I used to wonder if someone besides me had come to this world. Then I started suspecting a fellow from my hometown had crossed over. This world has so many Earth-like bits. If it’s coincidence, the planes lined up too perfectly. But today, I finally know for sure. I’m absolutely not the only transmigrant from Earth.

“Red six!” “Green six!” “Green three!” “Yellow three!” “Blue three! UNO!” “Red three!” “Red reverse!” “Red +2!” “Hey… what the heck… you guys planned that, right?”

Yeah, I’m playing UNO with Ilan and five others at the inn in Ailu Village. Crossed into another world and playing UNO. I’m gonna be the man who becomes the UNO king. Scared yet? Damn Aqua, I’ve never seen this strat before anyway.

Here’s how it went. We spent the whole morning on the dragon carriage. Ilan told me a lot of dos and don’ts about Rajeno Forest. We stopped for lunch, and Aefina told me she’d need to eat tomorrow. Then we pushed on and reached Ailu Village before dark. By the way, it’s called Ailu Village, yet there isn’t a single Airou cat. I’m giving that a thumbs-down.

Since we’re moving as a group, we all checked into the same inn. After dinner in the first-floor hall, Grey went back to his room first. I was going to head up with Aefina, but the five of them huddled up so skillfully it yanked me straight back to my middle-school dorm days.

Back then, one guy in our dorm had an MP4 player. The whole dorm knew it, and we knew he liked loading adult videos onto it. So we had this lights-out ritual. After lights out, he’d pull out his MP4, set it to mute, and start watching. The other guys would crowd around, a knot of people watching together. Their faces back then… were exactly like the five in front of me now. For the record, I didn’t crowd in. Seriously.

With that look on my face, wondering if they were about to whip out an MP4 and screen porn in public, Viter crooked a finger at me. “Luo Sa and Aefina, wanna join?” Join what? Watching porn with you? Just so you know, I have transcended low tastes.

Then again, count me in. If you watch with a critical eye, adult videos don’t count as low taste.

Once I sat with Aefina, Viter shot a glance. Granst deftly opened a backpack and started rummaging. Just when I was wondering if he’d really pull out an MP4, he finally drew out a box.

“You guys know UNO?” Viter asked us, wearing a mysterious look.

“What did you say?” I thought I misheard. Aefina didn’t react.

“UNO,” Viter repeated. “A card game. If you don’t know it, we’ll teach you. It’s simple.”

I pulled the box to the center of the table, dumped out the contents, and stared at the familiar cards scattered everywhere. I looked at Viter. “Where’d you get this?”

“Bought it in Osgilia a while back. Seems it got popular these past few years,” Ilan answered. Osgilia is this country’s royal capital, and it’s where Aefina and I are headed.

I figured I had nothing else to do upstairs, so I joined them for UNO. I did ask if Aefina wanted to play, but she didn’t seem interested in this stuff.

Back in the room, I quickly wrote it down. Other transmigrators are basically confirmed. Ilan said it showed up in recent years, which means that person is very likely still in this world, probably in the capital.

“Luo Sa? Worried about that Monstrous Beast?” Aefina suddenly leaned in and asked.

“No, it’s something else. Don’t worry,” I said. This kind of worry probably wouldn’t make sense to Aefina, so I kept it to myself.

“…” Aefina said nothing, walked to my side, and stared at my diary. She went quiet at the sight of those square characters she didn’t know.

“Hey, Aefina, when you’ve got time, I’ll teach you Chinese and how to write hanzi,” I said, looking at her profile.

Aefina trembled slightly at my words. She looked at me, then at the diary, a not-saying-yes, not-saying-no kind of look.

I was in too good a mood after a night of UNO and the first real feeling of home since crossing over. I got closer to Viter’s group without even noticing. I also didn’t notice her reaction, or that I’d kind of neglected her tonight.

“Tomorrow we should enter Rajeno Forest. I’m sleeping. Good night, Aefina.” I climbed into bed, pulled her into my arms, and spoke softly.

“…Mm.” Aefina nodded.

“…” Before long, I was out cold. With Aefina beside me, I slept very soundly.

‘…Asleep?’ Half an hour after I drifted off, Aefina glanced back at me.

“Luo Sa?” she called me gently, in a tone much like when I was plotting something indecent with her. The wheel turns, huh. Difference is, she hadn’t fallen asleep then. I’m dead asleep now.

Once she was sure I was out, Aefina carefully moved my hand aside. She crawled out of bed and walked to the window.

“…” She glanced back at me. Emerald eyes shimmered with complex light.

She opened the window, floated out, then turned back and closed it. Not a sound from start to finish. No one noticed.

Barefoot, Aefina stepped onto the silent night sky. The breeze gently lifted strands of her hair. She looked around, like she was confirming the direction. In the next instant, she simply vanished midair and appeared in Rajeno Forest.

The moment she arrived, the forest’s native denizens went silent as if on cue. The forest turned deathly still, like subjects prostrating under an emperor’s feet.

Aefina shifted in a blink, returning to her original Great Dragon form. Her tail swept unconsciously, and the trees it touched snapped clean like toothpicks. She walked forward slowly. Her tail kept dragging along the ground, brushing over footprints and hiding them. Every animal along the way seemed bound to the earth, frozen, eyes full of terror. At last, Aefina stopped before a herd of Windfang Boars.

They had sharp tusks and nimble bodies. In packs, Windfang Boars aren’t something adventurers want to deal with. Aside from meat and tusks, they have almost no value. In a forest, hunting them is a pain. So in Rajeno Forest, they live quite well.

But that was all in the past. What keeps them alive is a joke in front of Aefina. As for value, Aefina had her eyes on their meat.

With one paw, she slapped the biggest boar dead. It didn’t even resist. Then she started eating it raw. In that dead-still forest, you could hear a Great Dragon chew, and bones crack.

The herd lying on the ground could only grit their tusks in silence. The aura rolling off this monster was too terrifying. No thoughts of resistance even formed. They could only pray that the monster wouldn’t pick them.

Aefina ate four in a row before stopping. She licked the blood from the corner of her mouth with her tongue, then wiped it with her claw in a very human way. Seeing this shivering herd, she didn’t plan to bully them further. She flapped her wings and left.

It had been less than half an hour since she slipped out. Aefina checked the moon to confirm the time.

“…It’s just magic. I can…” Aefina thought of what happened before. Unhappy, she flipped in place in the air. She let out a small puff of dragon breath, which corroded a pit in the ground.

“…No, not like that.” She looked at the pit, a bit crestfallen. Clearly, that wasn’t magic.

She thought for a moment, then released a lot of mana, compressed it into a sphere, and fired it toward the sky.

Boom! The highly compressed mana sphere detonated violently midair.

“…Also not like that.” Feeling the blast wind, Aefina shook her head. That wasn’t magic either.

She fussed in the sky for quite a while and still couldn’t cast even a basic little fireball.

Aefina landed by a river. Her wings drooped. She looked very downcast. No matter how she tried and how she moved the mana inside her, she couldn’t cast magic. At most, she could only release raw mana as a direct impact. And that doesn’t count as magic.

Aefina swung her claw, slamming the river. Like a torpedo exploding underwater, tons of river water blasted into the sky, then fell like rain. Aefina’s strength was terrifying. Even a casual swipe felt like she’d cracked the river in half.

“I’m strong… Even without magic, I’m strong, Luo Sa…” Aefina spun once in place.

‘It’s late. Better go back…’ She checked the moon again. With a whoosh, she shifted back to her human form. In a blink, she returned to the room. She climbed into bed soft and slow, slipped into my arms, same as before.

In my sleep, I had no idea Aefina had snuck out tonight, or what she did.

Night slipped away without a sound.

“Aefina, morning.” She woke me, and I greeted her.

“…Morning.” Aefina already had her clothes on. She walked over to stand beside me.

“What’s wrong?” Something about her felt a little off. I couldn’t say where.

“…” Aefina shook her head and didn’t speak.

“Not feeling well?” I asked.

“…” She shook her head again.

Seeing that, I didn’t press it. If something’s up, she’ll tell me. That’s what I thought.

As usual, I took Aefina’s hand. We grabbed our luggage and left the room. We met the adventuring party in the first-floor hall.

“Ilan and Rio, check the gear. See if we missed anything,” Viter said after breakfast. Ilan and Rio are careful and handle the prep. Two careful people mess up less than one. Rio looks big-hearted and burly, but you’d never guess he’s actually meticulous.

And just like that, I set out on my first “adventure” since crossing over.