“Chief?”

  “Chief?”

  “Chief—”

  “I heard you the first time, Ike,” said Alton, sighing. He was the current vilge chief of Aurora Vilge and the fourth chief of their time. He looked over and saw three guards standing still, awaiting his commands.

  “It’s just that you’ve been staring for quite some time, Sir. I’m worried that—”

  “No need for that, I was just deep in thought,” Alton replied listlessly.

  “Of course, Chief. Have you made your decision on the matter?” Ike queried.

  “Alright, I’ll go meet these humans,” Alton decided as he stood up. He took his robes and put them on.

  “Thank you, Chief.” The guard nodded in appreciation. It wasn’t easy for the Chief to settle matters like this in person.

  “Yeah, yeah. Just lead me to where they are,” Alton waved dismissively as he followed the three guards on the way toward the humans.

  On the way there, he was greeted by an unexpected scene.

  “Oh my! Do it again!”

  “So cool! How did you do that?!”

  “Is it your sembnce?!”

  “I have seen a huntsman before but never like you guys.”

  Alton, in all his expectations, never expected his people to just… be excited to see them. Shouldn’t they be wary? Nervous? Why excitement?

  “Chief, I don’t know what’s going on. They were distancing themselves a moment ago,” the guard mentioned, as confused as everyone else was.

  “Me neither,” Alton replied, sighing.

  “Chief! Chief! You should have seen—Ahem, good afternoon, Chief,” saluted the guard after realizing his mistake of tone to the chief.

  “Gar, correct?” Alton questioned.

  “Y-yes, Chief. It’s an honor for you to remember my name,” the guard, Gar, said nervously.

  “Good, tell me…” Alton paused, looking at the cheering crowd. It was hard to tell what was going on inside due to how dense the crowd was. “What happened before I arrived here?”

  “Yes, Chief. It happened a couple of minutes ago when the two humans suddenly showed their sembnce in front of our people. We tried to stop them, but when we saw it was harmless… well.”

  “You—that’s a mistake! Even if they seemed harmless, we can’t just—” the other guard tried to argue but was cut off by Alton simply raising his hand. The other guard grumbled something under his breath, but it was unheard.

  “Sembnce? Are they huntsmen?” Alton asked, his voice calm, unlike Ike’s who bit his lip trying to suppress his anger.

  “That, Chief, I don’t have a clear answer to,” Gar shook his head, uncertainty written all over his face.

  Alton nodded. “Okay, at least tell me their sembnce.”

  “Of course, Chief. Their sembnce is weird; I have never seen anything like it. They just poof some kind of block out of thin air and after that they started what they call ‘crafting.’”

  Ike, Alton, and the guards behind them looked at Gar as if he’d grown a second head.

  “What?” Alton said, blinking. “Could you repeat what you said, Gar?”

  +++===+++

  John looked in total bafflement at the scene in front of him.

  “Take a look, everybody, this is a rock and this is a stick. If we pce them here boom! A sword!” Alex decred as she swung the sword around for all to see.

  “How did she do that?!”

  “Oh my!”

  “Dude, they’re crazy!” muttered Mike next to him as he too watched in total disbelief. “How can they do that by just throwing it on the table and skipping the process of even making it? That doesn’t make sense!”

  “Told you.”

  “I thought you were exaggerating!”

  John stared at his friend. “Am I crazy now?”

  “No.”

  “Good.”

  On one side, Steve watched as Alex used the crafting table for entertainment purposes. Gone were the crowd’s hostile looks, now repced by curiosity, disbelief, and sheer amazement.

  However, what perplexed Steve wasn’t the crowd’s reaction to the crafting table. They acted as if they had never seen anything like it.

  How is that possible? How have they not seen a crafting table once?

  He looked at the houses they built, judging from the structure. All were made of wood. How did they build that without a crafting table?

  Steve felt that this dimension was getting stranger.

  “Steve! Come on, help me here!” Alex turned her head and urged him to come and join her.

  “Alex, don’t you find it weird that they felt as though they had never seen a crafting table once?” Steve asked, approaching.

  “What? Come on, wouldn't that be impossible? How can they not know something so simple!”

  “Alex, do I have to remind you we’re not in the overworld?”

  Alex blinked, finally understanding. “Ah, right. Wait, gimme a minute.” She turned her attention back to the crowd. “Uhm, so give me a moment. I have to talk to my friend here.”

  “Oh, why?!”

  “Just continue!”

  “Yeah!”

  “Is he your boyfriend?”

  Alex ignored their pleas and turned her back to the crowd to face Steve. “So what does this imply?”

  Steve took a moment to answer. “We’re in a world where crafting doesn’t exist.”

  “How can that be possible?! How can they live like that?!” Alex gaped; a world without crafting was like her without adventure!

  “Okay, Alex, calm down. Maybe they have yet to discover crafting,” Steve guessed, though unsure. That would expin the crowd’s reaction to crafting. It’s like when he found out that there was an ancient city underground in the overworld that hosted one of the strongest creatures he’d fought, even more so than the wither and ender dragon combined.

  “That said, when did you discover crafting, Steve?” Alex questioned with a curious look. If she recalled better, Steve was the first person to spawn in the overworld, and she followed after.

  “Uh, I forgot,” Steve answered.

  “...”

  “Make way for the Chief.”

  “Make way!”

  That got the attention of Alex and Steve and they both turned their focus back to the crowd.

  “Welcome, humans of which I presumed to be Alex, the girl, and Steve, the boy. I’m the chief of this vilge; you may call me Alton.” Alton introduced himself. “And this guy beside me is Ike, my assistant.”

  “A pleasure,” Ike said, bowing.

  Steve and Alex stood unmoving and unresponsive for a few seconds before Alex spoke out.

  “Chief? So you’re the leader of this vilge?” Alex asked, trying to break the awkward silence.

  “Yes, that’s what a chief signifies,” Alton replied, nodding.

  “Oooohhh, that’s great.” Alex nodded back.

  “I’m here to invite you guys for tea if you’d like,” Alton offered with a smile, bridging another wave of reactions from the watching crowd.

  “Wait, is what I’m hearing true?”

  “The Chief is offering tea?!”

  “Oh my—”

  “Shut up!”

  The crowd began to get more restless.

  Alex turned to Steve, asking for his opinion. “What do you think, Steve?”

  Steve gnced at her. “It’s fine. Let’s accept their offer. I wonder what this tea they are talking about is.” He then pced his hand under his chin, curiously. A potion?

  Alex nodded. “Alright, we’ll accept your offer, Alton,” she responded to the chief’s offer.

  “Great! Now would you please come this way?”

  Alex and Steve followed closely behind, with two guards on each side. The walk was rather short, and they soon arrived at their destination. In the center of the room was a singur, circur table, which confused both of them. Three chairs were arranged around the table.

  “Here, now have a seat, you two,” Alton gestured toward the chairs.

  “Thank you,” Alex expressed her gratitude before taking her seat, which Steve followed.

  A woman faunus handed them their tea. “Here’s your tea, please enjoy.”

  “Oh, we will!” Alex replied, nodding eagerly at the woman, who smiled back.

  Alton cleared his throat. “So, ahem, now that’s settled. There are some questions I’d like to ask about the two of you.”

  Steve, who was curiously looking at the tea, gnced up at him. “Questions?”

  “Yes, questions. Would that be okay?” Alton asked.

  “Of course. It’s not like questions can hurt us, right Steve?” Alex asked, nudging his side.

  Steve nodded at Alex’s words.

  “Alright, then that’s good,” Alton said before continuing. “So the first question I want to ask is, did you guys come here with ill intentions?”

  Alex blinked. “Ill intentions? No! We would never. We came here to feel welcomed and to know you all,” she replied earnestly.

  Alton nodded slowly while gncing at his assistant, who said nothing. “Alright. Second question, are you two huntsmen and a huntress?”

  “Huntsman?”

  “Huntress?”

  Both Steve and Alex asked in unison. Alton noted the confused look on their faces before crifying.

  “You see, uhm, huntsmen and huntresses are elite warriors that are responsible for fighting off Grimm,” Alton expined, but all he got in return was another confused look.

  “Grimm?”

  “Grimm?”

  Both Steve and Alex asked again in unison.

  Alton’s brows twitched. Then he looked at Ike, who shook his head. Alton sighed. “Okay, so you guys don’t know what a Grimm is?”

  “Are they food?” Alex tried to guess.

  “...” Alton was speechless. “Ah-ahem, I never thought I’d meet a person that doesn’t know what a Grimm is. Tell me, have you two been living under a rock?”

  “Under a rock? Oh, did you mean a cave? Uhm, no, we decided not to since Alex here decided that it was too zy and spooky. So I had to settle on building a base in an open area,” Steve answered, much to the bafflement of the Chief and his assistant.

  “Of course! How does someone like living in a cave? It’s spooky, eerie, and more importantly, it looks worse,” Alex huffed, crossing her arms. Steve looked at her with an offended look.

  “Hey, building a base in a cave has endless possibilities. You still haven’t even considered it thoroughly,” Steve tried to argue back.

  “Oh? Then what about you trying to build one in the Nether?” Alex didn’t back down.

  “That doesn't even count as a cave.”

  As the two argued back and forth, Alton looked completely shut off, and Ike, who had been staring at the two, turned frozen. It was not the conversation they expected it to be.

  ‘What are they talking about?’ was the singur thought shared between the two faunus.