Seirei Gensouki: Spirit Chronicles Volume 20, page 1
Prologue: Wish
I detest this world.
It sickens me to my stomach.
That is why I will start a crusade.
A resistance against the foolish humans running rampant.
The crusade begins soon.
I think I’ll look back on the things that happened since I wandered into this world.
What went wrong.
Who was wrong.
Whether I was wrong.
Whether I’ve lost my mind.
In order to ascertain that...
◇ ◇ ◇
I was a lecturer at an urban university when one day, I wandered into this world with my beloved fiancé.
He was an associate professor in his early thirties and an extremely capable person. However, I didn’t fall for him because he was capable. His kindness, sincerity, and dedication were what attracted me to him. I loved him from the bottom of my heart.
The two of us first arrived in this world in the middle of the mountains. We were in the university research lab one moment, then surrounded by nature the next. There was a waterfall nearby.
At first, we thought we were in the countryside of Japan. Perhaps we had been caught in a warp, teleport, or rift in space. We had just encountered such an unrealistic event, but we still believed we were on Earth.
However, we were wrong.
This wasn’t Earth—it was a different world. We realized this after spending several hours descending the mountain.
There was a human settlement at the foot of the mountain. The village showed no signs of modern civilization. All the people living there had such ragged clothes; we were shocked. But they were the first people we had met since coming here. We had to talk to them.
Judging from their faces, they clearly weren’t Japanese people. According to my fiancé, their faces resembled Russian or European people. He then tried to speak Russian, English, and German to them, but they didn’t understand him.
But for some reason, I was able to understand them. In fact, their words sounded like Japanese to me. The villagers looked puzzled at my fiancé’s Japanese, but they understood every word of my Japanese.
After that, my fiancé and I were allowed to stay in an empty house in the village. We were exhausted from descending the mountain, so we slept like the dead that day.
◇ ◇ ◇
The night after we wandered into this world, I had a dream.
Apparently, I was a hero.
Someone appeared in my dream and told me that. I was dubious at first, but when I woke up in the morning, I had the same power as that I saw in my dream. I could summon a strange staff and control earth with a kind of paranormal power.
I told my fiancé of what I’d seen in my dream. In all probability, he was only in this world because he had been with me. I had dragged my beloved into this mess. Perhaps there was no way of returning to Earth. When I realized this, I paled.
But he just smiled and said, “I’m glad it was you who brought me here. I’m glad you didn’t have to come to this world alone.”
With that, I was saved.
He saved me.
Even though I couldn’t save him...
◇ ◇ ◇
We wanted to return to Earth if we could, so we tried to search for a means of doing so.
However, I didn’t know anything other than the fact I was a hero, and that I had obtained a special power. We had no hints on how to return. If something was hidden, it would probably be at the mountain where we first arrived in this world.
My fiancé and I continued to live in the village. As payment, my fiancé gave the village chief his long winter coat.
Living in the village was the best option until we became familiar with living here.
It was the best option—or so we thought.
◇ ◇ ◇
After coming to this world, time flew by in the blink of an eye.
Was that unexpected, or was it only natural? At any rate, there was lots for us to do in the village.
The villagers were far too unintelligent. Their lack of knowledge meant that they were living in an extremely inefficient way.
We used our modern knowledge to improve the standard of living in the village. At the same time, I hid my hero powers. I couldn’t see anyone else in the village that could use a magic-like power. Only nobility and other special people could use magic. That was why I used the power of my Divine Arms to plow the fields and enrich the soil in secret.
My fiancé studied this world’s language bit by bit, and eventually became capable of simple communication with the villagers.
We could feel our work getting easier and life getting better day by day. That was a fulfilling sensation. Of course, it was still inconvenient compared to living in Japan, but...
“Home is where you make it, as the saying goes.”
My fiancé would repeat those words like a catchphrase. Every time he did, I would reply with an embarrassed “Yeah.”
What truly mattered was who you were with. To me, home was wherever he was.
I was too shy to say that to him directly, but...
I was happy.
◇ ◇ ◇
More time passed.
My staff apparently had the power to heal people. I became aware of this when my fiancé was cut doing farmwork.
I didn’t know why, but for some reason, I thought I would be able to heal him if I put the magic power into my staff. I brought the end of the staff near the wounded area and it started to glow, healing his cut.
I told the villagers that I used a medicine I had on hand, but they were shocked by how his wound had healed in a day.
After that, a rumor that I was a doctor started to circulate, and I was visited by injured and sick people. I had to pretend I was a doctor and heal them while hiding my power. I had never studied medicine, but there was no one else in the village that could be called a doctor.
Meanwhile, my fiancé worked on improving farm tools, creating fertilizer, building water wheels and waterways, and improving the hygiene standards of the village.
Before we knew it, my fiancé and I had become central figures of the village. Whenever anyone had a problem, they would come to us for advice. I even witnessed the birth of a new life.
I explained to the couple that I had no experience in midwifery, but they insisted that I be there. I was completely absorbed in the experience. There was little I could do other than emphasize the importance of hygiene to the midwife and help prepare clean cloths that were sterilized with boiling water.
It was a terribly difficult delivery. With a conflicted face, the midwife let slip that the mother and child were both in danger. Seeing the pained look on the mother’s face, I decided to use my healing power, which I had kept hidden until then.
The villagers had told me about the existence of magic artifacts that had the power of magic within them. I used that as an explanation for my staff and activated its healing effect. Light glowed, and a miracle happened.
The baby was born safely, and the couple was very grateful.
“I will be indebted to you for the rest of my life.”
The father’s gratitude was so excessive, I was a little troubled. But he definitely didn’t seem to be exaggerating.
I held the newborn in my arms and felt the value of life. I wanted to give birth to a cute child like this with my fiancé one day.
I wished that from the bottom of my heart.
◇ ◇ ◇
We were completely accustomed to living in this world when we decided to visit the mountain where we first arrived once again. Our goal was to search for any hints as to how we might return to Earth.
It took some time before we were able to make the trip, but we had originally chosen to stay in this village for that exact purpose. We had grown attached to the village, but our desire to return to Japan was greater.
The reason why we were still unmarried also had to do with our lingering desire to return to Japan. We had decided that if we were to marry in this world, we would do so with the intention of being buried in this world.
There were two problems. The first was that we couldn’t specify the exact location we appeared at. We only knew that it was in the mountains and within a few hours’ walk of the village. We had no choice but to rely on our memories. We also knew there was a waterfall nearby.
The other problem was who would go to investigate. We were fortunate enough to descend the mountain safely the first time, but there were many dangerous beasts in the mountains.
Walking into the mountains unarmed was a suicidal act. That’s why I wanted to go alone, but my fiancé was worried.
“I’m much stronger than you now,” I said jokingly, but he just fell silent with a frown...because my power made that statement true.
If I wished for it, my hero power would enhance my physical abilities to a terrifying degree. My body would get sturdier as well.
In comparison, my fiancé had no such ability. He was a regular human. He had gained stamina from the daily farmwork, but his life would still be in danger against a savage beast, even if he was armed.
Although I was strong, I had never fought in a real battle before. Fighting was scary. I wasn’t confident in my ability to remain calm and protect him if we were attacked. That’s why I believed it was less dangerous to go alone.
“Even if I run into an animal, I’ll focus on running away. I’ll avoid figh
My persistence eventually won him over. Thus, I was to head into the mountains alone.
◇ ◇ ◇
Early in the morning, I departed for the mountains.
A little past noon, I found a waterfall that looked like the one we first arrived beside. Then, I found the spot where we had appeared.
There was a waterfall nearby. That was the only memory I had left of this scenery. It was hard to describe in words, but this place was oddly open for being so deep in the mountains.
There was no mistaking it. My fiancé and I definitely stood here when we first came to this world. However, although I had expected as much, there were no clues on how to return to our world. I probably knew it from the moment we arrived. But we had been so confused at the time, we didn’t conduct a proper investigation.
I investigated the area carefully. Both above the soil and underneath the ground. Fortunately, I was able to control the earth with my staff, so it was easy to dig around.
There was nothing to be gained no matter where I dug, but I couldn’t give up on going back to Earth after a single attempt. I would come back again later. After deciding that, I returned to the village.
◇ ◇ ◇
One week had passed since I began investigating the mountains. In the end, we hadn’t discovered anything on how to return to Earth.
There was no point in investigating any further than this. With that thought, my fiancé and I began to gather information outside of the village. Was there any literature about heroes in this world? We set out to find the answer.
One day after that, apparently, the village didn’t have enough to pay the upcoming taxes. The villagers came to us for any ideas.
Villages paid taxes to the country, in the form of either money or harvested crops. However, there was rarely ever the need to use currency in the village. Thus, the village had no cash savings and usually paid the tax with crops.
It wasn’t impossible for them to pay the upcoming taxes, but doing so would cause a large number of people to starve to death.
The modern knowledge we brought to the village had greatly improved their agriculture, but the results wouldn’t show until the next harvest. The new crops wouldn’t grow in time for the tax payment.
I asked them if it was possible to delay the tax payment, but apparently there was no precedent for such an exception.
I then asked what the consequences were of being unable to pay the tax. Apparently, they would have to gather anything of value and sell it off for cash. If they couldn’t manage the tax with that, the country would punish them with compulsory dispossession.
However, none of the families in the village possessed any valuable items. If they did, they wouldn’t be struggling to pay the tax in the first place. In cases like this, it was apparently most common to sell someone off as a slave.
When my fiancé heard that, he was the first to strongly oppose the idea. I was also against the thought of selling someone into slavery. My fiancé then offered to try and sell our valuables in the city instead.
Fortunately, we were in possession of a few valuable items—the items we’d brought from the modern world. Clothing and accessories could sell for especially high prices. When my fiancé stated his willingness to sell our possessions, the villagers clearly let out a collective sigh of relief.
They were items that had lost their use as soon as we arrived in this world anyway. There was no point in holding onto them forever. I wasn’t opposed to the idea either.
The father of the child whose birth I had witnessed mentioned he had relatives with a store in the capital, so we decided to sell our items there.
We immediately departed for the capital. I wondered why the capital was within walking distance of the mountains, but it turned out this was an extremely minor nation. From how the villagers described it, it was only the size of a few Japanese cities gathered together. The village was by the mountains at the border of the country, but if we left with the sunrise, we would arrive at the capital by morning the next day.
The group heading to the capital consisted of a few men armed with farm tools, and my fiancé and I who owned the items to be sold. The father joined us. He was born in the capital and would lead us to his relatives’ store.
We arrived at the capital without any issue. Although it was the capital, it was just the capital of a minor nation. It wasn’t even the size of a small city in Japan. From what I could see of the townscape, the civilization level was that of Earth’s Middle Ages.
We didn’t have the money for an extended stay in the capital, so we immediately went to do our business. We made our way to the aforementioned store and began negotiations.
However, we didn’t bring out every item at once. We showed our items in small amounts and watched their reactions. Because our items didn’t exist in this world, the price depended on how much the store was willing to pay. We didn’t know how much funds the store had, and bringing out all our items at once would reduce their novelty. We feared that would result in a cheaper price.
Negotiations were done by my fiancé and me. As a result, we were able to secure the tax funds after selling just one set of clothes. I’m sure the novelty played a part in it, but it also reflected just how high quality the clothes from Earth were.
We were first given a cheap price, but when I said I was willing to give up on the sale because I was attached to the item, they immediately raised their offer. They asked if we had any other items, but we brushed them off without showing them anything else. We decided it would be better to save them for the future. Thus, the sale concluded.
The purchase price was more than they had on hand, so it was decided that we would receive half upfront and half once the clothes had been resold. Since they were relatives, the baby’s father took on the role of staying back for the remaining amount.
The next morning, our group left the capital with one fewer member and returned to the village with half the payment. The return trip was uneventful, and we were back at the village by the morning after we departed.
◇ ◇ ◇
One week had passed since we returned to the village...
I was visiting the mountains once again; it was my first visit since returning from the capital. My purpose wasn’t to investigate—I had already searched the surrounding area extensively. So why was I suddenly here again? The truth was that yesterday, my fiancé proposed again to me.
“What do you think about getting married?”
We had been engaged since before we wandered into this world, but we had put off marriage because we hadn’t given up on returning to Earth.
There were no means of contraception in this village. Getting married would inevitably result in having a child, and once we had one, we naturally wouldn’t be able to move around freely for a while.
In other words, this marriage proposal symbolized giving up on our search for a way to return to Earth.
Honestly, my answer was pretty much set. However...
“Can you give me just one day to think?”
I’ve always been like this...since I was a child, even. My feelings were all but solidified, but I was hesitant to answer on impulse.
That’s why I visited the place where we first arrived in this world. If I came here, I would find out whether I still had the desire to return to Earth, or whether I was willing to be buried in this world.
I received my answer. I came here and looked back on my life on Earth, and found I had no lingering attachments.
My fiancé was here with me. As long as he was here, I could live anywhere. My feelings were completely solidified.
I would give him my answer as soon as I returned to the village. With that decided, I made haste back.
The body and physical abilities of a hero were amazing. It had taken us hours to descend the mountain when we first arrived in this world, but now I could make the trip in a mere ten minutes. And once I did...
“Ah... Ah... Ah... Ah...”
I couldn’t speak.
I could barely believe my eyes.
His dead body was displayed in the center of the village. Beside the body dressed in familiar clothes was his severed head. The ground was wet with blood. The villagers we should have been close with were throwing stones at his body while yelling with rage.
“They were suspicious from the start!”
“How dare they steal from a noble!”
They weren’t making any sense.
