Chapter 2: Chapter II – Which deals with our hero’s arrival and the incident that follows.

After what might have been eternity, or just a few seconds, for Watanabe had no way of knowing, our hero finally woke up. For a few seconds he had to squint his eyes while they were trying to adjust to sudden daylight. After regaining his vision, Watanabe slowly and calmly stood up and began observing his surroundings, noticing houses made of adobe making up what he assumed was a village, huge fields of cabbage and snowy mountains very far away from him.

Thankfully, I have trained my whole life for this, he thought.

First rule of being sent to another world: Observe your surroundings calmly, check. Now, for the second rule: If you have confirmed yourself to be safe, begin checking for any systems that are exploitable.

Now officially beginning his speedrun of “Overpowered Any%”, Watanabe began shouting commands such as “[Status]!”. Yet nothing came up, so Watanabe tried “[Character]!”. This didn’t work either.

For a few minutes, Watanabe exhausted most of his English vocabulary (who he hadn’t improved a bit since graduating university), shouting any nouns that came to his mind, “[Peanuts]!” he shouted, “[Fiddlesticks]!” he bellowed, “[Infrastructure]!” he vociferated.

Alas, our friend was in a situation in which a thesaurus or a dictionary wouldn’t have helped, for even Watanabe soon realized the predicament he was in.

So, this isn’t a LitRPG, huh…

But, worry not dear readers among you whom have a love for the LitRPG genre, I treasure all my readers equally so, I, as the oh-so adroit author, have found a way for you to get your fix of LitRPG in this story.

So please, you shall not despair dear reader, for your despair will now melt away as you gaze upon this makeshift status panel that I concocted for our hero:

Now that we have had enough concrete facts and stats to last a chapter, we can return back to see how Watanabe is faring.

I guess Rule 2 shall be put on hold for now, there is still hope for non-LitRPG systems that will let me exploit this setting. Now, third rule of being sent to another world: Seek the aid of the settlement closest to you and ask where the “Adventurer’s Guild”, or the local equivalent of the “Adventurer’s Guild” is.

The importance of going for the Adventurer’s Guild first is not to be underestimated, for such an establishment commonly allows a newly arrived tourist from another world to rise the ranks and gain fame. While Watanabe was lacking in strength and courage, he hoped that things would just end up going his way the moment he joined such a guild.

Also, most importantly to Watanabe, was that the Adventurer’s Guild was frequently the place where people like him would gain members for their harem. He had already missed gaining the first member of his harem in the previous chapter, so he hoped that he’d get back on pace and manage to find one posthaste lest he be left maidenless.

So, Watanabe adapted a suitable trot and started quickly traveling the short way towards the village that he had seen. When he arrived though, he saw something that left him utterly puzzled:

He couldn’t see anyone in the village, let alone any building that looked like an Adventurer’s Guild. Can you even call this a settlement if there is no one that has settled in it, thought Watanabe.

Though, if it’s abandoned, I can just call dibs on everything here, thought Watanabe and remembered all those times he had robbed villagers of their pots and other miscellanea in RPGs. He had no money to his name, except for a 1000-yen banknote left over from before he died, so acquiring some money by looting this village would have been a welcome boost to his fortune.

So, among all the adobe houses, he picked the largest one -which was still pretty small- and journeyed forth expecting some loot. Of course, he expected nothing legendary, but a few gold coins or something of the sort would have helped his fortunes advance greatly.

A straw bed, and… a chest! Finally, something adventure-worthy is happening to me!

In the room that he was now in, which was also the only room in the house, Watanabe finally found something that wasn’t confusing or disappointing: a chest, the quintessential item for anyone looking for loot.

Checking if the chest had any locks, which it didn’t, Watanabe opened the chest that now contained all his dreams and ambitions and found a set of peasant’s clothes and a small bronze coin.

I… You know what, not all chests are made equal. Maybe the other houses have some good loot, unlike this lousy, terrible house. Only idiots would think that such a lousy house might have good loot!

Calling the grapes sour, our hero ventured forth and explored the other houses. He, for his 30 minutes of hard labor, earned two more small bronze coins and…That’s it for what he found. Our hero, while he was normally used to getting disappointing rewards for his labor, still felt deep disappointment as he pocketed the meagre coinage he acquired, Thankfully, his disappointment dissipated when he saw, among all the run-down adobe houses, a gray building fashioned out of stone brick. The building had a tall dome, and three wings extending out of the structure with the dome.

This must either be an abandoned temple, a dungeon or a castle… Well, it might be a temple or a castle which is also a dungeon, but no matter! This, this is the kind of place where legendary swords and other artifacts are found, and if it is a temple and fate gives me her blessings, the temple may contain a forgotten goddess who might grant me a great boon and also follow me along as the first member of my surely soon-to-be great harem.

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So, with such intentions, our hero approached the door to the castle / temple / dungeon / temple dungeon / castle dungeon / temple-castle dungeon and bravely opened the doors.

“…and that, Brassicus Prima blesseth thee, is the essence of worldly existence. For as His Supreme Holiness Theodore, blessed be His name, said once to a filthy, ignorant heathen who questioned this truth…”

Our hero found around a hundred villagers sitting down, listening to a clergyman of some sort giving a sermon on a central stage. Finally, I get to see some living people, he thought. While he was slightly dissapointed to not have found a sword lodged in stone or anything of the sort, Watanabe was more excited to finally see other human beings. Observing that there was a sermon going on continued, I probably shouldn’t interrupt whatever is going on here. Deciding on what to do, Watanabe sat on an empty seat where no one would notice him.

“…so, when the leader of the cruel heathens, one King Vasily of the Fiyeletow, did he rebel against the offer by the merciful Holy Theodore, blessed be His name, a campaign to eradicate his utterly despicable rule began. Today, my fellow Brassicans, we remember the brave warriors who gave up their life for a such a cause that a cause truer and hallower has yet to exist again on this world. We celebrate their achievements and mourn the price they paid in their blood. They expanded the realm of the one and only true faith war and wide, which there can be no cause greater than that. Now, good Brassicans of this here temple, I implore upon thee to join me and all Brassicans around our most holy of kingdoms in prayer for these heroes. Ahem! Blessed be thee…”

After finishing his sermon, the clergyman initiated a long period of prayer, where the people in the temple joined him in his words. Watanabe, the heathen that he apparently was, who was sorely untouched by the sermon had begun dozing off by the end and was fully asleep throughout the prayer.

He suddenly woke up with a jolt when he noticed someone poking his shoulder. What in the- thought Watanabe, and opening his eyes saw that now a number of villagers now congregated around him. From this close up he could see, that in a most cliché manner, these villagers looked like Europeans.

Though Watanabe was unfazed by the looks of the villagers, for European-looking people are the stock fantasy standard in most settings and he was expecting people like them, the villagers were unlike Watanabe in that they had never seen anyone with East Asian features. His countenance was most alien and queer according to these village folk, who at most had seen people from the next town over in their entire lives.

“What should we do with him?” and “Does he even understand us?” were common questions thrown around the folk as they tried to understand why a foreigner, clearly from so far away, was in their village. I should have practiced my public speaking skills before coming here…, though Watanabe, who was frozen and unable to decide what to say.

Wait a second, these people are… They are definitely not speaking Japanese and most likely are not speaking English, thought Watanabe, how come I am understanding them? This was a thought that had never occurred to him before, as all the stories that he had were translated to Japanese and never dealt with such trifling issues. He didn’t have an opportunity to ponder for long however as the clergyman from before found his way through the crowd and approached our hero.

“Sir from foreign lands, may I please ask you why you are in our hallowed temple?” said the clergyman, looking directly at Watanabe with a stern expression.

This is bad… I don’t know anything about these people and what type of excuse they’d find reasonable here and I have to find an excuse fast. All I know about these people are the sermon I just heard while half-asleep, which I guess is better than nothing. Watanabe took a deep breath to calm himself, alright, I have apologized to my boss and made excuses countless of times before, time to use the skills I got on the job!

To put it into LitRPG terms, it was like if our hero activated his skill [Fake It ‘Till You Make It] -which he had gained thanks to grinding countless hours in his job before dying-, and began addressing the clergyman.

“Sir, I-” said Watanabe, looking to gain some time so that a plan could hatch in his brain, “I… Sorry, but it is a bit complicated so…”

“Hurry and spit it out already!” said a member of the congregation, “There should hardly be any excuses for a heathen like you to be here on such a holy day!”

What that fellow just said… Yes, I should try going with that approach, thought Watanabe and, his BS-making skills on overdrive, a gameplan emerged for how he wanted to get out of this situation.

“To the one who just called me a heathen, I’d like to point out that I am as much a Brassican like you.”, said Watanabe, “I came from the lands far to the east hearing of the truth of Holy Theodore, blessed be His name.”

Before the congregation around him could react, the clergyman retaliated, “But, if this is to be true sir, and if it is true then this is a most joyous occasion, then why have you come to this remote village, instead of the capital or any other major city who professes the truth of Holy Theodore, blessed be His name?”

Anticipating this retort, Watanabe was quick to reply “Sir, while I say I am Brassican like you, I have yet to officially profess myself a member, for my country of…”, there was no word for “Japan” in the language these people were speaking, which stumped Watanabe for a second. “Uhm… Nihon lacks any temples of your faith. So, while on my way to the capital city, I want to convert as soon as possible so I don’t die a heathen.”

The congregation still murmured among themselves, for they were still not fully convinced. Watanabe readied his coup-de-grâce, and took out the 1000-yen banknote still in his pocket, clearly showing it to the congregation.

“I have not come here by myself, for my lord, the venerable Lord Nanashi Inai, the leader of Nihon sent me here so that I may convert and learn more of the Brassican faith. This paper here,” Watanabe pointed toward the portrait of an author obverse of the banknote, “has a drawing of Lord Inai, who plans on converting to the true faith after observing the rituals of the Brassicans. You can also see, in red, his stamp which proves that I come here with his approval.”

The people here had never heard of a place called Nihon, or a man called Lord Nanashi Inai, but seeing such an intricately designed piece of paper and seeing how confidently Watanabe spoke about the matter, the murmurings began to quiet down and the clergyman assumed a relaxed and cordial look.

“Sir… Wannabe, was it?” asked the clergyman.

“No, it’s Watanabe, Haruto Watanabe.”

“Please excuse us for the rudeness we have shown you today. While I’d be honored to induct you into our faith today, we don’t have any holy water and dried cabbage which to conduct the ceremony required.” said the clergyman, “If you so wish, you may stay the night in our temple and we will prepare the required materials for your conversion.”

Thusly, managing to find himself a place to stay for the day, Watanabe accepted the offer by the clergyman.

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