“We are deeply saddened to inform all of you that one of our school’s students, a young man named Satomura Yuta, passed away unexpectedly last night. It is tragic how quickly a life can be cut short and as young men and women I urge you to always strive to live...”
Those were the words spoken by my school’s principal a week ago after the death of Satomura Yuta. As we were in the same class some people offered me their condolences which I graciously accepted despite knowing how insincere their words were. Most of them did not know who Satomura was. Most of them had only heard his name for the first time during the principal’s address. He was a quiet otaku who sat in the back corner of class where he would read his manga or some times talk to other otaku about anime or video games or whatever. An otherwise forgettable sort of person who few paid attention to and who nobody would remember by the end of the year.
In short, he disgusted me. Even if he wasn’t my classmate I knew from personal experience the type of person that he was. He was the type who one day gathered up every bit of courage he had and approached me when school was letting out. The same day he died, in fact.
“I-Inuzuka-san. I... I know that you’re popular so you probably don’t even think about someone like me but I think about you a lot and... would you be willing to go somewhere with me some time?”
Satomura shook and muttered nervously as he'd said those words. A love confession? I couldn’t believe he actually had the guts to do it and after hearing something like that there was only one thing I could say to him.
“Not in a million years.”
I saw how much those words hurt him. He had probably been working so long on that. He’d tried so hard to muster up all that courage to tell me that only to get rejected. Not just rejected but rejected in the coldest, most blunt way possible. He seemed to stumble back as if he somehow was expecting a different outcome and then glumly muttered an apology before trudging his way from the classroom. My friends chastised me and said that was cruel but the way they laughed as they did it told me they that found it hilarious. After all Satomura wasn’t the first boy to try confessing to me. He wasn’t even the first otaku-type to do it. One by one they would come only to be struck down by my harsh words.
For my part I didn’t find it funny as such, only natural. I am at the top of my class. Girls constantly jostle and compete to be my friend and they are willing to toss aside their other “friends” if it means being just a little closer to me. Boys fight amongst themselves to see who can date me. Everyone calls me one of the school’s idols. So when some gross otaku loser like Satomura bothers me at the end of the day with his goofy and awkward confession what could he have actually expected to happen? Did he think things would turn out like some romantic movie where I would be so moved by his heartfelt words that I would accept his feelings right then and there?
That isn’t how reality works. A person like Satomura has nothing at all to do with me. He is not my friend nor is he anyone I would ever consider to be a possible lover. In truth to get ahead, to get to the top, the feelings of anyone else but yourself can never be a concern of yours. After all, I got to where I am not through sentimentality but through self-interested ambition the same as anyone else. Those girls and those boys who want to be closer to me care largely for their own status. Just as I care nothing for them they care nothing for me. We are all simply individuals who strive for higher status and are willing to use, manipulate, step on and toss away anyone and everyone in our desire to reach the top.
This is why I ever so humbly accepted their empty and thoughtless words, words uttered for little other reason than so they could appear empathetic and thus increase their standing in my eyes, and organized an effort to send kind words to Satomura’s family “on behalf of the class”. Cruel as it may seem he would be just another rung I would use while continuing my climb up the social ladder.
“I heard he was hit while trying to pull a girl out of the way of a speeding truck,” a friend had said one day.
“Are you for real!? I thought that he was so embarrassed by Momocchi turning him down that he walked into traffic and killed himself in shame!”
My friends laughed at that. Of course I stepped in.
“That’s uncalled for Maki! Just because I rejected him didn’t mean I wanted him to... to...”
“Ah! W-We’re sorry Momocchi! We didn’t seriously mean to imply that you actually had anything to do with what happened! Right Aya?”
“Even still, you shouldn’t talk so cruelly about others,” I sniffed.
My friends then spent the next few minutes trying to comfort me and while it’s true that it’s not like I wanted him to die it’s not as if I was particularly upset either. But opportunity presented itself and thus I took it. It may seem heartless but I like to think that perhaps Satomura – who liked me enough to confess – would be happy to know that even in death he’s able to help me realize my own ambitions.
“I said something truly hurtful to him and then he...”
I began to sniffle again. More time was spent giving me reassuring words. I regretted what I had said and my own words, my cold rejection of Satomura, weighed heavy on me. Others soon joined as tears began to well up in my eyes and sniffles turned to sobs. But of course deep down I knew that I wasn’t truly affected. It was all performative, an act meant to elicit sympathy. To turn Satomura’s death into my own pain. At the moment I was the center of the class but I knew that soon others would want to join in as well. Soon I would not just be among the top girls of the school but I would indisputably be number one.
This was what occupied my mind as I left school and headed towards a place I had grown to have complicated feelings towards: home. I was notorious for never having once invited a friend over such that the idea of an invitation was seen as something mythical. Imagine being the first person or people that I’ve ever invited to visit my home? It's obviously wonderful place filled with the latest fashions and cosmetics that would reflect my own brilliant nature after all. The social boost they received would be immeasurable.
In truth home for me was a cruddy old apartment building where I had spent all of my life. It was a place my mother had long abandoned and where my father rarely was at as he worked very hard to earn money to spend on booze, pachinko parlors and hostesses. In a sense it was a shameful place that I could never allow another person to see lest it ruin my reputation. I would go from school idol to garbage idol. I would become impertinent trash not knowing her place.
Yet it was also a place where I had no need to put on airs and where ambition meant nothing. In that sense this old apartment with leaks and stained walls was a comfort.
But I could only stand to be in this place for so long and so tonight, like every night, I went for a jog through the neighborhood. It was during this jog that I encountered someone. He stopped me and grabbed me harshly by the wrist. He claimed I had caused Satomura’s death with the same callousness I’d shown to him and others boys.
“Is that it? You’re some boy upset about being rejected?”
I did my best to not betray any of the fear I actually felt. I wouldn’t allow myself to appear weak and vulnerable. That was until I looked at his hand and saw an object, the light from the street lights glinting and reflecting on its surface. For the first time since I’d entered high school the mask of someone who’s always in control and unflappable began to slip off. I tried to back up, I tried to shove him off. I tried to yell but a hand clamped over my mouth and then I felt a sharp pain in my side.
On instinct I touched where I had felt the pain and when I pulled my hand away saw it covered in blood. Again I wanted to scream or yell but instead all I could do was cry out as I was shoved onto the concrete. The boy’s weight was soon on top of me, his hand once more on my mouth as I felt more pain in my stomach and in my chest. Stabbing and stabbing, over and over. By that point he removed his hand as screaming had become impossible.
“You’ll never be allowed to toy with anyone again. You’ll never be able to harm anyone again.”
He said those words with an eerie calm and a satisfied expression. Then he plunged the knife at me one more time as the world went black.
Nowhere
I found myself in darkness, I felt weightless as I seemed to be floating in a dark void. Was this what awaited people after death I wondered? As if on cue a voice that was both calm and commanding spoke to me.
“Inuzuka Momoka,” it boomed, “it appears you’ve met with a most unfortunate end but fear not as you will be given another chance.”
“Are you God? What do you mean by another chance?”
“I am Dyeus, the deity that oversees a world that is quite different from your own. A world that is currently experiencing grave danger. You have been chosen to help protect this world in light of events in your own life and a connection you share with this world’s Hero.”
With this world’s Hero? What kind of connection did I share with the Hero of some other world? But I didn’t have any chance to ask anything else as this was apparently a deity who was direct and to the point. As such I felt consciousness leave me once more only the enveloping darkness was replaced with a blinding white light.
Grünhagen Palace, Margravate of Ascaria
When I finally regained my senses I was in a room that was well furnished. It was a far cry from my own room as sunlight poured in through a through a large window.
I was laying in a large canopy bed that was softer and more comfortable than anything I’d ever slept in before and as I sat up I could see ornate furniture, wallpaper with elaborate designs and a fireplace on one wall. I gasped in surprise as this was positively palatial, far lovelier and more inviting than the run down apartment I’d seen every day of my life.
“Lady Mercia, you’re awake!?” came the surprised exclamation of what looked to be a middle-aged maid of some sort. “I must tell him!” she muttered as she dashed from the room.
As I pushed myself off of the bed I could see that my arms were much bigger than I had ever known. Hanging on the wall on either side of the fireplace were two large mirrors and when I caught sight of myself in one I was shocked. The person who looked back at me was completely unfamiliar. First she was no girl but a young woman. She was tall and well-muscled and her hair was a brilliant copper color, shorter than mine and wild. She looked like the type of person who was more used to the rough and tumble world of combat than the fancy rooms like this. In a way she looked a bit ridiculous in the long chemise she wore.
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Lady Mercia... was that her name? But why was I seeing her? Why was she mirroring my own actions?
“Lady Mercia von Hundsberg,” thundered the voice of that deity, Dyeus, in my head. “A knight of the Kingdom of Angaria, a powerful and well respected warrior who knows no fear and few challengers.”
“Is that who I am? Why?”
“Ahriman, the ruler of the demonic realm of Mazandaran, is fighting a war of conquest against the human realm. A Hero was summoned to fight against him and Mercia was one of his companions. However in a battle against forces led by Ahriman’s son Sepid she was gravely injured and fell into a deep slumber. You were brought to this world due to your own connection with the Hero and reincarnated into Mercia herself.”
“So I’m supposed to fight a war when I know nothing about this war, this world or combat? I care nothing about any of this nor do I want to be this... gorilla woman.”
A harsh statement to be sure and I could of course see that this woman – Mercia – was not at all unattractive. But I had worked hard to achieve what seemed to be an ideal image of feminine beauty so to end up in a body like this was, in a word, undesirable to me. And all of this just to fight? To risk my own life for a world and a kingdom that was completely alien me? To help a so-called Hero that I seemingly was connected to and yet did not actually know? Nothing about that appealed to me. If I were to live again then of course I would want to be back in my own world.
“Rest assured that although much weakened, Mercia yet lives inside of you. Work with her and you shall be the great warrior that she herself and shall, in time, shall be as familiar with this world as she.”
“Why should I accept this? You dragged me into something that doesn’t concern me. Why not just fake injury and sit this out? This Lady Mercia seems to be some sort of nobility and if this room is any indication lives in luxury. Why would I want to potentially throw my life away to help this Hero anyway?”
“I know your nature, Inuzuka Momoka. What if I told you that the king of Angaria was childless? That he had selected the hero as his heir should he be successful in turning the tide of the war? How, then, would you feel? What would you think”
How would I feel? What would I think?
“I’d think that you’ve suddenly made this much more enticing, Deity.”
I looked again at the body I was inhabiting and now saw it in a much more appealing light. Even with the muscular nature or the, ugh, scar that ran along the left cheek I could now longer hate it. Not when it offered me such ample opportunity. It was then that I felt something in my head, a voice though one that was different from the deity’s. A voice that was, at the same time, not a voice at all but more of a feeling that I couldn’t quite place. It was both stern and compassionate, strong and gentle.
It was Mercia. It had to be, I realized. I could feel her consciousness though like Dyeus had said it was indeed quite weak; more like a gentle breeze than a strong gale yet I felt as if she was still pushing me in whatever direction it was I needed to go.
“Mercia!” The shouting of a loud voice grabbed my attention as the door to this room opened. “You really are up!”
I looked in the voice’s direction and was surprised by what I saw. A teenage boy dressed like the hero of some kind of fantasy video game was standing just inside the room with a look of happy surprise on his face. He wasn’t particularly tall nor did he look in any tough. He was rather plain and, to be honest, completely unremarkable. The type of person who you see and then instantly forget the second you turn away.
Which is, ironically, exactly why I remembered him.
“Yuta?”
“I’m so relieved!” he beamed. “After what happened in that battle I really worried that you were a goner so seeing you out of bed and looking healthy...”
My lips formed into a smile. I was taller than him and so leaned down. I wrapped my arms around him and embraced him and had to try not to squeeze the life out of him with my new strength.
“Yes, I’m relieved to see you too.”
My voice, though now of a lower pitch, still managed to evoke the same soft gentleness that I always tried to project when speaking with others. A manner of speaking that I knew tended to put others at ease and made them comfortable. An easy way to get others to trust you. Which is why I was surprised when Satomura began squirming. I eventually released him and stepped back in astonishment.
“What’s wrong? I’m happy to see you but,” I paused for effect, “are you not happy to see me?”
“It’s not that Mercia. It’s just, well, I guess you must have been really scared of never waking up again because I’ve never seen you act that affectionate.”
I stared at him for brief moment. So it appeared that this woman was more reserved and less inclined to displays of overt emotion. I guess that’s not surprising for someone who is a strong warrior likely focused more on fighting prowess or duty than anything else. That mental breeze as well seemed to be nudging me in that direction and so I instead affected a more stoic air.
“Yes,” I stated bluntly, “I suppose you’re right. I was overcome by emotion but I shall compose myself so as not to allow it to happen again. After all it would ill fit my duty as a knight and your guardian.”
That, from the bits of Mercia I could pick up, seemed to be what she’d say in a situation like this. To my surprise however Satomura simply laughed.
“I didn’t say I hated it. Honestly I think that it’s probably hard to stay cool like that all the time so I’d like it if you warmed up a bit a bit and loosened up, right Beatrice?”
“Oh! Y-Yes, of course!”
It was then that I noticed the person that was with Satomura. A girl who looked to be about as old as I’d been back in my world wearing robes that seemed to signify her as a member of some kind of religious order. Her hair was long and blonde, her eyes a sparkling blue and her face young and innocent. She looked like the kind of naive girl who, back at school, would have tried futilely to get along with everyone. The type of girl who was, in fact, quite easy to lead around.
Seeing as how she clung close to Satomura that was probably the case. Surely no one but the most wide-eyed Pollyanna could care for anyone like him. Because make no mistake, from what I could see he looked nothing at all like any sort of Hero but rather the same otaku loser I’d seen every day at school.
Not that I said anything like that of course. Instead I tempered myself, gave only a tiny smile and nodded.
“Then I will do that even though it may feel odd to me at first. I am so used to putting duty first after all.”
Satomura did nothing but give me a big dumb grin. As if I needed or wanted his approval. “So if you’re up how are you feeling?” he asked.
“Fine, I suppose. I certainly feel strong.”
“Think you’re up for heading out in the next few hours? We were going to head out to Fadarsheim since there’s been an increase of monsters and suspicious characters in the area that we’re worried might be related to the Mazandarani.”
“Yuta, are you sure?” asked Beatrice as she cast a glance in my direction. “She’s only just now awoken and you already want her to start fighting?”
“I’m fine,” I responded. “It’s my duty after all.”
“See, don’t worry about it! It’d take more than some scratches to keep her down for good!”
I placed a hand up to the scar on my cheek as Satomura said he’d see me later before he and the girl, Beatrice, left.
Once they were gone I sighed deeply and flopped down on the bed. This was not what I wanted at all, to be thrust into some world, made to fight against whatever an Ahriman or Mazandaran was. Worst of all, I was now forced to be a “companion” of a great Hero that turned out to be the same worthless loser who I had flatly rejected a week earlier. It was like some sort of great big cosmic joke was being played on me.
But I thought too of what Dyeus had said to me and I realized that opportunity was practically gifted to me. So I laid back and closed me eyes. I felt the Mercian breeze once more and allowed it to envelop me. Things came to me more in flashes than anything else but it was enough that I was able to begin to piece things together.
Mercia von Hundsberg was an adopted daughter of the von Hundsberg family, rulers of the Margravate of Ascaria. The House of Hundsberg had loyally served the rulers of the Kingdom of Angaria, one of the largest entities on the continent, for centuries as military rulers of the border territory of Ascaria. Mercia herself would continue this tradition joining the knightly order and distinguishing herself for her strength and brave loyalty, more than once showing willingness to lay down her life if need be in service to Angaria.
When Ahriman, ruler of Mazandaran, decided to expand his rule into the realm of humans she was on the front lines fighting his forces before the Hero showed up and she was assigned as his companion.
Of course as I could see she was not his only companion. That girl, Beatrice, from what the breeze carried was part of a religious order called the Sisters of the Merciful Light who practiced in easing pain and suffering through the use of healing magic. As the story went, her convent had been raided by opportunistic bandits and she was captured before Satomura appeared to drive off them off. As such she’s loyally stayed by his side ever since.
It seemed that he had other companions as well that I would soon be meeting, women all of them for some reason.
In truth all of this was beyond irritating.
What could Satomura have actually done to be called to this world to act as its Hero? What was special about him that he needed to be drawn here after his death? Someone so utterly forgettable, someone who never stood out. He spent his days doing nothing but indulging himself in his dumb hobbies before uselessly dying and this is his reward? The adoration, praises and hopes of others?
For someone like me who had fought, clawed and outmaneuvered everyone else in my path to the top, that Satomura could just be handed all of this for the mere act of dying... well to be honest it pissed me off. But I calmed myself down once more as a maid’s voice awoke me from my reverie and pulled me away from the breeze. It seemed she was there to relay a message from Satomura that were all meeting in front of the palace to head out.
Once more I pushed myself off of this large and comfortable bed as the maid let in a further group of servants carrying what appeared to be clothing and armor. I could feel Mercia with me and so with only minor difficulty I was able to put on the armor, a light thing with an elaborate hound design on the breastplate. I was then handed a large sword in a sheath that I, from what I could tell, was meant to wear on my back.
So here I was having gone from a school idol worried about how I could raise my social status to now a warrior about to set off to battle monsters or demons or whatever with a gross otaku loser like Satomura and his seeming harem of girls.
While I headed out to meet them all in front of the palace I couldn’t help but to smile. Somehow Satomura had managed to earn himself the position of heir apparent to an entire kingdom. Obviously he was doing much better for himself than he had been back in our world. He seemed to care for Mercia quite a bit as well judging by his reaction.
As a future king he would, of course, need a future queen. Those other girls, my “companions”? In reality I viewed them as nothing more than rivals. I had no idea if I would be able to get back home so while I was here I suppose I would do what I needed to in order to secure my own position. Because I now had ambitions of my own and to realize them I would need to win Satomura’s heart.
[END CHAPTER 1]