I look next to me where Lafia set out her fiancé's clothes. Lying there was a pair of blue high waisted jeans, a Metalania band shirt, a hat with the popular Kid Spider logo, long black formal socks, and a pair of Mikey Mouse gloves.
The arrangement of clothes just kind of left me in awe. Aren't high waisted jeans traditionally for women too? I was tempted to lookaround for something else to wear, other than this bizarre combination that looked like someone did a drive by on a bargain bin. But snooping around felt kind of sacrilegious considering they just took care of me. also I got blood and dirt all over me. I sucked up my stupid ego and put on the clothes, minus the hat and gloves, and made my way towards the front.
"Hey, you look great" Lafia exclaims when I set next to her at the front. there's a space between us, and in it lays a metal box. "But where are the hat and gloves?"
"Yeah, I actually wanted to ask you about that," I responded "What's with these clothes? they're all-"
"Oh so you noticed!" Lafia excitedly intergected. "I'm proud to tell you that my fiance is the only one in this side of the branch to own a full set! and I mean the whole shabang." she smiled at me smugly, as if I was supposed to be wildly impressed.
"A full set?"
"It's easy to own a shirt, or jacket, or even a pair of socks. But to have the whole thing, that's special. Normally we keep them in storage because they all look so strange together, but I thought it would make you feel more comfortable, because they all came from your world."
I almost twitched. It even looked strange to you, but you still wanted me to wear it. Honestly, the high waisted jeans are starting to ride up my butt a little, but I just wanted to move on.
"I might want to buy some clothes later or just maybe wash my old clothes, if I could, but could you first let me know where we are?"
Lafia, who looked a little let down about moving on from the clothes, responded ,"Of course! We can talk over food, I actually prepared some food for you before."
She laid her hand onto the metal box, and on contact, bright purple runes started to shine. The box levitate slowly in the air, as it starts spinning and splitting like a Rubix cube. I looked in awe as the runes circled around the box, floating in mid air. Then suddenly, it all converges and a bright light blinds me for a second. The cube is back to where it was, like nothing ever happened, but with a sandwich placed gently on top of it.
"Be careful when you pick it up." Lafia intergected as I went to pick up the sandwich. "The metal plate is still hot so try not to touch the bottom of the sandwich as you pick it up, you might burn yourself."
"Thanks" I replied. "Still, seems a little dramatic just for a sandwich, no?"
Lafia laughed at that.
"That's what I said when my Master first showed it to me too!" She collected herself for a second. "But it's actually an amazing cube that my master made. He was the first to tap into the fundamentals of Creation magic."
She stopped to look at me in the eyes. Those damn eyes that see everything.
"That sandwich your eating was literally created from nothing. And this cube can make take that nothing and make Hoglins strips, lettuce and tomato sandwiches 5 times a day. It's pretty impressive."
I looked to the cube, then back at her.
"Well if you put it like that..." I mumbled through the bites of what tastes like a normal BLT. "So, where exactly are we?"
"Well, we're on the 31st world tree but I think you already know that. All transmigraters are said to descend from Heaven, so they're usually found in the 4th quadrant of the tree, where the leaves touch the sky the most. But lucky for you, we found you in the upper part of the 3rd quadrant."
"No no" I had to interrupt. "What do you mean? I was definitely on a grassy plain. I did see the tree but we were on the bottom and I saw its trunk and there aren't branches above us"
"I think you're misunderstanding something. this isn't a big tree. This is the World Tree. Literally the World Exists on this tree. what you saw wasn't a trunk, but just a single branch. No, not even a branch, it's where a leaf meets the twig that leads into the branches if the world tree. Meaning you weren't on a plain, you were on a leaf. I think on Earth terms, the branches that would be above us would be as far out as the 'stars in space' or something like that, too far for our eyes to perceive through the atmosphere"
"...But the guy told me before we were on the bottom and-"
"The guy from before also tried to kill you, remember? Maybe he was just trying to make you feel comfortable before he betrayed you or something? Trust me, if we were at the bottom, I wouldn't have to struggle so hard."
Lafia shifted around and I saw a moment of intense stress and panic almost reach her eyes. But they were quickly replaced with her trademark fierce determination.
Looking at her like that, I'm inclined to believe her. She does seem like she's putting a lot of effort into... living I guess. I still don't know what she does here.
I looked around us. We were in a wooded area with the plains far behind us. It looked really looks like a normal forrest to me. Only the conspicuous branch that sat on the horizon be hind the trees in front of me gave away to anything. I see the distant branch retreating away and towards the heavens. It's hard for me to believe that isn't the whole tree.
"So why are you trying reach the bottom of the tree? What's down there?"
Lafia sighs, before responding, "I don't know. an opportunity?" She pauses for a bit. "You're not from here, so it's kind of hard to explain. There's this fairytale about how we came about the world tree, it's kind of a silly story." She looks a little embarrassed. "I have it on me, I could read it to you if you want?"
And I was just about to respond, the dreaded voice came back.
*Ding*
*World info detected. Play cutscene?*
....
....
God damn it.