Editing/Standardisation: Medicine Melancholy
Original Translation: Medicine Melancholy

Iris/Yanagi
The strange girl who suddenly appeared in front of me knew about the
real relationship between me and Ayame.
“…!”
I tried to get up and run away… but my legs were too weak. I was
unable to stand on my own two feet, and my body was falling
backwards. Oh no, I was about to hit my head…
“Watch out!”
The impact I had expected did not come, and instead I was caught by
something soft.
“Phew, you scared me to death, nya.”
The girl hugged me while blinking her eyes repeatedly.
“I suppose I should introduce myself, nya. I’m Ayame-chan’s friend
since high school and a junior of Reiji-senpai’s, nya. In the game I was
called Milly, nya.”
“Um… your speech pattern…”
“You mean this, nya? When I spoke like this, those pickup artists would
think I was actually a man in real life so they wouldn’t come near me, so
I did it until it became a habit, nya.”
“Ahaha…”
The reason for that was more trivial than I expected.
I mean, I didn’t know Ayame had friends. Come to think of it, didn’t I
know very little about Reiji and Ayame’s social circle…?
“Ah, by the way, I’ve heard everything about you from Ayame-chan, so
don’t worry about it. And I promise not to tell anyone, nya.”
That Ayame wouldn’t say anything strange to someone she doesn’t
trust, so everything should be fine, right…?
“Now that I’ve introduced myself, I’d like to get to the main issue at
hand… but there’s something I want to do first.”
Milly-san’s tone and face suddenly became serious.
“I’m going to touch you a little. If you can’t take it anymore, please tell
me right away.”
“…Eh?”
My arms were pulled lightly and I found myself in an embrace with my
face buried in her ample breasts… Wait, why’s she hugging me like
that?! Before any indecent idea could form itself, my hands and body
almost jumped at the thought of being restrained. It’s scary, unbearably
scary… Huh?
Something was gently tapping my back in a steady, relaxed rhythm.
Why wasn’t I scared of that?
“Easy, easy. From the look of your eyes, I’m sure you must have gone
through a frightening experience, right? Don’t worry, I would never
hurt Iris-chan. Just calm down, and listen only to the sound of my chest,
and you won’t be bothered by all the noises around you anymore…”
As I was being tapped on the back, I slowly felt more at ease. I did as I
was told and concentrated only on the sound of it.
…Ah, I could hear it now. The sound of a steady rhythm of movement.
When I concentrated on it, I gradually became less and less concerned
about the sounds around me and the flow of people. Being held gently
in this way, surrounded by warm body heat, and hearing only this
sound, it’s…
Suddenly, I heard another sound… was this my own heartbeat? I
thought it was pulsating like crazy, but it was moving at its usual pace.
Man, this was too comfortable…
“(sobs)”
I realized that a lot of time had passed. My memory of the middle of
the day had been wiped out. The moment I realized what was
happening, blood was gathering on my face and tears were pooling at
the edges of my eyes.
“Meowhehe… It’s really nice to do this to a small, cute little girl… he
way you squirm in my arms defenselessly like seeking your mother, it’s
really irresistible!”
Milly-san looked somewhat satisfied and enraptured. What should I do
now, I was too embarrassed to look up. I couldn’t believe I was held in a
girl’s arms and comforted by the sound of her heartbeat and even slept
a little at the end… it’s like I’d regressed back to a baby.
“S-Sorry about all that…”
“Don’t sweat it. Besides, this is a good opportunity for you to get stuff
out of your chest, isn’t it? Do you have a room you’re renting?”
“Um… I have a room that I’m allowed to use at the moment…”
“Alright, it’s round two. No refusal allowed, you still look terrible.”
I answered without thinking, and the next moment, she slyly dragged
me back to my room before I realized what was happening.
“Uh… why am I in your lap?”
As soon as I got to my room, she lifted me up with a single motion. I
was so embarrassed to be princess-carried by a girl… This body’s too
light, I should try a little harder to eat my meal from now on…
While my mind was spacing out like that, Milly-san sat down on the
bed, with me on her lap.
“Don’t think about it too much~ Is it comfortable? I consider myself to
be pretty soft, you know.”
“Yeah… I can see that.”
As Milly-san’s rather glamourous body gently wrapped around my
entire body, I… wait a minute, what’s happening here?
“If I hold you in this way, I can give you a hug as soon as you get scared,
don’t you think?”
A shiver ran down my back at her words. The fear that I had forgotten
slowly returned.
“…What do you mean?”
“Well, I need you to tell me what’s been scaring you right now. It’s been
bothering me since the first time I saw you, like you were about to
break.”
“…?!”
I quickly tried to release myself and escape, but my body was
ineffective against her firm grasp.
“I’m sorry, but you can’t run away. You have to get that bad stuff out of
your chest.”
“No, I don’t want to! Please don’t make me remember anything of
that!”
I thought she was a kind person, why did she say such terrible things so
suddenly! I flinched and tried to escape again, but the arms holding me
wouldn’t come off.
“But you have to. Both you and Reiji-senpai are men, so you often focus
only on finding a solution and neglect the rest. I don’t know about
Ayame-chan either, since that girl can literally do everything, for all
intents and purposes. So maybe those two just overprotected you and
didn’t touch the tumor of the problem, am I correct?”
I choked. Milly-san hit the bullseye. It was as if she had seen through
everything.
“I knew it… It was just a guess, but it’s probably not too far from the
truth. Anyway, that’s the reason why you’ve stored up so much painful
stuff. But… talking it out to someone else is more important than you
think, you know?”
Her voice changed to a serious tone and whispered softly, as if
admonishing.
“People tend to think of particularly traumatic events in fragments,
detached from their past, so they become really afraid when they recall
about them. You’re in that position right now, not yet moving on from
the past. But the fact that you’re here means that you’ve been saved,
and that past of yours has ended. So, even if it’s scary, you have to sort
through what happened as a ‘done story’ and properly accept it into
your life.”
“B-But… I’m afraid I just can’t take it… I’m sorry…”
“It’s fine. It’s perfectly fine for you to be scared, to cry about it. I’m here
to listen to your past. That’s why…”
I felt a hand gently rubbing my stomach. I felt my strength draining
away. Tears were slowly building up in my eyes. I wondered if it was
okay to show my vulnerable parts without hesitation, but I didn’t have
to hide them.
“I’ll listen to you no matter how long it takes, and if it doesn’t work the
first time, I’ll come back to see you and listen to you again. Just… tell
me everything, okay?”
Without prompting, I told her everything. I was afraid at first, but once I
started talking, I couldn’t stop as if a dam had been broken. Yes, I had
been wanting to get it out like this for a long time. About the incident in
my former world. About my sister. My encounter with Reiji. The story
of how we had been together for so long. And then, what happened
after I came here.
Being caught was humiliating, scary, painful, I lost my words so many
times I couldn’t make sense of them, and I cried many, many tears.
What was happening to me now. A body that had changed from its
original world and even its gender. The fear that I might not be myself
made me more miserable and distraught than ever.
And… my worries that if I didn’t do something, I’d become an unwanted
presence who was nothing but a burden to those two. Frustration and
anger toward the two people who, in spite of this, didn’t even listen to
me.
I think I really exposed a lot of things that were disgusting. I said many
selfish things that I had been afraid to say out of fear that they would
leave me. But every time I was hugged and gently stroked without
saying a word, I felt the waves of my emotions calming down.
When I had finished talking, the sun was already setting, and the
western sky was tinged with red. I was sobbing so hard that my eyes
were red, but I felt strangely refreshed compared to before I spoke. She
said something earlier about women wanting someone to listen to
them, not the solution itself. When I was a man, I thought it was
irrational. But now that I saw it this way, I realized that it’s an important
wisdom to live.
“…Alright then, Iris-chan, you’ve done two things wrong. Allow me to
point them out for you.”
“…Please do…”
I straightened my back. I was full of remorse, especially now that I’d
calmed down about what happened yesterday and today, and I felt
fidgety and restless, as my misgivings were found out.
“First, you went out without permission. This is a breach of promise to
someone who cares about you in whatever way, or to put it another
way, you have disrespected someone who cares about you. Do you
understand?”
“Yes…”
It would be a shock for them if I were to suddenly disappear. I would
have caused them so much worry. I felt so guilty that I had lost track of
such things.
“And second, You let your emotions get the better of you and ended
the conversation. Yes, they might have been clueless, but if you were
serious, you had to talk it out and convince them about your idea. If
you got angry and cut them off, that was running away, wasn’t it?”
“Yes… You’re right, now that I think about it, it’s really embarrassing…”
If there was a hole right here, I would jump into it out of shame. I
couldn’t just throw a tantrum and say that I didn’t understand them
because I didn’t get my way.
…Wait a minute.
It occurred to me that this girl is a friend of Ayame’s, which means that
she is younger than me in real age, right? What is this? She looked so
motherly.
“So, with that in mind, what do you want to do, Iris-chan?”
“…I want to apologize… And then I want to hear them out properly in
the future…”
“Mmm, good. How about you do it right after they come back, nya?
You can do it, nya?”
“Yes, this time I’ll make them listen to me!”
I laughed a little, brushed the tears from the corner of my eyes with my
fingers, and with a smile and a clear mind, I readily agreed to do so…
uh, why was she looking away from me?
“…That Ayame, she left me a really huge mess to clean up, nya…”
She held her mouth shut and mumbled something in another direction,
and I just tilted my head with a question mark above it.
“…Ayame-chan and Reiji-senpai haven’t come back, nya. Are they
always this late, nya?”
“No, they should have returned before evening… Something must have
happened.”
Anxiety was slowly creeping inside me. Come to think of it, it was
awfully quiet outside, even though now was a time when the place
should be bustling with people on their way home from work. I started
to feel uneasy.
“…Guh, aaaaaaah?!”
“Iris-chan, what’s happening?!”
Suddenly, a sharp pain pierced my entire body. I had a feeling that
something dangerous was approaching. I remembered this pain. Not
long after I came to this world, in that forest…!
Then suddenly there was a commotion downstairs. Someone was
running up the stairs. The door was opened violently, and a panicked
Mrs. Miranda jumps in, gasping for breath and yelling.
“Thank goodness you’re here, miss. You should hurry up and go…
there’s a strange monster in town!”
“…!”
I felt as if my heart was being squeezed.
“Um, I have some fighting skills, I can help people evacuate- Hey, where
are you going?!”
“I’m so sorry but, I have to find Reiji-san and Saul-niisama!”
I took the staff that was propped up against the wall, slipped through
their hands, cast a body enhancement spell on myself, and ran out into
the town. There was no way those two would lose so easily. I believed
that, but my heart was still pounding, and it was getting worse and
worse.

Editing/Standardisation: Medicine Melancholy
Original Translation: Medicine Melancholy

Reiji

In the room, a girl’s sad, shrieking cries echoed within.
“(sobs)… I’m sorry… Nii-sama, Nii-sama… I’m (sobs) sorry…”
Iris regained consciousness while Saul was cleaning her body and
exchanging her dirty clothes, and started crying again, forcing Saul to
hold her in place.
Something felt really, really wrong… that Yanagi would never have cried
like this.
By all accounts, he was in no condition to keep up the “Iris” act. Then,
who was this girl before me, sobbing and wiping the palm of her hands
to remove the large tears that were overflowing one after another?
Was this really the Yanagi I knew?
No matter how I looked at it, I only saw a stranger girl, who was just
entering her teenage years.
I couldn’t help but feel a bad premonition.
I lay Iris, who was exhausted from crying, down on the bed, and went
out into the hallway with Saul. Saul, who had been pondering
something earlier, spoke up first.
“After hearing what you said, and judging from Iris’ condition up until
now, I could only think of one thing.”
“Really? What’s it?”
“…Multiple self-states. It’s not my area of expertise, and I’ve only seen
bits of it, so I could be wrong.”
This was the conclusion Saul came up with.
According to him, people inherently possess multiple personalities that
they use depending on the situation and the person they are dealing
with. At the same time, however, our psyche is capable of holding
multiple perspectives and emotional states in different states of self at
the same time. Therefore, it seems that, for the most part, they are
shared perceptions and memories. In other words, we all have multiple
self-states.
However, whereas under normal circumstances the interconnection
between each self-state is easily possible, this behavior may not take
place in the case of traumatic events. When under intense stress or
other stressful situations, the shared perceptions and memories are
severed in order to protect the self, and an alternate personality is
created to “escape from reality”.
“So what you’re saying is… the Iris who looked like an ordinary girl just
now… was a part of the heavily damaged personality detached as a girl
named ‘Iris’? Am I getting this right?”
“Probably so… I think the main part Onii-chan’s personality thought
that ‘I used to be a man, this can’t happen to me’, and thus pushed the
problem to ‘someone else’ to mitigate the PTSD?”
When I thought about it, that guy didn’t seem to be so concerned about
the memory of “that time” when he was only with us without going
outside. It was as if it was someone else’s problem.
“Then the situation just now… was because of the ‘Iris’ personality
surfacing after extreme fear caused by being exposed to people’s
gazes…”
“That explains the panic… But what about the other times? He must
have been through a lot before his condition got that bad, right?”
“I think… it’s probably chronic at this point. After all, ‘Onii-chan’ has
been tortured by PTSD for more or less a decade now.”
He said that although it got worse, that was still just an extension of
what had been there before. In other words…
“This time’s just another newly added trauma on top of the pile, isn’t
it…?”
Right after becoming a girl… that guy was seriously injured, even almost
losing his chastity. Such a hopeless situation must have developed a
new psychological trauma.
“If it’s really become chronic like you said… This is going badly.”
That guy’s behavior was concerning. If this became a regular
occurrence, and his mind was always restless, it was impossible to
know when it would reach its limits.
“Besides, another problem is that a large portion of the personality that
remains ‘safe’ is the masculine part. But… even if ‘Iris’ hasn’t fully
accepted it, his body is now fully a girl’s. All the bodily functions, maybe
even all the chemicals exchanged in the body, are those of a girl’s. I
think the more he gets used to his current body, the more dominant
the ‘Iris’ side will become. What’s at stake, what’s unstable, is not the
‘Iris’ personality, Onii-chan’s supposed escape mechanism… but the
‘Kuga Yanagi’ personality.”
“So, if things keep going like this…”
“I think it’s possible that someday the personality called ‘Kuga Yanagi’
will either disappear, or become so small that it’s unrecognizable, and
only the scarred ‘Iris’ will remain…”
A cold sweat ran down my back. It seemed like there was not much
time left.
“Then what should we do?!”
“I don’t know! I wish I knew!”
Saul shouted in a fit of rage, as if to spit at me, impatiently demanding
an answer. He looked really frustrated as he bit on his own finger until
it was bleeding.
“…My bad, I’m just too worried.”
“Me too, sorry for losing my cool… But I can tell you one thing, maybe
every time those symptoms show up, more and more of ‘Onii-chan’
personality will be swallowed up… that’s how intense the shock was for
Iris.”
“Is there anything we can do to prevent that from happening again?”
The best we could do was to resolve the severance of consciousness
and restore him to his normal state of mind, but the fear that one
wrong step could be irreversible was too high, and we had no idea how
we could possibly cure him. If that’s the case…
Iris/Yanagi
Before I knew it, I was walking alone.
The building I was in had a crystalline texture, as if it were made of ice.
I had a feeling that the royal palace in the capital of the kingdom of
Nordglacier looked like this.
A well-built, dignified man, late 20s or early 30s in appearance, was
walking in front of me, escorting someone.
This person appeared to be a teenager, was she the daughter or little
sister of the man beside her?
Their gazes turned to me unexpectedly as they walk in a friendly
manner.
……
………
…………Why.
Why are you here?
She was much younger than I knew her, but there was no mistaking
her.
You were stabbed while protecting me, and yet your face was still
smiling to reassure me.
Even though hardly any memory of the incident remained, that image
was still strongly burned in my mind.
Mom!
Why are you here, in this world?! Answer me!!
I walked frantically, but I couldn’t catch up with them walking together.
Mom was walking slowly, but for some reason, the distance between us
was not closing.
And yet, they kept their position as if they were trying to lead me
somewhere.
Where am I?
It seemed like a long, long spiral staircase down.
In the pitch-black darkness, there sat a little girl covered in scars.
She was clutching her knees and crying.
I’m sorry.
Why are you crying?
Because I’m going to erase you.
Me…? Who are you?
I’m…
I reached out to look at her face and suddenly realized.
I’d seen this hair before. It had a faint rainbow glow… Are you me, or
“me”?
Then I noticed that the girl who was supposed to be sitting in front of
me was not there anymore.
Is it me who’s missing? Or is it “me”?
“…Huh? This is…”
When I came to, I was lying in a room with a familiar ceiling. I could feel
some liquid running down my cheek and wetting my pillow.
If I recalled correctly, on the way back home, I bumped into someone…
and my memory has been skipping since.
I think I was somewhere in a strange place,… but as soon as I woke up,
my memory fizzled out and I could no longer remember anything.
“…You’re awake.”
“Reiji-san… and Saul-niisama too, what’s the matter, you two look so
scared.”
Reiji tried to say something, but stopped. When I tilted my head at his
brusqueness, he let out one big sigh and began to speak reluctantly.
“…We should take a break from treating the victims, starting from
tomorrow.”
For a moment, I didn’t understand what was being said.
“What do you mean by taking a break?”
“We can’t afford not to do the requests at all, so we’ll be gone more
often, but I’ve already told Mrs. Miranda that you will be resting for a
while, Iris.”
Saul looked away and told me with a look of anguish. It seemed that
they were already talking in that direction.
“W-Wait, why are you talking like it’s already decided?! Because I fell
down yesterday? B-But, look, I’m already fine now!”
“The thing is… How do I say it…”
With clenched fists, the two of them told me what was happening to
me.
…
I didn’t understand what they were saying. No, I did understand, but I
refused to accept it. Was “I” going to disappear if things kept going like
this?
“It’s just a possibility. Once you calm down, we can work together to
find a solution… So please, take a rest for now… it’s for your sake.”
I could only nod my head in dismay at their words.
I’m sorry.
I thought I heard someone’s voice in my head.

Iris/Yanagi
I fearfully walked out of the room and found myself in a corridor of
something like a guest house. So far, well, I’d left a few times to do my
business.
I went down the stairs from my room on the second floor, squinted in
the sunlight I hadn’t seen in a while, and stepped outside to see a small,
but well-maintained garden with a nice atmosphere.
When I asked Reiji about it, he said this town… or rather this village,
was rarely visited, so there wasn’t any inn. It seemed that the mayor
had graciously lent this place to us visitors as a place to stay.
…This never happened in the game.
“Thank you for your hard work, ma’am.”
“Oh, if it isn’t the guests. I’m so glad to see that the girl has recovered
enough to go outside.”
There they were, greeting a kindly-looking old lady who was tending to
her plants. As I stood idly watching from behind, my back was suddenly
jolted by the conversation.
“Um, this is Mrs. Miranda, the mayor’s wife, who’s taking care of us and
our lodging. You haven’t met her before, right?”
“She knows about our circumstances and she’s a pleasant person, so
don’t worry… What’s the matter, Iris?”
“…You look pale. Are you feeling ill somewhere?”
The old lady reached her hand out to me. The old lady? Huh, why is a
burly man’s hand there…
“…?!”
An inarticulate scream rose from my throat of its own accord. I found
myself curling up and diving into Saul’s bosom.
“…Iris?”
“My apologies, I’m sure she was fine when it was just us in the room.”
In my head, she seemed to be a kind and nice person, but my body was
rigid.
“Iris, come on, you’re making her worried, see.”
When I fearfully turned my head to look at old lady, she was looking at
me with pained eyes.
“…If that was rude of me, then I’m really sorry…”
“It’s okay… You’ve been through so much after all… Get well soon,
okay?”
“Yes… Can you lend me a hand again?”
“Are you sure? Don’t overdo yourself, miss!”
I took the old lady’s hand. I felt my heart suddenly tightening, but I
managed to stay calm. Her hand was a little rough and dirty from her
gardening, but it smelled somewhat comforting, perhaps because of
the herbs. This hand would not hurt me. I didn’t have to be afraid.
Those two already said it would be okay. As I told myself over and over
again, the palpitations gradually subsided.
“…I think I’m good now. Thank you very much.”
I gently released her hand, bowed and thanked her with a slight
chuckle. I no longer felt the trembling from earlier. It seemed that she
had been classified as a “good person” in my mind, and I could handle
her normally.
“…Are you really okay, miss?”
“Yes. Once again, thank you for taking care of us, ma’am.”
I smiled lightly and bowed my head. The lady finally seemed relieved
and sent me off, telling me not to push myself too hard and that she
would prepare something sweet for me today, so I should go out and
do my best.
I put on a deep hood and went into town. Compared to the original
remote town in the game, the sense of distance and the number of
buildings had changed drastically, with much more people on the street
to boot.
“…As I thought, it’s still a little unpleasant…”
“If you can’t make it, tell me as soon as possible, okay?”
“Sorry…”
Unfortunately, if I didn’t hold on to Saul’s arm, I’d be falling over at any
moment. Whenever someone looked at me, a chill ran down my spine
and my arms and legs started to shake. In particular, the men’s gazes
made me feel like being choked. My condition had really worsened, I
thought… but at least I could still walk around like this.
Somehow, we reached the first destination without incident. The small,
compact house was commonplace in its neighborhood, and was
probably lived by an ordinary family in a very ordinary way. However,
the garden was overgrown with weeds, as if it had been untouched for
some time, suggesting the family’s distress while their daughter was
missing.
“Here’s the first victim’s house… are you up for it?”
“Well, this is a job that only I can do. I heard the other party is a girl, so
please wait outside, you two.”
The two of them began to talk with the victim’s family about what
happened, and now they were looking at me with concern. I would
really like Saul to help, but as we decided the other day to stay properly
in line with our current bodies, I couldn’t rely on him.
There was a girl lying on a bunk in the room I was shown. She was…
about the same age and the same size as I was now. She must have
once been a simple but lovely girl, but half of her face was covered in
bandages, her entire body was wrapped in bandages, and… her right
arm was missing beyond her elbow. She was lying there in agony.
It’d been about a month since she’d gone missing… many of the
disfiguring wounds had already been closed, leaving only scars. If it
continued like this, it would surely leave a big shadow over her future
life even if she was cured. As was the case in the game, non-players
with healing arts were very rare, and most of them were located in
larger cities. Even so, I heard that it was quite extraordinary to heal
such a serious injury, so the effect of my healing arts seemed to be
quite substantial.
In fact, it would have been impossible for even me to treat the scars
that had already healed… if it had been the me of before.
Only this time, I was thankful that I had been reincarnated. To avoid
waking the sleeping girl, I quietly released the light wings on my back. I
could not expose myself to too much publicity, and for this purpose, I
asked the family members to wait outside in advance. The patient was
also put to sleep with some very weak sleeping pollen.
Since that time when I treated Scott-san, several new magics had
sprouted inside me. All of them were proven to be effective, although
they had the verified drawback that they could only be used with the
wings out.
“…Thou shalt return to the way thou wert… ‘Restoration’”
The magic power inside me was sucked up so rapidly that I felt dizzy.
The particles of light floating around me gathered between my hands
and became a dazzling sphere the same color as my wings. I gently
pushed it into the girl’s chest, right where the heart was… The light
immediately covered the girl’s body and spread. The wounds that had
already become scars seemed to dissolve away. It was as if time was
rewinding… no, it was actually rewinding.
Rather than “healing”, I suppose I should call it “restoration”, since it
caused the wounds themselves to never exist in the first place.
Although its use was limited because it erased even beneficial things
such as the results of training, it was the most useful in this case. It
might not heal the wounds in this girl’s heart, but at least… it would
give her some hope for the rest of her life… With that wish in mind, I
watched as the treatment was completed.
After that, I did not have any seizures, perhaps because I knew exactly
what I needed to do if I was treating someone. Rather than that, the
only thing that dominated my mind was the sense of duty that I felt
sorry for the wounded child in front of me and that I had to heal her as
soon as possible.
After the second and third visits, the external trauma was completely
restored, and as I was patting my chest at the joy and tears of their
family members, I felt dizzy and struggled to stand. The magic
consumption seemed to be overwhelming and wearing me out fast.
“That’s it for today. You should take it easy from now on until you get
your strength back.”
Saul, sensing the situation, suggested that we go home for the day, and
my suggestion that we at least have one more case was easily overruled
by two to one, and we headed home.
I left the lodging around noon, but it was already approaching dusk, and
everyone was either finishing their work or shopping for ingredients for
supper. The streets, which had been sparsely populated, were now
reasonably busy.
“In any case… I’m glad to see you’re doing better than I thought you
would at first.”
“I think so, too. There are still some victims out there, and I have to
work hard tomorrow.”
I clasped my hands together in a spirited gesture. Perhaps because I
was in a good mood, I didn’t mind the stares from those around me as
much now as I did at first.
“Hahaha… You look kind of happy.”
“Mmm… I know it’s inappropriate, but I’m so happy to be able to help
someone in this way…”
Looking back, I think I longed for the very idea of helping someone.
Maybe that was why I was able to continue with “Worldgate Online”
even though people around me told me it was too harsh and that I
should stop. Because.
“Back in ‘the other side’, all I could do was receiving help from others.”
“That’s…”
“I’ve told you not to think that way so many times already, we did what
we did because we care about you.”
“…My apologies, Reiji-san.”
Did I offend him again? When it came to that topic, Reiji was always in a
bad mood. He dropped his gaze and walked away…
This was a bad idea. Because nothing had happened all day, I had let my
guard down.
It was by chance, really by chance, that I bumped into a man who was
walking unsteadily, probably after having a drink on his way home from
work. My small body could not withstand the impact, and I was easily
blown away and fell on my buttocks.
“Hey, where the hell did your eyes go?!”
“…?!”
At the sound of the threat, my breathing stopped. I felt as if my whole
body temperature had suddenly dropped.
“Hey, old man, stop, she’s-”
“Not you too?! Is that how you apologize?!”
There was no time to react. Reiji’s hand barely stopped him before my
hood was ripped off with force, revealing my bare face and silver hair
shimmering with a rainbow glow beneath it.
The stunned gaze in front of me pierced my eyes. Oh, what was that
wind on my cheeks? Ah, the hood… ah, aaaah.
“Hey, that girl…”
“Wow, so pretty…”
“Is she some aristocrat…”
“No. You see, she was captured by some bad guys…”
Gazes pierced me from all directions. Gazes coated with the carnal
desire crawled all over my body.
………
Huh? Wasn’t I supposed to have gone back to town?
Why was I still in that dingy room?
The townspeople’s
The bandits’
Curious gazes
Lustful gazes
Upon my tightly cloaked body
Upon my violently exposed nude body.
Where did they see?
The place that should not be exposed to public view unnecessarily.
No, that wasn’t right.
Because there was already nothing to hide.
No, I was properly clothed.
What? Whatwhatwhat?
A hand reached out.
No, no one was reaching out to me.
But, the hands. The hands were closing in. Countless. Countless… what?
What?
My consciousness switched from I to “I”.
“UUUUUUAAAAAAAAAAAGH?!”
Someone was shouting. The voice was awfully close… Wait, was that
my own voice?
“Where’s she?! Out of my way, old man!”
“N-No, I didn’t do anything…”
“Just shut up and get out of my sight! Iris?! Pull yourself together, look,
I’ve already put the hood up!”
“I’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryIwo
n’trebelIwillobeyquietlyIwon’tbitenononononoAAAAARGH?!”
“Dammit, she’s only getting worse! All of you, scram! Don’t look this
way!”
My body screamed. My body shook, my heart beat a strange rhythm,
and I continued to scream things I don’t understand, unable to get
enough air into my lungs through my labored breathing.
And yet… I was looking at “myself” in such a terribly calm way…?
“Curses! I’ll drive all these assholes away from here! Saul, don’t let her
bite her tongue!”
“Got it!”
Saul’s fingers were shoved into my little mouth as I continued to squirm
and scream. He didn’t want me to bite my tongue. My uncontrollable
mouth movements were starting to scratch Saul’s fingers.
“It’s alright, it’s alright… I’m here, and Reiji’s coming back soon… okay?”
“………”
My small body was completely embraced by Saul’s cloak. As he rubbed
my back, my breathing gradually calmed down. My mouth, which had
been clenched tight, relaxed, and eventually, my strength went limp
and my consciousness faded away.
Until the very end, “I” continued to calmly watched the situation.
Reiji
“She’s calmed down… finally.”
Iris was slumped all over, held tightly in Saul’s arms. The tears
streaming from the corners of her eyes and drool marks on the edges of
her mouth were painful, and although her eyes were open, they were
not reflecting anything.
Never before had she reacted this violently to anything.
The last few days, when she was with us, she didn’t have any problems
to the point where he could make jokes.
I was completely relieved to see that there had been no major
problems all day, although there had been some worsening. Turned
out, “some worsening” was too much of an optimistic thinking.
The full extent of “Iris’” trauma hadn’t even shown itself yet.

Editing/Standardisation: Medicine Melancholy
Original Translation: Medicine Melancholy

Iris/Yanagi
I was totally caught off guard. I had no idea that such a powerful enemy
could be lurking in what I thought was a safe place.
“Hah… Hah… Guh…?!”
In the sound of my rough breathing, my voice, almost like a moan,
leaked from between my clenched teeth.
The rumbling inside my stomach tormented me over and over, and
chills crawled up and down my spine.
Even if I tried to bear the pain, the small organ deep inside my belly had
been filled to its limits, and it was urging me to release its contents
outside.
There was no doubt that the slightest stimulus could cause the (already
fragile) dam to break. If “that thing” in my stomach was released in
such a potentially public place, my dignity would be shattered into a
thousand pieces, and the humiliation that came afterward might
immediately drive me past the point of no return.
I didn’t tell those two anything about this.
This was the only thing I was not willing to ask for cooperation for, and I
had come out here to run away from them, avoiding their eyes.
A solution already existed. If I went through the door that was in front
of me now, I could deal with the thing in my stomach without being
seen. There wasn’t actually any problem with me doing that.
But, passing through that door was also a declaration of defeat, and an
abandonment of my pride.
And so the cycle of seeking help in front of the door then rejecting that
idea went on for a quarter of a minute.
“Ugh… nngh!”
The repeated torture had already shaken my legs so much that I could
hardly stand up.
Even if I tried to close my crotch to at least hold the exit, the legs of this
body were fatally lacking in thickness, always leaving a gap and couldn’t
suppress my raging belly in the slightest.
It became obvious that the pressure that had been torturing my body
for a while now, prying it open from the inside, was getting unbearable,
and the oily sweat pouring from my entire body had made a smear on
the floor. It’s only a matter of time before everything broke down, as I
heard the devil’s whisper in my ears.
Stop resisting. Give in to your comfort.
I knew that. This was a game that I couldn’t win from the beginning
anyway, and no matter how much I refused to accept it, my body was
no way able to keep up with it. In the end, I would have to give in and
let out the thing stored in my body.
Still, I didn’t want to accept that…
I had to enter the female toilet.
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah………”
“Calm down, man. You shouldn’t make such a noise in that
appearance.”
I returned to my room, ran straight to my bed, and continued to moan
like a vengeful spirit from Hell with my face buried in the pillow, when
Reiji’s concerned… or disgusted voice called out to me.
“Hmph, Reiji would never understand my predicament anyway…”
“Yeah… Right now, from the bottom of my heart, I’m glad that I’ve
sticked with this male avatar.”
In case you’re wondering, as a result of slamming my pride into the
trash, I made it just in time. The knowledge my sister lectured me
about, which I once derided “Do I need something I’ll never get a
chance to put into practice?!”, had saved me from making a fatal
mistake.
Girl picking flowers was scary. The direction indicator was great. The
exhilarating feeling of draining that which was stored up to the limit
made me cry out a little funny.
In doing so, I saw “that spot” whether I wanted it or not, and even
touched it. That’s not to say I’d never seen it before. It was when my
sister was still a little girl. This “Iris” was also a beautiful girl in her midteen,
despite her youthful look… It was smooth. It hadn’t grown up yet.
I saw it, bare as a sheet. And I was sure it was just my imagination that I
felt a strange sensation when I touched that area when I wiped it off.
When I was changing clothes, perhaps?
I closed my eyes tightly.
“Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah?!”
My shame broke through the limit when I remembered it, and I got up
in the so-called girl sitting pose, grabbed the pillow and slammed it on
the bed with force over and over again.
“I said calm down, okay? You’re gonna injure yourself, okay? I mean,
stop raising so much dust!”
Injure… Injure?!
I was reminded of how I was when I suffered that injury.
The possibility of this flashed through my mind, and I snapped out of
the act of slamming the pillow down.
I turned and stared at Reiji. Blood rushed to my head, heating it. Tears
slowly formed at the edges of my eyes. Considering this possibility, I
couldn’t look up, so my face naturally dropped down and I looked at
Reiji with only my eyes. As soon as I did so, Reiji’s eyes wandered
suspiciously, but that was beside the point. I didn’t know what I would
do if I were affirmed, but on the other hand, I couldn’t leave my doubts
once they had arisen any longer. I fearfully voiced the question.
“…………You saw it?”
Three words. The question came out of my mouth after a long struggle,
and a moment later, Reiji’s face was turned away with a force that
made his neck twist. I see. Ye Guilty.
“Uh… you know… it’s irresistible.”
“Uwaaaaaaaah?!”
I repeatedly hit Reiji’s head with the pillow. I could no longer control my
emotions. I was too embarrassed to stop what I was doing.
“It hurts… not, but stop it already!”
“H-H-How else am I supposed to react?! Just blow away that damn
memoryyyyy!”
“Be reasonable, dammit! For the most part, I’ve seen you naked too
many times! Do you know how many times I’ve bathed you?!”
My hands stopped moving.
Come to think of it, he was right. I’d bathed so many times over there,
mainly with his assistance. I wondered what I was troubled by. It must
have been a temporary confusion. It was like a girl to be embarrassed
to be seen naked by a man.
“No, I didn’t mean it, but…”
I could hear some exasperated voices, but they did not reach my ears,
which had been refreshed by the resolution of my problems.
“What are you two flirting about?”
““We aren’t flirting!””
Before we knew it, Saul had returned from shopping, and we both did
our best to deny his accusations.
…We didn’t flirt, right?
Later, Reiji would come to regret his decision to use this method of
deception, but that’s another story.
“So… What do we do now?”
Saul sorted out the items he had bought and put them in their
respective magic bags… I nearly blacked out when I saw him handing
me a paper bag neatly filled with a large number of small, colorful
pieces of fabric…
Let’s just cut to the serious matter.
“In my opinion, I think we should use this place as a base and get used
to this world a little more.”
This was the one thing we could not compromise for our future safety. I
knew from experience that it was scary to travel before having
completed a thorough investigation of what I could and couldn’t do,
because I never know what might happen. In this world, it never hurt to
be cautious.
“I’m with you. Physical strength aside… we’re probably weaker than
people of this world.”
I could sort of understand what Reiji said. For example, when I blinded
that bandit, he immediately recovered and attacked me. On the other
hand, I was cowering and unable to resist anything after being punched
a little.
It’s the tolerance to pain that counts.
For those of us who once lived in a peaceful world, we were helplessly
inferior to the people of this world. Even if we were superior in ability,
we couldn’t stand up if our hearts were broken by pain. In the game,
we could do anything we wanted as long as our HP did not drop to zero,
but here we couldn’t do such a reckless thing. We had to rethink the
concept of “combat” in this world, which was different from that of the
game, from the very beginning. Otherwise, we might inadvertently step
over the line of death if we kept our habits from the game.
“…I thought you’d say that, so I talked to the mayor and asked him to
put together a list of the various problems this town was having,
starting with the simplest ones, so that we could get them as requests.
They’re also enthusiastic to take care of the rough stuff we can’t do
ourselves, and we can save some travel money. Of course, I’ve already
checked to make sure the terms are acceptable.”
With that, Saul pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket. Reiji took it,
and I looked at it from the side.
“Since when did you… Nevermind, I think it’s going to be helpful. For
the time being, we need to take care of the children who had been
captured.”
Reiji, who had been flipping through the list of requests, stared at a
point and muttered. Some of the children who had been captured were
badly injured. I knew how they felt now, and I wanted to heal them as
soon as possible.
“I’m probably feeling better now… I’m a little scared to go outside, but
I’ll do my best.”
“Alright, we’ll start visiting them tomorrow and see if you can get them
some treatment.”
“Mmm, leave it to me.”
“Now that we’ve got our plan out of the way, I have to tell you both
something.”
“Hmm?”
“Eh?”
After a round of discussion about our future plans, Reiji suddenly cut in
with a more serious face than ever before.
“It’s about your tone. If it’s really just us, it’ll be fine, but I want you
both to be as thorough as possible in your language to match your
current appearance. People from this world aside, if there’re other
players out there beside us and they know what’s going on, it could
become tricky.”
In other words… our original gender, namely me being a man and Saul
being a woman, should not be discovered. It was true that I was wellknown
as a “Princess”, but if people found out that I was actually a man
inside…
“You mean they’d accuse us of cheating them?”
Saul replies in a “What the heck is that?” kind of way, but Reiji shook
his head in denial with a bitter expression on his face.
“That’s one thing, but then I’d have to say you’re still underestimating
what a man’s desires are. I don’t want anyone to find out that ‘Iris’ is a
man inside. While some guys may hit on girls from time to time, they
rarely step over a certain line if ‘the girl is a real girl’. Try ‘the girl is
actually a man’. That line goes way down. It’s an unwritten rule. Even
more so if ‘Iris’ is now fully a girl and no longer protected by the
system.”
During the time of the game, anyone attempting to make sexual
contact with the opposite sex was penalized quite severely, and that
rule was strictly enforced. So despite the game being R-15 to begin
with, one couldn’t run around in underwear in a public place.
“For example, if someone tells a girl to ‘show her breasts’, they’re
definitely a pervert… Well, I can’t say for sure they exist, but those
idiots are few and far between. But try saying ‘I’m actually a man’ with
this guy’s look. There will surely be idiots who will say ‘Former male’s
fine, because you know how I feel’. Even if you refuse, selfish
complaints will build up. If you ever let them have their way, things will
only get worse from there.”
“You’re right… Besides, who knows what kind of idiots will come up
with the ‘pay me with your body to apologize for cheating you’
excuse?”
“Anyway, never get found out. At all costs.”
The conversation that proceeded so quickly between the two of them
was making me pale. When I was still a man, my sexual function was
questionable at best, and I had rather low libido, so I wasn’t the person
to ask, but is that what “men” are really like?
“Long story short, ‘Iris’, always use a female tone when going outside.
You should be conscious of that from now on before you get into
trouble. If only you could fix your tone of voice, not many people would
be able to identify you as a man by your gestures. You two, Saul, from
now on you must act like a man. Even if you are found out to be a
woman, even an idiot can easily figure out where you got the man’s
account from.”
“…Understood. Then this is how I’m going to go from here.”
Saul immediately switched to a man’s tone. Too quick.
“How about you, ‘Iris’?”
“Ah, okay, I’ll do it… uh…”
I got it totally wrong. He said I had to live as “Iris” from now on. In the
back of my brain, I turned on the “cross”-play mode I used during the
game. I sit on the bed with my legs dangling at the sides, straightened
my back, put my hands on my lap, tilted my head, and smile gently…
“…I understand. Then I, too, will do this, if that’s all right, Reiji-san, Saulniisama?”
Why did both of them look away from me?
“…Dammit, Saul, what the hell were you thinking when you designed
such a weapon of mass destruction?”
“…I’m really sorry, I never expected her to become this devastating
when she became real like this.”
As the two of them were talking secretly to each other, I had a question
mark over my head.

Editing/Standardisation: Medicine Melancholy
Original Translation: Medicine Melancholy

Iris/Yanagi

“……Ugh…”
My blurred consciousness slowly cleared up.
Another unknown ceiling. At least the bed I was lying on was clean and
soft, as if it had been washed and dried in the sunlight. Feeling relieved
that I was no longer in that place, I tried to sit up.
“…Ack, it hurts…!”
Pain started seeping out from the parts I tried to move, and I plopped
down to bed again, having lost all strength in my body.
I hadn’t felt any better compared to that time. My mind was still hazy,
my magical power didn’t seem to halfway return, and my entire body
was in a tingling, scorching pain.
Worst of all, I kept feeling that something’s missing from my body.
“…Onii-chan? You’re finally awake.”
Somebody opened the door. It was Ayame… no, Saul, who entered,
holding a tub of water.
“…Why are you looking at me like that? Are you still hurt?”
I shook my head at his caring words. The thought of seeing him again
filled my chest, and the overflowing drops gently wet my cheeks before
I knew it.
The bandages that seemed to have been wrapped all over my body and
the gauze under them were removed.
With a soft, wrung-out piece of cloth, my body was gently wiped so as
not to hurt the wounds.
My feverish mind wandered to the thought that if one were to look at
the current situation from the outside, it would be a moderately
immoral scene of a handsome older brother stripping his adolescentaged
younger sister naked and wiping her all over.
“Sorry about that… I really wanted to use ointment to treat your
wounds, but it might leave scars…”
He was waiting for me to wake up and use my recovery magic.
To my surprise, three days had already passed while I slept.
Since some parts of my body were infected, I first cleansed my entire
body with “Purification” before using recovery magic, just to be safe. In
a flash, all the wounds on my body disappeared without a trace, and my
original flawless white porcelain skin returned.
But the next symptom soon showed itself. I felt my body temperature
suddenly rising and had to wobble back onto bed.
I thought vaguely that I should be careful about using this treatment on
sick people in the future, since it consumed a lot of energy to heal
injuries and might possibly activate pathogens.
“…Here’s your medicine. Drink it up.”
A small pill, apparently anticipated and prepared in advance, was
placed in my mouth. Then I was fed water by the spoonful to slowly
swallow the solid pill. The slightly tepid water felt good on my parched
throat.
Once I was comfortable, I felt a little better because I no longer had
pain all over my body, but the fever still hadn’t subsided, and the cool
comfort of a hand on my face quickly lulled me into a trance.
The next time I woke up, my mind was rather clear. On either side of
the bed were Saul and Reiji, unarmed and dressed in street clothes,
each holding one of my hands and peering at me with concern.
“Thank goodness, you’re awake…”
“Do you feel unwell anywhere, Onii-chan?”
My fever seemed to have faded, and although there was still some
lingering exhaustion, I didn’t think any particular problem remained.
“…I made it back…”
How many times I’d thought that I’m done for, I didn’t know.
I was scared that I, who’s now a girl in flesh and blood, was going to
become a plaything for those men I didn’t know until the day I broke
down… but in the end, I was still able to make it back to the two of
them.
Tears of relief and joy again wet my cheeks, and soon I couldn’t stop
sobbing.
“I’m sorry… I shouldn’t have left you alone…!”
“This time, we’ll never leave your side again.”
Saul, whose physique had completely exchanged with mine, held me
gently, and Reiji gently rubbed my back as I continued to sob.
It was painful.
It was scary.
But above all else, I was concerned about them.
The world had changed, my body had changed. And I didn’t even know
if they were coming here.
With no way to contact them, it was impossible to shake off this doubt,
and I worried that I might never see them again.
But now, my anxiety was melting away like snow in spring. I could no
longer control my emotions by my own will, and for a while, I cried like
a child in their arms.
“…I’m alright now. Sorry you two, I shouldn’t be crying like this.”
When I calmed down, I felt embarrassed for crying so much earlier.
“Um…”
“It may be too soon since you just woke up but… there’s someone else
who really wants to meet you.”
The two of them turned serious at once. Someone wanted to see me. I
could only picture a single person in my mind with that description. My
body trembled and my hands started shaking.
“If you don’t feel like seeing him, just tell me, okay?”
“In case you’re wondering, it was because of that person calling for our
help that we were able to save you… Take it into consideration.”
To be honest, I was afraid. I hesitated for a not-too-short period of
time, fearing that I might hurl a few heartless words at him the moment
I see his face.
…But when I heard Reiji’s words, I made my decision.
The sight of a figure entering the room narrowed my field of vision.
The sounds coming in from my ears seemed so far away.
My heart was pounding like a fast bell, and my entire body was shaking
uncontrollably, despite my efforts to calm myself down.
My breathing became erratic, and I felt suffocated.
As soon as someone who wasn’t those two came into view, I wanted to
run away, but my strength from the waist down was drained, even
though I no longer had any wounds there.
It’s the same as the old days… rejecting everyone but my grandparents,
Reiji and Ayame… no, probably even worse this time.
Because there wasn’t only one robber with a knife. A gang of bandits,
all of them grinning and looking down on me with eyes full of lust… I
still trembled with fear when I recalled about what happened. The
sound of my teeth clattering was loud in my ears.
“…Are you sure you can do this?”
But I had to try. If I faltered here, I’m sure those two would simply send
him away and I would never have the chance to talk to him again.
“I’m fine… Please, let me talk…”
I shook my head at Reiji’s words of concern for me.
He’s right. Even now, I couldn’t help but be scared.
But… now matter how scary it was, running away wouldn’t save
anyone.
Scared as I was, I had to take the first step if I wanted to be saved.
Besides, unlike that time, those two were by my side. I could do it.
I gently lowered my feet to the floor.
Being bedridden for three days had considerably impaired my physical
strength. My slightly weakened legs couldn’t support the weight of my
body…
“Miss?!”
In a panic, that person… Scott-san, tried to help me get up in a panic.
But as soon as his arm touched me, a feeling of fear ran up and down
my spine, and a sound like a failed scream escaped from the back of my
throat.
“Ah, sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you…”
I quickly grabbed his hand as he tried to back away. The trembling
increased even more, and the blood drained from my face. No, I could
not fall over just yet.
My tongue was parched and I failed several times to speak, but the
touch of two hands on my shoulders encouraged me to put my strength
into my throat.
“It…hurt.”
“…Eh?”
“That time… I was really hurt.”
The scars might be gone, but the pain was still lodged deep inside. Just
by putting it into words, the horror of that time could be easily
replayed.
“I-I’m sorry, it was all my fault! Please punish me however you want,
even killing me’s fine!”
“If you say so… then your punishment is entirely up to me… and you
don’t get to complain… am I correct?”
“Yes! Punish me as you wish!”
Okay, I got his word.
“Well then… aaah.”
I opened my mouth.
The mouth of this body was small and did not open that wide, but this
was as good as it got.
“…? Miss, what are you… Ack!”
I bit at the thumb of Scott-san, who had a question mark on his head, as
hard as I could, with all my strength.
After a good 10 seconds or so. I removed the teeth that were biting.
The jaws of this body were not strong enough, and in fact, I hurt myself
a bit doing that. It didn’t go so far as to bite through the flesh, just a line
of neatly aligned teeth marks.
“Ouch! What was that just now, miss?!”
“Are you hurt?”
“No, this is nothing compared to your pain.”
“…Are you hurt?”
“No, this is nothing compared to the sins I committed.”
“……Are you hurt?”
I looked at him and asked three times, each time intensifying my stare
harder than the last.
“Uh… yeah, it really hurts.”
“Then it’s all water under the bridge now, okay?”
Finally, I got the answer I wanted.
I was done with it because he must have gone through the same thing
as me, judging from his look.
I smiled and laughed the best I could under the circumstances, then
chanted a simple spell. The restorative light that danced around Scottsan’s
body erased not only the dental marks, but also the wounds of his
entire body.
To be honest, Scott-san at the time was just a stranger with whom I
exchanged a few words… But he still went out of his way to call for help
despite his own injuries.
I rubbed his still clenched hands. They were rough and rugged, the
hands of someone who lived in this world, different from my current
hands, which looked as if they had never held anything heavy.
He wasn’t an NPC, he was just an ordinary person, not as good as I
thought he was, but not as bad as he thought he was.
So my point was not to sound bitter to him.
“Thanks to you… I was able to meet those two again… you have my
gratitude…”
My voice was fading out. The strength in my throat I desperately
gathered was being chipped away. The fear of touching others had not
disappeared. I felt like collapsing any minute… Still, I had to muster up
the strength to tell this much.
“Miss… I…”
Large drops were dripping from his eye. With the last of my energy, I
managed to maintain my smile at him. This was surely the best way to
thank him for his concern for my wellbeing and his devotion to me.
“… Seeing you safe and sound… I’m so glad…!”
Ah, was he concerned about me that much?
His tears, shed for me, brought warmth to my chest, and I felt that my
heart’s wounds were being healed, if only slightly…
He continued sobbing until I reached my limits and was put back on the
bed by the two panicked people behind me… That was the first thing I
heard after I woke up.

Editing/Standardisation: Medicine Melancholy
Original Translation: Medicine Melancholy

Part 1

Reiji

“…Where am I?”
I found myself standing in the middle of a medieval-style town. If I
recalled correctly, this was the square of the frontier town I was in just
a few minutes ago… However, its scale had expanded several times,
and the square, buildings and streets had become completely spacious.
“Reiji-san? Is that you, Reiji-san?”
“Oh, you’re here too, Ayame.”
A silver-haired young man, one head shorter than me, stood beside me.
He was wearing sharp-looking bluish metal armor, a cloak covering only
his left side, a shield on his back, and a slender sword hanging from his
waist. The familiar Saul from the game, but with strangely realistic
texture.
“Yes, I got swallowed by some weird magic circle, not to mention…”
“What’s the matter?”
“I feel something weird between my legs…”
Ayame… no, Saul, looked embarrassed as he mooched around the base
of his legs.
“Well, that’s because you’re a dude now… wait what?!”
I almost missed this detail, but there was no such “realistic” thing in the
game, was it?! I’m used to it in real life, so I was slow to notice it, but
what the heck!
“It can’t be helped, then. Seriously, how do you men move around with
this thing… Oh, Reiji-san, come take a look.”
He scooped up a handful of soil from the flowerbed and flaked it off.
“…This is too real. I don’t remember any specs like this.”
I picked a pinch of soil myself and put my nose to it, but it smelled
firmly of earth. I had no idea what kind of calculation was required to
reproduce such a realistic image. Game turning into reality, or sending
its players to another world, I’d only seen such developments in
Yanagi’s stash of novels he read for entertainment.
I pulled out a knife from its sheath strapped to the side of my waist.
Back in the game, the knife was just a decoration and I shouldn’t have
been able to pull it off… I took off my gloves and lightly scratched my
fingertip.
“…Ouch. Is this blood I’m looking at here…?”
The sharp pain and the slimy feel of my fingertips told me more and
more that my current situation was unusual.
As I was doing this, I suddenly felt eyes around me, and looking around,
I saw people looking at me from a distance and occasionally whispering
something to me… Well, to be fair, two adult men suddenly fiddling
with dirt and cutting themselves on their fingers would have been
suspicious, but then again, the game AI wouldn’t have reacted in this
way.
“Hey, Saul, let’s get moving… Saul?”
I looked at Saul, who was standing beside me, and saw that he was
mumbling something with a blue face, as if he were out of his mind.
“…Ah, let’s go somewhere with less people around, shall we?”
I saw him nod, and moved with Saul’s hand outside the town gate.
The road was wide and long, and all sorts of people were walking along
it. The snow underfoot was slippery in places, just like in reality, and it
took about 10 minutes to move to the town entrance, which took
almost no time in the game. When we reached the town’s wall, where
no one’s around, Saul suddenly stopped. I looked suspiciously at him,
who had not uttered a word since a few minutes ago.
“Saul? What’s on your mind?”
Saul had a blue face and looked like he was about to cry. I had never
seen this kind of expression in a game, and I frowned at the unusual
sight…
Hold on, there’re quite a few times when Saul… or rather Ayame-chan,
made this kind of face in real life. When this happened, it’s usually…
“Onii-chan?!”
“Oh, crap!”
That one word made me so upset that I wanted to punch myself in the
face. That should have been my first thought. But I was so bewildered
that I didn’t notice it.
“Onii-chan must be at level 1 right now because he’s just been
reincarnated! If I’m still ‘Saul’ here, that means he’s that ‘Iris’ with the
same looks and pure support status!!”
Hearing those words, I feel cold as if ice had been thrown into my head.
That guy has always allocated his stats based on the assumption that he
would be working with us. Base STR, and only the minimum VIT needed
for requirements because Saul had always been the perfect tank. Even
though he’s gone through his reincarnation, his level 1 stats were just
the initial value with a different color, only helped by a higher growth
rate. Even though the enemies in this area were not so strong, they
were still a sufficient threat to him. In the first place, it was unclear
whether the original stats were even valid in this world, and if, worst of
all, the physical abilities were only as good as one appeared, “Iris” was
nothing more than a slender, fragile girl. Moreover, he had almost no
useful offensive skills. What was I waiting for here? His situation must
be far more severe than ours.
Besides, the way Yanagi… Iris acted during our last conversation was
unusual. The more I thought about it, the worse it became.
“…Sorry, I hadn’t noticed. We must meet up with him as soon as
possible. You know which way to go?”
“Yes… we’d better hurry.”
After checking the direction with a compass, we hurriedly left the place.
The legs and endurance of this body were tremendous, and the scenery
was drifting backward in a flash. We had already been on the road for
more than two hours, sprinting about half of that time, but I didn’t feel
tired. The earlier concern, that if the in-game stats didn’t reflect the
physical capabilities in this word, was moot, but it was barely a relief.
It’s highly likely that a level 1 Iris would be no stronger than an average
person in the area, probably even worse.
However, even though I was marching at such a brisk pace, I could not
see the abandoned temple that I was aiming for. I was already running
at a pace that would have gotten me there in about five minutes if I had
been playing the game. I was getting impatient, wondering how much
of the world was out there.
We should have accompanied Iris to the reincarnation site.
I could not say such words out loud, because they would only drive
Saul, who was running next to me, into a corner.
Then, in my drifting vision, I suddenly thought I saw a figure among the
trees to my left. He seemed to be a man of good physique and mature
age. It seemed like a familiar face, but I could not recall.
“…Reiji-san?”
“Sorry, but could we talk later-”
We had to secure that guy as soon as possible. However, something
was strongly tugging at me. I couldn’t help but be curious, so I stopped
and walked to the place where Saul and I had just been, following him
with a dubious look on my face, but there was no human figure there,
as if I had seen it wrong after all. But instead…
“Is this… a page from a book…?”
“It looks brand new… Why is it here, of all places?”
…we found a blank piece of paper that seemed to be a torn page from a
book. As we looked at each other, we heard a “kin” sound of hard
objects colliding with each other in the distance.
“Did you hear that?”
“Sounds like someone’s fighting.”
“Let’s take a detour. You okay with it?”
I couldn’t help but be curious. It was as if something was guiding me,
some kind of premonition swirling inside me. Saul seemed to feel the
same way. He nodded his head, followed behind me, and we rushed
toward the sound.
Scott
“Scott, you coward, where the hell are you going?!”
“Because of your ass running away, we missed the fucking party! How
are you going to settle this, huh?!”
Of course, they knew that I was trying to escape and call for help. I was
almost on the road when I felt a sharp pain and something hot flowing
in my shoulder when I noticed the four pursuers. By the time I realized
that the arrow had pierced my leg, I was limping and had fallen. By the
time I got up, they had already surrounded me and seemed to have no
intention of letting me go.
They couldn’t wait any less to get this over with and return to have
their lowlife “party”. When I was confronted with the fact that my own
life was an insignificant thing that stood in the way of their “fun”, I bit
down in frustration so hard that my back teeth cracked.
“Even a coward like me still has something to do… I can’t die here just
yet…!”
I held up my dagger. My hand and feet were shaking, but if I didn’t
overcome this crisis, that girl would… So that’s why, this time… I must
do it…!
“What the hell’s wrong with you?! Wasn’t it you who ‘sold’ her to us to
save your own skin?!”
It’s just as they said. I’m a completely spineless coward.
My left arm was numb from the arrow, and I couldn’t do anything with
just a short dagger against the four of them… I must… call for help… no
matter what…!
Reiji
We ran a little further into the woods, and saw a fight. To be more
exact, four dangerous-looking men were pointing their weapons at a
wounded man with an arrow in his shoulder, looking absolutely
distraught. I didn’t know what’s going on… but I let my intuition take
over and instantly decided to help the latter.
“Get down!”
One skill that I usually used came to mind. As if moving from one
dimension to another, I closed the gap of about 100 meters to zero in
an instant, and swung down my large single-edged sword with all my
might.
My unique class was “Sword Saint”, and the skill I just used was
“Skanda”. Even though the system was not working, the acceleration
was still there, and the flash of speed and weight left my hand with the
unpleasant sensation of something cracking and shattering.
I blasted the big man away as lightly as if he were a baseball. The man
rolled for a while, then crashed into a tree and fell down. Naturally, I
had little experience in seriously wielding a weapon against people in
my former world, and I almost felt my knees tremble at what I had
done to the man who had fallen and was twitching. But now was not
the time to be talking about such things, so I put it in the back of my
mind and covered it up.
I look at the other man holding the bow at a distance. Saul held out his
sword to the limit and fired a thunderbolt, which was the skill
“Stunpiercer” of his unique class “Knight Lord”. The enemy archer fell
from the top of the tree with a muffled scream and fell silent. Normally,
that skill was used to catch a target that jumped far away and protect
the rear guard, but it seemed to have more power than that here.
“Calm down, old man, we’re with you.”
I stand between the dazed old man and his two attackers. Inwardly, I
was dripping with cold sweat, but somehow I managed not to show it.
The two remaining men became alert and readied their weapons after
two of their allies were knocked out in the blink of an eye.
“You are…”
“Please stay still, here’s some medicine to treat your wounds.”
“Ah…”
With Saul helping the old man up and handing him the wound medicine
on the side, I stepped out to face the remaining enemies.
The battle ended not long after. It seemed that the in-game stats were
indeed somewhat valid even in this world, and we could still use skills
without any problems, although there were many aspects that need to
be verified. For those of us whose level in the tertiary class had risen to
a certain extent, the enemies weren’t a big deal… except for the
emotional hurdle.
Leaving that matter aside, I turned to the old man we had rescued.
“Old man, you alright there?”
“Sir Swordsman and Sir Knight, I beg of you!”
“Hey, calm down, will you?”
As soon as the battle was over, the old man who had been standing
back grabbed at us with a desperate look.
“T-That girl…! I beg of you, please save that girl…!”
He pleaded to us with a tearful and snot-covered face… but what’s
more important was the word “that girl”. I couldn’t stop feeling a chill
down my spine.
To sum up, the first thing I heard was that it was definitely Iris who had
been captured.
The first thing I felt when I heard all this was immense anger.
“…Bastard, how dare you?!”
In a fit of anger, I grabbed the old man by the collar and tightened it
around his neck. I was tempted to strangle him to death, but then a
hand gently stopped me, and I reluctantly loosened my grip.
“Calm down, Reiji. I know you’re angry, but we can’t waste time taking
out your anger on him. Save that for later.”
“But, because of this asshole…!”
Saul had a point. But this shithead we saved was actually the one who
betrayed Yanagi… Iris, for his selfish end.
That being said, my voice, about to continue, instantly cooled down
when I saw the expression on Saul’s face next to mine.
Saul walked up to the man lying on his back under the tree that I had
just blown away, and swung his sword down mercilessly, without a
shred of hesitation. Immediately, blood spurted out like a geyser, and
before it could stain the surroundings, the sword was swung three
more times at the remaining living ones in the same manner.
He ”disposed of” four men before the blood could even stick to his
clothes.
“Sorry, but it would be a problem if these guys wake up later and get in
our way again. Your name is Scott, isn’t it? We’ll save her. Lead the
way.”
“…Y-Yes… This way, please…”
Saul’s sagacious face, set against a bright red snowy landscape, was
completely devoid of expression, and only his eyes were glazed with a
murderous intent.
However, I couldn’t even think of blaming my old friend for his sudden
and heinous act. In fact, I felt unworthy of myself for having let Saul,
who was a girl inside, do it. Honestly, I wanted to do it. I’ve never felt
such rage, such a desire to kill so much, that I would have never
thought of it in my former world. That’s right. It’s not this old man that I
want to take my anger out on, it’s the people who kidnapped Iris.
I didn’t even have time to keep up with the old man’s pace. I carried
him on my shoulder like a sack of rice and start running as fast as I
could, relying on his directions and leftover footprints.
“Wait for me, Iris, I’ll save you… so please, stay safe.”
Before I knew it, the trembling from fear of hurting someone of my
own volition had stopped.
(Author’s Note)
These two are seriously pissed, and all hesitation against killing people
are temporarily turned off.
Part 2
Reiji
(Timeskip to post-Chapter 11)
My gut was churning with anger. Iris was held down on a table, her
cheek swollen from abuse and her whole body covered with painful
scars. It’s hard to say that we’d made it in time, but the last line before
things truly became irreversible, was barely safe, such was the critical
timing of our arrival.
“Don’t be afraid, you idiots! If they’re here to save the hostage, just
kill…”
“That’s not happening.”
Saul’s skill, “Invisible Shield”, deployed an invisible barrier around the
fallen Iris. Immediately after, the window shattered into dust with a
rumbling sound. The man who had been holding Iris down was forced
to release her and cover his head against the rain of shrapnel.
The next moment, Saul jumped in through the window and attacked.
He tore off the neck of a bandit on his left, while avoiding the impact of
his landing by spinning, and the moment he stopped spinning, he
immediately lunged forward and stabbed another in the heart as he
passed by.
Saul, who had mortally wounded two men in the blink of an eye,
quickly threw his shoulder cloak, which he had apparently removed
beforehand, over Iris’ naked body.
“Force Shield!”
Saul thrust his shield into the floor, piercing the stone floor beneath,
and a wall was erected to protect Iris. This was another of the Knight
Lord’s skills that generated a force field around the user’s shield.
Although it had the massive drawback of giving up the shield, which
could become fatal to the tank position, it was the most solid defense
for important allies, and now the enemies around him could no longer
touch Iris.
When we raided this hideout, we had already ascertained from the
light we saw that Iris’s location was a room on the second floor. While I
charged head-on to get the attention of everyone inside, Saul moved in
from another direction to rescue Iris from the enemies.
It was a feat of strength that could hardly be called a plan, but the quick
action, which could only be described as remarkable, made one wonder
if this Saul guy was really a tank. Anyway, our biggest concern, which
was Iris’ safety, had been dealt with, so there’s no need to worry about
it anymore.
“Now no one can escape. Every single one of you, who have injured and
humiliated my Iris… don’t ever think of leaving this place alive.”
“And don’t even try to beg for forgiveness either…!”
The cruelty done to Iris earlier was seared in my eyes, and even now, a
new rage was welling up in me. At this moment, there was neither
hesitation nor mercy in the hands that hold the weapons, and to
dissipate this anger, we both leapt furiously at the bandits whom we
had set our sights on.
Our surrounding quickly became a hellscape. Every time Saul’s sword
flashed, fresh blood started dancing, and screams of despair rose up. As
we had declared, we had no intention of letting any of those people
escape. While Saul targeted the enemies who were trying to flee, I cut
down anyone who even showed a shred of resistance.
The reasonably sized room became a pool of blood, and the number of
live people inside went down, one by one.
“What the hell are you doing, they’re just two guys!! Goddammit, why
does this happen out of nowhere?! Iris…? Ah shit, she’s that rumored
‘Princess’, isn’t she?!”
Something improbable came out of the bandit ringleader’s mouth.
The name “Princess” was supposed to be some kind of nickname
imposed by the game’s official developers. Why did someone from this
world know about it…? Did the events of the game affect this world or
something…?
“Looks like I fucked up big time… Should have killed that walking bomb
instead of trying to play with her… Uooooooh!!”
The enemy ringleader suddenly stood up and charged at me with a
rusty sword in his hand, but he’s too late.
My sword was enveloped in the dazzling light of my fighting spirit.
I lightly ducked below the path of the opponent’s sword, and as he
passed by, I gave him a shallow cut to the side of his stomach. It looked
like a minor wound… but that’s all I needed.
“You’re already dead.”
“What the hell are you talking about- GYAAAAAAAAH?!”
The fighting spirit I left within the wound I had just reaped gushed out.
His abdomen swollen up and exploded in a flash, turning his body into
chunks of flesh scattering everywhere.
“B-Boss!!”
“W-We surrender! Just spare our lives, please!”
The people around him began to sit up and beg for forgiveness at the
sight of his gruesome death. I had heard that there was a method of
destroying the spirit of the enemies by cruelly disposing of one of them,
and it seemed that I had unknowingly demonstrated such an effect by
striking with maximum force in anger.
I felt nauseous at the sight of these bandits.
“…Fine.”
A moment of relief passed in the air as I muttered so. However…
“Only those who stopped when she told you to stop would be spared.”
The surrounding froze with my next words.
Of course, there’s no way anyone like that existed in this group, and I
wasn’t going to bother checking each and every one of them.
Thinking that I must be looking really dangerous right now, I coldly cut
down all those who were still trying to make excuses, those who were
trying to pin the blame on others, and those who were trying to escape,
all together, in order.
It took less than five minutes to clean up everything.
I wrapped Iris, who was still sleeping, in my cloak in addition to Saul’s so
she didn’t get cold. The poncho I had found earlier, which I thought
belonged to Iris, did not look too dirty or damaged, so I picked it up as
well.
When I carried her body, she felt as light as a feather, as if she would
break at the slightest touch, and it pained me to think of how much
torture she must have endured.
It was at this point that I finally managed to calm down and started
feeling terrible about the way I had been acting, even killing people in
cold blood. I couldn’t help but feel frightened at the idea of me, an
ordinary person until just yesterday, had acquired the power to kill
people so easily in just a few moments.
But when I felt the weight and warmth of the girl breathing in my arms,
taking out a gang of bandits seemed trivial in comparison.
Without my current power, surely we would have lost her forever.
“Aaaah… young miss, making you hurt so badly… it’s my fault… it’s my
fault…”
Old man Scott, who had been waiting outside, collapsed when he saw
Iris sleeping in my arm.
“Don’t beat yourself up over it, we managed to save her from the worst
of it… You have our thanks.”
“No! I don’t deserve your gratitude… I’m sorry, I’m really sorry…”
The old man’s lamentations did not stop, but from the way he was
wailing, there was no doubt that he was concerned about Iris. Before I
knew it, my anger at the old man had dissipated, and when I looked at
Saul, he simply shook his head.
If this is the case, the rest is all up to Iris, not up to us.
“Pardon my impudent request but… there’re more girls captured by
those people in the basement, could you help them out as well?”
The old man, now calmed down, told us about the girls who had been
kidnapped from the nearby towns. Maybe some of them were from
that town we were sent to.
“…Of course, please show us the way.”
“Follow me.”
He then led us to a horrible-looking basement. The air reeked of mold,
blood, and carnal desire, so nasally that we couldn’t breathe properly.
Some of the equipment inside was clearly intended “for that purpose”,
and in one corner, in a cage that was probably intended for animals,
several young women were sitting frozen and trembling.
“…I have no words for this.”
Various traces of the bandits’ deeds were left on the women’s bodies.
Some were badly bruised and scarred, some had deformed limbs, and
some were even missing body parts. A crushing fear grew in my heart
that if we had been late, Iris would have been among these people.
If Iris had been awake, she would have been able to heal the injuries,
but there was no way I’d wake her up when she looked so pale and
exhausted right now. I decided to leave it to Saul, whose eyes seemed
to tell me, “I’ll take care of it”. If the other party was a woman, he was
probably more attentive than I was, and it wasn’t something I was
supposed to look at anyway. Granted, both of us were in men’s bodies
now.
The old man and I would stand guard outside the door while Saul
destroyed the cage locks and any shackles or restraints he found.
“So, what do we do with these girls?”
“Let’s go back to town and inform the mayor, he’ll send people to pick
everyone up…”
“But we can’t just leave these girls alone, can we?”
It might sound heartless, but our first priority was Iris and only Iris, and
we really wanted to get her out of here as soon as possible and settle
down, for the sake of hygiene. Once we found an inn or somewhere we
could rest, we wouldn’t hesitate to report and get help afterward…
“Then let me stay back and take care of them.”
“…Are you sure about that? They probably like you as much as they like
those bandits.”
“I can’t blame them. It was me who turned a blind eye when these girls
were tortured or worse, and if they wanted to beat me up or kill me for
it, I think that’s a crime I should be willing to pay for.”
Seeing the old man so prepared, I didn’t have to say anything more.
“I see… Then this place is now yours. We’ll come back to pick you up as
soon as possible.”
“Yes, I’m leaving the young miss in your care.”
“That’s a given. You, too, must live to apologize to her.”
“Understood.”
I met up with Saul, who applied simple treatments to the women,
headed back the way we came, and returned to that first town.
Just like we expected, the town was also a victim of the bandits’ raid.
When we reported the bandits’ subjugation and the missing women,
the mayor thanked us and dispatched a group of men to pick them up.
As part of their gratitude, we were able to rent a room as our lodging.
Iris… didn’t wake up until three days later.

Editing/Standardisation: Medicine Melancholy
Original Translation: Medicine Melancholy

Reiji

When I first met him, he was just some strange guy I hadn’t seen
before, and that’s it.
He was recently transferred from another hospital to the local one in
my neighborhood, where he was hospitalized because of his broken
legs.
I was too busy strolling around the hospital and happened to enter that
guy’s room, and my first impression of him was that he was kind of like
a girl.
What bugged me was that the whole time, he was staring blankly
somewhere in the distance, not moving his face even a twitch.
I tried talking to him, he just gave me a small nod, not even hiding his
total lack of interest. Being the kid I was at the time, I spent every day
afterward trying to make him laugh, or at least pique his interest.
“That kid’s had a rough time. He absolutely doesn’t trust anyone else,
especially adults… But maybe he’ll open up to somebody of his age.”
Said my grandpa when he came to visit me in the hospital.
Turned out, that strange guy was the grandson of my grandpa’s
acquaintance.
Eventually, I got to befriend his little sister, who often came to the
hospital for that guy. As an only child, I felt like I had a sister of my own,
which honestly wasn’t a bad feeling.
My new daily life went on like this, until one day, I saw a group of adults
that I didn’t see around here coming in with their rather bulky cameras.
I sneakily followed them to see if they were some kind of bad folks, and
as soon as they entered that guy’s room… I heard a scream.
I jumped in impatiently and saw him shrinking and trembling at the
edge of the bed, and his sister clinging to him threateningly. And then
there were the guys grinning at them and pointing their cameras and
microphones at me with ugly looks on their faces.
It was obvious that that guy was scared of those adults. I was so angry
that I started hitting them with the crutches in my hand.
Before I knew it, the men were gone, and I got a lot of scolding from
the hospital staff. My parents and grandpa were quite mad at me as
well, but in the end, they praised me with a “Well done”, which made
me really proud.
The next day, that guy started responding properly when I talked to
him.
Me, him, and his little sister would watch the TV together in the
common room or explore the hospital together.
On the day I was discharged from the hospital, they were both crying so
hard that I cried myself, to everyone else’s chagrin… So when I saw him
and his sister pushing his wheelchair the following month, accompanied
by the old man who lived in the very large house next door, we all
laughed and wondered what it was that we had cried together that
time.
That guy’s grandpa used to be angry about his son’s adamant decision
to marry an unidentified foreign girl he had picked up from somewhere,
so much that he disowned his own son.
He only came to regret it when the son and his wife were killed by an
armed robber without his knowledge, and rushed to pick up his
grandchildren, who were this brother and sister, when the new finally
arrived to him long after the death.
And that’s why the two siblings, who had lost their parents, were taken
in by their grandparents to live here.
I’d gained two new friends, and we were together more often than not.
Even though many people looked at him strangely because of his
peculiar appearance, his inability to move his lower body and his
anthropophobia, I was the one who mediated, quarreled and even got
into fight to defend him.
I’m absolutely sure that I thought of that guy as a friend, but now that I
think about it, I’d always had some sense of superiority in me at the
time whenever it’s about “protecting him”.
This situation changed during our freshman year of high school. By this
time, his fear of other people was getting worse, and although we had
gone to high school together, we had less and less contact with each
other.
First his grandmother died. Then his grandfather died in quick
succession.
My family helped with the funeral, as we knew it would be difficult for
two kids to handle, and I didn’t see him again for a few months after
that.
Then… he suddenly dropped out of high school and disappeared
without telling me why. Feeling betrayed, I cut off contact with him in a
fit of rage. We became estranged for an entire year.
“Reiji! Hey Reiji, come take a look!”
Shortly after the new year, I heard his voice for the first time in a long
while in a very excited tone. I still harbored bad feelings for him, but
reluctantly went to see him anyway…
He proudly showed me a paperback book as if it was the result of a
successful prank.
“Illustrator: Kuga Yanagi”
I rubbed my eyes a few times at the letters, and asked him “What’s
this?” in bewilderment.
According to him, he’d wanted to be independent since his
grandparents died.
His grandparents were well-known landowners, and in their later years,
they converted their land rights into gold, except for the area around
the barrier-free house (so that a disabled person like him could freely
move around the place) where he and his sister lived, and left it to
them as inheritance, so they should not have any problems for a while.
But that guy was looking for a job he could do to minimize his reliance
on his inherited wealth as much as possible.
So he turned to his hobby of painting, which he had originally done
while he was a shut-in, and after various works posted on the internet,
he finally received an offer to make illustrations for a book.
In an embarrassed tone, he admitted that he wanted me to be the first
person to see the book on the day it was published.
When he said he wanted to leave as much inheritance as possible for
his sister, he looked stronger than any person without a handicap on
their body, and I felt absolutely defeated.
I guess this was the first time I recognized him as an equal in my mind.
After we reconciled and reestablished our friendship, he and his sister
invited me to play a game with them, a certain “Worldgate Online”.
I was speechless when I saw their avatars in the game for the first time
two months after starting late, and when his sister told me with a
mischievous expression that their contents had been exchanged, I was
completely crestfallen to see him next to her looking so dainty and
embarrassed.
Seven years had passed since then.
Through in-game communications, that guy was invited to join Arks VR
Technology, and from time to time I would see his illustration in the
game.
On my end, I graduated from high school, entered college and worked
my way up to a master’s degree, and his sister also attended the college
I was studying in… Throughout these years, we’d been on adventures
together.
Sometimes the three of us would be added to a raid party and fight to
the death against a mighty raid boss.
Sometimes we would butt heads and engage in heated discussions,
sometimes we would challenge each other recklessly.
…And somehow, I found myself becoming a top-level player.
Then… an update earlier this year forced us to move on without him.
But that guy caught up with us much sooner than expected, and we
were finally able to get back to our original trio…
We’d have many adventurers together again. Yes, our relationship
would continue as before, as I’d always hoped… we’d always hoped.
“Saul, Reiji, something’s happening…!”
“What’s going on there?!”
“Onii-chan, calm down and tell me!”
“Let go of m-”
“Hey, you alright?! Hey?!”
The noise coming from behind me, and the muffled anguish sent chills
down my spine. The painful voice that shouldn’t be possible in this
game, where the sense of pain was almost nullified.
“What’s wrong?! Answer me! Dammit, what the hell’s happening
here?!”
“Onii-chan?! Answer me, please!”
Around us, the players collapsed one by one and disappeared.
The sky, or rather the space itself, turned red, and soon the noise
became worse, and the ground was gradually consumed by darkness.
“Ha, hahaha… This joke isn’t funny.”
The situation was so absurd that I could no longer do anything but
laugh.
I was swallowed by something that looked like a magic circle appeared
above and below my feet… and my consciousness went dark.

Editing/Standardisation: Medicine Melancholy
Original Translation: Medicine Melancholy

Iris/Yanagi

Very little memory remained of the incident.
All I could remember was my parents getting stabbed when trying to
protect me and my sister, by a robber to suddenly broke into our home,
then I myself was stabbed, as the final line of defense for my sister.
The targeting was just a coincidence, apparently.
Later on, the police told me that the assailant had lost himself in
drinking and gambling and just happened to rob a house he saw.
For such a reason… I had my most important thing taken away from me
because of “bad luck”. I could never accept such a thing.
The next time I woke up, the lower half of my body had become
immobile. It seemed that the blade had injured my spine.
Since that day, whenever I saw a stranger, I began to fear that I might
be attacked the next moment, and eventually I was unable to continue
going to school.
The only place I could find solace was the game.
But that dreamlike realm had become my new reality.
“Yo, finally awake huh, ‘Sleeping Princess’?”
“…Eek!”
I was instantly woken up by a dirty face right in front of me and the
choking smell of boozy breath.
I instinctively raised my leg to shoo the man in front of me away, only
to be stopped by the metallic rattling sound and the feel of a metal ring
around my ankle.
For some reason, I was unrestrained except for my legs, but my arms
didn’t move at all when I tried to push the man’s body back.
“Hey, act more like a prince, will ya?”
“Then how about this? Princess, I’ve come to steal you away.”
“That’s no good either, dumbass. Look, our Princess here is so scared!”
I was completely surrounded by the sound of the men making gleefully
at their own stupid and crass jokes.
With my head in turmoil and my vision unable to move as much as I
would like due to my prone position, I looked around and see the worst
of the situation: I had been brought into what looked like a worn-down
room somewhere.
The smell of dust, mold, sweat and male odor was unbearable to my
nose. I was lying on what looked like a low table, covered with stains I
didn’t even want to touch, surrounded by filthy men, who looked like
bandits no matter how I looked at them. All of them were looking at me
with lustful eyes, as dirty as the rest of their appearance.
Looking back at myself, I was not wearing my cloak, which might have
been stripped off when I was unconscious, and the way my legs were
chained made them spread a little. I was almost relieved for a moment
to see that the rest of my clothes was still intact-
“Alright guy, let’s get started!”
“I’ve been waiting for this!”
“Good lord, I’ve been barely able to contain myself. Just look at her, I’ve
seen anyone like that before!”
Looks like they were fired up after their boss’ words.
“What do you mean by ‘get started’?”
That was, the most stupid line ever, to be spoken in such a situation.
Immediately, I regretted saying it. It was obvious, wasn’t it? I was now
in the form of a pretty girl, different from the world I was in before.
However, I wasn’t thinking straight anymore, and just said it because I
had an impossible desire to see it not happen to me.
“Ahahaha, what are you talking about? Is this your first time or
something?”
“It should be a given, right?”
“Come on, guys, cut her some slack. She’s just a naïve princess.”
Amidst the clamor of the men, the ringleader stroked my cheek with a
disgusting hand. The touch made my back foam and I felt nauseous.
“Actually, I was going to sell her off somewhere else.”
The word “sell off” made my shoulders tremble.
Slave trading, a word I probably had no connection to in my former
home in Japan, flashed through my mind.
Around my stomach, my robe was being unbuttoned slowly by the
ringleader, one by one.
“Surely, this girl would fetch us a high price… But you’re a high-ranking
healer, am I correct, girl? Soooo, we’ve decided what we would make a
much better profit if we just enjoyed ourselves right here, then keep
you as a slave and ‘sell’ your ‘service’ to whoever asks for it… Sounds
reasonable enough?”
The front of my robe, with all its buttons undone, was opened,
revealing the blouse and skirt underneath. Suddenly, amidst the cheers
of the enthusiastic group of bandits, the man’s hands were placed on
the collar of the blouse and…
How many hours had passed since then?
It did not take long for the torment, which was initially inflicted as a
punishment for fighting back, to change to the point that it became the
purpose of admiring a slender girl’s body and opening her wounded
heart, using “she could heal it anyway” as an excuse for hurting a
treasure that would normally be untouchable.
My body, which had originally been in a state of frenzy despite my lack
of physical strength, was now exhausted from the exertion, and I
remained limp, unable to move except for the occasional jerking of my
limbs, which I would sometimes do regardless of my will.
My innocent white skin, which used to be so beautiful, was now
painfully swollen with cruel scars all over my body, my shining hair was
tangled and unraveled in some places, and there were even bruises on
some parts of my body where I was beaten for fun.
The last defense of my barely untouched innocence was stripped away
just a few minutes ago, and at this rate it will only be a matter of time
before it was taken away from me… But that no longer mattered now.
I’m so tired. The will to resist of my battered body had been mercilessly
crushed.
This was just painful, agonizing, sickening, and painful. Wouldn’t it be
easier to just give up consciousness, let go of everything, and become a
doll? Yes, I should do that. There was no way that I could fall asleep
here and wake up in my usual room, back to my usual everyday life…
Come to think of it, I wonder how Ayame and Reiji are doing…
Did they get sent to this world as well…?
If that’s the case, I dearly hope that those two will never get hurt,
because if they get hurt in this world, I can no longer be around to fix
them up anymore…
I.Can.Never.Meet.Them.Again.Anymore…?
…I hate it.
Hatehatehatehatehatehatehatehatehatehatehatehatehatehate!
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!”
Tears welled up in my eyes, and my throat, which I thought was dry,
screamed again.
All this time, I was thinking.
That I was only getting in the way of the two of them.
Both Ayame and Reiji were very talented at their age, and I’d always
thought that if they were freed from the burden called me, they would
be able to fly even higher.
But it wasn’t until I was in this lousy situation that I finally realized that I
really didn’t have to give up like that.
I wanted to go back. I still wanted to be with them.
No matter how I did it, I just wanted to get out of this situation.
In response to such a will, a dazzling light shot out from my back in an
almost reckless way. The brilliance of resistance, restored at the last
minute, instantly turned the room white. It burned the eyes of those
who had just been staring and grinning at me a while ago, and the
feathers of light that danced around the room soaked into my
exhausted body when they touched it, and although I was far from my
full strength, I felt a slight revival of strength in my body.
As a last stand, I pushed away the man who was just about to climb on
top of me. The hand accidentally pressed on the ringleader’s face,
which was on my chest, and the ringleader, blinded by the sudden light
and caught off guard, was unable to evade it… With a squishing sound, I
felt my fingertip punctured and crushed something soft and moist.
“Gyaaaaah?! My eye, my eye!”
It seemed that my finger accidentally struck the eye socket and crushed
one of the ringleader’s eyes. Faster than I could recognize it, I
reflexively gouged it out. A sickening sensation followed my finger, but
there was a slight gap between the ringleader, whose body was pulled
back from me by the pain, and the men around him, who were frozen
by the sudden event.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!”
I just wanted to do whatever’s possible for me at the moment. Driven
by fear, I poured all my magical power into summoning “Divine Spear”.
My head ached like a cancer, my nausea was terrible, and my body was
losing strength like water in a bucket with a hole in it, but I unleashed
the spears with all the strength I had, knowing that if I did not do it
now, I would only meet despair for the rest of my life.
The countless spears of light that radiated in all directions without
aiming, even ignoring the limitations of the game, pierced the men,
rendering some of them comatose, but…
“This damn bitch!”
Unfortunately, none of them hit the ringleader, who was closest to me.
I was hit in the face with great force. My mouth started tasting blood,
as if the inside had been cut open. The pain and shock almost knocked
me unconscious, but I clenched my lips and held on.
…This world had already become my new reality.
I was helplessly a girl now, and if I gave up here, it would surely go past
the point of no return.
More than anything else… those two would regret not staying by my
side.
Especially Ayame… she usually had a strong bravado, but deep down,
she was ridden with regrets because of my injuries. I didn’t want her to
feel that pain anymore.
Besides, even if I disappeared here, I was sure those two would try
desperately to find me. Surely, those two would eventually form a
strong relationship together.
That’s why, in this harsh world of reality, if they were to get hurt in the
midst of it. If their lives were in danger. Just thinking about it sent chills
down my spine. I wish I would be with them at this moment.
Remember it, me! What was the most important thing in a recovery
job?! Wasn’t it to never give up, more than anyone else, until the very
last moment?!
“Hey, you’ve got some interesting properties here, for a mere
‘merchandise’… After messing you up as hard as I can, I’ll be sure to
make you a slave until the day you die… What the?!”
The man moved again to attack me, but this time, his fist was blocked
by a small barrier… “Solid Ray”, a formation of hexagons, conjured by
my will.
“Impossible… not even a chant?!”
“I won’t lose… to the likes of you!”
My exhausted body was barely held together by sheer force of will.
The desire to disappear quietly, somewhere out of the way, had always
been in a corner of my mind. But now…
“We would adventure together, right…?! We made a promise, didn’t
we…?!”
It was a simple promise.
But with those words as support, a strong desire burnt within me. I was
afraid, my wounded heart was still screaming endlessly. But more than
that.
I wanted to go back. To that place. Between the two people I cherished.
My back was burning hot. Something was meshing in my body, the
knowledge that was avalanching into my brain.
“’Sanctuary’… deploy!”
Instantly, the wings fluttered around me connected the light to form a
dome-shaped geometric pattern. The nearby men were repelled by the
newly-formed dome.
“What the hell is that?! Quickly, surround and tear it apart!”
“It’s no use! Nothing we do gets through it!”
It seemed I managed to keep them at bay… However, this was by no
means an attack, and even while I was buying time like this, my
remaining magical power was dwindling by the minute. There’s not
much time left to maintain the barrier. If it broke, I would have no
power left to resist, for real this time…
Don’t worry, just keep it going to the limit.
As my consciousness began to fade, I thought I heard a voice. I thought
I saw something white at the edge of my vision, but I was too busy
trying to maintain the barrier.
One minute… two minutes… This was the end. The feathers on my back
lost their luster and melted into the air as particles, and the “Sanctuary”
fleetingly vanished.
“Heh, hehe, what a shame, now I’m sure you aren’t going to pull
another trick on us again.”
My body, which had lost its protection, was once again held down by
the table. I stared at the ringleader, who had lost one eye and focusing
his entire hatred on the remaining one, with determination not to give
up until the very end.
The door to the room’s exit… no, the entire wall along with it, was
blown open before my eyes with a roar, as if a cliff had collapsed in
front of me.
“Just in time… Well, not really, considering what I’m seeing here.”
Emerging from the cloud of dust was a tall young man with fiery red
hair… a figure I knew really well.
“Who on earth are you?!”
He half-dodged sideways to avoid the attack of a bandit who leapt at
him angrily, grabbed his head unceremoniously, and, with a soggy, wet
sound, slammed it to the ground to silence him.
After a strange moan from the downed bandit, there was no signs of
movement again. The remaining men backed away from the newcomer
as if frightened by a horrific sight, though it was impossible for me to
tell what happened to the first bandit, since he was lying out of sight.
“This girl’s my close friend, so stop whatever you’re doing to her, okay?
I don’t really like these bruteforce situation… but I’ll pay you all back for
this, with great interests.”
The very familiar voice, aloof but with an anger inside that I had never
heard before. And the figure that seemed so familiar to me, even
though we parted only a short time ago.
“Sorry, we’re late… But it’s alright now, just rest easy.”
“Ah… what took you so long… idiot…”
My friend, whom I’d shared countless adventures with in the game,
whom I relied on more than anyone else… After hearing Reiji’s voice, I
was overcome with relief, and my consciousness sank into darkness,
feeling one last drop of water on my cheek.
(Author’s Note)
“Sanctuary”
This is the so-called trump card skill of the Lightwing race, boasting a
cooldown of several days.
It’s the ultimate protection magic, completely shutting out malicious
opponents, and deploying a barrier around a 3-meter square area that
heals the injuries and magical power of others inside at a tremendous
rate. However, the amount of magic power required to maintain it is
terribly high.

Editing/Standardisation: Medicine Melancholy
Original Translation: Medicine Melancholy

Iris/Yanagi

I drank several bottles of magic water to replenish my lost magic
power, and probably about an hour had passed by my experience.
It was when I felt healthy enough to return to the original path I
walked… that I noticed numerous footsteps coming toward me from
that very same path.
Emerging from the depths of the forest were men, each of them poorly
armed and of an appearance that at first glance did not suggest a
decent occupation.
It was already too late to turn on my heel and run away in the swarthy
atmosphere, and the other side appeared as if it had known of my
presence from the beginning, and the road leading to the street was
blocked in the blink of an eye.
“Heh, you really are a beautiful young lady, miss. Mind if you ‘heal’ us a
bit?”
The bald-headed man who seemed to be their boss spoke up, as if he
had already known me.
“How did you know…?”
“Yeah, about that…”
The man’s face contorted into an ugly grin, like a beast tormenting its
prey.
“This fellow here confessed everything, correct?”
He slapped on someone else’s back and pushed him into the front.
I didn’t want to believe it. I had come to this world and met only one
person, and there couldn’t be any others.
“No… You must be joking… right?”
He… sold me out?
Scott-san looked at me apologetically. I turned away from his gaze as
soon as our eyes met.
“I’m really sorry, miss…”
Blood rushed to my head.
“Silence! I don’t want to… hear anything from you!”
I shook my long hair and began chanting with my staff at the ready.
The four spears of light that appeared were a sign of my rejection.
“Kuh…!”
My body creaked from the recoil, and another four spears were fired.
However, it was difficult to simultaneously pursue moving targets. Two
of the four spears hit the men, while the other two lost their guidance
and flew away into the void.
But there was no time to be discouraged about missing the target, so I
turned on my heels and retreated.
“Just press on! That light won’t kill you anyway, as long as one of us
catches up, the rest won’t matter!”
I clenched my teeth.
The enemy ringleader was right. My weakness was exposed earlier than
expected.
I kept firing the spears to reduce the opponents’ number and ran
away… but my body strengthening magic I applied to myself only gave
me enough speed to barely buy time even with those weak legs of mine
running with all their might. Still, the difference in physical strength was
significant, and the distance was slowly closing in.
I had already fired three times. The men who were hit by the spear of
light fell down here and there, but looking at the state of these men,
the shortcoming of my attack was obvious.
No matter how powerful it is to knock a person unconscious with a
single blow, “Divine Spear” does not have the power to kill or injure.
The enemy number was still overwhelming.
And on my side, my limbs had been unusually heavy since a while ago.
My throat was in pain.
Even though I was at level 1, my status should have been set much
higher than the initial one, and from the way I felt, I should still have
enough magic power for a few more shots, but already the feeling in
my limbs was beginning to fade away.
“… Lea Lea… Di Viega!”
I tried to fire “Divine Spear” again, but my concentration was
momentarily disrupted by a figure that was much closer than I
expected.
The recoil from “Divine Spear” blew my light body away without mercy,
sending me spinning several times…
“Aaah!”
My back struck a tree hard, squeezing the air out of my lungs. I had to
quickly get up and run away, but my lungs, gasping for oxygen, would
not allow it, and when I barely regained my breath, my pursuers were
right in front of me, their hands outstretched.
Memories of the knife-wielding man flashed in my mind.
The burning pain in my back. The girl crying in my arms as I reassured
her that she’s okay over and over. The disappearing sensation in the
lower half of my body…
“YAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!”
In my screams, I summoned several spears without chanting and shot
them out randomly, knocking two more men unconscious.
The recoil caused my body to slam against the tree trunk, creaking my
bones. At least I wasn’t blown away again.
“(pants heavily)… It’s no good… I can’t run anymore…”
My limbs lost their strength and I fell helplessly into the snow, unable
to do anything about it.
Ah, I see, is that so.
Something had been tormenting me and inhibiting my movement for a
while now… fatigue.
It was something that I had felt many times during my journey here
since I woke up in this world, but kept deceiving myself with magic.
I should have been more careful. Even though I’d verified that “Divine
Spear” causes an “uncontrollable recoil” to my body, I didn’t even think
about that possibility. I had assumed that “HP” and “MP” were
separate, as in the game, and that they did not affect each other.
The magical backlash that I thought was “a little bit” had unknowingly
struck this slender body many times, saving it from danger, but at the
same time weakening it.
“Hahaha, found you! Do you really think you can get away with this,
you little shit?!”
One of the man caught up to me, grabbed me by the hair, and pulled
me up, but my limbs were no longer able to resist, and I was pushed to
the ground with my hands behind my back. I felt something like a
coarse rope being wrapped around my wrists, scraping my skin like
sandpaper.
I was restrained in a position that reminded me of “that time”, whether
I liked it or not.
Please stop, I don’t want any reminder of that time!
I thought I had been able to forget about it. If I remembered here, I
wouldn’t be able to resist anything anymore. There was only a dark
future ahead.
But… the fear overflowing from the once-opened wounds of the past
quickly took away my will to resist and blackened my consciousness.
Scott
“Young miss, no…”
Her petite body, limp and unmoving, was bound round and round by
the vulgar hands of these men.
The face that had smiled at me then was now as bloodless as snow, and
I could just see her eyes downcast like a doll.
Around me, men were excitedly enjoying the spoils of war and playing
with the unconscious girl’s body. Stunned by the sight, I jumped when I
felt a hand on my shoulder.
“All thanks to you, pal. Be sure to inform us of any treasure like this the
next time, okay?”
Yes, I had sold the young miss to these lowlifes out of selfishness.
I had plunged a lovely, kind-hearted girl who healed me, saved my life,
and shed tears of joy for my survival, into a darkness that had no end in
sight.
I could still remember the look of utter shock on her face. I could only
wonder how betrayed she must have felt when she tearfully refused to
listen to anything…
It would have been much better if I just died to that monster.
Already way past the time for regret, I wandered off on a trail off the
base, feeling so guilty and ashamed that I considered stabbing myself in
the throat with the dagger I had on my person…
“That’s not right… I cannot let her die that easily…”
I have to go get help. Then I must die by that girl’s hands.
With that as my only thought, I began to run, dragging my feet at first,
but eventually, as if driven by something, sprint with all my might.