[IC] I Was Summoned to A God's Office and his Secretary Transported Me to Another World?! (Accepting!)

[FujiwaraPhoenix]

"...You know, I never expected something that was supposedly divine to look like something so... I dunno, secular? Was that god one of law and order or something?"

A single, fleeting thought passed through Aaron's mind as he was left with that ever-so-strange lapse in consciousness that came with being dropped into a new world. There was no other way of putting it--this experience was utterly strange to the point where it could just as easily have passed off as a really weird fever dream.

But the cool breeze blowing around him and the utterly pristine surroundings that he caught sight of when he came to threw that idea out the window.

What caught his attention, first and foremost, was the appearance of a robe covering his body. They draped over what felt like the clothes he had been wearing until then back home, but Aaron was in no particular rush to check. Then there was the staff, which gave the young man a general idea of what he looked like: a classic fantasy mage.

So it was one of those scenarios, huh?

"Ah, geez... So it really was true, huh? Well, there goes my agnosticism, I guess," he joked to himself, pulling the staff off of his back and planting it firmly in the ground. He had always wanted to do that without getting weird looks from people.

It took a moment more before he remembered that there were other people(?) at that event, too. As it so happened, they also seemed to be popping up here. No fanfare, no spectacle, just... Poof, there they were.

"...Ah... Guess I should stick around until a party gets formed up. That's usually how this stuff goes, right?"

[VitaVitaAR]

Akira was really pretty confused by the entire situation. He'd gone to shrines and stuff, sure, but never expected to be confronted so... directly by the existence of gods. Especially not... a secretary of a god. That was weird. He couldn't help but start to wonder if that sort of thing existed for shinto, as well. Was that the case? Did Amaterasu have a secretary? He'd never thought about it so literally before, but after having been directly confronted with a deity, well, you sort of got to start thinking about those things. If only to distract yourself from how bizarre the situation was.

Speaking of which, maybe it was a dream? Maybe that's why it was so nonsensical? Perhaps that could explain it. It made infinitely more sense then what was actually happening, but the events that were occurring felt vastly more... real then what he could say for most of his dreams.

And... ah?! Why did he suddenly feel so hot and-

There was a lapse in consciousness, just as there had the first time, and then Akira felt a breeze on his skin. Fairly swiftly he noticed something was off, however. Everything seemed... Proportionally bigger, including the other people here. What, had he been summoned into a land of giants or something?!

"Why is everyone so-"

He shut his mouth immediately. That was not a near adult male's voice. That was the voice of a little girl. That was a little girl's voice and it had come out of his mouth.

There was a moment of realization, where Akira knew what he would see before he looked down. And, indeed, there was the delicate body of a doll-like little girl.

She stared for a moment. There was no vocal reaction, not at all, really. But you could almost see the blue lines under her eyes(of course, that only happens in anime) as she looked down at herself, raising her small, fragile looking hands to weakly clutch the air.

To everyone else, there appeared to be a little elf girl having quite a moment.

[TheFake]

— Somewhere? —

Sophia had been in a lot of meetings, both friendly and not in her time. A lot of these meetings usually ended in her being told what to do, one way or another. She didn't say much, just signed the paper and waited for whatever would come next.

What did come next was another brief interruption of consciousness and then she was standing... somewhere. more surprising she was exactly as she had been in 1990, as fit as she had ever been but currently with a lot more sense. The scenery was also as far from the mountains of Afghanistan as could be imagined. They hadn't been given any indication of what to expect while in that room but even after so many years, that was the first thing that she had imagined.

In that room they hadn't really been told anything about what to expect. Not sure of anything at the moment she walked over to the only person acting with any sort of confidence, ignoring the little... person that appeared to be having some sort of a crisis.

"Hey. Do you have any idea what to do next here?"

[jynmi88]

Abigail couldn't help but admit that the scene that played out before her eyes was different, very different. She thought, and thought, but couldn't recall anything like it in any previous books. There was a comic she read once, awhile back, that ran along the same lines of the events which transpired in the little office, but it wasn't exactly on the dot. She wasn't proud of it, but there was a part of her that was a bit agitated over the fact that reality had found a way to wiggle that made it appear stranger than even her fiction.

Not that there was much time to waste berating herself for not thinking up something similar. One moment she was behind the desk, signing the paper and then the world shifted. It was odd. She couldn't remember the world shifting before she found herself in the herald's prescience. All she knew was it felt like standing on a conveyor built that moved so rapidly the mind couldn't do anything to keep up so it just shrugged its shoulders and pretended the world before her always looked that way. The sensation left Abigail with a feeling her eyes and head weren't things she could currently trust so she decided to sit down until it passed.

Without anything else to do the redheaded woman surveyed the strange world around her, and it was strange, but maybe that wasn't saying much since every time her eyes were focused on anything besides a computer screen or the inside of a book, there was an intense feeling of wrongness. Also, there were more people around than she would've thought. One of them looked fine. The other looked like an mythological humaoid on the verge of a breakdown and the last one asked about ideas on what needed to be done next. Abigail decided the best thing to do would be focus on the person asking questions as that always seemed to be the quickest way to find answers.

"I'm sure somebody does." Abigail, still sitting on the floor, said. "We're here for a reason, right, and it would be a pretty big waste of time to just leave us hanging here." She paused briefly before continuing. "And if not then I said we start heading that way." She pointed forward. "Because every direction looks the same and in stories like this the heroes have to bump into something that'll start their journey."

[AtomicNut]

That hurt like hell. Seriously. The world had gone spinning for a while, as his dazed sight rested on the front bumper, an arm underneath the bus that had crashed. So someone had been caught in the hit aswell? Kevin's blood seemed to drain. He had been ran over by a bus, and was in no position to help.

On closer inspection there was something odd. That was his own arm. How did that end up there? Then he realized that even if his neck hurt like hell, he couldn't feel anything neck down. He literally had nothing neck down.

I see...was one of his final thoughts before he faded to black, his brain ceasing to function. He even began to allucinate. About an office. Was this the afterlife? He couldn't know. Then the guardian had started to talk. Kevin was furious. He had never heard those names in his entire life. And granting being run over by a bus didn't help. So he shouted back. About a soul theft. And heated words were exchanged in return. "Look you daft planarian, there's nothing left of you to fill even an sausage" was the most striking of them all. More voices were heard, as a second female voice exposed a kind of deal. Something with a priestess of a goddess of Light or something like that. Well, he could use someone like that. He was um, possibly dying.

So he in the end accepted. It wasn't going to get much better than that, anyway. Light engulfed him...

And he woke up in a strange, forlorn place, voices hushing around. He immediately reached for his neck. Still attached. Good. He slapped his face to try and awake himself and that's when he noticed something wrong. Her facial structure... was very different. And what he threw him off the most was the fact that despite having not shaving in days. And the neck. The collarbone had felt wildly different. He eyed his hand. It was thin and delicate, also clad in leather and white clothes.

And then he noticed the chest.

"FUUUUUUUUUUUUUN" She tried to curse, her voice coming melodious and intense, only coming with a clever last minute substitute. Two mounds of flesh attached to her chest told that, on first inspection, he was a woman now. That explained why she felt so funnily and sore. She fumbled around, as she struggled to get up. She was somewhat shorter than his past incarnartion. Well, that probably was the term for whoever happened here. She looked at her own reflection in a watery pool, raising her eyebrows. "Gosh. Awkward, I'm cute too." She stated as a matter of fact.

Priestess of Light

The thoughts lingered on the back of her head, and she felt different... like waking up from a groggily state. She knew things a minute ago she would've never thought of. Implanted knowledge. Of priesthood rites. She searched for her Book of Prayers, right next to her side. As well as a mace. Well, at the very least it wasn't an impossible to master weapon like a whip or some kind of weird stuff.

"Alright you boopin' Lady. I will play your funny gig." She said to herself as she steadied....

And that's when she realized she had been done the whole display in front of unknown strangers. Awkwardness and embarassment seized her mind as the colours raged in her face, and dropping to a kneeling position, she chose to bury her face in her prayer book. After what it seemed an endless time, she managed to utter a sentence.

"Um...ma...maybe...landmarks...rivers...roads...follow them..." She managed to piece together as she kept trying to reign her embarassment.
"I am Kevin...NO! I mean uh... Celeste!" She literally pieced the new name at the last second.

[Ryougu]

Raymon was blinded by the sudden light. One moment he had been sitting in bed, reading a book to a dim light, just to find himself in a well-lit room the next moment. After his eyes had adjusted, he spotted several people in the room, also several...awkward ones. A girl who looked embarassed and confused, a short girl who seemed very surprised, a young man, and two young women. The weirdest thing about them would've been their clothing, though. After all, surprise and confusion were on Raymon's mind too, (Although he did not consider himself all that cute) but at least he wasn't wearing such a silly...outfit...

Looking down at his own clothes, he realized that not only was he in fact wearing such an outfit, he even had a set of spiked metal gloves that might actually make him look as if he was from a geek-convention more than the rest of them.

Raymon did a fairly good job at hiding his surprise, but naturally he couldn't fully conceal it. Then he remembered what had happened, a god -or rather his secretary- had asked him to go on some weird quest to aid this apparently extraterrestrial world. He had agreed because it had seemed to him like nothing more than a weird daydream and because if it was real, it should at least prove interesting. He had not expected however, to seriously be dragged to another world. Raymon closed his book and watched in silence, this situation should get clearer soon...right?

[Hammerman]

When Maria woke up, she was not on her bed anymore.

Instead, she was on a plain, some forlorn place she had no idea about.

A gentle breeze hit her, making her dress flutter about.

Wait, dress?

She looked down, only to find she was now wearing a really fancy-looking dress, a dress straight out of a fairytale, a dress worn by a princess.

She also realized that her body had changed too. Her skin was whiter and softer, and her hair was pure wavy blonde reaching down beyond her waist.

She really, truly had become a princess.

Or at least a noble lady.

Or at the very least someone who looked like one.

She looked around to find a bunch of people in the same state of confusion as her.

First, there was the little girl. A little girl with quite a pointed pair of ears she must add. She looked really distressed as she looked down at her own little body.

Then, there was the young woman who looked to be some kind of cleric, looking like she was around her own age. She touched her own body all over, looking as frantic as a woman could possibly be. After the display, she buried her face in her book, clearly embarrassed.

She saw two other women, one a redhead and one with a silver blonde hair. The latter seemed to be a soldier of some sort, judging from her outfit. She asked if anyone knew what to do next.

Well, Maria couldn't answer that. She didn't know either.

The only recollection she had was of some place that looked like some sort of a law office. And how someone there, someone named Wyn, brought them here to do some job. What job was that? She couldn't tell.

The redhead suggested that they should just walk somewhere. The flustered young women added that they should follow a landmark.

"I agree," she said to them as she joined over to where they gathered. "Standing around here would get us nowhere it seems. No one here really knows where we are right now."

[FujiwaraPhoenix]

As the other people in the area began to awaken from their little naps and began to discuss a course of action, Aaron nodded his head in silent agreement before clapping his hands together.

"Alright, let's get to moving, then. Road's looking good... And thank that god for dropping us near a road and not in some random wasteland. That's not something I'd want to deal with, after all."

The young man motioned to the rest of the group to move forward before noticing that a rather petite elf girl was freaking out a bit internally... As was some lady in priestess garb, with the latter being more vocal than the former.

...

Maybe dealing with the former would be simpler.

"Yo, you okay there? 'Cmon, we should get moving... Though, uh... I guess this is a good a place as any to have a freakout. Just don't fall too far behind or I'm dragging you along, aight?" he called out to the elf before walking down the road with whoever else followed (which was, presumably, everyone else in the group).

Luckily, that secretary had decided to not drop them far away enough from a town to the point where they'd be hiking for hours with no goal in sight. Only about ten minutes into the walk did the group find their first stop: a town, rather rustic in its appearance... And notable European in origin. Well, at least it was appearance-wise.

There were no guards at the entrance to the town, though it was surrounded by a decently-sized wall to keep out undesirables from entering. There were a few strange animals that were moving around the outskirts, though; some strange mix of rabbit and cat that reminded him of a certain contract-making alien, but with a rather distinct lack of sapience in comparison. It would be weird to suddenly wander off the path to murder them now, though, but he could probably handle that later.

The buildings inside the town were, for the most part, built of stone; a few thatched-straw buildings were scattered around here and there, but those were mostly located at the edge of town. The town itself was neither dead nor bustling--it lay somewhere in the middle, in a perfectly average manner.

"Wow. They really went with ol' faithful here, didn't they?" he quipped to himself as he wandered deeper into the heart of the twon. The language on the signboards outside of all the buildings didn't look like any language he knew, but by some miracle he could read them all the same.

Thank god for auto-translate.

"...Well... There's a lotta buildings to check out here, I guess. Thankfully, our clothes don't stand out all that much, so we're not getting any weird looks... But I guess we should figure out somewhere to check out first."

The guild, the tavern, the inn, half a dozen different specialty shops... Their options were by no means limited, it seemed.

[Hammerman]

When the group arrived at the village, the first thought that came into Maria's mind was how it reminded her of the old towns that she once visited when she went to Europe that one time.

"This really isn't Japan anymore, huh?" she mumbled to herself.

She then saw the odd-looking cat-rabbit looking things that wandered around outside the village. At first, she was tempted to get closer to them since they looked so cute and all. But, seeing how the rest of the group just walked straight to the village, she resisted that temptation. It wouldn't do to be separated with the others when you had no idea where you were.

When she looked at the signs placed in the village, she was surprised that she somehow could read them perfectly even though they were written in an alphabet she couldn't recognize.

"Guild, tavern, inn, weapon shop, armor shop, item shop..." she talked to herself. "I suggest we check out the guild first. It seemed to be the most important place here, judging by its size," she said as she looked to the large building where the sign was pointing.

[Ryougu]

Raymon walked with the group in silence, ten minutes of walking later they found a town. The rabbit-cat-creatures near the outskirts of town drew his interest, but upon noticing he was falling behind he hurriedly moved along.

The group seemed to have a general interest in the signs, looking at a few himself he didn't get any wiser. Among others he read 'Outt', 'black market goods', 'Black market weapons' so when Raymon read those he didn't get any wiser. When Maria suggested to go to the guild, but he read 'Gang-hideout' on the sign she pointed at as, he decided something had to be wrong. Raymon struck himself on the side of his head, (much like one would strike an old TV when it stopped working) and after blinking a few times, he saw that the sign did actually say 'Guild'. Relieved that he hadn't ended up in some extremely shady place, Raymon once more read the signs.

Raymon read and considered for a moment. "Don't you usually go to a tavern to get some rumors and quests? I think we should go there first, honestly." Having stated his opinion, Raymon returned to looking around before realizing something fairly important. "Say, don't guilds usually charge you for joining? See, it just occurred to me, I don't think we have any money--or has that secretary left you guys any?"

[VitaVitaAR]

Still staring dully at her hands, Akira followed along, mute for a while. So she was now a little girl. A little elf girl. Why was she a little elf girl? Her understanding of the situation and why she had become a little elf girl. At no point had god's secretary turned towards him and said 'Oh right, you have to be a little elf girl'. Worse still, it seemed like the majority of the people around here had not undergone a single change. Admittedly she hadn't been paying the most attention, but it seemed that way to her. She didn't really take much notice of the animals, aside from vaguely acknowledgement of their existence, still staring at those delicate little hands. When they finally arrived at the town, she suddenly felt her mind clearing momentarily and strode forward.

"There's no point in doing anything else before we've picked out supplies," Akira declared, rounding on the others. This was a firm, logical assumption in her mind. Even if they didn't have any money they could still get a feel for pricing and an idea of the quality of quantity of items. If they had to go on a quest or whatever it only made sense to do their best to pick out the best available supplies. "The only other option is maybe checking out the inn, but that's irrelevant if we don't have the money for it as well. So doing anything aside from looking into supplies is absolutely stupid."

The tiny blonde elf folded her arms. After a moment's pause, her immediate dilemma returned fully to the forefront of her mind.

"Also WHY AM I A LITTLE ELF GIRL?!"

[Hammerman]

At the mention of money, Maria checked around her clothes just to see if she had any money on her. And sure enough, she found a couple of gold coins hidden inside a little pocket on her red dress.

"Here, I have some," Maria said as she showed the coins resting on her palm. "Maybe you guys have some too. If they were fair, they would give us all the same amount of money," she surmised.

The little elf girl then interrupted their conversation. Maria couldn't help to think how cute and adorable she was, the way she bossed around everyone with her opinion.

And then she suddenly shouted when she finished her speech. She seemed really distraught about her new body. She herself wouldn't mind being inside an adorable body like that. Perhaps she was some woman bodybuilder in her previous life?

"I suppose we can check out the shops first," Maria answered the elf girl, "And maybe buy some things that catch our eyes. Lead the way then, little elf girl," she said with a smile.

[TheFake]

— Somewhere? —

On the walk to the town she had checked through the bag that was hanging over her shoulder when she arrived. It's contents were unsurprising but she expected that since they were given to her then it might be very likely that she would be expected to use them. The medical supplies, while crude, were much more sophisticated than might be expected. There was also some sort of knife in a leather sheath in her jacket. No, it was a scalpel, the bevel of it's edge honed to a mirrorlike perfection. A pocket also had a handful of coins that seemed to possibly be of a high denomination.

Apparently they were all speaking the same language, whatever it was. It didn't sound like either Russian or English or even the little bit of Pashto that she had picked up in Afghanistan.

What the short... girl... thing said made sense but someone else could take care of that. That left Sophia with two choices of her own. Visit the guild and look for work or visit the tavern. She chose the latter and walked off in that direction.

[Hammerman]

Maria noticed out of the corner of her eyes the soldier girl walking away from the group. It seemed she was heading for the tavern, judging by the direction she was going.

"H-hey, where are you going?" Maria shouted to her. "Shouldn't we stick together?" She was quite surprised by her just walking away right that. She must have been a brave soldier in their original world.

[TheFake]

— A Town? —

Few of the people that she arrived with looked to be of any use and this princess figure was no different. But it might do to explain and see how firm a grasp she had on things.

"We need information as much as we need supplies, maybe more. We know we're suppose to fix a few problems in this world but weren't told what they were or how to accomplish this. We don't know the geography here, the political situation or anything else about where we are."

Sophia pointed at the tavern.

"In there people drink and talk. They'll moan and bitch and complain. And nothing is worth complaining over more than things you can't do anything about... other than complain, that is."

She was used to complaining and familiar with all sorts of things that she had no power over. The best way to gain the ability to influence things is to have knowledge about them. Sophia started for the tavern again with a purpose in her step. Pushing through the door this businesslike manner faded and she adopted the lazy gait of someone with nowhere better to be.

[Hammerman]

Maria heard her explanation. And she had to agree with her. They indeed knew nothing about this world, this land, this country, and the people living in it. The secretary had not told them anything about their task so they had to be the one to find out their goal.

Maria was quite impressed with her coolness and her knowledge in gathering intel.

"I-I see," she stuttered, blushing a little from embarrassment. "Then we shall check out the other places. We will leave the tavern to you."

After Sophia leaved, Maria turned back to the group. "So, we'll be going to the shops first then?" she asked them.

[Ryougu]

Checking for pockets again, Raymon found a pouch of gold, subtly hidden away in his armor. "Oh, okay, I guess we do have money. Sorry to worry you guys. Anyway, I think I'll be going to the tavern too, because I do believe mentioning the same, earlier." Raymon said, quickly turning away from the group and following Sophia. As much as he was against splitting up from the rest, he deemed knowledge more important. Though it wasn't like he doubted Sophia could handle it alone, Raymon decided it would be better to have the knowledge straight from the source, especially when being new to a foreign world.

Catching up to Sophia, Raymon realized he hadn't heard her name yet. "So uhh, we're in this thing together, I guess, name's Raymon, and...well, I'm very sorry but I do can't recall yours." Bowing apologetically before extending his hand as per proper introduction, Raymon simply hoped he wouldn't offend her, God knows people have been offended by less.

[AtomicNut]

It seemed as if the group agreed in walking down the road to the nearest town, so the once-upon-a-time scientist had not many qualms to complain to follow. She did pay little attention to her surroundings, merely noting that some of the beasts were unlike anything she had ever seen, even in books. She would like to have more information as a regard. And that was such the reason why she was only paying token attention to where they were going. Flicking through the Book of Prayers, she greedily skimmed through the pages to know the hows and whys of her current predicament. As well as the policy of her... "employer", the Lady of Light.

Her attention was brought upon the subject that the buildings did look the old-style fashioned craft. Huh, I've seen those kind of buildings before, at granny's place before. But they were still made with modern methods... So I take this is probably some kind of a backwater place with no industrial revolution in sight. There were talks about what to do. Some said supplies, some said the inn.

And there was the elf child screaming and freaking out. It probably beget a sort of response. "I don't know...why shouldn't you be an elf child? I mean... elves are usually the big winners in this kind of situations." The young female cleric seemed to peter out. "...it's not like in my case they also preserved my body, you know. Mostly because..." Celeste seemed to freeze for a moment, shock still lingering in a corner of her mind. "...I was decapitated by a bus." she seemed to finish in a barely audible whisper, before reexamining the situation.

One of the other girls had decided to no say a word, and head to the tavern. It wasn't a bad idea, given the circumstances. Gather some information was paramount. She dug a coin out of her pocket, and weighed upon wether it was okay to use the given money for such task. I mean, it's not like she was going to get drunk on that money. She needed information. And probably things would make more sense if some kind of ale had been taken in the meantime.

I was killed and then genderbent. I could use a drink.

She silently nodded. It seemed that the stoic woman had the same idea, given how curt her response was when questioned by another person of the group. She seemed the overbearing type, trying to keep herself useful by pointing out every single detail. She was promptly shot by the first girl, who explained throughoutly that she was treating this as a gathering information kind of task... and...

Isn't me or did that sound like something straight out a military doctrine book? Specially the term supplies. She pondered. Tavern woman seemed somewhat...intriguing. The choice of words and the steady response seemed like something she herself could abide with.

Meanwhile, another person, this time a teenager guy, approached the woman, and wanted to do the chivalrous thing. She could hardly fault him. She herself fancied herself as courteous, righteous man when it came to these kind of situations. It usually ended up in stutter, though. She bit her lip as she fidgetted, producing some coin of sorts. Sorry, my lady. But this is for the greater good of your name. She mumbled a half cynical apology. Information gathering was important. But she also needed a drink to steady her rollercoaster of thoughts.

"I'm going too. I'm parched." She muttered in half a mumble, to the other two.

[TheFake]

— A Tavern? —

She stopped and looked back over her shoulder. At least the girl before looked old enough to drink. This boy, which is exactly what he looked like, should still have been in high school. Well, Sophia doubted that anyone inside would care. She nodded.

"Sophia Pertrov."

A woman approached that looked like the most useful one that Sophia had met so far. At least she had a proper weapon. Sophia nodded, despite the rather asinine remark. At least this one looked old enough to be here.

The former soldier walked to the bar and tossed down a couple of coins that she seemed to have plenty of.

"A beer."

For now it would be fine to sit and listen to the gossip around her.

[Hammerman]

Maria sighed as she looked at the two leaving. Guess they would now go to the shops. No sense in crowding a tavern with all of them. It would just attract attention, unwanted attention. And they by themselves already stood out. Look at her wearing a fancy dress in a village like this. People would think she was a lost princess or something, just like in the real world where her friends kept calling her with that title.

The first shop they found was the weapon shop, and the shopkeeper, a balding old man with some temper issues looked at them suspiciously as they eyed his merchandise. Maria thought he was pretty rude for someone that worked by selling to people, but perhaps their suspicious appearance was to blame. His shop pretty much had the basic kinds of weapons available; swords, knives, axes, maces, and even a wooden hammer. Maria tried lifting each one of them and she pretty much found out that she couldn't really use any of them, even the wooden hammer, as its size was like a small child. And every time she tried one of them, the shopkeeper would glare at her so hard she was afraid he was drilling into her head.

"So, what will it be? Come on, I don't have much time," the shopkeeper said impatiently, "Or don't tell me you are one of those people who just look at things and not buy any of them. I know the lady and the little elf girl don't look like they can lift any of these but the rest of you sure could, right? Or else you wouldn't be here, wasting by time, right?"

@VitaVitaAR