The stranger lounged on my bed like it was made for her. What looked like her clothes were scattered haphazardly all over the room. She waved at me as I peeked from behind my closet.
“W-what are you doing in my bed?” I finally managed to stammer out. No matter how hard I tried to remember, last night was all still a blur. I knew drinking was a terrible idea.
The woman giggled before speaking in a strange accent I had never heard before. “Aww, c’mon, don’t be so cold. Not after how you treated me last night…” she trailed off as she turned away bashfully.
Huh? What? I… I didn’t do anything weird last night, did I? No, of course not. I wasn’t that kind of person. But I had to ask. Just to make sure, you know? “And, um, h-how exactly did I treat you last night?”
“Aww, no need to be so shy now. I mean, you were being so forceful back then, when you swept me off my feet and brought me here.”
I screamed internally. This was my worst nightmare. I wanted to just dive out the window and run away. But I couldn’t afford to get kicked out, so I did the next best thing.
I dove to my knees and begged for forgiveness. “I-I’m sorry for anything weird I did to you last night! I’m sorry for thinking any weird thoughts about you, and I’m sorry for being born!”
I remained kneeling until she started to laugh. “Aw, c’mon you’re making me feel bad. I just wanted to tease you a bit. Relax. I just needed a place to sleep last night, and you let me stay here. That’s all.”
“Oh.” So that’s what happened. A few of my hazy memories were starting to come back to me. Right, I got kicked out from the inn. After doing something I’d rather not talk about ever again, I wandered around the streets for a bit. I saw her crouched in an alley, looking lost and confused. She looked like she needed some help, and I couldn’t just leave her there. So, I let her stay the night.
I would’ve done the same for anyone, okay? It wasn’t just because she was pretty, I swear.
“I-I see. Well, um, I guess that makes sense,” I finally managed to respond. See, I knew there was a reasonable explanation behind all this. I didn’t just ruin my life last night. So that just left one tiny problem. “Putting all that aside… Why don’t you have any clothes on?”
“You mean you leave your clothes on when you sleep?”
“Yes! Now please put something on!”
Listen, it was hard not to stare at her, okay? Anyone would do the same in my position. Thankfully, after some effort, the woman managed to get dressed in the same clothes she had on from the night before. It looked similar to a school uniform, but one that left little to the imagination, with an obscenely short skirt and a low cut shirt that exposed her cleavage. Definitely not from any school I’ve ever seen before. The uniform was a bit dirty, but none of the clothes I owned fit her right. She kept complaining that all my shirts were too tight around her chest area, which for some reason really ticked me off.
The woman called herself Haine. It was a strange sounding name, and judging by her clothes and everything, she definitely wasn’t from around here. I got a little curious, so I asked where she was from.
“I’m from another world.” She smiled at me, saying something completely ridiculous with a straight face.
“Please stop teasing me.”
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“Aw, I’m being serious! That’s the only explanation I can think of. One moment, I’m chilling at home, and the next moment I find myself here, somewhere straight out of a movie!” She said, as she stepped uncomfortably close to me. I turned away in embarrassment as she placed her arms on my shoulder. “Not gonna lie, it’s been kinda rough out here and I was starting to get homesick, but I’m glad to have met someone like you.”
Her story was still too incredulous to believe, but a part of me still felt happy. “W-well, I don’t know if I can believe all of that, but… Thanks. That means alot to me.” I returned my own smile. How long had it been since I last smiled, anyways? With all the studying I’d been doing and… what happened yesterday, I honestly couldn’t remember.
“Aw, thanks a bunch!” She pulled me into a tight hug, and my mind blanked. All I could think was that she smelled nice. I could feel something soft and pillowy pushing against my head and—
I wrenched myself free. S-she didn’t notice me blushing, right? I shook my head, and slapped my cheeks as hard as I could. Purge every impure thought.
I cleared my throat and quickly changed the topic. “A-anyways, if what you’re saying is true, we should head to the Hero’s Library. If any place has any info on summoning or other worlds and all that, it should be there.”
Her eyes lit up in excitement. She looped her arm around mine, and practically started to drag me out of the room. “It’s a date, then! C’mon, lead the way!”
“W-wait!” My protests fell on deaf ears. She really was too much for me.
Eventually, I managed to wrangle her to the library. It was an imposing structure looking more like a courthouse than anything else, tucked away in the old district only a short walk away from the inn.
“Woah, this has some real antique vibes,” Haine muttered as we entered. I would’ve shushed her, since it was a library and all, but it wasn’t like anyone else was here. Only a single librarian manned the front desk, blatantly sleeping in their chair.
The Hero’s Library was always like this. It was once a symbol of the first hero, a testament to her legend. Sealing away the demon lord, and banishing evil from the world. But now that was all just musty old fairy tales. Demons were just something parents told to scare their children into behaving.
So all that remained were dusty, half empty shelves and weathered, featureless statues. Any actually valuable tomes were snatched up by the academy or Mage’s Association, so all that was left were outdated textbooks and ancient, forgotten myths.
Still, call it childish on whatever, but I loved to come here anyways to admire the statues of the first hero. Sometimes, when the librarian wasn’t around, I even tried to repair parts of them myself. I loved listening to the stories as a kid. They might have been fairy tales to most people, but I always still believed they were real. I wanted nothing more than to be just like that hero, saving those in need and dispelling evil.
But that wasn’t what we were here for today. Just because the shelves were a bit barren didn’t mean you couldn’t find some good stuff here. Old myths, no matter how absurd or fantastical, always contained some fragment of truth. So if I could find anything talking about other worlds, or summoning, or anything of the sort, that could be a clue to whatever Haine was talking about.
“...Here it is.” Hours had passed since I began searching. Haine occupied herself a bit flipping through picture books—she said she couldn’t read any of the words, anyways—but even though she didn’t complain out loud, I could see her getting more and more bored and fidgety. But finally, my searching had paid off.
Deep in this weathered old book, it claimed that the first hero was ‘summoned out of desperation, emerging from a portal to another world’. This had to be it. The book spoke of a special ritual, one that called forth a hero from another world. If that was true, then…
I stared at the statue of the first hero, the statue of the legend I admired so much. This book claimed the hero herself came from another world. Just like Haine claimed to be. I looked back to Haine, who was busy stacking a pile of books like building blocks. Was it just a coincidence? And if not, in the off chance everything she said was true, then maybe she really could be—
My train of thought was interrupted by the sound of her stomach growling, echoing throughout the quiet library. “Oops, my bad,” she laughed. “It’s been forever since I ate.”
I smiled. Yeah, there was no way she could be a hero. “Let’s go grab something to eat, then.”
Our little library trip was less helpful than I had hoped. Still, one question lingered in the back of my mind. If there really did exist a ritual that summoned people from another world, then who summoned her?