The maid made a squeaking sound as she froze, caught in the act. She was standing on a stool, in the midst of climbing down from where she had been listening to the goings on in the room next door, the room assigned to Zack Adder, the unexpected extra man summoned along with the [Hero].

  “Eep.”

  Zack stood between her and the room’s only exit. She was alone.

  She had light brown hair, and a lacy white headband atop her head keeping her hair pulled back. The rest of it fell to her shoulders in gentle waves. Zack estimated her age to be roughly the same as his own, and she was slender, that much was clear even under the long sleeved black dress and white apron that, apparently, was the uniform of maids in more than one world.

  “Er, uh, sir [Otherworlder]…” she stammered.

  She was utterly caught off guard.

  Zack stepped forward aggressively, though wary of any hidden knives. He remained out of reach and between her and the exit.

  “Who are you, and who are you working for?” he growled, falling back into old habits.

  And then the poor woman began to cry.

  Tears welled up in her eyes, and she collapsed to the floor, dress spreading out around her like a lilypad on which she sat. She buried her face in her hands and wept inconsolably.

  And suddenly it was Zack who was disoriented.

  What kind of spy broke down crying when caught?

  The woman—girl?—no longer an immediate threat, he examined the room more closely. It was another bedroom, the only difference between his assigned room and this the hole in the wall, larger on this side, that enabled listening in surreptitiously. But there was no backup, no second spy, and—he checked over his shoulder—not even a lock on the door to prevent exactly this situation from occurring.

  Amateur hour.

  But if Zack Adder had one weakness, one glaring flaw that exasperated his handlers to no end back on Earth…

  He was weak to pretty women.

  “Hey. Hey!”

  He called out to the crying maid in a low voice but she ignored him, continuing to weep.

  He heaved a great sigh and approached cautiously, eventually crouching down next to the girl. He rubbed her back, soothing her.

  “Hey, there there now, it’s okay. Nothing bad’s gonna happen.”

  The girl inhaled deeply and peeked out between her gloved hands, now wet with tears. “But, but…”

  “Shh shh shh…” Zack shushed her. He patted his pocket, searching for his handkerchief, but it was empty. He had arrived in this world with nothing but the clothes he was wearing, and nothing that had been in his pockets. “Settle down, come on, get up, let’s get you seated on the bed.

  He stood, and extended a hand to help her up. Trembling, trepidatiously, she placed her hand in his and he pulled her up as though she were weightless.

  A minute later, the interrogation began. Perhaps the most gentle interrogation Zack had ever performed, it was more akin to soothing a child that had tripped and fallen than what one would expect for a spy caught in the act.

  “Alright now, what’s your name?”

  “Emma, s-sir [Otherworlder].”

  “Oh no, please. Call me Zack.”

  “I, I could never, sir…”

  After a little back and forth, they settled on ‘Sir Zack.’

  “Now, Emma, what exactly were you doing in here?”

  “I was cleaning, Sir Zack…”

  “No no, Emma. You know that’s not right. You have to tell me the truth. What did I catch you doing in here?”

  She sniffed, tears welling up in her eyes again.

  “L-l-listening, m’lord.”

  Zack let it pass unremarked this time. “I see, and who told you to do that?”

  Was it the King? The Pope? Some third party?

  The lack of information about his situation was becoming almost physically painful.

  And lucky him, he had a source of intel right here.

  “I, I shan’t say!” Emma bravely declared.

  Zack narrowed his eyes slightly, and she broke down in tears.

  “There there, that’s very brave of you.” Zack rubbed the back of her hand. “And they had you do this alone?”

  She sniffed and nodded.

  “Tsk tsk tsk,” Zack clicked his tongue. “That’s no good, such missions should be done in pairs, for exactly this reason. Your boss must have it out for you…”

  “Eleanor’s not like that! She takes care of us!” Emma retorted.

  “Is that so? Perhaps I’m mistaken.” Zack retreated easily. “And who does Eleanor work for?”

  Emma bit her lip and flushed bright red, realizing her mistake.

  Zack suppressed a grin. She was too easy to tease, and too cute in her reactions.

  Not good. He needed to focus.

  “Alright, alright.” He let go of her hand, and stood up from the bed, where he had been sitting next to the would-be spy. He pulled the chair away from the desk—twin to the one left behind in his own room—and spun it around, sitting backwards in the chair with his legs spread and his arms resting on top of the back.

  “Emma, I find myself summoned to a strange world after a terrible accident,” he said coolly and professionally. “And I get assigned a room and right next door there’s a pretty young woman listening in on everything I do and say.”

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Emma blushed but kept her lips tightly pressed together.

  “What I find most unpleasant, is that I have no idea who’s who or what’s what around here. Do you understand? Everyone is a stranger to me, and I don’t know who has dirt on who, who owes who what, who works for who, and so on. Are you following?” He cocked and eyebrow and waited for her to nod.

  “That bothers me far more than being spied on, actually. I get it, I get it, you were assigned a job and you have to do it, and I’ve messed that up for you something terrible, haven’t I? But,” he paused, letting her interest be roused. “That’s only if I say something. If I say nothing, and you don’t report it, it’s like it never happened at all. I don’t need to say anything about you or Eleanor if you’ll just answer my questions. Do you understand?”

  Emma sniffed and balled her hands into fists, looked him right in the eye, and nodded. Just once, sharply.

  “I won’t even ask who you’re working for, but tell me, do you work for the King or the Pope?”

  With a relieved expression, she shook her head.

  Zack smiled warmly. “Good, that helps me out a lot. Now, setting aside your secret work, tell me about the castle and who works here…”

  He pumped her for information for about ten minutes, the answers flowing faster as it became clear he was more interested in mundane, well-known information than in who she worked for as a spy. The basic castle layout, the nearest exits to the outdoors, and so on. She also told him about the Castle’s main occupants. The King and the Royal Family; the Knight’s Order, the maids and squires and other servants, and a detachment of priests.

  “Priests?” Zack asked.

  “They monitor the Castle on behalf of the Church.”

  “And what is the Church? The Pope is their head, right?”

  “Yes. The Grand Cathedral sits atop a hill a short walk from the Castle Gates.”

  “And why are their priests monitoring things here?”

  Emma’s gaze wandered a moment before she explained. To put it simply, without euphemisms, the Church was the true power in this Kingdom, and they had control of every important state organ.

  No wonder even the King had bent the knee to the Pope.

  “Alright then, Emma. One last question.”

  Some time had passed, and given that she didn’t work for the King nor the Pope, there were sure to be other watchers.

  “Are there magical ways of spying on me?”

  Emma’s eyes widened. She kept her lips pressed tightly shut and silently nodded.

  “I see.” Concerning. “Thank you, Emma. Feel free to spy on me as you wish, and give Eleanor my regards, or keep this a secret between the two of us.” He winked and she blushed a deeper scarlet than any time so far.

  He stood, listened at the door a moment to make sure nobody was walking by, cracked the door open, and then slipped out, leaving the door slightly ajar. A moment later he was back in his own room.

  The poor girl. Perhaps her organization had been scrambling to prepare spies for an unexpected extra summoned otherworlder? [Otherworlder]. The natives had a way of saying certain words…

  Paradoxically, knowing that he was being spied upon actually set his mind at ease. And he had some sense of the scope of his predicament.

  Emma and her compatriots would certainly be secretly monitoring him.

  The priests of the church could be expected to monitor him openly.

  That left the kingdom, which would also probably be openly monitoring him.

  Then there were other organizations, and magical surveillance…

  He would have to keep an eye out for his minders, and for other spies. They were like roaches, after all, and he felt no shame in thinking this about himself as well: where you found one, there were sure to be a dozen more still out of sight.

  He lay down on his bed, the mattress lumpy and the blanket thin, and sighed.

  But…

  What did it matter if he was being spied upon?

  He wasn’t a secret agent anymore.

  Back on Earth, he had been about to start over.

  A fresh start in life.

  And then he died.

  But…

  He was getting another chance to start over, wasn’t he?

  Transported to another world…

  In a way, it was better than his plan back on Earth.

  He would have always had to keep on eye open, lest someone figure out who he was and come after him.

  Unlikely, but definitely a possibility.

  Now, however…

  He was a world away from his previous life, and his previous problems.

  He didn’t have a history here.

  Heck, he even had a job lined up for himself.

  What bothered him the most was…

  The God and the Goddess.

  The Goddess seemed easy enough to deal with, although her paranoia and posturing was irritating.

  All he had to do was keep his mouth shut. Simple.

  The God was a problem.

  He had a handler again.

  But…

  The God… Earth’s God, seemed pretty hands-off.

  Laid back, even.

  Well, that problem could be set aside.

  Zack didn’t know how to contact him anyway.

  He could just wait until Earth’s God made contact, and deal with it if and when that happened.

  So…

  Was there any reason not to just join the hero’s party and fight the demon king?

  The hero himself, Bradley Northcourt, was almost refreshingly honest and simple.

  And he seemed like a good guy.

  Who apologizes for failing to save someone and dying in the process?

  The other two members of the party, Priestess Maria and the knight captain, Rosimund…

  Rosimund seemed like a classic case of overwork and overstress. And he was supposed to be a guide?

  He’d probably burn out pretty quickly. He didn’t need more work; he needed a vacation.

  Maybe Zack could get on his good side.

  The Priestess seemed alright, though. She hadn’t immediately pointed a sword at his throat.

  And she had been the one in charge when they were summoned.

  And it seemed like she had a direct line to the Goddess, Arianna.

  The Goddess didn’t seem to care much about him, but maybe if he got on the Priestess’ good side, too…

  Yeah, this could work.

  It’d be nice to be a real part of a team for once, rather than playing double agent.

  Observe. Orient. Decide. Act.

  Zack allowed himself to sigh.

  The beauty of training is that training takes over automatically in a high-stakes situation.

  The downside of training is that it creates a mental rut. A habit.

  After playing double and even triple agent for so long, could he just relax and be himself and fully commit?

  BANG BANG BANG

  Pounding on his door.

  Zack smoothly rotated to a sitting position on the edge of the bed, and had barely begun to stand when the door burst open.

  The Priestess from before was framed in his doorway.

  “You! Zack Adder! We need to talk!”

  She stepped in and slammed the door behind her, fury on her face.