Chapter 5: My Arrival

Chapter 5: My Arrival

The Way Back

On the way the king looks at me with a serious expression. 

"I have judged your character as a man, and found it to be good overall, but before this can go any further I'll need some details regarding the betrayal you mentioned. The magic regarding the Absolute Loyalty Seal is a very serious matter."

I look at him seriously, crossing my fingers in front of my face.

I look to my left. He catches my intentions regarding privacy.

"Ah I see."

The king then loosens a black curtain to my left revealing a similar design to the one on his hand.

"Sir Kaijuu, please feed some magic into this pattern along with me."

We both do this. The circle glows red then fades.

"Our conversation in this cabin is now encrypted, please proceed"

I nod. and start telling him.

My Arrival

I woke up on a bed in a room, all I remember was falling asleep that night in my own world.

"Kaijuu Ryu, Welcome to our world, My name is Mel, I have been assigned to you."

He looks me over then marks his clipboard.

"No visible abnormalities found. Do you feel OK? Any dizziness or anything at all, please tell me even the smallest thing you notice out of the ordinary"

"I feel a bit dizzy"

"That's normal, It will go away in a moment. Anything else?"

"No"

"Please look at your hands for me" 

I look at my hands, I notice they look a bit off, kind of like it's too smooth. I can't see my pores and my arms have no hair. I lose focus as I get dizzy again.

"My hands are wrong"

"I see, please bear with me for a second and I'll fix you right up"

He puts his hand on my chest and I see a light glow from under my shirt

"Initializing" 

The glow fades. A screen that has numbers and bars pops up. All the bars fill up and my dizziness fades. The screen disappears. He moves to the back of the bed and puts 2 fingers on each side of my head on my temples.

"Calibrating optical"

I feel him lift his fingers.

"How's that, please look at your hands again"

I do, Everything seems normal. I can make out the detail now.

I sit up. Afterwards he informs me that I was summoned here, I asked what happened to me but he simply tells me that everyone that passes through here has a different experience. Some remember being hospitalized, others like me just woke up here after going to bed. Not very helpful.

He then begins to ask me a lot of questions about my life on earth. My occupation. I tell him I was a store clerk. He asks about my hobbies, I tell him I was a gamer and also an amature speedrunner. He doesn't seem to know what that is. And we are done. 

I collect my personal effects.

Ah I found my cellphone. I try to turn it on. It won't. When I try to remove the back cover it won't come off. and the (HOME) button can't be pressed like it's welded to the screen. I guess it's just a paperweight now. I receive a bit of money and a map to the Adventurer's guild, also a map to the employment office.

I decide to become an adventurer after they basically shoo'd my out the door. I wonder why they asked me those questions? I registered and all that jazz. Got a kind of comfortable life together in a few weeks. 

One day about a year and a half into my new life here I forgot my food at the Inn. I only realized it when I was basically starving. Some passing adventurers helped me. I remember one specifically was a really huge guy. They shared their food with me. That night I asked him if he was a giant or something. They all just laughed. 

The next day on the way back we were attacked by some wolves. Most of us got out OK but the big guy got hurt bad but he lived. I noticed he had to drink 3 HP potions and his health was not even 1/4. Judging by the color it seemed like it was decent quality potions too. We arrived back in town without incident, but that prompted me to start investigating again seriously. I learned the foraging skill and noticed that the plants' properties from the end of the day seemed higher than the ones I picked in the morning. 

Specifically the stamina flower. I concluded that it had to do with my own stamina.

I tested it out. I couldn't keep on picking stamina plants when my stamina was low for obvious reasons so I got an idea. I started digging up the plants root and all and when my stamina went under 10% I harvested them. Needless to say I got a more than decent haul that day. I started applying the same thing to MP and HP plants, however The HP plant harvest got super dangerous, so I started buying monster repellent.

That is when I met Steph, She joined me and I explained what I was doing, I mean she's kinda hot so what's the harm. then one day Steph disappeared. No goodbye Nothing. I started noticing that my high quality plants were selling for less and less everyday. When I asked the wholesale buyer, He just said the market was flooded with high quality plants.

I asked who sold them, but he couldn't let out information about his other sellers. So I staked the place out. Then I saw Steph again. when I approached her she claimed to not even know me, then had me thrown out and blacklisted by the wholesaler, I almost wound up in jail. 

One of the guards that came to arrest me, told me about her. Her real name was Lillith and she was the daughter of a wealthy merchant. The guard advised me to move on to the next town, but I couldn't let it go. I staked their business out and followed their wagons into the forest. What I saw there was awful. They used slaves by the dozen to harvest using my methods. 

Unfortunately they noticed me and I barely got away from them. I left that same night. 

I headed North and crossed the border to the Shadowfall Kingdom from the East Empire. 

I never partied up again.

The king listened calmly.

"I can see why you would not trust people easily after such a thing. Very well I can now grant special permission for use of the Absolute Loyalty Seal, provided my daughter agrees. Don't worry I'll make sure to convince her when the time comes."

I'm glad he understands.

"King Raymond what exactly is the Absolute Loyalty Seal exactly?" 

He stays silent for a bit.

"All I can say is it guarantees that what happened to you will never happen with my daughter, but to assure you further I'll have the relevant research documents sent to you room later"