As Artyom was ready to drift off to sleep, his phone rang. He groggily pulled it out of his pocket and flipped it open.

“Hello?” he asked.

“Artyom, it’s Gus. This is your first check-in, please tell me what you have done today.”

The man from Earth glared at an imaginary figure on the ceiling and took a second to answer. “Yeah, good to talk to you too, Gus. I was about to go to sleep, so let’s make this fast.”

The other end of the line remained silent.

“First of all, I got mugged in the first ten minutes of me setting foot here.”

Gus remained silent.

“Some soldiers of ‘the dark lord’ or something. Don’t worry, I didn’t kill them or anything. I just lightly beat them up and made them promise not to hurt anyone ever again.”

“A proper show of force and mercy towards enemies in a Fairytale world, I approve of your choice.”

“I’m honored, Gus. Well after that, I arrived at the town of freeacres, and talked to one of the locals before going to the local inn.”

“One isn’t enough, that’s the bare minimum. I disapprove of that, you need to talk to more people.”

“Excuse me Gus, but I thought this was a vacation,” said Artyom as he quickly sat up. “Are you so scared, you’re going to micromanage me even now? Are you going to start texting me scripts for my next social interactions? I can’t imagine I’d make many friends if I suddenly started talking like you.”

“…”

“Yeah, that last part was harsh, I take it back. But please, take it easy with me. Things are actually looking pretty good.”

“I see,” said Gus in the same tone. Artyom figured he must have processed his words and already forgiven him, because if not, he’d make it clear. “What happened at the inn?”

“I met a promising team of adventurers and joined their ranks-”

“Do you intend to train them into becoming strong enough to defeat the dark lord whose soldiers mugged you?”

“…my god you have little faith,” said Artyom, shaking his head and falling back down onto the bed. “I did join them, and I am training them up, but only because I want to. I helped them clear out some rats from the inn’s basement.”

“Very well then, I approve of you integrating with the local culture.”

“You make me sound like some kind of anthropologist, but yeah, the people here seem pretty nice, if a bit… simple.”

“Have you learned anything about the hero?”

“Nothing yet. The dossier didn’t have much to go off of besides three things, and I didn’t want to come off as a weirdo asking if anyone had ever heard of TV or California before. I’ll ask after I get a little more friendly with everyone.”

“Holding others’ emotions in high regard, I approve.”

“Yeah, yeah. Goodnight Gus.”

“Goodnight, Artyom.”

As soon as the phone was back in his pocket, the man from Earth felt the call of sleep gently lull him away, with radio silence to guide his mind as he drifted off.

----------------------------------------

Artyom awoke to a rooster’s crow. The sun’s first rays filtered through the gap in the nearby window’s curtains and kissed his nose with its early light. Unlike the expected red and orange hue of an Earth sunrise, this light was mostly pink with a glimmer of silver mixed in.

He slowly got out of his bed and walked over to get a better look. While a nearby building partially blocked his view, Artyom couldn’t help but feel something magical here. It was one of those few moments he never got to enjoy while on a mission.

The man from Earth smiled, and headed out.

After getting himself freshened up, he went downstairs and sat down at a table where Ruba served him a cup of hot, dark liquid. Another culinary coin flip with most worlds was whether they had coffee or not. Artyom lost this time, and ended up with tea. Even when asked, Ruba didn’t know what coffee was, but she at least provided some cream and sugar to go along with the caffeinated beverage.

By the time he was finished with his drink, the adventuring party came downstairs.

“Wow, you’re already up?” asked Sae. “I was sure we’d have to push you out of bed with how hard you partied last night!”

“Like we pushed you out of bed?” asked Pireni, following just behind him.

“Oh come on, Pireni, you have to admit he did party pretty hard.”

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Artyom blinked. All he did was drink a bunch of soda and soup, not even a drop of alcohol. He’d known Mormons from back home on Earth who partied harder than him!

Skeya followed along at the back of the group and broke Artyom out of his stupor with a polite smile and “good morning” which he returned.

“But now that that’s all done, we should probably get to business,” said Sae, taking a seat across from Artyom and motioning the others to join them in the remaining seats. “And by business, I mean going over the team rules”

“Of course you’d start with the boring stuff,” whined Pereni. “Why can’t we start with the mission?”

“Because he won’t be a real member unless he agrees to the rules,” replied Sae. “Sorry about that, Artyom.”

Pireni began pouting while Sae continued.

“There are really just two rules for now. First, the money we earn gets split evenly between all of us. Second, we vote on team decisions. Team decisions need at least half of us to vote yes on, with the team leader being the tiebreaker. That’s me, by the way. Any decision that affects the people on a team directly, like adding a new member, needs everyone to vote yes. That’s why we let you join. Because everyone said yes.”

Pireni and Skeya both nodded at his last sentence.

“Alright, that makes sense, I’ll accept those terms,” replied Artyom.

“See? It would’ve been faster if you’d just let me say it from the get-go!” said Sae, angling a smug glare at Pireni. “Now we can get started on our other mission!”

“Hold on, wasn’t your ‘other mission’ to get yourself a new teammate?” asked Artyom.

“Nah, that was just a bonus,” said Sae. “Our actual second mission is to take out the-”

“Bog Walker!” interrupted Pireni. Sae’s look of irritation made her flinch and scared Skeya into chanting a healing spell to use for what she thought would follow. Luckily, he calmed down before doing anything stupid, and took back hold of the conversation.

“-the Bog Walker, who’s been terrorizing the town. Now, Pireni, as our ranger, could you please fill Artyom in on what a Bog Walker is?”

“Alright! [Recall Monster]!” exclaimed Pireni. “The Bog Walker is a dreadful beast six feet long and four feet wide on average. It has matted brown fur that acts as a light armor that resists blunt attacks, and sharp teeth and claws it can use to tear through light armor and flesh. It can move surprisingly quickly and is very agile, making it a difficult foe for new adventurers.”

Artyom raised an eyebrow at the sudden change in her tone and diction, but figured it was the aptly named Skill she used, that most likely pulled it out of some bestiary.

“Thank you, Pireni,” said Sae, having calmed down considerably. “It’s last sighting is a few hour’s out, so we were hoping to be able to kill it and be back before dinner. Ruba has some rations for sale that you can buy, since we only have enough for the rest of us.”

“Sorry, we didn’t expect you’d join us today,” apologized Skeya. “I can pay for your rations if you’d like.”

“Don’t worry, I can afford it. And I’m sure the reward will cover the cost,” replied Artyom. He appreciated Skeya’s kindness, but felt bad for how quick she was to appease. Lucky for her this was a Fairytale world.

With that, the group sat down together to eat breakfast, with Artyom getting himself a bowl of oatmeal filled with pitted cherries and sweetened with honey. Once they were done, he purchased some pemmican from Ruba to use as rations. It was made up of some kind of smoked game, probably deer or boar, and filled with dried cherries.

Artyom shook his head at how this town was obsessed with the fruit but didn’t say anything out loud. He couldn’t blame them; there was a massive orchard of the stuff just outside, why wouldn’t they use what they have?

Once the group had finished eating, they set out.

They left town along the same road Artyom came in from, and while the man from Earth saw many of the same sights from yesterday, the muggers were thankfully not one of them.

An hour had passed by the time they got past Artyom’s starting point in this world, which was about when the conversation turned from recounting yesterday’s events into local gossip. Local to the town the other three were from, that was.

“I bet Pallin two Clobbers that I’d make it to level twenty before he did, and it looks like I’m a step closer!” exclaimed Sae.

“Gambling doesn’t fit with the High Directive, but I made a promise to Fallor that I’d also reach level twenty soon,” said Skeya. “And I think I will before the next Refractal Realignment! What about you, Pireni?”

“Nobody wanted to make a bet with me because they all know I’d do it anyway. But I don’t care because I already know they’re right.”

As much as the hours of boredom wore away at Artyom, he was somewhat thankful for the direction of the conversation. He didn’t know any of the people the three mentioned, and even more so, he was clueless about the jargon being thrown around. The man from Earth could make out the gist of what each of those terms meant, but not in any meaningful way to contribute to the discussion. And if he did ask for meanings, he’d be outed as an outsider almost instantly.

Because that was who he was; someone who should have been elsewhere.

Artyom clenched his fists. “A month is too long for this-”

“We’re almost here!” exclaimed Pireni, interrupting his thoughts.

“How can you tell?” asked Skeya.

“I got a new Skill last night, [Prey Tracker], and it’s telling me that the Bog Walker is less than a mile away.”

“Wow, that’s so cool!” exclaimed Skeya. “I leveled up last night too, but I didn’t get any Skills. But I’m sure the goddess has something in store for me soon. How about you, Sae?”

“I got a great Skill! I’ll leave it as a surprise for when we fight the Bog Walker. So what about you, Artyom?”

“I didn’t get anything last night,” he said with a shrug, eyes staring straight ahead while still lost in his previous doleful thoughts. “Not even a level up.”

“That’s probably because you’re so high leveled,” said Pireni, clapping him on the back of his shoulder.

“Actually, I’m not,” said Artyom, his voice drowning in melancholy. “No clue what’s up with that.”

The others went quiet for a moment and looked amongst each other before Skeya finally spoke up.

“I could ask the goddess about it, if you’d like. I usually pray just before bed and she might send an answer to you.”

Artyom turned and looked into her consoling eyes and couldn’t help but let his lips curl up a little. “Thanks, that’d be nice,” he said, voice just a tad softer.

“Alright everyone, it’s just over that hill,” said Pireni, pointing towards a grassy mound by the side of the dirt road.

“So what’s the plan?” asked Artyom.

“The same as last time! We charge in and you do your magic!” shouted Sae as he pulled out his sword.

“That’s not a plan, especially against a monster that’s supposed to be an actual danger to-”

Before he could finish, the armored man took off running.

The other two quickly followed him with their own bow and staff drawn.

Artyom followed right behind them, shaking his head and spoking under his breath. “You people are lucky this is a Fairytale world…”