I am Hyoudo Ryou, a freshman at high school and a member of the Kendo Club, but right now, I am in a different world with the whole student body of our school. One of them was Endou Kouta, my senpai at school. He might’ve forgotten this, but he saved me before when I was little.

It was when I was a kid, inside the orphanage where I grew up. I never saw nor knew my parents so I had no attachments to this world.

I was raised in this orphanage by the good and kind-natured caretakers. The women love gossiping, while the men like playing with the children. It was a good place for children with no place to call home go.

It was on a sunny day, a new child was welcomed in the orphanage. Her name was Endou Kayaka. According to her story, her parents died in a traffic accident and her brother, who was given serious injuries, was still recovering in the hospital, and won’t be released until another few months.

The newly added orphan brought smiles to the orphanage, the other orphans, the caretakers, and even me. It was until a month passed when I realized my feelings for her. You might say, “It’s just love of children. They’ll forget it when they grow older.” But I didn’t.

Day by day, my feelings grew stronger and I tried to get close to her. One day, I saw her crying in a secluded place after following her. I didn’t realize earlier that all her smiles and laughs were just a façade to hide her true feelings.

Come to think of it, I always noticed that Kayaka kept on going to the hospital everyday when she has free time, to visit her brother maybe? When she comes back, she looks happy, but on the inside, she must be breaking.

I thought to myself to do something for her so I tried to practice kendo. Why kendo you ask? It is for protection, and even at my age, I can still train my body using the proper exercise for a little child’s body. It’s just like how some little children can climb trees given their lack of strength.

Nowadays, there were some reports about criminals on the loose, rapists, serial killers, drug addicts, etc., who had no discrimination whether their victim was an under-aged child or an elderly person.

I asked one of the men who takes care of us in the orphanage. His name was Kitamura Ken. During his high school days, he was renowned as the champion of kendo through the region. What better instructor to have than a champion?

Luckily, he immediately agreed to accept teaching me kendo.

Thus, time passed peacefully in the orphanage. The next few months, Kayaka was smiling brilliantly. Her smile this time does not seem t be a façade, instead, it looks to be a genuine one. When I asked her, she said that it was time for her brother to be released from the hospital and admitted to this orphanage.

Looks like we will be seeing a new face here, is what I thought. After a few hours, a boy with pure black hair and black eyes that seems to suck you in appeared at the front gate. Kayaka happily rushed towards him and embraced him tightly.

The caretakers immediately welcomed him and he introduced himself. His name was Endou Kouta, two years older than me. He spoke in a very polite and formal way, not what you would expect from a child.

This time, the atmosphere around Kayaka changed. She was now happily spending her time inside the orphanage with her brother and the other orphans. No more fake smiles, fake laughter, nor fake happiness, just pure love and joy for her brother.

Like this, a week passed and a tragedy happened. During the time when someone has agreed to adopt me to the Hyoudo household, a fire broke out. Screams and cries of help echoed through the burning building. The people, who were going to adopt me, were outside because of something, and that was the time when the fire broke out.

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I was inside the burning orphanage, crawling on all fours in hopes to find an exit, just to find myself surrounded by flames. I thought to myself that I was going to die at that moment, before an unexpected person saved me. He had black hair and black eyes, and was holding a fire extinguisher in his hands.

“Quickly! Get out of there!”

He—Kouta called out to me to get out of the burning room. I quickly ran towards him and followed him while he cleared a path to the exit using the fire extinguisher. According to him, I am the last one inside the building, and because the caretakers were too occupied with saving the other orphans, Kouta came to help me instead.

At that moment, I realized why Kayaka always had a happy expression when she was beside her brother. To her, he must be a reliable existence, a pillar of support, a guardian, and her family.

Now that I had realized that, I swore to myself to pay back this life he saved with my hard work and effort. I wanted to pay him back by helping him in school, or when he got a job, or when he has encountered a difficult problem.

But something unexpected happened, the summoning of the God. We were to be summoned to a world of swords and magic and fight the demon lord. I thought to myself that in this world, I can definitely repay him. During the summons, we were given skills that relies on our skills and talents. Since I learned kendo, I had a skill related to it called [Swordsmanship].

But something unexpected happened. When the princess called out to us one by one to have our status recorded, when Kouta’s status menu was displayed, it only showed the skill given to us by the God called [Language Comprehension].

I stared blankly at it, not actually believing it, but when it was proven because I was the next to have his status recorded, the princess had a face of complete disappointment.

When the princess finished with the status inspection, I headed towards Kouta. I asked him if I can help him train during our time here in hopes of him obtaining a skill. He agreed to it, but the sad part was he, not Kayaka remembered me. Of course, I can understand because it was a long time ago.

We spent our time there practicing and training for the upcoming fight with the demon lord. The knights, royals, and some students made him a target of bullying, thus I had to shut them up. Because when I practiced here in this world, in a month, I raised my [Swordsmanship] skill level from 6 to 9, nobody could refute me, since I was considered as one of the tops of the heroes.

Just like that, half a year passed and we are on our way to a dungeon city named Fault. We were going to train in that city for a year before moving on to the next one.

During a subjugation of a monster named [Golem Chimera], another tragedy occurred. A demon claiming itself to be a Demon General appeared and tried to assault us, luckily, we had our warp stoned so we could easily teleport out of there, except for one person, the man who was regarded as weak and incompetent by the royals, Endou Kouta.

I and Kayaka tried to rush back in to save him, but were stopped by some of the students and the knights. I bit my lip as frustration and regret flowed through my body. During our way back, I heard some knights talking about how the warp stone they had given to Kouta was a fake, and it was ordered by the king to dispose of him this way.

When we returned to the inn, I sat down in a corner, asked for a mug of beer and drank. I say to hell with underage limit. I’m super pissed off right now.

While drinking, I saw Kayaka went upstairs. I’m guessing that she went inside the room to regret the fact that she left her brother in the dungeon alone. For a few days, she never really came out.

A week passed and an attack was made on the dungeon town. Monsters flooded out of the dungeon, monsters from the plains and forests nearby came and assaulted the town, leaving countless of dead corpses here and there.

I and the heroes quickly left the town and hurried back to the royal capital, just to be ambushed by someone and teleported into a cave.

There, we saw a man fighting a giant beetle, he had black hair and black eyes. He was Endou Kouta. My heart danced in joy for a moment before coming back to reality a few moments later.

Me, Kayaka, Kouta, and somehow Tanura worked together to bring the giant beetle down, but life isn’t so kind to give a happy ending. Kouta was killed and Kayaka killed it in a blind fury.

The three of us, a furball, and a child who I don’t know grieved his death and carried it back to the surface with trudging steps.

I didn’t know how much time it took, but what I do know, is that I can never repay my debt back to him. Kayaka had a sullen mood, and looks like she might break at anytime.

But what I didn’t know, was that something that will bind our fates together in the future will happen because of Kouta’s death.