NOVEL NEXT 02: Otherworlders!
Taking a moment to look around the carriage while the otherworlders calmed down, Kaitlyn noticed, unlike most carriages used, this one had a more rounded roof, one that also flared upwards at the front and back, where the entrances were.
Chalking it up to them using a carriage that was based on a carriage from their own world, Kaitlyn pushed the thought aside, asking, curious to their situation, “Sorry for my rudeness, but I have a few questions I want to ask... I’ve never met otherworlders before. The first one would be, since you weren’t born in this world, and seem to be like 23 or 24, did you get a crest?”
“Don’t worry about it! We’re probably around your age you know! No need to be reserved around us,” Josephine called out from the front of the carriage, “We’re all 21, though Damien is almost 22! So ask away~ us former university students all love oversharing about our circumstances to get some more pity points!”
Nodding in agreement, Damien pulled down his shirt to reveal a crest of a dagger and shuriken on his chest, before motioning to Oliver to explain further.
“Yeah, there’s a lot of interesting things really,” Oliver explained, leaning back while turning to the side to admire the downpour outside the carriage, the one soaking the horses to their bones, “So I can totally see the confusion on your face from our ages, and I’ll assure you, it’s not just us ‘looking’ older per se, even though it is pretty hard to distinguish between 21 and 23-24 year olds. But first I’ll answer your question about the crests, then I’ll answer the questions about our age.”
Sitting upright, Kaitlyn nodded, coughing a little from embarrassment, “Forgive me then, I’ll be asking a lot of questions...”
“No problem~” Rachel assured, hugging Kaitlyn from the side, “The amount of people back in uni who would kill to have a cute girl like you asking about their every detail and circumstance~”
Raising an eyebrow in confusion, Kaitlyn opened her mouth to respond before being cut off by Oliver who cleared his throat, giving Rachel a stern glare.
Letting go of Kaitlyn, Rachel turned away muttering, “Stupid Oliver, ruining all the fun with his normalcy...”
“Anyway,” Oliver chuckled, clearing his throat again, “About our crests, once we got summoned, they just appeared on us, sadly through a very painful burning sensation. As you can see over there by Josephine, there’s just a pile of our weapons, the sword and shield is mine and the Katana is Rachel’s. Josephine got blessed with a martial arts crest, and Damien always keeps his weapons on him, because of ‘constant vigilance’.”
“CONSTANT VIGILANCE!” Damien barked, coming out of his silence, interrupting Oliver, “Don’t disrespect Mad-Eye Moody!”
Leaning over, Rachel explained in a whisper, “Mad-Eye Moody is a book character from a story back in our original world.”
Muffling her laughter with her hands, Kaitlyn whispered back with a small smile, “Thanks for explaining!”
Sighing in amused exasperation, Oliver admired the surroundings to pass the time until his old friends, and their new temporary traveling companion calmed down to continue.
Oliver was still mystified, even a year later, to their current situation. They had been in university, hanging out after a lecture, deciding whether they wanted to go see a movie together, until another classmate came over and began harassing Rachel and Josephine, when in a flash, all five of them were summoned to another world.
“...Anyway,” Oliver coughed again, getting the attention of Kaitlyn and the others, “A difference we found out in this world compared to the world we came from, was how people aged.”
“What do you mean by that?” Kaitlyn inquired, tilting her head in confusion, “Do we age differently in this world compared to yours?”
Tapping his chin while staring off into the distance, Oliver explained, “Compared to the world we come from, people in this one age much slower once they get to 18, or an age around there, causing the people here to have much longer lifespans, I don’t know why this happens though. But unlike this world, where people live to 300 or something around there, people in our world at most only live to about 120...”
“That’s not a lot of time...” Kaitlyn muttered, also admiring the rain soaked forest that flanked the now muddy road, “You all barely lived then in your world. That would explain the tinge of an older look you all have, it’s very slight though...”
“On another note though,” Kaitlyn continued, seeing their awkward expressions, “You said you were going to be doing adventuring work? Are you all already registered?”
Lighting up, Rachel went through all the pockets on her coat, taking a moment before pulling out a silver-blue adventurer’s license, “Ta-da! We are indeed! We're all also S-Ranked Adventurer’s!”
Whistling, Kaitlyn asked, inspecting the card, “Could I take a look at your card? It has your name on it so you don’t need to worry about it being stolen. It’s just that I’ve never seen an S-Ranked Adventurer’s License before...”
“Of course!” Rachel grinned, handing it over, before chuckling and scratching her head, “Though to be perfectly honest, we’re more at the level of low A-Ranked Adventurer’s.”
“We got boosted quite hard by the higher ups in the Varis Empire,” Oliver chuckled, flipping his own silver-blue adventurer’s license in the air, “We plan on also doing some more training so we can get to the power level of true S-Ranked Adventurer’s.”
“Boosted?” Kaitlyn asked, once again mystified by the slang that her new traveling companions from another world used, “Could you explain what that means?”
Drumming his fingers on his knees, Damien answered with an exasperated tone, “It’s a term that kind of means they’ve been raised or are at a higher rank or level than they should be.”
Leaning back against the back of the bench in the carriage, Kaitlyn thanked, “That makes sense... you all use some interesting slang.”
“That means we can’t trash talk either...” Josephine lamented out loud, oblivious to the ongoing conversation.
Keeping a firm gaze on the road to ensure they didn’t slip off, Josephine then called out, “I believe if the map we bought is correct, there should be a camping site up ahead soon, we should probably camp as the rain doesn’t seem to be letting up at all. Would you like to camp with us, Kaitlyn? Or will you be going on ahead?”
“We’d love it if you could join!” Rachel cheered, hugging Kaitlyn once more, “It’s been great talking even though we haven’t been talking for long!”
With a small smile while returning Rachel’s hug, Kaitlyn nodded, “I forgot all of my rain protecting clothes all at home so if it’s alright I’ll join you all.”
