me a weirded-out look. “Your Persona, huh?”

“Yeah. It gives me a weapon and the ability to do magic and shit.”

“Magic?” She chuckles a little bit. “Okay, I’m not gonna lie. This does sound pretty occult to me, Ashley.”

“It’s not!” I snarl at her. Though come to think of it, I really don’t know a lot about the origins of this place. Still, if we believe the story about Ted being sent by an angel, it can’t be anything entirely wicked.

“Well then, what’s the deal with this jungle?” She asks me.

“I think it’s what’s called a ‘palace’,” I explain to her. “It means that there’s someone at our school with distorted desires.”

“Distorted desires?” She asks, looking alarmed. “How are they distorted?”

“I don’t know,” I admit. “There’s not much we can do here without finding out who it belongs to.”

“And if you did find out who it belongs to, what would you do?”

“Change their heart.”

“Hmm… so basically, this place lets you make bad people good? Or at least less bad?”

“Yeah, basically.” I’m starting to get tired of the 20 questions, so I look around at the foliage one more time to have something to do. Lucy said that a palace’s design would reflect how its owner’s desires are distorted. What kind of desires would cause a jungle to appear? The place does have a wild feel to it. Maybe it means that the palace owner is acting on baser impulses, without regard for the ethics of civilized society?

“Uh… Ashley? I see something moving!” Anja whimpers.

“Right… we should get out of here. We’ve been loitering too much,” I say.

And then, I suddenly feel something grabbing me by the ankle. Before I can respond, I feel it tug on me, causing me to fall on my face. Whatever it is must’ve gotten Anja too, as I hear her screaming from in front of me.

I feel myself being dragged into the trees, so I quickly scramble to an upright position. Some type of green vine is lassoed around my ankle. I grab my sword and use it to slice through the vine, and then kick myself free.

I quickly get to my feet and look around. Anja is gone now, but I can see a path through the trees of ruffled grass and broken branches, which means that she must’ve been dragged away by a vine. Without wasting any time, I hurry in the direction she was taken.

And so there I was, being dragged through the jungle by a force I could not see, terrified for my life, my head bumping into trees and my face being scratched by branches and leaves.

Eventually, it drags me into a clearing, far away from where I was just talking to Ashley. I see my assailant; a bunch of disembodied vines, which are now shooting out of the surrounding jungle from every direction and tying up my arms and legs, leaving me feeling extremely vulnerable and viscerally uncomfortable. It’s then that I hear a hissing voice from every direction at once, which bizarrely sounds slightly familiar:

“Excellent, now I’ve got you alone. Your armored friend isn’t going to save you. I’ve dragged you where nobody can see or interrupt…”

“Let me go, whatever you are!” I shout. “I do not like this one bit!”

“And miss out on this opportunity? I’ve been waiting for someone small and defenseless like you to wander onto my playground for quite a while. Now just be a good girl and stay put until I can be there in the flesh. Not like you have a choice…”

Nope. Noooope. I’m not letting this shit happen.

...Is what I would love to say right now, but I have no idea how the hell to get out of this. I utterly lose control and start screaming, every ounce of my fear pouring from my mouth in a shrill, terrible cry for Ashley or literally anyone to come help me before this creep arrives.

“Nobody’s going to hear you,” the hissing voice says. “But go ahead and continue screaming, it really helps set the mood…”

The vine starts pulling my legs apart so that they’re more spread out. Something kind of seems to snap within me at that moment… unfortunately, not in any kind of helpful way. I find that my voice goes hoarse, and my limbs just sort of freeze up. Damn it, no! Not the paralysis response! This is fucking hopeless…

However, amid my despair, I feel a strange, other feeling… And suddenly I remember something. Didn’t Ashley say something about having a Persona? She never really explained it, but… I need help. I literally don’t care who or what gives it. Anything that’s in there, or out there, or whatever, please…

Amazingly, I hear a voice within my head that’s not my own. It sounds like… an effeminate man.

Why hello there Anja, he says. I’ve been waiting for you to call on me.

Uhh, hi, I think back (this is weird.) Who exactly are you…?

I’m the part of you that you keep hidden away. I am your inner power, your spirit of rebellion. You called for me; does this mean that you’re finally ready to accept me?

I gain a sudden clarity of mind. This situation is seriously wrong. There’s no way in hell I’m gonna let this stand.

Yes, I accept, I think decisively.

Good, says the male voice. Yes, this is excellent. I feel your resolve. Come on now… And it's at this moment that I feel something change.

Now, I’m in an area surrounded by greenery- but it’s different from the jungle. This place feels much more peaceful. I find myself on my knees in front of a small pool of water. I look at my reflection in the water for a while, seeing my own brown eyes stare back at me.

Then, I hear the same voice as before, only this time it’s across from me. It says, “So… you believe that it is your time… to choose what is right, rather than what is easy…”

I look up from the pool, seeing who I’ve been speaking with for the first time… and this causes my cheeks to immediately flush bright red.

Across from me is a man… an absolutely gorgeous man, with flowing blonde hair, naked except for a sort of curtain blocking his midriff, and, most interestingly, a bed of daffodils growing out of the top of his head. He’s casually leaning against a tree. I’m temporarily at a loss for words, and just stare for a while, going against my usual etiquette standards. He doesn’t seem to mind, however.

“Teehee… Answer a question for me, Anja. What are you doing?”

“Uh… sitting by a pool.”

“No, with your life. What is the point of keeping yourself isolated like this? Why is it that you have all these ideals which you hold strongly, and all these changes you want to make, yet you never pursue them?”

“Well, there’s not exactly much I can do right now, is there?”

“Sure there is. You could be doing research. You could be engaging with others and strengthening your views with new viewpoints. Instead, you are like this pool; a motionless body of water, with nothing flowing in or out. And if left sitting long enough, pools will become stagnant and infested with algae.”

I look at my reflection in the pool again and frown. “That’s mean,” I say defensively.

“It’s true, though. Remember, I am your inner self; I am only saying things that you already know to be true. And besides all of that, the existence of this world opens up even more opportunities for you.”

I look up excitedly. “You think so?”

“Well, you think so, at least,” he says cheekily.

“Actually… that makes me wonder something. If you’re my inner self, why are you a guy?”

“I only take the form of your cognition of power.”

I frown again. “Are you saying that I’m like, secretly a misogynist?”

“No... You’re thinking about this way too hard, Anja… It just means that I represent something that you value or want to change about yourself.”

I laugh, feeling stupid. “Right, sorry. I do tend to think too hard about stuff, I guess…”

I stand back up. “Alright. Enough questions, I’m ready to do this.”

He grins at me. “Very good. We will form a pact. If you are ready to accept the responsibility that has been thrust upon you, I will lend you my power.”

“Hook me the fuck up, I’m in!”

Though I am in the grasp of the vines, my body begins trembling, moving so forcefully that I can’t be held still. As if following instructions I had agreed on long ago, I reach up to my face, where a white mask has formed, and I rip it straight off. For a moment, the pain is so intense that I can’t help but to scream… But then, I am engulfed in blue flames, which burn away all of the vines; I can feel the relief of my limbs being set free. When the fire is gone, I am wearing a curious outfit; a red dress, covered on the back by a thick fur coat, and a tight necklace of small pearls around my neck. In my hands is some kind of gun with a long muzzle and a huge handle right past the trigger.