Complete stranger: is as surprised as they are! Well, slightly less surprised at the impossibility, more at the event happening to him -

He glances around, wary.

He's standing on a strange sort of floor made up of light brown panels. The panels are arranged like an aesthetic puzzle, with panel-sized gaps revealing pools of water or white sand in which tiny ornamental trees and decorative rocks have been planted.

The walls to either side of him are painted with a mural of Japanese landscape, containing mountains and scaled-up versions of the tiny trees. The room is lit by round, glass lamps arrayed neatly across the ceiling.

On one side of the room is a polished wooden platform. A pale girl in green robes kneels in the center before a small podium. She has surreptitiously closed the book that rests on the podium and is watching him carefully.

Opposite her, across the floor puzzle, is -- this turns out to be a very large room. There are a dozen men in suits populating dark wooden benches. The benches are tiered, built into stairs that lead up to a much longer portion of room containing rows and rows of bookshelves.

All of the men are staring at their unexpected guest, alarmed. The oldest one there, sitting on the bottom tier, grey haired with alarming spiky eyebrows, rises to his feet looking affronted. "How did you get in here! How dare you slink into my private property during this private event, are you a thief?"

" - I don't know how I'm here, and I didn't intend to come here. Not a thief."

Old man seems unconvinced. “What does it mean, that you didn’t intend to come here? You are here! Do you expect I’ll allow you to rampage my library simply because you claim you don’t know how you —“ He breaks off and shakes his head. “Absurd. If you aren’t a thief, what is it you’re after?”

Hideko takes advantage of this disruption to begin quietly fanning herself, still watching closely.

"Figuring out where I am and then going home."

"You are in my library. In my mansion. On the outskirts of Kuwana City, if you're that daft. Where's your home, boy?"

(It's technically not his mansion. But it is his library, and the technicality means next to nothing.)

Hideko watches the other men in the room. Some of them seem intrigued, ranging from bemused to affronted, leaning forwards as though trying to take a closer look at the boy's explanation. Others are shifty and glancing at each other, concerned that some sort of stealthy sabotage is afoot and they're all about to be either sent to prison or robbed blind, or both.

"I don't recognize 'Kuwana City.' I'm from Ĝešil-Iri, on Zikum-Anubda, part of Mes-Kalam."

Sigh. "That's gibberish. You've offered no explanation from how you got here, from -- wherever Mes-Kalam is supposed to be. Are you just planning to squat on my property until you figure out where you're intending to be? Because I won't allow it. Not unless you have money -- real money! Not some gibberish Gesil-ibum money -- or some manner of valuable skill, which at this point I would find surprising."

On the one hand, a random stranger materializing in his library feels like a threat, which he dislikes. But he actually doesn't recognize the style of the young man's clothes, which makes him... interesting. And Kouzuki does like interesting things.

"Don't know how it got here. Last I was aware, I was in my house."

"Huh.

And so what are your immediate plans? Other than holding up my auction."

"Auction?"

"...yes. The auction." He gestures at Hideko. "Hold it up for him."

She lifts the book from her small podium and holds it up, eyes lowered demurely. The cover of the book looks expensive, but conveys no information about the manuscript's contents.

"The girl reads from the rare manuscripts that I auction, to conjure more vivid images and better impart the books' worth. These men here are all appreciators of such art."

"Uh huh. And people are nervous about this because...?"

He used to be a detective before taking parental leave. He can practically smell the wariness about the law on them. Not that he really cares, most laws are pretty damn stupid, but he's getting an odd feeling.

Several of the men abruptly look More Nervous. Kouzuki scowls.

"Because everything here is quite expensive and irreplaceable, and some young miscreant just appeared out of nowhere as though ready to wreak havoc!" he blusters. "Would you not be nervous if an intruder barged into your home and your private affairs?" 

"Eh, depends on what else was going on."

"What else do you think is going on?"

"With me or with you?"

"I am interested to hear what you think with is going on with regards to any aspect of this situation. Be that how you got here, or what you think we gentlemen have to be nervous about, or what you would hypothetically be doing when someone burst into your home."

"I wasn't trying to teleport, so I figure someone else moved me. I don't have many enemies anymore, but it might have been someone who doesn't like me. There are a lot of things you could be nervous about. If someone randomly appeared in my home I'd probably be reading or looking after my children, and I'd probably take them to the nearest community office so someone else could bother getting them home. If they were fleeing somewhere and didn't want to interface with the law I might offer to help them keep moving to somewhere safer, depending on why they were fleeing."

"What does that mean, to 'teleport'?"