“So something like that was hard even for you, huh, kid?” Albert grinned, chewing on his cigar.

“Shut the fuck up,” John grumbled. He was tempted to go and kill all the goblins right there and then, but Zero, with wise words of common sense, stopped him.

The head of the branch sighed and put his cigar out. Opening a drawer, he pulled out a picture.

“Hey. You ever see this woman?” he asked.

“...why would I have seen that woman?” John frowned.

“Damn,” Albert sighed. “Well, I should’ve expected that. Don’t worry about it.”

That piqued John’s interest. His brain started overclocking with possibilities of what “don’t worry about it” could mean. Someone important? No, if that was the case, he probably would’ve made a request of him… Someone dear to him? Possible, but… it didn’t have any relevance to the [Plot].

He thought about that for a second. The [Plot]. That was something he hadn’t thought about in a while… come to think about it, it was something he hadn’t really thought about at all. He was aware of a few things Zero had told him, but he’d never actually experienced any of what Zero had said.

In a way, the [Plot] was like a world’s “destiny,” a sort of force or inertia that kept events running in a specific manner. The world, after all, was a story. Stories had plots. This world was no different. There was a sort of predestined path everything would take, and it was possible to predict what path this world would take.

John called this ability [Reader’s Revelations], the ability to analyze the world around him and predict the future based on how he thought the [Plot] would progress. It was really like trying to guess the ending to a book, and any reader who’s read enough stories gets good at that eventually. John had read a lot of stories. Given that, it wasn’t really an ability; anyone with his knowledge would’ve been able to do what he was doing.

It was just that no one knew what he knew.

[Reader’s Revelations], therefore, wasn’t an ability; John just like to call it an ability because it sounded a lot cooler in his mind.

“Someone got kidnapped again, huh?” John said casually, trying to fish for a response. It was one of two possible things that this whole charade could’ve been leading to.

He guessed right.

“...who told you that?” Albert said quietly, trying to act casual but failing.

“The knowledge was revealed to me in a dream,” John said solemnly.

“You kids think you’re the shit these days, don’t you,” Albert sighed. “Fine. Keep your little secrets. If it gets back to me that you’re plotting something…”

The pressure in the room multiplied tenfold, but John didn’t budge.

“What, unfazed?” Albert sighed, scratching the back of his neck. “Maybe it’s time for me to retire…”

“You’re right.” Albert admitted quietly. ”This girl was an adventurer, a young elf, around twenty years old, C rank. She disappeared out of nowhere, poof, gone. No one’s heard from her, no one’s seen her, nothing, nada. Now, adventurers can disappear all the time, but… she was a C rank. There shouldn’t have been a quest dangerous enough to have done anything.”

John rubbed his chin. “So you think she was kidnapped.”

“Yes.”

John closed his eyes and thought. Realistically, she was probably alive, but it was possible this wasn’t that kind of story. Honestly, whether she was alive or not didn’t matter to John. What did matter was the significance of this event. Was this the start of a story arc? Was this just exposition?

Thinking back, John having met Prota was likely the beginning of one story arc. But where had that ended? Was this the end of an arc, or the beginning of one?

There just wasn’t enough information to go off of.

“Well, I’ll keep an eye out,” John shrugged, getting up.

“Hold on, you’re not gonna do anything?” Albert called out.

John shrugged once more. “What do you want me to do? We couldn’t even beat a group of goblins, remember?”

~~~

The sun streamed through the canopy of leaves, little spots of light dotting the ground as John and Prota walked back to the goblin camp.

“Fucking kidnappings,” John snorted, but his face remained blank. Prota looked up at him, slightly worried.

Since the day before, John’s attitude was much more aloof. He seemed distant, the blank look in his eyes often spreading to the rest of his face as they walked. She remained silent, but she wanted to do something.

There was just nothing that could be done.

“There you are,” John muttered as they came across the clearing again. “Little bastards.”

John scanned the area for anything that would stand out, but everything remained the same as yesterday.

“...does this not matter?” John sighed.

He rubbed his chin. Logically speaking, there was no way for him to really help Prota improve at this point. He had no idea how to help her with magic. His own magic was incredibly weak until it wasn’t, and he had no such thing as “technique,” only trial and error or overwhelming power.

So there really wasn’t a need for her to do anything, right?

“I could just throw her in headfirst and see how she responds…” John started thinking, but then caught himself and shook his head. “Wait, what the fuck? Did I just…”

John slapped his cheeks and shook his head again. “Stop. She’s just a girl…”

“But she’s also just a [Character], isn’t she?” his own voice echoed in the back of his mind. “Wouldn’t it be a lot easier?”

His breathing became heavier as he tried to block off the intrusive thoughts, but they kept coming in. He was starting to consider the most efficient method to a specific solution without considering what the method would cost.

In this case, it was Prota’s sanity.

“Argh!” John yelled with frustration, drawing the attention of the nearby goblins. They grunted as they started running their way. John gripped his head, not paying attention.

“Get a hold of yourself, John!” Zero yelled. “Choose one path; right now, you can care, or you can block your emotions off, but choose something! Now, you fucking idiot!”

John took a deep breath and closed his eyes as Prota prepared a spell. Chaos swam through his head like a foggy cloud, blocking his thoughts from progressing smoothly. Indecision was tearing him apart, and he didn’t know what to do-

“John,” he heard a small voice say. He looked to see Prota clutching his sleeve, a sad look in her eyes. Somewhere in the back of his mind, John was wondering how the goblins hadn’t reached them yet, realized it was probably lazy writing, and focused back on Prota.

Her eyes seemed to ground him somewhat. Those eyes reminded him that maybe, just maybe, she wasn’t just a [Character] after all…

His thoughts cleared up, and resolution set in.

“You take half, Prota,” John said quietly, then moved like a blur.

Prota took a deep breath as she stared down the swarm of goblins launching themselves at her. She thought back to the countless tries she’d done the day before. There had to be something different she could do…

However, it was too late to think. She infused her body with mana, rolling out of the way of a goblin and counterattacking with a fireball, blowing the thing to ashes. Another two appeared from behind, but ice thorns shot out of the ground, impaling both of them. She felt her body tiring, but there were still more enemies around. She prepared another spell…

But there were no more goblins nearby.

“...?” She panted as she wiped her forehead, pushing her long white hair out of her eyes to see John fighting the other seventeen goblins. In his left hand, he held a glowing red blade, in the right a pitch black gun, and was alternating between the two.

As a goblin threw itself at him, he thrust his sword through its stomach and blew its head off with the gun, then leapt up into the air while firing a volley of bullets. There was a click as the barrel announced it was empty, and in one smooth movement, John ejected the thing and slammed a new one in.

The goblins retreated into the trees, and a knife came flying out, slicing his shirt open and drawing blood, but John didn’t even seem to notice as he fired into the tree without looking, a wet thud announcing another goblin dead. Another two screeched as they flanked him, but he didn’t flinch as he threw his sword at one, impaling its head, and blowing the head off the other with a massive slug of a bullet.

“John-!” Prota started to cry as another two goblins leapt upon him from behind, but John swivelled around and grabbed one by the neck, smashing the other one into a tree with his foot. Reaching out, his sword came flying back into his hand and he shoved the blade into the goblin, guts and blood spilling out.

It was all very impressive, but what chilled Prota the most was the blank look on John’s face as he carried it all out. There was no emotion as he fought off and killed the swarm of goblins attacking him. Green blood splattered everywhere until there were only five left. Seeing how they were outmatched, they turned around and went for Prota, the seemingly weaker target.

“...” John didn’t even attempt to make a move. “If she dies, she dies,” he thought.

“She’s just a [Character], isn’t she?”

That was what he wanted to think. That’s what he wanted to feel, but… his heart wouldn’t let him. Her eyes stared into his mind’s eye once more.

“Smile for me, ok?”

The vision of Prota’s crying face smiling at him all those months ago made something pull in his heart. She… she really trusted him. Was it ok to break that trust? But she was just a character, so that trust wasn’t even real, right? But wasn’t he also a character?

He didn’t know what to do. Back before he’d reset that one time, he’d been under the brief illusion he’d be able to live a happy life, a satisfactory life. One where he wouldn’t be constantly suffering. Then he’d been reminded that no, this wasn’t real life, and that his life needed to be painful so that others could be entertained. It was a cold hard slap that woke him up to fiction.

So was it really a good time to get close? Was it a good time to open back up? He’d done that before, and he didn’t want to do it again.

But at the same time, wasn’t Prota someone important to him?

[You made a [Destiny Bond] with her. Don’t let that break.]

Why did he want John to form a relationship? Likely to break it… but why did he feel so conflicted? Logically, this should’ve been an easy problem to solve. Break the relationship. It would just make things so much easier.

But he found that he didn’t want to break it.

“Fuck,” he grunted as he felt a blade enter his chest. He’d forgotten he was still in battle. Then again, John tended to forget a lot of things, including his brain.

~~~

“Ready?” John said one reset later, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

Conflicted or not, he didn’t have to make a decision just yet. For now, it wouldn’t be that bad to hang out with Prota for a while longer. He would bury his emotions and wait. Wait for something to happen, wait to see if his bond was being formed only to be broken again…

Wait to see if it was worth it. But for now, he would enjoy what he had, at least on the surface. It was time to go back to his old philosophy.

If he pretended to be happy enough, maybe he eventually would be. Keep smiling, and maybe it’ll turn real.

He would take things day by day, and let the [Plot] determine what happened to him. There was no need to think. Thinking made things complicated. He’d tried opening up for a little bit, and that hadn’t worked, so it was time to turn himself off again.

“Let’s go.”

They rushed in to fight the goblins, side by side.

~~~

“...”

A masked boy stood, wearing a dusty beige cloak and loose wool clothing, a sheathed sword on his back and a pink fox resting on his shoulders. looked around the adventurer’s guild’s hall, silently observing. There wasn’t much going on. The activity board was pretty much untouched, and the man at the help desk was half asleep with nothing else to do. He looked at the pink fox on his shoulder and nodded, walking up.

“Hello?” he said, waking the man up.

“Uh- Huh?” the man snorted, slowly opening his eyes to see… a black mask with golden eyes gleaming out from behind. “Who’re you?”

“I’d like to see your boss,” Fate said with no further explanation. The man, not really in the mood for a confrontation, shrugged and got up, pointing to a hallway.

“Down the hall, knock on the door that says “the boss.” If he doesn’t want to see you, don’t go in.”

Fate nodded and followed the man’s instructions. However, instead of knocking, he kicked the door open, letting himself in unannounced.

“John, how many times do I have to tell you-” Albert started, looking up and seeing that his visitor was not who he usually was. “Who the hell are you?” he growled menacingly.

From the folds of his cloak, Fate pulled out a letter similar to the one John had received from Elfin and slammed it on the desk.

“I think this is enough identification,” he said quietly.

Albert sighed. “What’s with the new generation these days? I’m getting way to old to keep up.” He opened up the letter and read.

“Well, kid, you’ve got my attention. I’ll pretend to ignore the door for now. What’s up?”

“I heard you’ve been investigating some disappearances over the past few months. Let’s trade information,” Fate said, getting straight to the point.

“...what do you know about it?” Albert said cautiously.

“...I’ve been trying to locate them for a while,” Fate explained. “All my tracking has led me here, to this district. This is my first major find, and I heard you’re the expert on what’s going on. Can we collaborate, or not?”

Albert rubbed his chin. “How do I know you’re not a spy? Look, that letter from Elfin is more than enough grounds for me to trust you, but this is a really sensitive issue. We’ve spent a long, long time on this. We can’t afford to mess it up. Under other circumstances, I’d give you more information, but you’re gonna need to show a little more than just this.”

“...”

Fate hesitated, appearing to debate over something, then shrugged. “I’ll give you what I have, regardless of how you reciprocate. Do with it what you will.”

He pulled a scroll out and tossed it over, then spun around and started to walk out. The door had closed by itself after Fate had so rudely slammed it open, forcing him to open it again as he made his way out.

He never got to open it.

“Hey, old man, pay up!” a familiar voice called out, slamming the door open the exact same way Fate had just a few minutes ago. The boy had to leap back to avoid getting smashed by the swinging door and grit his teeth as he looked up to see the new visitor. A familiar red scarf fluttered behind a somewhat familiar face.

“We got the goblins,” John said, holding out the quest request. “Now pay- huh?”

He looked down to see Fate, glaring up at him.

“...well, well, well. Isn’t this a turn of events?”