I asked the woman about this, and she furrowed her brow in response to my question but still answered me. She said the summoning magic granted great physical and magical benefits to the person who was called here. Their body would be revived in its prime and strengthened, then given immense mana.
Therefore, the summoned hero would become an existence far superior to humans in this world and would be able to fight monsters that they were helpless against.
Summoning a soul would revive the physical body? It sounded so far-fetched that I said I couldn’t believe her.
“What purpose would there be to summoning a soul without a physical body? Magic is created to serve a specific meaning. That’s just how it is,” she responded.
But here I was, lying in bed in a white room.
The only thing that had changed was that I felt a little younger—perhaps eighteen. I had my same familiar appearance, and yet my heart whispered that this was not me. I had left my life and my body back with my parents and younger sister.
Ever since that day, I lay in bed, lamenting sorrowfully over that fact.
My sickness had not been cured. The only thing that was different was the world I lived in. Nothing had changed about me.
Personally, I doubted that I had become physically stronger or been given magical powers. I hadn’t even been given the chance to test it out. The benefit I really wished for was to have my illness be cured. I didn’t need some superior or special powers.
I had been bestowed the role of a hero, but since I was ill, there was no way for me to carry out my duty. So instead, I stayed in a room that seemed like it was inside a hospital, just as I had in the world I’d been born in. Magic had not cured my illness. There probably wasn’t a way to do it in this world, either. They gave me strange medicines as I continued my bedridden life.
To be honest, I wasn’t even sure if the medicine was meant for my illness.
Several more days passed. Since I couldn’t see what was going on outside, I just had to count the days by the number of sleeps I had. They provided me with food, clothing, and shelter, but I was not allowed to leave the room. I was confined in the name of medical treatment, but perhaps the most accurate way to describe it was that I was being kept under surveillance.
They had selfishly summoned me, deemed me useless, then taken away my freedom. However, I had a feeling that even if they did think I’d be useful, they would not have given me liberty.
I spent most of the day alone, and the number of people who were allowed to approach my room was limited. I figured I would just remain by myself, slowly heading toward death once again. It was all the same as it had been back in Japan.
No, there was one thing that was different, in a bad way. This time, I had no family to support me. There wasn’t a soul in this world who cared about me. I was completely and utterly alone. And I never thought being alone would cause such anxiety and sorrow. Placed in this situation, it made me realize for the first time just how much my parents and sister had loved me. They had cherished me much more than I had ever thought.
“Since your life ended in your previous world, you cannot return to it.” My heart ached when I remembered what the woman told me. I desperately wished I could go back home. But here I was, in a white room that resembled my past one so much.
All I could think about was my family.
One year had passed since I was summoned to this world. I was moved from my original room to another simple room, but I could see the scenery outside from this one. From my view outside the window, I learned that there were seasons in this world, too. I experienced the cold and heat, and once there were more days with a comfortable temperature, I suspected that a year had gone by since I was summoned.
The passing days had brought many changes; surely time was going by in the outside world the way it did in my old world.
Although that had nothing to do with me, since I was not allowed to leave this room. Though I thought that perhaps the calendar year in this world differed from Japan. When I was first summoned, I had counted the days for a while, but my memory became spotty after a certain point. So I decided to give up counting rather than having some messed-up calculation in my head. I realized it was pointless to continue anyway, so I stopped.
The biggest change in the past year was probably when I had been officially deemed to be completely useless. I overheard the soldiers who patrolled outside my room talking and learned that the 69th hero had been summoned. If that was true, then this situation would probably be coming to an end for me soon. Now that they had their new hero, they no longer had any use for an ill, incompetent one like me. I just wasn’t sure if I would die from my sickness in this bleak room or be killed. I knew this kingdom wasn’t so kind as to allow someone useless to continue living.
But, more importantly, I’d given up on life. Even if they did let me out of here, I would be completely in the dark about this world. I was sick; there was no way I could survive. Maybe I could if I were healthy, but it would be impossible with this sickly body.
I vacantly stared out the window from my bed. The thing we called a moon on earth shone with a blue light, sadly illuminating my figure. How many times had I wished it was yellow like the one back home?
“Hey, you. Aren’t you a hero?” All of a sudden, I heard an unfamiliar voice break the silence in the room. I was supposed to be the only one in here. I tore my gaze away from the blue moon and looked toward the sound of the voice.
I saw a young man standing there, with light-green eyes and golden-brown hair. When I didn’t answer, he grew impatient and approached my bed. “Hey. Answer my question.”
For a moment, I wondered if he was an assassin, but even if he was, there wasn’t any way for me to resist him. I wasn’t confident I could escape in my condition. I’d long thought this would be my fate, and now it had come for me. In that case…