I don't think being forgotten is a bad thing. You have no more debts. People won't have to care about you, and you won't have to worry about that. Being forgotten means I can be free. At least, a little bit freer. Responsibilities sucked. Life can move on without a person or two.

But life isn't about forgetting things. I know it sounds really corny, it is.

I don't really think about being forgotten anymore, trying to get away from the temple that's my body. To be honest, I'm not sure where to start with this. It was a strange set of days, and then years passed by since. Every now and then, I look back and the only thing I can think to myself was, "Did I go crazy?" I hardly believe it despite the memories still remaining in my head. I wasn't intent on letting it be known, but...I guess I should start writing.

…

I still remember it. Near-death, well...Should've been death experience. But I doubt you care because I'm still alive. I had every waking cell in my body give me a flash experience, a message that, in a unison way, told me that I was about to die right then and there in the likes of some crazy driver on another part of the streets of Louisiana. The aged nightmare of becoming another statistic from the likes of a guy who made a bad decision. Really sucks, doesn't it?

Then I woke up.

"Oh my God, I'm dead...Wait...What?" I stated, panicked. I began quickly glancing around the area, expecting remnants of an car accident. Wait. This didn't look like death to me. It was a forest, and a forest that I couldn't quite grasp with my head either. I wasn't sure if it was possibly a concussion that transferred over when I got hit or just the perks of this forest.

I looked around, mostly at myself first. T-shirt, jeans, socks, shoes. I felt at my head. The familiar feeling of hair was there. I looked down to see grass blowing with a breeze, a breeze that brushed against my face like bristles. It wasn't right, I thought.

"Okay…What just happened?" I asked myself in astonishment. I remember being in our family's Toyota Tundra truck, on an interstate on a trip home from Texas. We were on the exit, and a passing car ran a red light. The next thing I know, I could hear the deafening sound of brakes screeching against the road, then a collision of two hunks of metal, and…Yeah.

Well, I'm here now. I thought again. I then realized a weird feeling. I was speaking differently, and it didn't feel right. "I am Alan. I am a boy," I tested out.

I was speaking a different language. Either a concussion forced me to relearn my entire native language, or I just went through some kind of transformation.

"Shouldn't I be speaking English? Or Vietnamese? What am- Hm." I said a few words to see if I really was speaking something different.

"I. Wait. Stop. Thank you. I'm speaking Japanese," I realize, seeming to have a familiarity with some of the words. Of course, surprise was one of the main expressions plastered on my face. What else was new? What else changed about me? Did I reincarnate?

I presumed that this Japanese was a substitute for my native language, and it just felt like speaking English. For the time being, the environment was my main focus. The forest was definitely strange and unfamiliar. The trees looked different from the ones I used to see back home, and there was a very strange distortion to it. As if...It was giving the illusion that it was never-ending and ominous. It's hard to explain unless someone was there to experience it with me. Vertigo would be a good start. Inverted free-falling, a never-ending open area of trees...Something along those lines.

There were vast amounts of flowers and fungi around, but each one looked stranger than the next. None of them brought any memories to me. The forest suddenly seemed much terrifying to me once I realized I had no way to figure out my environment without face-checks. I checked in my pockets for anything of familiarity. Nothing except lint.

Then I looked up to the sky. Blue skies, orange sun. Hey, now, don't blind yourself. I thought to myself. However, I started seeing strange colors. Various patterns of a brighter blue, yellow, green, and red strobed in the blue horizon. Many of them seemed to be getting closer. I thought I had a headache or something.

I then immediately stumbled back, watching as the colors flew much closer, appearing as a sort of yellow star, which clashed harmlessly onto the ground..

I jumped into cover behind a larger set of trees. More stars of similar color and size clashed with the ground, and hit the tops of the trees as well. Are they bullets? I thought in my mind, somewhat panicked. I looked up through the gaps the trees' leaves left. More and more colors was filling the blue sky.

Then the realization hit me.

This is danmaku.

….

But how? I should've been on Earth, in America, casually complaining about how the end of school should be coming sooner until the last day! And here I am, in a forest, watching magical barrages of bullets shaped like stars hit the ground like artillery.

Well, artillery isn't that quiet.

I'm fairly sure two people are dueling it out, using this...bullet hell style. Maybe I am still on Earth…

So then I thought...Maybe I was in that world. Gensokyo. The forest with the strange distortion, and the stranger flowers, what if it was the same forest? The Forest of Magic? The hundreds of bullets in the air? It's not like it was impossible. After all, I was alive, but who's going to believe a guy who thought he was supposed to die that he managed to fall into the likes of a video game universe?

Corny, isn't it?

I needed to dig deeper for confirmation, and to do that, I needed to find a way out, or rather, a way to get even more lost, one would say. I looked around, careful not to step on any strange flowers or mushrooms, and began traversing carefully through the trees.

I need to think this through carefully. I began planning in my head.

If this is really Gensokyo, then the first thing I need to do is find a friendly. This...place isn't exactly the most human-friendly out there. No thanks to its creator. The one time I wanted to wake up in a world that I would like to live in, I end up getting mostly the opposite. I have no power here, I'm a human just like any other regular human, and I'll end up getting massacred or eaten by some powerful, or even weaker youkai.

I inwardly groaned as I managed to pass through the forest. It's a good thing I wasn't that hungry or thirsty, so it wasn't like I was a homeless bum. I needed to stay calm, and plan ahead. The Forest of Magic had at least two inhabitants, and they were...friendly, I think.

I spotted a nearby presence, what appeared to be a doll. It was hovering around, looking as if it was patrolling the area. I decide to approach it, slowly at first.

How do you talk to a doll, you might wonder?

"Uhm...Hi," I tried out. The doll inspected me, moving in different places around me as if to judge me. It then took out a marker, and began writing on the ground.

Oh...Crap. Hiragana. There's no way I can...Uh…?

Wait, I can read all of this? ...Lucky me. Resurrection doesn't seem like a bad thing now. It's so weird, it's like reading a regular book in English. I didn't think too much about it at the time. If I was able to speak and read Japanese, then I wasn't about to complain, considering where I was. My friends would've been a little jealous.

"Who...are...you…" I slowly read out quietly to myself as the doll wrote. The doll looked up at me, the marker also pointed in the same direction.

"I'm...Lost. I'm looking for a way out, thank you." May as well keep it simple, I thought to myself. I needed to find a friendly person, and I knew at least two people who would provide that role. I quickly looked down, noting the doll already writing.

"Stay at...You want me to stay at your house?" I realized that perhaps the puppet's owner was making an offer.

The doll nodded, confirming my thoughts.

"Yeah, sure, but...I want to find somewhere safer."

The doll nodded once more before the marker disappeared, taking me by surprise.

Guess that's this world's magic...Or something. I thought. Honestly, I didn't want to question anything. I wanted out of this forest.

The doll began flying, gesturing at me to follow it. I had to admit, for a puppet that looked like a tiny plush toy, its movements sure were humanlike. I continued following it with haste.

After a few minutes of what felt like power-walking in a straight line, there I saw it. A hut. It was a fairly big hut, but something about it seemed to throw me off. Then I noticed. Carvings and engravings rested on the roof of the hut, which formed a visible array of colors around it. Is it natural that I'm human and can see this?

The doll gestured toward me to continued following. I must've stood there, petrified by this magical shield I was just staring at.

Oh wait, it might be a bad thing if the puppeteer knows I can see it. I quickly followed the doll, which moved to the front door. I noticed there was a table outside, which chairs set upside down on top of it. It looked like a place to drink tea at.

The doll gestured to the door. "Uhm…Hello?" I said, knocking. After a few seconds, the door swung open, revealing the great puppeteer herself. The doll quickly flew by me and hovered over the new stranger's shoulder.

Alice Margatroid. She wore a pink-white dress over a blue apron. Her skin was pale, and had blonde hair which had a matching headband and ribbon. She held a black book wrapped with a pink ribbon, and she was also wearing black boots. Her blue eyes complimented her apparel, and her appearance overall reminded me of a doll. I noticed that I was taller than her by about half a head. She looked fairly human to me, and I was a bit surprised noticing how realistic she was.

"Hello," I heard her politely say. That is so weird, hearing her voice. She had a soft smile on her face as well, which is something I wasn't expecting. Maybe she was used to welcoming lost visitors.

"Hello, Miss," I replied, somewhat awkwardly. "Can I just come in?"

"I think that's the idea of inviting you to my house, yes," Alice replied jokingly, gesturing me inside.

I am not going to get used to these characters talking. I thought.

I walked inside, avoiding banging my head against the ceiling of the door, wondering how I managed to live this long without dying by stepping on a random pile of mushrooms.

The house itself wasn't small, but compared to back home with my family, it was like looking only at a living room. There were several bookshelves, but there was a kitchen in one corner, and another room that looked small enough to fit a bathroom. There was a closet which likely held most of her clothes, and some drawers and cabinets. There was a single table, likely only for being set for dinner, and it was fairly decorated with various arrays of dolls. There were two windows I saw, but several outside, above the other windows.

The dolls all looked like plush versions of the people in this world, though several of them shared the same appearance as the one I was looking out. It looked like Alice, but wearing a black apron, and having long blonde hair, with a red ribbon. Its eyes were simply two dots. It was cute, when there weren't about twenty different dolls gazing into your soul.

"Would you like some sandwiches while you rest?" I heard her ask from my right.

"Sure, thank you."

Alice nodded and moved to the kitchen. It was a fairly small kitchen, but it seemed enough for a one-man home. She has a refrigerator? She might even have a bathroom, too. Well, Gensokyo is behind on technology, but not that far behind.

Only the windows provided light, but it seemed to illuminate the room enough. I sat down on the nearest chair, watching as various dolls began moving around, setting the table with a large patterned cloth, and then fine china for tea, and finally plastic plates for sandwiches.

I looked at the sandwiches that Alice set on a separate plate. Sliced in triangles, with the crust perfectly gone. Inside was some salad, what looked like bologna, and maybe tomatoes. I tried a sandwich while one of the dolls poured my teacup with a steaming kettle.

"This sandwich is delicious, thank you," I complimented.

Damn, I had already started missing my own sandwiches.

"Thank you for the compliment, but let's cut to the chase. I imagine you're not from around here, correct?" Alice politely asked.

"That's true," I said, swallowing my food. "I'm from, uh...Not here."

"Well, this place is still on 'Earth', so for us, you're from the Outside World." Obviously, the clothes gave it off.

"Alright...So I'm an Outsider."

"Which isn't uncommon," Alice replied, sipping her tea. She glanced at me, and then toward my cup. "It's creamy black tea with coconut. I think you should try it."

"It has a nice smell," I commented, looking into the cup. I blew into the cup for several moments, before softly sipping it. It was pretty good, and I ignored getting my tongue melted.

"It's good, though I think this would go good with almond milk."

Alice nodded, rubbing her chin. "I'll take note of that," She commented simply. "So, continuing, it's actually a peculiar discovery, this occasion. Usually people are not transported here out of all places."

"It seems like the last place people would want to be...transported," I commented.

"I do hope the gap youkai is not up to her tricks again…You just suddenly appeared out of nowhere in the Forest."

"Wait, how did you know I woke up here?"

"Well, my doll just happened to find you, and I jumped to conclusions. I guess the first thing I should do is lead you to somewhere that's safer." She stared at me. "You're surprisingly accustomed to this."

I sighed. "It's not like I'm in an alien world, but at the same time...I don't know, I guess I'm used to being in forests. I'm just trying to adapt."

"It's hard to see what it's like in your shoes. I'll lead you to the shrine, and I think you'll be given a better explanation. You're only human, so anything in the forest could potentially do you harm." She has this voice that sounds like she's only in her late teens, but she speaks as if she's older, like an adult. As expected from a youkai.

"Thanks. I think I should know your name first. I'm Alan Vu."

"Alice Margatroid. Pleased to meet you, Vu."

"Same for you, Miss Margatroid. Am I going now?"

Alice looked through a nearby window. "Yes, let's go now. I think my friend is busy at the moment, but by the time I take you to the shrine, they'll be done."

I eventually nodded in reply. And so began a journey.

heya!

i'm reworking these chapters so they're easier to read and they follow more closely to the path i planned out for this fic

if you guys see any problems, then do let me know with a review

thank you