When morning came, I got worried sick since Al wasn’t back, and I had to cancel every plan I had for the day. I knew something was wrong when he wasn’t back. After all… he usually never broke his promises…

Well, maybe because he dodges any attempt to make any in the first place…. 

Still, I heard the news that some strange activities were occurring on the barrier outskirts. I headed there, only to see a giant Airship heading there. 

And then….

A blue light enveloped the sky, flickering and pulsating. When I arrived at that destination, the ground was scorched, leaving a massive crater. It was deep and extended about 2 kilometres in diameter…. And that was just the crater. 

‘…What in the world?’ I thought… 

This level of mass destruction was at least an S-Teir destruction spell…. And at the centre of the crater. There was an Armoured Death Blade, and it was severely injured as its limbs had fallen apart and could not regenerate…. 

…of course something like this would happen… Al has the worst luck imaginable…. 

I headed down to finish it for good, and as I pulled out my divine blade, it died without me doing anything. I placed my hands close to my chest. After all, Al must’ve been desperate to fire off a spell like this…. 

It hurts…. Al, are you alright…? 

But…he should be fine… after all… Hilos is with him, and if a former world-ender can’t… then… our contract must’ve truly been a mistake.

— :::: — 

Things settled for my classmates and me as we got taken in by the military, and they had us tell the whole story and a little about ourselves and our world as we travelled to the city. Not only that, Saint Amethely calmed us down with magic and gently comforted us with her gentle aura, in contrast to the somewhat cold first impression we got…. 

And as we told them everything we knew, they thanked us and said they’ll investigate the matter further. Of course, we’d be updated if we so wished. Since it did involve us…. 

I actually feel grateful for that… they don’t actually need to update us on anything and could keep us in the dark. Yet they’ve chosen to tell us. And that they’d look for survivors as well. So they would set up a rescue camp in the forest. They’d also set up detection magic, so if anyone came, they could save them before any monsters could attack. 

That’s great, and all, but… hearing bother Al mention mountains of corpses didn’t give me high hopes. 

Still, Julia has been more clingy to me ever since, just like she used to be in the past. 

I… I kinda knew she had feelings for me in the past, and when I found that out. She distanced herself from me to create some space between us. 

I at least know that much…. 

But… it will be a little problematic if she goes back to being clingy… 

Besides… 

I can’t see her that way. 

“Aska…” Julia meekly called my name. 

“...Yes?” I softly replied. 

“Please don’t don’t go anywhere,” she pleads.

“...I won’t,” I said as I patted her head. 

…my chest hurts, seeing her all hurt and sad like this… and well… maybe I’m calm because she’s like this…. 

— :::: — 

Later when we arrived in the city, we were told that we had some options, we join the military and study magic and combat, or we live our lives as normal citizens. 

Of course… going through the recent events, it was clear as the day that everyone would choose to start a new normal life. We had a week to choose, and I was in a predicament. 

As much as I wanted to learn combat and magic, I had Julia to take care of. Well… she’s a big girl and is independent, but she’s my only family in the world. 

Not only that, Miss Hilda and my only other friend Isak were here too. My other friends… well, I’ll mourn them once things settle down. 

And I suppose that it’s best to pick the second option…. That way, we’ll have the freedom to do things as long as it isn’t breaking the law, and we’ll get support until we’re self-sufficient.

And with that, a week went by, and all of us chose to live normally. There were a lot of things I’ve learned the past week living in this city called Velen Lon. 

The kingdom's name is Lea Nor, which is under the sovereignty of The Lesich Empire. And we got here through an event called ‘spatial quake’, a reality-bending phenomenon that rarely occurs, but maybe it was more common than they thought…? After all, they said that they do detect the larger ones. 

That’s probably why we went unnoticed since it was small ripples in our case. At least that’s what they told us….

Anyways…. 

The currency used is Lech, and it’s a squared metal thing. And to be honest… this world is kind of modern… although phones and stuff don’t really exist… there are arcades. Like… for real? 

Computers exist, too—magic ones, that is. But they’re only available in institutes and archives. 

…I sort of have a feeling phones don’t exist for a reason…. They’re disruptive of how states govern. What else am I supposed to think? We’re not the first other worlders, I can tell. That arcade didn’t appear from nowhere, as it probably originated from a world similar to ours. The same goes for many things around as well. 

Well… leaving that aside, it’s pretty comfortable living here. And since brother Al found us, he said he’d take responsibility and take us in. 

I do wonder… where does he get all the money from? 

And as of now, we’re just chilling. Brother Al said that he received permission to stay here for an extended period since there was no urgency to go back. He and the military he’s with was exploring the labyrinth anyways, so it wouldn’t hurt, he said. 

Oh? Labyrinth? Did I not mention that? Yes… we’re in a labyrinth city. The city's other half is dedicated to exploring and extracting resources from the labyrinth. A mysterious structure with resources that don’t appear to stop spawning. 

Sounds exciting and all, but I’m living a normal life… 

Or that’s what I wanted to say…..

Apparently, instead of joining the military, we later discovered that the labyrinth is a pretty safe way to make a living since up to floor 50 is mapped, and every enemy encounter is expected… so after calming down, many of us decided to give it a shot, which is why bother Al is training us. 

“Aska, you’re done already?” Brother Al asked concernedly, but his facial muscles didn’t move at all…. 

“Hah, hah...I… I’m out of mana,” I replied, panting like crazy. 

He looked at me and tilted his head, “Want to continue…?”  

“Siii… a… um… I think I’m fine for now….” 

“What about everyone else?” he later asked the others. 

But they all shook their heads in unison when he glanced their way. 

…you know… typically, when one’s out of mana, it makes no sense to say, ‘wanna continue?’ but in this case, brother Al is sort of a monster… he can match the wavelength of a person’s mana. Even it’s unique individualistic property, meaning… he can transfer mana to others without poisoning them…. Well, it goes both ways, I guess….

And, apparently… his side hustle is adventuring… 

Like what? 

His actual occupation is a military trainee, yes… you’ve heard me right. He’s a military trainee! Like… he’s new to the damn job! 

Seriously where does all the money come from!? He bought this land and built us a place to live! And he even moved in to make sure we were safe and comfortable! 

This guy is a serious mystery…. 

But I suspect his position is rather particular… considering he’s the fiance to the Empire’s Saint.

Ohh! About Saint Amethely. She would occasionally come to visit, and they’d be super lovey-dovey…. Well, we did get used to it in the end… but I can’t imagine how it is for Mister Hilos… living in that sword and all….