Volume 1 - CH prologue 1

At this moment, I am standing in a seemingly endless field of grass. In all directions, as far as the eye can see, it is grassland.

And I am still wearing the same clothes and robe as before.

――How did this happen?

The clock bell rang to signal the end of day’s work, its chime echoed through the office.

「Done for today, time to quickly get home and do some gaming」

The name’s Kisaragi Touya, I am 35 years old and neither married nor dating. I am a salary man like any other.

Normally this is how I spend my days, commuting straight home after work to play an MMO; a very competitive MMO that I am hooked on. My hurry to get home is to prepare for the war, which starts at 9 p.m., between countries battling it out to expand their territories.

This MMO game is called “Pandemic World” it is a battle-type MMO where three countries have nightly wars. It is a seven-day game, meaning a player can hunt in the field for a whole week to gain a lot of experience points. There are rare materials available and to level up quickly, players choose to align themselves to countries and live every night in battle.

I belong to Generate Kingdom and the other two countries are Lunette Empire and Ciffancy Empire.

Generate Kingdom and Lunette Empire every night are at war, and Ciffancy Empire supports either nation as mercenary. This only applies on weekdays. On weekends, there is an event to subjugate a large monster; in such cases the three countries expunge boundaries and fight together to complete the event.

My avatar in the game is massively muscular and somehow resembles an ogre; he is the highest level warrior: a Berserker. My Berserker avatar wears an armour made from mithril, he wields a two-handed sword with a length that exceeds his own height, and he is always on the front lines every day.

As a working bachelor I have a decent amount of savings. Thanks to that fact, I can spend money however I choose and I have equipped him with some of the best gear. He came to be known by some as the strongest avatar in the game.

999 is the maximum level that a player can achieve and only 700 players out of thousands are above level 500, which is less than 1% of players.

The war lasted for about an hour, it is then I can finally take my hands off the keyboard keys and stretch my back.

『Well done Touya! 』『We won today! 』

The conversation log will turn into a grand party log for winning the war.

「Finally it’s over. We won! I wonder if anyone would like to go hunting with me. For a change let’s check out Din in Ciffancy 」

It is not against any rules to create separate accounts in this MMO in order to work in other countries. But if the player uses multiple accounts during the war, the game’s system board can expose said player.

I logged out of the Berserker account and logged in again into a different account.

This different account’s avatar is from Ciffancy Empire.

I chose not to level this avatar up, and merely use it to store material for my Berserker and hold conversations with my Ciffancy Empire friends.

I received a wand and a high-class magician outfit after I had completed the event. The weapons and tools that are useless for Berserker are stored in this avatar’s inventory along with some money.

A face of a man is displayed on the screen. This avatar has silver hair and I had decided to make him 16 years old.

His job is Recovery Priest. It is refreshing to have a different kind of character from my Berserker main character.

After logging into this account, my avatar is placed in the main square of the town of Deliruta.

Given that the war has just ended, the square is full of people who are logged in, I opened a tab to check if my friends are online.

The person whom I am looking for, is on my friend list.

「There you are. Now let’s give him a shout.」

I clicked on the name『Din』in the list to open the chat.

『Great job today 』

『Hey dude. You came over for a visit? 』

『I’m going hunting. Thought I should check if you wanted to come. Are you up for it? 』

『Sounds great, I’m hanging out in front of the church north of the square 』

『Got it! I’m on my way 』

I closed the chat and ran from the square to the church.

With Din, there were a total of three people at the meeting place.

「Congratulations on winning today 」

「You were great today, Touya 」「Nicely done 」

There were four of us at the gathering, myself, my friend Din, who is a High Black Magician, Russell, who is a High Thief, and Melilla, who is a High Recovery Priest.

「We were missing a Warrior class player. You came at the right time 」

Up to five people can organize parties in this MMO. With me joining Din’s party, the party is well balanced.

「We’ll hunt in Loralka cave, right? I’ll change back to Berserker, and I’ll wait for you at the entrance 」

「OK」「Alright 」

Everyone’s avatars are bowing and waving, but in Din’s case he is still sitting.

As I am about to logout, a magic circle appears around my avatar.

「What is that?」「What? 」「This is… whooa 」

Everyone is confused, so am I, by the magic circle that is glowing and rotating, that has appeared around my avatar. The screen gradually turned white.

「What’s this?」

The light emanating from the display spread into the room. My mind drifted off into darkness with me sitting in front of my computer.

The field of pure white slowly filled my vision and I opened my eyes to see a completely different ceiling from my room. The first thing I notice is that it is 10 meters high and there are pictures like the ones on the ceilings of museums and churches in Italy I have seen online.

「Success! 」

「Her Highness, as expected! How incredible to succeed on the first attempt 」

The applause echoed in the hall with me still confused and I sat up to see what was happening.

「What the hell is this…」

Sitting on the floor, I see a beautiful girl standing in front of me in a very gorgeous dress. She has beautifully groomed blonde hair that flows down to her waist and a tiara on her head. Around her, there are men in fancy outfits and knights in armour who had their swords at the ready.

「I do apologize for the inconvenience. I am the First Princess of Generate Kingdom, Sharon von Generate. My kingdom of Generate is at war with our sworn enemy of the Lunette Empire which has already taken 20% of our territory. Therefore, we have decided to summon you, Hero, using one of our country’s hidden treasures, the summoning treasure 」

I do not understand anything of what she is talking about.

「With what you’ve said, I don’t know why I am here, I’m just a thirty-five years old ordinary salary man」

「Salary man? I am not familiar with the term, but from how I see it, you don’t look thirty-five years old. Does your race have a prolonged lifespan? Although from your appearance you look human」

――What is this girl saying? I know I look thirty-five.

I casually brush away the bangs from my eyes. And I see silver strands of hair….. Eh, silver? Why is it silver?

I quickly inspect my body and realize that I am wearing a robe and clothes not my own. My belly fat that had begun to show is now tightened as if I had gone to the gym.

I have my clothes rolled up, to observe my stomach and the knights begin to berate me on my behaviour.

「What are you doing in front of Her Highness?!」

The knights have their swords pointed at me.

「No, no!　I didn’t mean to! 」

I quickly pulled down my clothes, to evade trouble.

「Since you were summoned out of the blue, it’s no surprise you’re confused. If you open your status, you’ll see that the title says Hero. I’m sure you’ll be able see it. Even if you don’t say it aloud, it’s no problem if you can picture it in your head 」

Does she mean a status like from a game?

『Status 』

I pictured it in my mind.

A translucent panel appears in my mind and I check to see what is written on it.

But Hero is not written anywhere on it.

「Perhaps it’s in the title……」

The princess with an anxious face looks desperately at me.

「……..No, it doesn’t say “hero”. The title says “Summoned One” 」

「――That is…」

After I say this, everyone, including the princess, have their shoulders immediately slouch in disappointment.

「I didn’t expect it to fail…..」

The sighs that I hear from everyone around me for some reason make me feel regretful.

――Could it be my fault? What am I supposed to do with how I look? Will I be able to go back to my world?

「Can you send me back to my world… 」

I call out to the now depressed Princess.

The Princess looks at me apologetically.

「Even if there is no title of “Hero”, we hear that all the summoned people are high level. You should have already exceeded level 100, which is said to be the breaking limit? 」

「No, I’m at level 1 」

With that statement I crushed whatever remaining hope that the Princess had into fine dust.

「Eh, it’s one? Really? 」

A middle-aged man, who appears to be an aristocrat, starts to yell as if to block my words.

「How unfortunate. I’m sorry for summoning you. The Summoning Jewel is the counterpart to the Repatriation Jewel. It is said that it is possible to send a summoned person back to their original world. However, may I use the Summoning Jewel treasure one more time first? I can only do the summoning today when the moon is full. With my remaining magic power, I can only perform the summoning one more time. So we’ll perform the repatriation ceremony tomorrow 」

The princess with a regretful expression suggested.

「I understand 」

Knowing that I will be able to return home tomorrow and wanting to check on my body’s current state I nod at the Princess’s suggestion.

A knight ordered me to move away from the magic circle that is drawn on the floor. I am actually looking forward to watching the summoning ritual as I stand at the edge of the room.

The summoning ritual then begins.

There is a ball, said to be a Summoning Jewel that is placed in the centre of the magic circle, and the Princess starts to pour magic into it.

The Princess began chanting spell-like words and the magic circle began to glow around the treasure ball. The light intensified with the continuation of the spell.

「The light is stronger than before. Could this be…? 」

The hall gets swallowed up by the bright white light, the same as the one I saw before I was summoned here and the Summoning Jewel shattered into pieces. The light is unbearably bright forcing me to shut my eyes to block it out.

The light gradually disappears and the room returns to normal.

When I opened my eyes, there was a young man with blonde hair lying on his back where the jewel had been placed.

The young man is wearing fancy white and silver armour, he wakes up and there is a look of confusion on his face.

The knights who are surrounding him are in awe at the young man’s luxurious armour.

「What is happening?　Why are you here?　I was in the middle of fighting a monster… 」

The young man looks to be 20 years old, and is a beautiful man from all angles.

In fact he is more beautiful than the Japanese idols, he has a face that looked like it had been created using CGI.

In contrast to her depressed and defeated look, the Princess approaches the young man with rosy coloured cheeks.

「I apologize for the inconvenience, Hero. I am the First Princess of Generate Kingdom, Sharon von Generate, and――」

She tells him the same thing she said to me.

The young man is told to check his status, and he does as instructed.

「The titles are listed as “Hero” and “Holy Knight”」

The hall erupted with words of praise at the young man’s mention of his two titles.