[Release was delayed. I was having a bit of a burn out, then wasn’t sure how I wanted to take this chapter. As much as I want an angry John to head to HOTD, I have so many things lined up in The Great Cleric, that leaving now would be a shame. There will be a couple polls coming up for future worlds, to narrow down the choices from the prologue.] 

“Hun? Brod!? When did you get back?” John said looking at the massive man sitting beside him.

“Just a few minutes ago actually. Do you have a moment to come to my office, I have something I want to discuss with you.” Brod replied, an excited tone in his voice.

“Well…I can but-” he replied, trying to keep his voice from slurring.

“Great! Let’s go!” Brod said, and stood up an walked away.

Confused at Brod’s apparent excitement, John stood up and followed him, his curiosity piqued. 

I wonder what this is about? I haven’t known him long, but he seems the type that only get excited with cards, training, and fighting. Not sure what he wants from me that couldn’t wait until tomorrow. 

John casted a quick cure spell to clear his mind a bit, thinking this discussion would require a clearer head. It had to be important.

When John left the room, the air beside the bench he was sitting on seemed to shimmer for a moment, and if anyone was nearby a quiet *tsk* would have been heard. 

Alas, no one was in the room to hear it, other than the lone receptionist who was engrossed in their work. The shimmer moved, and became completely invisible again, leaving none the wiser at their passage.

Up in Brod’s office, with yet another drink in his hand, John was seated across from the man. The pair had said nothing for a few minutes, and just stared at each other. It felt like Brod’s eyes were boring into him, like he was trying to dissect him with just his gaze.

John didn’t really care that much, so he just stared back.

Is he trying to make me squirm? I thought he didn’t play these dick measuring games? Ha, I know, lets mess with him a little bit. (Yes, mess with one of the most physically powerful people in this country John. Brilliant Idea)

Between the Substance X and the alcohol that remained in his system both fueling his lack of caution, John licked his lips while staring at Brod dead in the eyes, then made a kissy face. The results were immediate and quite amusing to him.

“Ugghh! What are you doing?” Brod said, breaking the silence first.

“Ha! I could ask the same of you. You brought me up here, fed me a drink, then just stared at me for the last five minutes. Are you waiting for a poison to kick in or something? Because if the invitation was just to sit here and have a staring contest, I have better things to do with my time, like being in bed with my fiancée.” John retorted.

“No, not…wait fiancée? Nanaella? Since when?” he asked, a confused look on his face.

“I guess you hadn’t heard, it was a few days ago. I won’t go into details, but I asked her, and she said yes.”

“Hun, go explore a new dungeon for a week and suddenly things change. Well congratulations are in order. Now my offer for you is even more important.” Brod said, leaning forward in his chair.

“What offer?”

“The offer to help you become stronger so you could protect yourself and your family.”

“Seriously? That wasn’t an offer, that was dragging me around by my collar and nearly boot fucking me until I complied.” John said with an even tone. While he agreed to wanting to become stronger, Brod didn’t really ask him if he wanted to be trained, he just started and John went along with it since it served his purpose in this world.

“Well, now I have the perfect spot for you to actually begin training for real.” Brod said, leaning forward eagerly.

“I thought we were training?” he replied, a confused expression on his face now.

“That? That barely qualifies as light exercise. No, I will have you join some other adventures in dungeon diving. I’ve explored this new dungeon down to floor fifty, and I must say, it is nearly perfect for nearly any new adventurer to gain experience. The monsters on the first ten floors are fairly weak, but yield decent quality non-elemental magic stones. Then from floor eleven to twenty, it shifts to the earth element. Every ten floors it seems to change elements. Even Grandol, the City of Labyrinths, doesn’t boast a dungeon like this.” Brod said, growing more excited as he was talking.

“Magic stones?” John asked. When he returned to this world, Alec had indeed given him some general knowledge of this world that was forgotten about the first time, so he knew that Grandol was a city to the West, and home to the Adventures Guild Headquarters. But no where in that information dump was anything about magic stones.

“Hun? How do you not know about magic stones?” Brod asked, confused at John’s ignorance. This pissed John off a bit for some reason.

“How would I? They didn’t exist where I came from. Just like this status screen thing. Hell, most things here are different than in my world. Like this entire adventure guild setup, doesn’t even make sense to me. Why doesn’t the government just send out soldiers to deal with monsters? It would be good ‘experience’ for them, and makes the nation more powerful as a result.

Don’t even get me started on issues I’ve noticed with the government here. How could they let people be sold into slavery in the only nation where slavery is illegal? The lack of policing and enforcement of their policies is atrocious. I mean, every government is bound to have some corruption, but this is straight up bullshit. 

And this xenophobic attitude to beastfolk. For fucks sake, they are people too. They live here, pay their taxes, and it isn’t like they are trying to force their culture on the place. Marginalizing people just because they look a little different will just force them into situations where they become desperate and start doing the crimes they were being accused of falsely before just to survive. It becomes a self fulfilling prophecy…Shit.”

John just realized he let the cat out of the bag. Brod was staring at him, mouth agape, and so was Galba…wait where did Galba come from?

“John…are you from another world?” The vice-guildmaster asked, composing himself faster than Brod.

John paused…really ready to hit that DEN Return skill now. What was he supposed to say? That he died, and was now a contestant travelling through worlds? Yeah that would go over well.

Sighing, he was about to say the two magic words when the world…paused. No movement, no sounds, like everything just stopped. A moment later he got a system notification

*Ding*

<New Message Received>

<John, just tell them you are from Earth and you were transmigrated here. That happens from time to time in this world. No need to mention DEN to them, in fact I insist you do not, at least for now. Also, keep up the aggression, you are doing good work changing the Lore of this world. Keep it up, and it might have a new destiny sooner than you think.> 

<P.S. Transmigration is similar to reincarnation, so use reincarnation if it is easier for you to remember. It doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things.>

“Wha-” John started to say, but before he could even really process the information, time started flowing again.

“Another world? Like Lord Reinstar was?” Brod said, none the wiser to the time stop.

“Who was Lord-“

“If he is from that other world, this could be a great opportunity but he could very well be in great danger.” Galba said, the gears visibly turning in his head.

“Why would-“

“Yeah. No doubt their would be a great many people interested in him. We need to protect him, and help him get stronger.” Brod said, talking over John.

“He could become the next Lord Reinstar, and help us reunite both the beastfolk and human nations under one banner.” Galba replied.

“Ha! We use him to help break the corruption that has embedded itself in that blasted church too!”

“Wai-” John started again, but was once again interrupted.

“Brod! Don’t say we are going to use him, that diminishes him to a puppet. It will be his choice not ours, but if he is truly from another world, we, as representatives of the Adventures Guild, NEED to support him before the church and corrupt nobles can sink their teeth into him.”

“I didn’t mean to say use him as a puppet. Damn it Galba, you know I am not always the best with words.”

“JESUS CHRIST SHUT UP BOTH OF YOU!” John shouted, tired of being talked over and ignored, his last nerve finally snapping.

Fuck I hate when people interrupt me. I don’t interrupt others (He does) It is just rude. And Alec fucking stopping time to send me a message? I thought they didn’t interfere…damn it lets just toss it all out there, see where the cards lie.

“I am from another world, a place called Earth, and I was sent here after I died. I wasn’t given a reason, and I have this beat up old fucking body that on the surface looks about forty, but in reality I am eighty three years old. 

I have no bloody clue why I was sent here, nor was I given any significant prior knowledge of this world, other than dark shit with demons was going to happen, eventually. Do I know what? No clue, you probably have a better idea than I. I was just going to train to be a healer since that was the skill I was given, get a little tougher, and start a family again. Maybe introduce the idea of indoor plumbing.

That is it. So, if you want my help in whatever cockamamie scheme you two are cooking up, you better start at the beginning. And if you’re tired, too bad, go fetch a glass of that substance X, it will put hairs on your chest and keep ya up all night.

Cause once we start, we ain’t leaving this room until you give me some fucking context as to why I should consent to becoming this uniting force for the world and not just book it to some far off place to live out my days in fucking peace.

And lay off that aura shit you both seem to like flexing around so much. I’ve had enough of it, and it serves no purpose here unless you plan on intimidating me, which I tell you now, won’t go in your favor.”

John was pissed, and as much as he hated it, he was laying on the ornery old man stereotype pretty hard right now. 

Of course, it isn’t everyday you find out someone is from another world. Still, this is bloody strange response. 

They both looked at each other, and then over to John, the pair of former high ranked adventures probably not used to anyone talking back to them like this. Finally, Galba spoke.

“John, I, we are sorry about that. You need to understand, the last known person from another world, he united our peoples, and brought major changes to our world, not to mention he defeated the demon lord. That was around five hundred* years ago, yet the changes he made can be felt even today.

Actually, it isn’t well known that he was reincarnated, rather he is thought of as more of a prodigy, a hero, and an inventor. The Adventures Guild however, has many records that we are privy to, and the senior leadership within the guild is informed of such things. One of those things is identifying strange people, people with different mindsets, people who don’t know basic knowledge, and observe them incase they are someone from another world.

And you John, do not have the mindset of someone from this world at all. You are too soft, mainly for someone your age, so we were watching you.” Galba said at length.

Soft? Since when? 

“So you were watching….wait…” Something dawned on him then, a moment of clarity in his mind. “You got your brother to get me drunk tonight then feed me that vat of substance X didn’t you? You know I have loose lips for some reason when I have both. Fuck me, you are just a manipulative little shit aren’t you.” John continued, his anger rising further.

“Ah…yes…that was my idea. I needed to talk with you, to see who you really were. I won’t apologize though, I was worried for Nanaella. She is the only daughter of my deceased friend, and since I could find nothing on you at all, anywhere, I wanted to ask you directly.” Galba replied, not a hint of remorse in his tone.

“I see. Fuck it, this will be a discussion for later. For now, tell me some more about this world, and what you want me to do. I will tell you now, I will not give you an answer tonight, as I will need to think on it, sober. Speaking off, Detoxify!” John growled, then cured himself of any remaining drunkenness. “Now, continue.”

It was going to be a long night.

Nanaella was worried that John hadn’t come to their room yet. While not official, she had slowly been moving stuff into his room, clothes, a hair brush, a mirror, some little things to decorate the place a bit so it didn’t seem so cold. They could be like this for awhile, but soon they should be looking at buying a place nearby, unless she could convince Uncle Brod and Galba to let them convert one of the larger rooms upstairs into an apartment.

“I bet he is still playing cards and drinking. Bah, it is time for him to come to bed.” She said to herself. 

She didn’t actually care about that part, since he could cure his intoxication with his magic, but it was time they had a talk about their future.

And cuddles, I want cuddles.

She got dressed and went up the stairs to the main reception of the guildhall. She paused before she reached the top of the stairs, familiar voices echoing down to her from the main hall.

“-you have a moment to come to my office, I have something I want to discuss with you.” 

Brod is back?

“Well…I can but-” 

Oh that is why John isn’t back yet.

“Great! Let’s go!”

She sat silently for a few minutes debating on what to do. She could just go back to bed, as now she knew why John wasn’t with her, but she could also go see what this was about.  And if it was just more drinking, she would interrupt them, and pull her fiancée out of her over protective uncles clutches. 

Let’s go surprise them.

She walked up to the top level of the guild where Brod’s office was, fully intending on knocking, but paused outside the door, her ears more than able to pick up the conversation going on within.  It was a bit heated, and John was raising his voice.

The next words out of his mouth though surprised her, and she sat down on the floor, stunned.

 “He is from another world?” She whispered, not knowing what to think of that.

She sat there in the hallway for awhile, listening in to their conversation, her thoughts racing, wanting answers from the man she fell in love with.

* – Actual timelines are guesses. I originally thought it was 1000 years ago, but I cant find that reference in the LN. Best I can find is a old biography of Lord Reinstar, where it said 300 years ago he was born, but later on,

Spoiler

you meet a…copy of Lord Reinstar,

[collapse]

but still no hard time lines are made. So, times are AU.

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