Then, Seiji looked towards Koushi Nomura.
"Nomursan, how are you currently feeling?"
"I'm alright now," Nomura responded tiredly. "Where is this place? Harano-san… Hashimoto-san… what exactly happened?"
"None of us really know." Seiji checked Nomura's condition. "At any rate, it's good that you're alright. Take a rest here and catch your breath. I'll explain what's going on to you after you rest up."
"No… please tell me right now." Nomura sat up straighter in the chair. "I would like to know immediately."
Seeing that he insisted, Seiji sat down across Nomura and explained what was going on.
Nomura accepted Seiji's explanation and told Seiji and the others about what he'd experienced in his own novel's storyline setting as well.
"I feel better now, knowing that none of it was real. But… I still feel like I did something wrong." Nomura sighed as he leaned back against his chair.
"You didn't do anything wrong. Any normal person would choose to escape from such a scene," Miyabi consoled him.
Nomura fell silent for a few seconds.
"I know the plot of my own light novel, and I know exactly what the main character was going to do in that situation. However, I was unable to become the main character," he stated softly. "I'm only the author, not the main character… although I was clear on this already, I still feel like that shouldn't have been a reason for me to abandon someone that I should have been able to help. I'm relieved that what I went through wasn't real, and that nobody actually died there. But… that doesn't change the nature of my actions. I… am a coward."
The silver-haired boy lowered his head.
Seiji and the others didn't know what to say.
"Let him calm down by himself," Matsutani spoke up. "Loser dogs should lick their own wounds."
"…Senpai, I feel that there's a problem with how you're wording things."
"What problem? That's just the simple truth. He abandoned his own story's female lead. What else could he be other than a loser dog?"
Seiji wanted to comment on this somehow but didn't know how to do so.
He decided to forget about this topic.
"I'm a bit interested in what the restaurant owner just did." Seiji turned around as he talked to everyone else. "The power he just used was one that Hashimoto-san never wrote about in her light novel. And, since he used his power to help Nomursan without us even asking him to do so, that gave me an idea. Perhaps we can request this restaurant owner who used to be a 'hero in another world' to assist us. Hashimoto-san, could you please try telling him that we're all people from another world that have accidentally arrived in 'this world,' and that we want to return to our 'original world'? Tell him that we would like his assistance…"
Yuuko nodded upon hearing Seiji's words.
"Got it… I'll go try talking to him right now."
Yuuko headed towards the restaurant's kitchen.
Seiji and Miyabi watched her leave.
"Will it really work?" the cat-eared girl asked him in a soft voice.
"I hope so."
"If something goes wrong… will we have to fight?"
"Most likely," Seiji told her. "If that's what ends up happening, Matsutani-senpai and I shall do battle. Ishiharsenpai, you and the others should do your best to avoid the fighting."
Miyabi fell silent for a moment.
"Be honest with me. Aren't you afraid at all? Harano-san."
"Eh?"
"Although you've been acting quite calmly, this should be a mysterious incident for you as well, filled with unknowns. Aren't you even scared in the slightest?" The cat-eared girl looked at Seiji.
Seiji blinked upon hearing this.
"Although many things are unknown, I've experienced something similar, which is why I'm not really afraid."
"Are all Spiritual Ability users' lives so filled with danger?"
"No… but things do sometimes involve danger."
"How scary."
"That's not something that an author who writes about mystical, scary events should say, is it?" Seiji chuckled.
"I think it's fine for me to say it. Real life and fiction are different, after all." The cat ears on Miyabi's head twitched. "Although my story is about the mystical, I don't want my real life to become that way as well."
"I think that Senpai is quite cute with cat ears and a cat tail," Seiji teased her.
"…Don't say that!" Miyabi glared at him before averting her gaze as her cheeks flushed red.
'She really is cute,' Seiji said in his mind.
A few minutes later, Yuuko Hashimoto returned to the dining area with the restaurant owner following her.
"I can send you all back to your 'original world," the handsome middle-aged restaurant owner told them. "However, I can only 'open the portal' to your world once. So, if you have any other companions that have gotten trapped here as well, you should find them first."
…As easy as that?
Seiji looked at the restaurant owner. "There's no additional conditions?" he asked cautiously.
"What?"
"Since you're helping us out so greatly, there's no conditions that you're going to require, or payment that you're going to request?"
"It's my job to help my customers return to where they belong. I shall help with anything that's within my abilities to do so. I don't have any conditions, nor do I need any payment," the restaurant owner stated lightly.
'Wow, this middle-aged character is so cool!'
Seiji was truly impressed with the restaurant owner.
Miyabi, Yuuko, and even Nomura and Matsutani were all impressed as well.
"We're truly grateful for your assistance, Owner-sama." Seiji expressed his gratitude.
"Don't add -sama. Do you have any other companions? Or is this all of you?"
"Other companions… we're not really sure," Seiji explained. "We don't know exactly how we arrived in this world, nor do we know how many people are trapped here like us. Nor do we know just how we should find anyone else like us."
"In that case, I can help you locate them," the restaurant owner continued in his light tone. "As long as you help me with the spell, I can locate all of your companions. You can then go to find them and bring them back here."
Wow, this restaurant owner was truly amazing!
Seiji and the others were impressed once again.
"That's truly so much trouble you're going to. Thank you, thank you so much, Owner-dono!"
"Don't address with -dono, either. Can we start immediately on the spell?" The handsome middle-aged restaurant owner had a casual look on his face as if he was doing something incredibly ordinary.
Seiji looked at the others to see if they were ready.
Miyabi, Yuuko, and Nomura all nodded in agreement.
"I think that this is a bit suspicious," Matsutani grumbled.
"The restaurant owner is just too handsome, which is too much of a stark contrast with you, as you're both middle-aged men. That's probably why you can't accept him, isn't it, Senpai?" Seiji revealed the truth.
"You brat, could you not say it so directly!"
The pudgy middle-aged man received a critical hit of ten thousand true damage.
Seiji didn't feel like the restaurant owner was lying, as he was unable to detect any of the telltale signs. Besides, there seemed to be no reason for the restaurant owner to lie to them.
Another reason was that the gentle white healing magic that the restaurant owner used to heal Nomura seemed rather familiar to Seiji…
Seeing that Matsutani didn't adamantly refuse, Seiji looked towards the restaurant owner once more and indicated that he could begin the locator spell.
"In that case, follow me."
The restaurant owner walked back towards the kitchen.
Everyone followed him into the kitchen, then to a storage room. They then entered a basement and saw that many magical-seeming objects were placed here in the wide basement.
Seiji looked towards Hashimoto-san.
"Not only have I not written such a setting, I've never even imagined such a setting," Yuuko whispered to him.
'So, not only has it exceeded the published story's setting, it's even exceeded the author's imagination…' Seiji felt that his inference about what was going on was more and more likely to be on the mark.
"Everyone, please stand together in a circle around this." The restaurant owner retrieved a device and placed it on the ground.
The lower half of this object seemed like a three-legged round stand of some sort that had many mystical markings etched into it. The upper half was a globe-shaped object with highly complex circuitry-like patterns etched into it.