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“I’m sorry, you’ve just arrived in this world, but for the time being, get onto my carriage. We can talk inside.”

The distinguished looking man, who was dressed in gaudy attire for some reason, tried to get the two of them to climb onto his carriage. Kanata currently had no information at all about where they were, and also no reason to refuse the man’s proposal. Furthermore, even if they were to resist, he sensed it would be meaningless due to the brawny men surrounding them.

“…Please wait a moment.”
“Very well.”

Kanata brought his mouth to Sakura’s ear. She stopped crying and focused on what he was telling her.

“(It looks like someone came here. He says, he wants us to come with him.)”
“(Uh… is that okay?)”
“(I don’t know, but we currently have information at all. It looks like this man knows something, so…)”
“(…Well, I can’t see anything no matter what, so I can only leave it to your judgement.)”
“(Hm, gotcha. If something happens, you should leave me behind, so you can escape¹, Sakura, alright?)”

Before Sakura was able to reply, Kanata moved his head away.

“…We agree to what you said, but…” he replied to the distinguished looking man, “you won’t do anything weird, will you, Sir?”
“Indeed, I won’t. Far from it, I will treat you like guests.”

While the man was replying, Kanata intently studied² his face. Though he didn’t appear to be lying, Kanata decided that he couldn’t trust him yet, and nodded at him, while thinking of a way to escape, even if only for Sakura.

“Understood. We will come with you.”
“That helps. Get on, then.”

Kanata did as the man had said and went inside the carriage while pulling Sakura by the hand. He was awfully surprised, when the interior turned out several times more spacious than it had looked from the outside. Sakura also inferred that something was off about the room, merely from her sense of hearing. Naturally, the two didn’t know that this space had been turned into a magic room thanks to an enchantment.

“Alright, then. You can sit down on the couch there,” the man pointed to an expensive looking red sofa that had golden decorations in some places.

The two of them sat down on it. Once he had verified that, the man also sat down so he’d face them.

“First, we should introduce ourselves, shouldn’t we? I am Loukis Zeggray³ of Yggdrasil, the kingdom of the holy tree. As for your names… Oh, did you check your status screens?”
“Status screens…?”
“…Huh?”

The two doubted their ears at the word, which you’d encounter only in video games, light novels, and anime, coming from the man who called himself Loukis.

“What… you don’t know about it? The status screen is…”

When Loukis was about to tell them, Sakura suddenly raised his voice.

“Huh… wha-!? What is this?”
“Is something wrong!? Sakura! Wha-, woah! What the hell is this…?”

It appeared also for Kanata. A message from a so-called god of this world, was sent directly into their mind. The message gave them explanations about their situation and this world, and also encouraged them to think “I want to see my status screen” in their minds.

“Did something happen?” Loukis asked Kanata, seemingly not very concerned about what was happening.
“Some letters suddenly showed up in my mind…”
“What are you so surprised? That’s normal in Anazumu. Wasn’t that a thing in your world?”

To Sakura, those words sounded somewhat exasperated, as if to ask them “Why are you so confused by something completely normal? Is that something you can’t even do?”.

“You saw it too, Kanata, didn’t you…? Let’s try taking a look at this status screen.”
“Looks like we have no other choice. Mr. Loukis, would you give us some time to check it?”
“…Sure.”

The two wished in their minds to see their status screens.

The two couldn’t hide their surprise when something was displayed in their minds that seemed to belong to video game. Furthermore, they then received another message of that so-called god, telling them how the status screen worked in detail.

They recalled the special power mentioned in the message that had been sent to them at first, and were about to examine the details of the SK2 skills with five stars and the titles, but were interrupted by Loukis.

“You’re probably done looking at it by now. So, what are your names?”

Kanata, who was looking at Loukis, and Sakura, who’d turned to where the man’s voice was coming from, told him their names.

“I am Kanata.”
“I… I am Sakura.”
“Is that so, Kanata and Sakura? I’ll remember them… Then, there’s several things I’ll have to explain to you. We’ll talk on the way,” Loukis said, and the carriage started to move.

Kanata and Sakura unconsciously nestled closer together.

TL notes:
It looks like the chapters focusing on Kanata & Sakura will be from a third person perspective for now. It’s a nice touch how the names of chapter 205, 206, and 208 mirror chapter 2,4, and 3.

As of 24-09-16, I have replaced the English placeholders for the special skills with Old Norse since I never found fitting Irish words (and everything else in the Yggdrasil arc is based on Norse mythology, so having some random Irish in between seems a bit weird).

1. I’m sure an almost blind girl at level 1 with no information about the world will fare splendidly on her own.
2. The verb used here is 伺う (“to pay a visit”, “to inquire”), but that doesn’t make sense, so it’s likely a typo and supposed to be 窺う (“to peek”, “to examine”).
3. The original is ローキス・セッグライ (rookisu seggurai). The first part is also written as ルーキス (ruukisu), though only in this chapter.
4. The original is スパーシ・オペラティオン (supaashi operation). According to the author’s comments in chapter 210, it’s made up of two Irish words meaning 空間 (“space”, “room”) and 操作 (“operation”, “manipulation). The closest I have found to this is “spáis oibríocht”. The words I used are Old Norse with the same meaning. See chapter 254 for a more detailed explanation.
5. The original is エブリングリーメ (eburinguriime). According to the author’s comments in chapter 210, it’s made up of two Irish words meaning 促進 (“promotion”, “encouragement”) and 生命 (“life”, “existence”). I was not able to confirm this, Irish dictionaries neither gave me suitable translations for “life” nor “promotion”. The first part might be áibhligh (magnify, exaggerate). The words I used are Old Norse with the same meaning. See chapter 255 for a more detailed explanation.