The roar of a train engines could be heard, crossing the meadow. A female student with pig tails was siting by the window, she was mesmerize by the train and how it moves. The evidence of joy in her face causes the other student to smirk and make fun of her for being a county bumkin.
"Having fun Annabelle?" a male student said sitting down next to her."
Annabelle turn and looked at him, seeing his blue eyes and blonde hair. She also looked at his uniform and seeing a small yellow stain on his white shirt.
"Leo, did you eat something without me?" Annabelle said, while pouting her face.
Leo looked down at his shirt seeing the stain. He wave his right hand over it, and the stain disappeared. "No."
Annabelle started to pound her fist against Leo shoulder, while he thinks to himself, "Finally I'm at the opening of Spirit Blade, it only took twelve years. If the story stay on track, I formal Hirsoshi Satō a twenty two game dev, is now Leo Von Heart; age sixteen, a country bumkin who drove away the tutorial boss and became hero overnight."
Leo had a smile on his face, and he reached into his uniform jacket trying to get his journal that he kept his notes about the game story since he transmigrated in this world, but he felt nothing. He began frantically patting himself trying to look for those notes.
Annabelle saw how distresses Leo, and asked "What wrong?"
"My journal, I can't find them" Leo said looking desperately, standing up and looking on the floor and in-between the seats.
"Have you try your suitcase?"
Leo quickly ran out into the aisle entering the rear carts that they are currently sleeping in. Grabbing the suitcase under the bed and he dumping out his clothes looking for it, but it wasn't there either.
Annabelle enter the room seeing the mess and Leo slump up against the wall, looking broken and defeated. She walked slowly towards him, and sat down next to him.
"So no luck finding it."
Leo remains silent and was deep in thought, those notes contain years worth key story elements and side events that could have helped receive rare items that can't be crafted of obtain through drops.
Leo sigh and stood up, "Keep an eyes out for my journal and tell me if you hear anything about-." he pauses, and "hear" was constantly echoing in his head. "That shady fox." Leo said out loud. Quickly grabbing a pouch and bolting out of the room leaving Annabelle in confusion.
Spirit Blade is an fantasy otome game that follow the typical genre, magic, monster, demon, elves, dwarfs, and beastkins.
Entering the dining cart, Leo see a couple flirting with each other, and spots two grilled fish on the table. Taking a gold coin out his pouch and slammed it on the table. He grab the fish without saying anything, and ran away, leaving the couple stun.
Entering the first class cart seamlessly out of breath, Leo walked and act like he belong here, and try not to bring more attention to himself, but still getting eye down by the student from high noblety. He was a commoner after all, it was practically a death sentence.
As Leo walk down the aisle, he spotted red fox ear above the seat and a red tail with a white tip sticking out the aisle. Stepping closer he turn see a foxkin with long hair and looking graceful and a short hair wolfkin and asked, "Where my journal, Fox?"
Alicia Feywin a deceitful foxkin also one of the five main heroines, despite her red association her true magic is shadow magic and sitting next to her is a nameless wolf guard also dress in student uniform but as a disguise. Normally, Leo was supposed to meet her untill the Barbarians hold the students hostage.
"What makes you think I have it?" Alicia said calmly actting innocently, have her ears down and her eyes slightly teary if Hirsoshi didn't played the game, her act could have fooled him easily.
Leo hold up the two grilled fish, "I was hoping to find the person who has my journal and have lunch with them." he said forcing a smile.
"Well I don't have it." she said looking away submissive.
"Well that a shame, I was hope to try the new tuna recipe." Leo said, taking out and open a jar.
Alicia ears stood up and looked back with her mouth drooley. Out of the five heroines she was the foodie when it comes to fish.
Alicia quickly reached into her purse taking out a small book that looks old and over used and hand it back to him. Leo in return gave her the fish and the tuna.
As she began to eat the fish, Leo was about to walk off, but Alicia grab his arm, "Will you like to know anything before you leave commoner." she said with her mouth filled. Leo with his face turn away grin, Alicia was "the fox who hear all." having early relationship was crucial for progess.
Sitting down in front of her, he asked "I heard that the Kingdom of Baltimore was at war with our kingdom."
"Wow, you're really far out in the country side." Alicia said while look at him like he was an idiot, "The war ended two years ago."
"What?"
"The second princess try to poison the our crown prince, peventing the treaty to be sign and laid wasted to Baltimore kingdom."
"What? He said again but in his mind. Leo was sweating bullets, having his hand placed on his chin deep in thought.
The Baltimore was not supposed to fall at the beginning of the game, and the princess was one of the heroines as well. If she is missing the will have a drastic change.
"Damn that prince, how did he defeat Baltimore so easily." Leo said in his head. "But what has changed, I grab the starter gear and items that you can get at the beginning of the game nothing should have changed."
Look at Alicia, she was obviously disgusted with Leo sitting there in such distress. Leo quickly calmed down and stood up. He took out another jar filled with tuna, "Sorry for take your time."
Handing the other jar over, and quickly left the her area. Alicia motto is "asked once and asked later," If he would have press more questions, she would grow annoyed and push the relationship stats to the negative and lost complete trust.
Opening his journal turn the page the header read 2 years in English, The world of Spirit Blade has it own writing system, so write in English prevented anyone from reading it.
"Year 2: on the 5th of the 4th month, one of the princess attendance will vist Leo at the blacksmith in the biggest east port town, and travels to Baltimore and depending the chose Leo has made, he might have to fight one or two boss as the mid point, the corrupted knight captain and or the crown prince."
Leo was forces on the guide of the second year progress, he fail to notice and ran into Annabelle. She grab the journal and pulled it away, "You are obsess with this journal ever since we left the village, care to explain what is in this book?"
Annabelle try to keep it away from him, but Leo push back refuses to answer her questions. Everyone began to stare at them and cracking jokes.
"Great, now my reputation as a hero is tarnish." Leo through to himself.
The train jerk forward push Annabelle against Leo before it jerk back causing both of them falling to the ground. Leo felt something soft on his face, looking up seeing that he was on top on Annabelle.
Blushing he stood up, and clap his hands together, "Thank you for the pillows." he said out loud.
Annabelle stood with a sinister look, she lifted her hand and red particles appeared. Those are known as spirit and are the base line of magic and makes are categorize by Low; low mana which is a size of a small pond.
Mid; ave mana for mages.
High; that carry far more mana anyone.
And classed as 4th, 3rd, 2nd, or 1st which refers to the highest level of spell one has.
Annabelle was a 3rd, mid tier fire mage. As flames burst from her hand. The train doors opened as barbarians walked in every cart, taking the students one by one. A small group of barbarians enter the cart, point a knife at Leo back. They began to make threats to, but he just ignored them and said "Good, you can deal them."
Annabelle thrown a fireball at Leo, but he jumped into a booth, and the fireball hit the barbarians behind him. Stepping out of the booth, Leo gave her a thumbs up, but Annabelle don't take kindly to and began to producing more fireballs around her. This was her 3rd class spell, will-o-wisp. Hearing more the footsteps of the barbarians approaching them, Leo quickly ran toward Annabelle.
With a snap of her finger, she launched the will-o-wisp. Leo slide underneath the her attack and it strike the incoming barbarians. Leo pick up his journal and ran pass Annabelle and wave to her as he left for the next cart.
Opening his journal look at the act 1 guide, The barbarians will stop the train, by approaching from the front and as soon it stop the second group of barbarians will enter the back carts.
The barbarians weakness is magic, but devs add anti mana items to prevent the players spamming magic. They only have a few of those items here, one for the first class cart and one near the boss, and most students don't know how to fight, so no allys. Annabelle is a passive ally and was not supposed to attack any human enemy's, but was allow to hit Leo for any negative action. He will have to apologize to her after this or risk being negative in her relationship stats.
Enter the next cart, more barbarians showed up, they wielded axs and swords. Leo will have to fight two waves before the boss. Raising his right arm in the air, he brought it down, releasing am air slash easily cut one of them down and his sword drop close to Leo
[Equip One handed iron sword plus 5 attack]
Weapon, accessories, and armor will provide bonuse stats upon equipping, even without a panel to confirm the status but he did test it using his father sword and compare to an ax.
An ax was swing down, nearly stiking Leo, but he quickly jumped back, dodging it. Ax's are slow but quite powerful.
Charging forward, he swing his sword striking down the ax wielder, and follow with an air slash, cutting down the other barbarian.
Oddly he did feel bad about the barbarians, even though they were humans, he felt only satisfaction. He cover his mouth, letting off slight grin.