Volume 1 Chapter 1 - Could This Be Another World?

Read the prologue!!

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Part 1

When I woke up, the first thing I felt was my eyes being dazzled.

Light filled my vision, and I narrowed my eyes in discomfort.

Once my eyes adjusted to the brightness, I found a young blonde woman gazing at me.

A beautiful girl... No, a beautiful woman would be more appropriate.

(Who is it?)

Beside her was a man of a similar young age with brown hair, giving me a stiff smile.

A strong and arrogant looking man. His muscles were amazing.

Brown hair, arrogant type. Looking at his DQN appearance, I should have been repulsed. Strangely enough though, I did not feel he was unpleasant.

His hair was a pretty brown color, probably because it wasn't dyed, I guess.

"-----XX-----XXXX"

The woman cracked a smile as she watched me and said something.

What is she saying? Feeling fuzzy, I could not hear clearly and didn't understand it at all.

Could it be that it's not Japanese?

"------XXXXX----XXX," the man replied with a gentle expression. Really, what did he just say? I couldn't understand it at all.

"------XX-----XXX"

A third person's voice came from somewhere.

I couldn't see them.

I tried to sit up and ask them, "Where is this place, and who are you guys?"

Even if I was a hikikomori, I still wasn't a complete failure at communication.

I could still do something like this.

"Ah, Ah------"

But I couldn't tell if what came from my lips was a groan or just heavy breathing.

My body couldn't move.

I felt sensations in my fingers and wrists, but I couldn't move my upper body.

"XXX--XXXXX"

In the end, the man carried me up.

This is a joke, right? My body weighs over 100 kilograms, and he lifts it up so eas…

No, maybe I had been in a coma for dozens of days, and it caused my body weight to go down.

It was such a huge incident. There was a large possibility that I lost an arm or a leg.

(A fate worse than death, hah...)

On that day.

Those were my thoughts.

Part 2

A month passed by.

It looked like I was reincarnated. I finally realized that fact.

I had become a baby.

I confirmed it when I was carried up with my head supported and my own body appeared in my sight.

I didn't know why I still had my past memories, but there was nothing bad about retaining them.

Retaining memories upon reincarnation-----anyone would have entertained such delusions at least once.

But I didn't think that such a delusion would become reality...

The first couple I had seen when I opened my eyes seemed to be my parents.

They were probably in the earlier half of their 20s.

Clearly, they were younger than me in my past life.

From the perspective of a 34-year-old, it was alright to call them young.

It really made me envious that they had children at that age.

I already noticed it from the start, but I didn't seem to be in Japan.

The language was different, my parents' faces didn't appear to be Japanese, and their clothes even seemed to be that of a native village.

I couldn't see anything resembling an electronic device (the person who wore a maid's apron was cleaning with a cloth), and the utensils, bowls, and furniture were coarsely made from wood. It was probably not an advanced, developed country.

The light was not produced from light bulbs, but from candles and lamps.

Of course, there was the possibility of them being very poor and unable to afford the electricity bills.

...Maybe that possibility was very high?

I thought they surely had some money, as there was someone dressed like a maid.

But it wouldn't be strange if it was a sister of one of my parents. It would be a normal thing for her to be cleaning.

I certainly wanted to start afresh, but living in a family that could not even afford to pay the bills made me very restless.

Part 3

Half a year passed by.

Listening to my parents' conversations during this last half-year, I had started to understand things bit by bit.

My English grades couldn't have been considered good, but it seems true that learning it can be quite a slow thing when heavily influenced by a native language. Or could it be that this body's mind was pretty good? Maybe it was because of my young age, but I could remember things quickly.

By this time, I was able to crawl.

Being able to move is a wonderful thing.

I had never felt such gratefulness for being able to move.

"He'll run somewhere else when I move my eyes away from him."

"Isn't it good that he's active? I was so worried when he didn't cry at all when he was born."

"Even now, he doesn't cry."

My parents had this discussion when they saw me crawling everywhere.

I was not at an age when I'd cry loudly when hungry, after all.

But even if I tried to hold it in, the stuff that comes from below would still leak out, so I just left things alone as they were.

Even though I could only crawl, once I did so, I understood a lot of things.

First of all, this family was relatively well off.

The building was a two-story wooden house, and there were over five rooms. They had one hired maid.

At first I thought the maid was my aunt or something, but her respectful attitude towards my parents made it seem she wasn't family.

The place was a village.

From the scenery I could see from the windows, it was in a tranquil landscape of farming plots.

The other houses were scattered around, and on one side of the wheat fields I could see two, three families.

It was quite a rural place. I could not see any electric wires, lamps, or anything similar. Perhaps there wasn't a generator nearby.

I had heard that foreign countries place their wires underground, but if that was the case, it was strange that this house did not have electricity.

It was too rural. It was painful for me who had been jostled by the wave of civilization.

Even if it was reincarnation, I still wanted to have a personal computer.

That way of thinking ended on a certain afternoon.

With nothing to do, I climbed up onto the chair as usual, intending to admire the field's scenery. When I looked out the window, I was shocked.

Father was waving around a sword in the courtyard.

(Wha, huh? What is he doing?)

My dad is still waving that thing at his age? Chuunibyou?

(Ah, crap…)

Due to the shock, I fell down from the chair.

My undeveloped hands grabbed the chair, but they were unable to support my body and the heavier back of my head hit the ground first.

"Kyaa!"

I heard a scream just as I hit the floor.

My mother spotted me and dropped the washed laundry, her hands over her mouth, looking over me with a deathly pale face.

"Rudi! Are you okay!?"

My mother rushed over to me in a panic and carried me up.

She looked me in the eyes and placed her hand on her chest, looking relieved

"...Phew, you seem fine."

(Madam, it's better not to move someone after their head just received a blow,) I reminded her in my heart.

From her anxious attitude, it seemed I had fallen in quite the dangerous manner.

It seemed possible that I might become an idiot due to the knock on my head. Not that that would be any different.

There was a throbbing pain on the back of my head. At least grabbing the chair with my hands had lowered my velocity.

As my mother's reaction didn't seem panicky I assumed there wasn't any blood. It was probably just a swelling.

Mother took a careful look at my head.

Her expression seemed to say, if there's an injury it'll be serious.

Finally, she placed her hand on my head,

"To be safe... Let the power of God be converted into a bountiful crop, and bestowed unto those who have lost the strength to stand once more, 『HEALING』"

I nearly burst out, "Hey, hey, is this this country's [Pain, pain, go away quick]?"

Or was it that, along with my sword-wielding father, my mother was also a chuunibyou?

A warrior and cleric's wedding?

Just when I was thinking that.

My mother's hand emitted a dim light, and, in an instant, my pain disappeared.

(... Eh?)

"See, it's okay now. After all, your mum was a renowned adventurer, " my mother said in a boastful manner.

I was instantly plunged into confusion.

Sword, warrior, adventurer, healing, chanting, cleric. All these terms echoed in my head.

What was that just now? What did she just do?

"What's wrong?"

My father looked in the window from outside when he heard my mother's scream.

His whole body was sweaty as he had just been swinging his sword.

"Listen to me, dear. Rudi actually climbed on top of a chair...and nearly got gravely injured."

"Well well, it's not good if a boy isn't active."

A slightly worried mother, and a father who didn't treat it like a big deal and placated her.

This is a commonly seen event.

But, my mother didn't back off, perhaps because of the back of my head hitting the ground first.

"Just a moment, dear. This child isn't even a year old. Would you worry a little more!"

"Despite that, a child is meant to grow up falling down to become sturdy. This way he will become healthy. Besides, even if he's injured, can't you just treat him?"

"But I'm really worried, I keep thinking of him getting heavily injured and me being unable to treat him..."

"He'll be fine."

My dad said that and embraced her tightly.

My mum's face turned red.

"I was worried when he didn't cry at all in the beginning, but if he's so naughty, he will surely be fine..."

My dad kissed my mum.

Hey, hey, you're showing this to me on purpose right? Both of you!

Later on the two of them put me in the next room to sleep, moved on to the second floor, and started in on the task of making me siblings.

Even if the two of you go to the second floor, I can still hear the nyan nyan noises, damn successful offline people…

(But, magic huh...)

Part 4

Later on, I started paying attention to the conversations between my parents and the maid.

And then I heard a lot of terms not in my vocabulary.

Especially the names of countries, districts, and various other locations.

Some proper nouns I had never heard before.

Maybe this place is...

No, I was certain of it.

This wasn't Earth, but some other world.

A different world that has swords and magic in it.

At this moment, I had a flash of inspiration.

...If it's this world, perhaps even I can achieve it.

If it's a world of swords and magic, a world deviated from my previous life and what I know as common sense, perhaps I can do it.

To live like a normal person, to work hard like a normal person, to be able to climb back up if I fell down, to live my life fully.

I had been full of regret when I died in my previous life.

Dying full of burning restlessness over my impotence and the fact that I had accomplished nothing.

But the me who experienced all that,

Having retained the knowledge and experiences of my previous life, perhaps I could really do it.

--To live on seriously. (from a Hikimori's pov)