Mushoku Tensei — Chapter 28 - Transfer — Everything Changes

Lazing in Bed

How long has it been since I did this?

Since coming to this world, I've almost never lazed around in bed.

Before Roa, I'd generally just get up the moment I woke. And in Roa, I was always up early to prepare lessons. Weekends gave me a little extra sleep, but even then, once I was awake, I was up.

But now I'm awake, and I don't want to move.

I turn my head. Eris is still asleep on the bed beside me.

Aisha... it seems she got up early to help Lilia.

Such a sensible kid.

Oh well. A little longer...

.......

"Brother~ time to get up. Breakfast is ready."

When I open my eyes again, Aisha has already crawled into my bed.

She's just lying there looking up at me with that big silly smile on her face.

So cute...

I glance toward the bed. Eris has already gotten up and left...

"Mm. I'll get up now."

"Ehh — sleep a little more. Aisha only just lay down."

"Weren't you the one who told me to get up?"

"I just wanted to let Brother know that Aisha is lying together with Brother~"

"...Fine. A little more."

I pull Aisha into my arms and use the four-year-old as a body pillow.

She's so soft. It feels like if I squeezed too hard, something would snap...

"Ah! Brother's being a pervert!"

"Hm? How is a brother hugging his little sister being a pervert? And where did you even learn that word?"

"Not telling Brother~"

Anyway. After the little farce, I still got up.

I washed up and ate breakfast, couldn't tell if Lilia or Zenith had made it.

Apparently Lilia and Zenith had gone to town with Paul and Norn. They really do get along well.

Eris was out in the yard practicing her swordwork.

Hm...?

"Aisha, why didn't you go to town with them?"

"Didn't want to. It's boring."

"Really? Don't you have any friends in town? In the village?"

"Nope~ everyone there is an idiot."

"That's not great. If you don't make friends now, you won't know how later on. And not having friends gets lonely."

"Ehh — Brother, you're just as naggy as Father."

I... naggy... just like Paul?

Well... she just doesn't want to make friends. I really shouldn't be sticking my nose in.

Being called naggy by my little sister...

"And Father said Brother didn't like playing with kids back then either. Probably still the same now, right?"

"How could that be? I love playing with Aisha."

"Hmph~ if Aisha weren't Brother's little sister, Brother probably wouldn't even look at me."

I didn't have a response to that.

It's true, I'm not the type to walk up and talk to strangers. But it's not shyness. It's mostly that it feels like a hassle. If I knew the interaction would actually benefit me, I wouldn't find it a hassle at all.

"See! Brother is definitely thinking about what would happen if Aisha weren't your little sister! Aisha is so sad now..."

"How could that be... even if Aisha weren't my little sister, I'd still go out of my way to befriend her. She's so cute... uh... and so smart... and so sensible..."

In the end, my little sister played me completely.

She fake-cried while I heaped praise on her, and the moment I ran out of words, she broke into a grin.

"I get it now! Brother really does love Aisha!"

"Yeah, yeah..."

There's really no winning with this little gremlin.

By the time I finished eating, Eris had finished her sword practice too.

She walked back into the house and found me at the sink.

"Rudeus! I want to see Saint-level magic!"

"Hm? Where did that come from? So sudden."

"Sylphie told me Rudeus has used it before! But I've never seen it!"

"Ah... fine. But we'll have to go pretty far, somewhere open is better for casting."

"Then let's go!"

Eris is still exactly the same. Whatever she thinks of, she does immediately.

I put away the clean dishes, went to my room, and came back with Aqua Heartia.

"Brother! I want to see too!"

"I know, I know... you're coming along?"

"Mm!"

Since the trip was a fair distance, the three of us rode out together on Paul's horse.

Eris handled the reins, I don't know how to ride. Fortunately, we're all still children. Three adults on one horse would have been a different story.

.......

We arrived.

The place Roxy once brought me to.

The place where I took my final exam.

I dismounted, cast a quick earthwork, and built a thick earth wall for Aisha, Eris, and the horse to shelter behind.

"Which one do you want to see?"

"Mm... which are you best at?"

"Then... Cumulonimbus. It creates torrential rain across a wide area, lightning included. It's the magic I'm most comfortable with, and the first Saint-level spell I ever cast."

"Ooh! That already sounds incredible!"

I smiled and walked about 10 meters past the earth wall.

I looked up. The sky already had that pre-rain weight to it, grey, heavy, oppressive.

"First things first... let me clear out these clouds."

The effect would look better that way.

I raised my staff and sent magic into the sky. A blend of Wind and Fire, enough to scatter the clouds and dissolve them.

But even after it worked, the sky stayed dark.

What...?

"Rudeus! Hurry up and start already!"

"Brother! You can do it!"

I nodded. The sky was acting strange, but I'd deal with that later.

I raised my staff and started chanting with exaggerated theatrics.

"Fuhahahaha! Gather, mana! Majestic spirits of water, ascend to the sky and... hm?"

Something caught my attention.

"Huh?"

"What is that?"

Aisha and Eris looked too, not at the sky exactly, but at something in front of me, along my line of sight.

The color of the sky was changing.

Wrong color. A nauseating color. Purple and brown swirled together in marble-like veins across the horizon.

"Rudeus! Is that your magic? It looks so strange!"

"Brother! Make it stop, I don't want to see something that gross!"

No... this isn't right...

I sent Ice magic racing along the ground toward whatever was in front of me and pressed my hand to it, reading the mana through it.

This is... this is... an enormous amount of mana. And the further it goes, the more I can feel it growing...

Calm down. First priority: get Eris and Aisha back to the village. Find Paul. Get the whole family out.

"Eris. Aisha. We're leaving —"

The words barely left my mouth before I saw them both frozen in place, staring at something behind me.

I turned around.

A beam of light stretched down from the sky, the sky that had gone pure white, and touched the ground.

The instant it made contact,

It expanded. Not slowly. At a speed that made no sense, the beam bloomed outward into a torrent of white light that swallowed everything in its path, surging toward us like a wave. Like a tsunami.

Eris and Aisha saw it at the same moment I did. They just stood there. Blank. Still. Completely unable to process what they were seeing.

"Eris! Aisha!"

I ran toward them and cast every scrap of mana I had.

More than I'd ever used in my life. A massive, thick barrier of earth rose from the ground, throwing itself against the advance of that wall of light.

It didn't matter.

By the time I reached their sides, pure white had consumed everything around us.

I felt myself being pulled somewhere, toward the ground or toward the sky, I couldn't tell. The sensation dissolved into nothing.

But in the last moment before consciousness left me, one thing was certain.

I was holding onto Eris and Aisha.

➤ Next: The Demon Continent