My New Family

The house was very small.

It was so small it felt more like a 4.5 tatami apartment room. The floor was hard-packed dirt and in it, there was a small corner that held a cold fire pit. In another corner, there was a moderately sized straw matt which I assumed was the bed. There were a few ratty blankets on it, but overall the living conditions were rather plain and plebian.

My father set me down and began to start the fire back up. He went outside to grab some firewood from the pile outside and once he brought a few logs back inside he grabbed a small knife and a piece of flint.

With the skill of someone who had done it many times; Father eventually turned a cold lifeless firepit into a roaring flame. The heat was nice. especially since the weather seemed to suggest it was early spring. There still was a slight chill in the air, and thus the heat from the flame was a welcome pushback against the cold air that still lingered.

Kotori sat by the fire and warmed her hand

[well this sucks]

Although Kotori could tell that her existence, wasn't one that would be painful, she could tell it would be a life that was difficult. It was rather apparent that in this world farmers were not particularly wealthy

[Not that I could've expected that much]

Kotori once again cursed the fact that she had not saved any karma for her reincarnation.

[How am I supposed to resolves this]

She began to reflect on her -100,000,000 karma stat. She had to do something to get it back up to at least 0 or else she would likely be reincarnated as a bug with her soul destroyed

"Why the glum face"

Kotori was snapped out of her rumination by her father

"Just tired I guess," Absentmindedly replying. Of course, her father wouldn't understand reincarnation since for the most part, souls would lose their memories upon reincarnation. Kotori herself was an exception to that rule and Gabriel-sama took pity on her. Her father, on the other hand, wouldn't even understand what she was talking about

"If you're so tired you should rest on the bed," he said trying to be helpful

Kotori, who wasn't tired, at all went to bed and pretended to sleep. At the very least it would give her more time to think about how to regain her karma back.

[Now let me think here, what can I do that would get people to love me.]

Kotori had to think big, really BIG. For most people, living a life of virtue and honesty would be enough karma for their next reincarnation, but in Kotori's case just living a virtuous life wasn't enough. She had to do something massive that would benefit the whole world. In her previous life, she had managed to solve a cancer-like disease and resolve most of the world's hunger issues with brilliant inventions and knowledge. But based on the technology she's seen so far she didn't believe that recreating those technologies in this world would be feasible. Plus, she wasn't even sure if the laws of physics would work in the same way, or if the biologies of humans in this world differed from the biologies of the one in her previous world.

[Man, this is really going to be difficult]

She began to wrack her head. For one, She didn't even know how karma accumulation works. Based on the small drop she had earlier it seems to be a linear system. But she didn't understand how certain actions were judged. For example, if by helping one person she hurt another would that still rewarded with a karma increase? Or would the net gain be zero? What if she ordered someone to help another, would her karma value go up, or the person she ordered to do the act be the one to gain the karma instead.

As she laid on the scratchy straw bed, Piles of questions began to swirl in her head. So many questions that she almost felt like her head was overheating from all the thinking she had to do. She put a hand to her forehead and it felt feverish, but she soon realized that it was just the side effect of the small house being warmed up by the fire.

"I'm back dear"

Her thought were interrupted by a voice and she turned her head towards the doorway and saw a rather plain woman standing in it hold a small boy. The woman's hair was the same dirty blonde as Kotori's and her facial features were western. The woman wasn't a beauty by any stretch of the imagination, but she was also not ugly. By a simple process of elimination, Kotori assumed that this woman was her "mother"

"Welcome back!" Her father walked up to the woman and gave her a big hug.

"Papa you're squishing me" the boy was now trapped between them protested while trying to escape their embrace.

"Oh, sorry about that Ryuji" Father touselled the boy's head before letting him go.

Once free of his father's embrace the boy scampered up to me

"Nee-Chan, Nee-chan look what I found today" He outstretched a dirty hand

Kotori looking into her brother's hand and saw what could only be a pile of dirt

"Dirt?" She said confused

"It's not dirt!" He said moving his hand

"Hey wake up!" he said poking the pile of dirt with his fingers

Kotori watched in amazement as she saw the dirt shudder and move. Eventually, the pile shaped itself into what resembled a mouse.

"It's a dirt spirit!" he said excitedly "You can talk to spirits right!"

Kotori did indeed have the [Spirit Seer] trait, although she was unsure about what having that skill meant. For one, She didn't even know what a spirit was, and watching a pile of dirt shape itself into a mouse and begin to move was already defying her typical human understandings of what was possible in the first place.

[I guess I might as well test my skill]

"Hello?"

Kotori was surprised to realize that when she spoke to the spirit, the message didn't come out of her mouth but instead felt more like she was mentally projecting words from her mind.

The dirt mouse looked at her and she suddenly felt a strong feeling of hunger mixed with slight fear. She was confused for a moment before realizing the feeling was coming from the mouse. Apparently, it was communicating through feeling rather than words.

"Are you hungry"

The mouse stared her in the eyes and once again Kotori was awash with that same feeling of hunger again

"What you want to eat"

the mouse gestured to the pile of ashes near the fire gently taking the mouse from her brother's hand she brought the mouse over to the fire. It began to chew on the piece of charred wood ash. After several bites, it stopped and then looked at her again

Kotori felt awash with a sense of fullness and contentment. She took this to assume the mouse was happy.

"Status" she whispered

Simple Dirt Spirit

Race: [Spirit] Age: 1

HP: 5

Mana: 1

Agility: 1

Strength: 1

Defense: 1

Karma: 10

Skills: none

Traits: [Minor Earth Spirit]

Kotori realized that this spirit was a little more than a child. And thus that explained why it communicated more like a baby. Although, Kotori was unsure if that assumption was true since she had never really met an adult spirit anyway.

"Look the spirit is eating!" Her brother exclaimed

Startled by this, the spirit jumped into the dirt near the fire pit and disappeared

"Hey! where'd he go"

Her brother who saw the dirt spirit he had worked so hard to catch suddenly disappear was suddenly upset.

"Nee-Chan you scared it away" his eyes began to water "When I worked so hard to catch it too..." and then he started to wail.

Kotori was unsure what to do, in her past life she was bad at dealing with children and this situation was no different.

"Hey hey, Ryuji, no need to be mad you'll have plenty of time to catch more, come here let mama hug you," Her mother said, opening her arms.

Kotori sighed in relief after her mother saved her from what was likely going to be a tantrum from her new younger brother.

Ryuji ran over to his mother and began to cry into her arms

"Baka Onee-Chan," he said crying into his mother's arms

"No need to be like that I'm sure Onee-Chan didn't mean to let it go, and besides you weren't really expecting to keep that little spirit forever were you?" Her mother comforted Ryuji

Kotori who had been an only-child in her previous life was now learning the meaning of having siblings.

[Gabriel I know can't complain but couldn't you have given me a less bratty little brother]

She sighed internally, knowing that her path to a happy reincarnation was going to be a long one indeed.