School was much noisier than he remembered, filled with more people than he'd interacted with for the past year, could he really do this?

As his thoughts swirled and filled with his anxieties, he felt his gut pool with the same dread that always came when he prepared to enter a singularity.

But thankfully he had experience in dealing with that emotion and ruthlessly stomped it down and honed it into the fierce determination that had served him well and helped him go through every singularity with Chaldea.

He could do this, he just had to breathe.

Breath in,

Breathe out.

He just had to breathe and go for it, he had already faced much worse than high school, much worse than trying to go back to his peers, whose faces and voices were already a blur to him, and trying to pretend that everything was normal.

That he, himself, was normal.

That he didn't face down Gods and Demons, Monsters of myth and legend with the Heroes and Villains that defined eras of humanity, that he had already faced wonders and horrors beyond compare that made everything in this modern era totally pale in comparison.

No, this was not a problem, he could do this.

He just had to try.

And so, with another deep breath, Ritsuka Fujimaru steeled himself and walked through the iron gates of his high school.

Ready to begin another journey.