Veloth was tired. As he lay in the increasing puddle of mud at the center of his self-created crater, he lamented.
[That isn’t fair! I was basically thrown into a war at birth! Against gods no less…] Veloth didn’t know what his first step should be. All he could do right now was to survive. He didn’t know anything about this world, or whether his birthplace was on this same world somewhere. He did not know whether he could interact with the intelligent beings of this world, or whether they had the same language other than Tara.
Just as he made the though, A feminine figure appeared at the crater’s edge. It was Tara, and she looked haggard, her leather scratched and torn as though she threw herself into a giant blender.
“Hoh, the hero returns!” Called out Veloth with a mental link, an idea forming.
Tara hesitated at the words, but continued to Veloth’s position and stopped ten feet away.
“I need you…” “I need you.” They spoke at the same time. Tara was baffled for a moment, then her face was flushed red for a moment.
[Ah, that came out wrong. She probably misunderstood.]
After a long awkward silence, Veloth was first to regain his composure. “Erm, well since it seems to be mutual, could you lead the way to the nearest village? I am sort of… lost…” Veloth muttered embarrassingly. Tara blushed further.
[Ah! I was misunderstood further? So… cliché… Am I speaking to an anime love interest?] Veloth unconsciously furrowed his brows, causing Tara to stutter out “O-o-o-OK, just follow me!” And she began walking in a direction.
“Ah, so, what cardinal direction are we moving towards right now, for future reference? I am not keen on getting lost you know.”
“O-oh, erm, this is east… See there in the distance? Those are the Pearly Gates. Once we have crossed them we will be in the human continent, Paradiso. Tara pointed over the forest to the east, the direction we were walking, at a row of twelve mountains that were tightly spaced.
“So I am guessing there is a valley we will be traveling through?” Veloth ventured a guess.
“Yes, and there is a human fortress on the other side of the valley, Sancti Petra. That is our destination.”
[These names… They sound… Latin…] Veloth mulled over Paradiso and Sancti Petra. [They are Paradise and Saint Peter? As in guardian of the twelve pearly gates to Paradise Saint Peter?]
“You… There was something that was bothering me… What kind of mana are you using? And why is it always so cold around you?”
“It’s cold near me?” This was the first time Veloth heard of this, not that anyone had mentioned it before now considering they were fighting.
“Yes, it is as though you are made of winter itself.” Tara half-complained.
“Maybe it has something to do with my mana. Let me try something.” Veloth said as he looked inward. Indeed, as he suspected, it was as though Veloth’s mana-well had a leak somewhere in its invisible bottom. No wonder he never detected it before, it was difficult to discern something like a leak at the bottom of something that had no end after all.
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“You don’t even understand your own mana?” Tara asked baffled as Veloth patched this ‘leak’ with mana just as he had done to separate the dark mana.
“How can I? I am only a year old so far and was separated from the only other manna spirit who could properly teach me, my mother.”
Tara abruptly stopped walking. “A y-y-year old? MANNA SPIRIT?” She looked truly baffled now.
“Well initially I was a 23 year old human on a world without any sort of magic, but knowledge about magic from another world that has no mana, after all, can only go so far.”
Tara stared at Veloth in shock. Her expression was deadpan. [Did her brain fry at that?] Veloth smirked to himself.
“S-so you are a manna spirit?”
“Supposedly.” Veloth shrugged his shoulders, which considering he was on all fours, worked surprisingly well. He didn’t mention the god Zahramiik. Gods only cause trouble when you even mention them.
“That means you are made of pure primal mana?” She started petting and patting me all over as though searching for something.
“W-what are you doing? K-knock…it…off…” It felt oddly and disturbingly good to be petted.
“So this is primal mana? But then why do you use dark mana?”
“…Ah… right there… huhm…? Oh, right, er, I don’t know, after I was summoned I just found it mixed into my mana and messing with my spells.”
“I see… Your spells as well, they were unrefined, you were pouring too much power into them. I wondered about why in our battle two weeks ago, but I guess you being a reincarnation and a manna spirit explain it.”
“I have already been out here for two weeks… Ah, so then a week in this world is…?”
“Seven days. A month is 30 days, with some at 28 days or 31 days to account for daylight savings, and there are 365 days a year. A day is 24 hours, an hour is 60 minutes, and a minute is 60 seconds.”
“Hoh, just like earth.”
Tara looks at the ground beneath our feet at Veloth’s comment.
“Yes, yes, I know, terrible naming sense. Let’s move on.”
“I think you should go to a spell craft school once we reach Paradiso.”
“With this body? It’s impossible… and also cliché.”
“Do you hate clichés or something? And you have plenty of mana to maintain a shapeshift spell if you are a manna spirit.”
“Huh, I hadn’t considered shapeshifting. And yes, I absolutely despise clichés.”
They continued to banter like that on their way east.
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