by Max Jager
Alicia seemed shocked by this and took a step back. The guards next to her grabbed their swords and prepared for a fight but did not unsheath them yet. They relaxed when they saw that nothing happened.
"This is what we call an in-game menu. We humans can not do this in the world we come from, only in games. However this menu is missing almost all of the important parts of a game menu. The only thing it seems to have is a function for chatting with all humans in the world, a function for talking to one specific human, and a function to open a storage room of some sort. We have not tried out the storage room thing, honestly in all the commotion I completely forgot we could do this until just now." Mendelen said.
"That could be magic." Alicia stated. "That doesn't make this a game, or a fake world."
"Try it yourself. You can use magic, right?" Mendelen stated.
Alicia focused and held out her hand, palm down, and swiped it across the air just like Mendelen had done. But nothing happened. She tried it a couple times and even the guards gave it an attempt. But nothing. "Okay, so only humans can do it it would seem. That still does not make this world fake."
"You are correct. It does not make the world fake." Mendelen replied. "But we were told it was. We were placed in these pods and transported to this world. Most humans have never set foot in another world before! So believing that we just went to another planet would be insane. Our technology can't even find another planet with life on it anywhere in the universe nevermind bring us anywhere near one. So when we arrived here, we did not expect it to be a real planet. Then when we were met with this game manual, and this ability to open a menu that us humans only get inside of a game, we were duped into believing this was a game too." He said.
After a brief moment of silence Mendelen continued talking. "Most of us questioned if this world was real or fake from the start, it felt too real, we could feel pain here and that isn't supposed to happen in a game, as I said the menu was missing almost everything a game is supposed to have, and most importantly all games have a button you can press to stop playing, we never found any such button here. We were unsure about this, that was why we never died. Normally in a game, dying is okay. It just means you lost but the game will restart, bring you back to life and let you try again. But this didn't feel like a game, so we did everything we could to make sure we didn't die, we did not want to take the risk. We never met any intelligent life before you. But now that we have met you and the other elves, we know this isn't just some game anymore. I do not know where we are, or what this world is, but I know for sure it is not a game. Games do not have living people in them, the people in the games couldn't possibly be as alive and self-aware as you and the elves here."
Alicia nodded, but remained silent. Watching him as if judging every word he said.
"I can't speak for the others but I think we have given up on returning to Earth, our home planet, by now. We need to find our place in this world, with only four of us it would seem like the existence of humans will be short lived, but you never know what will happen and speaking for myself I want to find some sort of place for myself, some reason to be here, if I'm going to be staying in this world." Mendelen finished.
Alicia remained silent a moment longer, but when he did not speak she glanced down at the peace treaty then back at Mendelen. After a moment she signed the treaty and held it up for a second for him to see before slipping it into a bookshelf of archives and papers. "The treaty is signed then. There will be peace between the humans and elves. We may send a scout or two to watch over you humans from time to time but we will respect your privacy and refrain from doing that too much."
"Thank you." Mendelen replied. He let out a sigh of relief, glad he had defused that bomb. "So what do we do now? I get that we can stay here for a little while, but what do we do with our lives here and where do we go after this? We don't know what is out there."
"I do not really know what is out there either. Adamus made a point of not letting me venture too far from the village. So you would need to ask him. I do know, however, that the dwarves make their home deep underground in the mountains east of here. And the fairies live on the Altia isles, off the shore south of here." She said "as for what to do, I would suggest earning a place in the alliance. You have no chance of survival if we don't stop this demon outbreak. At the same time we can't afford to carry dead weight so we can't just let you in, you must earn a place. You must prove that you can do something to help that makes it worth keeping you. I am sorry if that is harsh, but we are struggling and faltering in this war with the demons already. Adding on dead weight would only break us."
Mendelen nodded "if I wanted to scout the demons, where would I find them?" He asked.
"In hell." Alicia answered. "Demons are not natural to this world, they are born in hell. When they enter this world and are killed, they return to hell. They can never truly be killed, just sent back. Which is why we struggle so much with this, we have taken down their leader countless times, each attempt he claims thousands more lives. Each time he just comes back as if nothing happened. However they can only enter the world two ways. One, if they are summoned but nobody in their right mind would summon a demon. And two, through these rifts between hell and the world that have recently been popping up, we keep these rifts guarded at all times but more keep cropping up seemingly at random. The nearest rift is out in the field just south of this forest."
Mendelen rested his chin on his hand "I will probably check that out then, thank you. I do not know what we can do right now, other than sharing our technology, but I'll figure something out."
Alicia smiled softly "good, glad to hear it." She paused for a moment then placed all the bags of things the Alphas had collected on the table in front of him. "you are free to go, I do not need you here anymore unless you have more questions. I noticed you have valuables in your bags, if you need money you can likely trade them for money in the stores."
Mendelen shook his head "No questions that you can answer. Thank you." He said as he got up, took the bags, and left. As he left he opened the holographic keyboard and sent a message to Kaden, Estellese, and Zanath.
"Guys, hopefully you remember how to use this. I have spoken with Alicia and we have signed the peace treaty. We should find a way to help them with the demons so we can join their alliance. I am going to gather as much information as I can. -Mendelen"
It was a minute later that he saw his hand emit a brief flicker of light and heard a ping sound in his head. He reopened the keyboard and opened his messages, finding one from Zanath.
"Sounds good. If you need help just ask, I am teaching the elves about electricity. -Zanath"
Mendelen sent him a message back "Can you also teach them how to make guns? It may help them in this war with the demons. -Mendelen"
"I plan to. They are learning these things incredibly fast, and their ability to use magic to summon the materials we need to build things is amazing. We are making progress at astounding rates, and even I feel like I am learning much faster than normal. I've felt like I was growing stronger and learning much faster since I got to this world. -Zanath"
"Me too. I wonder if that is some side effect of this world. Good luck. -Mendelen"
He started walking out into the city and looked around as he thought about where to go next. It was just a moment after he heard another ping and his hand blinked again.
"Hey, it is Kaden. I'm at the library with Estell. She just accidentally knocked over a massive bookcase, but more importantly as it fell she caught it and was able to lift it. Even she said that was not normal for her, she has gotten a lot stronger since we started."
"Zanath has noticed this same thing. We seem to be growing and learning much faster than we did in our own world. In her case that is shockingly fast. I can not explain how or why but we should take advantage of this, become stronger so we can survive out in this world. We will be gearing up to fight demons in the near future. I have Zanath working on getting the elves to invent
guns, you and Estell do whatever you can to get more powerful. I am going to scout out the demons and then I'll follow suit. -Mendelen"
"You going alone? That sounds dangerous."
"I will ask for an escort from the military. Also, if you don't sign your name I have no idea who is sending the message. It doesn't say. -Mendelen"
"I don't trust the military. That sounds more dangerous than going alone. -The amazing and awesome Kaden"
"Well I do trust them Kaden. They know what they are doing, and can keep me safe. I will meet you guys at the inn later -Mendelen"
"Please be careful. -Kaden"
Mendelen closed his menu and went out in search of Adamus. It took almost an hour to find him, but after enough asking around he finally found the man. "Excuse me, sir." Mendelen started.
Adamus turned to Mendelen "hello human." He greeted flatly. "I heard about the peace treaty. And I have checked on the labs, I am impressed by this technology and I have only seen this one thing you humans call electricity. It seems to work much like the fairies appliances, but without magical energy which makes it practical for use outside the Altia Isles. This could actually be very useful." He said.
Mendelen nodded. "I have also instructed my friend to teach you all how to make guns. Those are human ranged weapons, far better than a bow and arrows. They require much less effort to use, less space to carry, and can be fired a lot faster, while dealing out more damage in some cases."
Adamus raised an eyebrow. "I look forward to seeing these." He replied.
"I hope they exceed your expectations." Mendelen answered. "Now onto why I am here. Alicia has told me about the demonic portal south of here."
Adamus sighed and frowned. "She should not have said that." He grumbled quietly.
"Well, whether she should have or should not have is not the issue. I am going to go scout it out, if you want our assistance with the demons we need to know what we are up against. I am requesting a military escort. If I can not get one I will just go alone, but I would prefer to be with a soldier who knows what they are doing." Mendelen replied.
"No." Adamus answered. "The demons are too far over your heads, there isn't anything you can do. You're essentially no stronger than a civilian, and you're asking to try to help fight something that even my best soldiers struggle to fight."
"You are correct. Right now we are not strong enough. But we have noticed that we have been growing in power drastically faster than we normally do in our home planet. We are not sure why, or how, but in just the few short days we have been here we have learned skills that should have taken us months of practice to learn. And a friend of mine has gotten drastically stronger, physically, I do not know the specifics but if I had to guess I would say her strength has doubled in the few days she has been here. Something is making our bodies and minds grow faster than normal, a lot faster. Give it a couple weeks and we might actually be strong enough to help. Plus from what I understand you sell magic books here, and I think we can learn magic although I am not sure of that since magic did not exist in our home planet. But if I am right we will soon have magic to use on top of whatever skills we have picked up by then." Mendelen countered.
Adamus hesitated. "If what you say is true, with that and these gun things you speak of you may be able to assist later. However it is still unsafe for you to go there now."
"That is why I request a military escort. If I am with a soldier or two I should be fine, right? If a demon or two slips past the defenses you have set up the escorts can take them out. I will stay out of their way and will not try to fight unless they need my help." Mendelen answered.
Adamus shook his head. "You do not understand the scope of this. Demons are powerful, even my best soldiers can be taken down by middle-tier demons. And even if they do kill it that does not guarantee your safety, you have not faced magical creatures before, there is nothing the soldiers could do to protect you if the demon decided to aim for you. The demon could just simply make the ground under your feet explode, they can't save you from that. A trained soldier would know how to evade such an attack easily, or a trained fire mage could use their own fire control to cancel out the demon's fire magic and stop it. But I have no fire mages, and you do not have the experience needed to face magical attacks."
Mendelen looked down for a moment and thought it over, then looked back at Adamus. "I understand the risks, but I still want to go. We need to know what we are up against."
Adamus sighed softly. "I can not escort you, I have things to do here. But I will see if Emmei is busy and ask him. He's a master swordsman and knows some displacement magic to get you out of harm's way if necessary."
"Thank you." Mendelen replied. Then he followed Adamus, assuming he would lead the way to Emmei.
Zanath looked around at the elves in the room with him, all of them were taking notes on the lecture he had just given. "Anyone know where I can get a drink?" He asked, giving a six hour long lecture was no easy task. Especially when unprepared. And he wasn't even done yet. Oddly enough the elves in the room were still paying full attention and waiting for more information, it was unlike any school he had ever seen. But then again, these were not students, they looked to be mostly adults and were scientists who were getting information on advanced technology.
An elven woman spoke up, she had short black hair that was tied in a bun leaving just her bangs hanging over her forehead. She seemed rather small, but then again all the elves here looked a bit small. She had soft brown eyes and wore thin glasses, her clothes were similar to that of the other elves, they looked like clothes made of expensive silks. "Yeah there is a dining hall just next door. My name is Esyll tell them I sent you and they will give you a free drink." She said. She was the head scientist and was leading up this project.
Zanath nodded "thank you. If you would like you can experiment with the designed I showed you to make a few light bulbs work while I am gone. Or just take a break, we have all been working hard for a very long time." He said. As he turned to leave he saw the scientists turn to the two mages they had brought with them and asked them to summon all the equipment they needed. And just like that everything they needed to start building electrical appliances just appeared on the tables and the elves got to work. "These summoned items are temporary right?" Zanath asked, just to make sure he understood.
"Yes" Lillith answered. "There are two types of summoning magic. One where you create an item out of magical energy, which is what they did. The energy holding those items in existence will fade away in a few minutes and the items will go with it. The other summoning magic is to summon a real physical object. To take something that already exists and just bring it to you. But in order to do that it must exist, and you must know it's exact location. Those summons do not go away, they stay forever since they were not created by energy." She explained. "So, when we decide to build real appliances, we will summon the real resources we have. We just don't want to waste resources experimenting and learning. The things you need to build this stuff is mostly in short supply for us. It'll take time to stock up on it all."
Zanath nodded "when I get back I will begin teaching you about solar panels. With the living trees around you you'll want solar, wind, or water powered electricity since those won't harm the surrounding environment. And, being surrounded by trees with no lakes nearby, solar is your best bet since the trees will block the wind." He said as he started to leave.
"Solar? As in the sun?" Esyll asked.
"Yes, exactly. Taking the sunlight and turning it into electricity to power these things." Zanath said.
"Wouldn't that only work during the day?" Lillith asked.
"Uh, yes and no." Zanath said. "We can still get sunlight at night, not much. But the energy gathered during the day can be saved up to use overnight. It will get you through until the next day. I'll explain more when I get back"
With that Zanath left, and eventually returned with a drink to see the elves had all assembled their first electrical appliances
. Most just lit a light bulb with potatoes, but a couple of the more gifted ones, like Lillith and Esyll, had already assembled their first very simple Dynamo generators and we're making lights and switches with those.
"Alright, everyone ready for the true test of everything we learned? Building a solar panel? Once you learn this, your solar panel can replace the potato as a power source. With enough solar panels you can provide power to the entire village which will allow you to add lights to the houses along with countless other human inventions." When the others nodded and stopped what they were doing he began his next lecture on solar panels and solar power. As the lecture went on he eventually had them start making solar panels, and lead them through the process of building them. By the time the panels were finished it was night time
"Alright, so these will not work tonight, they have not had time to store energy during the day and it is a new moon today. However, I can see that they are all well built, we can test them in the morning." He said