[A/N : And from here the rewrite will start]
I woke reluctantly, burying my face deeper into what I assumed was my pillow while a sleepy groan escaped my lips. Every inch of my body protested against the idea of waking up this early, especially when the morning air felt unusually cold against my skin.
My eyes remained stubbornly shut as I reached around with one hand, trying to pull my duvet back over myself. Instead of finding the familiar warmth that usually cocooned me, my fingers grasped nothing but empty air, making me frown in irritation.
"Ugh... where's my blanket?" I mumbled groggily, my voice thick with sleep.
"It's freezing... Who stole my duvet this early in the morning...?"
Still refusing to open my eyes, I curled into myself, hoping to trap whatever warmth remained around my body. The surface beneath me felt strangely uneven, far lumpier than my mattress, but my sleep-addled brain simply dismissed it as me somehow ending up on the edge of the bed during the night.
"Mom..." I grumbled under my breath while rubbing my face against what should have been a soft pillow. "Five more minutes..."
My nose twitched almost immediately afterward as an unfamiliar scent drifted toward me. At first it was faint enough to ignore, but with every passing second it grew stronger until the smell became impossible to overlook.
The odor struck like a physical blow. It was a revolting mixture of rotten food, mold, damp paper, stale water, and something so putrid that my stomach instantly churned in protest. My eyes snapped open as I instinctively recoiled, only for my entire body to freeze.
Instead of my bedroom ceiling, I found myself staring up at a cloudy gray sky. Torn bags fluttered gently above me while rusted metal scraps and broken wooden planks surrounded my body. My hands were buried inside piles of damp garbage, and pieces of crumpled newspapers clung to my sleeves.
"...Huh?" escaped my lips in a tiny whisper as my brain completely failed to process what my eyes were seeing.
For several long seconds, I simply stared blankly into the sky, convinced I was still dreaming. My heartbeat began to quicken as I slowly pushed myself upright, only to hear the disgusting squelch of soaked trash shifting beneath me. Every movement released another wave of nauseating stench that invaded my nose, making me gag violently.
"W-What...?" I muttered, frantically looking around.
Mountains of garbage stretched in every direction, broken furniture lay scattered nearby, and swarms of buzzing flies hovered over heaps of rotting waste. There was no sign of my room, no familiar walls, no bed, no house—nothing that should have been there.
"No... no, no, no..." I whispered as panic rapidly replaced the lingering drowsiness. My breathing became shallow while my eyes darted wildly from one direction to another, desperately searching for something that made sense.
Had I been kidnapped? Was this some elaborate prank? Had I somehow sleepwalked here? None of those explanations sounded remotely possible, yet they were still more believable than what I was seeing. Just last night I had climbed into my own bed after scrolling through some Pokémon videos until I could keep my eyes open.
I vividly remembered pulling my blanket over myself before drifting to sleep. So how... how had I woken up inside a mountain of garbage?
My heart hammered painfully against my chest as I stumbled to my feet, nearly slipping on a pile of damp refuse beneath my shoes. My breathing grew faster with every passing second while countless questions flooded my mind faster than I could answer them.
"Where am I?"
Fear settled heavily inside my chest as the impossible reality finally sank in. I hadn't simply woken up somewhere unfamiliar. Somehow, in the span of a single night's sleep, my entire world had vanished, leaving me stranded in a place I had never seen before.
I swallowed the rising panic and forced myself to take a deep breath, even though doing so filled my lungs with the nauseating stench of rotting waste. Standing here and freaking out wasn't going to accomplish anything.
If there were people nearby, then maybe they could tell me where I was and how I had somehow ended up in the middle of this disgusting landfill. I just checked my pockets and there was nothing which was to be expected as he was in the night attire.
Who keeps money there? No, at first I need to find a road and hope to see some signs.
Clinging to that tiny shred of hope, I began making my way over the uneven heaps of garbage, carefully avoiding puddles of foul-smelling sludge that threatened to swallow my feet with every step.
As I climbed over a mound of torn sacks and worm eaten wood, movement finally caught my eye. A small group of people, dressed in patched and worn-out clothes, were digging through the piles of rubbish. Some carried sacks slung over their shoulders while others sorted through broken tools, bottles, scraps of cloth, and pieces of metal that looked worthless to me.
None of them paid much attention to the overwhelming smell surrounding them. It was almost as if they had grown completely accustomed to living in a place like this.
I hesitated for a moment before gathering my courage and walking toward them. As I drew closer, their conversation gradually became clearer. The first few words made me freeze in place.
My eyes widened as I instinctively listened harder. They... they were speaking Japanese. Not broken phrases or random words I recognized from anime, but complete, natural sentences.
Somehow, impossibly, I understood every single word they exchanged as though it were my native language. My heart skipped a beat. Wait... what? Since when can I understand Japanese? I never learned it!
That impossible realization nearly made me stop walking altogether, but my need for answers quickly won over my confusion. Taking another few steps, I cleared my throat to get their attention. The nearest man looked up from the pile of scrap he had been sorting, followed by several others who turned their gazes toward me.
Their eyes lingered on my clothes for a few moments. I was still wearing a bit worn out pajama sets, and thus it looked quite looked in the garbage heap. They exchanged brief glances with one another, clearly finding my appearance unusual, but thankfully none of them commented on it.
"E-Excuse me," I asked, surprised once again that fluent Japanese left my mouth as naturally as breathing. "Can you tell me where I am?"
The workers looked at one another again before one of the older men scratched his stubbled chin and answered in a matter-of-fact tone.
"You're in Gray Terminal."
I blinked several times, convinced I had misheard him.
"...Gray Terminal?"
The name meant absolutely nothing to me. It sounded more like a train station than a place filled with mountains of garbage. I searched my memories as fast as I could, but nothing even remotely resembling that name came to mind. Seeing my blank expression, the old man frowned slightly, apparently wondering how someone standing in the middle of the place could fail to know where he was.
"I'm... sorry," I said, my confusion only deepening. "I meant... What's the name of this place?"
This time every single one of them paused what they were doing. Several pairs of eyes stared at me as though I had just asked the most ridiculous question imaginable. One younger woman even tilted her head in confusion before looking toward the older man, silently asking whether I was serious. Their expressions made the knot in my stomach tighten even further.
After an awkward silence, the older man finally answered.
"...The Goa Kingdom."
The world seemed to stop.
My breathing hitched as those two words echoed inside my head over and over again.
Goa Kingdom.
No...
That couldn't be right. There was only one place I had ever heard called the Goa Kingdom, and it didn't exist.
It was the kingdom on Dawn Island.
The kingdom from One Piece.
The words refused to register no matter how many times they echoed inside my head. Goa Kingdom. My mouth opened slightly, yet no sound came out. This had to be some kind of elaborate joke. There was no such place in the real world. It only existed in a fictional story that I had watched and read countless times.
My breathing became uneven as I stared blankly at the people before me, desperately waiting for one of them to laugh and admit they were messing with me. Nobody did.
Instead, something else changed.
The confusion on a few of their faces slowly disappeared, replaced by an expression that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
Their eyes drifted over my pajamas once more, lingering on the clean fabric despite its worn appearance. Then they moved to my feet, my hands, and the rest of my body as though silently judging my worth. The atmosphere grew noticeably heavier, and instinct alone made me take an unconscious step backward.