What Zhang Dong was looking at was a group of high school kids. They were wearing matching school uniforms and even carrying bags. It was clear that the summoning ritual forcefully pulled them over here.
This was different from how he got here. After filling up that strange email his mind was transported into the body of Zhang Dong. His previous persona of Matt was slowly being fazed away through all these years.
In his mind, he would always go back to his core beliefs but it was clear that he was slowly changing with time. Killing enemies and defending his loved ones was the biggest reason for that. Now he was a leader, one that needed to make hard decisions and prioritize the many over the few.
Now, these four were put in a similar situation but instead of leading others, they were here to kill demons. Those creatures didn’t pose a threat to someone as powerful as he was but to non-combatants as these, it would probably be hard to stomach.
He also robbed them of a few encounters by taking out three of these archdemons during his travels. Thus he might have saved them from actually having to participate.
‘Were these children supposed to arrive here at this time?’
Zhang Dong started thinking, he wasn’t here for long. Only about a month had passed since his arrival. If these youths came at this very moment the demons back in the academy wouldn’t have even shown themselves.
If he took this as a generic plot to a movie or novel then the kids here would be the protagonists. They would go through their training phase slowly fighting progressively more powerful demons till finally taking out one of the demon lords. The ones he fought were of similar power but they got progressively stronger with each iteration.
‘I wonder if they also have some kind of system like me…’
He turned to Bob, his Ai companion. He wasn’t visible to anyone besides him here as he resided in his soul world and reacted to inner voice commands.
‘Scanning… scanning… affirmative, signs of similarities to the user's system detected.’
After nodding he continued to look at the quartet. The kids sure looked confused with so many people staring at them. Even more, considering they were of a different race and from a different world. He didn’t notice it before but black hair was rarer here than blond or even the other exotic colors like green and blue.
‘Interesting… now what will this King do with these kids….’
“The heroes are here but the language they are speaking is foreign to us, mages!”
The butler-looking person called out to the group of mages. They quickly moved in to deliver some kind of accessories which they then tried giving to the scared kids. They looked to be earrings, probably they would convert the sound and let the youths hear this place's language.
There was a slight problem that these people miscalculated. These adolescent youths weren’t that trusting of the people gathered here. Everyone was looking at them as if they were zoo animals. The smallest girl quickly went behind the oldest while the only male from the group tried going forward to block the approaching mages with his body.
‘Hm, at least he isn’t a coward… though I can see that he is quite afraid himself…’
Zhang Dong could tell that the boy was sweating, his eyes were darting all around. It was clear that he was under a lot of stress but the mages continued pushing forward with outstretched hands, some of them even stepped forward while trying to put one of the earrings on one of the girls.
“Hey, get away from me you weirdo!”
The girl delivered a swift kick to the middle age mage that was going towards her. The man was clearly not expecting this as he fell on his butt while grasping his stomach. This girl looked like the more sporty type that was prone to anger, the look on her face was quite dejected.
“Is everything okay… the heroes look scared…”
Beatrice commented from the side while everyone looked at the scene playing itself out. It was clear that these kids weren’t prepared for the summoning. The people here were quite mistaken in thinking that the heroes would just accept this sudden turn of events.
Zhang Dong on the other hand knew very well how they felt. He also was scared when he first arrived in a strange new world. There were monsters lurking in every corner but he was lucky enough to have an iron body to protect himself. He wasn’t sure if these youths started out with enhanced capabilities. Their form of world travel was different than his so probably not.
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“Don’t worry, let me handle this…”
The King that was hanging out in the back looked progressively angrier. If he didn’t do anything about this, there could be consequences for these rowdy high schoolers.
Thanks to him being quite of a weeb in his old days he had sat through many anime shows alike. Now with his enhanced intelligence, he was able to piece the language together that he once heard. The people here couldn’t understand what these scared youths were saying but he on the other hand could.
“Wait, what is that spirit doing…”
The king wasn’t alone in his booth, he was there with his current queen as well as with his concubines. His children and current crown prince were also here. This young man was in his early twenties and had a similar stern look like his father.
“Interesting… let us see what that spirit does…”
The king proclaimed which made everyone in this booth quiet down. Anyone besides the crown prince was afraid to utter a word, even he went silent the moment his father spoke up.
Down on the ground Zhang Dong had arrived at the scene of the summoning. Even before speaking to the high schoolers, he had Bob perform more scans on this area.
“Calm down, no one is going to hurt you.”
He proclaimed in Japanese while looking at the group of four. The girl that kicked the mage managed to get herself his staff and was now swinging it around against the others. The young man on the other hand was shielding the other two girls with concern in his eyes.
“W-what is this place, who are you people?”
“This is going to take a while to explain but let me ask you this first, are you really from Japan?”
The four looked at each other and then back to the somewhat imposing Zhang Dong. He was much larger than the kids and also looked out of place even among these mages. It was normal for them to also fear him but he was the only one that could speak their language.
“Y-yes, but where are we?”
Zhang Dong wanted to ask them about things concerning his old world. Things like the president from a popular country or what year it was. These youths could be from an Earth similar to his but not from the actual one that he came from. First, he had to talk them down and accept those earrings though, without them they wouldn’t be able to communicate.
“Well, this is another world. These people have summoned you to be their heroes. A somewhat selfish reason if I might add.”
“Another world?”
The boy asked while his eyes got big.
“Yes, I bet you saw many shows or read some books, it should have been a very popular genre in fiction…”
“How can this be another world? Take us back home!”
The sporty girl shouted out while pointing at him with the stolen mage staff.
“I wish I could but I’m not the one that summoned you here, it was the people from this world.”
“From this world? You speak as if you don’t belong here…”
The one that spoke out now was the oldest girl with the largest assets that was hugging the youngest girl against them. Zhang Dong wanted to not disclose the information about him coming from a different world. He didn’t really know the character of these four, telling them all of his secrets could bite him in the behind down the line.
Yet he felt a kinship with them. They were as he was, tossed into another world without any notice. The only real difference was that they weren’t alone when coming here but they also weren’t quite as strong. He could tell from just looking, they were just regular untrained humans. There was a certain potential behind them though, probably attributed to a similar system that he had.
“You’re quite observant, yes I’m also like you, a person from another world, though my origins are a bit different than yours…”
The four looked at him while he tried to smile. Being soft-spoken and kind-looking wasn’t really his forte. Mostly what he did was look mysterious or be a reliable teacher. He was still working on the reliable part though.
“What are they talking about, shouldn’t we stop them? How does it know the language of the heroes? Was it a hero before?”
People at the sidelines continued to watch as the summoned Spirit that belonged to Beatrice conversed with the Heroes. There were a lot of rumors about him, maybe now they would think that he was some kind of born-again legendary hero.
“Enough, tell them to accept the magical devices.”
A rumble was heard from behind as the King finally spoke out. His voice wasn’t loud but thanks to the infusion of mana it could be heard by everyone here. The group of high school kids trembled for a second as the voice and mana that was carried with it washed over them. It was something that their bodies weren’t used to so they instantly dropped down to their knees while panting.
“This guy has no tact…”
Zhang Dong waved his hand which caused the mana that was pushed out by the King to vanish. It looked like the man was trying to assert some dominance over these kids here. Regretfully if it came down to a fight, in his current state Zhang Dong would be on the losing end.
“We don’t have much time, listen here. Don’t trust the King and the people here, they just want to use you but for now, you will have to follow their instructions. The earrings that they offered you will allow you to understand their language. You probably aren’t aware of it yet but you have certain capabilities that will let you grow strong in a short amount of time. Use this time well but with some luck, you won’t need to act.”
Zhang Dong quickly told them the bare bones of what they needed to know. The most important fact was not to trust the people here. They would probably try to pull them to their side and use them as disposable pawns in their fight against the demons. What would happen to them after that was done was up to debate.
“I’ll try to visit you later, for now just listen to what they tell you but be careful and best to keep our conversation for yourself.”
He picked up an earring that had fallen down and handed it to the male of the group before heading out. While leaving he looked at the king that was glaring in his direction.
‘Ah, he has such a punchable face…’
After groaning inwardly he decided to go back to Beatrice and the group she was in. The heroes finally decided to put on the earrings and the ceremony continued, now without his involvement.
‘I wonder if I could dig up that cube... Well, not like it's going anywhere. I can focus on the demons, for now. Then come back and dig it up later...’
He thought to himself while moving back to his summoner, the day as not yet over so he would take his time to keep an eye on these new world travelers.