Chapter 1 – Royal Summoning

"Oh, Heroes! Please save our world!"

As I regained consciousness I heard a man's voice, begging for his world to be saved.

I got up and looked around, the room looked like an altar, some kind of place you'd see in a fantasy flick, glowing patterns on the floor and all. Beside me were three others, each holding a different weapon in their hands.

Sword, Spear, Bow... Isn't this the same as that book!?

Indeed, each of them was holding one of the weapons described in the book I was reading before I woke up here.

Wait a second... does that mean that I...

I looked at my arms and sure enough, there was a shield stuck to my right arm.

"Where are we?" Asked the man holding the sword beside me.

He looked very young, about 16 or so, looked to be fairly short, and looked to be the type that could crossdress easily, he had black hair cut short and sharp, blue eyes with very light skin. He looked like the silent and cool swordsman, befitting of the weapon he wields.

"The situation is dire, but we would like you all to come with us in order to explain everything." Replied the man that seemed to be in charge of getting us here. He was clearly avoiding a true answer.

"What's that supposed to mean!?" Shouted the man at the farthest end of the altar.

He was the one holding the bow, he looked to be around the same age as the sword guy, he had wavy, light-colored hair, with gentle, light green eyes, and while he was the shortest among us four, he seemed to have some sort of mysterious air to him. If I had to describe him in one sentence, he would be the soft-spoken younger brother with a thing for art and music

"Answer our questions, depending on your answers we may or may not be on your side" Said the guy with the spear, lifting it and pointing it at the men in robes.

He seemed to be about my age, he had a very attractive face and long-ish light-colored hair in a ponytail, his eyes seemed like those of the reliable older brother type, he had an air of confidence about him and looked like the type of guy that always had a girl or two by his side.

"Well, maybe it would be best to follow them..." I try to say but they don't seem to take me into account.

"Please, our world is on the brink of destruction, without your help we could never hope to save it!" The man in the robes exclaimed, trying to convince us to believe his story.

"I don't think so"

"We'll gain something from it right?"

"Will we be able to go back to our world after all that? If not, then what's the point?"

These three! What were they thinking!? Surely they can't act like that right after hearing what that guy said! And they were smiling too! They're actually enjoying this, I bet they think they're some kind of anime main character or something and that they're going to defeat the demon lord or whatever!

"Please! Come with us, we have prepared an audience with the king in order to negotiate your rewards.

"The king, huh."

"Well..."

"I guess if we're going with the king then..."

They all fell into thought, considering their options.

"All right, we'll go with you and meet this king of yours" The guy with the spear spoke first, perhaps thinking that he could swindle more out of the king than these guys.

The other two followed suit, and ultimately decided to go with the king, with no other choice, I decided to go with them.

"These four are the heroes?" Asked an old, royal looking man sitting on a throne.

After receiving confirmation from his vassal, he proceeded to welcome us.

"Welcome to our world, Heroes! I am Aultcray Melromarc XXXII, I am the ruler of these lands."

He sounded very condescending, like he was looking down at us like some sort of insect. I found myself wanting to shut him up but decided against it.

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"Now, I shall begin explaining our situation."

He proceded to explain the situation almost exactly like in the book I read before being summoned here. He went on about the Waves of Calamity, and how they would come over and over until no life was left on the planet, and unless the waves were successfully repelled, they would experience more and more losses, thus they decided to summon us, the four holy heroes in an attempt to repel the incoming waves.

He also mentioned that the waves came in intervals of 20 to 40 days, which were determined by an artifact called a "Dragon Hourglass" located in a church in this country, and that the sands began to fall about a month ago, with the first wave having finished a couple of days before today.

For the first wave, the knight army and adventurers were just barely able to repel the wave, and since it was said that each wave was more and more powerful, they decided to summon help from the prophecy of the four heroes.

That's just about the complete story he told us.

"Alright" Spoke up one of my companions. "I kind of get where you're coming from, but don't you think it's inconsiderate to basically force us to help you?"

"Seems really convenient, for you and your people that is."

"I agree, this sounds pretty self-centered to me. If your world is going to be destroyed, then why not just find and train strong enough people here?"

It was my turn to speak. "I agree as well. Why do we have to put out our time and possibly our lives for you, without a guarantee that we'll get something in return? What about getting us back home?"

"Hmmm..." The king turned to look at his vassal, then turned back to us. "Of course, all your efforts won't be without compensation"

All four of us turned to look at each other and had a satisfied look on our faces.

"Of course, arrangements have been made to accommodate rewards for all of your efforts, as well as anything you require in order to fight off the waves."

"Really? Cool, as long as that's true we should be fine." I reply thankful that we're not doing this for free.

"Don't think you've bought us off, though. As long as you don't turn on us, we're good"

"Agreed"

"Me too"

Why couldn't they ever stay quiet!? Are they trying to make an enemy of the king!? I don't get why they have to act so high and mighty all the time.

"Very well then, Heroes. Tell us your names."

The first one to step up was the Sword Hero.

"I'll go first. My name is Ren Amaki. I am 16 years old and a high school student."

Next up stepped forward the Bow Hero.

"Okay I'll go next. My name is Itsuki Kawasumi. I am 17 years old and still in high school."

Second to last was the Spear Hero.

"My turn now. My name is Motoyasu Kitamura. I'm 21 years old and a college student."

"Now, Ren, Itsuki and Motoyasu, correct?" The king spoke, completely ignoring my turn to introduce myself.

All the Heroes seemed to be Japanese, oddly enough.

"Your grace, you've forgotten me."

"Ah, yes, go on and say your name" He replied in a condescending tone.

"My name is Naofumi Iwatani. I'm 20 years old and a college student."

I already felt like I was somehow out of place compared to the other three, but now he just straight-up skips me? There's got to be a reason for that.

"Now then heroes, check your status and evaluate your abilities."

"Huh?"

What did he mean by checking our status?

"I'm sorry, but how evaluate ourselves?" Asked Itsuki

Ren sighed and said "You mean you haven't figured it out yet? You mean you didn't realize the moment we got here?"

Come on, he sounded like some pretentious know-it-all brat.

"Haven't you noticed any weird icons in your field of view?"

"Huh?"

Since he said that, I looked towards the corner of my vision and focused on it and sure enough, there was a little icon there.

"Try to focus your mind on it"

As I did, I heard a soft beep, just like an old school type game menu, and the icon expanded into a menu, kind of like an internet browser.

Naofumi Iwatani

Class: Shield Hero LV 1

Equipment: Legendary Small Shield

Other-World Clothes

Skills:

- Barrier

Magic: None

There was more to the menu, but these were the most important things for now. So was this what the king meant by status? This felt oddly similar to a game.

"Level 1... That's worrying."

"Agreed. At this level, who knows if we're going to be able to fight these waves."

"What even is all this?"

"Do these things not exist in your world, heroes? That is called "Status Magic" everyone can use it, but the hero's status is said to have more functions than a normal person's."

This seemed to be true, as no one batted an eye at what the king was saying.

"And what are we supposed to do about these stats? They seem awfully low."

"You will need to go on a journey in order to enhance your Legendary Weapons."

"So, you mean these things aren't strong from the get-go?"

"Indeed. The heroes must learn to harness the power of their weapons themselves. That is how you will become strong."

Motoyasu was idling by whilst spinning his spear when he spoke up "Why don't we just use other, more powerful weapons while we work on getting our levels up? Seems good to me."

That did seem like a good idea. After all, I wasn't even able to attack, so I really needed to get an offensive weapon as soon as possible.

Ren spoke up next. "We should leave that for later. For now let's focus on improving ourselves like the king said."

This was actually kind of exciting, I was starting to understand why the others were smiling so much a little bit ago. Just the thought of adventuring in another world makes my heart race!

"Are we going to form a party? All of us together?"

"Wait, Heroes."

Just as we were preparing to set off, the king interrupted us. "The four of you should set off separately, and recruit your own companions."

"And why would we have to do that?"

"According to the legends," He began "The Legendary Weapons cannot grow stronger when in proximity with each other. They can only grow when apart from each other."

"I don't really get it, but if we stay together we can't level up right?"

"Yes, that's right."

"Is there any way we can make sure you're not lying to us?"

I was wondering the same thing since it seems kind of weird that the weapons would act like that, especially since we were summoned all at once.

"Yes there is. There are monsters in the plains a couple of minutes from here, if you would like test it out."

Itsuki spoke up "I'll take you up on that, I want to confirm this with my own eyes."

"I agree."

"Same here."

"I'll go too." I replied.

Thus we set off to test out whether these legends were accurate or not.