Chapter 5: Girl, Tempted
THE next day, Nichika awoke from a shallow sleep. Surveying her surroundings, she slapped her cheeks with both hands to get rid of her grogginess. An unfamiliar room, an unusual sofa, and a talking wolf—so her second day in another world began with the same strangeness from the first.
“Blegh, it wasn’t a dream after all.”
“Morning, Nichika. Did you sleep?”
“Somehow.”
Wolfie sluggishly stretched as he got to his feet. He escorted her out of the house to the well she had spotted yesterday so she could wash her face. Refreshing air filled the forest, and it whisked away some of her pent-up feelings.
Nichika had never used a water well before. Mimicking what she’d seen on TV before, she threw the bucket into the well, then used the rope attached to the pulley to draw it back up. The bucket came up full of clear, cool water.
She wanted to rinse as much filth off her as possible, so she soaked her handkerchief in the water and got to wiping herself down. What she carried with her from her own world didn’t amount to much: the clothes on her back, a handkerchief, and a few pieces of hard candy in her pocket. She had been carrying her schoolbag when the ground had given way under her feet, but it seemed to have disappeared around the same time she’d lost her shoes.
“Now that I think about it, I still don’t know that person’s name. What does he go by?” Nichika asked Wolfie.
Really taking a moment to consider the situation, it was strange she didn’t know the name of the person who had stolen her first kiss. Though, should she even count it as her first if it’d happened in this world? Honestly, if possible, she’d rather not count it as a kiss at all.
“Master’s name? Mm, I don’t know if it’s okay to say it.”
“Why wouldn’t it be okay?”
“Um, um, you see a name is a very, very important component that lets a person exist here. So Master said you shouldn’t share your real name unless it’s absolutely required.”
Is that really how it works? Nichika thought.
“He said a powerful witch can curse a person to death with just their name.”
Nichika nearly spat out the water she’d sipped from her cupped hands. “That’s a bad joke, right?!”
I told him my name! I totally told him my full name yesterday. Does that mean he already has power over my life?!
“D-Do you mean everyone uses an alias or—”
“I see you start off your mornings already obnoxiously loud.”
“Eek!”
Nichika instantly spun around as if she’d been stung by a bee when she heard the deep growl behind her. The man was leaning against the door with his eyes half-closed.
Crap! I have to change his impression of me right now! I don’t want to get cursed to death!
“G-Good morning to you! Isn’t it a fine, refreshing morning?!”
“…You’re so obvious.” He walked over to the well yawning and leaned over to wash his face. He wasn’t yet wearing his glasses. Could it be that his eyes weren’t bad enough to need them at all times?
He dragged the bucket Nichika was using over and artlessly chucked it into the water as he scratched his head.
“It’s too much of a pain to figure out what to do with you. I’ll bring you to the nearest town, so get ready to go. We’ll leave in an hour.”
“Pardon?”
Her immediate relief that he wasn’t going to curse her or dose her with freaky potions clashed headfirst with the new fear that he might abandon her somewhere, while she still lacked a single clue about what was happening to her. Was he possibly trying to wash his hands of her now that some spooky rose parasitized her?
“U-Umm—” She was about to ask him if he could at least give her a pair of shoes, when—
“HELLOOOOOOOOOO! OSY!”
“GAH!”
Something rammed into his back with that bubbly holler. The man fell upside down into the well, and Nichika heard a loud ka-plunk accompanied by a splash.
“Whoa…!” she yelped.
“Oh? He disappeared.”
The culprit, a woman dressed in a way that screamed, “I’m a real witch,” had flown in from the sky. She was wearing a black pointy hat and a black mini dress with a short hem. Tied to her stereotypical broom was enough luggage to kill.
She hopped down from the broom as it came to hover just above the grass and pushed her luscious sunny blonde hair out of her green eyes as she squinted, straining to see as if she were trying to find an answer to his disappearance but was utterly lost.
“Oh my gosh, Osy! Did you finally complete the Teleportation Schema? You’ll doom my business if you have! What are you going to do to make it up to me?”
“U-Uhh…” Nichika was still debating whether to run away or strike a conversation, when the blonde witch twirled toward her.
A twinkle instantly lit the witch’s emerald eyes. “Wow! ADORABLE! Hold on, where did you come from? Are you possibly Osy’s girlfriend? Tell me, tell me!”
“I AM NOT!”
That was definitely the one thing Nichika had to deny at all costs. Especially after what had happened last night.
Wolfie trotted back over from where he’d been blown to during the witch’s initial crash landing, and gleefully rubbed his big fluffy body against her legs.
“Miss Charlotte! Welcome!”
“Good morning, Wolly. You being a good boy?”
“I am! I am! Ehehe.”
Oh, so this must be Miss Charlotte who makes deliveries from the sky that I’ve heard so much about.
While Nichika mentally sorted out the situation, a sopping-wet phantom—also known as the man who seemed to go by Osy—crawled its way out of the bottom of the well.
“CHAR! What the hell kinda entrance is that?!”
“Oh, dear me. Why are you coming out of a well? Did you become an apprentice to a water spirit?”
“Are you seriously asking me that?!”
The man’s sleepiness had been thoroughly washed away by the icy cold water. Nichika was surprised he actually survived the fall to the bottom of a deep well.
Is everyone in this world so eccentric? As Nichika started worrying even more about her future prospects, Wolfie let out a short howl to get their attention before introducing everyone.