Chapter Six
Warmth
I made my way over to Rosie’s place earlier than I needed to since I could just tell that I would get lost in exploring the city and lose track of time if I stayed out for much longer.
There was too much that I wanted to see with my own two eyes, no matter how many times I saw it through a screen before.
But what I did see was a beautiful world.
There dozens of different races of people walking around, knights on patrol who wore stylish hybrid uniforms mixing classic knight armor with modern aesthetics, taverns full of rowdy patrons sharing stories and singing songs, airships docking with warehouses, architecture out of a fairy tale—I could have gone on and on about the sights, but there was one sight more recognizable than anything else.
In the center of the city were the Heroes’ Towers.
Three beautiful, marble towers reaching higher into the sky than any other building with banners flowing in the wind belonging to each of the original heroes’ families.
The banners themselves were the impressive part because of just how unrealistically massive they were while still being able to flow with the wind.
I was so tempted to run over there and see if they offered tours, but I resisted. I also resisted interviewing every random person I saw to learn more about their lives and the world. There were so many people who I never saw in the game! I wanted to get to know every single one of them!
But that would probably make me look like a crazy person, unfortunately. Most people probably wouldn’t appreciate some random guy running up to them asking them all about their lives.
Anyways, what mattered was that I was standing in front of Rosie’s place unsure of how to proceed.
The normal thing was to knock on the door, right?
I never knocked on someone’s door before and there was no point in the game that featured having to knock on a door. It had been years since I last watched anything that showed someone knocking on a door, too.
Somehow, knocking on the door felt like a bigger leap in difficulty than going from an early-game dungeon to a mid-game dungeon.
Still, it was a challenge that needed defeated, so I lifted my hand up and knocked on the door to the best of my ability, trying not to be too quiet but also not too loud.
My social skills were going to need a lot of help.
Sure, I could talk to random people since I was used to nurses always getting hired and replaced at my nursing home, plus I sometimes had to share a room with chatty roommates with even chattier families who would visit, so I got used to talking to people.
It was everything else that I had no idea about.
Thankfully, the door opened so that I wouldn’t need to knock again… and standing in front of me was a woman who proved my theory about Frolin’s mountain climbing.
The woman who I could only assume was Rosie’s mom and Frolin’s wife was massive.
Even taller than me, having to bend over just to get her head under the doorframe, with breasts so large that they completely covered her torso and hung to her hips.
It wasn’t like they were all stretched out and saggy, either.
Sure, there was some sagging going on, but they still looked full and youthful. They were just that big.
The way that she bent over to see me also meant that she was basically hanging an endless expanse of cleavage in front of my face.
Sorry, Frolin, I thought.
It wasn’t like I was looking into his wife’s cleavage out of perverse intent. It was simply impossible to not look. Still, I felt guilty.
“Mm? Moh, are you the boy Frofro told me about?” the woman asked me.
Frofro. “Unless there’s multiple guys worth mentioning today, then probably,” I answered. “I’m Sev.”
I finally took my eyes away from her chest and looked up at her face.
She was the stereotype of motherly. Long, braided hair.
A single mole under her eye. Beautiful, mature features.
She was the kind of woman who existed in games and stories only for everyone to curse the fact that she wasn’t romanceable.
“Sev! What a cute name. I’m Ailsa. Please, come in,” she said, her voice naturally sultry as she stepped back to make way for me.
Damn.
That was all I could think.
Damn.
“There he is!” And there was Frolin. Seeing him next to his wife was…
something. He was small enough and she was big enough that he could probably fit most of his body inside of that forbidden valley.
His head only reached up to her waist, too, and just one of her thighs was thicker than his entire body.
You’re the man, Frofro, I thought.
And just to make sure that I understood who Ailsa belonged to, he rather obviously placed his hand on the back of her ass while looking me in the eyes. “We’re happy to have you!” he told me.
“Mmmoh, dear, not in front of company,” Ailsa whimpered to him.
There were so many questions I had about the two of them that I would probably never get the answers to.
But there was one thing that became incredibly obvious.
Frolin’s blood nerfed Rosie in more ways than just her height when comparing her to her mother.
That aside, Frolin gave his wife’s rear a squeeze before letting go with a hearty laugh. “Alright! C’mon, boy. It’s our turn to make the ladies happy, and there’s nothing like some fresh, homemade pasta to make a girl raise her heels over her head for ya.”
Ailsa covered up her blushing cheeks and looked away, totally confirming what her husband said.
Pasta must have been more powerful than I thought.
“You’ll have to wear one of my wife’s aprons since I don’t think mine will fit ya,” Frolin continued. “Oh, and I’ll have her grab you one of her hair ties. Don’t want that hair of yours getting into the food.”
I hadn’t even considered something like that being a possibility, but my hair was longer than most for guys.
By modern standards, at least. It wasn’t like I had hair going down my back or anything, but I did make it long enough to almost reach my shoulders.
That meant there was enough to tie back to keep out of the way.
“I’ll be in your care,” I said. “Teach me the ways of pasta.”
Frolin nodded with a confident smile and led me into the kitchen.
“I—I’m sorry,” I said as I looked down at the monument to all my sins.
“I don’t even know how that’s possible,” Frolin said. “It’s impressive, just in all the wrong ways. I only looked away for a couple minutes…”
You see…
The noodles.
I somehow burned them.
While they were in a pot full of water.
That wasn’t even supposed to be possible, right? Was this world using some kind of weird logic to emphasize just how bad of a cook someone was? Seriously, how did that make any sense?!
“I’ve… never cooked before,” I said. “Sorry.”
“Never cooked before, huh? Well, it happens,” Frolin said.
“I thought you didn’t even know how it was possible.”
“Maybe this doesn’t happen, but making mistakes happens. But seriously, a man of your age has never cooked? You come from a rich family with maids who cook for ya every day or something? Or maybe you’ve got some moms and other wives who keep ya fed?”
“Nothing like that. I just uh… up until very recently, I spent most of my life in a hospital, basically.” I figured that would get the point across better than saying a nursing home, but…
“A hospital?”
Right. Those didn’t exist here. There was no need for them when there were healers who could instantly cure diseases and heal wounds.
“A place for people who can’t take care of themselves.
I was born pretty weak, then… some things happened that messed up my spine, and healers couldn’t fix it, so…
there are probably a lot of basic things I have no idea how to do.
Even when it came to knocking on the door, I felt nervous since I never had to do something like that before, aha… ”
Crap.
I was oversharing.
I didn’t need to say all of that. Besides, wasn’t the story too suspicious? Without explaining that I was from another world, it made no sense. If what I said was true, how was I walking around and fighting in a dungeon?
“Sorry,” I said. “You probably don’t want to hear the grown man who likes your daughter saying that he gets nervous knocking on a door, plus you said I have to make sure I can cook properly for her, and—”
“Son,” Frolin said, gesturing for me to get closer to him. “Come here.”
He sounded pretty serious. I had no idea what was going to happen, but I crouched down to try and bring my eye level closer to his.
He must have been disappointed in me. I only knew about how to fight and mess around with builds, not how to do anything else. And my knowing how to fight didn’t even feel truly earned. Realistically, I should have been stumbling around like a newborn lamb who could barely walk. I really wasn’t—
Frolin placed his hand against the top of my head and gave it a gentle rub. “You’ve been through a lot, haven’t ya?”
“Not—not that much,” I said, trying to hold back the feelings I felt were about to burst out.
“There’s nothing wrong with not knowing how to do things, alright? The important thing is that you do your best. I don’t want a man who has given up around my daughter, but you haven’t given up, have you?”
“… no, in my past, I did. I resigned myself to my fate and—”
“But you’re trying your best now, aren’t you?”
“Sorry,” I said, my voice cracking. “I uh—” I tried to pull away, but I was stopped. Frolin reached forward to force me into a hug that he refused to let go of.
“My old man was a real piece of shit,” Frolin explained. “I told myself I wouldn’t be like him. If I saw someone who needed a hug, I’d give them a hug. If I saw someone who needed help, I’d help them.”
My emotions were all over the place ever since I came to this world.
I hadn’t cried in over a decade back on Earth. But, here, I was brough to tears multiple times in just a few hours.
I felt pathetic.
But… at the same time, I felt happy, and I felt like I could finally be honest about everything.