Chapter 54
—“Finally, tomorrow is the Holy Knight exam, right? Onii-chan.”
“Reina has already gotten used to calling me Onii-chan. huh.”
Kenya and Reina eating dinner together.
They’re used to it by now, they’ve spent nearly half a year together.
“Reina?”
“Yes.”
“Thanks.”
When they eat, they take what they want without saying anything.
Reina knows what Kenya wants and what to put on this ingredient.
It’s like we’re a couple, Kenya thought, but other than these things, nothing mufufu has ever happened in this live-in relationship.
“Phew, it was delicious. Thank you for the food.”
“Onii-chan eats so clean, so it’s worth making.”
Reina clears away the plates.
Seeing this, Kenya suddenly expressed his thoughts.
“Hey, Reina. Don’t you remember anything from the past at all?”
Kenya asked Reina.
She’s been doing better lately and smiling more.
Perhaps her memories are coming back.
“In fragments. But they don’t mesh. Trying to remember properly is… still scary.”
“Sorry! You don’t have to force it!”
When I ask Reina, she says she is afraid to try to remember.
Kenya, who doesn’t know anything about the past, doesn’t know anything, but it’s not good to try to force herself to remember.
He regrets having asked her without any idea.
“But I also know that I can’t keep running away. It’s my problem and…”
“I think it’s okay to take your time.”
Then Reina looks down and fearfully asks Kenya while turning only her eyes towards him.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you for a while now… Onii-chan, no, Kenya-kun, why are you being so nice to me?”
“Eh?”
“I don’t understand. The reason for the kindness I feel from Kenya-kun is… because I turned my sword on you… and I am an Asgard Empire who you, a Japanese, should hate. And yet.”
Reina’s doubts.
Since the day they first met, Kenya has been persistently involved with Reina.
There were many such men, to be honest.
Men who only talk, but not him, as I recall, when we first met on the battlefield.
That day I pointed my sword at him.
I turned hostile, I intended to kill him, and yet he did everything he could to prevent me from getting hurt.
Even though he was fighting for his life against the Asgard army, trying to protect Kaguya and others.
And yet.
“Why are you trying to help me?”
Why do they care so much about me?
“Reina…”
Kenya is reminded of those words.
(No, no, Reina. It was you who saved me… you were the one who saved me, when I was alone.)
What I remember is what happened in the world before.
I was bullied in secondary school.
When it was discovered that my parents were not at home and I was living on my own, the poor junior high school student, abandoned by my parents, was bullied.
Once targeted, it escalated, and there was no one to protect them.
If he changed home, he would be alone.
Gradually, going to school became painful.
Waking up in the morning became painful.
Every day I wondered what would happen if I died.
If I died, would those who bullied me regret it, or would they feel a little pain?
That was all I could think about.
The only way he could think of to rebel was to give his own life.
One day, on his way home.
He saw KOG in a commercial on a giant monitor and instantly fell in love with that world.
He felt like he could go somewhere different from here, and that even he could be free.
He found the robot to be truly romantic.
That’s why he scraped together his parents’ child-support money and bought a complete set of KOGs.
On the day I got it all together, I plunged into that world at once.
And there.
(I met you for the first time. It was love at first sight.)
Equal to everyone, straight to everyone.
The only thing she has on her mind is KOG.
She never cares about being without parents, are you strong, KOG? That’s all she looked at you.
It is only virtual.
It’s not like I can answer her questions.
But as I got better, the way she looked at me changed.
She was surprised at my growth, pleased with my growth, and she looked me straight in the eye.
That made me more happy than anything else.
I didn’t have anyone to look at me, because my parents didn’t love me and I didn’t have any friends.
But only you, only you and Kaguya were different, and I know that that world is a virtual world.
I understand that you were created.
Even so.
But I still admired your cool and noble way of life.
In that world where no one looked at Kenya, you became my goal.
Like you, I went forward on my own path without worrying about what other people thought.
I wanted to be such a cool existence.
“I admired… you.”
“Me? Someone as good as you?”
“Huh. I was weak too, you know? I was really weak, I was a crybaby, I was all alone… I couldn’t do anything but cower.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“You supported me. It’s a selfish belief. I’ve always had you as my goal, I’ve always wanted to be recognised by you, I’ve always thought of you. I’ve continued with those days, and before I knew it, I was…”
Kenya looked straight at Reina.
His eyes are a little moist and have become sentimental.
He remembers his past self, that time when he felt that despair and thought he was the only one in the world.
And then, just by accident, Kenya slips up.
“I’ve fallen in love with you.”
He confessed.
“Eh?”
“Ah…”
Kenya and Reina’s faces turned red immediately afterwards.
Kenya became sentimental, and perhaps he was caught off guard by spending every day together, but he ended up saying to the person in question that he liked her.
“Ah, ah! I, that was a hana…shi. …No, it’s too late now. Reina, I like you. You. I can say with all my heart now that I came to this world and this feeling is real.”
There is no way I can pretend that it didn’t happen now.
Kenya, who confesses his feelings in a passionate manner, and Reina, who freezes.
“Ah! But right now I have to become a Holy Knight first, and there’s also the Imperial Sword Festival! You can forget about it for now!”
“…”
Reina looks down, depressed, and silent.
She seems to be trembling, but she manages to keep her voice down.
“Yes… that’s… right.”
Her expression is invisible to Kenya.
Reina turns her back to Kenya as she looks down.
“I’m sorry, I’m taking the day off today!”
“Oh, oh. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to embarrass you.”
“No, no!”
Reina then went back to her room.
(I did it!)
Only Kenya held his head, wiggling, and squirming in embarrassment.
“I hope she doesn’t hate me…”
◇Reina’s point of view
“Haa, haa, haa…”
She returns to her room and closes the door.
As soon as she feels her back against the door, her trembling legs, which were desperately supporting her weight, lose their strength.
I sit down on the floor and lean back.
“Eh, eh? What? This… why is this so much?”
Reina didn’t understand.
She doesn’t know what the feeling is, so she flaps her hands on that burning hot face.
Reina understands that her own face is bright red.
The girl, who still doesn’t know love, didn’t know the name of that feeling.
Still, only her body is aware and her mind starts to move.
“Oh no. I… what’s wrong with me?”
The corners of her mouth naturally turn up and she giggles.
I hear the sound of my heart.
It’s pounding and my heart beats faster.
I’m so embarrassed, I don’t know what to do.
“My chest hurts, and it’s so… hot?”
What melts the frozen girl’s heart.
Fever of a passionate straightforward boy?