I'm reading the Re:zero light novel, volume 9. The second sentence in the book
is

> 水の中を漂うような、上下左右も曖昧な世界に投げ込まれている

What is 水の中を漂うような modifying? And I don't understand the meaning of 上下左右.
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2017-06-23T05:35:31.160
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words
I need help with this sentence from Re:zero
* 水の中を漂うような modifies 世界. → "the world where I feel like drifting in water"
  * 上下左右【じょうげさゆう】 is simply "上下や左右" or "up, down, right and left." → "the world where even (the distinction between) up, down, right and left is vague"
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> 水の中を漂うような、上下左右も曖昧な世界に投げ込まれている

**水の中を漂うような** _like drifting in the water_ " is a metaphorical expression
close to the astronaut's " **無｛む｝重力｛じゅうりょく｝の空中｛くうちゅう｝に漂うような** _like drifting
in the air/sky of weightlessness_ ", where you cant't distiguish the
360-degree direction.

**上下左右** is a set phrase that describes every direction, all directions or
360-degree direction.  
So **上下左右も曖昧な** means _ambiguous in 360-degree directions_.

**世界に投げ込まれている** is （誰｛だれ｝かが/何｛なに｝かが）世界に投げ込まれている, which means
_(Somebody/something) is thrown into the world_.

> What is 水の中を漂うような modifying?

There are three possible answers as:

Answer 1. （水の中を漂うような＋上下左右も曖昧な） → **世界** に投げ込まれている  
Answer 2. （水の中を漂うような＋上下左右も） → **曖昧な** 世界に投げ込まれている  
Answer 3. （水の中を漂うような→ **上下左右も曖昧な** ）→ 世界に投げ込まれている

I think this is not a question of Japanese but depends on how the reader, you
or me, interprets the given sentence.

Answer 1 is "水の中を漂うような" modifies "世界" in parallel with "上下左右も曖昧な". I choose
this one.

Answer 2 is "水の中を漂うような" modifies "曖昧 _ambiguous_ " in parallel with "上下左右".
"水の中を漂うような曖昧な世界" makes sense and is relatively natural. In truth, I would like
to change my former answer for this one if the phrase were "水の中を漂うよう **に** "
which is grammatically correct.

Answer 3 is that "水の中を漂うような" modifies "上下左右も曖昧な" to make the figurative
expression of "上下左右も曖昧な" more concretely imagined by writing another
expression similar to it.

As I said before, I do not think there is a fixed answer. Which one do you
choose?
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