The Isekai Police [Books 1 + 2 Complete!]

Artyom woke up in his dorm room after what felt like a really good night's sleep. Compared to the inn he stayed at in Cape Horn, the beds here were on a completely different level. It was a magic school after all, and the mattresses were probably enchanted to be extra comfy. Not to mention Tommy's role as the Chosen Hero would have gotten the whole party the best rooms at the academy.

Artyom stretched his body and let out a sigh of contentment as his bones creaked. It was odd though, his fight with Fenn yesterday wasn't all that strenuous. He'd had regular workouts that took more out of him without making him feel like this.

Artyom's muscles felt oddly sore, and his bones had an ache to them that echoed out from the deepest marrow. Going through his usual set of stretches helped alleviate much of the pain, but made him realize he was way more tired than he should have been after such a good night's sleep.

"Weird," he mused to himself. "Maybe I'm just getting old?"

Artyom let out a chuckle.

"Well hopefully not yet, I've got a long day today. I think they said something about searching for that armor piece today?"

He stopped his stretches and put a hand to his chin.

"Something about that feels familiar, didn't we-" he said before blanking out for a moment. "What was I doing? Right, stretches."

Artyom crossed one arm over the other next to work out his shoulders. When he saw Neitra's black hairband on his left wrist, his eyes went wide.

"No, no no no…" he whispered to himself as he dropped his morning routine and began to run around his room.

First to his bed. He tossed up the covers and saw it was empty. He carefully examined both the pillows and made sure the only hair on it was his own dark strands. No brown.

Neitra wasn't in bed with him last night. In fact, there was no sign of her ever being in this room.

That only made him more nervous.

Artyom ran over to the dresser and began to throw its contents out and onto the ground, only taking a quick glance at each item of apparel before discarding it. Soon the whole wardrobe was empty and he pulled the pair of drawers underneath it out and dumped their contents onto the floor.

"Just more clothes, all of them school robes," he said to himself before running over to the desk.

Artyom pulled out the center drawer and began to feel at the underside of the desk before pulling out a thick sheet of paper that was taped to the top. He began to read its contents, and his heart rate spiked.

The man from Earth pulled out his phone and hit the speed dial.

"Gus, anti-memetics protocol."

"Fuck," said the man at the other end, with more emotion in his voice than Artyom had heard from him almost all year. "What do you last remember?"

Artyom scrunched his eyes and began to think. "We arrived at the academy yesterday, and the headmistress took us on a tour."

"That was part of your report last night. What next?"

"I left a report? Oh man… anyway, the headmistress took us to the dorms so we could pick out rooms; I recognize the one I'm in as the one I was assigned. After that, we saw a class in progress and then went to the dueling hall. I beat some guy who wanted to replace me on the team and then me and the rest of the party went to get dinner… I don't even remember what we ate."

"Baked pasta, that's what you told me yesterday," said Gus. "Are you sure this is caused by an anti-meme and not just a localized amnesia effect?"

"I'm certain," replied Artyom, looking at the hairband on his left wrist.

Anti-memes and anti-memetics were a very obscure field, and incredibly rare, even out in the expansive multiverse. The term was lifted from a creative writing website from back on Earth, but the concept was a perfect fit for an actual phenomena.

Memes were ideas that spread; self-replicating information. At least according to the original definition, though internet memes also applied in their own way. Really important or memorable information, compelling ways of thought, or even really funny jokes all counted.

Anti-memes were the opposite of that: ideas that didn't want to be spread, self-erasing information. Complex mathematical formulas, boring passages of texts, or dreams. Those were all natural anti-memes.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

How did that differ from amnesia? Amnesia made you forget a piece of information. An anti-meme made you incapable of outright observing it or remembering it. It was like an always active amnesia effect that applied to a piece of information rather than a physical object.

And then there were anti-memes of the magical variety. The magic was bound to the information itself rather than an object or entity. How that actually worked, Artyom didn't know. But usually it'd be handled by a level System that had the ability to oversee an entire world and thus have the capacity for enabling that.

A practical example of a magical anti-meme would be something that told your brain that they were just another grain of sand on a beach and didn't deserve any undue attention. Of course, that one-of-million grain of sand could be a priceless treasure. Or a dangerous monster hunting in plain sight.

For a TOAL agent, having an anti-meme in play could mean someone being deployed to their death and nobody realizing it. Only for another agent to be sent by an enchanted dispatcher and end up with the same fate. And another one, and another. And yes, the magic didn't always fade between worlds, so it could even affect the people at headquarters.

The point was, they were dangerous. And TOAL had encountered enough anti-memes to understand there would always be more out there, and to have a protocol for dealing with them.

"Your check-in yesterday matches up until your duel," said Gus. "But after that, you said you went to eat dinner with the party, a pasta bake, and that you retired to your room soon after."

Artyom held up the note he'd found. It had several quick and dirty scrawls across it, but he recognized it all as his own handwriting. "I left myself a note, and it says we started the search for the armor piece yesterday itself after dinner."

"Does it say anything else?"

"It says there's an anti-meme in play, the location of the armor piece, and…"

"And? Where is it?"

"I can't tell. I can see the text and know it's the location, but I can't even comprehend it. My brain just won't let me."

"That confirms it, definitely an anti-meme," said Gus with a sigh. "Take a picture of the sheet with your phone and send it over to us. We'll see if we can find some way around it or at least figure out what sort of rules it runs on."

"Alright."

"And Artyom? Do you remember what I told you a few days ago? The burden I placed on your shoulders?"

"How could I not?" replied Artyom, feeling his gut tighten for an instant. "The Eye."

"Correct. It seems to not be affecting your short-term memory of major events before you arrived at the school, then."

"Yeah, I guess that's one positive," said Artyom with a roll of his eyes. "Well, that's about all I have on my end. Hope this isn't as bad as it seems."

"Agreed," said Gus. "Goodbye Artyom."

They hung up, and Artyom slowly turned around to the mess he'd made in the room. A messy bundle of robes was piled in the center of the open space, with accessories surrounding it. By the desk, stationery was scattered all over the floor, with a bottle of ink having spilled its contents into the soft carpet. Somehow, he didn't think there was a spell in the world that could remove a pitch black stain that bad.

"I think I'll clean up after I've showered."

Artyom took a very long shower.

It didn't help that he didn't take his eyes off of the hair band still around his wrist. Even when he lathered his face with soap, or when some got into his eye. It was his personal reminder that something very dangerous was going on, after all. And if a second band, one he found in one of the drawers and had placed next to the hair care products, ends up next to it, then there would be an even bigger problem.

Much to the man's relief, he was able to finish washing himself without another anti-memetic incident. But upon leaving the attached bathroom, he let out a loud groan.

After cleaning up most of the mess, and covering the inkstain with one of the robes, Artyom left his room and ran right into the headmistress.

"Ah, Artyom!" she exclaimed while clapping her hands together. The grin she flashed at him was too wide, and her eyes much too sharp to be one of only excitement. It was reminiscent of a predator eyeing its prey. "I was hoping to talk to you, would you care to follow me to my office?"

Artyom gave her a strained smile. "Oh, I'd love to, but I have to meet with the rest of the party first."

"Don't worry about them, the hero and the others are still fast asleep. I'm not surprised after the hard work they've put into searching for this so-called 'armor piece' yesterday. In fact, I'm surprised you're up so early despite your harrowing duel against Fenn! And my, what a showing that was."

She stared at Artyom in awe, her pupils growing wide enough to pull Artyom's soul through them into their inky black depths.

"It's about Rotte's enrollment."

"We'll wait for the others in that case," replied Artyom severely, making the headmistress flinch. He hated to admit it, but Tommy and Xerica had much more sway than he did here. He didn't want to go in without them, or else the headmistress might try to pull a fast one on him. Not like she already hasn't tried.

"This concerns you specifically," she replied after taking a moment to recover. Her lips were curled into a light frown, but her eyes still bored into him. "And I'm concerned if it isn't addressed, Rotte's scholarship might end up drying up soon after you leave."

"Fairytale world my ass," Artyom thought to himself. "That's a blatant threat!"

He didn't outwardly react lest he show weakness in this negotiation/shakedown, but he let out an internal sigh. "I guess academia doesn't change all that much between worlds."

The headmistress led Artyom to the stairs and towards her office. He wasn't too worried, however, since it wasn't like he had any control over the party's purse strings. But she likely knew that, so what did she have in mind for him?

Artyom couldn't help but feel a pit in his stomach. He knew he wouldn't like it.