Facing Reality

Hades kicked open the half-height stable door, and the scent of hay rushed toward him. He greedily breathed it in twice. Such a purely natural smell was rare in his world, found only at a few high-end experience farms.

But that satisfaction quickly faded. Before him stood a pitch-dark building, with moonlight spilling in through the "gaps" in the roof and wooden walls.

Calling them "gaps" wasn't quite right. The spaces between the roof and walls had clearly been left open on purpose for ventilation. Aside from the piles of hay inside the stable, there was nowhere to keep warm.

Carrying the basket Enri had given him, Hades went over to a pile of hay and grabbed a handful. He brought it to his nose and sniffed. At least the hay didn't smell strange.

Fortunately, the stable hadn't been used yet. Apart from the scents of wood and hay, there were no odd smells. Hades sat cross-legged on the hay on the ground and lifted the piece of burlap covering the basket to keep out dust.

Inside were several long, brown loaves of bread, with a clay pot beside them. Hades picked up the pot and shook it. There was liquid inside. He peered through the opening by moonlight and made out a few bean-like things beneath the murky surface.

He sniffed it. Though it had an indescribable smell, he could also detect the aroma of beans and a little salt.

It was probably some kind of broth made by boiling beans. He took the wooden spoon from the basket and stirred it. The smell of beans made his stomach feel even emptier.

Even so, he really didn't dare try it. Agriculture had nearly collapsed in his world, but it hadn't gone extinct. For the wealthy, life had hardly changed.

Hades had never eaten anything like this. The broth's strange smell made him recoil, but at least there was still bread. However, the moment he picked up one of the grayish-brown loaves, the feel of it in his hand told him something was wrong.

The bread was hard.

He gently squeezed it, but couldn't make a dent. Hades froze. Looking at the bean soup in the clay pot, he immediately understood what it was for.

Hades couldn't help grumbling inwardly. Without the soup, he probably wouldn't be able to eat the bread at all. Thank goodness that girl, Enri, had a kind heart, or he'd have cracked a few teeth.

He wasn't stupid. It was obvious Enri's father had only meant to give him a few pieces of black bread as hard as stone.

Still, he couldn't complain. Enri's father had been willing to help a stranger who'd knocked on his door in the middle of the night. That alone showed he was a good man.

Besides, perhaps they weren't well-off. Enri had clearly taken more food than her father had asked her to give him. She might even get scolded for it later.

Thinking of that, he felt grateful, and the strange-smelling bean soup seemed a little easier to swallow.

Hades dipped the bread, hard enough to rival stone, into the soup and took a huge bite with a loud crunch. Unexpectedly, though it felt hard, it wasn't all that difficult to chew.

The taste still made him frown, but he was hungry and couldn't afford to be picky. Before long, he'd polished off the bread. He tipped back his head and gulped down all the soup, too.

Hades rubbed his stomach and leaned against the haystack, letting out a soft burp. The taste rising from his stomach made him frown again.

It had been awful, as far as he was concerned, but at least it had filled his stomach.

"Well..."

Hades abruptly sat upright. He looked at the now-empty basket, rubbed his stomach, then licked his lips. The expression on his face suddenly fell.

"Just as I thought. This is the real world..."

Hades reluctantly accepted the fact. Until now, he'd still clung to the hope that a malfunction had trapped him in a virtual world.

But no matter how realistic a virtual world was, it couldn't simulate eating. Smell, taste, and swallowing were sensations that couldn't possibly be reproduced in a virtual world.

Hades admitted he'd simply been unwilling to face the truth. In fact, he'd noticed a sense of smell his virtual equipment couldn't simulate as soon as he arrived in this world.

But it would have been ridiculous to conclude he was in the real world based on smell alone. He needed to find proof that he was trapped in a virtual world.

But that slap and this meal had shattered his illusions completely. Hades felt like crying, but reason told him that panicking wouldn't help his current situation.

"First..."

Hades stood and rolled his shoulders. If the information that had flashed through his mind while talking to Enri's father hadn't been a hallucination, then although he'd come to another world, he seemed to have retained everything from YGGDRASIL.

He tried summoning his character information panel again. Sure enough, a set of data appeared in his mind the next instant.

Character Name: Hahaha Hades

Race: Human

Gender: Male

Karmic Value: 200

Alignment: Good

Role: Warrior (Monk—Specialized in Hand-to-Hand Combat)

Classes: Monk 10, Ki Monk 10, Outer Ki Monk 10, Ki Master 10, Dragon Breath Walker 5, Undying 5, Duelist 10, Duel Master 10, Master Martial Artist 10, Champion 10, Invincible 5, Transcendent 5.

Looking at the information, both familiar and unfamiliar, Hades suddenly remembered that he'd flown down from the sky. As a pure Warrior, he couldn't use magic, but using an item was no problem.

He touched the Necklace of Flight tucked inside his clothes and paused for a moment. He silently willed it to activate, intending only to test it, but it worked at once.

His body seemed to lose all weight, and he slowly floated into the air. At the same time, he instantly understood how to control his flight.

He'd experienced this once before, when he first crossed over. He'd been flying at the time, and the drastic change in his surroundings had made him overlook this "trivial" detail.

A little while later, Hades ended the flight effect. After taking a few deep breaths, he stared solemnly at the wrist of his right arm. His heart suddenly began to race.

Clinging tightly to his wrist was a dark green bracelet. It was an item, and it didn't take up an equipment slot.

Although it wasn't equipment, this item was more important than any piece of equipment. It was one of the only two hundred World Items in YGGDRASIL: the Seed of the World Tree.

Hades didn't know if the item would activate successfully. After all, changing races was too absurd to be possible in the real world.

No, if he was talking about absurdity, flying in the real world with nothing but a necklace was impossible, too. Hades hadn't fully accepted that this was the real world before, but now that he thought about it, from the very beginning he'd been in a situation that couldn't happen in the real world.

"Activate."