This is a Beta Test?! - A Literally Broken System

Boats... Haven't set foot in one for decades. For as long as I could remember, the last time I actually got on a boat was back when I wasn't even in grade school. Crossing a small river was a core memory of mine, and the gentle rocking of the waves made for a fun adventure at the time even though what we did was quite frankly mundane when compared to what we were about to do now.

And by that, I meant sailing through the sea of errors on what I could only hope to be a functioning vehicle.

[Port Khong]

Once more, the world helpfully provided me with the name of the place as the prompt lazily flashed in my HUD. [Port Khong] was something that looked straight out of the medieval east. Sharing the same architectural style as the Kattleynan capital, what changed was the obvious influence of the sea and the fishing lifestyle.

Nets and small boats adorned the numerous houses within the port village. And while this was the largest port that the Empire theoretically had, the number of large vessels out at sea was surprisingly limited.

"So this is [Port Khong]..." Shizu marveled to herself, her eyes wide with wonder as she gazed at the village. "I've heard stories of this place... of merchants selling fresh fish out on the streets but... this is kind of..."

"Disappointing?" I shrugged beside her. "I suppose that's the effect of war for you."

And wasn't that sad to think about. What was obviously once a bustling port town looked more destitute than most. Of course, there were still a lot of merchants running to and fro across the streets, but the number of people just walking aimlessly around us was kind of alarming. And if that was what I was feeling, then what more for the princess with an obvious nationalistic bent?

"War... So this what it's done to my people..." Shizu whispered to herself. "This has to end..."

"Yeah," I let out a small breath. "War sucks like that. It always hits hard for the common folk."

I raised an eyebrow as I looked out to the wider village. Looking at it closely, I could see the minute scars of war riddling the place. A few craters here and there, suspiciously cannonball-shaped holes scattered around on some of the tiled roofs... This place had really seen better days.

"To think that this is what my people are going through... all while I'm living in the capital like nothing's even happening..." the princess grumbled, her fists turning white as she spoke. "There's a lot to fix, isn't there, Moriya..."

"Yep," I popped my consonants. "Well, at least we have the chance to do that in the first place."

The world was a cruel mistress, after all. Not everyone had the chance to end a war with their own hands, and it certainly wasn't the easiest thing to do.

"W-what am I seeing..."

Of course, that wasn't the only thing that mattered to us at the moment. Guidance had been silent the moment she saw the sea of errors out on the horizon, and only now did she actually say something after like, what? A few minutes of gawking at all the red out in the distance?

"Finally back with us?" I quipped out to the poor programmer. "I told you it's a literal sea of errors."

"This... this isn't right... This isn't right at all!" Guidance stammered. "It's... How?! How can the water textures be missing?! It's literally just water!"

Aaand there she went... I could only shake my head as the dev went off on a rant about how stupid of a mistake it was for the game to misplace water textures. Hey, I didn't know how the Re:Mind Engine worked, and the technical babble that Guidance was spewing out was starting to fly right over my head as I inched closer to Shizu's side.

"Uhm... What is she saying?"

"I don't know, Shizu. I don't know," I shook my head at the princess's question. "The best we can hope for is that she gets tired of ranting soon. I know you're tired and hungry, and we really should get going."

*grroowwll...*

As if on cue, Shizu's stomach let out a mean growl, the flustered girl quickly covering her stomach as a mean blush spread across her face. Meanwhile, Guidance was blushing for an entirely different reason. The older woman's rant was reaching a fever pitch, and she was actually glowing red from all the anger that she was feeling.

Ahh.. the dichotomy of two gorgeous women being utterly human was truly a sight to see.

"Ugh! I hate it! I hate looking at it so much!" Guidance capped off, her words finally starting to make sense again as she panted. "It's so basic, and yet..."

"Hey, no fixing the sea right now, okay?" I hollered at the dev. "Shizu's gone through enough today, and we still need to spend the night before actually getting out of this place."

"Wha- R-Right," Guidance sighed. "I suppose it's getting late as it is. And I'm getting pretty hungry myself."

Huh... I guess I forgot that Guidance still felt hunger in this world. Well, she was designated as an NPC by the system, so I could only assume that she still needed sleep like everybody else... which meant I truly was a freak of nature in this world.

"Let's get into the nearest inn then," I suggested. "We can meet with the rest of the party tomorrow."

"Agreed," the dev nodded. "We have a lot of time anyway. And we have to think about where the hell we're supposed to go for you to gain some levels."

Oh yeah... That was a thing we had to do. "Right. Shall we then?"

Sharing a nod, the three of us finally went into the village, keeping an eye out for an inn as we kept to ourselves. Of course, our group looked hilariously out of place when compared to the common folk, but nobody really batted us an eye as we walked through the streets. Eventually, we found an inn and paid our dues.

The morning after was gonna be busy, I'm sure. Although, this also meant we had some downtime again. Downtime that I could use to experiment. This time, with Guidance's well, guidance.

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