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Ever since The Tragedy had begun, the world as a whole had been bad. As far as Toko was concerned, everything had been bad since before then. Though, of course, she wished she could think of better wording. If her thoughts were a novel of hers, she'd be ashamed at how simply she described it. Her simple description was one of the best she could use, even if bad wasn't nearly enough to describe everything.
Toko had never grown up with an optimistic view of the world. That mindset was almost a birthright for her. From the start, she wasn't valued. She wasn't loved, and wasn't looked out for. The outlook which came from her harsh upbringing was what let her see the world for what it was. A horrible place filled with horrible people who pretended to be anything else. No matter how much she tried, she could never sugarcoat, even when she was doing her best to write out the lies implying anything else.
When The Tragedy struck, she was taught that lesson all over again. Violence, death and despair spread, revealing the worst parts of an already flawed humanity.
When the Killing Game started, Toko was taught that lesson, when she had lost her memory of the previous time it was made obvious. The game became a bloodbath in what felt like an instant, leaving only six survivors in the aftermath.
When she became an intern for the Future Foundation, she learned that in two separate ways. Even as an intern, being in the Future Foundation gave her a look at how despair had truly shaped the world. The company itself, though, reminded her that even those who seemed like saviours were cruel, from the second she was made an intern while her fellow survivors were made members from the start. She knew the reasoning of course, but the constant expectation for her to be able to control Syo was one which she only kept in mind because it was what was asked of her.
When she found herself stuck in Towa City, a place where bodies lined the streets while children and Monokumas sought out to kill all remaining adults, she was reminded yet again. The adults of the city didn't lessen that message, equally as determined to take out the children as the children were willing to take out them, and yet too cowardly to act on the hatred brewing in them.
The world was horrible, awful and disgusting, and, in the simplest way Toko could describe it, entirely bad .
As far as Toko was concerned, that was all it was, and all it could be.
The world was also a harmful and dangerous one.
Toko never knew true safety or comfort. Neither her house or her school were places she could feel safe in. She could only assume that was why Syo was there, and why his targets matched the people who made Toko fear the world more. He didn’t make her feel much safer, though, regardless of what his intentions were.
Obviously, The Tragedy made the world more obviously dangerous, and far more violent. For her, though, it gave her even more reasons to be afraid, and to hide away. The Killing Game was the same for her, a reason to cower as everybody else died off.
The Future Foundation was supposed to be safer, but of course she had to end up too uncomfortably close to the impacts of The Tragedy when she found herself in Towa City. Not that it wasn’t her decision to go, but she expected it to be a quick visit. Instead, she found herself trapped, too close to dangers she couldn’t manage alone.
Though, a certain girl did most of the lifting when it came to taking care of the risks of the city, and Syo seemed to take care of everything that the girl in question couldn’t.
Worst of all, Toko stayed near that danger when she had a choice, despite all common sense telling her not to. She’d seen the ugliest sides the city had, but she couldn’t leave. After all, a girl who she’d learned to care for was staying as well, and, as dangerous as the city was, she didn’t want to leave her.
As she stayed in Towa City, though, the dangers of the world were as apparent as ever to her, and her beliefs about the inherent harm the world count offered remained.
Above all else, the world was cruel . All of the harm and danger of the world was rooted in cruelty, and all of the bad in the world was linked to that same cruelty. Everything she had suffered in her upbringing, and everything she had known since had to do with how cruel the world truly was.
As much as everything relating to her mothers tended to blur in her mind, she still remembered several individual moments, all of which she'd rather forget.
She remembered when she thought she had her first crush, and, following the guidance of the romance books she had read for, gave the person she wanted to receive it a letter, only to find that letter pinned up on the bulletin board for everybody to see.
She remembered being asked out, and thinking that if a boy cared for her that much, he must be the one, regardless of whether or not she cared for him, only to have that conession be a lie. She remembered staying up at night, tirelessly thinking of what to do with him, only for him to not arrive.
She remembered so many moments of cruelty from the people around her, each one leaving her unable to trust and too afraid to open up.
In a way, that continued into her days at Hope’s Peak Academy. She remembered meeting Byakuya Togami for the first time, and once again deciding, without much emotional attachment to him, that he was the one. After all, he almost mirrored the boys who she’d write about, who fell into messy but life-long romances with messier girls like her. Still, no matter how much she wanted him to be the one, the cruelty she had known from other people continued with him, and she could only convince herself that she deserved it, and that any realistic bond she formed had to involve the same amount of harsh words directed towards her.
After all, it was a cruel world, and any happiness she could find would have to have those strings attached.
Of course, she knew of cruelty in ways not directed towards her. The state of the world was rooted in it. The Killing Game was rooted in it. As benevolent as the organisation seemed, even the Future Foundation showed it. The state of Towa City, when she found herself trapped in the city, illustrated the inherent cruelty the world held.
For all of her life, Toko held firm to her beliefs about the world. She had no reason not to. The world had only proven itself to be a painful, horrible place filled with people as hurtful and disgusting as it was. That was what Toko believed for most of her life.
However, one day, she found an exception. One thing which made Toko reconsider everything. Or rather, one girl.
Komaru Naegi.
Toko would have never believed she would have been affected by her when they first met. As far as she was initially concerned, Komaru was a nuisance, a girl who gave up too easily, and who would cower in front of everything Toko needed her to be able to stand up against. She was an overly optimistic crybaby to her, and having her around was a hurtle Toko believed she’d have to overcome for the price of being able to trade her off to save Byakuya.
Before Toko could even blink, however, everything shifted, and she found herself caring about Komaru. As that happened, she realised that, no matter how many beliefs she held about the world, Komaru contradicted each one.
The world was meant to be hurtful, but Komaru never was, and, if the Monokumas didn't count (Toko had to assume they didn't. They weren't sentient, and were more murderous than anything which deserved mercy), she couldn't imagine Komaru hurting anything or anybody. Even when there had been moments where something that Komaru said had hurt Toko, she was apologetic. She remembered how much it had hurt, when the two of them were arguing and Komaru had told her that her behaviour was why she was alone. She was thankful that she could trade her off without remorse at the time, expecting them to stay as they were in the aftermath. It had made her think in the moment, but she had assumed their bond would end with the hurtful words they had exchanged. Then Komaru had mended their bond like it was nothing, and Toko was left wondering how she had done it.
The world was meant to be cruel, but Komaru was quite possibly the most loving person Toko had ever known. She gave chances to even people who didn't deserve it. She gave Toko so many chances that Toko wondered why she still cared. The writer felt like she had changed since they met because a certain girl showed her more kindness than anybody else had, and unlike other people who had come close to the amount of love Komaru showed others, Toko knew she meant it. Everything about her was too genuine for it to be superficial.
The world was meant to be bad as a whole, but Komaru was part of that world, and Toko could say with confidence that she was the best thing to ever happen to her. She was gullible, sensitive, stubborn, too invested in things as simple as children's puzzles or manga and, even after growing as a person, was sometimes easy to deter, but she was also kind, optimistic, determined, cheerful, loving and able to have faith in Toko when she didn't even have faith in herself. Maybe that was why putting her own faith in Komaru was so easy.
She couldn't say that she completely changed her outlook. Komaru was just one person, and while she made Toko see things in a slightly different light, and made her want to see the world with the same optimism, too much had happened, both to the world and to Toko alone, for her to be able to love it all. Komaru’s ability to look beyond what she had gone through was one unique to her.
Still, Komaru did change her. Or, rather, she gave Toko the courage to change herself. She would have never expected such a seemingly normal girl to affect her so much, but she found a way. Toko never considered anybody a friend before, or loved anybody in the way she had slowly found out she loved her before, and now that she did, she was able to be happy in a way once unknown to her. It was enough that, some nights, she couldn’t help but lay awake and gaze towards where Komaru was sleeping, wondering how she got to have her in her life, and what she did to earn the undying love of the girl next to her.
Komaru was only a light in the darkness of Towa City, but she was a light which helped guide Toko. The city was still infested with Monokumas, and they were still responsible for handling that as well as all risks towards both the children and adults, but Komaru made it worth it.
The world was a cruel, dangerous and horrible place. Most people agreed that it had been that way since The Tragedy had begun. It had always been that way for Toko since she was born.
The world was a bad place, but at least Toko had found Komaru. As much she had suffered to get to the point she was at, at least she had her.