I opened my eyes. I was sitting in a muddy street, and it smelled… disgusting. Like urine, mud, and old people. I feel hungry. Ravenously hungry. And I feel so weak.

  I looked around—at least I tried to. Everything hurt. I tried to stand up, which worked surprisingly well. I practically sprang to my feet.

  I looked down at myself. Dirty, torn rags. Small hands. Small feet. I felt dizzy.

  “Phew. What a nightmare.” I muttered to no one

  My stomach growled. In front of me was a broken beer mug with a few small red metal pieces in it. So that’s the money here.

  I looked around. The street was fairly busy; lots of people were passing by.

  I don’t really want to accept it, but I think I was actually transported to another world. Except instead of starting as a hero—or with some broken cheat—I’m starting as a beggar.

  Barely short of starving to death. Thanks, Nephorima. I don’t exactly know how a supernatural force is supposed to behave, but Nephorima was clearly.. detached from any socially expected conventions.

  I want to complain, but it’s obvious you can’t expect a supernatural being to follow standards familiar to me. I don't think I should meet her again. In other words, I will run from anything that only rhymes of malice. And try not to starve. I’m supposed to give this body a different life? I have the accumulated knowledge of a highly advanced technological society.

  I’m sure this will be a piece of cake. I mean, it looks like I landed in an era similar to the Middle Ages.

  Every fourth isekai story is about exactly that. I just need to identify one or two materials or products and I can just take over the whole Kingdom economically. I can use this primitive world to my advantage.

  But as it stands now, even if I earn money, will I not just get mugged? I seem to have become a small teenage boy again. My train of thought stopped—Nephorima said my “target” is a woman. I reached down with my right hand into my crotch.

  Nothing.

  Why am I even surprised? Does that mean I have to be with a man—nope. That is never happening.

  Just thinking about it makes me shudder.

  Back to what I can actually influence. My primary goals are probably to follow Maslows pyramid. That would be shelter, food and water first, then begin my trade empire. I grinned.

  First I need a way to earn money. That solves the hunger and safety problems, but if I suddenly start making a lot of money without protection, I’ll get fleeced for sure. I mean, I am in the body of a half-starved child.

  I should try to move as inconspicuously as possible and present as little vulnerability as I can.

  On top of that, it’s essential to gather more information about this world. Is there magic? Are there other people from another world? How do people earn money here? What is money worth? Can I speak the language? Writing—obviously not. Is the number system decimal here? Should I reveal my education to others, or does that make me a target?

  So many questions. Best to find another poor, weak, starving street kid. Someone isolated and half-dead with hunger. Otherwise I’ll end up as a prostitute in some desperate scheme. Nobody survives alone.

  If this Middle Ages is even half as bad as the stories from the Earths, this might not be so easy. But I’ve always wanted to start over with my current knowledge. These circumstances let me pull a few people out of the dirt. In stories, that’s how you create a bond of unbreakable loyalty.

  That’s what I need. People who are loyal—and who I can train competently. I don’t need especially smart or talented people.

  They just need to die for me when I tell them to.

  But before I worry about others, I need to be able to provide for myself.

  Enough income for shelter. Food. But for that I need information—so the rat bites its own tail.

  I bent down, took the money out of the broken beer mug, and followed the street, looking for possible sources of information. After a few minutes, the area started to look more upscale.

  I turned around and went the other way. After a few hundred meters, I found what I was looking for: a girl. She was as thin as I was—thin enough that her ribs showed. That wasn’t fashion. When I stood in front of her, it looked like she was asleep. She didn’t have a mug for coins. She wore a short, half-torn sheet. I nudged her lightly with my foot.

  Her eyes snapped open and she said, “No, please don’t, I’m going already!”

  So I do speak the language here. That’s almost a cheat in itself.

  “Wake up. I need to talk to you.” I sat down beside her.

  She looked at me. “What do you want from me?”

  “I have questions. Lots of questions. And you’re going to answer them.” I showed her my mug full of coins.

  “That’s barely enough for a fresh bread,” she said, disappointed.

  “So you’re not hungry?” I asked.

  “Do I get the money if I answer you?”

  “You’ll find out once you’ve answered.”

  She looked at me suspiciously. “No. Give me the money first.”

  “Keep dreaming. Are you going to answer my questions or not?”

  She hesitated briefly. “What do you want to know? I know you. I’ve seen you here often. Everyone here hates you—you’re devil spawn.”

  “I hit my head and got amnesty…” I said. “I don’t remember anything.”

  “Amnesy? Is this a illness?” she made efforts to back away from me

  I ignored her. “Why are there so many people begging here? Are there many murders here? Is this gang turf?”

  She looked even more wary. “You’re stupid. Everyone here is afraid of the Graupster. If I don’t hide at night, they come and beat me until I give them everything I have. And if I have nothing, it’s even worse. I… I’m useless, just a mouth to feed. That’s why I’m here,” she said angrily. “As if they’ve never caught you before.”

  Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  “Is there magic? An adventurer guild? Who’s the noble who owns everything here?” I assumed a feudal system—most likely for this kind of era.

  “What’s magic? There are no adventurers, but there’s a mercenary guild. They’re bad people. And I don’t know anything about a noble. Everything here is owned by Ludolf Landwig. He’s the mayor.”

  “Do you know how people here make money? Does the city produce goods? Are there resources mined nearby?”

  “Most people are farmers. There are hunters, woodcutters, millers, bakers, fishermen, butchers, tanners, carpenters, and there’s mining nearby. The city makes weapons and armor.”

  “You know a lot of professions…”

  “I watch people. The ones who walk past every day.”

  She hesitated and looked at me, like she might lose an edge for saying it.

  “It matters who you look at when you ask. Some spit. Some are nice and give me things. Some don’t look at me at all. You start to see patterns. Like… some kinds of people do one thing more than the others.” She shrugged. “I’m not gonna tell you which ones are better.”

  “Hm…” Is the girl intelligent? Or is this just the kind of knowledge you need to avoid starving? I should take her with me. How do I do that? “Do you want to be part of my crew?”

  Crew? Really? You idiot. But neither “family” nor “guild” sounded sensible. I’ll think of something better.

  “What’s a kruu?” She looked at me suspiciously.

  “You’ll be my subordinate, and I’ll take care of you.”

  “You’ll give me food? Why? What do you want to do with me?”

  “I’m too weak alone to do anything. But I’m intelligent. I’m going to dominate this world. And I need people who follow me. You can leave anytime. But if you betray me, I’ll kill you.”

  Threatening a starving child with death. Rock bottom.

  Still, rules mattered. I was the one in control, and any exploit was useless if it leaked.

  …She looked at me strangely. I didn’t understand what she was trying to express.

  “Are there monsters in this world?”

  “At night there are wolves and other dangerous beasts in the forest…” She kept drilling into me with her stare. “Yes. I’ll be part of your kruu. But if you throw me away, I’ll kill you.”

  I chuckled. “I already like you. I have some ideas for how we can produce goods. Do you know soap? Shampoo? Paper? Candles? Tea? Is there fermented food?”

  “To open a stall where you’re allowed to sell something, you have to join the merchant guild. Otherwise the guards will steal everything and to put someone in the pillory.”

  “Of course. What a primitive oligopol. Unbelievable.”

  “What’s an olgopol?” she asked, looking confused.

  “It’s a market dominated by a few people. Don’t think too hard about it. Can’t we just sell goods to merchants?”

  “No. The woodcutters and the miners are also in a guild and it handles transportation of the goods.”

  I could scream. No wonder progress in the Middle Ages was frozen in place. “And are there scholars? Bookkeepers? People who calculate and write for merchants?”

  “Yes, but not many. And what good does that do you? You can’t read, write, or calculate.”

  “We,” I said. “And you’ll be surprised.” I’m going to have to enter the service of a guild to earn money through services, aren’t I? I need to know whether I can write here. “Do you know the numbers?”

  “Sure. I can count to ten,” she said proudly, then slowly started counting to ten on her fingers.

  “Bingo. As a computer scientist, in this era I’m a calculation genius the way Albert Einstein was a physics expert.” I was getting confident—this world was going to be easy.

  "Do you know the word for bakery?" I asked her, then took a coin and wrote bakery in the mud on the street. Looks very much not like latin characters. But I can read it is bakery. I wrote 2+2=4, 16x16 and both times the numbers were a bit alien but they came natural to me.

  She looked at it suspiciously "The baker only has a bretzel on his shield you dummy"

  I did not really cared for her validation any longer, the fact I could read and write in a foreign language put me in a very good position.

  Full of enthusiasm, I told her to lead me to the guild. She was not really on board, but I could convince her.

  When we stood in front of a busy half-timbered building, I moved to enter, but a bouncer stepped in our way.

  “What do you think you’re doing here, street rat?” he said with a dismissive wave. “Get lost before you catch a beating.”

  I stared at him, stunned. I pulled myself together. It was just another stone on the path I’d have to clear.

  “I’m here because I want to be taken into service. I can calculate. I can do higher mathematics. Probably better than anyone else in this town. And obviously I can write and read. Fluent.”

  The bouncer stared at me angrily, drew back his leg, and kicked me. He hit, and I flew a short distance. Furious and in pain, I clutched my stomach where he’d struck me.

  “Fuck off and don’t come back, or I’ll beat you, heh. Hey, guards! What’s this street rat doing here—throw it out of the trade district,” he yelled to a few constables who were walking by.

  My hanger-on shrank back and followed me without focus as the constables ran over. One of them kicked me again. “You’re going back to the hole you crawled out of. If we hear one more complaint that you’re in the guild quarter, we’ll throw you out of the city. Now run.” He drew back his arm, and I understood the gesture and ran as fast as I could.

  I wanted to cry. But all I felt was anger and hate. What is wrong with this primitive trash? I’m at least a thousand years ahead of these people, and I am not even allowed to prove it.

  Was that it for my plans? Do I even have rights? Am I outside the law?

  If so, I have far fewer options—probably none that are risk-free. Should I build a syndicate?

  The girl grabbed my filthy clothes and I turned to her. She had tears in her eyes.

  “Stop crying. Tears just show everyone you’re asking for help.”

  She started sobbing. I sighed.

  I motioned for her to come to me, but she only flinched back.

  “Come,” I ordered. She hesitated, but couldn’t resist my hard stare.

  I flicked her forehead with my finger and she twisted her face into a pained grimace. But before she could run, I hugged her and held her tight. At first she struggled, but then she gave in and her sobs stopped. I held her for a minute.

  My God. A crumb of affection and she collapses. What is wrong with this world?

  “Now stop. I need to think.”

  “Okay,” she sniffled.

  And then it hit me. This world is a brutal, primitive place—comparable to the uglier eras of the Middle Ages. I though I understood by knowing, but I had to experience it before I understood.

  Especially for those who aren’t part of a privileged class. That holds explosive potential. But it’s also dangerous. One mistake and I’m finished—beaten to death, sold as a whore, starved, or worse.

  And as if that wasn’t enough, now I have to look after her too.

  We walked for a bit, and I went over my options.

  “I’ve decided,” I said.

  She flinched and cried louder. “Please don’t leave me.” — I hate this world.

  “Tsk.”

  I took her head in my hands and tilted it up until she had no choice but to look at me.

  “You’re mine now,” I said. “Your name is Lark.”

  She just stared. Blank. Hungry. That was fine.

  “And I’m Rot.”

  My theatralics calmed me a little. Pretty grandiose, considering I can’t even feed myself, let alone both of us. Am I acting like a whiny kid with eigth-grader syndrome? Probably. Is that really cringe in a world that is broken? Probably not.

  I brooded, without finding a real solution to our immediate problems.

  Lost in thought, I began to wander away from the city center. Lark followed quietly. Until furious shouting ripped me out of my daydream. In a smithy, a master blacksmith was yelling at his apprentice.

  “That’s the second time you’ve ruined a rapier this week. This week you’re back on the bellows, and that’s where you’ll do your service. Now clean up your mess.”

  The apprentice, intimidated, did as he was told. He picked up the broken pieces and threw them onto a pile by the roadside, then went back into the smithy.

  It was supposed to be a rapier, but the tip had broken off. What remained was a roughly forty-centimeter-long pointed, round iron piece ending in a sharp point. It reminded me of a weapon from a video game. Needle.

  I looked around, but both the apprentice and the master had gone into the back of the building. I didn’t really think—it was a chance not to be completely helpless.

  I darted to the pile of metal pieces and grabbed it—Needle. I stuffed it under my clothes and quickly left. Lark just stared with wide, frightened eyes, but hurried after me when I moved.

  “Rot, if you get caught, they’ll beat you up.”

  I looked at Lark after we’d walked for a bit. “Lark. If you don’t get caught, you haven’t done anything wrong.” Ah. A new low point—I’m teaching her clichéd villain wisdom now.

  Her stomach growled. Or was it mine? “Lead us to a cheap stall where we can buy food,” I ordered. She visibly brightened.

  I followed her for a while through buildings that grew visibly poorer until we reached a stall selling bread and vegetables. I watched for a bit what others paid, before Lark tugged at my clothes again. I sighed and went up to the stall and paid for half a loaf of bread. It was hard bread. Yeast must be a hygiene only concept in this world.