This is the story of an average boy.
From his perspective, 2 years had passed since the end of that April.
At that time, golden week was just around the corner. And he and his family would be going on a rare trip together.
Eager and impatient, he hurried back home as soon as school ended.
But as luck would have it, he suddenly fell – or was sucked – into something, and he vanished from the world.
By the time he came to, he was in the middle of nowhere, surrounded only by the greens of mother nature.
Although he didn’t make a commotion due to his personality, he was still understandably shocked.
After some time, he calmed down. But nevertheless, he was still at a loss with no idea how to proceed.
For a 13-year-old boy who had no knowledge on survival – or techniques for that matter – there was nothing else for him but to loiter about.
His phone was out of the question. The signal just couldn’t reach this odd forest filled with odd trees and plants he had never before seen or heard of.
Odd animals even roamed about.
A horned spider. A fire breathing rabbit. A giant bird as big as a jumbo jet, flying about in the sky.
He averted his eyes, trying to convince himself that this was not real, but eventually, even that reached its limits.
After fearlessly running from the giant bird, somehow someway he won lady luck’s favor, and he managed to exit the forest.
But as far as his luck was concerned, that was it.
With the giant bird gone, he breathed a sigh of relief, and it finally dawned on him.
But then again, it was really more of him being forced to acknowledge rather than just him coming to a realization.
Strange small animals were one thing. After all, those could still be blamed on his lack of knowledge. But giant birds were another thing altogether. Those couldn’t possibly exist on Earth.
So there was no choice left to him, but to acknowledge it. And by “it”, that is of course referring to the fact that he was no longer on Earth. He was in a different world.
For a boy his age who was loved reading books and comics, he had his fair share of knowledge regarding “otherworld” matters.
But as for whether it was for better or for worse that he quickly realized it, it was more or less neither.
After all, there was still nothing he could do about it.
So off he walked just as he did before, leaving behind the forest, as he tried to stifle any sort of uneasiness within him.
Why was he thrown into this world? What should he do from now on? Will he meet anyone here?
And if he does, will they lend him a hand? To begin with, are there even humans in this world?
If there are, how was he supposed to explain himself?
The more he thought, the more anxious he grew, so he stopped.
He chased away the one thing he didn’t want to worry about the most to a corner in his mind, where it was drowned out by other worries.
But in the end, he still ended up thinking about it.
––––––Can I even go home?
Could he go back home to that house? To that house where his parents and his siblings were waiting?
Pangs of despair lashed out from inside him accompanied by an odd sense of excitement.
It was almost as if he was the main character in an anime or a manga ––– but that flash of a thought was but a mere flash; it died almost as soon as it appeared.
He was no longer a child who would dream of something like that, much less believe in it.
He wanted to run away from reality, so he bluffed to himself. But in the end, he rejected the thought.
––– I was definitely summoned to this world to save it!–– Is of course, impossible…
Since he realized it almost immediately, he couldn’t even lose himself in that fool of a dream.
But when he stumbled across something that resembled a farmer’s village, he at least, felt some relief.
Alas, that relief couldn’t last past five minutes.
Obvious as it may be, he was a young boy from Japan who could only speak Japanese. Naturally, he didn’t know a lick of this world’s language.
After all, this was a different world.
The knowledge and common sense he had could not be used in this world.
So of course, neither could the only language he knew.
His one saving grace was that the “person” he saw at least resembled the humans he knew of.
With his poor communication skills, not even his gesturing and signing managed to get through.
He was an ordinary, Japanese middle school student, so of course, he was without training and was also obviously unsuitable for farm work.
As for the farmers, they just thought that a weak child incapable of speech suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
As misfortunes piled atop one another, as if to push that pile even deeper into the abyss, it turned out that the people of this world had only one language.
The only ones who spoke a different tongue were their enemies.
Regarding translation magic, they existed, yes. However, something of that nature wouldn’t possibly be passed to some farm village far out in the sticks.
Then again, even if it were, it still wouldn’t be able to translate for the boy, as the language the boy spoke was Japanese, a language from another world.
Aside from his half-baked appearance, the farmers must’ve felt him to be excessively odd.
In the end, regardless of whether it was him running or him being rejected, he had no choice but to leave the village
From that day on the days for him were harsh.
Fortunately, in his travels, he came across some people who offered him a hand. Some of which even became his friends, allowing him to learn their language and the rules of this world.
But due to his identity as an otherworlder and due to the actions he took, a certain incident occurred.
Those who fell into misfortune and those who perished were not just one or two.
Pangs of guilt weighed heavily upon his heart, preventing him from settling down. So for 2 years, he travelled the world, desperately searching for a way back home.
It was his fault, he thought. If only he wasn’t here.
If so, then the people who fell into misfortune wouldn’t have fallen.
If so, then the people who’ve died wouldn’t have died.
There was no reason for him to remain in this world.
As his fears grew, he grew more and more desperate to find a way back home.
Eventually his body grew bound to that sole desire, but…
Even in this world, traversing worlds was a dream within a dream.
Though this world’s civilization may have been built upon the cornerstone that is magic, its strength was not enough to surpass the boundaries separating the worlds.
If despite that, he still wished to go, then what he needed was knowledge and power of a different origin.
But he couldn’t find it. Despite all of the efforts he exerted searching for it, he couldn’t find even a single clue.
And so… he gave up.
He had no choice but to give up.
No matter who he asked, whether it was the renowned scholar or a renowned magician, whether he turned the shelves of the libraries inside out, whether he searched the ancient ruins, or investigated the legendary races, not one – nothing – could give him the answer he sought.
At that time, he had already gained enough power and knowledge to live in this world. So when he couldn’t find a way back home, he threw in the towel, and resolved himself to live in this world, in a corner, far away from everyone else.
Isn’t it fine? To live a life like that…
It was difficult to tell whether he was giving up or consoling himself, but regardless, he hardened his resolve with those thoughts.
He hid his true feelings from the people around him under the guise of a joke.
Staying with them forever was impossible, but they could at least stay together for a little longer.
He would continue to enjoy his days with them, and then one day, he would leave.
At the very least, he wanted his last memories with them to be ones of happiness.
––––But then, at the last moment, he suddenly found a way back home, leaving him lost and confused.
Rather than be happy, what he instead felt was that someone somewhere was messing with him.
He had friends, but because of his trauma, there was a gap between them.
He would get along with them as well as he could. He would see them as good people as much as he could.
He continued his travels under the excuse that he was afraid of being close to them.
There was no place for him to return to.
There was none, because he didn’t make one. After all, it was too scary to make one. If he were to create a place he could return to, he might just lose it again. And that fear was too much for him to bear.
Sometimes he wished he could see his family in his dreams, but not once, did he dream of them.
Not being able to see them, not seeing them – he was fed up of it all, so he thought…
–––I want to go home.
The small memories he had of his parents and his siblings were both nostalgic and painful.
Would his mother smile back at him like she always did?
Is his dad still being treated poorly and is sulking somewhere?
Is his younger sister picking a fight with some guy again?
Is his younger brother still crying after always getting caught up with his sister’s fights?
–––I want to go home.
Somehow, someway, he ended up thinking those things, and in the same vein, somehow, someway, it tugged painfully at his heartstrings.
But no matter how hard he searched, he couldn’t find a way. All he found were evidence upon evidences, declaring it impossible.
So he gave up.
No one could imagine just how hard the boy had to resolve himself to make that decision.
But then… after he finally resolved to give up that dream, he suddenly found it.
He found the answer, a way back home, just like that. Almost as if everything so far was nothing but a joke.
He couldn’t help but feel anger boil inside him.
But still… despite that, he still wanted to go home. If there was a way back, then he would go back. Those were his honest feelings.
Moreover, him leaving this world would also remove the danger his existence poised to it.
But in order to accomplish that, the boy needed to enter the treasure room of the demon king’s castle––––
The soldiers of the demon king’s army were all mostly running within the castle, searching for the intruder.
Outside the entrance of the castle were hordes of demons, blocking the way. The originally dim castle already had few windows, so with the entrances carefully guarded, the intruder was no different from a trapped mouse.
But as the many soldiers were deep in thought, the intruder – almost as if he had predicted their movements – had already slipped past them, only stopping before a certain place.
The majestic door was undoubtedly massive. This was not something that an assassin could open alone.
To begin with, it didn’t even a door knob. In fact, it didn’t have any gaps around it that was expected of most “doors”.
If he didn’t know this was a door ahead of time, at most, he would only assume this to be some sort of pattern drawn over a wall. But this was indeed a door. An entrance that led to another room.
Casually, the assassin flicked the blood of the demon king off his hand, letting it smear over the door. Then suddenly, the door shook. And in the next moment, it opened itself. It was almost as if it was welcoming the assassin.
“…”
Although he was informed beforehand, he still couldn’t help but wonder whether a system that only relied on blood as its key was safe or not.
But then again, this room could only be accessed by the demon king himself or with the blood of the demon king.
Putting the demon king aside, achieving the latter is no easy task unless it were to be done by someone strong enough to defeat the demon king.
“To hurt the demon king” was no easy matter after all.
Unfortunately, although it was only a farce, the assassin who accomplished that feat did not have any awareness of just how difficult a feat it was.
As the assassin entered the path just big enough for one person to enter, he closed the door from inside. With just that, this place became a sanctuary. Unless the demon king himself opened this door, no one could possibly hope of finding this assassin.
–––At least, until people noticed the traces of blood, but…
“Haah… I’m tired.”
Inside that sanctuary, where not even a sound could be heard outside, the assassin heaved a sigh of relief and muttered to himself. The sound the assassin made was indistinguishable, there was no telling whether he was a man or a woman, or even whether he was young or old. Noticing that, the assassin held his mask up, exposing his hidden face.
“I keep forgetting since it’s merged with me.”
Even as the assassin mumbled to himself, he looked around him ––– but what was horrifying was that the assassin was in fact a child.
With unkempt, long, black hair and two brown eyes, that was a face that could be seen anywhere in “Japan”.
He was neither tall nor short, no dominating aura about him either, but his presence was not weak.
He was an average, young boy, and if it weren’t for those black clothes he had over his body, no one would believe him to be the assassin.
He was the type who could easily blend in with a crowd even if that crowd was from another race’s town.
But it was precisely because of that that this boy stood out within this room.
Filled to the brim with gold and dazzling jewels, this here was none other than the demon king’s treasure room. The treasures here were stored up by the many demon kings throughout history. Mixed with these treasures were magic tools with varying effects that could be said to be their trump card.
For an average boy dressed in black clothes to be standing in the middle of all this, he stuck out like a sore thumb. While the person himself was not unaware, he didn’t show even the slightest bit of concern as he continued to look around him.
“…Oi, Giol. Exactly how am I supposed to find it from all these?”
The treasure room was vast, yet there was so much treasure inside that even the floor couldn’t be seen. In fact, if one were to take a closer look, seemingly dangerous objects like treasure swords and armors could be seen everywhere. Seeing how he needed to rummage through this mess of a room made the boy want to complain to a certain man who wasn’t here. None of these things were of note to him, the gold and silver included. He had little interest for wealth, so from the start, he never felt anything when he was greeted by this dazzling sight.
“Supposedly… it should be a straight line ahead. And then… it should be ahead of this mountain of gold. Haa~”
Although there was a mountain of gold right before his eyes that was enough for a man to live hundreds of lifetimes, doing whatever he wanted, the boy only heaved a sigh. With a jump he leapt across that mountain and landed on the other side. And just as he had been informed, that object was there. More precisely, it was enshrined.
“Why go through the trouble of enshrining it when you were going to get rid of it so easily?”
Atop an extravagant and golden pedestal was an otherwise ordinary-looking pendant. It had ordinary chains for its link, the ones that could be seen anywhere, but what hung from it was a transparent sphere, inside of which was a transparent liquid that seemed to be swaying.
“It’s swaying?
Ahh… the soldiers must be working hard.
I better hurry then. Otherwise, they’ll find me faster than expected.”
When the boy found out that the swaying was caused by the movement of the soldiers, he shuddered a bit.
Quickly, he took the pendant, and hung it around his neck.
As it swayed, it bumped against the crescent moon pendant that was already hanging from his neck.
Afterwards, he took the ghost cloth that had been transformed into a mantle, and he spread it across the treasures, then he rode it.
Several magic formations had already been drawn over the cloth, so there was already plenty of magic power coursing through it.
“Don’t worry. The coordinate axis has already been determined. We’ve also ran plenty of experiments.
All that’s left is to use this and cross worlds.
There’s no telling whether it’ll go well or not though unless we try it ourselves, but that’s exactly what makes it exciting.”
As the boy’s face strained in nervousness, he muttered as if he was talking to someone.
He’d done everything he could to prepare for this, but even all the preparation in the world couldn’t remove that sliver of probability for failure.
Such fears weren’t anything new however. They’ve been following him ever since he found a way back home after all.
But after finally finding a way back home, there was just no way he could live with himself without trying it out. He had to try it.
“…It’s not like living here’s bad or anything. It’s just that, so long as I’m here, I’ll trouble others so… it’s not a place I should be.”
The city he grew up in flashed through his mind. His childhood days. The house his family lived in. And although there weren’t many, the childish days he spent with the few good friends he had.
That was the place he belonged to. As he resolved himself, he held the two pendants tight in his hands.
One was a treasure that the many demon kings had filled with magic power throughout the generation, and the other was a cheap looking pendant shaped after the crescent moon.
“I-I’m coming back home… I’m definitely gonna come back home!”
Unlike other transfer magic, a strange sense of disgust filled him. But just as he thought he was about to lose to that eerie feeling, he stopped it with his thoughts.
What appeared at the back of his head was the image of his family suddenly separating from him 2 years ago. When he recalled that, he stopped shaking, and he stood firm on his two legs.
I’m going to meet them! I want to meet them! As he resolved himself to meet them one more time, the boy yelled.
––––––––––––I’m gonna come back home even if it’s from “Falandia”!!!
…
……
………
…………And so, he arrived.
When he saw that, the boy was sure of it – he was back.
When he arrived at the designated unpopular forest, he saw a manmade light, in which he saw hope.
For a while, he caressed the nostalgic concrete road, but not long after, a squad of black-haired Japanese men appeared before him.
Japanese numbers and geographical locations could be seen written over the number plate of the station wagons and the jeeps lined up.
When he heard the men fluently speak Japanese, he almost broke out in tears.
But that feeling quickly vanished when something unexpected happened.
“Don’t move!”
Even though that voice was strong and forceful, because it spoke in Japanese, the boy felt something well up from inside his chest.
Or at least that would’ve been so if not for the black lustered object that was obviously a gun aimed at him.
Still… the boy couldn’t help but be surprised that he would actually find himself nostalgic despite that.
Just what was going on?
Torn between the excitement of his successful return and his confusion at this turn of events, his heart couldn’t calm down.
He was glad to have met another person. Moreover, him returning to his own country was nothing short of God’s work.
Now, if only he wasn’t being surrounded by a group of men that looked like the JSDF…
“2218, You are under arrest for illegal entry from another world! Arrest him!”
––––What’s going on!?
––––The boy returned on this year’s April.
To him it was misfortune, but to the world it was fortune.
Tl Note: Oh, and RTD gave the OK for me to translate this novel, so yeah it’s officially picked up now. All I could think of while reading this chapter was this song:
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