Chapter 19: Is this Isekai?

After telling Chiyuki to take a nap, I pulled Moye out, not giving a single damn in the world whether she was resting or not.

"I'll give you exactly three seconds to prepare a ten-page speech to explain this situation." I glared at her.

"Now, now… I am your ancestor, you know…" Moye coughed. My eyes did not move away.

"Alright, alright… I'll explain it, jeez." Moye started, "So, uh… you were actually originally born here in this world."

"What the-" I almost swore.

"Let me finish! I chose you as my successor way back when you were two or three years old. When you were eight, the Kitano family of this world experienced a massacre." Moye sighed. "I knew their target was you, but doing something that would change the course of the future significantly would create too many parallel worlds, so I chose a way to keep you unharmed without breaking any laws of time and space — by literally throwing you in an existing parallel world."

"I did my best to protect the Kitano family. Fortunately, the killers all had etiquette — they only ran through the family to hunt you down; after a while, they gave up and didn't harm anyone else in the family. Anyway, so I threw you into the Kitano family of your world, which is what your family is now." Moye paused slightly, and continued again after another sigh, "Sadly, to make sure you did not break time and space, I had to erase your past memories. If you can't remember anything from before you were eight, this would be why."

I indeed could not remember a single thing. All of my memories from before I was eight had been told to me by my adoptive father and brother.

"Then why did you not remove my memories when you threw me in… back in this world?" I asked.

"Because you can't really use technology to affect this world that much — but with spirit abilities from this world, you could've easily manipulated your old world," Moye explained.

"Ugh…" I took a deep breath. "I'll let it slide this time, considering you were trying to save my life. Just tell me some important memories from this world."

"I can just give them back to you-"

"Well, then why didn't you do so earlier?"

"Chill, chill. Here."

Moye smacked me in the head with her hilt, knocking me out. When I opened my eyes again, I realized the world was monotone.

"This must be in my memories," I murmured to myself.

I was in a village somewhat resembling one I had seen in Hokkaido. In what seemed like an instant stretched out into three years, I learned about my past.

"So Chiyuki is blood-related. Good." I sighed in relief. "Hopefully she won't be too attached to me because of that."

From what I saw, Chiyuki had been attached to me since she had learned how to talk. I was only two years older than her, but we'd been really close — until I had been thrown into the "tech world."

Man, there was a lot to digest.

"Ahem… laws for that don't exist here." Moye coughed awkwardly.

"I was just joking." I rolled my eyes.

"Anyway, that should give you a good explanation of what's going on. I'm off." Moye went back to sleep, as if trying to avoid me.

It was still nighttime. I sat there alone, reviewing my memories from the past to try to merge my old self with my current one.

"'Heh! Look at this weakling. How 'special' of you to have not awakened your spirit after everyone else in that family has!' A chubby boy laughed at me, playing around with his spirit fire in his hand.

'Didn't he awaken his spirit already, though?' another boy with buck teeth said, standing beside Chubby.

'His broken sword? That pity of a spirit shouldn't be called a spirit.' Chubby scorned.

'True.' Buckteeth grinned, pushing his already long teeth further out. 'Chubby-sama, I don't like the way his eyes are looking at us.'

'Well, you know what to do.' Chubby shrugged. Buckteeth, having received confirmation, formed two rock shards and aimed them at my eyes.

'You're lucky we aren't allowed to kill you,' he said in disgust and lunged the shards at me.

The truth was, my broken sword was very powerful, but I had been told to not use it because it would reveal my spirit to the world, and apparently, a lot of people would be on my tail.

I was about to use my arm to block the shards when an ice block appeared in front of me, blocking the two rock shards.

'Stop bullying Reiken-kun!' Standing in front of me was none other than Chiyuki.

'Who do you think you are, you swine?!' he yelled and slapped Chiyuki, who tried to hold in her tears. Seeing the only person who ever cared for me get harmed and humiliated, I instantly stood up and called for my spirit. In a split second, I grabbed a branch on the floor and severed Buckteeth's throat in one swift motion. Everyone froze.

'You… Y-You killed him?' Chubby muttered in a shaky voice, 'You murderer!'

Chubby ran off. Chiyuki seemed to have fainted from the shock."

I looked down at my own hands. I was a murderer. But did I regret it?

If I were to use the morals of the "technology world," I'd probably never walk out of this incident. But after having regained my memories and lived in this world for a bit, I understood.

The knife would always be in someone's hand. If it wasn't in yours, it'd be resting on your neck.