Road Trip

We spend the next hour or so getting ready for our adventure. While I get some last minute encouragement from Minerva, my three traveling companions pack our wagon full of supplies.

Of the isekai’d souls willing to adventure south to save the town only the four of us remained. Myself, Jet the fearless adventurer, Azuki the mischievous cat lady, and Spector the oh so mysterious rogue. Unfortunately for this rag tag group I’m not so sure we stand a chance. Jet has a tendency to leap before he looks, Spector barely talks, I’m y’know… ME, and I’m pretty sure Azuki is here just to make me miserable the whole trip. Yeah we’re screwed.

Despite the horrible thoughts of impending doom running through my head, I wave back to Minerva as we set off in our wagon. How on earth did she talk me into this? I’m going to die. Luckily I have some parchment paper, so I should have enough time to write my will.

To whomever it may concern,

I am dead. If you find this I leave everything to you. My possessions include my clothes, books (including the coveted limited time collector’s edition of the Emperor of the Lantern series, you’re welcome), and my Nantando Swap system and games. Some of the game titles include Boulder's Fence 3 and Critter Crossing. If you delete my save on that one I swear I will come back from the dead and kill you. I worked hard on that island. Thanks.

Sincerely,

June Crowley.

“Oooh what do we have here?” Oh no. Azuki popped out from the back of the wagon clearly not minding her own damn business.

“Leave me alone. This is for my eyes only.” I say with a confidence that surprises even myself. Good job me. Way to stand your ground!

“Welp not anymore, yoink!” Well my privacy rights sure were short-lived. She snatched the parchment from my hands swiftly. I can’t believe she said “yoink” unironically out loud. I also can’t believe that she is about to read my will to the other two guys on this wagon.

Azuki clears her throat and begins reciting my will in an all too dignified prissy voice. Seriously is that what she thinks I sound like?! “Mhhmm to whoever it may concern, I am dead. Bleh.” She makes an overly dramatic pose with her tongue sticking out. God I’m ending this charade now otherwise the only thing I’ll be dying of on this adventure is embarrassment.

Spector and Jet listen intently as I try my best to claw and scratch at Azuki to give me back my papers. But, as I swipe at her hands, she effortlessly dodges all my incoming attacks while still reading! “...my possessions include clothes, books, and games.”

“Azuki, if you keep reading, I will kill you.”

“Oh contrare. According to this you’ll only be committing murder if the person in possession of this will ‘deletes my save in that game Critter Crossing’ in which case you will ‘come back from the dead and kill you. I worked hard on that island!” Azuki erupts into mischievous little giggle fits, clearly very proud of herself.

“You humans are soooo concerned about your possessions aren't you? Well keep in mind that stuff isn't yours anymore. You're in this world now. All you've got to your name is that magic staff of yours and a few pieces of paper.”

“You still play Critter Crossing?” Spector finally chimes in.

“Hey! Aren’t you supposed to be guiding the horses? Keep your eyes on the road mister!”

“What road?” Spector retorts. I look up. At this point in the journey, it seems like we won’t be seeing much civilization for a while. We have just strolled out of the last town and are heading into the unforgiving Syla Desert.

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Part of me really wants to be geeking out right now about how awesome it is to be in one of the coolest settings from the Emperor of the Lantern series, but another part of me is fricking hot in this desert heat. Seriously, I’m sweating in places that I didn’t even know was possible, but I can’t drink water right now despite how thirsty I am. We may need to ration out our supplies to make it to the next town. Maybe I can distract myself in the meantime?

“Do you guys want to play a game?” I ask.

“No.”

“Not really…”

“Sure!”

Well that was quite a colorful list of responses. I’m glad Jet was eager to appease me though. His infectious enthusiasm is just enough to even break the cynical Azuki.

“Ugh fine. What do you suggest?” Azuki asks.

Hmm. I didn’t think I’d get this far. What game should I say? We can’t play the license plate game on account of the lack of cars and “never have I ever” is certainly off the table for this group. What else?

“How about I Spy? I’ll start! I spy with my little eye something…”

My voice trails off as I try to come up with something. Well crap. I just realized how immensely difficult it’s going to be trying to find something in a desert that isn’t sand.

“You found the problem with this game haven’t you?” While Azuki does have excellent observation skills, her levels of sass leave something to be desired. Whatever, I can’t let her win.

“No! I spy with my litt-”

“Sand. And let me guess? The next one is sand.” Azuki says with confidence.

Well the interruption was uncalled for even if true. Come on, hopefully there’s something around here that isn’t sand! Ah-ha, there you are!!

“Nope! I spy something green.” I say with a grin.

“Ooh it’s a cactus!” Jet cheerfully points out the plant growing up ahead.

Damn it! I needed Azuki to struggle trying to guess so that I could see the look on her smug little face fade away! But I guess if Jet saw it that easily, Azuki would have too. Wow, it’s a whole acre of giant cacti over there.

“Greeaat,” Azuki says with an eyeroll. “Now do you spot anything else outside of this wagon that isn’t sand or a cactus?”

“No…but-”

“Alright you two enough.” Spector calls out. “We’ve got about fifty miles more to go south before we reach the next town and I don’t want to hear either of you fighting. Understood?”

Sheesh. He’s like a disgruntled dad on a lengthy road trip. He’s the last person I expected to raise his voice, but he’s right. Azuki and I are bickering like children and we’re on a time-sensitive quest to save the town of Tauwren.

It’s rather boring as we slowly but surely make progress forward. There isn’t much to look at. Just acres of sand followed by the occasional forests of cacti. The flora and fauna in this world sure is strange. After my watch party got repetitive, I talked to Jet for a while about sports. He kinda got me to understand the rules behind football. Only kind of though. I mean, why is it called football though if it mostly uses hands? And how many yards are there anyways? Don’t they only play on one yard or field or something?? On second thought, maybe I didn’t learn anything.

Well, I fought valiantly to distract myself from my desires of the flesh, but unfortunately, all of my efforts thus far have been in vain. I’m getting pretty hungry now, but I know I need to save our supplies. Our horses have not been able to make much progress as the wind picks up. If the strong current continues like this, we might run out of both food and water before we make it to our destination.

CLANG.

I turn my attention towards the back of the wagon. Azuki fumbles with some crates tossing out the supplies she has no use for. She’s digging through everything, but can’t seem to find what she’s looking for. Wait, what IS she looking for? Oh no.

Azuki shouts to Spector and Jet sitting up front, “GUYS. How are we out of water already?!”

“We’re out already?!” Jet echoes the sentiment.

“Oh great you can hear me. Sadly that’s not going to get us any water!” Azuki claws back with what I think is unnecessary hostility. Jet is the last person you should ever speak to like that. But unfortunately she’s right to be worried. If we don’t find water soon, we won’t be able to continue our quest. And we’ll die. Which would totally suck.

“I don’t understand...” Spector says. “Didn’t everyone pack their own supplies and put it in the wagon before we left? There should be enough if we all packed.”

“Ooooh hahaha…. About that…” I had no idea we were supposed to pack our own stuff! Oh God I look like an idiot and pretty soon I’ll be a dead idiot.

Azuki catches on immediately to my slip up.

“Well thanks to you, we may have to start eating the horses!” Azuki says coldly.

“Ah how dare you!” Oh no, think of something quick. I know survival situations get desperate, but I can't bear to see our poor horses suffer!

I point my fingers towards the horses and give a proud proclamation. “This here is Sir Chestnut and that is Lady Maple. See they have names so now you can't eat them!”

“I’m going to kill you!” Azuki says as she pounces on me. My back hits the wagon floor as she shakes my shoulders vigorously. I know she’s not actually trying to kill me, but the way she jostles me around does hurt. This must be what having siblings is like.

Right when Azuki gets about ready to choke me out, I see a strange shimmering image in the distance. I can’t quite make it out, but it looks like salvation. While my one hand is concentrated on trying to fight back Azuki the other points out to the shining shape ahead. It looks like… water?