TheMushroomLord

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Damn, that sucks. Hope things get better for you and your family soon.

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Finally managed to get my opening post out, apologies for the delay. Annoyingly the test I spent all that time studying for turned out to be very easy so I probably could have gotten it out a hell of a lot sooner.

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Petra Davis

A sudden clap of thunder snapped Petra out of her thoughts, and deep in them as she'd been she had to spend a moment to reorientate herself before taking the opportunity to glance down at the time indicated in the bottom corner of her screen. 4:46. Blanching as she realised just how much she’d let time get away from her, the young woman hurried to close the browser window before giving a furtive glance around the library, feeling a sudden mixture of guilt and anxiety as though she might’ve been spotted with her hand in the proverbial cookie jar.

Thankfully, the library was always pretty quiet at this time of day and of the few students that were still around, the majority seemed more concerned with waiting out the rain than in paying even the slightest bit of attention to her, though that didn’t necessarily mean that none of them had noticed…

Wait. What was she worried about again?

It suddenly occurred to Petra that she hadn’t actually done anything wrong or even particularly out of place given the environment, and if anything, acting the way she was almost certainly more suspicious than anything she’d been doing. Rather than doing anything anyone would find objectionable, she’d more or less simply failed to do the thing she’d promised herself she would – no one would call her out for that at least, though that did little to ease her guilt.

Turning her attention to the report she’d come to the library to work on in the first place Petra grimaced. It didn’t even take her a whole minute to read all of what she’d written, it was after all little more than a working title, some sub-headers, and a few sparse notes on the details she intended to eventually include. It wasn’t that she had a problem with the content covered – in fact, she thought the content was pretty awsome – no, the problem was the content was so much more interesting than actually writing the damn paper. If the task had been to talk about the topic, she’d have been able to talk about it all day and then some, but no, they wanted her to write it as a report, with word limits, and specific structuring, and formatting, and all the other things she wasn’t good at. Each and every time she sat down to write something, she inevitably ended up just doing more research into the topic without making any real progress on the paper itself. At least her references would be robust when she finally did the thing.

This was fine.

Closing her laptop Petra assured herself she still had a few days before the report was actually due, besides, if history was any indication, panic would set in over the next couple of days and give her the motivation to actually get the work done so making sure she knew her stuff before then was, if anything, probably the best course of action! Petra’s thinly veiled self-deception did nothing to convince her of its truth and she knew full well that she was just trying to make excuses for herself, but that certainly wasn't going to stop her from trying anyway. In any case, it was actually getting pretty late, so excuses or no, she should probably start heading home.

Glancing at the window as she packed her bag, Petra couldn’t help but grimace. She’d forgotten about the rain and if the sheet of water currently obscuring any clear view of the outside was any indication, the walk to the station was probably going to be pretty miserable. She briefly considered waiting for the rain to let up a little, but ultimately decided against the idea – she had no idea how long that’d take, and the station wasn’t too far away, besides, it wasn’t like a bit of rain would do her any harm.

A flash of colour caught Petra’s attention as something landed outside the window. Was that a bird? From where she stood, Petra could see that it was a tiny red thing, probably not much larger than her fist, though further details were obscured by the rain and condensation. Intrigued, Petra approached the window and slowly pried it open, being careful so as to not spook the bird and completely oblivious to the otherwise obvious annoyance of the student seated behind her.

The bird was seemingly unbothered by the heavy rain and Petra both, having perched itself atop a ledge in the building’s façade where it eyed Petra with seeming curiosity. What was it doing up here? Petra had thought smaller birds tended to shelter during rain like this, was she wrong about that or was this particular species unusual? Maybe it was foraging for food? Birds need to feed quite often, right? But if that were the case why up here? There weren’t any nearby parks or gardens that she knew of. Even up close, Petra hadn’t been able to identify the bird’s species – something that kind of bothered her a little since she’d been pretty confident she could identify all the local birds.

Oh well, she could try to ID it on the train.

Fumbling in her pocket for a moment Petra produced her phone, rising onto the tips of her toes and leaning out to try and get a decent picture of the bird - heedless of both the rain falling onto her and the annoyed student packing his stuff behind her. Almost in sync with the artificial shutter sound of her photo, Petra felt something bump into her from behind. As her body teetered forward dangerously, Petra’s free hand instinctually shot down to catch her fall, only to slip uselessly against the water-slicked tiles. She saw the bird fly off – startled by her sudden movements – and the ground below was rushing up to meet her.

…

When Petra came to, it was to the sound of sirens. She was lying down flat on her back and seemingly in some kind of vehicle from the jostling – an ambulance judging by the sirens. Each bump in the road sent shooting pain down her arm and back, her head hurt like hell and she felt nauseous too. What had happened? She vaguely remembered something about a bird and… oh that was right, she’d gotten carried away and done something stupid causing her to fall out a window. This situation was entirely her doing.

Opening her eyes Petra confirmed that she was in fact in an ambulance. She tried to sit up but the movement only served to send a wave of pain shooting throughout her body and to prompt one of the paramedics to gently hold her down lest she exacerbate her injuries – not that the gesture was necessary, she’d given up on moving the moment she’d started trying.

“Good you’re awake, that’s a good sign. You’ve had a pretty nasty fall, but we’re taking you to the hospital. You’re going to be fine. Okay?”

The paramedic’s voice was gentle, clearly intended to be reassuring. After a moment Petra managed to give him a grunt that she hoped sounded at least mostly affirmative, the action triggering another burst of pain, though at a far more manageable level than when she’d tried to move.

It was kind of funny really, she could do something egregiously careless and stupid and then not suffer any lasting consequences for it. Just another one of the wonders of modern science. Not that she’d complain about that; as far as she was concerned the less she or anyone else had to suffer the better – even if they were only suffering the consequences of their own stupidity.

The paramedic started to say something else, but he never got to finish, his words interrupted by the horn of a truck. Petra felt the ambulance swerve violently to the side and then she felt something hit the vehicle even harder.

As she watched one side of the ambulance cave in towards her time seemed to slow to a crawl to Petra and she couldn’t help but think that this situation was unfair; she’d just been told she was going to be fine and there was so much more she wanted to learn and discover! She hadn’t even gotten to learn what species that bird was…

Petra's body was mangled and crushed beyond recognition.

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

@Digmata@TheMushroomLord@Expendable@SilverPaw@Kero No rush. Just a casual tap to make sure you're still with us.

@TheNoCoKid

Sorry for the delay. Wanted to get my post up earlier, but couldn't justify the time to finish it up given I've got a test due Monday to study for. Should have some time tomorrow night or at the latest the day after, assuming I don't get hit by a truck or something before then.

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Also, for anyone who doesn't want to read the whole thing, you can pretty much skip the the part about her Minami's missing jacket. In case treaidng about a sad, pointless and unpleasant everyday existence bores you. ;P

@Xaltwind

That was an awesome first post. How dare you suggest we only read half of it, you monster.

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Petra Davis

Real World

Petra Davis

"What’s that? How does it work? Why does it work like that? Why?"

Age: 19

Appearance: Petra is not the sort of person to stand out in a crowd, being neither particularly attractive nor particularly unattractive, simply average. If someone had to pick a defining feature to describe her by it’d either be the constant bags under her eyes or the fact that she’s rather short.

Petra’s dress sense prioritises comfort first and practicality second, with little to no thought given to fashion. Petra has been known to wear mismatched socks simply because she found them together and has a habit of wearing the same clothes for days on end, up until they stop passing the sniff test.

Job: Full time uni student.

Cause of Death: Petra fell several stories out of a window after being bumped while trying to get a better look at an interesting bird. Miraculously Petra managed to survive the fall itself, getting off with several broken bones, some internal bleeding, and a concussion, nothing that couldn’t be treated through the wonders of modern medicine. Fate however had other plans, and the ambulance transporting Petra to the hospital was hit by a truck, finishing the job.

Background: From the moment she learned to talk, Petra has been asking questions. As a kid she drove her parents up the wall with her incessant questions, then later she did the same with her friends and teachers in school. When she wasn’t asking people questions she was instead explaining the things she’d learned to anyone who would listen, even when they definitely weren’t listening, because who wouldn’t want to learn everything about everything?

As she got older Petra eventually came to understand that there were people that disliked answering questions or learning new things. Try as she might, Petra never was able to fully understand that mindset nor how to predict who would hold it and quash her own curiosity simply wasn't in her nature, so instead she gradually withdrew from others in favour of studying the world on her own terms, becoming more and more withdrawn over time so that she wouldn’t risk bothering anyone.

Beyond that, Petra led a pretty uneventful life right up until the point of her death – she got passable grades at school, spent her free time learning about whatever she could, never made very many friends but considered those she did have to be good ones, and when she eventually graduated from high school moved straight on to higher education where she pursued a degree in science.

The single most interesting event in Petra's life would probably be her sudden death only a year into her degree.

Vecta Form

Appearance: Where she blended in as a human due to her average appearance and build, as a slime Petra now instead blends in because she's literally translucent. In her resting state, Petra appears as little more than a raised puddle or perhaps a jellyfish-like dome. Her amorphous flesh appears clear at its thinest points, and purplish or blue at its thickest, depending on the angle and lighting.

Race: Slime

Deity: Drasil

Weapons/Tools: How Petra will fight is yet to be determined, but, probably magic, or better yet, avoiding combat entirely. As for tools, Petra has a whole new world to explore with all new rules to understand, whatever tools she’ll need will depend on the nature of the new world, not to mention whatever she’ll need to fill in the gaps in her education from Earth.

Likes:

• Science
• Learning
• Spicy food
• Getting lost in thought

Dislikes:

• Parties
• Sleeping
• Being a bother to people
• Formal Settings

Quirks:

• Very messy. Tends to leave things all over the place and considers the ‘floordrobe’ to be convenient and efficient. Somehow, she almost always remembers where she puts things and thus gets frustrated when people ‘clean’ her messes.
• Constantly fidgets and tends to externalise her thoughts through wild gesticulation.
• Bad at time management.
• People generally get one of two impressions from Petra; that she is a quiet and timid girl who could do with opening up more, or that she's overly brash and kind of weird. In reality, both perspectives could be said to be true, Petra is constantly nervous and cautious to a fault with little idea on how she's meant to interact with people outside of her close friend group, it simply happens to also be the case that at times Petra's curiosity gets the better of her, burning away any and all anxiety and hesitation whenever she feels she has something new to learn.

Skills: TBD

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Curious what Petra's Vecta form will look like... There're so many good dark elf pics out there...

@Xaltwind

That there are. Unfortunately, I discussed changing Petra's race with NoCo, so no dark elves today.

IC is up! Let's get started.

@TheNoCoKid

Yeah! The best news to get off of class to.

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Now, now. Let's not get carried away overthinking things. Anyway, the real question is how a god determines whether someone died too young in the first place. Is it just a general vibe they get? Do souls have some preordained expiry date? Is this all just some massive conspiracy by Big Divinity?

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

The curse of Timezones. It’s 7:30 AM here, but worry not, I’ll refrain from posting any spoilers for the next 9 hours.

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

@TheMushroomLord *Petra pops into the void and Dalton grabs Drasil by the throat with both hands*

Dalton: "Do the women choose you because you look like you were designed by Tetsuya Nomura or something!?"

@Zeroth

Don't you understand? The laws of isekai clearly state that all female characters must be members of the protagonist's harem. Dalton's clearly the protagonist here. There was never anything you could do, this outcome was inevitable.

@TheMushroomLord
Truck-kun strikes again! >:D
I like Petra. But Minami won't. HOW DARE SHE LIKE SPICY FOODS?!

@Xaltwind

Wouldn't be an isekai without getting hit by a truck.

And I swear I didn't read your CS and immediately decide Petra loves spice food... that doesn't at all sound like something I'd do. But yeah, not liking spicy food is tantamount to herasy so, Minami's dead to me.