A new friend to show them the ropes.

“Hello? I’m volunteering with the Acclimation Club. I noticed this room got filled,” a pleasant voice called through the wooden door. “I don’t want to rush you; I’m just letting you know that I’m here when you’re ready. You’re welcome to stay in that room for as long as you need to; I won’t come in until you invite me.”

Arianna appreciated this idea. The memory of the discovery of her **** back in Vardt’s office was still fresh in her mind. If these rooms were one of the places new souls normally ended up in Melfluere, she could understand their necessity. That explained why the room was so simple and plain. It was inoffensive, easy on the eyes, nothing that could potentially overwhelm somebody who just came here for the first time after dying.

She also appreciated the general attitude of this woman a lot more than Vardt. She sounded very sensitive, comforting, and caring in a way that the blue receptionist wasn’t.

That being what it was, Arianna was perfectly calm by this point. “You can come in now if you want,” she called back. Not seeing any clothing nearby, Arianna decided to maintain some degree of decency by covering her nipples and privates with her arms. The voice sounded like a lady, so she wasn’t too concerned about her nudity.

“O-oh,” the voice returned, “that’s surprising. Most people need at least another hour or so to gather themselves.” The wooden door was pushed open, and a beautiful woman stepped through. She was slightly taller than Arianna and Zander with wavy fiery orange hair and gorgeous glittering golden eyes. When she saw Arianna, she stopped dead in her tracks and widened her eyes. “Oh.”

“Something wrong?” Arianna asked.

“N-no, I’m just surprised to see that you’re a demon, forgive me if that sounds rude.”

“Not at all, I’m just as surprised as you are. I wasn’t a demon when I died.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed, “Interesting.”

“And I’m not overwhelmed because I didn’t, uh, start here. I was in the… Ministry for Misplaced Souls? I think that’s what it was called.

Her eyes widened again, “One surprise after another. Tell me, by chance did you happen to be contacted by any deities or god-like beings after you died?” Arianna noted that she was asking a lot of questions but was doing so in a conversational tone. And of course, this all was probably relevant to her acclimation efforts.

“Yeah, an abyssal. Ilvaneth was what she called herself.”

The woman cleared her throat, “And what did he tell you?” the gentle pronoun correction was not lost on Arianna who took it in stride. She was only confused on the matter because Vardt had used both male and female descriptors when referring to the abyssal.

“That he wanted help corrupting this school or something like that. It sounded fun.”

Arianna could almost see a weight get lifted from the woman’s shoulders. She certainly relaxed a bit and gave her a calm and almost flirty smile, “And what’s your name?”

Arianna blushed at the smile and wondered if her flushed cheeks would be visible while she had red skin. “Arianna,” she replied, “Arianna Finley.”

“Nice to meet you, I’m Natessa. I’m going to be showing you the ropes of this school and getting you acquainted with afterlife in general. You and I are going to be working together very closely from now on.” As she said this, she sauntered up closer to Arianna, shimmying and swaying her hips and making her purple plaid skirt flutter as she did. Natessa was sizing her up in a way that made Arianna think she should have found a better way to cover herself after all.

Or at least that’s what she would have thought if she frankly didn’t love the way this gorgeous lady was molesting her with her pretty golden eyes. And honestly, could she even blame her? Arianna considered herself quite a bombshell now.

“I think the first piece of advice I should give you,” Natessa said, stopping just in front of the Arianna and smoothly brushing a lock of jet-black hair away from Arianna’s cheek, “is to not be quite so tense. We’re going to have a lot of fun together, you and I.”

Suddenly, the sound of a flushing toilet filled the suite and both women froze in place. Arianna realized that she had failed to tell Natessa about the other occupant. After a heartbeat of silence, they could hear the sound of running water from a sink.

The newcomer just seemed confused and looked toward the bathroom door, “Is there someone else in here?”

As if to answer, the door swung open the reveal the stark-naked frame of Zander scratching the back of his head, “Yo, Ari, you’re not gonna believe this. I was literally peeing for like, five minutes straight. I think I can just pee forever now…” It was at this moment he realized Arianna was not alone in the main room. He gawked wide-eyed at Natessa.

“Who is this?” Natessa asked, turning to Arianna.

“That’s my boyfriend.”

“My name’s Alexander Grant III, my friends call me Zander,” as he said this, he approached and made a motion to shake hands with the newcomer, doing his best to put on an air of suaveness. He was clearly just as smitten by Natessa as Arianna had been.

“And by ‘friends’ he means me,” Arianna added.

Natessa shook his hand somewhat awkwardly, “Where did he come from? These rooms are only accessible by their original occupants and those with acclimation club business.”

Arianna did her best to explain that they both ended up here at the same time, were both in the Ministry for Misplaced Souls together, and been contacted by Ilvaneth before they arrived. They both conveyed the fact that they weren’t from Halphor, instead being from another world entirely.

“Well, that will make showing you the ropes more interesting at least. I’m Natessa Luna, by the way, head of the Twilit Dragon Institute’s disciplinary committee.”

Both Arianna and Zander froze at this. If the two of them were on a mission from some sort of demonic god to corrupt a school, hindsight dictated that telling anybody from that school was a bad idea, but especially bad if they blabbed to the head of the disciplinary committee. Arianna kicked herself for talking about it earlier, she should have thought that one through.

To their surprise, Natessa chuckled warmly, however, “Don’t let my title fool you, I’m on your side, actually. But you should definitely be on better guard from now on. I am a clandestine follower of Ilvaneth, myself. I’ve been volunteering in the acclimation club by his command. You have nothing to fear from me or the rest of the disciplinary squad, they are also covert members of the Dark Princess’ cult.”

“Oh,” Arianna sighed, “that’s a relief.”

“I probably would have pissed myself if I hadn’t just gotten done doing that,” Zander admitted letting out a long breath. He did note, but did not share, that his asshole clenched the moment Natessa said “disciplinary”.

Natessa laughed charmingly and smiled at them both.

“Say, uh, Natessa,” Zander began, clearing his throat, “do you happen to know why I can just pee forever? I’m still a little weirded out by that.”

“Also,” Arianna added, “why exactly do we need to pee at all? If these bodies are new there shouldn’t be anything in them to pee out, right?”

Natessa explained that, in general, many of the things that the pair thought of as necessities were no longer so. They could go without food or drink and didn’t even technically need to breathe. She didn’t recommend going without any of those things, however, as even though they weren’t necessary, going without them could still be very uncomfortable. People who ate and drank would still need to use the restroom periodically, though there was magic available that would eliminate even this need.

But she went on to say that Arianna and Zander hadn’t reincarnated into the same kind of creature they were when they died, they had reincarnated into demons who worked a bit differently. Demons were the physical manifestation of desire, excess, and pleasure so their physiology worked differently. The reason the two of them could urinate as much as they wanted and whenever they wanted without running out was simply because there were some who might want to enjoy such things recreationally.

“In any case, I’m sure you’ll get used to the feeling,” Natessa said. “There’s a lot about Melfluere that you’re going to have to get used to. But once you do, I think you’ll find it’s quite nice.”

Natessa began going over the basics at that point, making sure Zander and Arianna understood the fundamentals. Firstly, she got them dressed, informing them that there were clothes in the armoire and dresser. Inside they found school uniforms for the academy, Arianna’s being nearly identical to Natessa’s save for a silver crescent-moon clip on her short sleeve that Arianna didn’t have. This was apparently an accessory to denote her position as a member of the disciplinary squad. On the other hand, the male uniform was similar to the female one, but it had a pair of black slacks instead of a skirt.

Once the two were dressed, Natessa showed them that they each had an “inventory” which was an extradimensional space where they could register and store their various belongings. While other people could store a registered item in their own inventory, the designated owner could instantly transport it to their own inventory. It was possible to bypass the registration, but it was not an easy task.

Storing something required bodily contact, so the pair practiced by storing the ties of their uniforms. They found they could summon them again with some practice by exerting very little mental effort, like a muscle they had never flexed before. Ultimately, Zander and Arianna chose to go sans tie, they were optional anyway, and they both thought they looked cooler without them.

“Next we should talk about your jobs,” Natessa said.

“Jobs? You mean we have to work?” There was despair in Zander’s voice as he asked this. It seemed even in **** he couldn’t escape the daily grind.

Natessa chuckled, “No, not that kind of job. Sometimes they are called ‘classes’, ‘occupations’, or ‘professions’.”

“Oh!” Arianna exclaimed then turned to her boyfriend, “she means like game jobs, like in the Infinite Fantasy games or Lairs & Liches.”

“Wow, RPG mechanics are baked into this place, we really have been isekai’d haven’t we?”

Natessa was visibly confused by most of this exchange, but carried on anyway, assuming they got the idea, “Yes, sure, I suppose. In Melfluere, each job comes with various statistics that determine what you are physically capable of and your overall aptitudes for various tasks. Before you ask, no, we aren’t sure why any of this is the case. It simply is, and we’ve learned that questioning it is ultimately fruitless.”

“How do we know what ours are?” Arianna asked.

Natessa responded by showing both of them how to properly look inside themselves to see all of their various statistics and aspects. Like their inventory management, this involved “flexing” a mental “muscle”. Once they did, they could see a lot about themselves including what was in each of their current inventories.

The feeling was strange and took some getting used to, but once they did, they both thought it wasn’t all that dissimilar to opening a menu in a videogame or glancing down at a character sheet. Natessa was surprised and shocked to see how well they were handling it, and Arianna attributed it to their experience in things like videogames. It certainly made it way easier to mentally compartmentalize, and she could understand why people who didn’t have access to videogames would struggle with it.

In any case, once they were able to examine their statistics, they could “see” their jobs in their mind’s eyes. To the surprise of no one, least of all themselves, they both shared a common theme: weeb. Just as the two of them had always been avid gamers, so too did they consume—without shame—anime, manga, and all manner of Japanese culture back on Earth.

Arianna’s job was a Spirit Swordsman, which evidently was a katana-wielding samurai that could create pacts with otherworldly spirits in order to enhance, aid, and supplement her martial prowess with magical abilities. It was sort of like a mystic warrior class, it seemed.

Zander’s job, by the same token, had the same common mechanic of binding spirits to gain special powers, but in his case, it was to aid him in feats of speed, trickery, and deception. His job name was the fabled Shinobi.

Both of them loved the basic description of their classes, and they couldn’t wait to play around with their new abilities. Natessa explained that a few of the actual courses at the academy would teach them the basics of what they needed to know.

Natessa then showed them that they could see the basic statistics of other people, such as their race and job. Natessa was revealed to be a human with a job of Shadow Mesmer. When asked what that job was, she basically explained that it was a sort of psychic hypnotist mixed with a shadowy illusionist. They also saw that she was level ten, a relatively high level for a student.

“Okay so,” Zander began, “we get cool superpowers and magic and stuff. That’s neat.”

“Yeah,” Arianna agreed, “the world we came from didn’t have magic or anything like that, just stories.”

Zander nodded and then continued, “But what happens now? We’re supposed to be helping you corrupt the school, right? How are we gonna do that?”

Natessa smiled, “I wouldn’t worry too much about that yet. After about a week of adapting to this afterlife, and this school, I’ll officially make you members of the disciplinary squad. I’ll need this time to work out a general plan anyway. At the moment I honestly don’t know exactly what I’ll need you for. So, just relax and enjoy yourselves. I’ll be keeping an eye on you, but just so I can figure out what your individual strengths are.”

“It sounds like this school is a very deeply religious one,” Arianna observed, “is it going to be a problem that we’re both demons? Should we tell people we used to be humans?”

Natessa shook her head, “Definitely don’t do that. Ilvaneth chose for you both to have that appearance for a reason, I just need to figure out what it is. Luckily for you, it’s quite taboo to ask a person about their lives before they ended up here. The circumstances of one’s life and **** can be rather sensitive subjects, after all. And furthermore, nobody is likely to actually treat you poorly. If you’re here, most will assume it’s because you managed to repent yourselves in the eyes of Azomeia.”

The pair nodded. “All right, sounds good,” Zander said.

“Good luck, I’ll be meeting up with you throughout the week just to catch you up. I’ll need to introduce you to the other two members of the disciplinary squad at some point as well. You’re free to leave this ward as you please, but I would recommend staying inside at least until tomorrow. People might be suspicious of you if you adapt too quickly.”

After that, Natessa left the couple by themselves again.

Zander and Arianna were excited for what was to come.