Being greeted by the morning sun took a whole new meaning.

A streak of light shone over Benny’s face, causing him to wake up. With a loud yawn he stretched his arms. It would seem that he had slept with his glasses on and they were now lopsided on his nose. Benny’s bag had been used as his pillow and a large sack cloth had been thrown over him like a blanket.

“Where am I?”

From the looks of things it seems he was at the back of some wagon. That does explain the shaking but not how he got there. Suddenly the coverings opened up and Benny had to shield his eyes from the sudden glare.

“Oh! I thought I heard something! Look who’s finally up!”

Benny blinked as his eyes adjusted to the light. He sees the red-haired Swordsmage grinning right at him.

“Morning, Benny! Are you okay?”

“Tenryu?” says Benny, “Where-”

Nia peeked from behind the coverings with a relieved smile on her face.

“Good morning, Benjamin!”

“Good morning…”

“C’mon up front!” Tenryu gave him a hand, “I bet it’s stuffy in there!”

Benny crawled up to the front and peeked outside the wagon. They were on some dirt road in the middle of a wide field of green grass and flowers. Snow-capped mountain ranges could be seen far away. This view was definitely postcard-worthy!

Benny clambered right onto the seats at the front of the wagon. The wagon had two rows of seats. There was one in the front where a driver sat and another row behind him where Tenryu and Nia were sitting.

“So? How’re you feeling?”

“A little tired…But where are we?”

“On the road to Amber City!” answered Tenryu.

“Weren’t we supposed to be riding the train?”

“The tracks still aren’t fixed. But we managed to get a ride on a wagon heading straight there. It’s slower but either way it’s better than staying in Marblewood!”

“How rude!? My driving is not slow! Didn’t you say you wanted to go at this pace so we don’t wake your friend up while he recovers-meow!”

Tenryu points a thumb at the wagon driver, “Oh yeah, I’d like you to meet Meowtchill! He’s the wagon driver!”

“Please, you can just call me Meo! That’s how they call me-meow!”

“Meow?” repeats Benny. Does the guy have some kind of weird vocal tic?

“Your friends were worried about you, you know-meow! You were sound asleep even after all those bumps we had in-meow!”

Benny thought it was amusing to hear the guy talk like that but as soon as he the wagon driver turned to face him, he got his explanation!

The “man” wasn’t a man at all! He was a cat!

Or rather a humanoid cat!

He had whiskers. He was covered in fur and a long, fluffy tail. Except he had the build and size of a human! Benny assumed that he must be in his late twenties. At first he thought he was hallucinating but after a few blinks he saw for himself that he was definitely real!

“Err…good morning!” Benny says, his voice quivering.

The cat/man/wagon driver looked at him a bit disconcerted.

“You’re staring at me weirdly-meow. Do I have something on my whiskers-meow?”

“Err…no! They look fine to me!”

“Don’t worry!” Tenryu cuts in, throwing an arm around Benny’s shoulders “This guy tends to get shocked by just about everything!”

If you been thrust into a whole different world, who wouldn’t get shocked about everything? Benny thought.

“Well, you had me worried there for a minute-meow. We Felipusa have our pride in keeping ourselves neat even amongst the rest of the Animalians and Humans-meow.”

Benny was able to understand that Humans aren’t the only intelligent species in this world... Animalians were probably animal-human hybrids. The Felipusa must be one of the ethnic groups that are humanoid cats. Benny had to admit he was intrigued by this knowledge.

This is really turning into some fantasy world game storyline. Benny thought.

“So how far are we from Amber City?” says Benny as he sat himself right beside Tenryu.

“We’re on the Amber Highlands so we’ll be there in no time. Are you hungry? I made think we’ve got some sandwiches.”

Tenryu reached into a nearby picnic basket and pulled out a four-feet-long submarine sandwich! Benny was about to turn down the offer when his own stomach began growling. Didn’t he just eat a buffet before passing out?

“Um thanks for the sandwich...”

Benny took the sandwich and bit into it. It was really good and still warm! Benny thought Tenryu must’ve cooked it just now and probably with the help of that flaming sword of his.

Benny heard a loud neigh, similar to a horse.

“No, Gallop!” says Meo, “You have to wait until I say so-meow!”

When Benny craned his neck to see the horse, much to his intense disbelief it wasn’t a horse but a Unicorn! It was definitely a Unicorn! What kind of a horse would have a long horn on its forehead?

“Is that a Unicorn?!” stammers Benny, pointing at the horned horse.

“Amazing, huh-meow?” says Meo glancing at where Benny was looking, “Those guys can run up to 200 miles per hour-meow!”

Is that thing some kind of machine to run at such speeds?

“Wow! That’s pretty fast!”

“Yesiree-meow!” says Meo proudly. “This here is my partner Gallop and he can run faster than that! He wanted to go full speed but we didn’t want to in case it’ll wake you-meow!”

Benny kept glancing from between Meo and the Unicorn. As if an anthropomorphic cat-human driver wasn’t weird enough. Here pops in a real live Unicorn. The Unicorn was white as snow with golden colored mane and tail. Its horn was white and it looked like it was made of ivory! Even though that thing couldn’t be real Benny remembered that this was the Magical World. Whatever things that didn’t exist in his world are real here.

All these thinking gave Benny a headache.

“Are you sure you’re okay, Benjamin? Maybe you should go back and lay down.” asks Nia.

“I’m alright, really!”

Deciding to change the subject he began to ask the next questions that came to mind.

“Err…what happened to me yesterday? All I remember is that all of a sudden I just-”

“Oh, well you passed out.” Tenryu finishes for him.

“I passed out? How long was I out?”

“Well, about almost a whole day.”

Benny chocked on his sandwich as he heard that, “A whole day?!”

If he recalled, in just this few days (excluding this one) he had passed out three times already. He was hoping that this wasn’t going to become some kind of a trend to him.

“It’s to be expected as you suffered Manna Depletion Fatigue.” explains Nia.

“Manna Depletion Fatigue?” repeats Benny, looking confused.

Nia looked at him with worriedly, “I take it that it was your first time using Magic? First-time users usually feel very exhausted after using Magic.”

Benny remembered the miraculous thing that happened yesterday that involved the book and the mysterious voice.

“Um, yeah, I guess…”

“Well, you have to be careful. Using powerful Magic can really take a toll on your body so make sure to be aware of the Spells you use! Look at what happened to you in the end.”

Benny thoughts went back to the book he had left next to his bag. “Yeah, I’ll remember that next time. I think making those Barriers appear really took it out of me.”

“I was talking about that other Magic you used. That one was particularly powerful!”

“Yeah, what kind of Magic was that?”

“Other Magic?” repeats Benny, looking confused.

“Don’t…you remember?” Nia asks in a strangely careful voice.

“Remember what?”

“Just before you passed out…did you remember what happened before that?”

Benny scratched his head trying to remember, “Well, the last thing I remember was Tenryu blasting Cactus Hun through a wall. Then we were talking about the damages and then Cactus Hun popped out again. But as he was about to attack us…” Benny stopped. His memory from that forward went fuzzy, “I can’t remember anything else.”

“That’s it?”

“Yeah, that’s about it then I blacked out.”

“Don’t you remember what happened afterwards?”

“Why? Did something else happen?”

“What about the part where you-” Tenryu tries to continue saying something but Nia cut him off.

“-got praised by the locals for your bravery in saving the hostages.” She said abruptly.

Benny blushed, “Really? Well, since I was out cold I guess I couldn’t remember that part.”

He felt a little mortified about it and stared intently at his knees. He did not notice Tenryu and Nia exchanging glances with each other.

“So…um…where did we a get a wagon in the first place?”

“Well, we have you to thank for that Benny!” Tenryu pats him hard in the shoulder.

“Ow! M-me?” says Benny looking stunned again, “What did I do?”

Nia explained for him, “Well, before that let us fill you in on what happened yesterday.”

After Benny had passed out, Tenryu and Nia gathered up all the Bandits. Cactus Hun himself was the worst off as he looked like a badly cooked chunk of meat. Luckily, the Royal Army had arrived just in time to apprehend them all.

Unfortunately…there was another thing.

“They tried to arrest us too…” Tenryu crossed his arms.

“EHH?!” yelled Benny, dropping his sandwich.

“They thought we were conspirators with those bandits! It did not help when the owner of the restaurant was furious that we had a battle that practically destroyed his entire restaurant. He not only tried to get them to arrest us but he also attempted to charge us with the damages.”

Benny felt a sense of dread creeping up in him. Three days hasn’t passed and he already got himself a track record with law! He wasn’t even conscious about it for the most part! He can already see how his dad would react if he ever found out about this.

“But then you won’t believe what happened!” Tenryu said, suddenly looking excited.

“What happened?”

“The customers went up in our defense! They said if it had not been for us, things would have been much worse. Apparently most of them were the people you managed to help escape.”

“So they’re alright?” says Benny with a sigh of relief that they managed to get out okay.

“A little shaken up but they were alright enough to even threaten that restaurant owner with sue charges for lack of security! Well, it seems the owner that restaurant didn’t want that to happened so he dropped his charges. And we got off scot free!”

“Thank heavens for that…” Benny breathed a sigh of relief.

“And that’s not all!”

Benny stiffened, “Wait? There’s more?”

Tenryu grinned as he reached into his bag and hands him a heavy pouch.

“This is for you!” he gives it to Benny.

“Um, what is this?”

“It’s your share of the reward!”

“Reward?” says Benny, looking perplexed.

He realizes that the pouch was filled with gold coins!

“It’s for playing a part in capturing Cactus Hun and his cronies, of course!”

“The guy’s got a bounty of about 300 Au! So since we each played a part, we have 100 Au each!”

Benny takes out a single gold coin and observes it. He has never held a real gold coin before. But he has seen a few…in a museum.

The coin looked like an ordinary minted coin with serial numbers and designs, there was even an image of young lady with a tiara (who was no doubt the current queen) at the center of the coin. At the other side of the coin was emblazoned the symbol 10 Au.

“I can’t accept this!” Benny tries to give the stack back to Tenryu.

But Tenryu pushes it back to him, “Don’t be a piece of burnt ashes! I have my share! You played a part in capturing those bandits so you get a cut! Besides you know full well you need the cash!”

Tenryu had hit the nail on the head. It just dawned on Benny that no matter where you where it was important for one to have money to support himself.

“I guess you’re right…” Benny finally admitted.

Benny later learned from Nia the denominations of their currency. It seems easy enough to understand and remember. They have Cu, Ag, Au coins and something called Pt plate as the names of their currency. One hundred Cu coins is equivalent to one Ag coin. A hundred Ag coins is equivalent to one Au coin. Cu, Ag and Au all come in copper, silver and gold coins respectively with different denominations of 1, 5 and 10 coins.

The only exception was the last one called Platinum plate (they abbreviate it as Pt.) As its name suggests, it is in the form of a rectangular plate rather than a coin. One thousand Au coins is equivalent to a Pt plate.

To compare the currency equivalent between this world and his home world, it would be something like a Cu being equivalent to about 50 Philippine Pesos or about 1 American dollar. This is based from comparing the purchasing prices of some random items Benny asked of his friends.

So if he were to estimate how much he had.

1 Cu = 1 $/ 50 PHP

100 Cu = 1 Ag / 100 $ / 5,000 PHP

100 Ag = 1 Au / 10,000 $ / 500,000 PHP

1000Au = 1 Pt / 10,000,000 $ / 500,000,000 PHP

Benny had freeze up when he realized that a single 1 Au coin is equivalent to almost a college education!

I never held that much money in my entire life…

Benny’s train of thought stopped when he realized he was holding a 100 Au coins in this pouch…so that would mean he had about…

“A… m-million…d-d-dollars?” stuttered Benny.

“Is something wrong?”

“Eh? Oh, uh, nothing! N-Nothing’s wrong at all!” Benny frantically hid the pouch in his bag.

Tenryu, however, paid no attention to him as he looked quite excited. He examined his own share. “I can’t wait to show my share to Aunt Magma and Flare-ate! They’ll be so surprised!”

“It’ll be the first time you actually brought a reward. And one as big as that!” says Nia with a chuckle.

“Hey! I’ve managed to bring home some reward a bunch of times!”

“I can’t remember the last time that happened. Although with my share I might just buy myself some new high grade Potioneer tools and that limited edition Herbal Glossary I’ve been eying…” Nia patted her purse with content.

“You kids are lucky-meow! If it were me I’d buy myself a cartful of fish-meow!” says Meo, licking his whiskers.

Gallop neighed again loudly.

“Of course, I didn’t forget about you, old pal-meow! I’d buy a whole cart-full of hay-meow!”

“Speaking of wagons, that still doesn’t explain where this wagon came from? Did we pay for it?”

“As a matter of fact we were just getting to that part! Do you remember the man you saved yesterday? The man with a wife and their kids-meow.” says Meo with a smile that reminded Benny about the Cheshire cat.

Benny vaguely remembers that part. But everything that just happened was still quite a blur. But he did remember them.

“Mr. Azalea? What about them?”

“Well, the man you save is my boss! I’m sure you heard of Azalea Trading, have you-meow?”

“Err, well…no…”

Meo chuckled, “I’m being serious here, kid-meow!”

“No really. I don’t know.”

Meo suddenly yanked the reins on Gallop and the carriage skidded to a stop! The Unicorn neighed as to say watch the rope, man! Meo turned to face him. His whiskers were quivering. It would’ve been funny if it were the fact that Meo was looking as though he said something weird.

And that’s exactly what he said, “What-meow? Is that some kind of joke-meow?!”

“No, I don’t really know!” Benny stammered.

“Benny’s not from here so he wouldn’t know.” says Tenryu.

“Oh, you’re a foreigner-meow?” Meo seemed to relax a bit and they began moving again.

“Um, yes…I am.”

Benny breathed a sigh of relief at that instance of Tenryu’s interjection managing to calm things down.

“Well that explains that why you don’t know about Azalea Trading-meow. You see Azalea Trading is a big business in transporting cargo-meow. We’re a big business and we’re known everywhere-meow! Well not much out of the country-meow… Hey, can you tell more about the other countries-meow! It will really help the business if we expand-meow!”

Benny sweatdropped, since when did this turn into a business opportunity?

Nia cleared her throat loudly, “Ahem*…I think were drifting away from the topic.”

“Oh yes, sorry about that-meow! Where was I-meow?”

“Um, you were explaining about Mr. Azalea?”

“Ah, yes-meow!” says Meo while licking his whiskers, “Like I said before, he’s my boss! Marco Azalea, the owner of Azalea Trading!”

“Are they alright, then?”

“Oh they’re fine thanks to you-meow! Although Mr. Azalea is still in the hospital to have his wounds properly treated but the Medic says he’ll be up and about by next week-meow!”

“That’s good to hear! Ah, oh no, I broke his cane!”

Meo laughed, “Mr. Azalea says he has a lot of those so that’s okay-meow! He’s just grateful that you managed to help him and his family out of that situation-meow. They’re good people I tell you-meow!”

“Ah, I see…”

Nia looked at him with interest, “Speaking of which, it seems you’ve gave an emergency treatment to his injury. It minimized the risk of the injury getting worse until he had proper treatment.”

“I just applied first aid. That’s all…”

“Is that so? You haven’t by any chance planned to become a Remedician have you?”

“Um, no… but I did pick up a few things about medicine…”

The truth was Benny did learn first aid from Physical Education last semester. But he was pretty sure the lessons did not involve a fast healing ointment.

“He was really grateful to you for saving him and his family-meow. Mr. Azalea wanted to at least repay you for what you’ve done so when he heard that you lot were going to Amber City, he asked me to bring you guys to your destination-meow. “

“But doesn’t Mr. Azalea need this cart for his business?”

“I just happened to be on the way there myself to deliver some goods-meow. I don’t really mind! Neither does Gallop but he still wants to run fast-meow!”

The Unicorn neighed in response.

“Oh, look! He’s saying hello!” chuckles Nia.

“H-hi Gallop!” stammers Benny.

The Unicorn neighed again in a sound similar to “nice to meet you!” Or probably that was just his imagination.

“Well, since you’re already awake! Let’s get things heated up!” says Tenryu.

“Are you sure you want to try it-meow?” asks Meo.

“Oh, yeah!” cheers Tenryu, “I want to see how fast these guys can go!

Meo tugged on the reins, “Ready to go full speed, Gallop-meow?”

The Unicorn neighed in response.

“Wait…what are you?”

“You might want to hold on to your seat, Benjamin.” Nia advised him.

“But what’s…”

“FULL SPEED AWAY-MEOW!” yelled Meo as he cracked the reins.

Suddenly the Unicorn ran at full speed!