Chapter Text
You both find yourselves standing in the quiet yet busy town of Axel. You hear the soothing sounds of a river passing through the city canals. There are many villagers of various shapes and sizes, all going about their normal business. You then turn to face one another.
“Introduce yourselves,” Yuzaki said, gently adjusting his glasses from behind the cardboard screen in front of him. His messy black hair had to be constantly pushed out of his eyes so he could see.
“Um… I’m Kazuma Satou, a reincarnate adventurer. I uh… used to live in Japan but then died and reincarnated here,” Kazuma said, awkwardly glancing between his character sheet in front of him and the two other two people at the table.
“What does Kazuma look like, Kazuma?” said Yuzaki.
“B-Brownish hair, green eyes, and a green mantle,” Kazuma read off the few details he’d written under the appearance section.
“So… your character is just you, but with different clothes?” Akari Mizuki said, staring blankly at her childhood friend. “Real original idea there.”
"Look, the book was complicated so I just read the first option for each category and went with that,” said Kazuma, rolling his eyes. The only reason he was here in the first place was because of Akari’s insistence that he join a club this year. “And I don’t recall there being any rules that say I can’t play as myself.”
“Hmph,” Akari said. She casually flipped her dark bangs out of her eyes. “Fine. I am the goddess Aqua, in the form of a Goddess Avatar whose class is an Archpriest. I am here to finally slay the evil Devil King who threatens this world! I have a picture of her. See?”
Akari raises a drawing to the table, depicting a very pretty-looking girl who looked less like a goddess and more like an idol.
“So… you just made yourself… but prettier?” Kazuma pointed out the similarities in facial structure and hairstyle.
“And a goddess,” Akari reminded him, tapping him on the forehead. “I’m allowed to be hot in fantasy worlds.”
“Now now, everyone,” said Yuzaki, really not wanting this to escalate. “Everyone likes to play a little differently. Say, may I have a closer look at your character sheets? It’ll help me with figuring things out later.
"Sure, I don't know what I was doing anyway," Kazuma said, handing over his sheet.
"Here you go!" Akari said a big grin on her face. Her smile always made Yuzaki uncomfortable. Whenever Akari was smiling, it always meant she was proud of herself. And when she was proud of herself, it usually wasn’t for a very happy reason…
“Let’s start with Kazuma’s character- oh my,” Yuzaki did a double take. “Um… Kazuma?”
“Yes, I’m Kazuma.”
“You didn’t pick a class.”
“Yeah, I couldn't find one that I met the stat requirement for," Kazuma said. “I thought I had enough for Mage, but apparently not.”
“…You put almost all of your stat points into Luck.”
“The book said Luck helps with everything, right? And the base adventurer class can take any skill from any class, so I’ll just be a jack-of-all-trades!” Kazuma gave a thumbs-up.
“…that’s quite creative…” Yuzaki nodded, though was internally screaming to try and figure out how to design an encounter around that.
“Hah! With a build like that, good luck doing any real damage!” Akari smirked as she handed over her own character sheet.
“Hey… are goddesses really a playable race?” said Kazuma.
"Technically it's a subrace of the Divine Being race," said Yuzaki. "And to take it, you're not allowed to take a Cheat."
“Oh right,” Kazuma recalled the entry in the book. A Cheat was a special trait that gave a character both advantages and disadvantages.
"I get 40 bonus stat points, a free Uncommon magic item, bonuses on several different skills- "
"In exchange, her Intelligence and Luck will always be at zero," Yuzaki explained. "And a few other things too. And don't worry, I've already checked over that race ahead of time. She isn't getting away with any power gaming on my watch.” He winked. Then he took another close look. “Uh guys, you didn’t write anything for your backstories.”
“We’ll figure that out later,” Akari waved her hand. “Let’s get to the adventuring!”
Yuzaki sighed. He had hoped to lay the groundwork for a personal story for each and every player, but apparently, that wasn't happening today.
“Alright then,” Yuzaki said. “What would you like to do?
“Uh, what can we do?” said Kazuma. The GM smiled, eager to indoctrinate the newest member.
“That’s the beauty of tabletop roleplaying games,” he said. “You can do anything you want, only limited by your imagination.”
“…Then I look for the adventurer’s guild!” Kazuma declared.
Akari facepalmed.
“How would he even know there is one of those?” she said.
"Well, that's what I would do. There's always something like this in every RPG," Kazuma said.
“…Okay, I’ll allow it,” said Yuzaki. “Axel’s a pretty big place though. Which gives me the perfect opportunity to explain how skill checks work.”
Yuzaki handed over a pair of six-sided dice.
“On your character sheet, there should be a list of numbers with a plus or minus in front of them next to each of your stats. Those are called modifiers. Find the one next to the Sense stat, which represents how good your character is at being aware of things.”
“Okay… I have +0.”
“That's not bad, but it's not good either," said Akari.
“That’s your modifier, it’s determined by the stat. Roll the dice, add them together with your modifier… which is negligible in this situation… and if the total is high enough, you’ll succeed in finding the guild. If not, you’ll fail.”
“Alright, here goes!” Kazuma gently shook the dice in his hand and let them fall onto the table. “9.”
“Success!” Yuzaki said.
The two of you manage to find the impressive building that is the Adventurer’s Guild with relative ease. It’s the largest structure in the whole village, with tall, decorated walls, a clean rooftop supporting a central clock and bell tower, and stained-glass windows depicting famous adventurers from times long past. The two of you enter the building, where you see many tables at which people eat or chat. There's a large corkboard up against the wall where adventures are scouring for an easy buck. In addition, there are a series of desks at which many receptionists sit and talk with adventurers lined up behind them.
A young blonde woman with very large breasts-
“Wait, what?” said Akari, raising an eyebrow.
Yuzaki blinked before looking over his notes.
“Uhm… I rolled on the wrong table… whatever, just ignore it.”
-comes up to the two of you with a friendly smile.
“Welcome to the Adventurer’s Guild. I’m Luna; how can I help you?”
“Alright, Kazuma!” Akari confidently raised her finger. “Time to show you what true roleplay looks like!”
“You could start by coming over to my place and we could have some fun together if you know what I mean?"
“Akari! Not that kind of roleplay!” Yuzaki said, a huge blush on his face.
“Come on! I've never hit on a girl before, give me a little slack!" Akari awkwardly fidgeted slightly, trying to hide her own blush. “But that’s totally what Aqua would do!”
“That isn’t the point!”
“Um…” Kazuma raised his hand. “Can I talk to Luna?”
“…Go ahead,”
“Sorry about her, Miss Luna,” Kazuma shoves Aqua to the side. “What she means to say is that we just rolled into town looking for some adventuring work. See, as it stands right now, we don’t have a single penny to our name, but we sure got the spunk and the know-how. Know what I’m saying?”
“Oh, you want to register with the guild!” Luna breathes a sigh of relief. She hands you each a form, which you fill out with your information, not necessarily agreeing to anything, but information that the guild can use for its own purposes. "Aaand, that should about do it! You're now officially adventurers! Head on over to the quest board to find your first job. Be safe out there!”
“We will!” Kazuma chuckles and continues. "And thank you for your help, Miss Luna. Luckily, we ran into a very pleasant receptionist.”
“Oh, stop it!” Luna laughs along, blushing slightly.
"Okay, that was…" Akari paused a good few seconds, her eyes wide. “…really impressive. How’d you pick that up so fast?”
“Video games,” Kazuma shrugged. He wasn’t lying, he just said something he’d heard once in an RPG.
Just then, the sound of the school bell signaled the end of the club session. And by extension, the game session.
“Huh?” Kazuma looked up at the clock. “Wow, time really flies when you play this game.”
"A shame, I didn't get to use my character at all today," Akari sighed.
“This was only session zero. Next time will be a lot longer," Yuzaki smiled. "In the meantime, your characters will be doing day labor to make some money.”
“Day labor?” Kazuma and Akari pictured their sharply dressed adventurers lifting around construction materials and spreading mortar and resisted the urge to giggle.
Yuzaki shut the book in his hands. “So, what did you guys think?”
Kazuma and Akari exchanged looks.
“I mean… not a lot of stuff really happened,” said Kazuma.
KONOSUBA!
As club time was over, the group proceed to pack up their things. Kazuma and Akari delicately secured their character sheets in their binders and returned their dice to the central storage bin in the middle of the room. They then pulled apart the desks they had used to form their game table, putting away the GM screen, laptop, dice cup, and tape recorder into the classroom storage and the rest into Yuzaki's backpack. And with that, the Tabletop Roleplay Club ended their first club session with a success.
“Thanks again for joining the club, Kazuma,” Yuzaki smiled warmly at the other male of the group. “Akari and I were seriously concerned that we wouldn’t be able to find any new members for the club.”
Yuzaki was the quiet type in class who could always be found at the back of the class reading a book or staring out the window. His glasses, extremely messy black hair, and violet eyes, only served to further this view of him. Nonetheless, it was clear that his proper place was at the tabletop, not the classroom.
“Hey, don’t worry about it.” brown-haired, green-eyed Kazuma smiled back at him. “If anything, I should be thanking you. I would hate to end up joining a creepy or lame club, like the anime club or, heaven forbid, the literature club. And besides, this was actually kinda fun. I’m sure we’ll get some new members soon.”
Kazuma’s life had taken a turn for the worse after Eighth Grade. The only thing that spared him a life as a young hikikomori was his childhood friend who attended the same school as him. Regardless, he had spent most of his time in his room playing RPGs and whatnot as opposed to anything else. It was only at his childhood friend’s assertion, or more accurately insults, that he ended up joining a club at all.
“Don’t worry, with the super cool poster I put up, we’ll have some new members in no time!” Akari raised a thumbs-up.
Akari and Kazuma lived next door to each other for a good while. Whenever Kazuma got stuck in a rut, Akari would be the one to drag him out. Whenever Akari was feeling lonely, Kazuma would invite her for games. While Kazuma feared the world outside of their fantasies, and Yuzaki wanted to pretend it never existed, Akari very much resented what lay outside of her comfort zone. And while she hated to admit it, she envied pretty, popular, idol-like girls. Not just because she wanted to be them, well at least her version of what that meant. But because she also wanted them.
All three of these socially inept outcasts had formed something vaguely resembling a club to play the popular tabletop role-playing game: Fantastic Dreamer. A system that had an emphasis on humor and bizarre characters.
But for now, they would resume their lives as high school students.