[Reberu] ga Arunara Agerudesho? Mobukyara ni Tensei Shita Ore wa Gēmu Chishiki o Ikashi, Hitasura Reberu o Age Tsudzukeru - CH 103

[Self-Awareness]

No matter how many times he pressed the ‘Sacrificial Rite Talisman’ in his hands, the item did not show any effect.

It meant that there was no ‘Curse’ in Akano Reika’s body. An abnormal state which did not cure naturally over time had disappeared—what did that mean? The answer was in front of him—her body that was lying silently and powerlessly on the ground.

“It can’t, be.” (Amanai)

His fists kept trembling, and his sense of time went distorted.

He should’ve defeated Sakurai quicker, he thought.

Like a child he snapped, screamed, recklessly struck and be struck.

Thrusted with the fact that all of that ended up in vain before him, his ragged body fell on its knees.

“……in the end.” (Amanai)

In the end, he couldn’t do anything.

He kept acting like a protagonist and kept making as much preparation as he could think of.

Yet, he couldn’t even protect his childhood friend, nor could he hold her who had become still as death with his powerlessly dangling arms.

“Ah… ahh… ahhh.” (Amanai)

Tears naturally spilled out his eyes as he continued to stare at her, stunned, and all that he had unknowingly suppressed within until now burst out.

I failed, I couldn’t do anything, I couldn’t save her… millions of words blaming himself ran through his mind, making him want to deny all of his existence.

“…Then, what was I supposed to do?” (Amanai)

The words were not directed at anyone.

He just couldn’t help but say.

“Just what was I supposed to do! I didn’t even remember dying, and yet I was already in such a world when I came to! Moreover, I was born by robbing the protagonist’s body! I’m just an ordinary person!” (Amanai)

He told his family he was going to bed, and when he woke up, he was reborn as a baby in this world.

He carried his self-consciousness from his previous life, which was why he also inherited his mental strength and weakness.

If he had experienced a ‘true death’, he would have been able to give up on his previous life and part from it to some extent.

However, because he hadn’t, Amanai continued to drag along the values of modern society from his previous life.

Therefore, the aversion to conflict itself, which sometimes was called a virtue in modern society, had become his clear weak point in this world.

He couldn’t cast it off just because it was ‘bad’ and ‘pathetic’ according to this world’s standard.

He wasn’t a deviant who threw away his previous life’s common sense and moral the moment he found out that there were levels in this world; he was but an ordinary person you could find everywhere.

“I don’t want to fight! I don’t want to fight to the death! I don’t want to use violence against people!” (Amanai)

Unfortunately for Amanai, he knew about the original game, about the ‘future’ of this world.

That was why he was aware of the crisis that would occur while he was alive.

And he realized early on that the original protagonist who could solve it had disappeared from this world because of him.

“Since I knew the future of this world, and was born as ‘Amanai Hayato’! I have to be the one to solve it, right!? Everyone’s going to die, otherwise!? That’s why I have to be ‘Amanai Hayato’, isn’t it!?” (Amanai)

Knowing that the people who supported him when he was confused due to his reincarnation would die, he couldn’t be irresponsible enough to take his eyes off the imminent crisis.

If there was a life that was lost as a result of his arbitrary action that the original protagonist didn’t do… he didn’t think that he had the strength to carry such burden on his back.

Therefore, he continued to act as ‘Amanai Hayato’ as best as he could, and continued to keep things like the original in the hope that nothing changed.

He kept torturing himself, saying that he wasn’t the real ‘Amanai Hayato’, that he was just an imitation, to begin with, and that if he didn’t keep that in mind, he would definitely make a mistake at some point down the line.

He had to keep doing what he did not want to do.

However, he couldn’t take the option of ‘not doing’.

“What was I supposed to do… just what was I supposed to do!?” (Amanai)

He couldn’t meet Akano who died in the world of the living even in the Netherworld, he couldn’t get her back.

Akano Reika’s special attribute that was ‘perfect compatibility’ to demonization, required her spirituality.

And her spirituality had outstanding ‘acceptability’ that allowed her to accept foreign substance as is.

That was why she would end up accepting even her own death as is.

That was why she most likely wouldn’t be able to get to the ‘Netherworld, which couldn’t be reached without strong sentiments.

Large drops of tears fell on the back of his hand.

To the irreparable event that was his childhood friend dying due to him doing what he believed he should do, Amanai couldn’t help but cry.

(Well, even if you ask what you were supposed to do…)

There was a good-for-nothing guy watching that back of Amanai while drinking a potion with one hand.

In regard to the question, “What was I supposed to do”, if he could irresponsibly say whatever he wanted to, there were many things he could say.

However, most of them were hindsight-based opinions, they would no doubt further drove Amanai to the corner.

He might be able to come up with words that would give him salvation for the time being if he put the effort into thinking, but… to be honest, he was not confident.

And even if he could, he wouldn’t say because it would have negligible persuasive power if he, the one who stirred up this trouble, was the one to say.

Leave things that one couldn’t do to others.

Sakurai had always done so, and he did so this time as well.

What Sakurai had to do now was to keep silence so as not to get in the way because he had left the task to someone else.

Thus, when the energy of Amanai, whose falling tears began to cease, was running out.

“I see, so that’s Hayato’s, no, your true feeling.”

“…………eh?” (Amanai)

Akano Reika got up and put her hands on the cheek of the stunned Amanai.

Her body heat was transmitted to the shrinking and trembling cowardly boy in front of her through her hands. Then as if to reassure him, calmly and gently, she——

“This would be… our first time meeting, I guess? Strange, isn’t it? Even though we’ve always been so close.” (Reika)

——showed him a smile overflowing with joy.

“Rei, ka…?” (Amanai)

“I thought you would find out if you were to hold me, but to think you didn’t even touch me—it was kinda disappointing. I might lose confidence.” (Reika)

“Eh, that… why…?” (Amanai)

Akano showed a paper taken out of her breast pocket to the confused Amanai.

It was a used ‘Sacrificial Rite Talisman’. The talisman that had sucked a curse and turned purple was reflected in Amanai’s eyes.

“Sakurai, wh- what’s the meaning of this?” (Amanai)

“I asked him.” (Reika)

Akano stopped Amanai from turning his face to Sakurai.

Actually, everything from a to z was set up by Sakurai, but Akano lied.

She wanted him to focus only on herself at this moment.

Right after saying it, however, Akano realized that her words were like confessing, “I’m the mastermind behind this case,” but did not mind it.

If that’s how it looked like to Amanai, even if he were to get angry later, the anger would be directed at her. She would be able to take responsibility for the failure by herself.

No matter which way it turned out, it didn’t matter as long as the things he had been carrying on his back became lighter, even only a bit.

Besides, even if his anger was directed at her… that would mean she would be able to monopolize his passion, albeit a fragment, in a sense.

While knowing that that thought of hers was sordid and ugly, she renewed her determination to fulfill her role.

“I heard about you from Sakurai-kun. About what a ‘reincarnated person’ is.” (Reika)

“——!” (Amanai)

Amanai had his breath taken away.

From surprise, confusion, and fear.

“He told me you came from a world where we were told as an illustrated story, and you were a different person from the real ‘Amanai Hayato’ whom I was supposed to meet, and… a lot more.” (Akano)

Akano said so while getting up.

Amanai, facing her, was visibly agitated; it was easy to see that within, his fear was particularly strong.

After all, she basically concluded that Amanai was a ‘foreign existence’.

Him being a reincarnated person no doubt made him different from others, but to Amanai, a ‘foreign existence’ was something that would definitely be rejected… it had a meaning close to a subject of discrimination.

That was exactly why he hid that fact.

He was extremely afraid of being kicked out of the community in this world and having nowhere to go.

And more than it became public, he was far more afraid that it became known by Akano who harbored good feeling toward him.

Amanai was strongly conscious of the sensation of blood rushing from the top of his head.

“I heard a lot of things. I thought you were an arrogant person.” (Reika)

“A-arrogant…?” (Amanai)

Through Sakurai, Akano learned that the world she and Amanai saw was very different.

There were many things rooted in this world that she took for granted. ‘Fighting’ being part of ordinary life, and the existence of monsters that people fought to the death.

Also, if one were to be left out of the society in this country, which was a land closed by an outer wall, it was often the case that they would become a ‘thief’.

Such people eventually formed a group, became bandits, attacked various places, and ended up being annihilated by the knights who started to notice them… This repeated many times.

She might feel guilty about hurting people, however, she did not think it was ‘scary’.

After all, when conflict broke out, the only way to live was to hurt, or at worst, to kill other people.

Either fighting or killing each other, sometimes, hurting people were inevitable in order to live.

However, to Amanai, who kept dragging along the world of his previous life, that was not ordinary life, but abnormal life.

Fighting, killing each other, and physically injuring people were treated equal to taboo in his world, and those who did so were kicked out of society.

Amanai still saw this world with such values, which was one of the reasons why he decided to fight the Black Sword.

“You knew about this world, you knew, so you should have been able to avert your eyes and look out only for yourself. Still, you decided to fight despite your fear of fighting. I think that’s really praiseworthy.” (Reika)

“Then, why. Because… what should I… I’m sorry, because…!” (Amanai)

“Un. Because you think you can carry everything by yourself and that you can do it somehow by yourself, after all.” (Reika)

Amanai, whose face had turned pale and who kept being conflicted internally.

Akano slowly unraveled the emotional threads that were intertwined in his heart by coming into contact with him, and speaking to him.

“Every illustrated story’s protagonist has friends, and he faces difficulties together with them. Yet, you try to do everything by yourself.” (Reika)

“That’s, because, I took the protagonist’s… I’m responsible to…” (Amanai)

“That’s all the more reason for you to rely on someone else. Even if you take the protagonist’s position, you don’t think that you are one, right? Yet you don’t say anything to anyone… isn’t that arrogant?” (Reika)

“But……” (Amanai)

“Ahh~~ mou! This stubborn blockhead!” (Reika)

After scratching her head, the impatient Akano grabbed Amanai’s shoulders powerfully.

Bringing her face close to him, whose eyes went wide in surprise at her suddenness, to the point where their noses were about to touch, Akano yelled at him.

“If you keep being stubborn, then try to prove that you can overcome a difficulty by yourself right here, right now! If you can, I’m not going to complain anymore, and let you to do anything you want! If you can’t, know your place, and confess everything, I mean everything to me!” (Reika)

“S-such a domineering-! In the first place, just what do you mean by prove.” (Amanai)

“That!!” (Reika)

After separating her body, Akano pointed vigorously behind Amanai.

He slowly turned behind him, his arms and elbows taut, and followed the direction of her finger with his eyes.

There he saw a deviant who used a thread tied to a tree branch to hang his body so that he could maintain a vertical posture with respect to the tree’s trunk, and used movement technique to roll his body up and down while making a wind noise like a yo-yo and practice-swinging at the same time.

“If you say you’re not going to have a problem in the future! Do something about ‘that’ right now!!” (Reika)

“…………impossible.” (Amanai)

“This world isn’t as good-for-nothing as ‘that’, you can’t always have your way here! You can’t live in this kind of world without cooperating with someone else!” (Reika)

“…is that the case… no, that’s right…” (Amanai)

Amanai came to be aware that he was arrogant.