(A/N: Please give me as much feedback as possible. I am used to fantasy writing, so I am not sure if I will be any good when it comes to modern day type of stuff. So please let me know if you find any problems with the chapter.)
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Opening my right eye, I was met with a brilliant blue sky. I sat up and scanned my surroundings quickly. Luckily, it seems no one was around to notice our sudden appearance. Checking to my left and right, I found Sana and Noroi were both asleep by my side and, like always, were snuggled up to my tails.
They look cute whenever they do this stuff, however, due to the circumstances, I have to wake them up quickly. So, I decided to slide my tails from their arms and hide them from the view of others, along with my fox ears. So now I appear as a normal human male teenager.
With my tails and ears now hidden away, I start waking up the girls.
"Mmmmm~" (Sana)
"Staaahhhppp..." (Noroi)
"Come on you two, it's time to wake up. We've arrived in my world and it would be awkward if someone sees the two of you sleeping in this place." (Sora)
With their eyes squinted open they begrudgingly woke up. Both yawning at the same time and stretching in the same way. In fact it almost looked as if it had been rehearsed.
While they were still waking themselves up, I stood from the ground and checked around to make sure there wasn't anyone nearby that could see us.
I continued to keep watch until the girls were finished waking themselves. I guess this is something like jet lag when people get tired after traveling a long distance on a plane, because of the change in time-zones. Although, I'm not sure why I'm unaffected by it...maybe because I've, technically, already travelled to another world? Or perhaps it is because I was the one who cast the magic.
Thankfully, nobody ever came by while the girls were trying to wake themselves up.
After they finished waking up, and got off the ground, they too looked around and started to admire our surroundings. I had transported us to the Fushimi Inari Shrine that I had been forced to go to during a school trip one time. It takes a long time to travel along the Torii Gate path, but I figured it might be less conspicuous if we came from the shrine, compared to waking up on the street.
Why didn't I just take us to my old home? Well...I already died in this world, so I think it would be better if I let that version of me rest since there's nothing I can do about that situation.
Besides, I've already resolved to live in this new body of mine, so I don't see why I need to try and slip myself back into my old life and pretend nothing has happened. So, after convincing myself that I have resolved to live my new life, I dragged the girl's attention away from the shrine, and tell them that we'll have to start walking down the Torii gate path so that we can get into the city before it has a chance to get dark.
After I mentioned the city, they became excited immediately. They were really interested to see the city that I came from, and wanted to know what it was like. So with their excitement and energy rejuvenated, we started our trip down the Torii Gate path, towards the city of Kyoto.
It took about three hours, but, after we had exited the Torii gate path, we were met with the bustling streets of the big city. I gotta say though, it feels nostalgic seeing all of this once again. However, something feels a bit off about everything. It feels as if something has changed, and not in the way that there are new buildings, or that someone remodeled an old one. Something seems really weird on Earth. It could also just be me, my body being so used to the other world, it might feel slightly uncomfortable on Earth.
I shook my head, and stored the thought in the back of my head to contemplate at a later time. For right now, we need to find a way to get currency, because I doubt Ruld would be accepted here. Although the metal will definitely hold SOME value, it won't be enough for us to get by.
*Ding*
Huh? What was that noise? opening the menu, I scanned over and saw that I had a new message. Probably from Akio-sama, since she was the only one that can actually send me messages. So, I opened it up and it read as follows:
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Dear Sora,
Hi there!!!! It's your favorite Goddess Akio! Welcome home to Japan! I do hope that you remember the deal that was made for being allowed to travel between here and Auralel!
I also forgot to mention something before! As you transfer between the two worlds, any currency that you accumulate within your dimensional space in either world, will then be converted into the currency of the world you go to. So it basically means your Ruld has been turned into Yen, and when you go back your Yen will be turned into Ruld.
Aren't I great? I hope you praise me! (\(*v*)/)
This means that you don't have to live on the street like vagrants until you find a home!
<3 Goddess Akio <3
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"Haaaaaa...She is a completely irresponsible goddess...She could have mentioned all this crap earlier when she created the spell for me. I hate having the information withheld from me." (Sora)
However, I suppose that this means our money problems are gone now, so long as we can keep a good income in Auralel. I guess for now, we should try to find a decent apartment to rent that won't cost us too much money. Before doing so, I made sure to send her a message in return. Nothing big, just complaining about how she is too lazy to check and see if she had told me everything I needed to know before it comes up later.
After sending the message to the goddess, I reached into my pocket, out of habit, to get my phone. I felt silly for doing so though, since I don't have a cell phone anymore since it was on my old body.
Well, guess after we can acquire an apartment, I should try and get us some cell-phones so we can communicate with each other, if we aren't all home at the same time.
With our objectives now laid out, we started to search for a realtor that wouldn't mind renting an apartment out to a couple of 'high school students.' Hopefully we can find a decent one near a school. I'd like it if the girls could use the schools as a way to understand the culture of my world, as well as how things are completely different between here and Auralel. Also, I suppose it would be worth it to finally finish my high school education huh? The only drawback is that I'll have to repeat a grade since my new body is a little younger than my old one.
Now that I think about it, what information did the goddess put in for our identification? With this in my mind, I reach my hand into my jacket to make it look like I am searching my pocket. In reality, I have opened up my storage and pulled out our identification documents.
Thankfully the goddess was able to make sure it matched up properly with how it was when I was alive before. Reading over it, our identification documents stated that the three of us were siblings sharing the last name of Aise, that we came from a small island nation located in the Pacific, we moved to Japan alone with parental consent so that we can pursue a higher education, and that Sana and Noroi were sixteen years old and I was seventeen years old. This body's real age is seventeen, so I was thankful for that.
They also told other information, like our height and weight, but I wasn't that interested in the rest. So long as they weren't weird in any way, then I was satisfied. After double checking the information on them, I handed Sana and Noroi their documents and explained to them that these documents prove that we are citizens of this country, and that we would be in a lot of trouble if they were lost.
With our documentation sorted out, we began our search for a realtor. What surprised me was that I was still able to read the Japanese characters, which I wasn't sure would be possible since I was put into a new body that never had any experience with Japanese. So, thankfully, it shouldn't take us too long to find a kind realtor who isn't trying to rip us off.
The only problem we ran into while searching for the realtor, was the fact that our clothing was very out of place, compared to everyone else. My clothing was at least somewhat alright, and Sana could have passed if her clothes weren't emitting a shine whenever sunlight hits it. Then there was Noroi, who was dressed in her classic gothic lolita dress. Hopefully people only think we are a bunch of cosplayers. However, the other problem I had with this, was that since people were drawn to our odd clothing, they were then drawn to my eye.
With an ugly scar going over part of the left side of my face, where my left eye used to be. They would immediately turn their gazes away from me. It actually started to make me feel a bit self-conscious about the looks they gave me so, using my hands, I combed my hair over to cover the area where the scar was. My hair won't be long enough to cover the entire thing, but it should be able to cover most of it. I was told by the king that if I keep my tails and ears hidden, then I should be able to extend my hair by a little bit if I focused hard enough. I can't do that right now though, not while we are in such a huge crowd of people.
It took about an hour, but when we finally found a decently hearted realtor, she was asking about why we were looking to rent an apartment by ourselves, and if there was a way for her to meet with our parents. I had to explain the woman a fake backstory about why she couldn't meet with our parents.
What I told her was that we had moved here from a small nation in the middle of the pacific ocean, and that we were sent here by our parents to try our best at living a better life. They gave us what they could to help start our finances, which where we lived was trinkets and odd wares. I continued on to say that our parents were very sick, and had actually passed away on the day that we were scheduled to leave for Japan. I did my best to add some sadness into my voice when I mentioned their death. If I were a better actor then I would have shed a few tears for some bonus points, but unfortunately I wasn't able to do that kind of thing on command. Lucky for me though, Sana and Noroi had quickly caught on to the lie that I was spinning to the woman, and at the right moment they both had wet streaks running down their cheeks.
When I looked up to the woman, I could see tears coming down her cheeks as well. She quickly apologized for bringing up such painful memories, and asked what kind of property we were looking for. I waited for a moment and acted like I was trying to regain my composure. After 'gaining my composure' I explained to her that we would like an affordable apartment that isn't too far away from the high school that we might be attending in the days to pass. I also told her that furniture isn't mandatory as we are used to sleeping on mats woven from straw. Secretly I am hoping she might give a discount on a fully furnished apartment.
"Awww you poor things...Well I wish I could get you a fully furnished apartment near a good high school, but those are expensive. However, I can do a discount on a half furnished apartment, plus I will recommend a good person I know that can help you three with finding decent but cheap furniture to finish it off." (Realtor lady)
"Thank you ma'am, I feel really bad because I am sure you might be losing money by doing this, but I really do appreciate the help you are giving us with this matter." (Sora)
I'm sure you're wondering why she didn't question the truth in our lie, especially with the nice clothing we were wearing. Well I got through that my explaining that we were given these clothes by some kind people who were in their way to some sort of cosplay party, and they had left over outfits. We accepted the clothes because they were cleaner and fresher than the dirty and tattered rags we wore beforehand.
It was difficult to feign ignorance to my own country's culture, but I was able to pull it off for the act.
After about three more hours being wasted on talking to the nice realtor, and filling out paperwork, after reading over everything first, we were then given the keys to a decently affordable, half furnished apartment that was only a few blocks away from a high school. Before leaving the office, I had asked the realtor if there was a way she could call us a cab that could take us to our new home. I wasn't worried about being lost on the way there, since I checked the map on how to get there, but since Sana and Noroi are new to this world, I don't want to lose track of them.
What surprised me after asking the realtor if she could call us ride, was that she actually stood from her desk and offered to give us a ride, as well as start us off with a more normal set of clothes for each of us.
This woman was a truly kind person, it made me feel bad for taking advantage of her so I tried to turn her down when she offered to buy us some clothing, but she didn't listen to me and before I knew it, we were in a clothing shop and were in line buying two sets of clothes, each, for three people.
Sana and Noroi were busy looking at everything with that innocent look on their faces, and it kept making me question if they truly were centuries older than me. However, I guess this is the normal reaction some people might have when introduced to a new and exciting environment.
I still felt bad about our realtor paying for our clothing, but she didn't want to hear anything about it, and was just saying that it was the 'least she could do' for all the 'pain' we had went through.
Well, sorry to say, but that was all a lie, and that was why I was feeling so bad about this. However, I had to keep the lie going so I simply kept my mouth shut and acted like I was thanking her from the bottom of my heart. Then she also offered to help with signing us up for our education. I tried to deny her offer again saying that I'd like to be able to pay whatever fees, myself.
Thankfully, she was understanding of my wishes, but simply offered to sign the paperwork as a sponsor. It was similar to being a guardian, but since we don't have parents she wanted to do it so that the process would go by much quicker for us.
I guess it would help us a lot with getting things done quicker, so I accepted her offer. This time I genuinely accepted it.
With all of the clothes bought for the three of us, the realtor lady finished driving us to our new apartment while also showing us the sights. I tried to look interested, but it was obvious that I wasn't as excited as Sana and Noroi. Although, I don't think it bothered the realtor that much since she didn't bring it up to question.
By the end of the day, we had finally reached the apartment, and said our goodbyes to the realtor woman, along with many thank you's. I was tired from spending the whole day out and about through the city, so I hurriedly made my way up to our new apartment with Sana and Noroi by either side of me.
We were located on the top floor, which was on the second floor, and we were the last apartment at the end of the line. The place was decently sized, and was pretty clean as well. There were some futons set aside so, since it was already kind of late, I rolled them out on the floor right next to each other. Also, since I had gotten used to it, after getting ready for bed, I decided to reveal eight of my tails and had them evenly split with four in each futon beside me.
Sana and Noroi then got changed for bed as well, and then joined me under the futons. As always they immediately wrapped their arms around my tails and with everything settled for the day, we slowly drifted off to sleep while snuggled together.