Isekai Terry: Tropes of Doom (An Isekai Adventure Comedy)

Terry and Kelima left the fake small town. He cheerfully waved to the two demons while Kelima seemed determined to ignore them. Thoughts of giving her endless shit about it played prominently across his mind, but he decided to leave well enough alone. While he had never been in any real danger from the demons, the same couldn't be said of the noble girl. Once he'd figured out what was going on, he could have intervened to save her if things went ugly. But there had been that brief window of time when she'd been legitimately fighting for her life.

I shouldn't give her shit, right? Terry asked other-Terry.

Guess that depends on just how much of an asshole you want to be. If you're aiming to be the biggest asshole ever, give her shit, responded other-Terry.

Come on. That has to be an exaggeration. The biggest asshole ever? Some of those politicians back on Earth had to be bigger fucktards than I would be for giving Kelima shit.

Their douchebaggery was institutional. Your douchebaggery would be personal. That makes you worse.

That seems super arbitrary, complained Terry.

Moral philosophy is complicated. You'd know that if you'd spent more time paying attention to that professor and less time looking at Isabel Garcia's chest.

Was that her name?

Oh my god, you're hopeless, muttered other-Terry before going silent.

It took most of an hour before Kelima's pathological inability to endure silence finally wore her down.

"How much longer do you think it will take to get to the mountain?" she asked.

Terry thought that over before he said, "Probably not too long."

"How do you know that?"

"Well, we had a random encounter—" he hesitated. "Hmmm. It was sort of a random encounter. There was some fighting, but nobody died. It was also sort of a Kindness of Strangers moment, except less so for you. It had some of the Little Shop That Wasn't There Yesterday mixed into it as well."

"What are you babbling about?" demanded Kelima.

"It's just otherworlder stuff," said Terry. "Let's just say that it's sometimes helpful in letting me figure things out. Like how much longer it will take until we get to The Mountains of Madness."

"The Mountains of Madness? Since when were we going to a place called The Mountains of Madness?"

Terry shook his head in a sad way and said, "Kelima, we're going to a mountain with an unknown monster or monsters on it. We were always going to The Mountains of Madness. Anyway, I figure we've got one or two more unexpected hindrances, then it's up the mountain to get the unobtanium."

"I thought we needed orichalcum?"

"Can you at least try to work with me a little bit?" asked Terry as he threw his hands up into the air.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"Maybe I would if you'd stop speaking in gibberish."

She's got you there, said other-Terry smugly.

Oh, you stay out of it, snapped regular-Terry.

Magic 8-Ball says, outlook not so good.

"My best guess," said Terry, "is that we've got another week or two to get there."

"Assuming nothing goes—"

"Do you have the learning curve of a rock!" shouted Terry. "Do not put that crap into the air!"

"I'm sorry," said a clearly frustrated Kelima. "I never had these problems before I met you."

That brought Terry up short. If that was something new in Kelima's life, did that make him the problem? Had he been blithely wandering around like some kind of low-grade, nickel-plated doom magnet? He did know that he was moving through the world in some kind of divine circle of catastrophe, but he'd assumed that he was the primary target. Had he somehow infected Kelima with that same level of bullshit cosmic disfavor? The idea troubled him a lot…for about ten seconds.

Then, he shrugged it off. If that was the case, the damage was already done, and there was exactly fuck-all he could reasonably do about it. Besides, he'd given her every opportunity to leave him alone. Maybe he was like some kind of twisted patient zero for interdimensional crap-stomping. Maybe he was able to pass that infection along to others. But if people insisted on inflicting their company on him like that high-school sort-of friend you guilt-invite to a party ten years after graduation who just refuses to go the hell home, they rolled the dice and took their chances. Feeling better about everything, he started walking again.

"Why are you smiling like that?" asked Kelima. "It's creepy."

"Oh, it's nothing," said Terry, still smiling.

That smile evaporated when other-Terry offered his two cents.

Biggest asshole ever.

Once they made camp for the night, Kelima took up her favorite pastime. Asking Terry questions while Dusk soaked up attention from the girl.

"So, if you don't know what the monster is, how do you plan to fight it?"

Terry desperately wanted to be irritated by that question, but, for once, it was actually a relevant question. Not that he had a good answer for it. He had an answer, but definitely not the kind of solid, well-reasoned, battle strategy that people in Chinese Period Drama Hell always seemed to want.

"Well, I thought I'd try slashing and stabbing it. If that didn't work, I figured I'd move on to punching it really hard. If that doesn't work," said Terry with a shrug, "I was mostly planning to wing it."

"Wing it?" asked Kelima.

"Make things up as I go. It usually works out for me. Eventually."

Kelima stared at him in open-mouthed horror for a while before she said, "That's your entire plan?"

"Yep."

"No secret techniques or otherworlder knowledge?"

"Like what? If I knew what it was, maybe I'd have some more ideas. But this is what we call decision-making under uncertainty. I have no information. So, trying to come up with some elaborate plan is pointless, because I'd have to build that plan around assumptions that might be completely wrong. In my experience, though, almost everything dies if you stab it enough or punch it enough. Sure, it's not subtle, but it is both simple and adapts well to most situations. If those straightforward and usually effective measures don't work, then I'll start trying to get exotic with the plan."

There was another long pause during which Kelima gave Terry an assessing look.

"What?" he demanded.

"It's just that what you said actually makes sense."

"Why is that a shock?"

"Because half the time you say things that sound completely insane. It makes it pretty easy to assume that you've only lived this long because the goddess of luck has some kind of misguided crush on you."

Not one goddamn word, Terry mentally shot at other-Terry.

The only response was uproarious laughter echoing in his head.

"Well," said Terry through gritted teeth, "it isn't all dumb luck. And I've never met any goddesses that I know of."

"I expect that's for the best," said Kelima.

"Why?"

"If you ever met a goddess, wouldn't you probably end up yelling at her about something? You seem pretty angry at, well, pretty much everybody. From what the stories say, yelling at goddesses doesn't usually end well for people."

"I definitely—" Terry paused. "I probably—" he paused again. "Look, it's not an absolute certainty that I'd yell at a goddess if I met one."

"Really?" asked Kelima in a tone of infinite skepticism.

"I'm going to sleep," grumbled Terry. "And give me my cat back, cat thief."