C1— The Middle-Aged Man Who Became the Strongest in Another World: Awakened with Physical Specialization.

Chapter 1: Transference, and Becoming an Adventurer – 01

When I woke up, I was lying on the grass.

Above me stretched a clear blue sky, and sparse branches of trees were visible here and there.

“Ow… damn, that hurts…”

As I lifted my upper body, a sharp pain surged through my entire body for a moment.

The last thing I remembered was being on my way home from work.

Dragging my exhausted body down the stairs… and then, I recall a sudden sharp pain in my chest, like my heart had been stabbed, and I lost consciousness halfway down—then I missed a step...

If that’s the case, I should be waking up in a hospital bed. So why am I lying outdoors?

I was still wearing the same clothes I had on—shirt, slacks, and tie.

Ah, my shoulder bag is missing. There’s nothing in my pockets either. Wait, I don’t have my phone—that’s a serious problem, isn’t it?

Thinking all that, I tried standing up. Other than the pain from earlier, my body moved just fine.

The persistent pain from my frozen shoulder was completely gone—that was strange, too—

“…Where the hell is this?”

What I saw around me was a vast plain unlike anything I’d ever seen in my life.

Grass reached about to my ankles, stretching endlessly into the distance.

There were some scattered trees around, but deeper in, it seemed to turn into a full forest.

On the opposite side of the forest, I spotted a dirt path.

Following that path with my eyes, I could see—was it a town? No, more like a village. Some kind of settlement. Even from a distance, the buildings looked like nothing I’d ever seen in modern Japan.

“This doesn’t seem like a dream. I guess I’ll head over there for now.”

There was no point in just standing around. I decided to start walking toward the settlement.

As soon as I began walking, I noticed something: my body felt unusually good.

It wasn’t just my shoulder. My knees and lower back, which had long been in bad shape, felt light as I stepped along the dirt path.

Speaking of the path—there were other people walking along it, too.

They clearly weren’t Japanese, but they also didn’t seem to belong to any nationality I knew.

The closest comparison might be Westerners, but their facial features weren’t very deep—more familiar-looking to someone like me.

But their outfits weren’t so familiar.

Their clothing looked clearly old-fashioned, and even regular-looking people had things like short swords hanging from their belts—clearly weapons.

A few of them glanced at me with curious eyes. That made sense. I was unarmed and wearing clothes no one here had seen before—I must’ve looked completely out of place.

Still… where exactly was I?

I listened in on the conversations of people chatting as they walked past. They were speaking in a language I’d never heard before.

“…The knight order in Mainen… the dungeon’s been sealed…”

“Is that true? …Rumor has it that dungeon… adventurers… even the neighboring country’s aiming for it…”

But strangely, I could understand what they were saying. As if it were my native language, their words just made sense in my head.

But “knight order”? “Dungeon”? “Adventurers”?

Some of these words sounded completely unreal.

To be honest, it reminded me of the world of a video game—the kind I used to get lost in to escape the stresses of real life: like my divorce, work problems, or office politics.

Could it be that, overwhelmed by stress, my exhausted brain was hallucinating all this?

…No, that couldn’t be it. No matter how hard I tried to believe that, everything I saw—the scenery, the sound of the wind, the scent of the earth, the feel of the ground under my feet—was far too real.

The idea that I’d been transported to another world actually made more sense.

While I was thinking all this, I arrived at the settlement entrance—if you could call two upright wooden posts an “entrance.”

The settlement looked more like a small town, with two-story houses lining a winding main street that led inward from the entrance.

There were houses beyond just the main road too—at least 50 buildings, maybe more. It felt like a residential district in Japan.

But everything looked aged. The road was paved with uneven stones, and the houses were built from wood and what looked like plaster. It was like a fantasy village out of a video game.

People were walking down the street or tending stalls by the roadside—just like those I’d seen earlier.

“…What the hell is that?”

Looking around, my eyes caught a group of four men and women dressed in incredibly flashy—or rather, armed—outfits.

One man wore armor and held a large pole weapon (something I recognized as a halberd thanks to my gaming knowledge). Another had a shield as tall as himself. There was a woman with a wide-brimmed, pointed hat, a cape, and a staff, and another nimble-looking woman with a bow and arrows.

They looked like an adventurer party straight out of a role-playing game.

But everything they wore was worn and practical. Even a civilian like me could tell: these people were fighters.

“…Did I really end up in a fantasy world like something out of a game or movie?”

It sounded ridiculous, but looking around at everything, that really was the only possible conclusion.

I continued walking the main street while observing the surroundings.

The area resembled a shopping district. Shops selling food, clothing, and daily goods dotted the street between the houses.

What stood out the most were the weapon and armor stores. Seeing displays of lethal-looking weapons—impossible to find in modern Japan—only made my situation feel more bizarre.

Still, the atmosphere among the townspeople seemed relatively peaceful. But it was only now that I noticed something: a significant number of people had horns or animal ears on their heads.

They must’ve been the other fantasy races common in games. Seeing them in real life was a bit shocking, though.

I also spotted a few more people like that adventurer group from before. They had varied gear, but all shared a certain unapproachable aura.

After walking up and down the main street, I returned to the town’s entrance.

“…This seems real.”

The words slipped from my mouth. But after seeing all this, there was no denying it anymore.

It seemed I had fallen down the company stairs… and ended up in this world. Considering the heart pain I felt before, maybe I had actually died in the original world and come here.

“…If that’s the case, then what do I do now? I need to figure out how to survive, at the very least…”

Assuming I had to live in this world, that was the first problem.

Right now I had no money, nowhere to stay, not even anything to eat.

Even if I wanted to work day labor just to get by, I doubted a town this small had those kinds of jobs. Even if they did—would they hire me?

Great. I get thrown into a weird new world… and I’m already screwed before I even begin—

“Perhaps you, young man, are looking for the Adventurer’s Guild?”

Just as despair started to set in, someone called out to me from a short distance away. It was an elderly man who looked like a local.

“Huh? No, well… what’s this Adventurer’s Guild?”

“Oh? Then perhaps you’ve only just ‘awakened,’ have you?”

“‘Awakened’…?”

Baffled by the unfamiliar term, I stared blankly. The old man continued.

“Hm, seems like you don’t know much. Probably driven out of some village without a clue, huh?”

“Ah… yeah, something like that…”

I didn’t fully understand, but I nodded along to learn more.

“Then you must go to the Adventurer’s Guild even more. Come, follow me.”

“…Alright, I got it.”

I hesitated briefly, but the old man seemed kind and trustworthy enough, so I decided to follow him.

Besides, the concept of an “Adventurer’s Guild” wasn’t totally unfamiliar to me. He probably wasn’t taking me somewhere dangerous.

“But awakening at your age… never heard of such a thing. Things may be hard from here on out, but do your best.”

“…Thank you.”

Comforted by the old man’s words, I walked down the street with him.

He brought me to a three-story building I had passed earlier without noticing.

“This is the town’s Adventurer’s Guild. If you speak to the young lady at the reception, she should be able to tell you what to do next. Now then, try not to overdo it.”

I thanked him, and he left muttering something like, “Poor guy, seems decent enough, too…”

I didn’t really understand what was going on, but it seemed that if I talked to someone at this Adventurer’s Guild, I might get a clue on how to survive in this world.

I stepped through the large, open doors and entered the Adventurer’s Guild.