As the sunlight entered the room I groggily attempted to open my eyes. Still blurry from my sleep it seems it would take a moment for my vision to become clear. Attempting to bring my hands to my eyes my body felt like it was in a critical state of disorientation. To the point where moving my limbs as intended was seeming to be quite the challenge. Not only that, but my thoughts were a complete and utter mess.

What exactly had I done last night to end up like this?

Attempting to recall the previous day, I could fully remember everything that happened up until around half way through my study session. Nonetheless, I don’t recall anything that would have led to my current state of immobility. With enough blinking my eyes finally cleared to reveal a slanted wooden ceiling.

Eh? Wasn’t the ceiling of my apartment made of drywall?

Coming to this rather shocking revelation my eyes immediately attempted to scan the room. The surrounding walls were made of wood, with candlesticks attached to the bottom and left wall. Directly beside the candlestick on the bottom wall was a closed door and pushed up against the left wall was what appeared to be a dresser. Yet, what drew my attention the most was a window embedded into the right wall. More specifically, what was outside of it. A small courtyard containing a large tree in the center surrounded by several patches of vividly blooming flowers.  

At this point, I started to panic. This room clearly was not my apartment and it was unmistakably spring or early summer outside. Being unable to move my body as I desired only added to my panic.

“whaaaaaa!” (Glen)

My scream resulted in a shrill voice; completely unlike the voice I had expected to hear. I immediately stopped in wonder of why it was so different and the sound was replaced with hurried steps from outside the door. With a slight squeak the door opened revealing a woman in a light blue dress. If I had to guess she would be in her late 20’s or early 30’s, although if makeup was applied she could easily be older. Defining features would her mid back length strawberry blond hair and clear blue eyes. If you were to ask any random man they would all easily agree that she was beautiful. Anyhow, let’s leave that for another time as upon seeing my face her eyes began to tear up as she muttered something under her breath. Great, the first thing I do after waking up is cause an unknown woman to cry. I couldn’t help but feel guilty.

“*******.” (Woman)

Saying something in a shaking voice the woman moved towards me and tightly embraced me.

What language was that in?

English, German, French, Spanish, Japanese, Chinese. It had similar sounds to all of them yet I couldn’t place it into any specific one. Although I am only truly fluent in English I should have been able to at least recognize it if it was any other major language. Perhaps it’s a little know language from some small foreign country. Although that raises the question as to why it is being used now.

Noticing my lack of response and seemingly rejecting behavior to her hug she pulled back and looked me directly in the eyes before speaking again.

 “********?”

To that I gave a slight groan and moved my hand to rub my head.

How exactly am I supposed to respond to this? Should I start by asking her if she could speak English? Would she even understand what I was asking in the first place?

As I continued to rub my head and wonder exactly what I should say she appeared to come to a conclusion herself and after a few more words left the room without giving me a chance to speak. With the sound of the door closing I gave a small sigh as I moved my hand off of my head. At this point, I stopped for a moment and looked at my hand. Something had been bothering me about it ever since I reached for my head; it was far smaller and smoother than it should have been, very similar to a child’s. No way . . . That’s impossible. I quickly shifted my head to look at the rest of my body as to ascertain my fear. Surely enough, my body was that of a 10 or 11 year old child.

This has to be a dream, there is no other possibility.

Like this, I lied to myself. Indeed, the easiest solution to come up with was to just assume this wasn’t real. Just give it a few moments and I would wake up and be berating myself as a fool for ever thinking otherwise. As quickly as it came to me I dismissed that line of thinking. Even if the possibility of it being a dream was 99% it would be useless to continue with that line of thought. If it is a dream I will eventually wake up and just laugh it off, but if it isn’t a dream then it is crucially important that I come to understand my situation.

What other solution are there to this problem?

Four possible scenarios came to my head. The first is that I’m hallucinating in a hospital room after some type of accident. This would explain why I’m having such a hard time moving my body, but is essentially the same as the dream idea, so let’s dismiss it for now. Second, my brain was somehow transplanted into that of a child. That would explain the body, but was there really technology capable of that? Furthermore, can an adult’s brain really fit into that of a child? Why does there appear to be a lack of electivity here and why was that woman speaking in an unrecognizable language? There are too many unanswered questions for me to take that idea seriously. The third and fourth options came right out of fantasy novels I had read in high school.  That being, third, I somehow slipped back in time to when I was a child. But I have no recollection of ever being in this place so that is rather unlikely. Finally forth, that I was reincarnated into the body of this child; perhaps in a different world. However, this is assuming that reincarnation is something that can happen in the first place and that you keep your memories when it happens. Overall, I didn’t have enough information to make the call.

Regardless, wrapping my mind around these possible scenarios it seems like I will need to be cautious about what actions I take from here on. For example, that woman who entered the room earlier seemed to have some sort of relationship with this child. It’s imperative that I keep the fact that I’m a different person a secret until I at least know if this kind of thing is normal around here. The last thing I want is to be accused of being a witch and burned at the stake.

But how do I keep my identity a secret when I can’t speak the language?

This is the elephant in the room when it comes to what my actions should be in the future. If I try to communicate in a language that this child doesn’t know it would be a dead giveaway to the current predicament. By that logic it would seem that my only option is to be the silent protagonist, even if that is also incredibly suspicious. Resigning myself to this fate I can only despair at the need to learn a foreign language from scratch.

As if in perfect timing with my decision several different footsteps can be heard from outside the door moving towards the room. With the same squeak as last time the door opens and the woman from before walks into the room. Following her a young girl and two men entered the room. The girl appeared to be 12 to 13 years old and had near identical features to the woman including wearing a similar dress. From this I induced that she was most likely the woman’s daughter. As for the men that entered the room, the first was clean shaven with dark brown hair and eyes. If I had to guess his age it would be slightly older than the woman. The second man was a gray haired man donning a pristine white church robe highlighted by gold trimming. He was well over the hill in terms of age.

After some unintelligible conversation the old man moved in front of me and spoke while looking in my eyes. Playing the silent protagonist I simply looked back at him although it seems that my facial expressions gave away that I didn’t understand what he had said. Seeing this the man reached into a small bag he had brought with him and took out a small leather-bound book. Opening it and flipping to a specific page he stopped for a moment before pulling the page out of the book. On the page were intricately drawn circles and stars with strange symbols place both around and in the circles. It was something you’d expect to see on charms and the likes. Taking the page the old man pressed it into the center of my forehead and began a strange chant.

. . . What exactly is this old man trying to do to me? Is he an exorcist or something? Does he think I’m some type of demon possessing this child?

Well, maybe he isn’t wrong. Regardless, it was shockingly hard to maintain a straight face as he continued his chant. It was just so surreal to see someone committing an act that only ever happens in fiction.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

After around two minutes of having this paper pressed to my face something finally started to happen. The paper started to glow. How? I have no idea, but it was enough to make my jaw drop.

As the light started to dim a strange sensation came over me. The body that felt restrictive and difficult to move in began to feel more natural. Not only that, but knowledge of symbols and sounds began to match themselves with letters and words in my mind. It was the feeling of finally recalling something that you had been trying to remember.

“Sophos, how do you feel now?” (Old man)

As the old man spoke the meaning of his words came to me as if it was my native language and I felt as if I would be able to easily reply. Sophos . . . Was that the name of this child? More importantly, how can I understand this language? Did that glowing charm do that to me? Although it doesn’t make any logical sense it is the only possibility that came to my mind. But alas, a response was required at this point. Goodbye silent protagonist! I never wanted to be you anyways.

“Uhh, much better than I did before.” (Sophos)

Yes! The words came out rather smoothly. It seems that thanks to whatever he did I would have no problems speaking in the future.

“Good, good. Now do you remember what happened to you prior to waking up here?” (Old man)

Might as well answer honestly here, it’s not like I really have any other choice.

“No, I don’t” (Sophos)

At this the only man frowned before asking another question.

“How about the people behind me, do you recognize them?” (Old Man)

Now this was a hard one. It was clear to me from their actions that they were in some way associated with this child, but if I got the relationship wrong then it would only lead to more questions that could reveal my true identity. As such I guess I should pretend to have amnesia and be as vague as possible in my statements. It’s not like it’s a complete lie since I truly don’t remember anything about this child’s life.

“. . . They seem familiar, but every time I try to think of their names my mind goes blank.”(Sophos)

At this the woman in the back started to become visibly distressed and the man moved to comfort her. Furthermore, the frown on the old man’s face became even deeper as he nodded in understanding before turning to the people standing behind him.

“I see. It seems that although my divine healing spell did heal the damaged parts of his brain the memories still remain lost. It’s uncommon, but not unprecedented for a situation like this to occur and I fear that only the divine magic of an archbishop or our holy leader himself could produce a better result. However, considering the state he was originally found in it is surely a blessing of the goddess that he survived and has recovered to the point where he can make conversation.” (Old man)

Wait, spell? Magic? If it was the me of yesterday I’d laugh him out of the room calling him a senile old man, but the proof was right in front of me. That paper and chanting certainly produced some type of phenomena that fixed my compatibility with this body and allowed me to speak a foreign language like it was nothing. That wasn’t something that I could deny. Hell, a part of me is wishing for it to be true; after all, hasn’t everyone who has ever read a fantasy novel desired to have the ability to use magic? It’s pretty much the dream of all humans on Earth. If it does exist here I will endeavor to follow that path regardless of the hardships.

As my eyes sparkled at the revelation that magic might exist the old man packed his book back into his bag and began to head towards the door. He was stopped at the door by the other man who proceeded to hand him a small pouch that I assumed contained a payment for the treatment. The old man smiled.

“The church appreciates your donation towards our beloved goddess. She will surely continue to grant you her blessings in the future.” (Old man)

With that, he left the room and the sound of his footsteps faded leaving the room in an awkward silence. A conversation had to happen here but I was at a complete loss of what to say. Finally, after a few moments the silence was broken by the man.

“So, I just want to double check, you can not recall who we are, correct?” (Man)

“Unfortunately, that would seem to be the case.” (Sophos)

“Well, I guess introductions are in order then. I am your father, Lark. To my right is your mother, Mia, and this your sister, Carmella.” (Lark)

After that the conversation went into specifics about both my new family and myself. I confirmed that my name was Sophos, as I had predicted from the earlier conversation, and that I was currently 10 years old with my birthday coming up in 2 months. My new father, Lark, was a traveling merchant in his youth. Once he met my new mother, Mia, the two began traveling together until the point where she became pregnant with my sister, Carmella. At that point they decided to settle down in the small town of Arcton and open a general store, the result of which is the building I’m currently in. I was born two years after Carmella making her 12 years old now. The town’s population is around one thousand mostly consisting of farmers, hunters, and adventurers. In this case, adventurers seem to be an existence right out of fantasy novels. There is also a local blacksmith, tailor, woodworker, inn and church.

Eventually I brought up the question as to what exactly happened to put me in this state. After some prodding to get rid of their hesitation I was finally told the story. Supposedly it happened 3 days ago while I was out playing with the local kids. For whatever reason we had decided to go and play on the bridge that crosses the river on the outskirts of town. According to the testimony of the other kids I had decided to attempt to walk on the railing of the bridge which resulted in me falling off of it head first into the river. The other kids quickly realized that something had gone terribly wrong and called out to the closest adult they could find. Luckily it was a traveling adventurer who was just heading into town. He quickly discarded anything heavy he had on him and jumped into the river after me, eventually dragging out my corpse of a body. Surprisingly, that isn’t an exaggeration. My body didn’t even have a pulse at that point and the adventurer had quickly given up hope of me living. However, after several minutes of essentially being dead for some reason my heart started up again and I coughed out the water that was in my lungs. This is why the priest that came here earlier had said it was a blessing of the goddess that I was still alive. After that I was brought back to my parents’ house in which I had been in a coma until I woke up today.

After that story everyone went quiet and I could only lament on how stupid this kid was. As I was about the change topics a rumble was emitted from my stomach signaling that I was hungry. It makes sense considering that I hadn’t properly eaten in 3 days. Hearing that everyone had a slight chuckle and Mia said that she would go and make some soup. Carmella followed quickly behind her as she left the room leaving only me and Lark. After a further half an hour of talking I was starting to have reasonable idea about how the town was structured and who I used to be.

Around that time Mia entered the room carrying a bowl of soup. After allowing it to cool I slowly started to eat it spoonful after spoonful. It wasn’t anything that I could call delicious, but at the same time it certainly wasn’t bad.

Finishing the soup I was told that I should get some rest and I eagerly agreed. My body was still clearly weak from the accident and after these few hectic hours I was incredibly tired. With my new parents leaving the room I laid back on the bed and slowly closed my eyes. Thus ended my first day as the boy named Sophos.

Authors Notes: Hello everyone, and thank you for reading the first real chapter of OWP. Wow that was a long chapter! I originally only expected it to be around 1.3k words but it suddenly jumped to over 3k. Anyways, as you can probably tell I have issues when coming up with good names for characters. I suck at it! So if anyone has suggestions for names, please comment them, it would help me out a lot considering that there are many more characters to come. Once again, thank you for reading, and I look forward to seeing you again next chapter.

-Yin