First, I sorted out the situation.

The ones who wanted to go back to the world over there were my companions. The thing was, going back as things stood was all but impossible. Since we'd managed to get here, there might be some way to get back, but finding it and pulling it off would take a fair amount of time.

Magic worked. Except that, on account of the mana being thin, there were limits on what magic could be used, and some of the actual effects were apparently the kind of thing you couldn't know without trying.

As an important point on my end, I explained that this world had none of the other races — the ones that existed over in the other world apart from the human race. We'd have to disguise them as ordinary humans somehow.

Princess Pricia and Sanctina were human, so they were fine as they were, and as for appearances, Filia the elf and the Demon Lord of the demon race sorted themselves out.

"I can use transformation magic."

"Something like this, I suppose."

When the two of them changed their forms with the transformation magic they both could use, Filia's long, distinctively elven ears shifted into a shape no different from a human's, and the demon-clan crest on the Demon Lord's face vanished.

The truth was, their looks weren't all that far from human to begin with. For whatever reason.

The strain of transformation magic apparently varied with how much you changed, but for the two of them it wasn't at a level that'd cause problems in daily life.

That meant the next issue was food, clothing, and shelter.

For housing, I had no choice but to have them live at my place for the time being. It was a single house, so while it wasn't spacious, it should be enough to get by.

As for clothes… these, naturally, couldn't just stay as they were. The Demon Lord was in a dress, and my companions were in combat gear — armor and robes and the like.

Step outside in that and they'd draw attention as ridiculously realistic cosplay, no question about it.

When I told them so, the first thing they wanted was to see what kinds of clothes there were, so I decided to look it up on the computer and show them.

"Fascinating. It's not a magic tool, either. It runs on some power other than mana."

When I switched on the laptop, the Demon Lord took an interest.

Princess Pricia, being royalty, was more of the muscle-for-brains type… well, that's rude to say. She favored the straightforward path and left the fine details to her retainers and ladies-in-waiting. Sanctina the Saint was diligent, but not the type with a strong intellectual curiosity. She seemed better suited to quietly working through whatever she was given.

"I've never seen anything like this."

Of my companions, it was Filia the elf who took an interest. She probably liked exploring the unknown and so on.

When I quickly searched up images of women's clothing and showed them, the four of them peered at the monitor from the side, watching with great curiosity. Anything too expensive would be a problem for me, though.

"Hero, are you all right for money?"

The one who understood this was reality and worried on my behalf about what came next was Filia. Someone like Princess Pricia had probably never experienced a commoner's life. Filia didn't strike me as having much in the way of greed for money, either, though.

"I've got enough money for now. I live apart from my parents, but I've got an inheritance I received from my grandfather."

My parents had been on an overseas posting for about ten years now. I'd been raised by my grandparents, but my grandfather passed away back when I was in middle school, and my grandmother passed away last month.

"If it's clothes that aren't too difficult, I can make them. The fabric and such would be different, but not all that different. Wouldn't that come out a bit cheaper?"

Ah, that might work. Hold on. Maybe I should go buy clothes at a cheap store first? For everyday wear, one outfit that didn't match their taste wouldn't hurt.

While I was thinking that, I looked at the faces of my companions and the Demon Lord, but there was the worry of whether it was okay to leave them behind. Princess Pricia and the Demon Lord especially. I figured I could take Filia along to do the shopping, but Sanctina wouldn't be able to stop those two.

Nothing for it. I'd go alone. Not that I knew the first thing about women's clothes.

"For now, I'll go round up some clothes. Just don't get your hopes up. They're commoner clothes. We can use those as a reference and think about having Filia make the rest."

Matching the level of my companions' and the Demon Lord's outfits, where a master craftsman's skill shone down to the finest detail, was out of the question. I made sure to drive that point home in advance.

I set out the drinks and snacks we had in the house, asked them not to go outside under any circumstances, and pedaled my bike in a hurry to a chain clothing store that sold relatively cheap clothes.

The timing was just after opening. Being a chain store, no clerk came over, so I could take my time choosing — but honestly, I had no idea what to buy when it came to women's clothes.

And on top of that, these were clothes for high-born girls from another world.

Inoffensive ones would do, I figured. Two outfits each, one pair of pants and one skirt for the bottoms. For the tops, a shirt and something to layer over it. Plus socks and shoes. Shoes were a no-go — better to buy women's one-size-fits-all sandals.

Clothes came in all kinds of colors and designs and patterns, which was bewildering, but this was an emergency, so I went with the ones that looked like they were selling well.

"Crap…!?"

It was then that I realized I'd forgotten to ask about something important. The matter of what to do about underwear — panties and bras.

To start with, I'd never even seen underwear from over there, and I had no idea what kinds there were. Their measurements, naturally, were a mystery too.

Should I head back once, bring them here, and have them pick for themselves? Except, letting them out in public came with risks.

They didn't look Japanese. I'd need to think about what to do for ID, passports, and so on. Maybe magic could handle it somehow — the Demon Lord had probably already come up with a plan, I figured.

Still, as things stood, it'd be better for them not to leave my place until things settled down. Even something as simple as common sense, or how to walk down a road, was different between that world and this one.

In that case, spare underwear was a necessity after all. There was no way they'd actually want underwear I'd picked out. They wouldn't go so far as to call it gross. This was an emergency.

Thinking it that far through, I steeled myself.

A thought suddenly struck me — how did I look to the store clerks right now? A high schooler who showed up the moment the store opened, and never mind the clothes, was picking through women's underwear.

It was a customer-facing business; I wanted to believe they wouldn't pay it that much mind.

This chain used self-checkout anyway, so I'd hardly stand out. Besides, it was practically my first time even setting foot in this store. There wasn't anyone here who knew my face.

Telling myself all this, I put eight pairs of panties total — two each — into the basket along with the other clothes. The panty sizes were a guess. They went by M and L and the like, after all. The bras, though, were impossible. I'd give up on those this time.

Underwear or clothes, I had absolutely no idea what was good when it came to designs and materials. I didn't know their tastes or preferences either, so buying things they'd like was out of the question. I just went with whatever looked like it was selling well in the most eye-catching spot.

Honestly — I rarely even bought my own clothes, and here I was buying a whole set of clothes plus underwear for women, women of standing no less. Way too much of an impossible game.

If I acted too suspicious, I might get spoken to, or so I worried, dwelling on things I didn't need to. I'd make a point of staying calm and getting through the checkout.

Being treated like a pervert was the last thing I wanted.

"Haah…"

The moment I stepped out of the store, the exhaustion hit me all at once.

Next, I'd need to get lunch ready too. Living alone, I didn't have enough food to feed them all.

I decided to stop by the nearby supermarket.

That said, I figured they wouldn't actually be all that picky about food. Princess Pricia had marched off to the battlefield as a soldier, and there'd been times she'd made do with hard black bread and dried meat that was just plain salty. If anything could be called a saving grace, that was it.

Well, even so, I'd buy a few things they looked like they could eat. The stress of meals had been rough on me too after I went over there.

As long as the food was all right, they should be fine for the time being.

Side: Demon Lord

The new world was nothing but things that sparked my curiosity.

The construction of the house, the furnishings of the room, those magic-tool-like things I felt no mana from. All sorts of intriguing things were here.

At the very least, he wasn't a pauper, I supposed. Though, thinking about the kind of person the Hero was, he couldn't have been born into the upper class.

Princess Pricia never took her eyes off me, same as always. If anything happened, she'd surely come at me. Then again, to put it another way, she wouldn't move so long as I did nothing.

"What pretty glass."

While I was wondering what to do from here, Sanctina the Saint was looking at a glass cup. Five cups, all of perfectly identical clarity and shape, sat on the table. The Hero had served something called barley tea in them.

When I looked closely, the windows of the house were all fitted with uniform glass. Was glass of little value here, I wondered?

The Hero's manner and his way of life didn't add up by the values of our original world.

"Demon Lord, can you read these letters?"

Filia the elf was looking through a book that had been in the room. On the cover was something like a picture of a young woman, as if transcribed by magic, and inside was something made up of pictures and letters.

The woman on the cover was baring quite a lot of skin — was that normal over here, I wondered?

"Unfortunately, I can't read it."

Among the letters left behind in writing by Heroes of past generations, there should have been one of the same lineage as this. The thing was, the samples of the script were few, and the deciphering hadn't been finished.

Truly a civilization unlike our original world. Princess Pricia and the others might be happier going back.