59 Not So Secret

They meander their way through the other people, following the map on their new tablets to the building they're going to be staying at. Once they arrive, they take the stairs to avoid the overcrowded elevator, and soon arrive at quite a nice room. It's split into multiple rooms, each bedroom with a bunk bed, two desks, and a pair of foot lockers. It has a small kitchen, and two shared bathrooms.

Everyone agrees to let Sen have his own room while the girls choose form the others, and Lynna is insistent that she gets to room with Xue so she can have her own room when "She moves into Sen's room". Sen and Xue are both glaring at her at this point, but it's softened by the fact that both of them are blushing.

They haven't been there long when there's a knock at the door, and their things are all delivered. Sen is shocked to see that the sword his father had bought him for a birthday is included in the items delivered, until he realizes that his father must have been nervous and gotten him a good weapon to prepare him.

Lynna also ends up having a custom sword delivered, while the rest of the group is simply given a plain cast sword and simple shields.

Once they've placed their belongings away, they all start to go through the information on the tablet. Sen is surprised to see that one of the reasons that crystals are so valuable is because along with the strength of the monster, you can also absorb other characteristics, from increased sight, to regeneration. The most valuable thing though, is that you gain a portion of the monster's life span.

Sen quickly gets everyone else to see. You can theoretically be immortal if you eat enough crystals. While low rank crystals can't be used forever, as they will eventually stop being useleful, no one has found the saturation point of high rank cores yet.

Annoyingly, along with the increase in lifespan, comes an increase in grinding. It can take up to a few hundred cores of the same monster to reach the point that you can reach with just twenty cores in game.

Sen is looking through anything else relevant, when he comes across something that makes his heart jump. It's titled simply: Reincarnators. Opening the file with trepidation, he's met with a massive flood of information.

Reincarnations had started to happen once they'd opened the first gate to the fifth dimension, and now, for those living in close proximity of the gate, around one in a hundred children are those who are born again.

Reincarnators tend to fall into two broad categories. There are those that are born remembering their past life, the reborn, and those that remember it after experiencing some sort of shock, the awakened. The reborn almost always keep the same appearance they had in their past life, while the awakened later tend to have a different body.

There's even a page on sexual preferences, which shows that reincarnators, for a reason that they've yet to figure out, reborn tend to prefer people their own biological age in their second life, while the awakened tend to have their preferences follow their own age for the first couple of years, then shift into people their biological age.

Sen at least can feel a bit less guilty now, but continues reading the rest of the articles with an unknown feeling. Apparently, Lynna manages to notice either his fingers tightly gripping the impressively durable tablet, or something about his expression, as she comes over and starts to read over his shoulder.

She reads for a bit, then pulls up the article on her own tablet. A few minutes later, there's a short "That makes so much more sense now!" from her. Sen starts, and looks at her.

"Why didn't you tell us you were reincarnated?"

At Lynna's comment, everyone's eyes snap to Sen. He laughs dryly.

"Would you have believed me?"

Lynna frowns, before making a sound of agreement. "So were you a virgin in your past life? You're pretty clueless when it comes to girls."

Sen sputters. She figures out he's reincarnated and that's the first thing she asks?

"NO!"

Lynna simply tilts her head. "Wait, so when were you born then?"

Sen shakes his head, of course Lynna would just take him being reincarnated as something normal. "I don't remember at this point. We still used cold weapons when I lived."

"Well duh, I mean, those sword skills of yours didn't come from nowhere."

"Wait, so what was life like back then?" Julie decides to get some information rather than just being in shock. Xue is looking down, and Lynna grabs her tablet real quick, pulls up something, then hands it back.

"Let's just say that sewers being in every city is a blessing."

Julie winces at that comment. Xue seems to have perked up a bit after having read whatever it is that Lynna had decided to show her. "Did.. Were you in a relationship in your past life?" Xue asks in a nervous fashion.

"No, I never had a serious relationship, and died young." Xue lets out a breath she'd been holding, and seems to be far less bothered, though Sen isn't sure which part she's more relieved about.

"So how old were you when you died?" Lynna asks.

Sen shrugs. "Early twenties, I never knew my actual birth year. You'd have to subtract about two years from that to get my age on Alpha, so here, maybe twenty to twenty two?"

"How did you die?" Jennifer finally gets a chance to join the conversation.

Sen gets a soft smile on his face. "I died fighting for my lady."

That comment, more than anything else, got stares. "Your lady?" Xue breaks the staring with.

Sen places his face in his hands for a bit. "I was basically a bodyguard, what are you thinking?"

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean you smile when talking about dying for someone."

Sen is a bit defensive at this point. "She saved me from a life that was practically hell…" Realizing what he'd just shared, he winces, and refuses to expound upon the details when asked, not wanting to talk about that part of his life.

Eventually, they run out of questions to ask him, and he goes to bed more exhausted than ever before. He's utterly clueless why the group had simply accepted him being reincarnated, but he's not going to complain. The next few days pass in a similar manner, until everyone is called to another assembly, and told to bring their weapons.

They're given a short explanation on what they're going to be doing in the fifth dimension, and then herded to one of the blocky concrete buildings. Once inside, they're greeted by a cavernous space, with a massive contraption in the middle, which somehow seems to open to a city. Going around it, Sen can see nothing, but when looking through the circle surrounded by eldritch looking tech, he can see the city again.

"This is the gate to fifth dimension. A guide has been sent to your tablets, along with a map and your room assignments. May you gain fame and fortune in the fifth dimension." the man finishes his short speech, and steps aside, letting everyone start to file through the hole in space.

Sen and the group eventually come to the front of the line. Taking a deep breath, Sen steps through to this new world.