(Bryan Gale)
"Yes, I will join your group. Please take care of me."
'If I can eat better food by murdering a few demons, then I'll take it. I'll just have to hope they don't start speaking to me a lot. If I make myself important enough for the group, then I don't have to be very social anyway.'
"Haahaha! I didn't expect such a quick and decisive answer, but that's fine. Welcome to the group!"
"Yeah, It's always great to have another member in our squad!"
Leo and Kevin seemed to be happy with me joining their expedition, while Iris, Alesha and Tony didn't show much of a reaction.
They sat down around the campfire, encircling the empty pot from which I ate all of the stew from.
"Uhmm, Bryan... Did you eat all the stew?"
Kevin questioned me while examining the empty pot.
"Yes. The demons were keeping you busy, so I took that time to eat as much as possible. I was still under the assumption that I was leaving after eating breakfast and I haven't eaten anything remotely this good in a long time, so I hope you'll forgive me."
"No, it's fine. I can just cook again. Also... Th- Thank you for liking my food."
"The food was delicious. I would also like seconds."
"What do you mean, seconds?!" Leo shouted. "You just ate all the food meant for six people! Six whole people! Shouldn't your belly be bulging by now?!"
"My body is still growing."
****
After we finished eating and I got my seconds, Kevin started explaining to me what the purpose of our journey was while cleaning up the corpses of the demons.
"There were 100 people transported to this world to defeat the demon king. Honestly, it felt kind of impossible at the time, but now I have a little bit of hope."
Kevin glanced at me for a second, before returning to his work.
"The 100 of us didn't get teleported at exactly the same position, but we should all still be in America. We got lucky and found each other rather quickly, but I don't know how the rest is holding up. The six of us should be able to deal with any enemy except for the demon king, so if we don't get overwhelmed, then we can start traveling towards the demon king's base."
I stared at Kevin, who suddenly went silent while throwing the corpses away.
'Is the conversation over or am I supposed to say something now?'
"But what are we going to do when we meet the demon king?"
"Since we can't win against the whole demon army even with the 100 people from my world together, we're planning to stay rather low-key so the enemies won't know where we are. We'll go to where the demon king's base is and hope that other groups will also have the same idea. If we are lucky, then we will meet another group on the way. If we aren't, then we will post our general location on social media, or something along those lines. That way, everyone will know where we are, so we just have to hold back the enemies that are also going to come there for long enough until everyone can regroup and attack the demon king."
I observed Kevin for a few seconds, before replying: "And the rest of the group agreed to this plan?"
"Yeah, they all agreed. Is there anything you want to change about the plan? We can still adjust it if you want."
"The plan is alright. I'm not the kind of guy that thinks of plans anyway, so I'll just follow the rest."
Kevin smiled brightly at me.
"That's great! If you have any questions, then you can ask me or anyone else at any time."
I nodded and walked away from Kevin so I wouldn't disturb him anymore and I could stop talking to someone who always appears kind and energetic.
'Sometimes he seems too happy-go-lucky for someone on another planet without any relatives nearby, except for his sister.'
The rest of the crew packed up the tents and other stuff, while I stood by and watched them. Since I just joined the group this morning, they gave me the rest of the day to adapt to the new environment and get used to traveling.
We started by traveling at jogging speed, while steadily speeding up.
Since this was my first time traveling with the others, they had to figure out how fast I could go without completely exhausting myself.
Of course, I was probably the fastest creature alive and had near-infinite stamina, so I didn't slow down the traveling speed of the crew.
We slowly sped up until we reached a world record pace. We stopped speeding up after reaching this pace and peacefully ran between the trees while staying close to the rest.
We only stopped running to eat, sleep or take a bathroom break.
The next day, I woke up and got out of my tent. I was the last one to wake up, just like yesterday.
Alesha already started cooking breakfast. It was something that I haven't seen before, but it looked like some kind of melted cheese.
'Although my diet while living alone wasn't anything standard, this is on another level.'
After we finished eating the surprisingly good melted cheese, we started packing up everything. I actually had to help this time, since I'm part of the group and already had time to adapt.
It was decided that I'll just carry most of the items and won't have to fight the enemies, except if I want to or am forced to.
"Uhhhmm, Bryan, are you sure you can carry all of that? The bag is basically the same size as you."
Leo worryingly looked at me while I picked up a huge bag on the ground.
"I'll be fine. I used to workout a lot when I was still living alone."
Leo examined me with a skeptical look on his face.
"But I don't see any muscles on your body?"
"Leo, stop questioning the new guy. He is able to carry the bag, so it's fine. Also, didn't you see him run with us yesterday? He's definitely fit enough to carry that bag and keep up with us."
Tony stopped Leo from asking me any more questions, unknowingly saving me from having to come up with another lie.
"Anyways, let's go! We have an adventure to experience!"
Kevin excitedly shouted while taking the lead.
The rest of us quickly ran after Kevin.
I dashed next to Kevin and asked:
"I have a question. I know that we are going to the demon king's base, but where is that located? How many days will it take to get there?"
Kevin kept skillfully going between the trees while answering my questions.
"Ah, I forgot you basically lived under a rock for over a month. The demon king actually has a social media account where he regularly posts. For some reason, he revealed where he lives, what his favorite food is and he writes motivational quotes. If he wasn't the demon king, then I would have thought that he was just a normal human."
"Thank you for the extra information, I'll look into it when I get the chance. I'm assuming you forgot, so I will ask you again. Where is the demon king's base located and how long will it take to get there?"
A wry smile appeared on Kevin's face.
"Sorry, I got so immersed on the demon king's peculiar posts that I completely forgot your questions. The base is in Japan, so at our current pace including our breaks it will probably take a little less than a month to get there. We are going to Japan through Alaska and Russia."
"You have my gratitude Kevin."
"Wow, instead of getting closer to the rest of us, you just get further and further away. Don't worry, you don't have to be so polite with us."
I turned my head around and heard Leo chime in to give his opinion.
"Sorry about that. I'm just concentrating on the new information and the speed at which I'm traveling, so I'm not really thinking about what I'm saying or how I'm saying it."
"Nah bro, it's fine. Just do what you're comfortable with. This journey is going to take a while, so there's tons of time to get to know each other."
The rest of the day went by without any problems happening.
We set up the tents, but I was the one that was supposed to keep watch tonight. If I get unlucky and an enemy shows up, then I can quickly wake everyone up.
The sun had set, and everyone except me was already in their tents.
I slumped down on a nearby tree stump and looked up at the cloudless sky.
"What am I even doing here... Not even mentioning my poor reason for joining this group, I don't even have any goals for my life. It's quite unmotivating and depressing. At least I'll have a lot of time to think about it."
I quietly whispered to no one, as I spent the rest of the night on the tree stump, staring into the void.
Admittedly not doing a very good job of keeping watch.