Chapter 1—We’re Finally Here in Another World!

Once the light faded away and I could see again, I found myself in the middle of a grassy plain. I looked down and noticed that my hands looked more delicate than they had been before. When I looked to my right, there was another good-looking elf who was also inspecting her own body. She was a beautiful girl with long blonde hair, and her face reminded me of someone I knew.

“Um, you’re Haruka, right?” I asked.

“You’re Nao, then?”

“Yeah,” I said with a nod. After a closer look, I found some resemblance to the Haruka I remembered, despite the different appearance she had now. She looked shorter than she had been before. Haruka’s height had been around the high end of the 160-centimeter range, and she had been quite voluptuous too, but the elf that was in front of me right now was definitely shorter than 160 centimeters, and as for the rest of her body—well, she was a lot more slender now.

“What? Do you have something to say?” Haruka glared at me after she noticed where I was looking.

She sounds kind of scary right now! “Oh, well, uh, I was just thinking that you’ve become really beautiful! As you’d expect of an elf!” I shook my head in a panic and did my best to change the subject. Haruka had already been pretty before, so the difference now didn’t feel off or weird, but she was inhumanly beautiful now. Well, she’s an elf now, so I guess she is literally inhuman.

“Hmph. Didn’t you choose the elf race too, Nao? I knew you would.” Haruka looked away from me right after she finished her sentence. I saw a little bit of a blush on her face, so maybe she felt embarrassed. Yeah, I never called her beautiful on a regular basis before, so that makes sense.

“Hey now, I know you two get along quite well, but I wish you’d notice me too!”

I heard a voice from behind me, and when I spun around, I saw a beastman. He had animal ears that resembled a dog’s on top of his head and a fluffy tail protruding from his butt. As for his face—Oh, I recognize this face. It was definitely Tomoya. His eyes looked a bit sharper than before, but otherwise, his face looked more or less the same.

“Ah, Tomoya,” I said. “What did you choose? You look like a dog.”

“I’m a wolf, not a dog!” Tomoya replied. “Every fiber of my being told me to go for a beastman!”

Tomoya happily wiggled his ears and wagged his tail. He seemed very proud of them. Oh, right, I knew he’d make decisions based on his fetishes, but I forgot that this was the main one.

“Honestly though, what’s the point of a male beastman? Did you ever stop to think about that?” I asked.

“True, I don’t care for male beastmen at all,” Tomoya agreed emphatically. “However, think about this! What if the beastmen in this world have a tradition where marriage with other races is forbidden?! Would I give up?! No, never! I couldn’t let my only chance of marrying a girl with animal ears slip away from me!”

Thus Tomoya firmly declared his reasoning for picking a male beastman as his race. It seemed like he had actually thought through his choice carefully. I wasn’t sure if it was really a good use of brainpower, though. Well, I feel you, bro! I wouldn’t exactly say no to a wife with animal ears!

“Hmm, Tomoya, you’re here too, eh?” Examining Tomoya’s body, Haruka nodded to herself.

“Wh-What, did I interrupt something?”

“I never said anything like that. But anyway, you’ll be useful as a meat shield.”

“Wait, what did you just say?! Did you just call me a meat shield?!”

“Oho ho ho, of course not!” said Haruka. “Believe me, I’m counting on you to be our frontline fighter!”

Tomoya was shocked and objected to Haruka calling him a meat shield, but Haruka smiled with grace and dodged the subject. I’m pretty sure I heard something about a meat shield too, but Haruka was probably just trying to put Tomoya at ease with a joke, right?

“That reminds me... As childhood friends, we have a really strong bond,” said Haruka. “We could tell each other apart even in soul form.”

“Yeah, I had a feeling it was you two!” replied Tomoya.

“Y-Yep!” I chimed in hastily. “N-Nothing beats the bond we forged over the years!” I was panicking and doing my best to play along with what Haruka and Tomoya were saying. There’s no way I can admit that I didn’t notice at all!

“Hm? Yeah, of course. It looks like none of our classmates are nearby, so I’m glad we were able to group up here.”

Haruka might have been a bit suspicious of my behavior, but she seemed to decide to ignore it. She then turned to examine our surroundings. Tomoya and I looked around as well, but there were no signs of anyone at all. I could see much farther than before thanks to my Hawk’s Eye skill, but all I saw was more of the grassy plains we were in and a forest. There were also some wild birds, but that was it.

“Well, we’ve really gotten ourselves into a crazy situation,” I said with a sigh. “Is this misfortune? Or are we really lucky?”

“Let’s just say it could’ve been worse,” said Haruka. “There’s no changing the fact that we got into a bus accident, so we might as well try to stay optimistic instead of the opposite.”

“This might be a lucky situation for me!” Tomoya chuckled. “Now I actually have a chance to find a wife with animal ears!”

Haruka responded to my sigh with a shrug and a wry smile. Tomoya was upbeat about the situation due to being an optimistic guy, but I was a bit worried about my parents. Well, even if I hadn’t ended up in this world, it wouldn’t change the fact that I died. I may as well accept that it could’ve been worse, like Haruka said.

“Ignore Tomoya’s delusional dreams. There are more important things to discuss,” said Haruka. “Right now, let’s decide on a course of action. We all need to agree before we can do anything together.”

“Y-Yeah, that’s true,” said Tomoya.

I had already been thinking we should do things together as a group of childhood friends, but Haruka was being more serious and pragmatic about it. She’s got a good point, though, since our lives are actually on the line in this world.

“Let’s start. Prioritize self-care!” Haruka declared. “Okay, repeat after me now!” Haruka pointed at Tomoya and me. She seemed determined to make both of us follow along.

“What?” we exclaimed. Weren’t we going to discuss our course of action together?

Haruka ignored our confusion and repeated the same statement again.

“Prioritize self-care!” said Haruka.

“P-Prioritize self-care?” we repeated.

“Don’t aim to become a hero!”

“Don’t aim to become a hero!”

“Slow and steady wins the race!”

“Slow and steady wins the race!”

“Obey all of Haruka-sama’s orders!”

“Obey all of—wait a minute!” I stopped myself before I could finish those words.

“Tsk!”

I had almost blurted out some dangerous words without careful thought. Did you just click your tongue at me, Haruka?

Tomoya, on the other hand, had eluded danger by shutting his mouth at the last moment. He ditched me!

“So yeah, those will be our main rules. Agreed?”

It seemed like I wasn’t allowed to complain. Well, it’s always been like this. I guess this is just what my everyday life was and still is.

“Sure, I don’t mind. Anything works for me as long as I can eventually settle down and enjoy a peaceful life with a wife who has animal ears!”

“Yeah, I’m fine with those rules too. Or rather, the idea of going off by myself never even crossed my mind.” It’d be too lonely to explore this world alone, given that I know nothing about it.

Haruka nodded in response to our answers, as if satisfied, and then crossed her arms confidently. “I see! That’s good! All right, next up is to check out what skills we have. We’ll have to work together to ensure our safety in this new world.”

“Yeah,” I replied. “Uh, let’s see if saying ‘Status’ out loud works.”

Oh, it worked! A display screen appeared. It looked like that was a common trope for these kinds of worlds.

Name: Naofumi

Race: Elf (Age: 17)

Condition: Healthy

Skills: Help Guide, Weapon Proficiency: Spears, Magic Aptitude: Time

Level 2 Spearmanship, Level 1 Evasion, Level 2 Robust

Level 1 Hawk’s Eye, Level 1 Stealth, Level 1 Scout

Level 2 Third Eye, Level 1 Traps and Snares 101

Level 2 Time Magic, Level 1 Fire Magic

Oh, it only shows my first name. It seemed like there was no way to change the display screen. I looked around for a page that would show my stats, but there didn’t seem to be one.

“Looks like there’s no HP or MP bar in here, or stats like Strength or Dexterity,” said Tomoya. “There’s also nothing to indicate our own level or anything like that either.”

“Yes, so it appears,” said Haruka. “At least we can check our current condition and our skills, though.”

Tomoya and Haruka nodded together while we all looked at our own display screens floating in the air in front of us. So, my current condition is Healthy? If this display actually shows status effects like Poisoned or Cursed, it might be quite useful. I’ll be able to figure out what status effect I need to cure right away. As a side note, Haruka never really played video games that often, but she did sometimes play with Tomoya and me, so she does have some knowledge of common game tropes and systems. This kind of display screen is probably familiar to her as well.

“The most important thing here is the list of skills,” said Haruka. “Especially this one, the Help Guide skill. You have this, right?”

“Of course,” I replied. I’d known that Haruka would get this skill too. If the Help Guide had only cost, like, 5 Points, then maybe not, but the fact that it cost 20 Points was a clear sign that it was important. It took me a while to decide because of the cost, though.

“What? You two got that skill? Why? It wasn’t necessary at all for the character creation process.”

What?

“Did you not get it?!” we exclaimed.

Haruka and I both got up in Tomoya’s face, but he clearly had no idea about what he had done wrong. Oh no, this is bad! I hope he didn’t make some really risky choices!

“Tomoya! Tell us all of your skills, now!” yelled Haruka.

“U-Um, okay...” Overwhelmed by Haruka’s threatening tone, Tomoya hastily listed his skills.

Weapon Proficiency: Swords, Level 3 Swordsmanship, Level 1 Charge

Level 1 Roar, Level 2 Evasion, Level 4 Robust

Level 2 Fleetness, Level 2 Appraisal, Level 1 Blacksmithing

Whew, none of them were gimmicky skills! Haruka and I looked at each other. We both let out a sigh of relief.

“Man, I really wanted to get the EXP skills, but I ran out of points while picking skills that I absolutely needed for my badass beastman character. I had no choice but to give up on the EXP skills and prioritize my initial build concept.”

“Believe us, you made the right choice!” I said.

“Yeah!” said Haruka. “Your weird obsession with animal ears was actually useful for once!”

That was a close call! The EXP skills aren’t life-threatening, but they would’ve definitely made your life hell, Tomoya!

“Huh, really? Aren’t skills like that the kind that make a huge difference later on? It’s not like it’s a competition or anything, but still.”

“No, those skills are traps!” I said. “In fact, they would’ve ruined your life!”

Haruka and I took turns explaining how bad and gimmicky the additional skills were, and Tomoya’s face gradually turned pale as he learned more.

“ARE YOU SERIOUS?!” Tomoya yelled at the top of his lungs. His face looked just like that famous painting The Scream. “Wait, hold on, doesn’t that mean if you made bad choices with your skills, you’d pretty much be screwed for life?!”

“Yes, anyone who chose Plunder as one of their skills is probably dead by now,” said Haruka.

“Yeah, that’s the only one with a good chance to kill its user right away,” I said. “I don’t know what the typical skills and levels are for an average person in this world, but anyone who uses Plunder against me is definitely dead instantly.”

I would get my stolen skills back too, so I’d basically be getting extra life span for free. I sense a bit of malice behind Plunder’s skill description, though, considering that on the surface it says it’ll steal all of a target’s skills. Sure, it’s the user’s fault if they get punished for stealing someone else’s hard-earned skills, but the skill description is still bait...

“Yikes! Super yikes! Now that’s more like what you’d expect from an evil god!” Tomoya continued to yell. All the while, his face still looked like The Scream.

Yeah, I feel you, Tomoya. I screamed those exact same words internally when I obtained the Help Guide and saw the hidden text.

“Actually, I think that evil god was quite kind and helpful, since the advice in the Help Guide is specific and useful, and he also emphasized that there were no cheat skills before we got to start choosing our skills,” said Haruka. “If you still chose something that seemed like a cheat skill, then I guess you’ll get what you deserve.”

“Well, yeah, but aren’t the EXP skills just outright torture?” Tomoya replied. “There’s no real benefit to any of them.”

Oh yeah, that’s true. The other skills at least had some kind of benefit. The EXP skills were the only ones where the drawbacks rendered them completely useless. Maybe they needed to be combined with other skills in order to be useful. I remember playing a few games like that, where there were skills that were pretty much useless on their own, but extremely useful when combined with another specific skill for synergy.

“Hmm, I’m not too sure about that, but he did also say ‘Effort will never betray you,’ so maybe he doesn’t like people who want an easy way out?” said Haruka. “Besides, if you really wanted to make use of the EXP skills, then you’d just have to work harder than normal to compensate for the drawbacks, so it’s not like some of the other ones that you can’t do anything about.”

Oh yeah, that was kind of weird for an evil god to say. I guess he has a harsh side, since he’s forcing people who search for an easy way out to work much harder than they’d have to otherwise. You also wouldn’t be able to get that many skills if you only chose from the additional skills.

“On the other hand, the skills that were available from the beginning are quite fair,” I said. “Or rather, they’re all very useful, though Robust seemed like an essential skill.”

“Mm, resistance to diseases is quite important,” Haruka agreed. “A disease that people don’t have resistance to tends to be a common device to explain near extinction in science fiction.”

“Huh? Wait, is Robust that important of a skill?”

Oh yeah, Tomoya doesn’t have the Help Guide, so he doesn’t know. He was lucky that he had picked a good skill like Robust. Or rather, it must have required insane luck to completely dodge the gimmicky additional skills without any extra knowledge.

“The extra description for Robust mentioned that there might be some unfamiliar diseases in this world,” I said. “I decided to get it after I saw that text.”

“It’s possible that we might naturally develop resistance to those diseases over time, but it’s better to be safe than sorry,” said Haruka. “Things like unemployment insurance probably don’t exist in this world.”

Yep, and there’s probably nothing like national health insurance or life insurance either. We might end up dead if we find ourselves in a situation where we can’t work for a while. There are no adults for us to rely on in this world, so we have to look out for each other.

“Oh, that makes sense! I’m glad I decided to get the Robust skill, then!” Tomoya sighed in relief. He probably hadn’t been thinking about diseases when he picked Robust, but Level 4 would most likely be more than enough for most diseases.

“All right, next up are my skills,” said Haruka. “These are the ones I decided to get.”

Help Guide, Weapon Proficiency: Bows, Craft Aptitude: Alchemy

Magic Aptitude: Light, Magic Aptitude: Wind, Magic Aptitude: Water

Enhanced Mana Capacity, General Knowledge, Level 2 Archery

Level 2 Robust, Level 1 Throw, Level 2 Third Eye

Level 1 Disassemble, Level 3 Light Magic, Level 1 Wind Magic

Level 1 Water Magic, Level 1 Swiftcast, Level 1 Alchemy

Level 1 Sewing, Level 1 Cooking

“Huh? Wait, why do you have way more skills than I do?” asked Tomoya.

“Yeah, you have way more than me as well, Haruka,” I said. “How many Points did you start with?”

Tomoya and I were both confused by the number of skills Haruka had. She had way more skills than either of us. I don’t exactly remember how many Points each skill cost, but I’m pretty sure 150 Points wouldn’t be enough for all this.

“I had 200 Points. What about it?” Haruka answered nonchalantly.

What? She had 200 Points?

“Huh?! I only had 120 Points!”

“I had 150 Points. Was there really that much of a difference between Haruka and me in terms of human worth...?”

“Dude, I have it worse than you! She has almost double what I do!”

It’s true that her grades were better than mine, and she beat me in the looks department as well. On top of that, she was good at sports and very sociable too. But still, this reality check via numbers is kind of depressing...

“W-Well, these points are just the biased opinion of that evil god!” Haruka exclaimed. “It doesn’t mean you two are worth less than me as human beings or anything like that!”

“My worth as a human being...” I muttered.

“Almost half...” Tomoya muttered.

Haruka tried to cheer us up when she saw our depressed reactions, but her words were the final nail in the coffin. Tomoya looks like he could vanish at any moment right now.

“D-Don’t worry about it! You can just level up your skills!” Haruka insisted. “Okay, Nao, you’re up next!”

She seemed to have realized her poor choice of words, and she slapped my back to cue me, no doubt so we could change the subject.

“A-All right, these are my skills.”

I didn’t like the way Haruka was trying to get me to hurry along, but I still decided to do what she told me and list my skills.

Help Guide, Weapon Proficiency: Spears, Magic Aptitude: Time

Level 2 Spearmanship, Level 1 Evasion, Level 2 Robust

Level 1 Hawk’s Eye, Level 1 Stealth, Level 1 Scout

Level 2 Third Eye, Level 1 Traps and Snares 101, Level 2 Time Magic

Level 1 Fire Magic

I thought I’d come up with a pretty good skill build, but I’m not so confident anymore after seeing Haruka’s skills. I want to believe that mine is decent, and that Haruka’s build is just much better. Mine is decent compared to my classmates’, right? I hope so. I had more skills than Tomoya did, but we had more or less the same number of Points to work with if I didn’t include the cost of the Help Guide.

“Hm, so you chose a skill build for a center position in battle?” said Haruka. “I guess that matches what I thought you would get.”

“Wait, really? Did you both plan out your skill build?” Tomoya asked.

“Of course,” Haruka replied. “You’re the type to charge in brainlessly, Tomoya, and I was fairly sure Nao would end up being a jack of all trades but master of none, so I grabbed support skills to balance things out.”

Ack! I mean, you guessed right, but I wish you could’ve at least described me as, like, “capable of fighting on the frontline if needed” and had just left out that “master of none” part. I couldn’t really complain, though, since I wasn’t really thinking that thoroughly when I chose my skills.

“Well, we ended up with a frontline, center, and backline fighter, so things worked out well. Okay, now let’s hurry and find a town.”

“Oh yeah, Haruka, you chose a skill called General Knowledge, right?” I asked. “Did that skill tell you a reason for hurrying?”

“The skill said that this area isn’t that dangerous...as long as we’re near a town.”

“So you’re saying that it’s dangerous to be far away from town?”

“Yes, but even if we’re near a town, something like a wild boar could easily kill us,” said Haruka. “We do have new skills, but we should test them out in a safe place before we use them in combat.”

“Oh yeah, even in our old world, I remember occasionally seeing news about people who died after being mauled by boars,” I said.

“Did you two know that when cats mean business, people are no match for them?” said Tomoya. “Well, at least, that’s what I heard.”

What Tomoya said actually made some sense. He has a point, since it’s quite hard to catch a cat that’s running away. Anyway, even though we did have skills, we were completely unarmed. Our clothes looked like they probably fit this world, at the very least.

“Enough talking. Let’s get going!” said Haruka. “You have the Hawk’s Eye skill, right, Nao? Do you see a town anywhere?”

I looked around again with Hawk’s Eye, but I saw only the same grassy plains and forest I had before. There were no signs of a town anywhere. The farthest thing I could see was a mountain. Wait, is that a road?

“I didn’t see a town, but I saw a road in that direction.”

“You didn’t see a town? Oh well, at least there’s a road we can follow,” said Haruka. “Let’s aim for that road for now.”

“Roger,” said Tomoya.

We walked for about ten minutes in the direction I’d pointed out. When we reached the road, it turned out to be about three meters wide. It was just a simple road of packed soil, slightly elevated, but that clearly meant it was man-made.

“Yeah, this is definitely a highway,” said Haruka. She looked around to her left and right before asking us, “Now we need to decide which way to go from here—any preferences?”

I had no idea at all. “I don’t see any signs of a town in either direction,” I replied. “Maybe I could make something out from a higher vantage point, but there are no trees nearby.”

The plains we were walking through looked mostly flat all the way to the horizon. Oh yeah, speaking of the horizon, it seems like it should be far away, but it actually isn’t. It wouldn’t even be five kilometers back on Earth. The distance depends on the size of the planet, so maybe it’s different here.

While I was lost in thought, Tomoya suddenly grinned and said, “Hey, Nao, it’s time to do the thing, you know?”

“What do you mean, the thing?”

“Oh, you know, the thing where I cross my arms, and you stand on my arms, and then I toss you in the air! We couldn’t do it before, but we’re probably strong enough to do it now, what with our new bodies, right?”

Oh yeah, I remember seeing characters in manga get over walls that way. I’m lighter than I was before, and Tomoya’s probably stronger now as well due to Beastman muscles. However...

“Hold on, what if you mess up and end up doing a weird German Suplex on me instead? We’ve never done this before, so are you sure you can do it correctly?”

“Relax, I’m sure it’ll be fine—”

“Stop,” said Haruka. “What if you two get injured?”

Tomoya cocked his head in thought while he stretched his arms to warm up for the toss, but Haruka stopped him with a slap to the forehead.

“Try climbing on Tomoya’s shoulders first,” said Haruka. “With your skill, that should be enough to see a few kilometers ahead.”

“Yeah, I don’t want to risk getting injured right away,” I said.

“Oh, come on! I wanted to try it at least once.” Tomoya grumbled a little, but when Haruka glared at him, he hastily forced a smile of agreement, planted his feet solidly on the ground, and beckoned me over.

“Upsy daisy.” I stepped up on Tomoya’s joined hands and got on top of his shoulders. Tomoya’s body was sturdier than I’d thought at a glance, and it seemed like I also had improved physical abilities, so I managed to stand up without difficulty.

“Do you see anything?”

Looks like there’s nothing in front. Let’s see, what about behind? Hmm, a wall?

“How did it go?” asked Haruka.

I hopped off Tomoya’s shoulders and pointed in the direction where I had seen the wall. “I saw something that looked like a wall in this direction. By the way, thanks for the ride, Tomoya. You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. It felt like a massage, so my physical abilities must have improved a ton,” Tomoya replied, dusting off his shoulders.

“You too, Tomoya? It felt pretty different for me as well. We should probably test our abilities the first chance we get.”

“Yes, we definitely should, but let’s get to town first,” said Haruka. “We can discuss things on the way, and besides, do you want to sleep in the open with no roof?”

“Mm, let’s not,” I said. “We also don’t have any food right now.”

Having agreed to Haruka’s suggestion, we resumed our journey with Tomoya marching out in the front. Haruka had said that a highway near a town wasn’t especially dangerous, but we decided to play it safe and have our toughest member, Tomoya, lead the way. I was in the middle and Haruka brought up the rear, since she could use healing magic. Well, she should be able to, anyway.

“Since Nao saw that wall from on top of your shoulders, Tomoya, that means it’s somewhere between five to seven and a half kilometers from here. At least, that’s what it would be back on Earth.”

“Really? You’re as smart as always, Haruka! I don’t get what you’re saying at all!” Tomoya chuckled.

Haruka sighed at his reply. “Tomoya, don’t be so quick to brag about your ignorance! Besides, it’s not like I know the exact formula. I just remember that you can see about five kilometers under normal circumstances, and even if you doubled your height, you’ll only be able to see half again what you could before.”

It was basically trivia, but it still amazed me that she remembered something like that. She’s definitely built differently. It must be those 200 Points. Not that I’m jealous or anything...

“So that means we should get to our destination within two hours, right?” I asked.

“Yeah,” replied Haruka. “By the way, do you two have anything on you?”

“Hm? As you can see, nothing at all. What about it?”

“Yeah, same here.” I turned around and held out my arms in front of me. All I had on me were some normal clothes (they were a little thick and felt handmade) and that was it. I had no other belongings.

“Oh, are you thinking we might have an Inventory that we haven’t checked yet?” Tomoya asked. He sounded excited about the possibility of a menu we hadn’t found earlier, but Haruka shook her head.

“No, the General Knowledge skill says nothing about that, although expensive magical satchels and bags apparently do exist. For right now, forget about that and check the pockets of your new clothes.”

I followed Haruka’s orders and checked my clothes. I did indeed have pockets, and when I thrust my hands in, I felt a few coins. They were about the same size as a one hundred yen coin. “This is money, right? Let’s see, it looks like there are ten coins here.”

“Oh, same here!” Tomoya took the same number of coins out of his pocket and held them up in his palm like I had.

Haruka inspected our coins and nodded. “Yeah, I have the same amount as well,” she said. “They’re large silver coins. Each one is worth the equivalent of about one thousand yen, although it varies a bit. As for the currency in this world, one large silver coin is worth one hundred Rea.”

I see... So these ten coins altogether are worth roughly ten thousand yen.

“Was it the evil god who gave us these clothes and money? It’s definitely pretty evil to abandon us here with just clothes and about ten thousand yen each,” said Tomoya. “Most of the additional skills were horrible too.”

Those horrible drawbacks were probably the fault of our classmates who had wished for skills they didn’t deserve, but at the same time, the fact that the god had booby-trapped the skills was super malicious.

“Really? I don’t think he was that evil. As I mentioned earlier, I believe he was actually rather kind,” said Haruka. “He gave us clothes that fit this world and enough money to both buy necessities and stay at an inn for one night. He gave the same to everyone in our class, as well, so that’s thirty-two people. Would you give a total of 320,000 yen to people you were meeting for the first time, Tomoya, and prepare clothes for them too?”

Well, when you put it that way, that evil god does sound pretty generous. He did bring us back from the dead too.

“I mean, sure, that’s one way to look at it,” I said. “But isn’t he a god? If he was actually a nice god, he wouldn’t have booby-trapped those additional skills.”

“Why would you ever depend completely upon the mercy of a god? Most of the gods in ancient mythology from around the world are totally egocentric. Take, for example, the supreme deity of the Greek Pantheon. Anyone who tried to emulate him would be nothing more than a disgusting sexual predator.”

Ah, yeah, there are a lot of spicy stories in Greek mythology. There were very few gods in that pantheon who could even be considered sane. I guess these gimmicky additional skills could be considered just pranks compared to the irrational things the Greek gods did all the time. I don’t know if it’s okay to call something that can kill you a prank, but what can you do against a god?

“Also, if you ignore the absurd ones, there are actually some useful powers among the additional skills,” said Haruka.

“Really?” said Tomoya. “Do you mean aside from the Help Guide?”

“Yes, my General Knowledge skill was an additional skill.”

“Oh yeah, I was going to ask about that,” I said. “Was that skill actually on the list? I didn’t notice it at all.” I was fairly sure that I had looked through everything at the beginning.

“I requested it during my character creation process, so that’s probably why you didn’t notice.”

“That makes sense. I didn’t search much further after I got the Help Guide and noticed the gimmicks in the first few skills I looked at.”

“This General Knowledge skill is most likely a very valuable and important one,” said Haruka. “Make sure you two ask me before you try to do anything. You wouldn’t want to stick out like a sore thumb, would you?”

That made sense. We wouldn’t have known how much these coins were worth without Haruka’s information. It would be a bit awkward to go up to some stranger and ask them about something that ought to be general knowledge or common sense in this world. Back in Japan, if someone had approached us to ask about the value of currency or about the amount they had in their pockets, we would probably guide them to a police station in case they needed to be taken to a hospital. That would seem like common sense to us.

“Okay, I’ll keep that in mind,” I said. “Also, I just thought of a question. Will we be able to enter a town right away when we get to one?”

“No, we’ll have to pay an entry toll for towns that are surrounded by walls. The rates vary from town to town, but they tend to be in the ballpark of one hundred Rea. However, if you live in a particular town, or if you’re registered as an adventurer at the Adventurers’ Guild, then you don’t need to pay the fee.”

“Oh, so there’s an Adventurers’ Guild!” Tomoya turned around when he heard Haruka say those two words and repeated them in a joyful tone.

“Yes, there is. That’s a trope one can take for granted in this kind of fantasy world. However, don’t get into a fight with other adventurers, understood? It’s strictly forbidden! You’ll get arrested and dragged off to a dungeon, regardless of who you got into a fight with. In fact, I would say the rules for adventurers are even stricter than the rules that apply to scuffles between ordinary citizens.”

Oh, so I guess the Adventurers’ Guild in this world isn’t hands-off when it comes to fights and conflicts between adventurers.

“That makes sense, considering that most adventurers will probably be armed,” I said. “Back in Japan, I remember hearing about how you’d get a heavier punishment for public brawling if you practiced martial arts.”

“Is that how it works?” Tomoya asked with a sigh. “Oh well, I guess that means we’ll miss out on the trope of getting bullied while we’re registering as adventurers.”

Why do you sound disappointed, Tomoya?

“Okay, so our goal for now is to work hard towards a stable and sustainable life without drawing attention to ourselves, right?”

“Yes, and don’t forget the rules that you repeated earlier!” Haruka said.

“Roger. Well, I’ll eventually find a wife with animal ears!”

“Uh, yeah, good luck with that,” I said.

Haruka and I both let out a dry laugh at Tomoya’s resolve.