Booking a business trip in the monster slaying industry.

Practically bouncing as I approached the main screen, I considered just where I wanted to go, pausing only when I saw the message on the screen had been updated. “Press here to complete my quest, huh?” Shrugging, I did just that, smiling as the quest complete window popped open.

Scanning it quickly to confirm if I’d earned the bonus training time and ‘patch point’ (I had) as well as if there any new or important information hidden in the sass of the prompt (there wasn’t), I closed it again, eagerly looking back towards the screen and grinning as I saw the blinking text.

You have one new world slot available. Would you like to select a new world to explore?

(Y/N)

Without a hint of hesitation, I reached out and selected yes. As it turned out, it was a touch screen, accepting my input easily enough and helping me avoid the embarrassment of leaving fingerprints on a standard TV screen like a five-year-old with sticky fingers. The screen flickered, new text replacing the old.

Would you like to explore an original world, or a pre-existing world from popular media?

Please be aware that connecting to a mirrored version of an existing world is considerably easier than forging a connection to an original world of your specifications, and thus will have fewer downsides and/or restrictions.

Furthermore, it is advised that you consider your available patch point whilst selecting your new world, as spending it whilst in the process of world selection will allow you to adapt a portion of the target world’s available powers into your existing Protagonist powerset.

Curious about what the patch point could change, I focused on that section, and was delighted when the system provided an example in the form of a tooltip.

With this in mind, I took a moment to consider what sort of world I wanted to go to. There were several game worlds I could think of that would be perfect, but I’d grown to enjoy the anime-style of mirror earth in the time I’d been there and wasn’t quite ready to give that up.

I was also man enough to admit that growing strong wasn’t my only consideration whilst choosing a world to explore. Being perfectly honest, I was pretty sure the system had handed me the tools to build the harem of my dreams (because let’s be real, what else was Waifu Exp supposed to do?), and a lot of top tier babes I would love to get to know on a more intimate level were from various anime.

Theme chosen, I started narrowing down my choices, cycling through all my favourite anime to find something that could work. Adhering to the needs of the moment, I said a silent and unhappy goodbye to the romance and slice of life anime I was fond of and would’ve loved to visit, making a mental note to come back to such worlds when there wasn’t a dire need for me to grow stronger.

Still, there were plenty of action and adventure anime to choose from. I just needed to find the right one.

Unfortunately, any world based on KonoSuba was right out for the moment. Despite hosting some of the worst-best girls in anime in the main three heroines, the starting city would be terrible for initial growth, in line with a major plot point from the show. Even the presence of Wiz, an adorable lich and my personal best girl for the series, couldn’t sway my decision.

Like this, I continued considering various titles, weighing the merits of each. Some were rejected for the spread-out nature of the monsters I’d need to fight, the time wasted in travelling from place to place currently unacceptable, whilst others didn’t make the cut due to lack of easy access to civilisation, and thus decent equipment. After several minutes of careful deliberation, I’d finally reached my answer, the world of DanMachi.

DanMachi, or ‘Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?’ as it was also known, was an anime I rather liked set in a fantasy style world. The main story of the series was based around an adventurer in a large city known as the ‘Labyrinth City Orario’, the only city in the setting known to be built around a dungeon.

As the story went, most of the gods of this world had forsaken and sealed away their divine powers, choosing instead to live amongst mortals on the surface. These gods built organisations known as ‘Familia’ around themselves, empowering mortals through a process known as ‘Falna’, and creating strong and loyal bands of adventurers.

As far as I was concerned, the choice was perfect, encompassing both an endless source of level appropriate monsters to fight and a sprawling and vibrant city in which to acquire equipment (and, possibly, waifus).

Entering my choice into the screen, I excitedly read through the next section, which contained basic information about my choice.

‘Well, that’s not in the least concerning,’ I thought sarcastically, wincing slightly at the last of the so-called modifications. From a brief exploration of the screen, I found that the backstory section was an option I should usually be able to customise, a nice drop-down menu showing me several lovely options such as ‘childhood friend of the series protagonist’, that I simply could not pick.

My eyes returned to the modification responsible for this lack of choice, a small frown on my face. ‘Major powers, huh? I’d be willing to bet it’s Freya.’ The system remained quiet on my assertion, but that did little to change my mind. ‘Something-something forged stronger, something-something flames of adversity.’ I mentally grumbled, going over what I knew of the goddess.

In the anime, the goddess Freya had taken a liking to the main protagonist of the series, a rookie adventurer named Bell Cranel. In the series, her interest quickly morphed into obsession. She would do anything within her power to see him grow. This could sometimes be helpful, like leaving a ridiculously expensive book of magic lying around for him to stumble upon, but more often than not, it meant throwing poor Bell into the figurative fire.

With me on her radar, it was likely that I was in for the exact same treatment.

‘Does that really change anything?’ I thought, before shaking my head. ‘If she wants to throw powerful gifts and tough challenges at me to help my growth, then let her. That is the goal, after all.’ Course reaffirmed, I continued on with the rest of the details.

The final section, to my growing delight, turned out to be modifications of a more adult nature. I was given a list of worlds, each with various adult modifications, ranging from tweaked gender roles to normalisation of various fetishes.

As fun as it would’ve been to pick a world lacking a nudity taboo, one world with three interesting modifications quickly caught my eye. My smile grew with each mod I read, the three perfect for a little fun on the side.

All three options sounded pretty good to me. The first two would help in the short term, hopefully skewing things in my favour with the ladies. As for the third mod? It was more of a long-term investment.

If one of my long-term goals was to build myself a harem of beauties (spoiler alert, it absolutely was), then inter-harem cohesion was something I needed to consider. I was no expert on the matter, but it felt like there would be a lot less arguing and bickering if hypothetical members were just as happy playing with each other as they were playing with me. That, and it would be hella sexy to watch.

Grinning to myself, I looked over my choices, making sure that I was satisfied. Finding everything to be to my liking, I breathed in a deep, excited breath, and then pressed the prompt to accept. Languidly stretching out, I took a moment to bask in a job well done. That, naturally, was when an achievement popped up, informing just how much of a bonehead I was.

‘Wait!? Since when was that an option?!?!’

And then I was teleported away, bound for a whole new world.