He was there, on top of a skyscraper with a large footprint, the road barely visible as he looked down, and a huge, beautiful park flanked by other skyscrapers when looking down on the other side. The sun was bright and almost blinding, and a strange, but nice-feeling substance could be felt under his feet. All around, there were other skyscrapers, often having wide walkways between them, where Crona could occasionally see children playing on beautiful gardens high above the ground.

When Crona opened his eyes, he was somewhere else.

He flinched back instinctively as the light hit his eyes, the transition from dim indoor lighting to the bright light sun almost blinding. He opened his eyes with a wince and as his eyes adjusted, he took in the scene.

He was at the top of a skyscraper of some sort, built from some strange concrete-like material. A chill wind blew strands of hair across his face as Crona walked closer to the edge of the roof, and as he looked down he saw a large park surrounded by tall buildings, a meticulously-kept slice of nature growing in the heart of the city. Walkways connected the towers to allow foot traffic, and looking down he saw gardens on the roofs of many buildings, children playing in green spaces hundreds of feet above the ground.

It could have been any city on Earth. And yet, it seemed cleaner, more put together. It was like a picture of some futuristic city, not because of its technology (what little of it he could see), but because it seemed almost utopian.

It was also far too high up to jump down, even if he still had the black blood.

There must be another way down. A door or a rooftop access hatch, whoever built this place would have needed to have access to the roof somehow, even if just for maintenance. While he was loathe to travel through an unknown, probably-occupied building and draw unwanted attention to himself, it was his best way down to ground level. He could slip out a back entrance, and then-

The thought settled in his mind like a heavy stone. And then what?

For his entire life he had been forced to live in the short term. He planned and schemed, sure, but only to escape immediate problems. To escape the constant threats that surrounded his life. He had known for a long time that a future was denied to him. The very idea of living to see the next day had seemed like a fantasy to him, even now. But the next day had come, and the next, and the next. And now the future was here, and he didn't know where to go next. What to do next.

He was lost. And he was alone.

Crona stood there for some time, the cold wind blowing through his hair, the muffled sounds of the city reaching his ears. His mind whirled around that single thought.

Where do I go now?

A hatch opens, and a child, a girl wearing a white skirt, seemingly with a snake coiled around her arm, gets one look at Crona. "How could you have gotten here? I haven't seen you walking past anywhere. And who are you?"

Hearing the metallic creak of the hatch, Crona turned to look at the new arrival-

-snakes writhed beneath the girl's flesh in agitation, making the skin ripple and flow like cloth. Her golden, serpentine eyes were at odds with her cherubic, innocent expression, and when she opened her mouth and he heard her cruel, affectionate voice, it only confirmed what he already knew. Mother had returned-

-and came face to face with his worst nightmare.

Crona's heart leapt into his throat as whatever peace he had managed to find shattered instantly. He tried to school his expression -vulnerability was leverage he couldn't allow her to have- but no one could miss the way his dark eyes widened, the way they darted between the door and the girl as he searched for escape, like a cornered rat.

The girl said something he didn't catch as he stared at the dead woman come back to life. The monster who never quite seemed to stay dead. His mentor had slain her in the dungeons beneath the academy. Crona himself had pulled her from her host in the last battle. But that had been at the height of his power, surrounded by allies. Now he was alone. Now he was powerless.

And his blood kept still within his veins.

It was impossible, some small part of his mind kept repeating. Everything he knew, everything he thought he knew, told him so. He had killed Mother, watched her die with his own eyes. Watched her soul become the capstone in Ragnarok's evolution.

More than that, he had escaped. He had left that place behind. Left behind the needles and the basements and the battlefields.

Crona didn't even realize he was backing away until his heels tapped against the lip of the roof. For a split second he turned and looked over the edge, the ground far far away.

He was trapped.

The girl just waves her arm with the snake around, waiting for a reaction or response from Crona. "Am I doing something that's scaring you?"

Crona continues to press himself against the lip of the roof.

-It can't be her it can't be her it can't be her-

It can't be her. Now that the moment had passed, logic began to overtake the panic in his mind. It can't be Mother because Mother is dead. Dead and in a different world entirely. He watched her fade away himself.

And that snake in her hands probably wasn't one of Mother's at all. The color and proportions were all wrong, and on second glance he wasn't even sure it was a snake at all.

"Who are you?" He asked, letting the mask fall back over his emotions. "Where am I?"

"I'm Candace. This is a city named Heran Parents' City. There are lots of kids just like you living here." She hints at Crona to follow her inside, wanting to tell her parents about the new stranger who appeared from nothing.

"...Crona."

He debated telling her a fake name, but frankly, his name was the least noteworthy thing about him. If she would recognize the name she would have recognized his appearance.

"...what's a 'Parent's City'?"

"A city meant to care for and support the needs of parents and children. There's, like. More room for playing outdoors, family-sized apartments, a huge system of childminders to take the stress off, a more appropriate selection of medical services, redesigned streets and public places... there are a million little difference to make being a parent as comfortable and stress-free as possible."

"What?"

A city designed entirely for raising children? Crona wasn't sure how that worked, but he somehow doubted they had a need for trained murderers.

Lack of a legal identity and lack of a shared history in the world was a hell of a thing, but something he had gotten used to. But at least he had direction.

Assuming this girl wasn't Mother in disguise (something which seemed increasingly likely), he probably wasn't in any immediate danger. But he didn't have a legal identity here, nor much in the way of marketable skills, which strongly limited his options. He wasn't worried about food or shelter in the short term, he was used to having to steal and fight, and no matter how idyllic this place seemed it was bound to have its share of criminals.

But then what? Wander the streets forever?

And none of this changed the fact that he was stuck on a rooftop with a strange girl.

"Well, are you going to live here, or what? I think you should see my mom so we can find out what we should do here."

Well, it wasn't as if he had anything better to do.

"Um... okay? That would be... nice."

The girl opens a hatch on the floor of the roof, revealing a grey corridor with quite a few doors. "We'll have to take the elevator down a bit". She walks forward before finding a door that's notably wider, revealing a quite large and spacious elevator. She waits for Crona to come in before tapping two buttons and sending it rushing down quite quickly.

When the elevator finally stops, it reveals another corridor. The girl starts walking ahead of Crona. "My name's Candace, by the way. What's yours?"

"Crona."

He debates telling her his last name as well, or any of the other names he had been known by. Kishin. Demon Swordsman. Gorgon.

There was no way the girl would recognize any of those names, but it would have been the truth.

And he couldn't stand being associated with that woman. Not now.

She walks a bit further, eventually taking Crona past a classroom, with many chairs and tables. There's a book placed on each of the tables. She stops at a door, knocking on it, and a woman opens it, looking at Candace and Crona. "Who's that you brought here, Candace?" she asks, smiling gently at Crona.

Crona lets Candace take the lead, standing unobtrusively behind and to the right of the girl. He takes in everything with a blank expression and hollow eyes that seems to stare into the middle distance.

Was this a school of some sort? It wasn't like any school he had ever seen, although he had to admit his perspective was a bit skewed there. After all, the DWMA was a combat school for child exorcists, and he had never gotten to attend a civilian school.

The woman turns her head to look at Candace. "Who's walking with you, Candace?" "She's Crona, I don't know how she appeared to the roof. I want another new family member, I think she's nice."

The woman nods and looks at Crona. "Crona, that's a pretty name. Can you talk about where you came from? And who you are?"

"He." Crona thinks, but does not say. Its a common mistake, and not important right now.

"I'm from Nevada." Crona convincing seeming lie to explain how he was found on top of a skyscraper, but nothing believable came to mind. He doubted 'was teleported there' would be accepted as an excuse, and he wasn't sure it would be a good thing for him if it was. "I don't know where I am or how I got on the roof."

The next question took him aback, and he tilted his head slightly to the side as he thought it over.

Who was he?

There were many answers to that question. He was a Sword Meister. He was a demon god reborn. He was a monster. He was a victim. His scars defined him in more ways than one, simply because they were the only thing he had left. They were the only things that hadn't been taken away.

But that wasn't relevant here. Wasn't real here. He had been given another chance at life, to be more than what he had done and what had been done to him.

"I'm an orphan," Crona finally says, soft and quiet, the note of sorrow in his voice masking the complicated feelings he felt.

The woman nods. "Then, you'd want to be in our family, wouldn't you? We have room for one more. You'll get to play and have fun with other kids. Doesn't that sound great?"

"...sure."

Crona had never had a family before, not a real one. Thinking about it, he wasn't sure if he knew anyone who had a family either. Not in the traditional sense, at least.

He wasn't sure what to expect, but what more did he have to lose?

"Well, you'd want to see your dorm, wouldn't you? Please follow after me." She takes Crona along a corridor until finding a door labeled 41, opening it. Inside, there's a narrow room with a king-size bed, and a desk with a chair placed against the wall. There's a window with a view of a walkway, full of children playing and having fun, maybe 4 or 5 stories below. Then she opens the door to the bathroom, a room roughly the same size, with a toilet placed against one of the walls, a sink on the same wall, and a huge, square tub with a glass shower cabinet above it. There's also a small stack of thin wedges of soap, wrapped in plastic, on top of the sink.

"Welcome to your new home! We hope you'll be happy here."

Ah.

The dorm was far more spacious than he was used to, but it was still familiar territory.

Crona followed closely behind the woman (he refused to call her Mother), taking in everything with his customary empty gaze. In particular, and most notably, he takes interest in the windows and doors, the sizes of the openings, the quality of the locks, and their viability as entrances and exits.

They wouldn't stop a determined attacker, of course, even a mundane one. But they would serve as the last early warning he could get.

Once the short tour was over and his new guardian welcomed him to the dorm, Crona simply stared at her for a few moments with his blank, empty stare.

He was a bit lost for words here, out of his depth. Typically at this point the other person would give him his marching orders, or at least a class schedule. He figured she was looking for a response, but he wasn't sure quite what.

"...ah. Thanks," he said eventually.

Well, the doors aren't too special? The windows, on the other hand, are closer to glass walls than windows. The lock uses a cylindrical key that goes inside the lock; it looks like it'd be very tough to pick.

"Well, I'm sure you'll be happy with our little family, Crona!"

Mindy isn't sure about what she should do for Crona, really. The boy is so terrified, but he doesn't seem like he's wanting physical contact, so she doesn't know what to do reassure him. She feels that giving him space and stability is the big thing she can do for him. She quietly waits, expecting him to ask for some privacy before settling in.