The new world and (un)fortunate encounters

I fell with a thud against my unmade bed. It was messy, just as I had left it when I had jumped out of it this morning to make it to work on time. I checked the time on my phone and sighed. It was only nine pm but I felt an immense wave of fatigue wash over me.

Sure, I wasn’t being worked to the bone like all the other shows I’d seen where the corporate slave main characters would stay at work for a few days at a time, sometimes even sleeping at or under their desks. I let out another sigh as I let my hand fall back onto the bed.

I thought back to when I had first started this job and how I’d come back from work, go to the gym, come back home and take a shower, cook a healthy meal, then hit the hay after some well-deserved doom scrolling. But now, the only thing I could think of was falling into a deep slumber to never, ever, wake up again… with that, my eyes got droopy and I felt that familiar jolt one feels right before they fall asleep – as if they’re falling off a building – but this feeling seemed to last for a bit longer than I had expected.

I opened my eyes and realized that I was sinking into my bed at a rapid pace, and before I could even grab onto anything, I had fallen through and was surrounded by complete darkness.

What the hell? Have I finally hit that level of fatigue where I was hallucinating? It didn’t seem like it. I continued to speed up, free falling through the nothingness as my body tensed up. My mind went blank, bracing myself for some kind of impact, but nothing came. The feeling of free fall was soon replaced by one of buoyancy, almost as if I was floating in a pool of very dense water.

Then, a light, faint but still bright enough in this darkness that it made me squint, appeared in the distance. I felt a slowing force on my body as I approached the light and it glowed brighter and brighter, then so bright I could only shield my eyes to prevent myself from being blinded by it. I then felt my feet touch solid ground and was quickly reminded that my body was not weightless anymore as my legs gave out and I crumpled unceremoniously onto the ground.

The first thing that hit me was the smell. A fresh, verdant, pure air that carried the scent of wild grass, forest bark, and rich soil. As I pushed myself up with my still wobbly arms, I heard a chorus of birdsong which was so in tune one might mistake them for musical instruments.

I slowly pushed myself up to my feet and was able to open my eyes. I was standing in the middle of a quaint little forest clearing. If Ba*bi or Sn*w Whi*e or Cinde*ella had suddenly appeared from the woods I would have accepted it without a question. Little wildflowers of various colors adorned the ground of the clearing, almost like a mountain meadow.

Seeing all this, my first thought wasn’t about how or why I had ended up here all of a sudden. In fact, I didn’t think anything. I just put my hands on my hips and leant back, taking in a deep breath, as much as I could, letting this pure air fill my lungs until they could no more, then with a satisfied grunt, I exhaled.

Then, I dropped to my knees and clenched my hands in prayer, prostrating myself to no one as I wept, “Oh Lord! Thank you! Thank you! My prayers have been answered! I’ve been isekaied!”

I sobbed and wept tears of joy and wiped them away with my sleeve. Then I looked up expectantly. Isn’t this where the god or goddess usually appeared to give me some kind of overpowered cheat ability? Oh well, maybe the god here was an introvert. I got up and dusted off my knees. Without an intro guide this was going to be pretty difficult.

First things first, I needed to figure out what kind of world this was. There were three options; the first: this was a world of magic and I could use it. Second: this was a world of magic and I couldn’t use it. Third: this was not a world of magic and so I couldn’t use it no matter what. I wasn’t so delusional as to believe in a fourth option in which this would be a world with no magic in which I was the sole user. That would be boring anyway.

I held out my hand and conducted the most obvious test any avid consumer of the isekai genre would know to determine which of the three it was.

“Fireball!” I said out loud. Nothing happened. “Hmm, maybe I need to sell it more…” I got into a Kame*ameha pose and began to focus hard. “Channel your energy… and…” in a louder and more strained voice I repeated “FIREBALL!”

Nothing happened.

Hmm. This was a real pickle. I hadn’t proven what kind of world I was in yet, but at least I hadn’t disproven it either. Maybe there were certain conditions I had to learn from others to activate magic. That did, however, involve interacting with the people – or monsters even – of this world. I just had too little information at hand.

Damn it! Where is this world’s goddamned god?

I didn’t have much longer to think about that as I heard a rustle in the bushes. Crap! I had no idea what to do. I couldn’t hide since any foliage or tree was meters way. I hadn’t even come up with a story yet to explain myself and my strange getup. I steeled myself as the rustling grew louder, then stopped.

Just as I was about to relax, a white rabbit with beady red eyes jumped out of the bush.

“Kyaa! Oh… it’s just a rabbit.”

The next second, I heard a whistling of an arrow and one came flying from the side with such force that bored right through its head and pinned the rabbit to the ground.

“Kyaaaa! I mean… ahem.” I had let out a high-pitched squeal in spite of myself. No, no, I couldn’t do that. Gotta stay nonchalant even in this world. I recollected myself and turned to face the direction where the arrow had come from, expecting to greet a hunter or ranger of sorts.

Instead, I was face to face with a pack of a dozen goblins, half of which wielded battered swords, three who held bows, and one massive burly goblin with a cracked wooden mace on its shoulder.

“ARE YOU KIDDING ME WHAT KIND OF SHITTY START POINT IS THIS!” I ranted to myself as I turned tail and ran, narrowly making it into the treeline as another arrow landed with a dull thud into the trunk of a tree directly behind me. Damn this world for such an inauspicious start!

I kept running as I heard the screeching and scurrying of those damned goblins behind me. I turned to see that the smaller ones were matching my pace – no, catching up to me.

Damn that stupid desk job! All that sitting around had made me so unbelievably unfit I already felt winded a mere minute into running away.

My heart was beating fast, the blood rushing to my forehead making it difficult to see properly. I finally made it to a dirt track and looked up and down it desperately, hoping to run into other people. No luck.

I continued running down the dirt track, then realized that I was no longer being pursued. I slowed down, then stopped, collapsing to my knees to catch my breath as I looked back to where I had emerged from the forest. Why hadn’t the goblins chased me out here?

That’s when I noticed lanterns hanging from trees on either side of the track that glew dimly even in the daytime. Huh, did that have some sort of warding effect? If it did, then I must have been pretty close to civilization. There’d be little reason for spending money on infrastructure like this out in the middle of nowhere. I thanked my lucky stars and kept walking in the same direction, hoping that it would take me out of the forest and some place civilized.

And boy oh boy did I exit the forest to some civilized place. Just past the treeline was a flat open plain which seemed to stretch all the way to the horizon where I could see snow-capped mountains all along it. Right in front of me on this grassy plain was the epitome of the fantasy starter town: a circular, walled medieval town of earthy orange brick and stone complete with quaint guard towers and a rickety looking metal gate.

I collapsed to my knees yet again, this time tears filling my eyes.

“This is it, I really did get isekaied” I sniffled and prostrated myself on the ground, thanking whatever god had brought me here, already forgetting their unforgivable transgression of not giving me any cheat skills.

“Freeze and stay on the ground!”

I froze, then slowly turned around to see a knight ride up to me on his horse and dismount. Behind him was a small convoy of two more knights on horseback and a two-horse drawn carriage. Some sort of noble or merchant, I presumed.

“We do not have time for beggars or suspicious individuals impeding our mission, so please move to the side of the road and do not make a scene until our lady has passed.”

“Huh?” I looked at him confused. “Uh, I’m not particularly suspicious…” I then looked at the clothes I was wearing: not of this world and covered in dirt and sweat from the earlier chase. Then I looked back up at the knight while still kneeling. Ah. Yes. I was definitely not unsuspicious.

I quietly got up and moved to the side of the road, standing there as I brushed some of the dirt off my pants. The knight huffed in exasperation and remounted his horse, staying in front of me while the convoy passed.

I studied them as they did. They wore some kind of medieval armor, and even my untrained eye could tell that they were a cut above what one would be able to procure in medieval times. They all had some sort of insignia on their breastplate, a gold eagle, not too dissimilar to the Roman Aquila. The carriage passed by and I spied a curious pair of eyes peeping through the curtains inside. I merely inclined my head in a humble greeting. I was not trying to get my head lopped off for disrespecting some noble right after I had reincarnated.

As the carriage finished passing me, the knight in front of me harrumphed and prodded his horse along, disregarding me as if I were a weed in the grass. Oh well, crisis averted, I guess.

I let some distance open between the convoy and myself and was about to start heading into town again when to my right, I heard a commotion in the edges of the forest. Hmm? This was…!

The same goblins from before broke through past the trees and made a beeline right for the carriage. The knights had realized it too late and the one who had kept me aside and was now bringing up their rear was shot at by the goblin archers. The arrows bounced harmlessly off his armour but the same couldn’t be said of the ones which found their mark in his horse’s behind. The horse whinnied and reared up, throwing the knight off and knocking him out cold before running off in the other direction. The other two knights, now realizing what was happening, readied their swords and began a strafing charge on horseback at the goblins. The first charge saw them slice an archer each clean in two. They came to a halt and turned right round, then charged back again, now cleaving the third archer and one sword wielding goblin apart.

Just as they were about to ready their third charge, I noticed something. Where was that large goblin from earlier? The one that had seemed like their leader? I whipped my head around after hearing a crack of a twig and saw that that massive goblin was sneaking its way towards the carriage away from the scene of battle.

“Oi! Knights! The big one’s over here!” I yelled at them and waved my hands but they were too focused on the still remaining half a dozen goblins and had just dismounted their mounts after a third successful charge. I was not going to be able to get through to them, I realized.

The goblin leader kept inching towards the carriage, now faster and more emboldened. I took a deep breath and made up my mind, picking up two fist-sized rocks that lay by the side of the dirt track, and ran towards the carriage so that I was halfway in between the goblin leader and the pack of goblins being cut down by the two remaining knights.

As I got close to the one who had been knocked unconscious after being thrown off his horse, I threw the rock at the goblin leader. It barely even flinched. Crap. I was going to use the other rock to get the attention of the two knights so they could engage it. I steeled myself and threw the second rock at the goblin leader too, and this time, it turned to me.

I felt myself freeze up again. This was truly a disgusting creature. All those isekai shows really sanitized their depictions. I reached down and unsheathed the knight’s sword from its scabbard still attached to the unconscious knight’s hip. It was a tad bit heavy in my hands, but well balanced. I flicked my wrist and swung it around a bit, holding it in a style adjacent to kendo. Do or die, I told myself, and slowly walked towards the goblin leader.

I remembered some of the advice I had received in the old world. It applied to anything, really, be it sports, martial arts, gambling, you name it. Let your opponent be the first to strike and the first to make a mistake. And so, I did not change my pace one bit. I kept approaching the goblin leader, steadily, now dropping the point of the sword towards the ground. This seemed to put the goblin leader on edge and it stopped approaching the carriage. I could see it considering me as a target now.

Then, without warning, it got on all fours and lunged at me. It was still far away enough that I could raise the heavy sword well above my head and wait for split second. Though that moment felt like an eternity. I couldn’t let it get too close or it would completely overpower me. Instead of panic, I felt an unnatural calm as I let the sword drop at just the right moment, landing clean on the goblins skull and covering me in its acrid, dark purple blood.

Only once the goblin leader at collapsed to the ground at my feet did I realise how much adrenalin was flowing through my body. My entire body felt hot, even my feet. They felt like they were burning. Burning?

I looked down to see that my sword was wreathed in flames. The tip was close to the grass and it had caught on fire, tickling my shoes with flame. I quickly stepped back and waved the sword around, trying to extinguish it.

“Oi, you damn knights!” I yelled out to the knights in the distance who had just run through the last goblin. “Help me out here, will you? I don’t know how to put this thing out-“ I was cut off by a torrent of water that hit me from above, drenching me completely and extinguishing the flames on the sword. I stood there, dumbfounded, dripping with water, looking like a rat that had just been rescued from a bathtub.

“Put that sword down you numbskulled novice and get on your knees!” Came an authoritative female voice. I turned around to see a very displeased woman with a wand in her hand in a French maid outfit with a long skirt, frills, and a white frilly headband.

Hmm, I nodded in approval of the execution of the outfit which seemed to piss the woman off even more. “Why you vermin!” I flinched as she was about to ready another spell when a voice came from inside the carriage. “Marie, stop! He saved us you know?”

It was the voice of a young girl. And indeed, out of the carriage stepped a young girl with undulating blonde hair, dressed in regal clothes that resembled what an equestrian might wear. High leather boots, a navy polo sweater, and billowing trousers that were caught by the boots and restrained by a thick leather belt. A beret of sorts rested on her head at an angle.

“This street urchin most definitely has some sort of ulterior motives in mind!” Marie the maid snapped back, not letting her wand drop a centimetre. “He was already acting suspicious when we passed him!”

“Woah, woah, let’s all calm down.” I slowly raised my hands but a further insistent gesture from Marie had me on my knees with my hands on my thighs obediently as the two other knights finally rushed back.

“Hey, isn’t this the guy from before?” Said one of them.

“Yeah, why’s he here? And why’s he… wet”

“Took you two long enough-“ I turned around and was about to express my grievances further when another bucketload of water was dropped on me while I had my head turned around.

“Phthoo, *gasp* hyuck *cough*” this time some of the water had gotten into my mouth. My ears went red and I was dying of embarrassment from having almost drowned on dry land. What I noted, though, was that the water tasted different, almost like carbonated water but without the fizziness or the tartness of the carbonic acid. It felt more… alive.

“Hmph!” The maid turned her nose away haughtily. “I would have taken care of that brute even if this beggar hadn’t intervened.”

“I am not a beggar! And just what would you have done, dumped more water on its head?” I scoffed.

Without a word, Marie pointed her wand at me again and this time, a small pellet of water shot past my left ear and into the ground behind me. I turned my head around slowly to see a small sizzling crater.

“My apologies, hallowed one” I quickly prostrated myself and slammed my forehead against the ground. “Spare this wretch his life, your grace”

“Hmm, that’s more like it. But save the titles for Lady Julie” She gave a light bow to the girl who had approached from inside the carriage.

This Lady Julie or whatever gave me a wry smile, then shot her maid daggers very quickly before turning back to me, holding out her napkin. “I am sorry for Marie’s behaviour. She just wanted to protect me.”

Ah! A saint! In this cruel world where I had been assaulted by both human and monster alike since I got here she was the first to show me any kindness!

“Uhuuhuu” I felt another stream of tears flow, moved by this beautiful girl. “Thank youuuu,” I sobbed as I reached out for her napkin, though that seemed to have put her off seeing how quickly she retracted it. “On second thought, I allow you to douse him once more, Marie.”

I couldn’t even react as a third wave was dropped on my head. I was getting so used to it now that I didn’t flinch. I just knelt there, looking off into space.

“Ahem.” I cleared my throat as I got up and adjusted my collar. “My apologies for the undignified display. It seems that long days of travelling had gotten to me.” I slicked my hair back with forced nonchalance and looked back at Julie who stared at me dumbfounded. Then she burst out laughing.

“Haha!” she wiped a tear from her eye. “You are a strange one. But yes, thank you. That was very brave of you.” She held out her hand. What was the right move here? Get down and kiss it, just kiss it? I opted to just grab her hand gently and shake it.

“Though I do feel a bit embarrassed now, seeing how your maid was more than capable of stopping that goblin.”

Marie looked away yet again, this time with a look of self-satisfaction as she couldn’t help the corners of her lips from turning up. “That’s right! I’m here to escort Lady Julie after all.”

Julie sighed and shook her head. “Oh well, the least I can do is give you a ride to town, though…” She looked me over head to toe. I still looked like a wet rat.

“Um, let’s see. Hold your breath and close your eyes.” She said as she raised both her hands towards me, palms open and facing me.

“Huh, ah ok-“ I was cut off yet again by a strong blast of warm wind that I almost struggled to keep myself upright in. Did no one in this world let others finish their sentences?

A few moments later, I was dry and my hair got all puffy. “Wow, thanks.” I looked at my clothes which were also clean and dry now. Almost as if I had been put through a full laundry cycle.

“It’s the least I can do.” Julie said with an affirmative nod. “Now, let’s get back inside the carriage, shall we? Sir…”

“Ah, no need for honorifics. Just call me…” I racked my brain for a second. Should I give her my real name? No. That name and its life was dead to me now. I needed a new one to symbolise this new life I had been granted. “Alfonse. Just call me Alfonse” I said with a grin.

“Alfonse…” repeated Julie. “Well, then, Alfonse, shall we get going?” She turned around and headed back to the carriage. I obediently followed, sitting down inside across from her and Marie as the carriage gave a light jolt and we resumed our separate journeys, now united, towards the walled city.

At that moment, Marie mused, “What ever happened to Carl?” with a hand against her cheek. Her and Julie both turned around to look through the rear window and past them, I saw the knight from before who had been knocked unconscious desperately chasing the carriage, waving his hands, but so weighed down by his armour that the gap only increased. I had found myself in the company of some real characters, it seems.