"So let me get this straight," I say, looking at the three girls who are staring at me like I'm some kind of exotic pet that just materialized in their living room. "You found a creepy old book in library, thought 'hey wouldn't it be fun to try this summoning spell,' and now you're surprised that it actually worked?"

  "Well when you say it like that it sounds irresponsible," Celine says, clutching the leather-bound grimoire to her chest.

  "It was irresponsible!"

  "But we didn't think it would actually work!" She's got these perfect blonde ringlet curls that bounce when she talks, that which require either magic or serious effort, and right now they're bouncing frantically. "The book was old! Half the pages were falling apart! What were the odds?"

  "Apparently pretty good considering I'm standing here." I cross my arms, which is when I notice again that my arms are tiny, childlike, pale as fresh snow with this weird faint glow like someone applied an Instagram filter to reality. Great. Just great.

  The redhead—Mara—hasn't moved her hand from her sword this entire time. "You still haven't expined what you are."

  "I told you already. I'm a High Demon. Name's Nyx."

  "That's not an expnation, though."

  "What do you want, my resume?"

  "That would be a start."

  'Ugh…'

  You're probably wondering how I got into this situation, right? Even me wondering how I got into this shit, y'know? Girl in a gothic lolita dress with demon horns arguing with three medieval teenagers in what looks like the set of a period drama. But, well, fair question. Let me back up.

  Six hours ago I was sitting in my apartment grinding the final boss of the Abyss Sanctum in [Asteroth Online], which if you're not familiar with it—and why would you be, I'm talking to myself in my head—is only the most popur VRMMORPG on the market right now. Not because it's good, though it is, but because it's the first one that actually delivered on the promise of "virtual reality" without making you motion sick or requiring a mortgage to buy the equipment. The game unched two years ago and absolutely exploded. Twelve million active pyers. Esports tournaments. Merchandise. The whole corporate nightmare. You name it.

  I don't py it for the community though. I py it because I'm a graphic designer with anxiety and insomnia and this game lets me create something beautiful and then watch it destroy things, which is deeply satisfying in a way that designing logos for wellness brands is not.

  Nyx is my main. My baby. My masterpiece.

  I spent eight months building her into perfection. [High Demon] css, legendary-tier DPS, gear that took actual months of grinding to collect because the drop rates in this game are designed by sadists. But it's her design that I'm really proud of. See, most people treat character customization like a checkbox. Pick a preset face, sp some hair on it, choose whatever armor has the best stats even if it looks like garbage. Not me, duh. I'm a designer. I spent two weeks in the character creator alone.

  It is a gothic lolita aesthetic but actually good. Bck dress with real tailoring, silver filigree that catches light, pale skin that creates proper contrast. Small curved horns like a ram. This is a design that makes other pyers stop and ask where I got the cosmetics, except I didn't get them anywhere, this is just what you can do if you actually understand color theory and silhouette.

  Anyway. Six hours ago, in [Abyss Sanctum], final floor, boss fight against [Ia Shub Niggurath], which is a horrible name that the devs clearly pulled from Lovecraft without understanding what it means, but whatever. The fight's a nightmare; twenty-minute rotation, constant add spawns, and traps that one-shot you if you're not paying attention. Most parties wipe four or five times before they clear it.

  But… hmmm… obviously this is not a brag, okay… well, I did it solo.

  Because Nyx is that good. Because I'm that good. Because I've run this fight so many times I could do it in my sleep, which I practically was doing considering it was midnight on a Monday and I had a client call in nine hours that I was definitely going to regret.

  The boss dissolved into pixels and loot, standard victory fanfare, and I was about to check my inventory when I saw it. The summoning circle. Purple light spiraling up in these zy ribbons, geometric patterns way more intricate than the standard portal design, particle effects that looked expensive. My brain went: oooh hidden event, new content, or even rare loot!

  So obviously I walked into it.

  Because I'm a completionist with poor impulse control and I've been pying this game long enough to know that mysterious glowing circles usually mean good things, like secret achievements or rare drops or access to hidden areas. The devs had just pushed a major patch. The forums were full of people finding new content. This was clearly one of those things.

  Nyx, well, I… stepped onto the circle.

  And suddenly…

  … the screen went white.

  Then I was falling through space that shouldn't exist, then my apartment disappearing, then reality doing something it absolutely should not be doing, and when I hit solid ground it was cold stone instead of my worn-out carpet, and my hands were small and pale, and I was wearing Nyx's dress, actual fabric! instead of pixels, and there were three girls staring at me like I'd just appeared out of thin air.

  Which I had.

  Because they summoned me.

  "—listening?"

  I blink. Mara is gring at me, hand still on her sword. "What?"

  "I asked if you're dangerous."

  "Do I look dangerous?"

  "You have horns."

  "Hmm? Ah! Rex, girls. They're decorative."

  "That doesn't look decorative!"

  The dark-haired girl—Vivienne—steps between us, one hand raised like she's trying to prevent a fight. "Mara, she's been standing here for five minutes and hasn't attacked anyone. I think we can lower the threat assessment."

  "She appeared in a summoning circle with horns, Vivi," Mara says ftly. "Forgive me for being cautious."

  "Cautious is fine," I say. "Stabbing me would be less fine."

  "I wasn't going to stab you."

  "Your hand says otherwise."

  Mara looks down at her hand on her sword hilt, then back at me, and her expression shifts slightly. Not quite embarrassment but close. She drops her hand. "Fine. No stabbing. Yet."

  "See, that 'yet' is really not helping your case."

  Celine bounces forward, ringlets flying. "Um, well, can we talk about how you're from another world? What's it like? Do you have magic there? What were you doing when we summoned you?"

  "Killing a boss monster."

  "A what?"

  "Big creature. Lots of health. Drops good loot when you kill it."

  The three of them exchange confused looks.

  Right. Different world. Different terminology. I need to start transting my game knowledge into words they'll understand, except I have no idea what words they'll understand because I've been here for approximately ten minutes and my entire knowledge of this world consists of "they have summoning circles" and "at least one of them wants to stab me."

  "Look," I say, trying to organize my thoughts. "Where I come from, we have... combat simutions. Training grounds. You fight creatures to get stronger and collect rewards."

  "Like dungeon crawling?" Vivienne asks.

  "Sure. Like that. I was in the middle of one when your spell pulled me out."

  "And you're upset about that," Mara observes.

  "I'd been working on it for four hours."

  "Four hours in a dungeon?"

  "It was a long dungeon, to be honest."

  Celine's eyes are sparkling with that specific excitement that comes from meeting someone interesting and not yet realizing they might be a problem. "What kind of creatures were you fighting? Were they demons? Undead? Dragons?"

  "Yes."

  "Yes to which one?"

  "All of them. It was the [Abyss Sanctum]. Everything in there wants to kill you."

  "And you survived alone?" Vivienne's analytical gaze sharpens. "For four hours?"

  "I'm good at what I do." I pause. "Was good at what I do. Past tense now, I guess, considering I'm stuck here."

  The room goes quiet. It's the first time I've said it out loud—stuck here—and hearing the words makes it real in a way that it wasn't before. I can't just log out. Can't close the game and go back to my apartment with the dried-out ramen and the client deadlines and the pile of undry I've been ignoring. This is my reality now. Stone floors and candles and three girls who accidentally summoned me while pying with magic they don't understand.

  "We'll find a way to send you back," Celine says, but her voice wavers.

  "Will you?"

  "The book has to have something—"

  "I already looked." I gesture at the grimoire. "Your book has instructions for summoning. Nothing about reversing it."

  Vivienne takes the book from Celine and starts flipping through pages. She's the smart one, I'm realizing. The one who actually thinks before acting. "There has to be a counter-spell… every major working has a reversal procedure."

  "Does it?" I let the question hang.

  She keeps flipping pages, but I can see the doubt creeping into her expression. The growing realization that maybe they fucked up worse than they thought. That maybe there's no easy fix for "accidentally summoned a demon from another dimension."

  Mara crosses her arms. "So what do we do now?"

  "Now?" I look around the chamber; stone walls and dust everywhere suggesting this room hasn't been used in years. "Now you hide me before someone notices you summoned something you're not supposed to have."

  "Hide you…?" Mara repeats.

  "Unless you want to expin to your parents why there's a demon child in the mansion."

  "I'm not expining anything to my parents," Celine says quickly. "Father would… um, he'd be so disappointed. Mother would never let me study magic again."

  "Then we're in agreement. I need to not be a summoned demon."

  Vivienne looks up from the book. "How do you propose we do that?"

  "Cover story. Maybe I'm your friend from the academy, visiting for the summer, because of family emergency, and then happened this urgent travel, and you offered to host me. Or whatever. Simple, right?"

  "That's not simple," Mara says. "That's a lie that needs multiple supporting lies and constant maintenance."

  "You have a better idea?"

  Vivienne exhales slowly. “I… don't. But we can’t take you anywhere public. Not like this.”

  “Define this,” I say. “Because I’m currently defining it as your problem.”

  Celine winces. “Uh. She’s… not wrong.”

  Mara shoots her a look. “Celine.”

  “What? We summoned her.”

  “That was an accident.”

  “An accident we performed using a restricted grimoire,” Vivienne adds ftly. “From the Royal Academy library.”

  I blink. “Royal Academy as in—hmm let me guess—elite institution, absurd tuition, and a strict ‘do not summon extradimensional beings’ policy?”

  “…Yes,” Vivienne says after a beat. “Very strict.”

  “Cool. Love that for us.”

  Mara straightens, defaulting into what I’m starting to recognize as her official voice. “We’re fourth-year students. Academy track for applied magic and combat arts.”

  “Combat arts, huh,” I repeat, eyeing her sword. “That expins the twitchy hands.”

  She bristles. “That sword is for my protection!”

  “Sure. And I’m sure it’s very good at it.”

  Celine steps in quickly, her hands raised. “We’re not bad people, Nyx. We really didn’t think the spell would work. It was supposed to summon a familiar. Or, at worst, a minor spirit.”

  “Instead you got me.”

  Vivienne nods. “A fully manifested entity with independent will, physical form, and, if I’m reading the residual mana correctly, an arming amount of power.”

  “Hey,” I say. “Armingly competent, thank you.”

  Mara crosses her arms. “If the Academy finds out, w-we’ll be expelled… get arrested too probably.”

  “That sounds worrying.”

  “It would ruin everything!” Celine says. “Our families, our futures—”

  “—our funding,” Vivienne finishes. “Which means we handle this quietly.”

  I tilt my head. “So let me get this straight. You’re rich, magically gifted academy students who accidentally summoned a demon and now need her not to exist.”

  “Yes,” Vivienne says.

  “Correct,” Mara agrees.

  I consider them. A banced party, honestly. I sigh.

  “Fine. Temporary alliance, then.”

  “That’s… reassuring?” Celine offers.

  “Don’t push it.”

  Vivienne closes the grimoire. “Then this is what we’ll do.”

  All eyes turn to her.

  “You stay here,” she says. “At least for now. It’s secluded, warded, and Celine's estate staff doesn’t ask questions if we tell them not to.”

  Celine nods slowly. “Yeah, no one come here unannounced, and the estate wards will mask your mana signature.”

  “Mask it from what?” I ask.

  “…well, we nobles used it as a protective measure to remain secretive,” Celine replies.

  “Cool,” I say. “Love being a secret.”

  Celine reaches for the grimoire, hugging it to her chest again. “We’ll keep finding out, carefully this time, we will cross-reference summoning theory, dimensional anchors, reversal rites—”

  “—without activating anything,” Mara cuts in sharply.

  “Yes. Without activating anything,” Celine agrees quickly.

  I look between them. “So the pn is: hide the demon, which is me, panic but keep it quiet, and hope you’re smart enough to fix this.”

  Vivienne meets my gaze. “We are smart enough!”

  Mara adds, “And if we’re not, we’ll adapt.”

  “That’s the most comforting thing anyone’s said to me all night.”

  A distant bell tolls, echoing through the stone halls.

  Celine flinches. “Oh! It’s almost midnight.”

  “Which means the servants will be changing shifts,” Vivienne says. “We shouldn’t keep standing here.”

  Mara gestures toward the corridor. “We’ll get you settled first. Tomorrow morning, breakfast in the east dining room.”

  “Breakfast like… food breakfast?” I ask.

  “Yes.”

  “Good. I’m emotionally unstable without food.”

  Celine smiles despite everything. “We’ll go over your cover story then, and… everything else.”

  “Right,” I say, exhaling. “Future problems for future me.”

  They exchange looks again—another silent agreement—and I can tell this is it. The moment it becomes official.

  Nyx, demon from another world, is staying.

  “So,” I say, rolling my shoulders. “Who wants to show me to my room?”

  Celine exchanges looks with the others. Finally Vivienne nods.

  "Well there is a room in guest wing," she says. "East side of this mansion. We must hurry!"

  "Huh? Right."

  "It's past midnight!"

  "Right. Medieval schedule. Got it."

  "Medieval?" Celine tilts her head.

  I wave a hand. "You know what I mean."

  They clearly don't, but they're too polite or too confused to press the issue. Mara moves to the door first, checking the corridor like she's scouting for enemies, which I guess she is. Vivienne gathers the candles while Celine tucks the grimoire under her arm with the kind of care that suggests it's precious despite being the source of all her current problems.

  I follow them into the dark hallway, footsteps silent on stone floors, and my brain is cataloging everything; the architecture, the ck of electric lighting, the way sound echoes suggesting high ceilings and rge spaces. This is real. This is actually happening. I got isekai'd like some protagonist in a light novel, except I don't have a cheat skill or a system menu or a helpful goddess expining the tutorial.

  I have three girls who accidentally summoned me and a body that looks twelve years old but contains the consciousness of a twenty-six-year-old woman with anxiety and poor life choices.

  "Try not to make noise," Mara whispers from ahead.

  "I'm literally wearing a dress. How am I supposed to be silent?"

  "Walk carefully, then."

  "Helpful. Thank you."

  Vivienne suppresses what might be a ugh. "You're very sarcastic for a demon."

  "Where I come from, sarcasm is a survival mechanism."

  "It must be a dangerous pce."

  "You have no idea."

  We turn a corner and the hallway opens into something rger; a gallery maybe, with windows letting in moonlight and portraits on the walls showing stern-faced people in expensive clothing. Nobility, huh. Old money. The kind of family that has summer estates and personal libraries and daughters who can casually attempt interdimensional summoning without adult supervision.

  "This is your house?" I ask Celine.

  "My father's summer estate," she confirms. "The main house is in the capital."

  "Of course it is."

  "What does that mean?"

  "Nothing. Just… Rich people things."

  "Are you not wealthy in your world?"

  I almost ugh. "I'm a freence graphic designer. I make enough to pay rent and buy instant ramen in bulk. Wealthy is not the word I'd use."

  "What's instant ramen?"

  And there it is. The cultural gap. The reminder that I'm not just in a different pce but a completely different world with different food and different technology and probably different physics considering magic is real here. I'm going to have to learn everything from scratch. Language, customs, social rules, how magic works, what's considered normal and what's suspicious.

  I'm going to have to pretend to be someone I'm not while figuring out how to survive in a world I don't understand.

  This is fine. Everything is fine.

  (Everything is not fine.)

  "It's food from my world," I say finally. "Not important. Keep moving."

  We reach a door at the end of the gallery. Vivienne opens it carefully, checking inside before gesturing for me to enter. The room is nice, too nice for someone like me. Four-poster bed, heavy curtains, furniture that looks antique and expensive. A dress is id out on the chair, pale blue with white trim, and there are undergarments and shoes arranged next to it.

  "The servants prepared this?" I ask.

  "I told the head maid once to prepare this room," Mara says. "She had the room ready everyday."

  "Efficient."

  "She's very good at her job."

  I walk into the room, my small feet silent on plush carpet. This is my life now, huh. This room, this world, these three girls who brought me here by accident.

  "We'll come get you for breakfast," Celine says from the doorway. "We need to go over your cover story. Make sure you know enough to be convincing."

  "What time again?"

  "Eight bells."

  I have no idea what that means. "Sure. Eight bells. Got it."

  Vivienne lingers while the others head back toward the ritual chamber. "Are you really from another world?"

  "Yeah."

  "What's it like?"

  I think about my apartment… my monitors, the half-finished client work, the anxiety about money and retirement and whether I'm wasting my life.

  "Different. So much different."

  "Do you want to go back?"

  Do I? I should. That's the obvious answer. But standing here in this room that's nicer than anywhere I've ever lived, in a body that can use actual magic, in a world where the worst thing I have to deal with is three teenage girls instead of passive-aggressive clients and bills and the crushing weight of adult responsibility...

  "Ask me again when I've been here longer than an hour," I say.

  Vivienne nods like that's a reasonable answer. "Goodnight, Nyx."

  "Night."

  She closes the door softly, leaving me alone in the silence.

  I look down at my hands again. Small, and pale. I touch my horns. Solid. I can feel the mana flowing through my body, warm and electric and ready to use.

  This is insane.

  This is completely insane.

  And I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing.

  But I've faked confidence through worse situations: Client presentations where I had no idea what I was talking about. Deadlines that seemed impossible. That time I had to completely redesign a project in three days because the client changed their mind.

  I can do this.

  I climb onto the bed—have to actually climb because my legs are too short to reach normally—and stare at the ceiling.

  'Well, it's going to be a long night."