novelraw Chapter 403: Another World
Chapter 403: Another World
"Monster... monster... Don't come near me, my meat isn't tasty... Namo Amitabha... Namo Amitabha..."
Looking at the trembling girl who had shrunk into the corner of the cage, Gou Wen smiled bitterly in distress. He then glanced at Fisher beside him, who had also been observing the young girl before them all along.
Through her clothing and stockings, Fisher could roughly tell that this young girl was completely an ordinary little girl. Neither her soul nor her physical body showed any signs of training whatsoever, let alone the strange words she kept muttering.
Gou Wen didn't speak anymore, but Fisher, still in place, spoke up,
"Hey, stop chanting. This isn't a dream, but reality. If you don't believe it, why don't you slap yourself and feel if it hurts?"
The smile on Gou Wen's face became several degrees more helpless. But before he could evaluate Fisher's odd suggestion, Asuka Karasawa, who was shaking like a sieve, slightly raised her head, her brown pupils brightening slightly...
It seems that what this monster said actually made a little bit of sense.
Then, in the next second, beneath Gou Wen's surprised gaze and Fisher's calm look, she fiercely delivered a harsh slap to her own cheek. As the crisp "smack" echoed within the cage, Asuka Karasawa was instantly stunned in place.
"The solution provided by Mr. Fisher is truly rough..."
Hearing Gou Wen's voice, Fisher, sitting in place with crossed arms, shook his head and said,"It's also the most direct method, isn't it?"
Meanwhile, the pale face of Asuka Karasawa, who had just slapped herself fiercely, gradually flushed deep red. Her skin seemed to be the rather sensitive type—the sort that would leave marks even with just a little exertion of force. Earlier, she thought she was in a dream and hit herself without any restraint. This slap not only helped her verify whether she was dreaming right now but also made her newly awakened consciousness completely clear.
But... but... it really hurts so much...
Asuka Karasawa remained in a daze, yet her eye sockets gradually reddened, causing Gou Wen to burst into uproarious laughter,
"Hahaha, you human little girl are truly silly, actually making yourself cry by hitting yourself, really..."
"Eh... eh?"
Asuka Karasawa looked Unbelievably at the "Mr. Monster" before her, and then turned to look at the dark-haired gentleman with an expressionless face beside him. He didn't laugh, but merely continued,
"Now you've confirmed it? You aren't dreaming; you're exactly in reality. You can turn around and look outside to see where we are right now."
Asuka Karasawa's mind went entirely blank. Her seventeen years of life experience seemingly proved completely insufficient against dealing with the sudden situation right now. She was obviously just taking a nap in the classroom in the afternoon, but woke up appearing in another bizarre place...
Just as Fisher had done three days ago, she turned her head. Through this small window, she saw the giant planet outside, as well as the golden, illusory giant tree. She instantly went mute, and only after a long time did she scream, Struck With Panic, while clutching her skirt,
"Eh... eh, is Japan recruiting astronauts right now? Why am I in outer space... Wait... what is that tree? And what are these buildings suspended in mid-air... This... this isn't [Earth]?"
"Earth?"
Fisher blanked slightly, chewing over this bizarre noun that had suddenly sprung from the other party's mouth.
"R-right... It's also a planet. The land on it doesn't look like this. There is no giant tree like this. Even if there are space stations, they couldn't look like this! Where in the world am I right now? Shouldn't I be at school? You... You guys must be on some show organized by TV Osaka, right? Stop joking around, let me out! I want to go home!"
Asuka Karasawa turned her head with reddened eyes and frantically gestured a circular shape towards the two behind her. The more she spoke, the more her voice trembled, and the dampness in her eyes and the sobbing tone in her words grew heavier. Only until the very end, as if truly breaking down, did she turn around and begin smashing the wall of the Cage of Sealing Curses with her hands, producing loud "bang, bang, bang" sounds.
"Haha... stop joking around. We can't hear sound in a vacuum... You guys really are pranking me, right... Let me go! Hurry up! If this continues, I will absolutely call the police!"
Gou Wen's smile faded bit by bit. Looking at Asuka Karasawa, who was breaking down and crying while smashing the cage wall, his fingers twitched slightly, as if emitting a faint fluorescence there. As that invisible fluorescence connected to Asuka Karasawa in the distance, her irritable and broken down emotions gradually calmed, and her whole person became listless, Weak And Feeble.
But even so, she still panted, curling her body into the corner somewhat fearfully bit by bit, scanning her surroundings within the cage.
"Let me out... Stop fooling around, I beg you..."
"Little girl, could you please calm down? The reason you can hear sound in here is because the Angels placed a ubiquitous medium in the Sanctuary, just to make their forging smoother. Although I understand the emotions generated by you being captured right now, our current situation isn't safe. If you keep going on like this, it's very likely to attract the Angels. They aren't entities that are easy to get along with."
Gou Wen's gentle words couldn't move the huddled Asuka Karasawa in the slightest. She merely hid her head in front of the hem of her skirt, not wanting to look at him at all, and merely said,
"Stop acting. You bunch of actors, quickly let me leave. I'm absolutely going to call the police."
Gou Wen was out of ideas. Fisher, however, sighed and walked over to her side. Before she could sense someone approaching and prepare to voice insults, Fisher had already squatted before her and spoken,
"Listen to me. Even though I don't know what those strange nouns you just blurted out actually are, I can tell you right now: since you've come here, if there is any entity playing a joke on you, it can only be Destiny... The place we are currently in is completely different from the Earth you just mentioned. Perhaps you can still disbelieve the bizarre scenery outside, but the fact that you can bypass language and directly understand our words in this cell—isn't that enough to make you suspicious?"
Asuka Karasawa raised her head blankly. Listening to the man before her speak a language she had never heard before, yet understanding all of it perfectly, while Fisher's cold and sharp expression remained completely unchanged... He pointed back at Gou Wen behind him and continued,
"You said earlier that Gou Wen was a monster. This proves that in your world—at least in reality—creatures like him do not exist, correct?"
"R-right, over there, there are only humans like me."
Gou Wen smiled. The whale tail behind him swung very nimbly in coordination with Fisher's words, as if proving to Asuka Karasawa that the appendage on his back wasn't a toy or decoration.
"A human from outside the world. This is truly... unheard of. At least I've never heard of the existence of other worlds. No wonder those Angels earlier had to go ask the Archangels to make a decision. Wait, could it be they'll even report it to the Chain of Heaven?"
Fisher shot a glance back at Gou Wen, then turned his head to once more look at the young girl before him, who was frightened like a chick, and continued speaking,
"Alright, I understand. Let's introduce ourselves to each other first. My name is Fisher, a human like yourself. That guy in the back is named Gou Wen, a Whale-kin from the ocean."
"Whale-kin?"
"You can learn about this later. For now, simply treat him as another race different from humans. Next, talk to us about the world you lived in. If there are any differences here, we will tell you. That way, you'll be able to understand the place you're currently in at the fastest degree."
Gou Wen nodded in agreement and, full of curiosity, sat slightly closer to Asuka Karasawa.
Meanwhile, the knee-hugging Asuka Karasawa secretly peeked at the slightly swaying black long ears beside Gou Wen's head. It was only after several seconds that she seemingly truly confirmed those things were genuine ears, rather than some glued-on toys...
She pursed her lips, secretly shrinking back a minute distance towards the corner, then lowered her head and whispered,
"I-I am called Asuka Karasawa."
Hearing the bizarre yet familiar pronunciation from the other party's mouth, Fisher's superficial expression remained unchanged, but his heart shuddered slightly. Right now, the pronunciation chanted by the young girl before him was exactly the pronunciation Baimon had him chant back then.
Indeed, the person before his eyes was precisely the subsequent President of the Creation Society, the Magic Lord, Asuka Karasawa.
"Um... I come from Earth. It's a planet similar to yours, but it doesn't possess that giant tree, nor such spectacular space stations. Our space stations are very, very small and completely sealed, because we cannot survive in a vacuum."
"In other words, the physique of humans in your location is probably roughly the same as yours, right?"
"No... I don't exercise often, so I'm relatively weaker. If they exercise regularly, they should be much stronger than me, right?"
Fisher's eyes lit up slightly. Could it be that the humans of the other world were different from here and were all very powerful?
"How strong? For instance, can they jump a hundred meters in a single leap? Can they forcefully break through storms? And what about Magic? These powers..."
Halfway through hearing this, Asuka Karasawa hastily waved her hands and quickly said,
"It's not that exaggerated... They're just a bit stronger, but still humans! What you're describing is a Superman, right? Things like Magic simply don't exist!"
"Superman?"
"That is... an existence in comic books."
"...I understand. Continue."
Asuka Karasawa looked at Fisher, who was Lost In Thought before her. Pinching her skirt, she deliberated for a long time before continuing,
"I come from a country named 'Japan' on Earth. It is an island nation located in Asia. This year is Heisei Year 8, which is the Year 1996... In June, I will be exactly 17 years old, studying in the 2nd Year of Kyoto's Hechuan High School."
"Then, do you have any impressions before you left your world? Did anything special happen?"
"Special things..."
Asuka Karasawa racked her brains, thinking for quite a while. Subsequently, she decisively shook her head and said downcast,
"No. Nothing special ever happened to me at school. I don't have friends, it was just simply commuting to and from school. I only remember I was very sleepy in the afternoon, so I napped on my desk for a while, and when I woke up I arrived here."
Mm, actually Fisher had already anticipated this. Based on his reading of Caleb Uz's Completion Handbook, he roughly knew that man couldn't be considered successful in his own world, nor experienced anything particularly noteworthy. Otherwise, he certainly would have written it in the Completion Handbook.
What Fisher saw was only a frustrated middle-aged man, with an unfaithful wife and a rebellious daughter, living a somewhat screwed-up yet not extremely special human life. The Asuka Karasawa before his eyes was likely the same.
Thinking of this, he silently memorized the country she came from in his head, then continued asking,
"Then have you heard of... the name 'United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland'?"
"Eh?"
Asuka Karasawa blanked slightly. She raised her head, looking at Fisher in high excitement, blurting out in succession,
"Y-you guys are truly not pranking me from a TV station or school or something? How could you know..."
Even a hint of anomaly flashed across the eyes of Gou Wen, who had been listening behind him all along. He turned his head and sized Fisher up and down once again, subsequently revealing a Lost In Thought expression.
However, seeing her reaction, Fisher's heart leaped slightly. He hurriedly pursued the question,
"You really know it?"
"Y-yes, I... I know. This is a country, we generally call it 'the UK'. It's another place very, very far away from our country. Mm, let me think... Hmm, pardon me, my geography is truly quite poor, because I didn't select this course at school. But anyway, we seem to be on the same continent. They are in Europe, and we are in Asia."
Fisher quickly realized that these Transferred Persons likely all hailed from the identical world. Although judging from the cultural symbols they left behind, they most likely did not know each other—just as a weaver in Naris would absolutely not know a painter living in Chevalie, or a street cleaner in Kadu—yet they also originated from the identical world.
Then, is it possible that the author of the Demi-Human Completion Handbook also came from this world?
"Wait, can you help me check if the owner using this text comes from your nation? The words she uses seem identical to the text on your chest plate."
"Eh?"
Under Asuka Karasawa's largely surprised gaze, the Mana Circuit in Fisher's hand illuminated bit by bit. Subsequently, forcefully imbuing Mana, he left streaks of bright, sparkling text upon the cage's wall. Although the text on the wall would vanish into thin air once his Mana dispersed, within the darkness at this moment, that line of text was incredibly conspicuous.
Impressively, upon that wall appeared a line of block characters restored extremely close by Fisher, reading,
"First of all, I am not a Demi-Human Girl Con."
Fisher turned to look at Asuka Karasawa, but after scrutinizing the text, she shook her head to Fisher's Totally Unexpected surprise. Following that, she whispered further,
"Um... Mr. Fisher..., may I call you that?"
"You may."
"Mm, well, actually our country originally lacked a written language. All the text we use originates from an ancient nation residing closely to our West. Although the Japanese used currently has undergone modifications by us, yielding quite a few changes, there are still quite a few characters bearing the exact identical appearance to those in their homeland..."
Asuka Karasawa raised her finger and traced several straightforward strokes in midair from thin air. Then she hugged her knees again,
"The text you wrote are authentic 'Kanji', the script utilized by the ancient nation known as 'China'. So... probably that person you're asking about comes from there as well, right?"
As expected, the author of the Demi-Human Completion Handbook shared the same world of origin as the Magic Lord.
"I see. Are you familiar with that place?"
"Mm, I suppose I understand a bit? Because anime on television features many Chinese elements. There's an incredibly cute animal called a Panda there, along with highly pretty clothing named Qipao. Plus, I heard it's very, very traditional or whatever there. But I've never been there either. Even domestically, I've only visited Tokyo and Kyoto..."
Traditional?
Fisher blanked slightly, acquiring zero useful information from Asuka Karasawa's description. Even if there was a bit, it seemingly didn't align at all with that eccentric Transferred Person anyway.