“Is someone there?” a timid voice echoed down the hallway.
Wayne looked at the intricate spirals of runes and alchemical symbols beneath his feet, pulsing a faint blue. Stone pillars held up decorative archways high overhead. The vaulted ceiling was a skylight of stained glass depicting a holy figure handing a sword to a kneeling man. The darkness beyond was filled with stars.
The chamber had plenty of torches, but none were lit. The stars and the runes were his only light.
“Hello?” Wayne yelled back.
A boy, perhaps no older than seventeen, came around the corner with a torch. He wore nondescript gray robes with a rope cinched around his waist. “Someone in there?”
“Yes!”
The boy entered, shining his light on Wayne. “You’re uhh… you’re fortynine years early.”
“What?”
“The Chosen Heroes. Not due for another fortynine years.”
And that was how Wayne learned that he had been isekaied, a longtime dream of his if he was being honest. His last memory was sitting in his home office, working late on a client report. His chest started to hurt–a heart attack, which was not a longtime dream of his–and he woke up in a summoning chamber. Somewhere along the way, his body reverted from 41 to 18.
The Chosen Heroes were gifted with enhanced bodies and special boons that gave them access to superhuman abilities, magic, and what the locals called “the Diary of the Gods.”
Status menus. The Diary of the Gods was a bunch of status menus.
That all matched his isekai hopes, more or less.
As the young acolyte pointed out, however, Wayne’s arrival was not expected. It was far earlier than the legends foretold.
His new eighteen year-old body was not enhanced. And his system menus glitched when they loaded. The menus were covered in graphic artifacts, like he hit the power button on a console with a cartridge only half-inserted.
His menu had two options:
Status – displayed his attributes in a sort of character sheet format.
Christmas List – greyed out and unselectable.
Nobody in this world knew what “Christmas” meant, literally or spiritually.
For the first six months, he spent most of his days sitting and waiting in his room at the castle or being led around for training, like he was a puppy in obedience school. The scholars needed that much time to consult the texts for a possible explanation. They found two other records of out-of-cycle summons. In those cases, the new arrivals had no system access whatsoever, and each entry had a simple note: “Known issue, low to minor concern.”
Yes, Wayne had been isekaied, but he wasn’t a Chosen Hero. He was a normal fortyone year old trapped in a normal eighteen year old's body. He could look at the system, but he couldn’t use it in any meaningful way. The only real benefit he received was an immediate understanding of the world’s common tongue.
The fortunate part of the otherwise terrible experience was that the royal family was pretty nice about the whole debacle. They set him up with a job at the Royal Library and sponsored his training to become a scholar, which was essentially a librarian who also did research.
Even in a fantasy world, Wayne ended up with an office job.
Now twenty-two, his training was complete, and he was about to begin his first independent research project.
The focus: The previous generation of Chosen Heroes.
“I hope that doesn’t feel too much like salt for your wounds,” Fergus said, pushing a cart stacked high with boxes and books. He was a large man with a short beard, a bit of a tummy, and a bald head, his few remaining hairs long-turned silver. “You’re uniquely qualified, though.”
“I’ve come to terms with it,” Wayne said.
“Yes, of course.” Fergus handed a keyring over. “This room will be reserved for you for the duration of the project. If your initial proposal is approved, we’ll assign the appropriate number of research assistants.”
“Sounds great.”
Fergus patted the deep pockets of his robe. “That’s all the important stuff. As for real business: I’ve got a new bottle of red from a vineyard in the north country. Join me this weekend?”
“Usual time?”
The old scholar nodded.
“I’ll bring the food.”
Fergus wished Wayne good luck and stepped out of what would be Wayne’s workspace for the foreseeable future. About the size of his bedroom on Earth, he had a desk against the wall, a table in the middle, and three empty bookshelves.
Spreading the books from the cart out on the table felt like being back in grad school, getting started on a thesis. Even then, he liked to begin projects with a high-level review of the topic and the available sources, and he relished doing it with physical books. His university days were relatively early in the internet era, so he got to enjoy that flavor of research for a little bit. By the time he completed his masters, nearly all of it was digital.
The first several tomes he unloaded were notes kept by scholars of the era, individuals whose sole job was to log the movements and achievements of Chosen Heroes. Next were bundles of journals and personal documents, separated by which hero authored them. He intended to stop at setting them out, but the spine of a book in the “Laszlo the Paladin” bundle caught his eye.
Where the other books were bound with leather and cloth, this was a printed paperback. The name Terry Pratchet was on the spine.
“Items can isekai too?”
Wayne hadn’t seen any other items from Earth, at least, not any items that were as obviously from Earth as a beat up fantasy novel printed in the 80s. He undid the cord holding the bundle and retrieved the book. A piece of paper fell out when he opened it.
When he picked up the page up and unfolded it, he had two surprising sensations:
The first was the mental feeling of a cellphone vibrating, the awareness that he had a message to read without the physical touch of a device. He didn't have a cellphone in this world, of course.
The second was the paper between his fingers. It was thin and waxy, a texture specific to a very particular kind of document from his world, a texture that sent his memories hurtling through childhood.
In his hand, he held pages 7 and 8–front and back–of a catalog. The bottom of page seven read, “The suite life begins at Electronics Boutique.” A grayscale drawing of a nutcracker was next to the text.
Most of page 8 was unreadable, covered in heavy black ink from an apparent spill. The only games visible were Spot, which was a 7up branded game if he remembered right, and Dragon Warrior II, a game he remembered quite fondly. Page seven featured a game called Pipe Dreams, a picture of a peripheral called the Laser Scope, as well as the games Crystalis and Ultima: Exodus. Product descriptions for each ran down the side. Other than the last two games, every item on the torn page, front and back, was scribbled out aggressively with a ballpoint pen or covered completely with black ink.
Holding the page was like being back in the summoning chamber all over again, trying to navigate a strange new set of realities. He hadn’t seen anything from Earth since his cardiac event, and seeing a Christmas catalog page from 1990 was far more jarring than a Terry Pratchet book.
Christmas?
Wayne opened his status menu, seeing familiar graphical artifacts and errors breaking pieces out of his user interface. He mentally selected Christmas List. Until that moment, it had always been greyed out.
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The Christmas List menu was empty.
Fantastic.
That was disappointing, but the novelty of holding the page hadn’t completely soured. He read the blurb for Crystalis:
The good magicians maintaining order in the world have been conquered by the evil Draygon. You can defeat Draygon if you can find the pieces of the mighty Crystalis sword.
He remembered watching his older brother play this game. It opened with the hero waking in some sort of cryochamber that exited into a fantasy world. For Wayne's part, he never got as far as unlocking the Wind Sword, one of the earliest objectives. He’d start the game, run around the first area whacking monsters, and then die immediately when he attempted to go any farther. The game itself wasn’t very scary, but the cover art–a hero surrounded by monsters, one a giant eyeball with legs–made every pixel feel creepy and dangerous.
A familiar childhood compulsion itched at his finger tips.
Wayne sat at the table, uncorked his bottle of ink, and dipped his quill. He drew a circle around Crystalis.
He felt the spectral phone vibration again. Crystalis now appeared under Christmas List, and when he clicked into it, he read:
Power Ring – Doubles the power of a sword.
[Locked]
[Locked]
[Locked]
[Locked]
[Locked]
Holding his breath, he switched to his status menu:
Hero: Wayne the Guy
Level: 2
HP: 51
STR: 12
AGI: 11
VIT: 5
LCK: 16
He still couldn’t help but check his stats several times a day, even if they didn’t change, so he could say for certain his strength was at 6 that very morning.
The way Fergus explained stats, based on the research of scholars going back dozens of cycles, a person from this world rarely had stats above 10, which sounded awful against the backdrop of RPG logic, but the average person lived a normal life and got along just fine with the equivalent of three or four points in an attribute.
Stats between 10 and 20 were exceptionally above average. The right genetics–Wayne’s word, not Fergus’–and a lot of work could get a person to 12. Stats between that and 20 were rare but not impossible. People with those stats were usually outliers, the once-in-a-generation-talent types.
Beyond 20 was the domain of legendary heroes and demi-gods.
As a young man, Wayne played soccer and ran track, achieving modest success in local high school sports. When he learned the context for stat points and their relative power, he was proud to have been rated above average by the system, but every other stat was mundane and typical for mortals.
Wayne had clawed his way from level one to level two shortly after his arrival. A scholar suggested that earning a level might reset his system access, so a trio of soldiers escorted him through awkward battles with goblins in the depths of a nearby forest. He gained a level, but his system access stayed broken.
That was the only time anything in his interface changed or updated. Until now.
Christmas List gave him an item from Crystalis, or at least it said it did. He checked for physical rings on his fingers, finding none. That item doubled his strength, he believed, and he had the bonus even if he didn’t see any jewelry.
I do feel more… empowered?
But that was a significant increase.
For comparison, he read that Laszlo the Paladin retired with the following:
Hero: Laszlo the Paladin
Level: 50
HP: 885
STR: 69
AGI: 40
VIT: 35
LCK: 29
That made a six point jump in strength seem fairly significant.
Hand shaking, he circled the box art for Ultima III: Exodus.
He felt the phantom vibration.
He opened his status menu. His options now read:
Status
Christmas List
Spells
“Spells!” Wayne covered his own mouth and hoped the closed door was enough to keep from disturbing his colleagues. He clicked the menu item and read:
Repel – This spell is effective against Ork, Troll, and Goblin.
[Locked]
[Locked]
[Locked]
[Locked]
[Locked]
If Repel wasn’t grayed out, presumably because he was not in battle, he would have cast it right then and there. That would have been bad, he realized, thankful the system put a safety latch on that particular menu item to keep him from trashing his workplace.
When he went back to Christmas List, the same text for the spell and locked abilities appeared under Ultima III: Exodus.
With as much self-control as he could muster, he circled the rest of the games on the page. He felt a brief vibration, the sharp buzz of a failed input. No menus changed. Any item that had been scratched out or inked over seemed unaffected by the Christmas List ability.
Wayne sat back and took a deep breath.
His system interface wasn’t “fixed” as far as he could tell. The graphic errors persisted on even the new menus, and he knew real heroes had several default menu options compared to his initial two. Furthermore, the Christmas List ability had never been recorded by scholars before.
Nothing about his interface was normal, and he was pretty sure pulling items and spells from Earth video games was not normal either.
Between Crystalis and Ultima III: Exodus, he had twelve new abilities, ten of which were locked. He didn’t get any spells from Crystalis, but he distinctly remembered swords launching tornados and fireballs in that game. If those were under the locked abilities, he’d be very grateful. Power Ring sounded like a classic RPG accessory, which was useful and all–often the source of gamebreaking synergies–but shooting fire from a sword was far more in line with Wayne’s long-nurtured childish desires.
Spells from the Ultima series were exciting to be sure, but most of Wayne’s experience with the series started at Underworld. By that time, 3D dungeon crawlers with Doom-style graphics were the norm. Ultima III meanwhile was barely an 8-bit title. He tried to watch his brother play the PC version, but it was so incredibly boring. Between the limited graphics and insane amount of grinding the game required, he had a hard time watching his brother play for hours like he did with other games.
Repel wasn’t a spell he remembered, and the spell’s description was painfully vague. What does “useful” mean in this case? Was it strong against those enemies in terms of doing damage or did it have some other kind of effect?
Wayne jumped out of his seat and locked the door behind him.
***
“Wayne? What are you doing here?” Rush was one of the instructors at the Fighter’s Guild. A retired mercenary, he had decades of combat experience, and while he wasn’t as quick as he used to be, he was still far quicker than most fighters half his age. He had been one of the soldiers to carry Wayne to level two.
“I’m working on a new research project,” Wayne said, “and I was hoping I could hire your help.”
“You need me in the Library?”
“Field research. I need to find an orc, troll, or goblin. Just one, and I don’t need it to be exciting.”
“Have to say I’m curious. Usual rate work for you? Full day minimum.”
Wayne agreed.
“We can leave now if you want. Might find one today if we’re lucky. At worst, we camp for a night and get one tomorrow.”
“I don’t have any gear with me.”
Rush smiled. “Can give you a loaner set for a little bit extra.”
“Yeah, that’s fine, let’s do it.”
***
Rush came over the rise, crouching low. He knelt next to Wayne.
“Two ahead at the creek,” Rush whispered. “You go. I’ll follow for backup.”
Wayne nodded. This wasn’t his first time hunting goblins. He killed twenty five of the little puke-green gremlins to advance to level two. His skill with the sword improved enough in that time that one goblin was manageable. Two was potentially doable, but Wayne quickly got lost in the chaos when it was two monsters lunging at him like rabid attack dogs instead of one.
For this run, Rush had instructions to step in if any monster got within melee distance of Wayne. Today was for testing, not training.
But hot damn was he nervous.
This morning, Wayne believed the rest of his life would be the continuation of his bad joke of an isekai. Now, he had an actual spell in his interface.
He crept up the hill. The goblins were at the creek as Rush said. They had short wooden spears and bounced around on the rocks, stabbing at fish swimming by. For as much as they stabbed, neither of them had yet caught a meal.
Wayne extended his arm, pointing his hand as if to select a goblin, and in his mind he mentally clicked “Repel” like it was a menu item in a turn-based RPG.
Was that how this worked? He had no idea.
Repel.
One of the goblins fell face forward into the creek. It twitched once, but other than the water current gently shaking one of its arms, no other part of the goblin moved. The remaining goblin kicked his comrade. Then he lifted his head to check his eyes for life. Seeing none, he dropped the head back into the water.
The goblin looked around, unsure if he was under attack. He found Wayne standing a few feet up the bank.
Repel.
Wayne saw the goblin’s eyes roll back, and it collapsed. Like the first goblin, there was no visible violence involved. The spell seemed to flip the life switch from on to off. The limp corpse and gravity did the rest.
“Holy shit.”