Chapter 92

And then, three mornings later.

On a bench tucked into a quiet corner of a large park in some unfamiliar city in the Western Continent, a broad-shouldered young man with black hair lay sprawled, a newspaper covering him.

…Yeah. No use hiding it. That’s me.

Coo-coo-coo-coo…

The familiar morning cooing of pigeons woke me.

When I opened my eyes, the crisp air of early spring and the bright sunlight cutting through the buildings greeted me.

As I sat up, the newspaper I’d used as a blanket all night fell to the sides with a soft rustle.

Ugh… all crumpled.

I gathered the papers together and tucked them under my arm.

“Phew… Let’s see… Where should I set up today? Since it’s a weekday, maybe that corner near the busy street would be better.”

A little ways off, I spread the newspapers I’d collected onto the ground and sat cross-legged on top of them.

“Even with this much, the cold’s still seeping up… I’ll need to get more later. A box or something would be nice…”

Just then, a dwarf in shabby clothes pushed a cart stacked with cardboard boxes, his worn leather shoes squeaking on the pavement.

So, the Western Continent even recycles paper. That means paper must be fairly common here…

I’d already guessed as much seeing newspapers roll by like it was nothing, but it seemed their industrial output—including papermaking—far surpassed that of the Northern Continent.

“Collecting scrap paper… makes sense. Life’s hard everywhere. Yeah, I can handle a bit of cold—my body laughs at subzero blizzards. The more important thing is my livelihood tools… Ah, there it is.”

After several days, the tin pot I’d grown so familiar with it felt like part of me was placed in front of me.

I bowed my head deeply, placing both hands gently on the pot.

Alright… today’s setup is complete. Time to start.

After about five minutes…

Clang~

The sound of metal hitting metal rang out from the pot. My body jumped on instinct. Judging by the heavy tone… this was a big one!

Overjoyed at catching such a catch, I let out a loud roar to the world.

“Whoa! Thank you! May you be blessed!”

I lifted my head to look inside the pot, and as expected, a shiny 500-mill coin gleamed at the bottom.

Sure, it didn’t have the crisp sound of silver or the satisfying thud of gold, but even a single 500-mill copper coin was a rare miracle—maybe only twice or thrice a day. With this, the day could already be considered off to a good start.

“Why are you giving money to him?”

A man’s grumbling voice reached me as a woman passed by, dropping a coin into the pot.

“He looks pitiful. Seeing him like that first thing in the morning…”

“Didn’t you read the paper? People like him… actually go home in a gemstone cart. And didn’t you see just now? Look at the size of that tin pot. How much do you think he’s trying to make with that massive begging tin? Isn’t it ridiculous?”

“Why do you care so much?”

“You really are too softhearted…”

From a distance, I listened to the couple’s voices and let out a long sigh to the sky.

Huh…

“…I just want to bite my tongue and die.”

Of course, there was a perfectly good reason why I ended up like this.

A few days ago, I’d clenched my teeth in anger remembering a certain crazy woman who claimed to be Demon King Disis.

Flash!!

The moment she threw me into another space, I had no choice but to be stunned.

A strange place. Strange scenery. Strange climate. Strange people. Strange clothing. Strange language.

And… completely naked.

Yes. I had been thrown into a public place with no clothes on, in broad daylight.

All I had was Astrafe in my hand and a Recall Dagger on my hip.

‘That damned woman…!’

“Kyaaa! Pervert!”

“Wh-what is that person?”

“Suddenly appearing in the park?!”

“Teleport? A mage?”

“Why would a mage teleport naked into a park?”

‘Damn it… I’m not a Termi×ator or anything…!’

I quickly hid my body, then knocked out a passing pedestrian and “farmed” his clothes.

Sorry. But I had no other choice. At least I still had my underwear on, right?

Once I’d roughly gotten dressed, I glanced around, then approached a young man standing a little ways off.

“Excuse me.”

“Huh… yes?”

The man flinched and stopped when he noticed Astrafe hanging from my waist.

“This might be a strange question… but, can you tell me where I am?”

Luckily, thanks to the language pack, he understood me.

He looked awkward, but he answered my question without resistance.

“You’re in Redna City.”

“…Redna?”

Where on earth is that?

“…Which country?”

The man tilted his head in confusion.

“Country? So you’re asking which country this is?”

“Uh… yes.”

“…The Tubilan Empire.”

Tubilan? And that’s… where exactly?

By now, I could feel cold sweat trickling down my spine. Because as far as I know, there’s no empire with that name on the Northern Continent.

Which meant… no, surely not. It can’t be.

Hoping I was just mistaken, I cautiously asked one last time.

“…This isn’t the Northern Continent, is it?”

The man clicked his tongue, giving me a look as if I were insane.

“…I don’t know what kind of joke this is, but… let’s stop.”

“No, I’m serious. I’m asking seriously.”

“…Why would the Northern Continent even come up here? This is the Western Continent. Got it?”

He shrugged off my arm and strode away.

I stared dumbly at the sky.

The Western Continent? So, the continent that’s 5,000 kilometers across the sea from the Northern Continent?

I tried asking a few other people just in case, but all gave the same answer.

Western Continent. Tubilan Empire. Redna City.

“…Good grief. What kind of absurd coincidence is this?”

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I decided to focus on what I could actually do for now.

1. Find companions.

I spent nearly two hours surveying the area, but I didn’t see Shia or anyone else who had been swept up in the light with me.

Which meant… either I was the only one sent here, or everyone else had landed somewhere different—one of the two.

‘Shia can probably manage on her own, so even if she landed somewhere else it wouldn’t be a big problem… Still, I hope it was just me.’

2. Communicate.

I looked up at the starry sky for a moment, then sat on a park bench and accessed my mental interface in semi-immersion mode.

Before I could even speak, Bel’s voice reached me first.

“We’re aware of the situation outside as well.”

“Is that so? Do you have anything to say, or maybe a good idea?”

Bel, after all, retained some memories of the Archangel Yuribel. With someone like her, there had to be at least a little more useful information—or a solution—than I could come up with.

“Judging by the constellations, yes. This is indeed the Tubilan Empire in the Western Continent.”

“Ha… damn it. Don’t you have a map or something?”

At my words, Bel immediately projected a hologram into the air. It was a world map showing the continents arranged in a cross over the oceans, with the central continent at the intersection.

…Wow. I didn’t know Bel could do something like this.

“This is the Western Continent. And this is the Tubilan Empire.”

She pointed to a location roughly in the middle vertically, touching the right-hand ocean horizontally.

“…What scale is this?”

I asked, and a scale appeared just below the map.

By rough estimation, the distance between the Northern Continent and the Western Continent was about 5,000 kilometers by sea, and the distance from where I was in the Tubilan Empire to the Kesra Marquisate was…

“Eleven thousand kilometers…? My god.”

How on earth am I supposed to get back?

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The first idea that came to mind was to use an Angel Summon Scroll.

But the problem was, all my valuables—including the scroll—were in the Hero’s Backpack, which Shia had taken when I was teleported here. And the Angel Summon Scroll could only be used by me.

In other words, aside from Astrafe and the Recall Dagger, I had nothing.

“…How the hell am I supposed to get to the Northern Continent from here?”

Bell let out a wry laugh.

“There are two ways to cross continents. One is by sea, the other is by using a sanctuary controlled by each guild.”

“How long by sea?”

“If you intend to travel by ship, you’d have to wait at the port for at least half a year.”

“…Half a year?”

“Yes. Two hundred years ago, many ships traveled freely… but after the Demon King appeared, sea monsters have run rampant. Ordinary voyages are impossible unless you travel in a large fleet. From what I know, fleets depart only twice a year, in early spring and early autumn. By timing, one probably left about half a month ago.”

“…Damn it. Then what about the sanctuaries? Can I use them?”

“Not easily. In the Western Continent, each guild has only one. Normally, they’re reserved for the highest-ranking clergy or royalty. You can use them if you pay… but one use would cost about 100 billion mil in local currency.”

“…How much is that?”

“About 1 billion Sel, using Sel as the standard.”

“Crazy… There must be mana towers here too… Can’t teleport work?”

“Teleport 5,000 kilometers over the ocean? Impossible. You could set intermediate markers to create relay points, but even if that worked, they wouldn’t let an outsider use them.”

“…So realistically, I have two options. Wait half a year to join a fleet, or make a ton of money to pay for a sanctuary.”

“Yes. If you had a Pilgrim Priest Certificate stamped by the Lumina Guild Pope, it would be a little easier…”

“…That’s in the Hero’s Backpack too.”

“Right.”

“…Sigh. For now, I guess I’ll just gather information and figure out a way to make money.”

“You don’t have to be too discouraged. After all, you have Archangel Yuribel. She’s probably monitoring your situation periodically. Once she realizes what’s going on, she might do something to help.”

“I hope so. Huh… at least I wish I could send Shia a message saying I’m fine, so she wouldn’t worry.”

Of course, Shia already knew I was safe.

Not only because of my skill, but the Sealing Sword Pendant she wears around her neck is linked to me. If the seal is intact, that means I’m fine too.

“…Still, there’s a difference between directly letting her know and her guessing.”

“Hmm… I might have a way for that.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I’ll try it, and if it works, I’ll let you know.”

“Alright, then I’m counting on you.”

So first, I had to make some money.

Ah, to clarify, the money I was trying to earn wasn’t for using the sanctuary. It was just for survival.

What do I mean? I was flat broke. I had nothing. To even start doing anything—gathering information or finding a way to make money—I needed to secure food, shelter, and clothing first.

But… this crazy place made even that difficult.

“Your identification, please.”

“Huh? Even manual labor needs ID?”

“Hey, you’re in big trouble. Where did you come from? Don’t you know that hiring someone without ID can land you in chains?”

Right. This country assigned a personal identification number at birth, registered fingerprints at seventeen, and monitored citizens like a dystopian nightmare even worse than the Republic of Korea.

No matter where you went or what you tried to do, you had to present your imperial ID card—also called a ‘civil certificate’—or you could do nothing. That was the Tubilan Empire.

“Dammit…”