"Ooh. I think I need to stand up… so I can lay down again," murmurs a young boy, barely five years old, his contemplations taking an abrupt turn as he stands facing an unfurled scroll.
Its contents are the cause of his distress, accompanied by a wooden slab and a charcoal stick on the side –a means to transcribe.
To anyone else, the wooden slab displays indecipherable scribbles and odd shapes –just weird and unstructured enough to be mistaken for a child’s antics. Yet, to the boy named Kenki, they hold great significance.
Arithmetic.
He muses over the astounding revelations within the scroll. If the claims inside hold the truth, then the empire he resides in spans dozens of light years across. The sheer enormity of this world is enough to boggle one’s mind.
“Religious texts might not be the most reliable source of information, but with what everyone’s been telling me since birth, it just might be true," Kenki mutters, pressing a closed fist against his chin and pondering this new and inconceivable reality he finds himself in.
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‘The Earth in its entirety would have been considered a tiny and pathetically weak backwater nation here. Conquered and dominated in what would probably be the span of a week. No, that's not even the most concerning piece of information in this scroll. Where is it?’ The boy combs through the scroll once more, seeking a specific passage.
'Ah, here it is. '...an intricate piece inscription or technology may function one day, but not the next due to the whimsical nature of the heavens. The governing principles of entire domains will fluctuate and transform like the wills of mortals…''
'What is this even supposed to mean!? Are you seriously telling me that the fundamental forces of the very world I’m standing on can change as time goes on? Gravity is obviously nonexistent, one simply needs to look at the empire's vast size to find out why, but what about electro-magnetism, or weak and strong interaction? How do I even exist without those forces?'
'Jesus Christ… I mean, I guess I'm supposed to say 'Dear Emperor’ now,' a sigh escapes the boy's lips.
‘I guess that this puts the ‘Higher Being’ theory to rest. With the vastness of this world my 'different way of thinking' has no meaning. I am no prodigy, I was given no cheat-like abilities. I have nothing.’ Kenki scratches the back of his head.
‘Unless I was sent here solely for the purpose of entertainment. To see what I would do, watch out my antics like an animal inside a zoo. But why do that? Why jump through hoops when you can find someone interesting just by roaming the lands, this world has an unending landmass, does it not? Whatever… at the end of the day, I’m no closer to finding out why I was reborn.’
The boy stands up, the old floorboards creaking under his feet. He dusts off his clothes and proceeds to carefully roll the scroll back up, placing it back where he found it. The disappointment etched on Kenki’s face is painfully obvious for all to see.
A stretch makes some of the bones in his body pop. It seems that he’s spent quite the length of time seated and unmoving.
“So…”
“…What do I do now?”