Volume I

Chapter 4 ─ No Background

The recruitment post for the army was the military's barracks, the place where the soldiers of San Ilia would be taught, and trained, and where they would eventually go to sleep at the end of the day.

This would also be Ashton's home for the time being.

"So this is it, huh," Ashton muttered as he looked up at the army's emblem hanging above the entrance of the building.

It was a large round silver shield combined with the image of a praying angel, which had two pairs of wings. One set of wings extended upwards around the higher side of the shield, while the other pair of wings did the same but downwards.

There were also a few lines written on the bottom of the shield, between the two ends of the angel's second set of wings.

The victory belongs to the Goddess,

But the sword must remain sharp.

Not being a fan of religion in general, Ashton didn't pay much attention to those words and simply entered the barracks before Jean, who was gawking at the building from outside.

Unlike the outer appearance of the building, the interiors were much more colorful. The floor was made of wood, and so were the surrounding pieces of furniture. As for the stone walls, there was wallpaper covering them so the bricks were completely invisible from the inside.

While the building looked pretty ancient from the outside, the insides had a particularly modern style. It was quite an interesting gap between designs that took Ashton by surprise.

And as he expected from a recruitment post, there were already people lining up in front of the reception desk, half of which were men and the other half being made up of women.

Considering that this was a military barrack, it was quite a strange sight to see women signing up for the army.

"Come on, let's get in the back," Ashton was pulled out of his thoughts by Jean, who also entered the building and pulled him to the end of the lane, to wait for their turn.

The line was long, and it would take a while before their turn came, so they killed time by chatting a bit.

"So, where do you actually come from? I don't think you've said anything about it." It seemed like Jean wanted to know more about that subject since he was interested in the fact that Ashton came from outside the city.

"Far away from here." And just like last time, when they were still walking to the barracks, Ashton was shallow with his answer.

However, it didn't look like Jean got the hint, and kept insisting on the topic by following with another question. "And where is that? Is it maybe in the region of Safina? Noah? Gold?"

Then, Jean's eyes widened in surprise. "Or is it in the Ilias Continent?"

Ashton slowly blinked as he blankly stared at Jean with a half-open jaw, not knowing how to answer that question.

He had a few questions himself to make regarding the choice of the names for a few regions that Jean just mentioned, but Ashton had to push those doubts aside to answer Jean's question instead.

"...Actually, I don't know the geography of the world, so I can't really tell you." Surprisingly, instead of lying or concealing the truth in some way, Ashton directly told Jean how things truly were.

And of course, that answer took Jean by surprise, as he didn't expect Ashton to not know about such basic knowledge. "How do you not know that? Did you come from some isolated village?"

"Ehh…" Ashton merely trailed off without giving any clear answer, but after half a dozen seconds of silence, he instead took the opportunity to request something. "...Anyway, since we're on the subject, can you tell me more about the continents and stuff like that?"

This was why he said the truth just now, so he could get the opportunity to ask this question. And fortunately, Jean didn't seem to mind it as he replied with a shrug.

"Uh… Sure, I guess."

And this is how the two of them spent the rest of their time while waiting for their turn, talking about the world's general geography and some unique details for each location.

Throughout the conversation, Jean was so deep into the talk that he didn't seem to perceive how bizarre this situation truly was, and Ashton was so engrossed in the information that he didn't notice the fact that they were currently a spot away from the reception desk.

"And then there is the most important place in the Ilias Continent, Iliasville..." But just as Jean was about to tell him about the said location, he paused his words when he saw the man in front of Ashton walking away from the desk. "Oh, it's your turn."

"Hmm?" Ashton turned around just in time to see the receptionist looking up at him from behind the desk with a bored expression on his face.

"Oh, hello sir." He greeted the receptionist who looked like a grumpy old man at first sight… And well, what else was there to say? He was indeed a grumpy old man, seeing that his answer to Ashton's greeting was this:

"Shut up and fill this form, we don't have that kind of time to chit-chat here."

After saying that, the old man pushed a fountain pen and a sheet of paper in Ashton's direction, bringing the young man's attention to them.

"Sure." Without making much fuss, Ashton looked down at the document to check it out, and he didn't know how or why, but he could perfectly read the words in the paper despite it not resembling any known language back on Earth, at least none that Ashton knew of.

It was fortunate that he could understand this world's language, or he would truly be lost at every possible level he could imagine.

After giving a quick glance at the form, which resembled a normal curriculum, Ashton's eyes rolled down at the fountain pen on the desk and picked it up.

But instead of immediately starting to fill up the document as the others before he did, he curiously stared at the fountain pen. This was the first time he had the opportunity to work with this kind of pen, so one couldn't blame him for his sudden display of interest in the tool.

Its barrel and grip were both dark brown, with the latter being at least wider than the modern pens Ashton once used, but it was still easy for him to get used to the new size as he gripped it in the same way as he held other pens.

As for the nib, it was entirely made of gold or at least a metal with the same color. It looked just like Ashton had expected a fountain pen to look, but even after observing it, he didn't understand how he was supposed to write with it.

Should he write in the same way he did with normal pens? Or was there a special way to use this kind of pen in particular?

"It's just a pen, don't start fawning over it and start writing." Exasperated by the sight of Ashton looking at the pen, the old man grumbled out. "You village boys are all so bothersome."

It clearly seemed like the old man was misunderstanding a few things over Ashton's actions, but the young man didn't bother correcting any of them and simply proceeded to lay the fountain pen on the form.

At first, it was difficult writing with this particular pen, as it seemed like he had to hold it in a particular way for it to work. But after some trial and error, he managed to understand the writing method to utilize it properly and began to fill up the document.

Name: Ashton.

Surname: Cobb.

Age: 19 Years Old.

Gender: Male.

Birthday, birthplace, current residential address, nationality… Wait a second.

Ashton had to stop writing almost immediately after he began due to the dilemma he just came across into.

What was he supposed to write in those fields? He literally had no background to write up beyond the hour he spent in this world since he woke up!

Chapter's ended, now onto the reviews! ...or review.

man: HE'S BACK LETS GOOOO

Answer: LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOOOO!