“Gee, thanks,” I reply sarcastically. “I totally want to spend time talking to you about giant toads and bloody swords.”

He throws me a scathing glare. “What’s your name, anyway?”

“Hana. Hana Kim. And you’re Kris Wu, right?”

“How do you know my name?”

“Unfortunately, I learned your name about 10 minutes after I came to this school. So now that we have introductions out of the way, can you tell me what the hell happened this afternoon?”

Kris raises an eyebrow at me, obviously taken aback at my bluntness. "Rude, but yes, I suppose I should get to the point. That monster that we fought today was part of the Kado. Its purpose is to kill and devour organisms to gain chi."

“Wait, what's the Kado? And what’s so important about chi?” I ask. “I know you said that it’s power, but-,”

“Power is extremely important,” Kris replies in an oddly strangulated voice. “It’s… everything. When you’re fighting a member of the opposite force it’s the most important weapon you can have-,”

“What do you mean, force?”

Kris groans. “This is going to be long,” he mutters to himself. “Let me backtrack a bit. So basically, there are two forces in existence: the Hado and the Kado. Hado is good, Kado is bad. I’m a Hado fighter.”

I my head. "Just out of curiosity, why are you a fighter?" I ask. "How did you discover this Hado and Kado business anyway?"

His face darkens. "Let's just say that I've fought against the Kado for a long time." I choose not to question him further. 

"Basically the Hado and the Kado attempt to eliminate the opposite force. For the past few centuries, however, the Hado side has been winning, thanks to its fighters. So everything's safe." Kris concludes his little speech and leans back in his seat, concentrating on the road. 

I'm taken aback. That's... it? It's funny how an absolutely outrageous, crazy event such as what happened at lunch can have such a simple explanation. The thing is, I don't think I fully believe Kris. Why would entire organizations exist to fight just the occasional monster? I ask him this, and he (predictably) looks at me like I'm stupid. 

"You think the Hado and Kado are just little groups of people? Or businesses or something? Think again," he tells me scathingly. "They're forces. Like forces of nature, except bigger. They represent time, good, bad, matter, everything, and they've existed since the creation of the universe." 

"How do you know this, though? I've never heard anything in any of my history classes about these so-called forces, so how do I know you aren't lying?" I ask him suspiciously. Amusingly, Kris ends up banging his fist frustratedly on his steering wheel. 

"Stop laughing!" he snaps at me. "This is serious business. I'll prove it to you when we get to Headquarters." 

"Where's Headquarters located, in a tree house?" I . 

After an hour of driving, Kris and I finally reach our destination: the middle of nowhere. Everything's so silent you could probably hear a pin drop on the browning grass. The area looks dull and desolated, with not a single building in sight. How pleasant. 

Kris steers and parks his fancy car in the middle of an empty field. I look around, unimpressed. The sky’s dark and gloomy, foreboding clouds hanging in the air, and further up ahead a grassy knoll sits behind a small creek. Kris starts off towards the creek and I quickly follow behind him.

“Where are we going?” I ask curiously. “There’s nothing here.”

“You’ll see,” he replies vaguely. I snort, unsatisfied.

We reach the creek and Kris looks at me. “Try and step past the creek.” he says.

I’m a little confused and uncertain on why he’s making this such a big deal, but I casually jump across the flowing water… and then I feel it. A strange, not unpleasant buzzing in the bottom of my stomach.

“I had to see if you could get past the barrier,” Kris informs me, jumping over the water himself. “If your chi isn't at a certain level, then you won't be able to get across." 

“Wow. I feel special. I can jump across a trickle of water.”

“You are special," Kris replies, either oblivious to my sarcasm or choosing to ignore it. "You’re a Fighter of the force of Light now, Hani, and you’ll be required to train and work and be inducted and stuff.”

"Sounds fun. And it’s Hana.” I tell him irritably.

We climb the hill, and when we reach the top, my jaw drops. A large, formerly invisible building that’s the size of three suburban houses combined sits on the hill, painted in light shades of white and blue. Various people, their clothes ranging from professional attire to shorts and a t-shirt, bustle inside and outside the building, carrying equipment or speaking rapidly into a cell phone. As we get closer to the building I can make out a large royal blue banner draped across the front of the building with “Region 6: Upper Northeast” shimmering in gold font.

“Welcome to Region 6 Headquarters,” Kris announces, flourishing his arms in front of the place. “Let’s go. I have to take you to Captain Sterling.”