‘Right. Other world or not, I am imprisoned… For some reason.’

  The guard's heavy footsteps echoed through the hallway which led to the two man cell, before eventually stopping right in front of it. A large man, wearing a military uniform not too unlike those of Arthur's world, perhaps only a few decades older.

  Knocking on the bars a few times to wake them up, in case they were still sleeping, he'd greet them with an expressionless face. Tired, sunken eyes, with eyebags which reminded Arthur of the state of his body.

  Well, of his old body, at least. Looking down at himself and wiggling his hand around, it didn't feel real yet, that he was brought to another world. It was like he hadn't yet quite woken up from that feverish dream. He pinched his cheek, but due to the lack of pain, he couldn't even be sure if this was reality.

  Clicking his tongue, his gaze moved back to the guard, now rummaging through his belt for a specific key. Various keys were hanging off of it, each step resounding with ‘clinks’ and ‘clanks’. After sorting them out for a few minutes and finding the right one, it would slide smoothly into the keyhole, opening the door with a metallic sound.

  Arthur glanced at the other boy in the cell, as if asking him whether they should leave or not. With a nod, he'd step forward, leaving the room. The guard sighed, and once they both had got out, he'd lock the door back up, before speaking in an annoyed tone.

  “Go to the common room… Then get ready for… Ugh, you know the routine already, just go. I can't bother dealing with you.”

  “My, how generous, good sir!”

  Ayn smiled at the guard, a smile as sweet as honey and as fake as the ones Arthur saw back at Werners, recognizable from a mile away. The guard, too, must have spotted it, inciting an annoyed groan as he walked off to the next cell.

  With the guard gone, the shorter boy started walking, leading the way towards the common room. Arthur looked around his surroundings, taking in the architecture and structure of the prison, just in case he'd need it.

  Though, for a prison, it was kind of loose, so to speak. The fact that the guard just let two prisoners march freely through the corridors meant that they either had a lot of confidence in their guards, and in their ability to catch prisoners, or that they were incompetent. Really incompetent.

  After walking for a few minutes behind Ayn, Arthur quickly took a few steps forward, reaching his side and tapping him on his shoulder. He had stayed quiet so far, thinking the other would speak up first, but he didn't seem like that was going to happen.

  “Earlier, ignoring all that stuff about other worlds and… Whatever that light show was. You, you know how and why I got here, right?”

  Ayn smirked at his question. The way he spoke, knowing of Arthur's situation, and speaking of him almost like a successful experiment, he knew something. “Correct! Why, want to know how to go back? Because-”

  “No, not at all. Right now, what I need to know is why are we in prison.”

  The boy stopped for a moment, falling behind Arthur, slightly confused by his words. Although most of them failed to become famous, in Irminsul there were some books and novels talking about people transported to other worlds without their consent.

  The common trope was the main character's goal, or one of the goals, being the return to their homeland, going back to how it was before their adventures began. The desire to go back home wasn't something Ayn was unfamiliar with, either. He gripped a hem of his clothes tightly.

  And yet looking at Arthur, he didn't seem especially troubled about that. He was walking forward while rubbing his chin, deep in thought, his eyes glancing at the structure around them, and eventually falling back towards Ayn.

  “So? Can I know?”

  “Oh, uh, yeah, sorry,” the boy stuttered and caught up to the other, before cleaning his throat with a cough.

  “Right now, we're in one of the military academies of the Empire of Teiws…”

  Arthur’s head throbbed, a wave of pain following soon after. This time, instead of the pain spreading through his numb body, however, only his brain ached. The feeling of a boiling hot bubble of water popping pervaded his head, making him dizzy for a moment. Right after, his thoughts felt clearer.

  The Empire of Teiws, one of the biggest forces of that side of Irminsul's hemisphere. Its cities could be found in most regions of the world, though the emperor's control over them waned as they distanced themselves from the capital.

  Finding its roots in the continent of Winguric, according to tradition they were once a tribe of the glacial region to the east of the continent, Midgar. Though, after crossing over the enormous mountain chain which separated the two halves of the continent, they settled in the southwest, founding a settlement taking the name of the chief of their tribe, Tiwez.

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  In the manner of decades, that settlement grew to the size of an empire, with Tiwez managing to invade and conquer an incredible number of lands. Some were taken back by natives, while some split themselves from the empire's direct control while accepting alliances. Originally, the chief despised trampling over foreign cultures and civilians being hurt in invasions, which dubbed him the title of ‘Merciful King'. Even if he was an emperor, not a king.

  He massaged his temples, his mind still hurting due to the information suddenly flooding back, while Ayn kept speaking.

  “Although, they also keep young criminals or prisoners of war in these academies as prisoners, and possible young talents for the militia.”

  “Right, these guys do that, don't they. Upholding Tiwez's tradition, they offer any talent an equal chance.” Once again, he looked at Arthur with a surprised look painting his face. He was supposed to be from another world, and yet he was acquiring information about that world without Ayn's help.

  It probably had something to do with the body he was currently residing in, they both figured. Arthur realized this, that even if he couldn't call upon that body's memories, common knowledge and information was still present, just waiting for something to recall it.

  Only now did he notice that the language he was speaking was nothing like the English or German he knew, though he understood and spoke it perfectly.

  “Well, yeah, you can guess the rest. They found us- well, me and your body, trespassing on military property, and threw us in here. We might get sold off before our sentence finishes, but someone's going to break us out. Don't worry.”

  For some reason, he felt like he should worry after all. That first part all but confirmed that Ayn knew whose body Arthur was currently inhabiting, but more than that, he was worried about who was going to break them out, exactly.

  Teiws had a strong military force. Not to mention, right now, they were in a military academy. The prisoner holding complex, sure, but it was still connected directly to a military academy. Cadets and soldiers in training resided there, they'd probably drool at the thought of having a chance to test out their studies in a practical environment.

  That is, attacking any possible intruders and escaping prisoners. He clenched his fist and opened it a few times, his senses didn't seem to be returning any time soon. And if a fight broke out, he'd be helpless, with what little strength he could draw out from his body. In other words, unless he blindly trusted the person Ayn trusted, in the event of a breakout, he was in trouble.

  He sighed, he didn't have many choices apart from following him, anyways. The light slowly grew more intense, they had been walking for a while now. If he remembered correctly, they were heading towards the common room. In other words…

  “Welcome to the mess hall! We're lucky enough to have been caught in one of the better Teiwesian facilities, so even us prisoners can enjoy a free meal with average flavour and nutrients!”

  Led by the seemingly expert of the prison, the two headed towards an extreme of the room, where a number of similarly aged prisoners were lining up for food. After rummaging through his pockets for a bit, Ayn pulled out two pairs of items.

  Both made out of wood, the same kind which made up their beds, two small bowls and spoons. Another piece of information found its way to Arthur's mind. Each prisoner had its own bowl and utensils that they were tasked to keep and wash, if they wanted to eat. In case one lost their utensils, a new pair could be bought by working overtime.

  Of course, Arthur had no way to remember that, without first seeing the bowl and spoon firsthand. He was thankful that Ayn took his along, too, though he didn't know when exactly he grabbed it, or where he took it from.

  “By the way, don't get your hopes up. This might be a slightly better off prison, but it's still a prison.”

  Still, the smell coming from the kitchen room was quite appetizing. Sneaking a glance into other people's bowls, it seemed to be some boiled food, maybe a stew, or a really dense soup. Though, if it was soup, and assuming this world was somewhere around the middle ages when compared to his own, he couldn't expect it to taste much better than hot water.

  After getting their bowls filled and sitting down in a corner of the large room, full to the brim with prisoners eating on the floor, Arthur hesitantly poked the food with his spoon. It looked like mashed potatoes, even smelling vaguely like potatoes… But wasn't that too luxurious of a food to give prisoners?

  He dug into the food, and took a bite with a sigh. His eyes lit up, it was surprisingly good. The texture was unusual, not like the mashed potatoes he was used to, but he was expecting worse. It was kind of chewy, but soft, and, most surprising of all, it was salted. He could feel the slightly sweet aftertaste of milk, too.

  “This… Isn't this a bit too good, for prison food?”

  Chewing some potatoes, Ayn tilted his head slightly. “I mean, not really? What, were you really poor in your old world?” Arthur furrowed his brows, trying to force more memories out of his brain. The key to that was taking another bite of salted potatoes.

  The town in which they were imprisoned at the moment was named Sigel, meaning ‘blessed by the sun’ in old Teiwesian. Even in modern Teiwesian, the suffix -gel kept the same meaning, with the word meaning ‘holy’, heigel, originating from the construct ‘blessed by the sky’.

  A coastal city, who thrived since times of old thanks to the production of salt. He tried to remember the history of his world. Salt was used since imperial times and even further back than that, but it was mostly a luxury, or used to preserve food.

  Using salt as a condiment, especially in medieval times, would be impossible for peasants, much less for prisons. And yet, they were able to not only salt that food, but give that many prisoners mashed potatoes as a meal. That's how wealthy the city of Sigel was.

  The sealine was shallow and dense with salt, which allowed people proficient in fire-type magic to efficiently produce salt. Arthur stopped himself for a moment, while elaborating that information in his mind.

  Then, was magic real, in that world? Was what Ayn had shown him earlier, that light construct and that watery orb, not some kind of trick, but magic? He could feel more information about to flood his brain, but forcefully stopped it from doing so. For now, he wanted to enjoy his meal.

  “So, potatoes, milk and salt aren't luxurious, got it…”

  “Well, it's not that they're that cheap. The milk and potatoes are produced by the prisoners, as part of the eligible jobs for the obligatory work routine. The soil is fertile and the cows are healthy, so when they produce a lot, they let the kitchen cook us something with it.”

  Arthur ate another spoonful of mashed potatoes, while thinking over the information he had gathered thus far.

  A world in which magic existed, as something common enough to be used for the production of salt and foodstuffs. Imprisoned in a meritocratic empire, that gave even its prisoners a chance to climb their way up. Trapped in a body not of his own, sharing memories and information every once in a while.

  Chewing another spoonful, Arthur grinned. This all was starting to seem interesting.