Chapter I – Which deals with the arrival of our hero to the new world and his meeting with its natives. (Patreon)

UPDATE (10/03/2024): I'll be going with this chapter after all.

UPDATE (31.01.2024): I'll be completely re-rewriting this chapter, this chapter 1 will stay here for archival.

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“Damn you, there’s a difference between Haruhi Watanabe and Haruhiko Watanabe!”

“Do we send him in?”

“I can’t bother with it. Send him through.”

“All right…”

…

“Mmm…” Watanabe opened his eyes. How long had he been asleep for? An hour? A day? An eternity? However long it was, his head felt like it was full of water. His vision was blurry, and his legs heavy. “I’m pretty sure I refused to go to that drinking party.”

Watanabe raised his head up to take a look around at the least. There were plenty of trees around him, trees that looked to be some species of fir. Behind this forest of trees was a snow-covered mountain range that loomed in the background. Looking at the snow, Watanabe realized how cold he felt. Laying on the wet, muddy ground probably didn’t help at all. He shook his tiredness and jumped up to preserve his dear life. His blue suit was covered in mud, so had his black hair become more of a mess than it already was.

“So, where the hell is this?” asked Watanabe. Was he in some sort of national park? There were no signs anywhere to suggest so. The only thing that led him anywhere was a small earthen path cutting the woods in twain. There was nothing else for him to follow, so our hero set forth for a grand journey that lasted for five minutes until he came across a village. It was definitely not a Japanese village. The houses were very simple, with walls made out of adobe and wood with roofs made out of thatch. They were either one or two stories, with no windows anywhere to be seen. Around these houses were large clearings that were most likely made for agriculture, though no crops were visible.

Our hero knew what this meant. Isekai? I wonder how I gain access to the system here. “Umm… [System]!” he shouted. “[Status]!” he bellowed. “[Inventory]!” he vociferated. Yet, there were no systems to be found. No matter how many English nouns he shouted into the skies, the gods answered not with a stat screen but with total silence. Is this not a litRPG? Crap. Still, he took a deep breath. This was an isekai with him as the protagonist after all. I’ll be getting all the maidens soon enough. Maybe I need to find someone to unlock the system for me? They probably have something at the Adventurer’s Guild, like some sort of magical stone that’ll read me and tell me that I’m a rank SS+ adventurer with super-special powers. Or it tells me that I’m D-rank, and I have to go on a quest to prove that my D-rank skills are actually super-duper OP. Or… Well, no matter what, it’s bound to involve some sort of harem.

With his spirits heightened, our hero began scouting the area for an Adventurer’s Guild. However, he couldn’t find anyone let alone an Adventurer’s Guild. “Hello? Konbanwa? Nihao?” No response. The houses looked too well-kept to be abandoned. Where were the inhabitants? “I swear, if I see the person responsible for massacring all the villagers or something…” …I’m going to run away as far as possible and avoid getting massacred myself!

Not seeing the culprit or any corpses, Watanabe decided to stay a while longer. If the owners aren’t in this world anymore, then there’s nothing wrong with me… recycling their items. He opened the door to house #1 to see a featureless room with nothing but a straw bed, a table and a large chest stashed at the back. Watanabe loved large chests, so he happily hopped towards it. Opening the chest, he found… two small orange-metal coins and a set of tattered clothes. Shouldn’t you at least have a few golden coins in your stash?! Nevertheless, he set off to loot only house. The interior was similar, and he only found one small coin. Another house revealed nothing. Even a two-story house only had three small coins to its name. What is it with you poor people?! Our hero gave up on hunting for valuables. His time was wasted only to get six small coins that looked to be of no worth.

Among these houses however, Watanabe had spotted a structure that looked to have way more loot. It was a stone building with a grand dome, hidden by a grove of cherry trees growing around it. A building that looked hallow, something which surely contained booty. A dungeon perhaps? Maybe it is the domicile of a beautiful goddess? Oh, how wonderful that’d be, to get blessed by one... It could also contain ferocious monsters as well, but that’d just lead me to unlocking my cheat skill or whatever in such a time of need. Eager to throw himself to the arms of a cute goddess or ferocious monsters, Watanabe headed to the large wooden door in the front of the building. I gently open the door…

“…and then when the cruel heathen Vasily began his campaign to eradicate the faithful, we united as one behind the merciful Theodore, and…” It wasn’t a beautiful goddess, it was an old man giving a sermon to a crowd sitting on pews. He was too caught up on his fiery gospel that he didn’t even notice the newcomer. “…so they expanded the realm of the faithful, the hallow land of the Brassicans, for which there can be no greater cause to be martyred for. Now, join me in prayer for those who have fallen on this day. ‘Oh, blessed ye be Brassicus Prime, ye who provideth and…’”

Watanabe had grabbed himself a seat in the back. He was disappointed to not have found anything he expected, but he was happy enough to have found other people. Being the “heathen” that he was, Watanabe slowly closed his eyes and dozed off out of boredom.

…

“You know, we probably should have just killed him instead of sending him here.”

“Yeah, this is quite a mess…”

“Are you going to bother solving it?”

“Nah, he’ll probably die soon enough.”

…

“Snore… Yawn…” Watanabe lazily stretched himself without even bothering to open his eyes. It had been a while since he had such a nice sleep, without having to bother with work and… wait, why am I so relaxed? He opened his eyes. There was a crowd of people around him. Right, I did get isekai’d. “Hello?” The fact that he was speaking a whole another language was skipped over by Watanabe; instantly learning another language was just another part of the isekai experience.

“It speaks!” The crowd suddenly got rowdy upon hearing Watanabe. He did look very different compared to these people, being an Eastern man in the middle of what he thought looked like Westerners. Thankfully his outfit didn’t look too odd. His formal business suit helped him look wealthy in the eyes of these villagers.

“Who are you, heathen who hails from a foreign land?” asked the priest from before. He had all-white robes and an all-white beard that flowed down his chest. At least he seemed to be the reasonable type considering he hadn’t burnt Watanabe on a stake yet.

“I’m…” Watanabe looked at the crowd. The crowd looked back. They didn’t seem all too happy to have a heathen within their midst. At times like this, Watanabe knew that it was the time to serve up some freshly-cooked BS. All he needed was something to convince them, something to convince the crowd…

“Why are you here?” asked the priest again.

“Ah, you see…” Watanabe was going through his pockets while biding for time. It seemed that his phone hadn’t made it to the other world, most likely because it was smashed on the pavement along with Watanabe’s head. He still had his wallet however, with his cards that were now of no use and one ¥1.000 banknote. Feeling the paper of the banknote, Watanabe felt gears turning in his head. “Here you go.” He took out the banknote and showed it to the priest.

The priest looked at the paper. He tapped on the shoulder of someone else next to him to confirm if his eyes weren’t failing him. “…we can’t read this.”

“Of course you simpletons cannot read it, because it is… it is…” What could it be? “It is a… document, from Lord Natsume Sōseki whose face and seal you can clearly see on this paper. It clearly writes here that I’m on a diplomatic mission to… to learn the righteous religion of this realm and bring it back to mine.”

There was an uproar in the crowd upon the mention of religion. The priest seemed especially excited, but he was equally cynical. “That is wondrous sir, but why would a man of high-standing like you be anywhere near our village? We’re pretty far away from the capital.”

He’s right, what would a diplomat be doing here? “Uhm… My caravan… My entourage, yes, my entourage. It was attacked by bandits on the way to the capital, and your village was the first one I could find. Yes. That’s what happened.” Watanabe felt like he was on the edge of breaking down from the stress. In Japan, priests and other preachers could mildly annoy him at most. He didn’t know what they could do here, but his knowledge of Western medieval religion began and ended with witch burnings. He wasn’t very eager to be tied to a cross and burnt on it, so he was praying to whatever deities were listening to him to help him out on this one. “I beg for your kindness, good sir.”

“Oh… That is disastrous, good sir!” The priest seemed to be convinced enough. “Have you been inducted into the faith yet?”

“Inducted? No, not yet, I’d like to be as soon as possible.” Better to play it safe.

“We shall do so tomorrow then!” The priest then turned to the rest of the crowd, who had turned curious now that they were dealing with a man and not some demon. “Git! Don’t tire this traveler out! It’s a sin to tire someone out for your profane curiosity!” He convinced the onlookers to get out, monopolizing Watanabe to himself for his own profane curiosity. “Now… Good sir, I am Anton of Sherifeld, apologies for having dared to call you a heathen, you should refer to men of the cloth like me as ‘Your Reverence’. What would your name be?”

“Haruhi. Sir Haruhi Watanabe, but most just call me Sir Watanabe.” Watanabe thought that it’d be easier to charm the ladies if he had a higher rank, so he had given himself a promotion to “sir”. “I come from the Far East.”

“I see, I see.” Anton sat next to Watanabe to rest his old legs. “Do you have any news from the east? How is the fight against the Reformist heretics going? I last heard that the Grand Preacher, blessed be His name, had begun mobilizing armies to send down there.”

“Uh… It’s going great! I saw a few of them being slaughtered and killed and whatnot. Long live the Grand Preacher! Heil to him?” Watanabe stopped himself in his fake enthusiasm. Maybe I went a bit too far?

“Great! That’s the only thing those dirty heretics deserve for daring to rebel against the Grand Preacher, blessed be His name.” replied Anton with actual enthusiasm.

What kind of world have I found myself in...? Did I spawn in the territory of the big bad evil empire? What’s with this enthusiasm for killing heathens and heretics?

Unbeknownst to him, this realm had many more surprises in store for Watanabe.