Chapter 6: Thoughts

The abyss threatened to reclaim what little he had gained.

I check my watch. It’s 2:27 am, I haven’t gotten a wink of sleep. I’ve fretted over the earlier exchange for over 4 hours now. At this point, I’m really surprised with myself. I told myself that I wouldn’t be affected by any romantic intentions or anything, but I’m still nervous as fuck. I also realize that my emotions are starting to come back.

When I came to this world, I felt emotionless, but when I discovered the guitar pick, I felt something. Then later when I chased Zure around, I was angry with myself for being duped so easily, and embarrassed when she hugged me.

At this point, I feel like my psyche has been dragged around and beaten to a pulp. I try to force myself to think about something sad, like a war, and I try to visualize people dying in trenches and getting blown to pieces. This doesn’t exactly calm me down, but it takes my mind off of Zure for long enough to drift into nothingness.

“Wake uuuppppp…. Wake uuppppppp…. Wake up already, you big lug!” I try to open my eyes, but find them firmly shut. I move my hands towards my face and try to pry apart my eyelids, but instead find someone else’s hands over my eyes.

And then I move the hands to see Zure standing over with that same demonic smile. SSSSHHHHIIIIITTTTTT. The schedule. [So first thing in the morning, whenever I wake up, we’re gonna fight until I’m satisfied.]

Dude. I am not prepared for this, mentally or physically. I want to activate freeze, but I’m way too tired. I check my watch. 5:51 am. Of course.

“Sorry! I was too excited for the punching bag session, so I couldn’t sleep!” While I’m groggy and still trying, unsuccessfully, to drag my ass out of bed, Zure seems positively bubbly, ready to pound my face in.

As if responding to my drowsiness, Zure grabs my arm and pulls me out of bed, where I land on my butt with a loud thump. I’m still wearing the same clothes from yesterday, the black and white shirt and my old world pants. She’s dressed in what look like normal clothes, but are probably defensive garments.

“Okay okay okay, I’m getting up.” I try to take one good look at her face, then realize that her eyes don’t look very tired. “How is it that you can get like 5 hours of sleep and be perfectly rested?” “I don’t know; ask this!” She tries to slug me in the arm, but the imminent danger breaks my groggy feeling, and I dodge.

I’m now awake, but I still feel like ass in a can. “Do you have any extra clothes?” I’m trying to keep cool, but when asking a question like this, I can’t help but be a bit flustered. Damn. Where’s my emotionless demeanor when I need it?

“Nope. You’re stuck in those garbs until we’re done training.” She beckons me towards the kitchen, where she has actual food for breakfast. “Where’d all of this come from? I thought you only had junk food?” “I made an early morning shopping trip and got real food.”

I inspect the food on the table and observe eggs, sausage, gritz, and hash browns. Cool. I plop down onto the chair. “You’re not religious, right?” She asks this while sauntering over to the table.

“Nope. I don’t see why I should believe in something that’ll only give me a false sense of security.” She seems satisfied with my answer and sits down. I guess that means we don’t have to pray. We eat the food. It’s not bad, but I could do better.

“Tomorrow, I’m making breakfast.” I make a motion with my fork, and say “This stuff ain’t bad at all, but I can do better.” “Yeah yeah yeah, I’ll believe you when I see it.” We finish up, and we rest for 30 minutes, watching more StarBill RoundShirt before Zure tells me it’s finally punching bag time. I was dreading this, but it seems like it can’t be avoided.

“All right, here are the conditions for fighting; no magic, no weapons, no time control or mind games, just pure one on one. No buts.” We walk out into her backyard, which reminds me of the grass from the Joe meeting. The sun has just passed over the horizon. “Get ready, Get setty, Get Deady!”

Zure rushes towards me, and my eyes can barely follow her as she zig-zags, aiming straight for my face. I throw up my left arm in retaliation to her punch, but she is already following up with a kick.

I step back and counter with one of my own. She smirks and then forces my foot down onto the ground, effectively cutting off all means of escape.

Then punching bag mode begins. I get punched in face, gut, and shoulders thrice, all in rapid succession. I feel my arms go limp, and then after a few minutes of literal torture, I don’t feel anymore.

At the end of this, Zure is breathing hard, and my entire torso is racked with pain, my heart pounding harder than a jackhammer. I try to mumble out a few ragged words.

“Are you satisfied yet?” She nods, still panting. Okay then. I try to cast recovery magic on myself, but only get a small recovery; it must be because I’m dead tired. Zure walks over and casts recovery magic on me, and I’m once again able to move.

I sit up and pull up my Cred, then check my stats, which are now

|Strength: 24| |Defense: 18| |Speed: 28| |Stamina: 33| |Intelligence: 21|. The hell. Did my INT actually go down? On the up side, all of my other stats have jumped up a bit, though I’m still level two.

I check the screen for an EXP bar, and it’s a small bar under my name.

|Zephyrus: Level Two| |Title: Big Frick| |Exp: 78%|.

I squint a little bit at my title. Big Frick? The frick is that supposed to mean? Damn Joe; what’s his deal anyways? “So, did you level up at all?”, Zure inquires. “Nope, but my stats increased a little bit; particularly my defense.”

I say this as I shoot a look at her. She just acts like it doesn't matter. I guess it's now or never, right?

“So, about that hug...” I trail off. Zure seems to remember this in an instant. She smiles at me and says, “What about it? You know what I said. I know what I said, and to be frank, I only slept this well because of it.”

“Okay then. I already told you, I'm not interested in romance.” I feel satisfied with my answer as long as she doesn't try to make it weird.

“We'll see how long you can keep that resolution. After all, we're living together.” She gives me that smirk again. Well, I don't see what harm it could possibly do to be in a relationsh- No. I already told myself this. I'm not doing this.

I shut off my emotions and remember that I'm trying to regain my memory, and also get back at Joe to figure out why he liked to me. That's right, Zeph, get your priorities in check. And now I'm referring to myself in the third person. Fantastic.

“Yes. Indeed we'll see.” I smirk back, and this seems to surprise her. “That's right. The flustered Zeph is no more. I have returned to my expressionless demeanor.” I say all of this in a dead, flat voice. For some reason, this sets her off into a fit of laughter, and she falls to the grassy floor.

I then realized what I just tried to do, and that, honestly, it's useless around her as I collapse, laughing along with her.

“I meant what I said yesterday. I've had more fun with you than anyone else I've met in a long time.”

“And I meant what I said when I told you I'm not interested in romance. Are we clear?”

“Crystal clear. Just because you aren't interested now doesn't mean you won't be eventually.” She says this in her teasing voice, like she's mocking an idiot.

She winks then turns and walks away. “Go take a shower and get ready to go to the mountains.” I do this, and while I'm in the shower, I start to think.

How should I go about trying to get my memory back? I've gained a little bit through flashback scenarios where something in this world serves as a reminder. I would of course like to ask Joe, but I have no idea how to find him, much less expect reliable information from him.

In spite of this, perhaps, I call out his name. “Joe. You there?” I swear I just heard a hmph, but I doubt he would respond to a name that I gave to him.

I instead try to piece together what little I do know. The boy central to all of my visions is definitely me, but why am I always so sad? In the guitar pick moment, I felt respite. Following the forest vision, I felt melancholic and broken. I felt lonely after the school vision. So why? Was I depressed? Rejected?

Zure said that I don't act, which I guess means I don't act like I feel something if I don't. Going off of what Joe told me, people who commit suicide get some sort of penalty after coming to this world.

All of the visions combined with this knowledge seems to implant in my mind that I may have killed myself. But, according to Joe, I was the first person to ever come to this world without their memories. So why? Under what circumstances could I have died, then lost my memory as punishment?

Also, losing one's memory isn't that great of a punishment, as it only incites a greater desire to rediscover the memories, and I've proven to myself that I can recover my memory, however slow it might be.

Though I get the feeling suicide is a very real possibility, it seems to me that something greater is at play. Is Joe behind all of this? I also don't count out this possibility. I shut off the shower and begin to dry off my body with a towel.

Well, I'll think more later, probably after the mountain expedition.

I turn my thoughts towards the mountains. What actually awaits there? Fantasy like monsters? Zombies? Pokemon, ripe for the catching? I shake my head at the latter, telling myself that though this world is magic, it isn't an anime.

I won't come back to life from some stupid ass pull, and I don't get any special protagonist powers. Even though I have an overpowered special ability, if it runs out at a crucial moment, I'm screwed.

I put on my clothes and exit the bathroom to find Zure standing in front of it, waiting for me. “What took so long?” “I was showering.” What else do you expect me to say? I was testing out my right hand while time was stopped, then took time to rest? I check my watch to see that I was in the shower for about 20 minutes, which I guess is a little long.

She seems to be up to something, but I don’t know what; I hope she doesn’t start following me around. That would be truly scary.

“Can I go now?” I’m trying to get out from the door, but Zure moves back and forth to block my escape. “Why are you blocking me? Are you twelve or something?” “No, I’m thirteen.”

Why is it that all of the people I meet just happen to be one chromosome short of a pair?

Do I have some sort of power in my right hand that dispels all luck and blessi- Oh wait.

At this point, I just want to get a move on, so I push her out of my way and walk forward. She makes a small hmph and follows after me. If I have to evade her every time I try to go anywhere, I’ll never get anything done, especially now that we live together.

Maybe I should’ve spent my money on a downpayment for a house or an apartment instead of buying that naginata; but it’s a pretty nice blade, nonetheless. “To the Batmobile?” I say to Zure.

“You mean the Catmobile?”, she says as she cocks her head. Oh yeah, I forgot about different world parallels. But Catmobile sounds pretty ridiculous either way. We hop in and set off towards the mountains.

We take a few weird backroads and side streets, but we arrive to the mountains by 11 am. After showing some guard looking headass dudes our Cred’s, we pass through.

“Hey. You missed the turn for the mountains.” There was a turn on the left, but she passed it up. “That was the turn for the first mountains. We’re going way past that if I going to have any more fun.”

I look forward to see an impossibly long stretch of road ahead of us, which seems to reach to more cities and mountains farther out. Zure floors the gas and I notice the speed gauge, which goes up to 450 miles per hour.

Wait. I think I just saw something really important now. I watch it fly past 100 into the 200’s, and then to 300mph, and then all the up to 390. Holey Buhjeebs. Everything outside the car is a colorful blur, and then a minute or two later, she slows down.

“Huh, usually there are more people out here. We got lucky this time, but the road isn’t always this clear,” Zure remarks. She pulls onto the side of the road and parks, and I see a mountain. A really tall mountain. Easily extending past the clouds, which only seem to get to around halfway up the mountain.

“Are we going inside of that thing?” I point towards it and she nods. She already seems excited. “I’ve never been to this mountain before. This one’s recommended for level 40 and up.” Hey. I’m only level 2. Why are going into a level 40 recommended mountain?

I immediately turn around, but Zure grabs me by the collar of my shirt and drags me all the way to the mountain. Balls. I begin to think that our early morning training session will seem easy compared to this. I hope I don’t die here. That reminds me.

“Hey. If I got a slave, what would say?” My back is still turned to Zure as she continues to drag us to the mountain. “Hmm. Lemme think.” She once again strokes her imaginary goatee before responding, “I wouldn’t really care so long as the slave was male; slavery isn’t very rare.”

“Why male?” Oh wait. Aren’t slavery girls a commonality in fantasy worlds?

“Because if it was a girl, they would probably try to steal you away from me. Okay?” She smiles that crazy smile with demon aura on full blast. “Okay okay, I get the point. It’s just that at this point, I want someone who I can trust no matter what. I’m finding it hard to trust you after the earlier parts of yesterday, no matter what you say.”

Zure puffs out her cheeks and turns slightly pink at this remark, but I’m just being honest. I want reliability.

“So I’m going to get a slave soon, okay? And it will be one that can fight, rest assured.” “And how many yenoms do you have?”

Heh. Almost forgot about that part. I have about 1000 yenoms right now. “One thousand.” Zure begins to shake, and starts holding her mouth with her free hand. After a few seconds, she bursts out laughing. Am I really that stupid? Am I going to get head chopped and then get called a baka?

“You need at least 20,000 yenoms to even consider getting a slave, much less a battle oriented slave.” These words drop on me like a ton a bricks, and I suddenly find myself sagging. “How much do you make per month, Zure?”

“Hmm. About 28,000 yenoms a month.” Isn’t that almost ten times the average person’s income? Why is someone with that much money living in the origin town?

“Why don’t you just move closer to the harder mountains with that kind of money?” “Well, you see, the housing gets progressively more expensive the farther out you go, so I’ve stayed in Yerk Now for most of my life. But I do have a really nice car, which cost me around 350,000 yenoms.”

The shit. That’s a lot money for just one car. But hey; it goes to 450 mph, so I’m not complaining. I guess she just puts the rest of her money in a bank or her inventory or something.

“Well, we’ve arrived. How does it look? Breathtaking and heart pounding, right?” More like heart stopping. She seems ready to attack the literal mountain itself.

She drags me all the way up to the first entrance at the base of the mountain, and then we enter into the deep dark.

End of Chapter 6