F*cking Portals

After witnessing Quincy get beat into the floor, I'm starting to get a feeling for how strong Armstrong is. The dude ain't a guild leader for nothing after all.

"That looked kind of painful. Did you really have to be so rough with him?" I ask.

Quincy looks like he's had enough of this strange world. Everyone's also trying not to look at how beat up he is.

"HA, HA, HA sorry about that I guess I did kind of get carried away. But that truly is the nature of monks. You see those who come from the monk war class have a strong tendency for fighting," Armstrong states. "I reckon your friend here must've enjoyed fighting in some aspect in your prior world."

"Yeah, he liked watching shounen anime and boxing, but this doesn't come anywhere close to that."

I've got to hold back the sarcastic remarks when he wakes up later.

"So are we gonna fight too or can we not cause I don't wanna end up looking like Quincy. Also I'm a swordsmanand I wouldn't be able to give you a good fight with this old piece of junk right?" I state trying to avoid any more conflict and show Armstrong my rusted shortsword I found earlier.

He takes a look at the sword that's about to break and responds,

"We can fight only if you want to, but after hearing that you did help kill a death mantis yesterday I suppose I can let you pass on this one. Anyways the lords seem satisfied now so you ought to get this kid fixed up in the meantime."

Why do I feel like the lords are going to force him to go on this journey with me even though I can already tell he'll be like hell nah. Tough luck I suppose. The knight who grabbed my wrist earlier walks over to Quincy's unconscious body and picks him up with one arm.

She turns to me and says,

"Young hero, I shall take your friend to the infirmary in the castle. We can have a few healers look over him until he recovers. They'll direct him to your room shortly thereafter."

"Ah, thank you. Also, I apologize for the destruction my friend caused in the lower plaza yesterday," I respond.

After the lords' little test, we walk back to the previous room that appears to be a central meeting hall. Somehow, I can tell that these lords don't seem to get along very well. Part of me doesn't really want to do this prophecy thing right now, especially if they're going to bicker the whole time.

"If I may, is it possible that we resume this meeting when my friend regains consciousness? I believe it would be best if he were awake to hear this so-called "prophecy" that you mentioned earlier," I mention thoughtfully.

The lord whose name I think is Jana stands up in agreement as she says,

"Yes, if that young man came along with you then he must have equal status as a hero. I believe that would be a proper course of action. Honestly I don't see the merit in beating people into the ground to test if they are worthy heroes."

This woman seems like the most reasonable of the bunch. Hopefully we'll get along in the future.

"Hmph, fine do as you wish," mutters Creon.

The meeting is disbanded and the man with black hair who I think is Lord Borin comes up to me and Remi.

"Hello young hero I would personally like to thank you for dealing with the death mantis that has been plaguing the nearby village. That village is responsible for at least twenty percent of the crops that come into the capital so it's such a relief to hear that the pest was dealt with. Especially after the last party I sent perished, they must have all been fledglings at the very least. I suppose this would be a suitable reward for the two of you," he states as a guard comes up to us with a large bag of gold coins.

Remi takes the large bag of gold and examines it.

"Whoa 500 gold coins, this is so much! Thank you Lord Borin!" Remi exclaims.

She looks really happy to have so much money in her possession.

"Not at all lass, this is the least I could offer. It was a four star quest after all," Borin claims.

Why do I feel like Remi took on a quest that wasn't at her level? That mantis would have definitely killed her if I wasn't there. No wonder Armstrong thought she wouldn't return.

Suddenly, a buff old man with a white beard just pops into existence and everyone turns their attention to him. Lord Borin's expression turns sour at the sight of him. This guy must be pretty bad news if the lord hates him. I wonder what he did.

Lord Borin talks down to the old man,

"Gah, you old fart, don't just pop out of nowhere like that, it's not good for my heart. Oh yes, Will, this obnoxious man here is imperial court wizard, Vasavir. Do try to avoid him as much as humanly possible."

"Now, now don't be like that. I write about you one time in my erotic literature book—and you try to execute me. I think it was a rather good story in fact, it sold well with the masses and even boosted your popularity. Who wouldn't want to read about their lord and his 10 inch d*ck?" Vasavir exclaims with glee.

Ah, now I see, this old man is a pervert who writes pornographic stories. Although I am kind of interested in hearing about this story.

"I swear, if I had the power you would be dead by now!" Borin yells. "Anyways, what are you here for? I've got much more important things to be doing than dealing with your nonsense," Borin commands.

Vasavir scratches his nose and replies,

"You see, I've received a report from the guards stating that there's been irregular activity with the portals recently. I believe I may know the root cause of the problem. It is caused by a person who has the ability to manipulate space. In fact I believe the person in question might be our young hero here. William, is it? Would you please step through this portal here? Don't worry, it should lead to the courtyard and we can see it from this window."

A portal opens up next to us as the wizard had just said. Oh, hell no. I swore I wouldn't go near another one of these things again. I turn to Remi looking for reassurance. . . maybe she'll go through this portal with me.

"Nope, don't even think about it. This is all you," she replies with caution.

Dangit, welp, I'm gonna die in the next few seconds. It was a good life. I take a deep breath and take a step through the portal. I end up falling right into the fountain in the courtyard. Completely soaked and fed up with portals I pick up a small rock and throw it right into the portal. It ends up hitting me in the back out of nowhere. F*ck me. I look up at the window and I see Vasavir and Remi laughing at me. Lord Borin just has this look of pity for me. I bet he felt this same anger when he heard about that erotic story. The old wizard steps through the portal and comes out completely unharmed.

"Now, that's quite convincing indeed. But, indulge me with one last test, if you don't mind?" Vasavir asks.

Another portal ends up opening out of nowhere and I decide to get this over with.

Suddenly I find myself in a fancy looking bathroom, but I think I just walked into a really bad situation. In front of me I see one of the old lords from earlier sitting on the toilet with their pants down. I think it's that cranky old guy who didn't like me and doubted I was a hero. Who was he again, oh right Lord Creon. But why in the world does he wear pink underpants? Shit, I think he noticed me.

I attempt to diffuse the situation,

"Wait, wait, I can explain. The old wizard Vasavir sent me through a portal and I didn't know where it would go, I didn't mean to come here!"

The old lord sighs and states in a stern tone of voice,

"Say no more. I understand. I'll have to order another execution attempt on that man later. You see child, we've actually been trying to kill that damned wizard for years now, but he's so slippery and always manages to escape. That man has had 287 assasination attempts and all have failed. The emperor even put out a reward stating whoever killed him gets to become the next imperial court wizard."

I see, so it's not only me who hates this damned wizard. Also did the lord mention the emperor, I wonder what he's like. I hope he's sensible at the very least.

Lord Creon speaks up,

"Now child I will let you live as long as you never mention this incident to ANYONE. Do you hear me?"

"Y-Yes I hear you my lord. I promise my lips are sealed," I stammer.

I quickly turn around and walk back through the portal I came from. I meet the damned wizard who seems to have this smug, trolling look on his face. Damn, I want to punch him so badly right now.

"Now before you complain, this was necessary to determine if you had the talent," Vasavir says.

"What talent?" I say angrily.

"The talent to manipulate space. A very fearsome ability indeed. If you want I could teach you how to channel and harness this power," he responds.

"I don't care, I just want to know enough to not die every time I walk through a portal," I reply.

"Then I do get to train you in using your power. This is so exciting, the last time I had a student he died after teleporting himself into a wall. Ah, but that's what he gets for skipping the necessary 50 years of training," Vasavir proclaims.

"50 years?! Isn't there a faster way to learn how to use this stupid power? I'll probably be dead by that time," I blurt out.

"Well, in that case, how good are you at math?" the wizard inquires.

He pulls out a strange magical looking book and hands it to me. This thing is heavier than most of my college textbooks. Math, what the hell does that have to do with this?

"Pretty good, I guess," I say as I take the book from his hands. I was a computer science major in my old world after all.

"Then, read that book, it should fill your head with all of the knowledge necessary to manipulate space like me," Vasvir notes.

"Wait, it's that simple?"

"Yep."

I open the strange magical book and suddenly my brain is assaulted with all manners of information. Five minutes pass and I decide my brain can't take anymore of this pain. I close the book and end up puking in the fountain right next to us.

"What the hell was all that!" I say reeling from the backlash of information overloading my head.

"It seems you really weren't lying when you said you were good at math. That's the longest I've seen anyone read that book when it's their first time. Most simple minded people that try to read the Void Apocrypha end up bleeding from the eyes and convulse after reading ten seconds of it," Vasavir explains.

I think I just had rocket science level physics crammed into my head. I thought I would be able to escape math now that I've come to another world but nope it followed me here. Calculating vectors through the 11th dimension. Folding space and understanding how spatial coordinates overlap with one another. All this shit borders on theoretical physics.

"5 minutes is pretty good, now only 23 hours and 55 minutes left until you complete the book. You certainly have potential, if you don't die from reading the book. I'll let you keep that for now," the old wizard states.

Is this old guy trying to kill me? Why is learning so painful?

"How far in do I have to be until I can use portals normally?" I ask.

Vasavir replies,

"Maybe about an hour in? You should come by my workshop and I'll show you a few tricks later."

I swear, if I have to spend anymore time with this guy I might die.

"Oh by the way, try not to go into the city if you can help it. At least not until you fix your little portal problem. Your presence will probably affect all of the nearby portals in the area. You'd be a danger not only to yourself, but pretty much everybody around you," Vasavir suggests.

Oh, great, at least I can mess up everyone who uses portals around me.

After putting the stupid void apocrypha thingy in my room, I decide to go meet up with Remi and get my share of the reward. With all the commotion with that stupid wizard I forgot all about it.

"So what are you going to do now?" Remi asks me.

"Well apart from being forcefully trained by Vasavir, I think I might start looking to form a party of adventurers. I need to find talented individuals who can help me survive the prophecy thing the lords were talking about," I declare.

"Oh, you're right, we probably should construct a party of good adventurers." Remi agrees.

"Wait a moment, what do you mean we?" I ask.

"Well, obviously, I'm part of your party now. Rejoice, for you have the assistance of a powerful Tamer from this point on. If I stick with a soon to be renowned hero, then I'm sure to become famous and rich as well," Remi exclaims with pride.

Did this girl force her way into my party? I thought this would be the last we would see each other. I sigh in response to her actions. I guess I can't complain, help is help after all.

As we're walking around the lower parts of the castle a hooded figure runs up and snatches the pouch of gold coins hanging by Remi's waist. The thief proceeds to book it for the lower part of the city with the speed of a cheetah.

In response to having her reward swiped, Remi curses,

"Shit! Are you kidding me? Just my luck. Will, we gotta go after that thief!"

Remi proceeds to summon her wolf and we proceed to chase after the thief as fast as we can. We end up venturing into a bad looking part of the city which I think counts as the slums.

"Will, keep chasing the thief, I'm going to try and cut them off in the road ahead," Remi commands.

She proceeds to take a turn and goes in a different direction from me; maybe she knows this part of the city in some aspect or another. I doubt she comes from the slums though, her clothing looks good enough to be made by a custom tailor. I think I remember her saying she was from a rural fishing village from the elven empire, wherever that is. Either way I'm chasing this thief until Remi hops out behind a corner stopping the thief in their tracks. We've cornered the thief now and they have nowhere to go. Remi is in front and I'm in the back, there's no alleyway to the sides so they can't escape that way. However there's a small boy right next to the thief and it would be really bad if the thief took them hostage. Before the thief has any time to act, I fire a gust of wind in the general direction of the thief, but the sun was in my eyes so my aim was off. Poop, I think it might hit the kid instead. The blast I fired wasn't enough to seriously hurt someone but knock them off their feet.

Unexpectedly, the thief jumps in the way of the attack in order to protect the kid. The thief gets knocked to the floor and as they get up their hood falls down. The thief looks like a small girl with short black hair and has a small scar above her right eyebrow, but it's barely covered up by her hair.

The small girl turns to me and yells,

"HEY! YOU ASSHOLE! WHAT KIND OF PERSON ATTACKS KIDS!"

Taken aback by her demeanor--I state,

"Whoa, wait, that was an accident! I didn't mean to attack that kid, it just happened that the sun was in my eyes."

She's still mad at me despite my answer as she's running at me preparing to attack. I throw a punch with my right hand in order to defend myself, but the thief dodges it right at the last second and punches me in the dick. Critical hit. The pain has me reeling as I fall over in pain and agony. Oh God, why did it have to be in the dick. I would have been just fine if she punched me in the stomach or in the face or anywhere else for that matter. It's like that thief had an intuition for where it would hurt the most. It felt like the force of my attack, but 2 times my attack'ss potency. Remi winces at the sight of what just happened as she can tell just how much pain I'm in right now.

Taking this opportunity to escape, the thief runs past me and runs into a nearby portal around the corner. Remi runs up to me and helps me up.

"Dammit she could be anywhere now. Also are you ok, that looked like it hurt a lot?" she asks, anticipating my response.

I'm barely able to stand up right now, but I think the thief running into the portal was a good thing.

"NO I'M NOT OKAY, but never mind that I think we don't have to worry about that thief for now," I gasp, barely managing to catch my breath.

"What do you mean by that, of course we do?" Remi responds.

"No we don't, just look up," I say.

"What do you-" Remi says as she looks up at the sky and sees the thief fall from 100 feet up in the sky and crash down on a nearby apple stand.

Yep, Vasavir was right, I'm a menace now. The owner of the apple stand looks devastated as he cries,

"Not again! First some black foreigner runs up and destroys my products and now some thief falls out of the sky."

It seems the fall knocked out the thief as we walked over to where the crash happened.

We end up calling the guards and have them arrest the thief. I hear the guards mention that they take most prisoners to the castle dungeons so I guess that's where she's headed. Remi comes up and tells me

"Hey, Will, I'm going to go deposit the money at the bank before it gets stolen again. I think I'll start an account for our adventuring party, but it'll be pretty boring so I don't think you should come. I'll meet you at the guild tomorrow around 2 o'clock to discuss future plans. Don't be late."

"Okay, sounds good, I'm going to stay here for a little while. I think I need to heal a little. You don't happen to have any healing potions on you at the moment, do you?" I ask pleadingly. "Nope, but here go buy some, there should be a shop around here," Remi states as she tosses me some gold coins.

As I enter a shop called "Potions and Herbs," I see a girl with a french braid sitting behind a desk.

Remembering that I needed to pee I ask,

"Hey, do you happen to have a bathroom here?"

"Depends, are you going to buy something?" she responds menacingly.

This girl seems to be annoyed by my question, but I didn't do anything to annoy her so it's not my fault.

"Yeah, sure. That's what I'm here for after all. I'll have a few healing potions if you don't mind," I order.

"Finally a paying customer. That will be 30 gold coins for three potions, oh and the bathroom is on the left," she mentions.

I finish the transaction and walk to the bathroom on my right. At least the bathrooms in this place are similar to my old world, but goddamn--it smells in here. Finishing my business, I walk out and I see the small boy I almost shot earlier talking to the lady. He notices me then comes up to kick me in the leg.

"OW, what the hell, kid?!" I yell.

"Free big sis,' you meanie," the boy cries.

"Who is this 'big sis' person?" I ask while rubbing my leg.

The girl in the french braid speaks up,

"It's that thief who was arrested earlier."

Oh why should I care about the person who punched me in the dick?

"I have my reservations about that thief, but she's not a bad person--she probably only stole that money so she could buy food for the people in the slums," she continues.

"Is she really your sister?" I ask the small boy.

"No, but she always treats me like family. I don't want to see her get executed," the boy cries.

"What, they're not going to execute a minor thief. I bet she'll only spend a few nights in the dungeon or something," I say showing little care for the dick puncher.

"That would be so, if she were truly a minor thief. The imperial guard has been after her for years, so she's become quite notorious," the shop owner states.

What do I do? Am I really about to free a notorious thief? I doubt the guards would allow that even if I ordered that she be pardoned. I'm starting to feel a little guilty and I really don't want this kid to cry.

"Gah, fine, I'll think of something so don't cry kid your big sis will be okay," I say reassuringly.

Honestly I have no idea what I'm about to do, but I'll think of something.

All of a sudden an imperial knight barges into the shop and announces,

"Young hero, if you're done here I must ask for you to come back to the castle at once. Unfortunately we've already had about 50 reports of people falling out of the sky due to portal malfunction."

Oh, right, I forgot about that. Oops. I've only been down in the city for about 3 hours and many people have already been affected. I better go with this guard or else a lot more people will get hurt.

As we arrive back at the castle I think I've come up with a plan that will allow me to free the thief and maybe possibly get a new party member. I decide to enter the castle dungeons and I see that the guard on duty is sleeping. That's perfect for what I have planned. I guess the guards here are pretty lazy. I go up to the thief's jail cell and pull up a wooden chair nearby.

"Enjoying your stay at this fine luxurious hotel room?" I say mockingly.

No response. Geez this person is quite cold, I suppose that's your thief personality speaking.

"Are you ok? Falling out of the air isn't something that's fun or enjoyable. I would know," I say, trying to get her to warm up to me.

"What do you want, child attacker?" she says quietly.

Great now I feel guilty again. Well I made up for that as I tell her,

"I wanted to let you know that I've helped out your people in the slums. I managed to convince the stupid wizard to set up a portal so that unused food gets sent to the slums. Hah, I guess the lords are really picky and don't want to eat stale bread. But food is food right?" I laugh.

"Thanks, I guess," says the thief as she starts to liven up.

"But, I'm really here to give you a choice. I've been hearing talk that you might get executed for all the crimes you've committed. So I'm giving you a chance to escape your predicament and possibly help people," I whisper trying not to wake up the guard.

"What do you want me to do? Steal some valuable artifacts--or maybe assassinate someone who's gotten on your bad side?" she asks, jumping to conclusions.

"Nothing like that, I'm not a criminal, not yet at least. I want you to join my party and help save the world," I answer.

"What?! Are you even willing to trust someone like me? Especially after I punched you in the. . . you know," she says with a hint of guilt.

I'll be sure to get her back for that later, but I answer,

"I'm willing to give you a chance. Especially after a certain small boy came crying to me to free you."

I was kinda guilt tripped into doing this.

"He was all like, free big sis, she can't survive in prison she can't even go to sleep without her stuffed dragon," I say mimicking the small boy's distress.

Hearing this causes her to turn red with embarrassment and she turns her head away so I can't see her face.

"Either way, your choices are: stay a thief and keep living this life, or join me and we can make a difference together. I'm pretty sure you could escape if you wanted to. The security in this place isn't very strict," I say, mocking the guard. I slip in a lockpick through the cell bars and state "Come find me if you're interested, your choice."

After eating dinner in the main dining hall I proceed to walk to my room. Huh, Quincy's still not here, I wonder what they're doing to him in the infirmary. Maybe they are experimenting on him and drugging him or something like that. Maybe it has something to do with fixing that tooth that I saw swinging in his mouth. I decide to pull out the void apocrypha and attempt to learn more about manipulating space. 5 minutes later I end up running out to my balcony and puking over the ledge. Ughhh, this sucks, learning how to use air elemental attacks wasn't this painful. It was then that I noticed the thief from earlier passed out on my balcony. How the hell did she get up here? Did she climb up the side of the wall? Her hands look like they're wounded and bleeding. It seems like she really did climb up the side of the castle wall as I notice spots of blood on the sides of the wall. Jesus.

"Hey, you, wake up--what happened?" I say as I give her a light slap to wake her up.

"Ugh, ow, I scraped my hands on the castle wall and kind of. . . fell a little," she reveals as she wakes up. "By the way, I accept your offer. However, before we talk about that--do you have any food? I haven't eaten anything in two days, so I'm starving."

The small girl is shaken with hunger so I call the nearby servants to bring some food for her. I end up cutting the meat into small pieces and start to feed the thief.

"What are you doing? I can feed myself," she states.

"Not with those hands. Can you even pick up a fork right now?" I ask.

The small girl tries to pick up the fork, but staggers from the pain and drops it on the table. I would give her one of my healing potions right now, but I think those better be saved for more life threatening injuries.

"Hmph, fine, make it quick," she groans.

Man, she's eating so much I've already ordered like 7 plates of food already. I guess when you come from the slums there's not a lot of food that goes around, but I don't even eat this much whenever I go to a buffet.

"Thanks for the food!" she says right before burping loudly.

This girl has no manners or etiquette, does she?

"Now that I think of it, I still don't know your name, now do I? Well, I'm Will, nice to meet you," I say.

"Nazuko, my name's Nazuko," she says as she proceeds to drink right from the juice pitcher instead of pouring it into a glass.

I'm still not satisfied with her condition as she looks so dirty and ragged. I end up ordering the servants to give her a bath, a change of clothes and patch up her hands.

As I'm waiting in my room for the servants to return with Nazuko, the commander of the guard barges into my room.

"Sir, we've received reports that the thief you helped us arrest escaped the castle dungeons," he says frantically.

"Oh that. Yeah, I helped her escape. On my authority as the hero I'm taking charge of her punishment. She'll be helping me in my adventure from now on," I reply nonchalantly.

The guard has this dumbfounded look on his face.

"S-Sir, I highly advise against this action. That thief is notorious for stealing all sorts of things throughout the capital. We've been after her for years. She even stole the emperor's royal scepter two years ago. She cannot be trusted," the guard bemoans.

"Ohoh, that's pretty impressive. All the more reason to have her on my side then," I remark.

"Do you really intend to have her help you?" the guard sighs.

"Yep, maybe I'll have her steal Lord Creon's pink underpants too," I say sarcastically.

The guard facepalms.

"Fine if you really insist then we'll only allow it under one condition."

"And that is…." I ask, wondering where the guards are going with this.

Once the servants come back with Nazuko, the guard leads us to what is apparently the imperial court wizard's workshop. Oh no I don't want to be anywhere near here.

The wizard greets us,

"Why good evening young hero. Oh and the infamous scepter thief as well. I remember how I paid you to steal that two years ago. What business would a hero and infamous criminal have with me tonight?"

The commander reluctantly ignores the remark about the scepter and states,

"Vasavir I need you to set up a geas between the hero and this hoodrat here."

"What's a geas?" I ask.

It probably is something to keep me safe I'm guessing.

"It's basically a contract between two people. Those involved must abide by the terms of the contract or else they will suffer in pain. In your case this setup is made to ensure that the thief will follow your orders sir otherwise she might cut your throat in your sleep or something dastardly like that," the guard explains.

This all makes me uncomfortable as it almost sounds like I'm a slaver.

"Is this really necessary? I trust her and I don't believe she would do anything bad," I say.

"It's this or execution," the commander says sternly.

"It's alright Will, I trust you," Nazuko says, trying not to agitate the guard.

"Honestly, young hero, if you were to choose a sex slave you could have done better than this flat girl here," Vasavir remarks.

In response to this the Nazuko throws a dagger right at Vasavir's face although it gets teleported away and appears on a table next to us.

"Hmm that makes 288 assasination attempts now," he notes while stroking his beard.

"Hey it's not like that you stupid old man! I'm having her join my adventuring party," I say defensively.

Vasavir looks defeated and replies,

"Hmm well that's disappointing. No one ever does anything fun around here; it's always politics or murder or peasant uprisings. Although it was fun watching you cause all those people to fall out of the air earlier. I did warn you after all. Well either way both of you hold out your hands and I'll place the mark finalizing the geas."

We reach our hands out and feel a small burning sensation as a weird mark appears on our hands for a few seconds and disappears.

"Does this mean I have to call you master now?" Nazuko asks.

"Please don't, that makes me really uncomfortable," I answer.

"In that case, I'll call you master every once in a while," she responds.

Great, I hope this girl doesn't troll me as much as the stupid wizard.

"Well that's done, enjoy making love to each other and good night," the wizard teases.

I pick up Nazuko's dagger and make my attempt to kill him as I throw it right at his heart. The commander looks up hoping for the impossible, but the dagger ends up falling on the floor.

"289! Hopefully the emperor makes the 300th attempt," Vasavir jokes.

I swear to one of the Gods that I'll make a national holiday on the day anyone ever manages to kill this guy.

As we return to my room, I plop myself on to the large bed and bury my face deep in the fluffiest pillow I can find. This has been a very painful day--mentally and physically. I tell Nazuko she can sleep on the couch until I can get the servants to make another bed here.

"Hey Nazuko, do you think I'm the kinda person who would take advantage of the geas?" I ask out of curiosity.

"Well I made that contract with you because I sensed you were a good person, but also because I feel like you're a degenerate like me," she remarks casually.

"Ow, thanks for the brutal honesty, we can be degenerates together," I say sarcastically.

"But, to answer your question, no--I don't think you are. It seems like you're the kind of person who would be awkward around women. You're probably a virgin, aren't you?" Nazuko remarks.

"Oof. I'm not going to answer that question. Why do you have to be so blunt? Are you sure you're not an assassin instead of a thief?" I say, as I prepare to go to sleep. "Anyways just go to sleep already, I have to be prepared to deal with the lords bickering about a stupid prophecy tomorrow and I really don't think I can handle anymore insults at the moment."

I blow out the candles lighting up the room and prepare to sleep.

Two hours have passed and I still can't fall asleep. I see that the moon is blood red and gives off this really eerie feeling. I wonder if that's a sign from the prophecy. Back in my old world we'd take that as a sign of the apocalypse, but I don't know if that has similar connotations here. I heard one of the lords mention something about a demon wave. Whatever that is, maybe this is a sign of that or something. I get up and see that Nazuko is shivering in her sleep so I take my blanket and put it over her. I get back into bed and start to feel really cold, but I'd feel worse if I let my new friend suffer.

Morning comes and I feel something really weird clinging to my body. I take off the blanket and I see Nazuko snuggling right next to me.

"What are you doing?" I ask as I pinch her cheeks to get her to wake up.

"You were shivering last night in your bed so I put the covers over both of us to share body heat. You were the one who said we'd be degenerates together after all," she says groggily.

Hoo boy. If anyone saw me like this it would be kinda bad, wouldn't it? Just as I think this, Quincy comes into the room and stares at me. How am I gonna explain everything that has happened since he got knocked out? Welp, I guess I could start with the f*cking portals.