It was night.

Quiet, save for the sound of traffic and the indistinct chatter from pedestrians. Amber light shone from the streetlights, reflecting off the hoods of the passing vehicles

From huge screens mounted on the buildings, advertisements played, adding into the cocktail of lights.

On a bench beside the road, an old man sat, shivering from the cold air that rushed by despite his coat.

Even with his glasses in the way, the dark circles on his eyes were plain to see. Held gently in his right hand was a photo of a young girl.

Perhaps sensing the atmosphere, some passersby gave him a wider berth than usual.

"Sitting here all day and moping, is that doing you any good?" someone asked from behind.

The old man jolted in shock, turning around.

"Mi-misha?" he gasped. "What are you doing here?"

A woman was standing behind him, wearing a black trenchcoat and sunglasses for some reason.

"Hi, Gilbert!" she waved.

"What's with the weird fashion?" he frowned.

"That's what you're concerned about?" she chuckled. "Well, I can't have you sitting around, depressed and staring at photos all day, can I?"

The man sighed.

"I've told you in the past not to keep one of your eyes on me. You promised."

"Yeah, that's not happening with your current situation. What if you decide to just end it all?" she pouted.

"I've been through much worse." the man said, a bit defensively, tucking his photo away. "I don't need you to disturb me at a time like this!"

Misha patted him on the shoulder.

"We've got an interesting case to investigate this time. You might not have noticed with all your moping, but various things from a different world have been sent here at random, including two humans."

"Uh-huh."

"You should talk to them and do some research. It can help you take your mind off."

The old man stayed silent for a good moment, before sighing again.

"Urgh. If you say so." he resigned.

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

Alther felt like he should have realised sooner, but there really was practically no use of magic here, or maybe even in the entirety of this world. At least not the type he was used to.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

The air was lacking in mana, incredibly so. If there were mana veins in the planet, it didn't make sense why such an advanced city would use so little magic; he found much to his shock after reading up on the science in this world. Even the dwarves would be put to shame by the level of complexity in so many things, and without the use of magic at that!

And they didn't pale in combat either, some of the weapons here were so horrifying, he wasn't sure if his country would be able to actually win if they got into a war. Well, unless a dragon got involved. He felt like a dragon would probably shrug off those crazy weapons anyway.

In the past, he felt like the saying from a famous dwarf: 'When science gets advanced enough, even magic will have to bow to it!' was an exaggeration, but this world was living proof of that.

But perhaps what he found strangest was the magic the people here used. He couldn't sense even a trace of mana being used when they did it, heck, they even seemed to be generating a small amount of mana instead! What type of logic was that?

That seemed to the source of what little mana was around too, as the places these 'superhumans' frequented were richest in mana.

It had been a long time since he was so eager to expand his knowledge in the field of magic, but now, a strong fire to learn how their magic worked burned within him.

Unfortunately, even they had no idea how their magic worked. They usually only had one nonsensical and illogical ability that awakened by pure chance, not after training like back in his world.

This was very frustrating for him. Getting sent here did not seem to be the best turn of his life.

Bob, however, seemed to be very happy here after discovering the medium known as 'video games'. Alther didn't really feel like trying them however, too focused on trying to learn about this world.

The room was in a huge mess, clothes strewn all over the floor, stationery and books shoved aside to make room for the laptop on the table, which Alther was hunched over.

A knock came from outside the door.

"Come in," he said.

Gilbert, the old man walked in along with Ethan, who looked very annoyed.

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

Yueler was a bit troubled by their guest's sudden departure.

He really didn't mind to be honest, in fact, he was kind of annoyed by 'her' freeloading outside of their house.

The main issue was how Galu was throwing a tantrum about them leaving. And apparently, he had been talking to the golems from time to time in the the past. He was very upset by how Minnie was gone and how Jaxt was now constantly refusing to talk.

After some bugging from his son, eventually, he went to talk to the higher-ups. It took a lot of convincing and paperwork, but finally, Jaxt was allowed to talk to people and read while the guards were around.

But in the end, after finally making those changes, the golem continued to act the same way; it means Galu continued to bug him. What the heck was he supposed to do?

With all the nonsense that was going on, he felt like he was going to go insane. But right now, he had something to look forward to. The harvest season was right around the corner!

Today, the Winterland fruits would ripen.

He rode in a carriage, with a few dozen others following.

Around this time, the animals would be trying to get their paws on the fruit too, so he was there to make sure they didn't break their end of the bargain.

He couldn't help but grin. These fruits kept for an annoyingly short period of time. Sure, they could be pickled and preserved, but he felt like that was just not the same.

Delicious wine, juices, marinades, desserts! He salivated a little as he thought of the food.

As they arrived, dozens of very angry animals greeted them.

"You worthless humans! You must have done this!" a wolf barked.

"What?" Yueler was very confused.

"Almost all the fruits are gone! Who else can it be but you humans?"

"WHAT?" Yueler shouted.

"We asked the dryad who keeps the place and she said someone in a vehicle drove here and asked her to pick all the fruits!"

A vehicle? No, it couldn't be, could it?"

He hurriedly shoved the angry animals aside and went straight to the dryad.

"YOU MUST TELL ME! Did it look like..." Yueler described the truck to her.

"Uh, yes...?"

With an angry roar, the swordsman swore to enact vengeance.