"Girl—ugh—I finally made it!"
Yeah, no. Don't clap. This isn't a heroic return. This is the face of a survivor who just spent forty days walking back from Crauester Dungeon. Imagine hoofing it from Tokyo to Seoul with no Uber, no snacks, and no anime breaks. That's me. Alone. Moses-style. Except Moses had followers. I just had blisters.
Why was I even in that dungeon? Oh right— money. Classic adventurer gig: "Go investigate the creepy dungeon, maybe there's a shady syndicate inside." Real subtle. Totally not suspicious. I had a partner at first. Keyword: had. She dipped faster than a party member who realizes the tank's about to die. Left me to face goblins and cult freaks solo.
So yeah, I survived Goblin Slayer DLC and beat up a bunch of black-hoodie weirdos without even knowing their guild name. Guess I should've gotten an achievement for "Carrying the Party."
And now? Exhausted. Starving. Smelling like death itself. But standing right in front of the Graaswell City gates. My glorious homecoming—cue the triumphant anime opening.
Except… no one told the extras to shut up.
Two guys, two girls behind me were gagging about a "horrible smell," swearing it was so bad people were fainting.
Spoiler: that was me.
I ignored them, but yeah, people started collapsing like dominoes. Which makes sense. Forty days in a dungeon turns you into a walking garbage dump. I smelled like a rat that got run over, pickled in soy sauce, then deep-fried. Basically—surströmming on legs.
Even the guards weren't doing their jobs. They were off to the side, whispering like gossiping NPCs about Prince Gabrielle Graaswell and his little sister Astley. Apparently, sis is obsessed with her big bro in a "this is not okay" way. Cute anime subplot or future police report? Hard to say.
Anyway, the guards—Amiria and Watoson— turned to me.
Their first words weren't "Welcome back" or "You're alive?!"
Nope. They just hit me with:
"You stink."
Fair. Couldn't even be mad.
So what did I do? Easy. Summoned water, gave myself the fastest public shower in history, and pulled flower essence to make myself smell like springtime in a perfume commercial. Everyone stared. Don't care. Better than smelling like corpse stew.
Gate description time: imagine the Roman Colosseum but painted red, carved from iron, sliding open with that majestic "shhhk- THUD" sound effect. I swear it even had its own theme song.
I left the gossip guards behind—bye, side characters—and marched toward the gate.
And right as I crossed the threshold—
…the world glitched.
Like static on an old TV. Colors bled. The air cracked. My vision flickered—one second the city was there, the next it was… something else. Black rooftops bending in impossible angles. A shadow that shouldn't exist.
Then, silence.
Everything snapped back to normal. People laughed, talked, bought takoyaki like nothing happened.
Me? I froze. Heart pounding. Was I losing it?
Or did I just see the real Graaswell City?
END OF THE PROLOGUE — "Back From the Dead"