Chương 36: Answers and More Questions

"Wait, what?" Oliver stepped closer to take a look.

"Oh, I know who that is! It's Agatha and her old team. See, there on the right, that's is Agatha. The two men on the left are Headmaster Orva and Ben Garro. Garro is dead now. He died before I was born, but he was very famous. I don't know who the woman on the center is, though. I know they were a four-man team, but I think that woman died many years ago as well. I don't know her name."

"I do," Evan said, still trying to make sense of what he was seeing. Just as he thought he was finally finding his footing in his new world, this happened. This painting, flipping everything on its head again.

"You do? You mean she's from…"

"Yes."

"And you know her?" Evan gave himself a little shake, trying to focus even though his thoughts ran a thousand miles per hour.

"I'm not even sure if it's her real name, but I knew her as Helen Gregory. She was a patient I took care of in the hospital I worked at. She… she gave me that necklace the day that car hit me."

"Necklace? Car?" Oliver's brows knitted together in confusion, unable to fill in the gaps of Evan's mumbled train of thought.

"It's her, I'm sure it's her," Evan murmured, talking more to himself than to Oliver. The Helen Gregory he remembered was an old woman, but the painting still bore a striking resemblance, all the way down to the mismatched eye color. He wondered who Helen really was. Was she a world traveler, like him? Was she responsible for him being brought to this world? He tried to remember their last conversation, but could only reconstruct bits and pieces. Everything was a bit scrambled by what had happened shortly after.

The breakup with Leah, the car, and then, well… all of this. Before he could properly sort through his thoughts, the door next to the painting flew open and Headmaster Orva walked out. He was walking like a man with a purpose, not so much as looking at the two young men waiting for him in front of his door, let alone stopping to ask them what they wanted. Evan tore himself away from the painting to follow him hastily.

"Headmaster Orva? Headmaster, a word please!" he called out. The man slowed his steps and turned his head.

"Sorry, boys, I'm in a bit of a hurry. Whatever it is you want, put it in writing and send a letter." He picked up his pace again, but Evan stayed right on his heels.

"Agatha sent me," he blurted out. The man had a giant painting of her right next to his office. Hopefully throwing her name around would get them somewhere.

"Agatha Tyodadi." The headmaster paused and turned around, looking at Evan and Oliver, who was standing a little further away, with an expression of curiosity.

"You know Agatha?" Before Evan could answer the question, Orva answered it himself.

"That's her sword. If she gave Dawnfire to you, you must be important to her." The sentence just further cemented his lingering guilt that he had accepted such a valuable and personal gift from the old woman, but then again, Agatha was a grown woman and she could gift her sword to anyone she liked, including world-traveling dudes she barely knew. And if this sword was his ticket to getting some answers from Orva, Evan was happy to go along with it.

"She said you could help me with a very… special question I have. Or that you at least know someone who might have some answers." Orva looked intrigued.

"A special question, you say? We'd better go to my office to discuss that then." They followed him back to his office and entered a very impressive round room with large, floor-to-ceiling windows that allowed a breathtaking view of the academy campus and the ocean beyond. The room was dominated by a large wooden desk. Orva sat down behind it and gestured toward the cushy chairs across from him. The Headmaster folded his hands on the table and leaned forward.

Intelligent blue eyes scanned both of them, but lingered on Evan.

"Alright, young man, I'm all ears. What's that special question you came all the way to my island to find answers to?" Evan took a deep breath, trying to find the right words for the things he was about to reveal.

"Headmaster…"

"Please, just call me Simeon. A friend of Agatha's is a friend of mine."

"Alright, Simeon. How much do you know about traveling to… to other worlds?" Simeon's eyebrows rose.

"To other worlds. Are you saying that you…" Evan nodded.

"I'm not from this world. My own world is called Earth. It's very different. We don't have mana or mana users or ledgers. At least not that I'm aware of." Simeon frowned thoughtfully.

"But without mana or skills how did you come to our world?" Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

"I have no idea," Evan said.

"There was this car, and I think I died? Or at least I was about to die in the next few seconds, and then my memory cuts off, and the next thing I remember is waking up in these ruins with a bunch of weird notifications cluttering my vision, telling me I have stuff in my inventory and quests to complete." Simeon looked at him in silence, seemingly lost in thought for a long while.

"Hm… hm, how very strange." Evan huffed.

"Yeah, tell me about it."

"I've heard of world travelers before, Evan, but they are always very powerful mana users with portal powers. I've never heard of anyone ending up in another world by accident."

"Did your old teammate Helen have portal powers?" Simeon reeled back as if Evan had slapped him across the face with a cold, wet rag.

"Why do you ask?"

"Because I think I know her. From my own world, I mean. And she happened to be one of the last people I talked to before all this happened to me, and looking back now, she was acting a bit strange that night."

"Impossible," Simeon said a little too quickly.

"Helen is dead. She died years ago."

"But let's say she didn't. Did she have those world-traveling portal powers you mentioned?"

"She did not, and even if she had, she died before you were even born. I would appreciate it if you stopped asking about her." His friendly demeanor was fading quickly, being replaced by a cool stand-offishness. Next to him, Oliver cleared his throat and shot him an uncomfortable look. Evan decided to back off the topic for now. He was still certain Helen had something to do with all this, but the question of how he got here was less important than the question of how he could go back to his own world.

"I have no idea how or why I ended up here, but I would really like to figure out how I can get back to my own world. How does one gain those portal powers?" Simeon seemed relieved about the change of topic, and his face relaxed.

"I'm by no means an expert on the topic, unfortunately. One of my staff is, though. I suggest you talk to her. She might be able to help you figure out a way back home." He pulled open a drawer of his desk, and to Evan's surprise, he took out an object that looked like a bronze mechanical bird. Simeon scribbled something on a small piece of parchment, rolled it up, and put it in the bird's beak. The bird's eyes, gem, maybe even crystals, started to glow light blue.

"Bring this to Julia Verenu," Simeon told the bird. The little automaton flapped its wings, lifted off from the palm of his hand, and flew out one of the large open windows. Evan turned his head to follow the bird's flight path, but it had already disappeared from his view.

"Woah, what was that?"

"A messenger bird, of course. Oh, wait, you don't have those in your world?"

"Not like this, no."

"The messenger bird will find Julia, she's one of the teachers here, and deliver the message. In the note, I told her to meet you in the library in one hour." Evan bowed his head.

"Thank you for your help." Simeon smiled, although it looked a little forced.

"Just don't mention Helen, yes, Evan? Not to Julia or to anyone else." It was worded as a request, but Evan was pretty sure rank 19 mana users didn't request things, they commanded.

"Okay, I won't," he promised before rising from the chair. He left the headmaster's office with the feeling that the conversation with Simeon had caused more questions than it had answered. They left the central tower and wandered the beautiful gardens a bit to pass the time until their meeting with the teacher, who hopefully could give Evan more answers than Simeon had.

They sat down on a stone bench right next to the entry of the library, shaded by a large tree, and pulled out the sandwiches and fruit juice they had stored in their inventories before coming to the island.

"He reacted pretty strongly to you mentioning his teammate," Oliver said, munching on a piece of hard cheese.

"Hm, he's hiding something," Evan said. There was no doubt that Simeon knew more about Helen's presence in Evan's world than he let on.

"Nothing we can do about it, Evan," Oliver said, and the tone he used made it sound like a warning.

"If a rank 19 wants to hide something from you, it stays hidden."

"Don't worry, I'm not stupid. I understand pestering people way more powerful than me is a bad idea." More powerful was probably an understatement when it came to Simeon Orva. Just standing next to him had left an impression on Evan. The incredible power that man radiated spoke for itself. He wondered what he could do in a fight. Watching Alex had already been breathtaking, and she was only rank 11. Advanced, higher than many mana users ever got in their lifetime, but nothing compared to Simeon Orva.

"If Simeon wants me to keep my mouth shut about Helen, he probably has his reasons. She was his friend, after all, right? Maybe he's trying to protect her, although…"

"Although what?" Oliver asked, uncorking a bottle of juice.

"When I left my own world, she was on the brink of death."

"Really? Why?"

"Cancer."

"Oh, you have that in your world?" Oliver asked.

"Yes. It kills a lot of people. Young and old. We have treatments, but they're not always effective. In Helen's case, they weren't."

"That's sad. In this world, cancer is very treatable," Oliver said.

"As long as you have enough mana stones to hire a healer. It's very advanced healing magic, required several different healing skills, so it's not cheap." Evan took a sip from his own bottle and considered Oliver's words. The topic had been at the back of his mind since he saw that healing potion fix Oliver's shattered leg.

"Can healers heal everything?"

"Most ordinary diseases and injuries, yes. The more destructive the disease is, the harder it gets, because you need a restorative power to fix the damage after removing the disease, and those a rare. And monster-induced diseases and poisonings are even more difficult. That's… that's what took Miles." Evan saw Oliver swallowing hard. He wasn't sure if it was the right moment to ask questions about his brother, but this was the first time Oliver had mentioned Miles in a while.

"A disease a healer couldn't heal?" he asked quietly.

"Poisoning. I was ten when it happened. Miles and I were in the forest searching for mushrooms, but then a Bloodserpent attacked. That's a snake-like monster. Miles was sixteen. He'd just gotten his Affinity Crystal. Earth, like mine. He thought he could kill the Bloodserpent on his own. He told me to run, so I ran… but when he returned… he…" Oliver trailed off, eyes unfocused, staring at the ground. Evan let him be.

This was clearly a very painful memory, one laced with guilt and regret, so he didn't want to prod any further. He didn't get the chance to, anyway. A woman, maybe in her early forties, with a square face framed by chin-length blond curly hair, approached them. She was wearing a dark blue tunic, decorated with the same silver pin the students wore on their uniforms. Evan jumped up from the bench to greet her.

"You must be Julia." She smiled at him, her pale blue eyes crinkling at the edges.

"And you must be Evan, the world traveler. Simeon told me you have questions. I might have some answers."