Tip, tit, tat.
Like the grating shrill of chalk against a chalkboard, the inscriptions of pencils reverberated.
"Yes, I feel it... language is speaking to me!"
Rowan's pencil flew out and about, a dance of lightning as his hand scribbled at blistering speeds, his mind slowly succumbing to the realization of his circumstances.
His room was an absolute calamity--piles of balled-up paper colonized the floor, dried pens and worn pencils scattered like fallen soldiers in a battlefield of frustration.
Only his desk remained untouched, standing tall like an island amidst the chaos, his bed having long since been consumed by the war.
"After years, I've finally begun to do it. The words... they're perfect. The ultimate poem, It's finally here--"
Spontaneously, a blinding flash of light erupted, drowning out Rowan's inscriptions just as he carved the final stanza.
"No... no... no!"
...
Rubbing his aching head, Rowan opened his eyes, bracing for the expected piercing assault of light—but was instead greeted by suffocating darkness.
"Where am I... or, rather, where are we?"
Violently, Rowan recoiled, the sudden voice hammering through the silence and knocking him off balance.
It had been months since he'd last heard another human voice, yet strangely, no pang of nostalgia stirred within him.
"It seems that something flung us into this dark, cramped room."
Another voice chimed in, this time from the opposite side, prompting Rowan to push himself off the cold floor.
He paid closer attention this time—the voice was male, but not fully matured. Sixteen, seventeen, maybe.
"Whatever that thing was, it seems we're trapped with these creepy men."
A new voice rang out nearby, distinctly female, carrying an aggressive edge that made Rowan instinctively tense.
As she spoke, the oppressive darkness began to peel away, Rowan's pupils dilating painfully as weak light seeped back into existence.
Etched beneath them was a massive, ominous pentagram, deep red lines snaking out from its center--one tendril kissing Rowan's foot.
At each of the five points stood one of them--four others besides Rowan, each radiating an unfamiliar, electric presence.
The redhead, broad-shouldered and fire-eyed, wore strength like a second skin. Her upright stance and razor-sharp glare made approaching her feel like volunteering to be flayed alive.
"I mean... how else could we have gotten here?"
Standing just beside her was a petite girl barely scraping five feet, her violet hair cascading down her back, her figure both delicate and embarrassingly conspicuous.
"Yes... perhaps these men surrounding us might know."
To Rowan's right stood two young men, each about his height, though their demeanors split in opposing directions.
One had a composed, almost detached aura, his pitch-black hair hanging low, swallowing the dim light.
The other, a jolt of energy incarnate, sported messy yellow hair that seemed perpetually charged, tiny strands jutting out in all directions like frozen bolts of lightning.
"I say we make a break for it!"
Fwish, fwoohhh!
Suddenly, dozens of robed figures lining the edges of the room collapsed as one, their robes fluttering and slapping against the stone floor.
One of the robed men yelped, "I-I-it worked!"
Some of the robed figures remained sprawled unconscious, while others twitched feebly, struggling to right themselves.
"Hey, wait, damn it! Tell us why we're here!"
The redhead stomped toward the nearest conscious cultist, grabbing him by the collar and hoisting him high.
Thoom!
With the grace of a demolition crew, she slammed him into the wall, cracking the stone in a spiderweb pattern that hissed dust into the air.
The abrupt burst of light spilling through the fractured wall made Rowan recoil, shielding his eyes.
Gasps broke out among the others, but Rowan's focus narrowed in on the redhead herself—she wasn't just strong. She was *deliriously* thrilled by it.
She stared at her palms, wide-eyed and grinning like a wolf catching its first scent of prey.
"You... have been summoned to this world..."
The cultist coughed blood onto the floor, his voice ragged and bubbling, each word struggling past the liquid congestion in his throat.
Rowan froze.
'World?'
No way.
Was this really that?
Was this really the thing every isekai-obsessed teen dreams about but knows deep down could never actually happen?
"Huh!?!"
The four of them shrieked in unison.
The rational part of Rowan's mind battered his skull, screaming to dismiss it as absurd. But something deeper--something primal--scraped at his chest, whispering 'what if'.
"Well, if you think about it, it makes sense."
The black-haired boy's voice sliced through the panic like a scalpel.
"You all saw it—the teleportation, the magic circle. And our bodies feel... different."
Rowan flexed his hand instinctively. It was true. His limbs felt light, almost unbearably so, as though he could leap and never come back down.
"Yeah, honestly, I feel like I could run a marathon without breaking a sweat!"
The yellow-haired boy spun on his heel, laughing, fists pumping through the air like pistons.
"Very perceptive," another voice said, this one thicker, older, and full of a calm authority that made the cultists seem like squabbling ants.
Out from the shadows stepped a man bathed in flowing robes of gold and platinum, each thread shimmering with an unnatural brilliance.
The very air seemed to bow to his presence, the oppressive atmosphere making Rowan's knees feel suspiciously unreliable.
This was no mere summoner.
This was something else.
Something dangerous.
Something... important.