Prelude: To Domathra (Isekai/LitRPG/OP MC)

How could it have come to this? What god had Nephthys angered? What karmic balance had she upset? How could she have missed this?

“I…well, I guess gold is gold…” the inn proprietress mused, turning a gold coin over in her meaty fingers.

Tara rubbed her temples from the side, shaking her head slightly as the proprietress bit the coin.

“Hmm, soft, small marks from biting, and the plating isn’t cracked. Probably a decent amount of pure gold,” she said, pocketing the coin.

“I’ll do ya a solid and take it. The gold is almost certainly worth more than the room and meal. That said, get these exchanged as soon as you can. I can’t use ‘em to buy anything, so even if gold is gold, it’s just useless metal to me till I can find a way to sell it for somethin’ useful,” she said, handing Nephthys a key.

“Thank you very much,” Nephthys replied, relieved that her blunder had resolved so cleanly.

That the currency might have changed from the game had not even occurred to her. She possessed unbelievable wealth in coins from the game, but they were all vards, the currency of the nascent Sardvend Kingdom. This was the setting of Prelude’s vanilla questline, but as she had seen firsthand, that kingdom was already very different from two hundred years ago.

Tara, who had kept silent as they climbed the stairs, finally spoke as they reached the second-floor landing.

“So, what are you, exactly? You live in the center of the most inhospitable land, probably in the entire world, you use magic manually better than even the Words do, and you walk around with pockets full of gold coins that no one recognizes. What’s the deal? What’s your story?” she asked, arms crossed.

Nephthys turned around and looked her in the eyes.

“You first,” she said with a small smile.

She turned around, suppressing a chuckle at Tara’s huff. The hall they proceeded down was well-maintained but rugged. The uneven floor planks were barely noticeable beneath a rug of woven vines or reeds or something. 

Nephthys thought it resembled wicker, but it was much softer. She supposed the material would be cheaper than a wool rug, more durable, and would probably help protect the wood beneath from the myriad boots passing through.

The walls were bare, though a nice shade of blue had been painted over whatever the material was. Nephthys had never paid much attention to interior decoration or construction beyond making her tiny apartment livable. Were these plaster walls? Did plaster even exist here?

Was this world even equivalent to the medieval period of her world? Prelude was vaguely reminiscent of that time, but the addition of magic threw the comparison into disarray. Could a society really be considered medieval if it had magic artifacts comparable to modern mobile phones and the like?

Nephthys shook the idle thoughts away as they proceeded down the hall.

Opening the door to their shared room, Nephthys nodded with satisfaction. It was comfortably ordinary. As proud as she was of what she had created in Nemesis, she had not built any of it with the intention of living there. The ostentation had begun to grate at her, though perhaps she would acclimate eventually.

Two small beds sat close together, separated only by a wooden nightstand between them. The mattresses appeared to be stuffed with straw, and the sheets were wool, though there was a linen sheet beneath, an indicator that the proprietress had estimated Nephthys’s coin to be valuable. Nephthys imagined that most rooms had only wool coverings.

To the side of the beds, which were wedged against the far wall, was a shuttered window with a small table and chair beneath it, probably meant to be used as a desk. In the corner opposite the beds, a chest on the ground, and pegs jutted out of the wall above it, likely intended as clothing hanging and storage.

Nephthys’s nose wrinkled as she spied a large pot beneath one of the beds. She did not need to guess what that would be used for. Suddenly, the ostentation in Nemesis was looking less bothersome.

Glancing over, she saw that Tara appeared satisfied with the accommodations, yet Nephthys had read enough about medieval inns and bed sharing that she was not satisfied quite yet.

“What?” Tara asked, seeing Nephthys beckoning.

“Come,” she replied simply.

Tara approached until, just a couple of feet away—

“Wah—” Tara exclaimed, her cry muffled by Nephthys's robe.

“Don’t look until I say so,” Nephthys said, pressing Tara’s head into her shoulder.

Blue flames ignited, covering every surface in the room. There was no smoke, nor was there a smell of char. The flames simply appeared and, after a few seconds, vanished, leaving no trace of their passing. No marks remained, despite most of the room being made from wood.

“Wha-what was that about?!” Tara gasped, inhaling deeply as she pulled away.

“The room should be free from lice and fleas and whatever else…though, there is little I can do for the rest of the inn,” Nephthys replied, her brow furrowed as she stared at the gap beneath the door.

“Regardless, you should get some sleep. I will return before morning,” she said, turning toward the door.

“You’re leaving?” Tara asked, her tonal shift giving Nephthys pause.

“Yes, I have errands to—” Nephthys started, interrupted by the faintest tug on her robe.

Turning, she saw Tara gripping her robe with only a few fingers, her eyes downcast. At Nephthys’s gaze, she seemed to recover herself, jerking her hand back and wringing both of them before her.

Nephthys lifted her hand, and Tara flinched.

A fire ignited within Nephthys's chest, burning hotter than the hellflames that had just scoured the room. That this teenager, this child, would flinch instinctively when a hand approached her burned Nephthys inside with a rage fit to bring the world to its knees. She did not need to know the details; nothing could justify such instinctive fear in a child.

Her hand landed gently atop Tara’s head, and she suffocated the fire within her. Being angry in front of the girl would accomplish nothing but making her even more fearful, further feeding her trauma. 

Still, it was an important fact to remember: no matter how strong, brave, and mature Tara was, no matter how the world had forced such maturation on her, she was still just a child.

“I will wait, and we will go together in the morning,” Nephthys said, rubbing Tara’s head briefly before seating herself on the bed closest to the door.

Tara’s cheeks colored, and she seemed to squirm in place. Nephthys had been a teenager once, so she understood the conflicting emotions being vulnerable with someone, especially someone one does not know well, invoked. She also knew that what a teenager really wanted was not to dwell on it, so she shifted the conversation.

“If you are not sufficiently tired, perhaps you should practice your circulation,” Nephthys said, withdrawing a book from her inventory and flipping through it casually.

“No! No, I am tired enough already, believe me,” Tara said, quickly crawling under the covers.

It took only moments for Tara’s breathing to become steady and deep, supporting her claim of exhaustion. Nephthys supposed it was logical. They had traveled hundreds of miles through the air and dozens overland. That was sure to wear anyone out, let alone a child experiencing both flight and horseback riding for the first time.

Nephthys returned the book to her inventory. She had not been reading it anyway; she had been pondering the situation instead. The fact was, she would eventually have to set off on her own. She had things to do that Tara could not be part of.

Without knowing Tara’s exact past, she could not know what exactly would comfort her enough to leave Nephthys’s side, even temporarily. She did not seem keen to share, and Nephthys had already agreed not to pry, and she would respect her own given word and Tara’s wishes.

She had formulated a basic plan that required observation throughout the night, but the first, most obvious step was to ensure Tara always felt safe. For that, Nephthys had many options.

She reached over and carefully pulled the wool blanket over Tara’s face, shielding her eyes from the bright white light that flared up in the center of the room. Indecipherable scrips of runes and symbols twirled around a hole into a black abyss, and a creature emerged from it, as if propelled by some reversal of gravity.

The light vanished just as suddenly as it had arrived, and before her now stood a cat resembling a panther, though it was larger. Or Nephthys guessed it was. She had never actually seen one in person, but this cat’s head would reach the top of her shoulder if she were standing. As it was, the cat was at eye level with her from her seated position.

Her fur was black, and it glowed blue underneath in a rhythmic, undulating pattern. She seemed to have glowing skin, and the glow pulsed in a pattern that reminded Nephthys of a lighthouse’s oscillating lamp. The black fur atop created a strange effect, where the blue glow filtered through it and projected a pattern like a field of stars onto the ceiling.

Her eyes were pale blue, and they, too, pulsed in time with her skin’s inner glow, though Nephthys knew that she was an apex predator, and the glow would stop when she was hunting. That she was glowing freely right now was as indicative of her mood as her tail, which stood straight up.

She bounced lightly over to Nephthys's bed and hopped up, making not a sound, despite her size.

“It is good to see you, Aka,” Nephthys whispered, a smile managing to break through her body’s imposed neutrality as she petted Aka’s head.

Aka purred, the sound a low rumble that was probably intimidating to those unaware of its meaning, and rubbed against Nephthys’s face, making her chuckle.

“I have a favor to ask,” Nephthys said, gently uncovering Tara’s face. “Will you look after her?”

Aka hopped soundlessly to Tara’s bed, her movements sleek and graceful. She spun in a couple of circles before curling around Tara and closing her eyes, purring gently.

Nephthys smiled. She knew that Aka had cubs of her own, though she was unsure how many litters specifically Aka had birthed. Regardless, she knew how to take care of younglings.

Nephthys shifted her attention, staring down at the floor, seeing through it to the dining room and kitchen beyond. She watched the proprietress scamper back and forth, clearing tables and transporting dishes to the large basin in the back of the kitchen, where a burly man scrubbed them.

A couple of serving girls wiped tables and swept, chattering to each other about the day's goings-on. The smiling staff were a good sign. One could glean much about business owners from their staff’s attitudes and how they were treated. However, she would need to watch much closer and for much longer before she would be confident leaving Tara with them.

She would take no risks.

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