When Kyoko woke up the next day, she was worried that the entire day before was just a dream. I mean who would blame her? She found a magic gem after dreaming about it, and then she was approached by a talking ferret who gave her a mission to help save a magical world that she’d never even heard of before? That kind of thing only happened in stories, not real life. At least that’s what she thought, but the gem was still there, lying on her nightstand right beside her bed. The glistening blue gem, encrusted into the silver necklace. Well, if that’s still real, then maybe Takeo was too… And maybe she’d actually get to see what he looked like today too. She promised to meet him just at the edge of town.

    “Well that’s enough thinking about it! Let’s hop to it! If it is all real, today’s gonna be exciting!” Kyoko hyped herself up as she sat up from her bed, hopping to her feet with an enthusiasm unheard of after just waking up. She threw on her clothes for the day, tossing her pajamas in the hamper, and then finally picked up the gem, putting it into her pocket. She ran downstairs, her parents already set up for breakfast.

    “Hey sweetie! Are you off in a rush somewhere?” Her mother asked, a curious smile painted on her face.

    “Oh, yeah! I promised that I’d meet Satoko nice and early so we could get some work done on our treehouse.” She thought of the first excuse that came to her head. Thankfully it wasn’t the first time that she and Satoko had met early, so it was an easy enough excuse to believe.

    “Just be careful, we don’t need you in a cast, because you couldn’t slow down and you fell on your arm again.” Her dad chuckled, holding out a few pieces of his plate of food to Kiyomi, who quickly wraps them up in some tupperware and stows them into a brown bag, holding it out to Kyoko.

    “Just take some breakfast to eat, okay? If you’re gonna be running around like that all day, you’re going to need your energy!” Kiyomi gave a playful flex of her arm after handing the food off to her daughter. Then she returned to the food and started to fill out a plate for herself, now that she knows Kyoko won’t be joining them.

    “Definitely! Thanks guys, I’ll be back later today. Love you both!” She quickly spat out, taking the bag and tucking it into her backpack, running up to each of her parents and giving them a peck on the cheek. The pair chuckled as their energetic little girl had run out the house, with just as much momentum as when she was stalled by them.

    After racing out of the house, Kyoko quickly zoomed to the outskirts of town to see if Takeo was in fact waiting for her like they had planned. After the jog, she finally started to slow down at the edge of Palmont. She put a hand above her eyes to block out the sun, while looking around to try to see something resembling a mustard yellow ferret. Only a moment later, she felt a tap on her shoulder behind her, a young man only a centimeter or two taller than herself with a similarly colored yellow head of hair smiled at her. He was dressed up in a beautiful garment that was clearly made for someone of a high social standing.

    “Hello, Kyoko. It’s a fine morning in your city, isn’t it?” His voice was the very same as last night, but Kyoko was having a hard time containing her excitement that all of this was actually real. So much so that she didn’t know what to say next, taking her silence for confusion, Takeo tilted his head to the side. “What? As I told you, I’m not actually a ferret… Oh perhaps you’re still waking up from your sleep, my apologies.” He bowed his head formally in an apologetic gesture. Quickly recomposing herself, Kyoko shook off the apology, waving her arms to reassure him.

    “No, no, no! You don’t have to apologize. I was just… well there was a part of me that was a little bit worried that this might have not been real is all. But it is, and you’re here, and I have the gem, and… and… we’re going searching for even more of them!” She fired off her words like a machine, barely pausing to take any kind of breath between them. “I’m just so excited! A real mission, a quest! Just like in the stories!” Takeo was clearly caught off guard by just how enthusiastic that she was, but let out a small giggle in response.

    “If you can maintain this kind of enthusiasm throughout the search, I’m sure that we’ll find all of our gems in no time!” He looked out towards the center of Palmont. “Not to cut your excitement short, but I assume all this means you’re ready to get going?”

    “Definitely! Just point me in a direction and I’ll search it high and low!” She nodded her head, pumping her fist to show off her enthusiasm.

    “Alright, well since people don’t know me here in town, I was hoping that you would be able to handle asking around to see if there has been anything strange that anyone has seen. Even if it’s not a gem, it could point us in the right direction.” He turned his focus to the woods. “I’m going to be searching in there to see if any other gems landed there, considering that’s where you found yours.”

    “Sounds good to me! Oh, then I should tell you where mine and Satoko’s super secret hideout is.” She looked left and right to make sure that no one else was around to overhear her.

    “Satoko?” Takeo asked with curiosity in his tone.

    “Oh right! She’s my best friend. She was there with me when I found the gem at the hideout.” She explained to Takeo. “She actually held me steady so I wouldn’t fall from the treehouse while I reached out to grab it.”

    “And have you told her about everything?” He didn’t seem concerned with his line of questioning, only curious how much she’s told.

    “No, I haven’t seen her yet since I went home last night.” She paused, considering her words. “Wait… should I not?”

    “Nothing like that. You are free to tell anyone that you think should know…” He looked at her, his eyes more serious now, instead of the gentle and kind expression normal to him. “However, just be aware that whoever you tell could be a part of this, and the dangers that it entails, okay? Tell who you trust, and only those who you think could handle themselves.”

    “Oh… I guess there would be danger in a quest like this…” She hadn’t really considered the dangerous parts of the mission. Her youthful enthusiasm kept her far more focused on the idea that she was even involved in something important like that, instead of the more practical parts.

    “Indeed. I would not even consider bringing you into this, if I thought that you might not be able to handle it. But your passion, and your excitement, lend themselves wonderfully to your pure heart. I was sent out for many reasons, and my judgment of characters was one of them. And because of that, I’m putting my trust in you to decide what you think is for the best, including telling who you think you should.” He finished explaining with a bow. “You’re going to be a great asset.”

    “I… Right. Thank you, Takeo. I promise that I won’t let you down with any of this. I’ll do my best to find those gems, and I won’t make you worry about me!” She was more nervous now, but her voice still held her normal enthusiasm. “Let’s get to work!”

    “Indeed!” He smiled at her renewed vigor, heel turning towards the woods and giving a wave to Kyoko.

    Kyoko took her queue to head back into town, first she decided to start with talking to people, instead of just searching blindly. She stopped many people as she went down the streets. She asked them if they’d seen anything strange. And while many of them had different anecdotes of very mundane strange things, such as cats meowing late at night and keeping people up at night, or someone’s pipe leaking, flooding their basement, to which Kyoko apologized for the inconvenient occurrence. But none of those really gave her any kind of direction to search for a magical gem. That was until one person had mentioned that there had been some strangers arriving in town suddenly. She had to wonder if he was talking about Takeo or not, though he didn’t seem to have any real descriptions. She was starting to get frustrated. Her search wasn’t able to turn up even one location that would at least maybe offer a possible gem. She didn’t expect it to be so hard, but realistically, she didn’t know what to expect at all. Taking a break, she took a seat on a park bench, just trying to think of who might have some kind of information for her. While she was lost in thought, she saw the familiar figure of Satoko stepping in front of her, leaning down and looking at Kyoko curiously.

    “Hey… I went over to your house to see if you were ready to figure out what the gem thing was, but your parents told me that you’d already come out to meet with me? And then I see you running around talking to people that you normally don’t… Is everything okay?” Her voice was calm, but worried.

    “Umm… Yeah, I was looking for…” She stopped herself, thinking about what Takeo told her. Kyoko wasn’t sure what to do. She wanted to tell Satoko, but she didn’t want to put her into any kind of danger. “I was just getting an early head start, you know? Nothing though. Seems like no one really knows about this thing.”

    “Right… So why did you lie to your parents then? Or… why not make it not a lie and actually come to see me?” She took a seat next to Kyoko. “You’ve never been a great liar, at least not to me, Kyoko. If it’s personal I won’t pry into it, but if it’s something I can help with…”

    “Maybe, I mean… you can, but I don’t want to…” She shook her head, “I don’t want you to get hurt.” She let out, though she at least wanted to tell the truth about that.

    “Get hurt? From what? I don’t think anyone’s going to try to mug a kid like us to get a necklace.” She tried to offer a comforting smile, but knew that it wasn’t really going to provide much help here. “Did you find out something about the necklace? Is it something really serious?”

    “Yeah… you could say that.” She nodded, with her head held down. Satoko put a comforting arm around her shoulder.

    “It’s okay, I’ll keep you safe, whatever it is, okay? You don’t even have to tell me. But that was our promise to each other when we first became friends, right? I keep you safe, you keep me safe. If you’re keeping me safe by not telling me, then I’ll keep you safe by doing whatever it takes.” She pulled her friend into a hug, making Kyoko realize just how good of a friend that Satoko had always been to her. To Kyoko, it wouldn’t be fair to not tell her anything about the gems, or Takeo. And she did trust her, more than anyone in the world. She was smart… Smarter than Kyoko ever thought that she herself was.

    “No…” She mumbled, letting out a deep sigh as Satoko comforted her.

    “Huh? No to what?” She was confused, caught off guard by her sudden denial to… whatever it was that she was talking about.

    “I should tell you. Last night I found out a lot about the gems.” She reached into her pocket and looked down into the blue reflection of her face. “I met someone who told me that it’s a really important thing called an Elemental Gem and… well I don’t have all the details, but me finding it means that I have the power to help stop something really bad from happening.” She tried to recall all the information that Takeo told her, but some parts were coming up blank for her. “There’s this… other world, and an evil empire, and these gems have powers that they give to their wielders, it was like something out of a storybook, Satoko, I’m telling ya!”

    “Wait… look if this is just some kind of an exc-” Satoko tried to brush this all off, not sure if her friend was just coming up with stories like she often would.

    “No! Satoko I promise this is all real, okay? I know I have an active imagination, and I know that sometimes I exaggerate things, but this is 100% real.” She looked into her best friend's eyes, a dead serious expression on her face. “I… I didn’t want to tell you, because I didn’t want you to be brought into something that could hurt you.”

    “Okay…” She nodded her head. She wanted to at least try to believe her friend, even if it was difficult to wrap her head around. “But who told all of this to you?”

    “His name is Takeo, he came into my room disguised as a ferret, he’s out in the woods looking for one of the gems himself right now. He told me to only tell people that I trust more than anyone else.” She nodded her head confidently.

    “Disguised as a… And you just trusted this… strange ferret man?” She asked, baffled by her friend’s naivety.

    “I mean… he was a magic ferret man! What was I supposed to do?” She responded with indignation.

    “I… suppose I can’t argue with that logic.” She pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed. “Okay… so all of this happened. There’s an evil kingdom we have to fight. And these gems are the key to that. I’ll try to understand all of this, but maybe we should speak with this Takeo? Perhaps he can better lend insight… or I can see if he’s a liar trying to get you wrapped up into something bad…” She whispered the second statement to herself, seemingly unheard by Kyoko.

    “Yeah! Maybe he’s found some kind of lead too!” She responded happily. “Come on, I’ve already wasted enough time, he might need our help getting it!” Her energy soon returned, once again highlighting her natural enthusiasm.

    “Alright.” As Satoko rose to her feet she looked at her friend already jogging off towards the end of the city and shook her head before starting to catch up with her. She whispered to herself, unsure of the entire situation, “I really hope you know what we’re getting into Kyoko, always throwing caution to the wind.”