Enchanted forest

Will continued to mine and mine, it seemed like he was stuck in an endless loop, doomed to repeat the same action over and over again. But then again that is the very definition of 'grinding' in video games.

Sitting down while leaning against a stone wall to rest, Will was thinking about his life.

"This is not working out. I need to find a method to mine without having to do any of the work… Slaves are the only answer I can think of."

The fact that he hasn't taken a rest in a while made his eyes droopy. Then, he fell asleep in an uncomfortable position.

Will, in his dreams, was on a sidewalk, waiting for the light to turn green so he could obviously cross the road. Right now he was only 15 years old. He was holding a video game case called "Bloodborne."

Ever since playing Dark Souls, he has been looking forward to this game ever since he saw the trailer on youtube.

Ecstatic to play this game, when the light turned green, Will didn't waste a second and quickly rushed to get to the other side of the road to play the game in his home.

However, at that very same time, a truck, who's driver was distracted when he was changing his music playlist, did not stop and was about to crash into Will.

Will forgot to look both ways before crossing the road. When he looked at the truck, it was as if death was coming towards him, and he couldn't do anything to stop it.

"Not today, truck-kun." A voice resounded behind Will.

Will felt someone pull his sweater from behind, and was barely able to escape the truck. Not being able to hold on properly to the game, it was crushed entirely when the truck ran over it.

The truck driver just noticed the red light in front of him, and several cars were already crossing to the other side. The truck driver pressed the brake pedal as hard as he could and swerve to the right. The truck tipped over its side and feel right in the middle of the road. Thankfully no one was killed, aside from the truck driver who only received minor injuries, and possibly jail time and a huge fine.

Will found it hard to breathe at all due to the sudden shock, and fear that enveloped his body. He almost died. He was sitting on the ground and couldn't find the strength to get up, or think properly.

"Are you okay, kid? You almost got yourself isekai'd in the most cliche way possible."

Will looked at who was calling for him.

Will could not tell properly who that person was, as the sun was right behind the figure, shining brightly, making it difficult to tell his features.

It was none other than Alexander Anderson.

"GASP!"

Will woke up gasping for air.

"I haven't… thought about that in so long." Will gently massaged his forehead. But, he felt his wooden mask over it. Taking off the mask, he began massaging his eyes.

Then, he noticed he was shaking uncontrollably.

"Damn… why am I shaking?"

After a while he stopped shaking.

Looking up, was a roof filled with various types of minerals. However, Will likes to think that Alex is somewhere up there, in peace.

"I really hope that there's anime where you are right now, Alex. It's the one thing that you loved wholeheartedly." Will said after smiling for a bit.

Will swunged his pickaxe and continued mining. It wasn't until a few seconds later that he found something, a type of new ore. This ore looked oddly familiar to what the Great Sage has at the tip of his magical, enchanted staff.

"What?" Will mined it with his pickaxe, it multiplied into two and dropped on the ground. He touched it and examined it. His brown book glowed to tell him he had just unlocked something new.

{Low-tier mana ore}

{The rarest, and most powerful metal in this world}

That was the entire description. Nothing else.

"Mana ore?" The mana ore glowed a type of pink and light-blue color, but it was a very dim color. Even in the dark one could barely see it dim glow.

"It's 'low tier' so maybe there must be a higher tier."

Will took out the brown book and scanned for what new crafting material he could create.

"Let's see…" Will looked at the crafts he could create with this new ore.

{Mid-tier mana ore}

{Crafting materials required: 10x low-tier mana ore}

{Mana staff low-tier}

{Very beneficial for sorcerers}

{Crafting materials required: 1x staff(of any kind) 1x low-tier man ore, 2x diamonds}

{Low-tier mana crystals}

{Barely boosts the power of mana of sorcerers when holding onto this item}

{3x low-tier mana ore, 1x diamonds}

{Low-tier mana bullets}

{Bullets made from mana are nearly impossible to block. Also carries a sort of destructive might}

{1x low-tier mana ore, 100x bullets(of any kind)}

Will was surprised. Most of the crafts were related to sorcerers. The same went for bows, arrows, swords. But there was not a single type of armor piece he could craft using low-tier mana crystals.

Flipping the pages to see if there were any more types of crafts, Will found something that instantly caught his attention.

{Low-tier golem core}

{Bring to life a golem by injecting this golem core in it. It will be great in battle, but it will be stupid, like very dumb, also slow, depends on the size of the golem you create}

{10x low-tier mana ore}

"A golem core? Wait, is this like the golem from minecraft?" Will went into a deep thought.

Everyone who has played minecraft should know of those iron golems. Although they are very powerful, they aren't the best to use when fighting.

"Does this mean I have to make my own golems? I never made one but I guess I could give it a try. But should I even bother? If it's not strong I shouldn't bother making them… ah, I'll decide until AFTER I've built one."

Will looked at how many mana ores he mined from that little spot, only 4, and it's the first time he's seen this type of ore, meaning that they must be extremely rare.

"Welp, back to more mining, oh boy!" Will fainted joy as he was being sarcastic. Mining turned out to be boring, but if he doesn't do it no one will. He'd rather do something else.

"Not fun. This. Is. Not. Fun. At. All." Will complained all the way while he continued to mine frantically without pause.

Meanwhile…

In the middle of a forest, a group of people, consisting of 1 sorceress, 1 girl, 1 hero, and one loli dragon. They were purposefully heading deep into the woods for one reason only, to find the elven princess.

The woods were surprisingly quite loud, the sounds of the winds hitting the leaves, the sound of critters shrieking, crying, calling, etc.

"How much further?" Felicia asked, they've been walking for hours now.

"According to this map, we're almost there." Naveah said, "But, Hero Josh Jones, there is something you need to know about the enchanted forest, it's not safe for us to get too close-"

"Relax, if I see something attacking us, I'll be sure to rain down fireballs on their faces! Hahahaha!" Josh laughed like a madman.

"Is Hero Josh Jones okay?" Felicia whispered to Naveah.

"I think he lost all reason when we mentioned the elves and elven princess to him."

"Of course I didn't." Josh overheard them with his acute hearing. "The reason why I am acting like this is because it's all coming together!"

"What do you mean?" Felicia and Naveah asked.

The little dragon loli stood by the side following them against her will.

"You see, before I was summoned to this world, I had a very, very, difficult, harsh life."

"Aw." Felicia felt sympathetic for him. But she doesn't remember asking him for his life story.

"My parents were the worst. Every day they made sure to drive me home to school, which was one of the best and expensive schools in the state. Every morning, I would put on my most expensive and newest clothes, right after being served a nice, healthy, and large breakfast."

"Aw… wait." Felicia found something odd about that story. Was it supposed to be tragic?

"Every day, they would make sure I would study, and always kept me clean and warm. Restricted my freedom to be with my friends because my parents thought that they were a 'bad influence' I don't remember the last time I went to a party. Like 2 weeks before I was summoned here. I had to sneak out for that party but somehow my parents found out and gave me the punishment of a lifetime. How cruel they were." Josh started to cry for real a bit.

"..." Felicia didn't know what to say anymore. Isn't that normal for any loving parent? If their child had vanished all of a sudden and found out he had sneaked out of their house, they'd be pretty scared, angry, and confused.

"And then, when I came across these amazings, fun books called 'Harry potter' 'Lord of the rings' and also manga, and anime in general, it was the best thing to have ever happened to me. But, my parents would either restrict my free time to study just so I could become a great lawyer, or take it away because I didn't study enough. They were truly the worst and I hate them for it."

"Hero, you have truly lived a harsh life." Naveah faked a sobbing tone. When she saw Naveah was standing there processing what she had her, she nudged her shoulder with her arm.

"Ah, yes, you truly have lived the 'worst' life of any other hero." Felicia said. They were clearly sucking up to him.

"It's fine. But now all of that has changed. Because this is my world now. I am the main character of this world! Hahahaha! I can't wait! My harem is coming together! Elven princess, please don't wait any longer, here I come, your knight in shining armor is here to release you from your chains or whatever."

Naveah and Felicia looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders.

If the dragon loli could say anything to them in their language so they could understand her, she'd call them 'morons'.

"But, hero, wouldn't you settle for an ordinary elf? I heard that elves who eat meat are much easier to 'capture' compared to the princess." Felicia asked.

"NO! I won't settle for cold, sloppy seconds. There is nothing that turns me on than a princess… which reminds me, after this we need to find the princess who was captured. She's actually very beautiful, according to the pictures and drawings I saw."

Then, they stopped dead in their tracks. There was what appeared to be a 5ft wall blocking their path, it was made entirely out of roots, vines, leaves, fruits, vegetables, it was all natural. In fact it was even slightly moving, as if it was alive.

"What is this?" Josh didn't expect something like this.

"Huh, you're lucky, Hero." Naveah said with amazement.

"Why is that?"

"If I heard correctly, those who seek to harm the elves, protected by the goddess of this forest, shall be harmed. Those who are lost, will find themselves guided out of the forest by the same goddess. The fact that we can see this wall means that the forest wants us to find the elven kingdom… I think."

"You never mentioned anything about a Goddess."

"I tried, believe me I tried." Naveah did indeed try, but Josh always kept interrupting her mid-way.

"Nothing turns me on more than a Goddess. Where is she? Is she hot? And also, why am I lucky?" Asked Josh in a confused manner.

"This is the entrance to the elven kingdom. If you were to cross this wall, you will find the elven kingdom. Then again this is something I heard long ago. I do not know how much of it is true."

"Great! A measly 5ft wall made out of nature won't stop me!" Josh prepared to jump over the wall. With his hero strength, he can easily jump over the kingdom of Reyes's walls in a single jump.

"Wait! I also heard that those who forcefully try to cross the wall, the forest will att-"

Of course, Hero Josh did not bother to listen and jumped over the wall. But, very quickly, faster than Josh could see, a thick, vine came out of the ground behind the wall and bitch slapped Josh back to his side.

"Ow! What the fuck was that?"

One could see a red make on Josh's face. It was painful for him but he also felt warm on the spot where he got slapped.

"Like I was gonna say, those who cross the wall will find themselves under attack by the forest." Naveah said.

"Is that so? Well then." Josh extended his wand towards the wall and attempted to conjure a fireball.

"Stand back! This won't take long." Josh said menacingly. Nothing is gonna get in this way to add the elven princess to his harem.

"Hero, fire won't wor-"

"FIREBALL!" Josh yelled. Yelling out 'fireball' is unnecessary, but he just thought it made him look cool when he did.

The fireball caused a mini explosion on the wall, and several branches and leaves flew all over the place. A small cloud of smoke enveloped the area.

"Haha! No matter how strong this Goddess is, it cannot withstand my fireball! Ahahaha!" Josh began laughing maniacally as he thought he succeeded.

But, once the smoke settled there were no damages to be seen on the wall. Either the wallregenerated that fast, or it absorbed the impact and fire of the attack and that's why it didn't take any damage.

"Um… what?" Josh has never faced this problem before. He is known to have the strongest offensive ability compared to any other hero, aside from The Great Sage. He could even take down dragons with ease, but it could not destroy a single wall made out of complete organic material.

"Hero, there is a reason why it's called 'the enchanted forest' and why no man has ever set foot in the elven kingdom." Naveah said.

"Wait, do you guys hear that?" Felicia asked.

"Hear what?" Josh asked.

"The forest… it's gotten quiet… too quiet." Naveah noticed. During their whole entire time walking through the forest, all they heard was the sounds of the critters and wind, but now it has gotten eerily silent.

Even the loli dragon, who has shown no signs of emotion the entire time, walked backwards due to the immense fear she felt. Her entire body was shaking uncontrollably. Sweat dripped down from her forehead, her breathing got heavier and faster.

"What's wrong?" Josh noticed the dragon loli quaking in fear.

Then, the thickest root of all time came out of the ground and circled around Josh's legs. At first one would think that this vine was a monster's tentacle.

"THE HELL?!?!" Josh couldn't even react in time, even though one of his hero perks is having amazing reflexes.

The vine around Josh's legs coiled and tightened, and began whipping him around the air, slamming him on the ground with great force, treating him like a rag doll,

Josh focused whatever he could and launched a fireball attack at the vine. But it did absolutely nothing to it.

"HELP ME!!!?" Realizing that it would not work, he decided to call out for help to his group.

"Quick, we must save the hero!" Naveah started casting a spell, but a loud, painful, awful cry could be heard coming from a hero.

"AAAAAAAOOOOOOOOHHHHH!!!"

The vine around his legs crushed it completely, like how an anaconda would do to its prey.

Josh's legs were completely broken, and that was the most painful experience in his life.

Felicia, the ordinary girl, couldn't do anything at the moment. She's not a dragon, a hero, or a sorceress. What is an ordinary girl like her going to do to protect a hero?

"Come on, please work." Naveah conjured her most powerful spell, a water spell and released it to save Josh. It might sound like a simple spell, but she had poured so much mana into it that it was extremely pressurized, and once released, it acted like a powerful cutting machine that sliced part of the vine.

But, it wasn't enough to completely destroy the vine. It only managed to cut a tiny part of it.

"I thought that would work." Naveah said.

Then, a tree behind her, bent down, as if it suddenly sprung life, and used its entire body like a baseball bat to hit Naveah and launch her far away, like a baseball ball.

A few of the broken branches she landed on impaled her limbs, and the impact of the hit broke a few of her bones. It was so quick and sudden, she couldn't even breathe nor speak properly because of the pain.

"Um. um, um." Felicia was freaking out right now. She has never felt this scared in her life.

Josh, was completely it pain. No matter how much he tried he couldn't break free from that vine. All he wanted was to add an elven princess to his harem, but it did not go as he expected.

Meanwhile...

Inside the elven kingdom.

Silvas was casually sipping some tea as he was taking a break from training. In front of him was his son, Arbor, sitting behind a table thinking seriously. They were playing a round of chess to pass the time.

"I think the forest is telling us that an intruder attempted to break into the elven kingdom. Should we go check it out, or have someone else check?" Arbor said.

"Probably not important." Silvas casually said.

"Hm."

Back with idiot intruders who were completely unprepared.

"That's right! Maid! Help the hero!" Felicia ran up to the loli dragon.

However, the loli dragon hid behind a tree, not daring to go against that. The reason she didn't heed her command despite wearing a slave collar is because she can only take orders from Josh, no one else.

But, Josh suddenly lost consciousness from all the beatings that he took. His wounds were recovering at a fast rate, or else he'd be in a much worse state. But the pain was too unbearable for him to handle. As someone who has never known the meaning of 'pain' this much abuse would be too much for anyone to handle.

"Wait, where am I?" Josh woke up just in time.

The giant vine flung the hero far off into the sky, like Team Rocket. It didn't want to ever see him again anywhere near here.

"AAAAAAAHHHHHHhhhhh...." His voice got softer and further by the second.

"HERO!!!" Felicia cried out to him for some reason.

The vines retracted and went back into the ground. It did not bother attacking Felicia nor the dragon loli, since they were the only ones who didn't act violent towards it.

"Felicia… help." Naveah weakly asked. She too was injured heavily.

"Naveah… hold on, I have some healing potions with me." Felicia took out a few red pills from her pocket and fed Naveah. Her wounds healed relatively quickly.

Felicia even had to take out some of the branches that impaled Naveah. Luckily for her it wasn't fatal, but it must have hurt a lot.

"Wait… why didn't those vines attack you?" Naveah asked the first thing that came to her mind.

"I don't know. But, what matters now is that we need to find Josh."

"Where did he go?" Naveah realized that Josh was indeed not with them.

"The vine flung him off like a thing. Over to the west."

"I hope he's okay. Heroes don't die easily. Let's leave this forest as quickly as possible, otherwise this forest won't be as merciful." Naveah dragged Felicia with her.

"Wait, where's Maid?" Felicia noticed that the dragon loli was gone.

"Oh, no… she escaped." Those two had made a grave mistake of letting the dragon loli escape. She was the hero's favourite one out of the three of them.

As they said, the loli dragon did not spare a second. The moment they were occupied, she took this chance and ran off as fast as her little legs could carry her.

She tried taking off the slave collar from her neck, but as expected it didn't budge. Something was impeding her some using her full strength, the strength of a dragon. It could be because she was stuck in this form, because one of the hero's commands was to 'never transform into your dragon form unless I say so' this is mostly because if she were to transform into her true form, the collar would break into several pieces.

The loli dragon took a rock, or whatever hard object she could find and tried to pry the slave collar off. It was a desperate attempt to get back home. And right now, she had no better ideas. Turning back into her dragon form is the only way to guarantee her survival, otherwise she's no different than a helpless kid.

Josh never commanded her to never take off the collar, that's because he thought it would be wise if he didn't restrict her freedom too much so their relationship would grow. But he was an idiot. Turning others into their slaves doesn't exactly mean they recieve much freedom to begin with. And she would never willingly be a slave, like those other female lead characters in other mangas.

The sun was setting down. When she noticed he dashed off to the forest to seek some shelter. Staying in the forest too long is suicide for her. Even a merem goblin would pose a threat to her.

Meanwhile…

The Great Sage was sitting atop of his black tower, watching the heroes practice and gaining fighting experience.

Looking at his wrinkly, old, hands, he sighed deeply.

"This will be the last time I will ever witness another hero summoning. These will be the last heroes who will protect the world long after I'm gone. Only Shaun can continue my work and protect them and this kingdom."

",,,aaaaAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!"

A voice could be heard getting louder and closer by the second. His body was headed right to his black tower.

"Now what?" The Great Sage asked in an annoyed tone.

Josh started to float in mid-air, literally a few centimeters away from destroying the tower.

"I'm… I'm actually flying?" Josh was too scared and confused to notice the Great Sage standing in front of him.

"No you're not." The Great Sage deactivated his skill and dropped Josh on top of his tower. He didn't even move a muscle to save Josh from crashing into his tower.

"Sage?"

The Great Sage noticed the wounds on Josh's body, and it was rapidly healing as expected of a hero's natural regeneration.

"Did you go to the enchanted forest?" The Great Sage read Josh's mind.

"Yeah…"

"Then you deserved it. Did I not tell you all that you should never mess with the elves, only avoid them?"

"But the king said that…"

"I don't care what he said. Unless thou… unless if you don't value your life anymore, then do not set foot on that place again."

According to the king, he said that they are at war with them. And they should kill them or capture them if they were to see one.

But the Great Sage knew better and warned the heroes not to act rashly against the elves, especially in their territory.

The Great Sage waved his hand and flew Josh off from his tower. Josh then landed on the middle of the road. Luckily no one was hurt but him.

"Ow… why?" Josh asked, then got up. The pain that he received from the forest still lingered on his body, but it wasn't as bad as before.

The Great Sage is friends with the King of the elves. And after reading Josh's mind of adding the elven Princess to his harem, he got a little mad at him.

"Oh my god, a hero almost landed on my head, that's so awesome!" A grown up man said.

A group of people gathered around the hero, and started murmuring amongst themselves.

"Wait, Maid, and… the others, they're still back at the forest." Josh jumped over the castle's walls, leaving an even larger crater on the ground.

Josh reached for his wand, but it wasn't there.

"Hold on, where did my wand go?" Josh searched his whole body for that wand. It was his only offensive magical item, which complimented his fireball ability.

"Don't tell me… I dropped it when I was in the forest." Josh wanted to cry. He was one of the fews heroes to receive a magical item, due to the kingdom's limited resources they could not give every single hero a magical item.

After all, making a magical item is expensive and risky.

Meanwhile…

Rias was coming back to the village after feeding her dad who's a zombie.

"..." Rias.

Whenever she comes back, she feels terrible, terrible at the fact that her father is infected, and that she has to kill people in order for her father to survive-ish.

As she reached the elven kingdom's walls, one of the vines reached out to her. It was holding a wand.

"Um…" Rias didn't know what to say. It's the first time she's received something from the forest.

Rias slowly took the wand from the vine. It soon went back into the earth.

"Thank you, Goddess Lea."

Expecting the wand what she first thought was a stick, it started to pique her curiosity.

"It's a wand." Rias placed the wand inside her pocket and entered the elven kingdom.