“There are bandits in the marquis’s chambers!”
“Let no one escape!”
I heard soldiers pouring into the room, one after another, their swords scraping together as they crammed through the blown-apart doors. Moments later, I began hearing explosions, followed by men’s screams.
A particularly loud explosion shook the entire building. It was followed by the sounds of something crumbling, then the roar of flames.
The building was on fire.
Ariane entered the room and called out to me in an exasperated voice.
“Just what are you doing, Arc?”
The dark elf stared at me with her arms crossed, a look of annoyance on her face. With her cloak now discarded, her crossed arms rested atop her leather corset, propping up her full chest from below, further accenting the twin peaks barely contained by her armor.
From her point of view, it probably looked like I’d snuck off to steal a bunch of gold. If only I had green cheeks, the look would be complete.
If there had been a chimney nearby, I might look like Santa Claus instead. But there wasn’t one in sight.
“It’ll cost quite a bit of money to get the organization back together.”
“Huh?”
She looked at me suspiciously, not understanding what I was saying. Finished with their work, the other two elven women appeared behind her.
“Assuming someone wants to create another slave trading organization, they won’t be able to do it without this money as starting capital. If we bring the money with us, it will slow down their activities.”
I thought this was a nice-sounding excuse for why I was taking all the money. To be fair, there was an element of truth to it.
Ariane exchanged looks with the women flanking her. After nodding in approval, they also stepped into the room and begin shoving gold into leather bags. Sena was now wearing Ariane’s gray cloak, who also joined them.
“I’m impressed you can hold such a heavy bag without even breaking a sweat. It’s gotta be at least three times the weight of mine.”
“I agree with what he said, but just how are we supposed to get out of here with all of this weighing us down?”
“Yeah, it’s heeeeeeavy.”
The three women looked at me, surprised at the size of the bag I was carrying.
“Don’t worry about that. He can use teleportation magic. It looks like we’re done here, so let’s get going!”
“Wh-what?! Teleportation magic? By himself? I thought those were just fairy tales!”
“Hmph, I need more practice…”
While the three talked among themselves, I could hear more sounds coming from downstairs. If we didn’t leave soon, things were about to get much more complicated.
The three of them had finished collecting the rest of the gold in the room, so there wasn’t much else for us to do here.
“Time to leave town! Transport Gate!”
As soon as I summoned the spell, a magic pillar began glowing around us. The next moment, we were standing on the opposite shore of the river in a grassy plain, looking out over Diento.
“Looks like we escaped! I can’t believe how convenient that teleportation magic is. I wonder if there’s some way I could use it…”
“No… No way! Was that really magic?!”
“Yaaaawn. I’m tired… Where are we anyway?”
The three elven women looked around in surprise. I was also surprised, but for a different reason. Everything in the magic pillar had teleported with us. All the pieces of artwork and various knick-knacks that had adorned the room were now lying about in the open field.
Fires continued raging across the river in Diento, smoke rising into the sky. In fact, it looked even worse than before. I remembered hearing the sound of fire crackling in the marquis’s residence.
“So, I suppose my job is complete?”
Ariane looked away from the scene unfolding across the river and shot me a wide grin. She pulled ten elven coins out of her waist pouch, put them in a bag, and tossed them my way.
“You were an incredible help. Here’s your fee, plus the extra amount I promised. I assume that’s enough, though it’s probably nothing compared to the money you stole.”
I caught the bag in one hand and tossed it into the sack on my back.
“Much appreciated.”
Ariane dropped the bag of gold from her shoulder and fixed me with a serious look.
“Listen, Arc… We’re heading over to Lalatoya. It’s the closest village. Why don’t you come with us and meet the village elder?”
I was taken aback by her suggestion, but I really did want to see an elf village. On the other hand, I also wanted to avoid running into anyone important, and that included village elders.
“I would love to come with you. But…is it necessary for me to meet with the elder?”
“Of course it is. We need to get permission from the elder just to invite an outsider into the village. And, to be completely frank, I was hoping we could work with you again in the future. To prove how much I trust you, I want to introduce you to the village elder, one of the people I trust most in this world.”
The two women standing beside Ariane looked surprised by her words, but they didn’t voice any objections.
“If you’ve come to trust me that much, then I won’t lie to you. I’m afraid I can’t meet the elder. Not if it means taking off my armor.”
“I mean, you would have to at least show your face. You won’t change your mind?”
I simply nodded.
“May I ask why?”
It was hard to respond to that. I didn’t want to lie to her, but I couldn’t tell her the truth either.
“If I were to take off my helmet, I may end up on the receiving end of your blade.”
“What if I promised I wouldn’t do that? Would you show me your face then?”
Her golden eyes were locked on me.
Would she turn against me? Or might she understand my plight? If I could see the reaction of a person who’d grown to trust me this much, it may actually help me decide how to continue living my life in this world. After all, there’d probably be many trials waiting for me in the future.
I put my hands on the sides of my helmet. Ponta hopped off and landed easily on my shoulder.
I slowly pulled the helmet from my head and faced the women.
The expressions on their faces betrayed their surprise.
Standing in front of them was an armor-clad skeleton, light blue flames flickering from deep within its eye sockets, like a pair of disembodied souls.
The two elves on either side of Ariane took fighting stances and began summoning their magic.
“Stop it!” Ariane threw out her arms, holding back her comrades.
“Arc, is that really… What happened…?”
Ariane did her best not to let her voice betray her surprise, but I still caught a hint of it.
Obviously, I couldn’t tell them that I’d woken up in a different world from my own and was now living as my video game character. There was no way they’d understand.
“I don’t quite know myself. But one day, I found myself in this body, all alone in the country of Rhoden.”
“He’s not undead, is he?”
“A super strong undead in armor? That’d be awful!”
Sena and Uhna maintained their fighting stances and continued glaring at me. Ariane remained calm, maintaining eye contact with me.
“He doesn’t have the corruption of death on him. Besides, a spirit animal like the cottontail fox wouldn’t get so close to an undead monster. He was also able to perform healing spells.”
Ariane’s words had the desired effect of at least getting the other two to stop and think.
“Huh? Now that you mention it, is that a cottontail fox on his shoulder? A spirit animal? What’s going on here?”
“That’s right. Corrupted undead can cast curses, but they wouldn’t be able to use the power of light to remove curses. This doesn’t make any sense!”
Ariane laughed gently at their confusion. It seemed like the tension had eased slightly.
“Arc, you’ve done so much to help me and my companions. Your secret is safe with us. If you’ve been cursed, then the elder may have some information that could help you.”
“That would be greatly appreciated. Nothing would make me happier than to remove this curse from my body.” It would be nice to go back to having a flesh-and-blood body that could actually respond to the sight of the beautiful women standing before me.
I put my helmet back on, thinking over my past actions and wondering why it was that I’d ended up turning into my skeleton avatar in the first place.
“Let’s start from the beginning. I am Ariane Glenys Maple, a soldier from the Maple borough in the forest province of Canada. I would like to ask you again, Arc. Will you come to our village?”
Ariane extended her right hand toward me. I reached out and took it.
“My name is Arc. I am on a journey to cleanse my cursed body. I will gladly take you up on your offer.”
Now that I’d finally put it into words, I decided that returning to my own world would become my new goal.
I’d never actually considered that removing my curse could become the purpose of my journey. I didn’t even know if I was cursed. But so long as I continued to live like this, I would face many hardships. If the elf elder had any wisdom to share with me, then it’d be worth the journey.
“Well then, let’s head up the river and join our friends!”
Ariane smiled at me and hefted the gold-filled bag over her shoulder. I lifted my own bag from the ground and looked toward the forest, where the two rivers met.
It was still dark, and our path was lit only by the moon. But our course was clear.
“Let’s get started, shall we?”