One second, all he saw was whiteness. The next, he saw the backs of his teammates and some other new employees.

That was weird as hell. Raine shook his head and took a look around.

He was in a hall that looked much like the one he’d entered the portal through. But there were no lights here. The place was lit with lanterns hanging on the walls.

“And now,” Song Hyun-woo said, snapping his fingers. “We’re in the New World.”

A flame appeared out of nothing in front of him, and it was as large as his head. Then it shrank to the size of a marble and orbited his hand.

Wow. Raine watched the flame in fascination.

“Holy shit,” Arnett said.

“We’re in a fantasy world, people!” Vick said.

“Oh my god, we’re going to become mages and knights and fight dragons and shit!” Max said.

The flame vanished, and Song Hyun-woo approached an olive-skinned man in a yellow-and-white coat and shook his hand. Raine hadn’t seen the man earlier among those at the hall on Earth.

The doors out of the hall were already open, and the guests were being led out by a small group of Hopkins employees.

The new employees followed Song Hyun-woo out of the hall and went the opposite direction as the guests.

They went down a simple but beautiful hallway with elegantly designed lanterns, marble floors, and the occasional painting. Most of the artwork depicted people using swords and magic to fight and kill monsters.

“No electricity?” Raine asked. With over ten years of being filthy rich, he’d expected Hopkins to have made some progress on that.

“It’s super expensive,” June said. “It would be really wasteful to use it here.”

At some point before they reached the end of the hallway, they took a detour into a room where they were told to put down their backpacks on the ground and leave them there. There was a small group of young men and women there who immediately started pulling sacks out of the backpacks, loading them onto carts, and taking those carts out a door at the back.

The new employees then left the room and were led up a flight of stairs and down another hallway.

Then they were at a money exchange. It wasn’t exactly the first thing Raine had expected to see in the New World, but it was a logical place for an exchange to be.

Opposite the money exchange was the exit. The doors were wide open.

Most of the new employees ignored the exchange and headed right for the doors. Raine was among them.

“Here we are,” June said. “Welcome to Rialis City.”

They went through the doors.

The first thing they saw was a beautiful park with a large pond at its center. A tidy cobblestone pathway looped around it. Quite a few people were in the park, sitting on the benches, walking their dogs, having picnics. It was nice, but it wasn’t anything Raine couldn’t see on Earth.

Beyond the park were huge Gothic-style homes with arches, spires, and stone walls. And past those, a fair distance away, were three huge towers, each with a design that was a mix of modern and Gothic architectural styles.

Raine looked up. All he saw in the sky were the sun and some clouds, no people or dragons. Well, not exactly the crazy fantasy sky I imagined.

His eyes returned to the ground. Right in front of him was a small series of steps to the road, which was made of unnaturally flat and smooth Belgian blocks. A few cyclists passed by on simple black bikes. Their ride seemed smooth; they weren’t bumping up and down like they would have on a normal Sett road.

“Has Hopkins started trying to make cars here?” Raine asked June.

“Nope, but I’ve heard Xiyashi has,” she said. “It’s not that easy to develop technology in the New World because of the interruptions from the goblin attacks and whatnot.”

“What? How bad are they?” he asked.

“Oh, it’s not that bad,” she said. “But everyone does have to do some hunting once in a while, even the engineers.”

“I see.” He shot a glance behind him. “By the way, I should change my dollars to vurs, right?”

“Yup. The exchange behind us has the best rates for us since we’re Hopkins employees.”

Raine turned around and went back into the building to change his money. There were already two lines of other new employees waiting to do the same.

The money exchange employees had no electronic calculators, but they did have computometers, which they used with stunning speed and ease.

This sure is a strange fantasy world, Raine thought as he waited.

When he reached the counter, he didn’t get a giant bag of coins. He got a small stack of paper money. It was 2,690 vurs in all. He put all of it into his wallet except a ten-vur bill so he could take a look at it. The bill wasn’t completely made of paper. To one side, there was a flexible, metallic part of it in the shape of a spear. Right in the center of the bill was the portrait of a bald man with a crown on his head. On the back of the bill was the imprint of a leaf. Huh, Colonial America style. People from Earth probably had something to do with that.

Once the new employees were done changing their money, they were led toward the three towers. They passed the park and the Gothic homes. It seemed like a fairly wealthy neighborhood; most of the homes had large, well-maintained gardens, and some had big dogs like rottweilers and German Shepherds that barked as the new employees went by.

Past those homes, they saw everything from a bakery to a tailor to a school. Everyone they passed looked like a normal person, no different from someone on Earth, and most spoke English, not Ephrian. But there was the occasional surreal display of magic, like someone washing their hands with water that came out of nowhere.

Raine looked around in curiosity and fascination. From the architectural style of the buildings to the people on horseback to the ubiquitous use of magic, everything made him certain he was in another world. Whatever traces of incredulity and disbelief he had before were gone. I’m really in another world. This is fucking amazing.

Eventually, on the same street as one of the three towers, the new employees came upon a series of short and long buildings, each no more than five stories tall.

Song Hyun-woo stopped there.

“This is where you’ll all stay for the rest of your time in the New World,” he said. “My work ends here. Your team leaders will take over now. Good luck in the New World. Don’t die.”

He headed for the tower down the street, and a few others followed, including Kim Jun-seo and the olive-skinned man in the coat.

“Everyone, attention please,” June said loudly. “I’ll now say the name of the building and the floor you should go to. Wait there to get the keys to your rooms. Everyone in my team, as well as Livia Wade, Sato Reo, and Julia Yang, please head to the second floor of the Yan Residences.” She pointed to the shortest and longest building, the one closest to the tower down the street.

“See you guys,” Raine said to his five former teammates who weren’t going to be on the same floor. “Let’s all grab lunch or something when we can.”

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

The eight said their goodbyes, and Raine, Kayden, and Reo headed for the Yan Residences. Raine saw Edgar shuffling over, while Cecily and Julia were striding to the apartment building.

My god, Raine thought, glancing at him. He looks like a zombie.

Edgar’s appearance was fine on the surface: his hair was gelled, his face shaven, and his clothes ironed. But he carried himself with a slight hunch he hadn’t had before, and seemed devoid of energy and motivation. He occasionally sighed for no apparent reason and slowly shook his head.

Raine entered the Yan Residences and slowly climbed the stairs, using the handrail for support. Kayden and Reo matched his pace.

“Pretty cool that you’ll be able to walk up the steps normally in a week or two,” Kayden said.

“Yeah, I’m looking forward to it,” Raine said.

Reo nodded. “You may want to train on your own when you can,” he said.

“I’ll definitely do that.” Raine was far behind the majority of new employees in stamina especially.

By the time he reached the second floor, June had already caught up to them.

“Hello, hello,” she said. “Here are your keys.” She started passing keys to everyone there. “The rooms are really nice on this floor, everyone. Get ready for a shock. Take a look inside, then let’s meet again here in about five minutes.”

Raine’s key was labeled ‘2-1.’ He headed for that unit.

Edgar did the same.

Raine was sure of it now: someone at Hopkins had a grudge against him. He had to figure out who it was and apologize immediately. Song Hyun-woo? No, I never insulted him. I doubted that the New World existed, but I never went overboard. Steele? Did I ever even speak with her?

He spent a while seriously considering who he’d slighted.

Edgar entered the unit first and went into one of the rooms.

Raine sighed. Fuck, he didn’t even ask if he could take that one.

The apartment was beautiful. It was spacious and had a great view of the city. But Raine could hardly appreciate that. He entered his room. Inside was a bed, a shelf, a desk, and a closet built into the wall. There was plenty of space in the middle of the room to exercise if he wanted to, and the bathroom looked decent too. He was pleasantly surprised to learn that there was running water. Maybe they put more resources into this than electricity.

Raine left the apartment after a quick look. June and a few others were already outside. Once all eight people on the floor were gathered there, June told Reo, Julia, and Livia to head downstairs and meet the rest of their team.

“Where’s Ava?” Raine asked. He looked around. “And actually, why is this whole floor empty besides us?”

“Ava lives in another building,” June said. “And it's usually top tier candidates who get units here. Everyone from the April batch left already.”

“So they already rented out nicer places?” Cecily asked.

“Some did. I think three or four of them are renting a house on Blackwood Street now—that’s where those big houses with nice gardens were. That’s often the case with top tier candidates. I don’t know about the rest, but they probably moved out of here. It isn’t easy to make the big bucks from hunting if you just stay around Rialis City.”

After a few more questions from Raine and others, June suggested they take a quick walk around the area so she could show them what was around. They agreed.

“This huge tower,” June said as they passed by it. “It’s the Hopkins Tower. We’ll be coming here really often. The second floor is where we find and take requests. Oh, that’s what we call a job, by the way.”

They also passed the cafeteria, which was far larger than the one on the island. It would have been a rather plain-looking building if not for the huge mural on its front wall, depicting the Hopkins founders hunting a wild boar. June explained it was supposed to remind people how much effort it sometimes took to get food. Hopkins was trying to minimize food waste here, just as it was on the island.

The five of them dropped by the nearest bank, uncreatively named the Hopkins Bank.

A bank open on a Sunday, Raine thought. Solid proof that I’m in another world.

To open their bank accounts, they didn’t have to do much aside from signing some documents. There were no forms to fill, since the bank already had their information.

Raine skimmed the document in front of him, written in English, and signed it.

“So how safe is it to keep money here?” Cecily asked.

“Very safe,” June said. “Rialisian laws are a bit draconian, and the average income in this city is really high, so there’s minimal risk of a robbery or something. Fraud and identity theft are also rare. The usual sentence for either is um...the death penalty.”

“Oh.”

Seemingly satisfied with June’s response, Cecily put money into her bank account, as did Kayden into his own.

Then the five of them left the bank.

“Right now, we’re kind of on the Wall Street of the New World,” June said. “There are a few investment banks down the street. The Hopkins Stock Exchange is the other way.”

Raine’s ears perked up when he heard the words ‘stock exchange,’ but he wasn’t going to invest in anything until he learned far more about the New World. Plus, he had no money to invest.

They left the bank and spent a few more minutes walking around before returning to the Yan Residences. June gave Raine the directions to the healing hall.

“Down the street, you’ll see L. Kingswood,” June said to Raine. “It’s a weapon store. Make a right turn and head for the building that says ‘WRC Healing Hall.’”

Raine followed her instructions. L. Kingswood was a huge store that he couldn’t miss. Through its display glass, Raine saw swords, spears, and maces. He felt some excitement at the idea of learning how to use a sword once his leg injury finally healed, but the feeling quickly faded when he remembered how dangerous his work was going to be. He would have to treat his swordsmanship training with the same seriousness he treated his studying.

I should just pick up translation in a month. He didn’t want to be dead weight to his teammates, but once the team broke up a month later, he could put all his time into studying and translation without troubling anyone else.

He made a right turn and headed down the street. The healing hall was already in sight. The building itself wasn’t that big, but on its roof was a tall spiraling structure that indicated it was a healing hall.

As Raine made his way there, he heard something from behind. It wasn’t a sound he’d heard much before, but he recognized it. Hooves hitting stone.

“Go, go, go!” someone shouted.

A horse shot past Raine and slowed to a stop in front of the healing hall. On top of the horse were two people, one of them a badly injured red-haired man. Blood was seeping through the gauze around his leg, and everything on his right arm below the elbow was gone. He held something wrapped in cloth. From the size and the patch of blood on it, Raine guessed it was the severed part of the man’s arm.

Jesus Christ. Raine watched as two more people on horseback passed him. While one of them took care of the horses, the other helped their friend lower the injured man and help him into the healing hall.

When Raine reached it, he saw a handful of people waiting near the entrance, seated on sofas. The lady at the counter asked about the purpose of his visit and whether it was urgent. Then she asked him to take a seat and wait for a bit.

Raine sat down, and about five minutes later, he saw four people walk out of a room. One of them was the red-haired man, looking relieved despite his pale face. His right arm was back to normal and working perfectly fine from what Raine could see.

“Lesson learned,” the man said with a smile. “Time for a kevlar gambeson.”

“Yeah, lesson learned,” his friend said. “It’s time to teach you to get the fuck out of the way when an orc swings its axe, man.” Then they left the healing hall.

Raine blinked. Well, it’s time to relearn everything I know about recovery.

He waited another ten minutes, during which two more people went in and out of the room.

“Mister Raine Williams,” the lady at the counter said. “Please enter Doctor Lai’s office.”

She gestured toward that room, and Raine headed into it.

It was a simple room with a bed, a few cushioned seats, and a desk. There were two people inside, one of them a broad Chinese man in a green-and-white coat, while the other was a young Caucasian woman who sat to the side.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” the Chinese man said. “I’m Adrian Lai.”

Raine returned the greeting and was about to explain his injury when the doctor interrupted him.

“Oh, no. It’s alright,” Doctor Lai said. “I’ve already heard the details. This is just going to take a few minutes. All you have to do is keep calm and relax.”

He put his right hand a few inches above Raine’s thigh and closed his eyes. His left hand tapped his right wrist. Then a white light appeared between his right hand and Raine’s thigh. Raine watched in fascination as its intensity waxed and waned over the course of three or four minutes.

Then they were done.

“Hah, that was quite tiring,” the doctor said, taking a deep breath and leaning back in his seat. He looked exhausted. “But it’s done. You should be able to walk without the crutch in three or four days. But don’t try to run please. Your leg won’t fully recover until at least ten days from now.”

Wait, that was it? Raine felt nothing but a slight warmth in his thigh. He briefly wondered whether he got ripped off.

“Should I keep doing rehab exercises?” Raine asked the doctor.

“Definitely,” Doctor Lai said. “Just don’t overdo it.”

Then Raine thanked him and left the office. At the counter, he forked over 2,300 vurs for the healing. And that was with 7,400 vurs already paid by Song Hyun-woo.

Raine left the healing hall with a heart full of nervousness. Even after seeing the red-haired man’s unbelievable recovery, he was concerned. I dropped something like 2,000 dollars on that. It probably wasn’t a scam, but in the very, very unlikely case that it was...I’m going to cry myself to sleep every night for the next week.