One: Living in This World Is Painful
I failed to kill the prince.
The knight called it. We killed each other.
All that was well and good. It’s what’s happening now that makes no sense.
“Good morning, Selena. You’re so cute today, like always,” said a woman with black hair and blue eyes. She was holding me. I couldn’t understand how she was holding me. A woman with arms as thin as hers wouldn’t be able to pick up a full-grown person like me.
I reached out to push her away, but my hands were far smaller than I remembered. My body wouldn’t move how I wanted it to.
What the hell is going on? What happened to my body?
“You’re so energetic today, Selena.” The woman rubbed her cheek against mine.
It was disgusting. I don’t like being touched.
“Wah, waaaaah!”
I can’t talk. What is this? Someone explain this to me. I died, didn’t I? Why am I still alive?
“Oh, Selena, what’s wrong?”
Selena this, Selena that. Shut up already. My name isn’t Selena. I don’t have a name. The man who gave me work and money just called me a number.
“You’re a tool. Tools don’t need names,” he’d said.
“Aw, Selena, this is your first time seeing yourself in a mirror, isn’t it? Maybe it surprised you.”
What?
That’s when I first noticed the mirror in front of me. It showed a baby with the same black hair and blue eyes as the woman. But the mirror didn’t reflect me.
Something is wrong.
In half disbelief, I moved my arm. The baby in the mirror moved its arm the same way as me.
……
Next, I tried scratching my cheek. The baby in the mirror did the same thing.
It did hurt.
In the mirror, there was the baby and the woman holding the baby.
They look similar, so it’s safe to assume they’re mother and daughter.
And there’s me. Dead me. I don’t feel like I’ve turned into a ghost. Not like I would become one anyway. I don’t have any lingering attachments to this world. I died because I was weak. End of story.
Having thought through it that far, there was only one logical conclusion.
“&@#@? $=++&$£%@! &£$&¥@&+$%.”
“Oh, what’s the matter, Selena? There, there.”
The woman patted my back to calm me.
I wasn’t crying, though. I was shouting in confusion.
As far as I know, it was the first time my emotions had been in that much of a mess.
Actually, it was definitely the first time. Because I’d been reincarnated.
I’d heard the word “reincarnation” before. Some religious people in my last world taught about the cycle of reincarnation. One priest outside a church I happened to pass by said something like, “God grants blessings in death to those who did good deeds in life. That blessing will allow them to lead an incredible life in their next reincarnation.”
I snorted at that. “Good deeds”? Good deeds by whose definition? These religious followers called anyone who believed in a different god “demons.” They sometimes even killed them. You claim killing people is a sin but, do it yourself? They preached about “good deeds,” but it was hard to believe they meant it literally.
I laughed at them because they probably called whatever deed was convenient for them a “good deed.” I made fun of them because it wasn’t like they’d ever experienced death. How could they proclaim, with certainty, that they’d be reincarnated and their next life would be blissful? And now look at me. I’m the one experiencing reincarnation.
They say you can never anticipate what happens in life, and they’re right. I’d never experienced anything that struck me to the core like this, and I probably never will again. I hope, at least.
✦ ✦ ✦
†††
LET’S start over with an introduction. My name is Selena Violette. I am six years old. I was born into a duke’s family in the kingdom of Astra. This world is incredibly similar to my previous world, but it is not, in fact, the same world.
Oh, by the way, that black-haired, blue-eyed woman from earlier is my mother. Her name is Amaryllis. When I could first speak, I called her by her name, and she insisted I call her “Mother.”
Initially, I was confused, but I used to be an assassin. I’m good at adapting.
Assassination doesn’t always end once you’ve sneaked in and killed your target. Sometimes, you have to pretend to be someone near your target and spend time in their vicinity, meaning I’m good at becoming other people.
That’s what I thought, anyway. Not in a million years would I imagine the difference between an assassin’s common sense and a normal person’s common sense would cause me this much trouble.
I couldn’t do anything about being reincarnated. I just had to fully become the ordinary person named Selena Violette.
But I quickly learned how difficult that would be. That became evident when I reached the lively age of six.
✦ ✦ ✦
†††
“EEEEK!”
Someone in the garden screamed. It was my maid. She screamed because I stabbed a dog that tried to attack me with a cake knife. The dog had slipped into our property from somewhere with a girl about the same age as me.
The dog’s blood was all over my face and dress, but I didn’t care. That used to be my every day.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Selena, how could you do something so horrible?” said Amaryllis. We’d been in the garden having tea. She ran over to me and gripped my shoulders.
“Horrible?” I said, not understanding what she meant. I was just defending myself. It was the dog’s fault for attacking me. It was on the ground bleeding, its tongue hanging out because it was weaker than me. I wasn’t injured because I was stronger. Because I was agile enough to dodge its attack.
That’s how I’d always lived my life.
And yet…
I scanned the area, keeping an eye on Amaryllis. The maid was pale and trembling as she stared at me like she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. It was the same reaction all the people I’d killed before had. I didn’t think I needed to worry about it.
“Selena,” said Amaryllis, and I turned my attention back to her. “You cannot hurt living creatures. Not for any reason.”
What she said made no sense. That dog clearly had hostile intentions towards me and acted on them. Could Amaryllis not see that reality?
You cannot hurt living creatures? That’s the same as saying I’ll inevitably be hurt myself. This noblewoman grew up in a walled-off cloister and now lives in a dream world. I can’t say I envy her. She’s just a moron.
“Lives are not equally valuable,” I said. “That dog meant to kill me. If I didn’t kill it, it would’ve killed me. Are you saying I did something wrong by using a weapon to protect myself?”
The assertion seemed obvious, but Amaryllis looked at me like she’d just encountered some monster.
“Selena, it doesn’t matter what the reason is; it is wrong to harm a living creature unnecessarily. You may not be aware of this, but being stabbed with a knife is very painful.”
I am very aware, actually. I was stabbed several times in my previous world. I was an assassin; I got injured basically every day. And, by the way, being stabbed isn’t just painful. It can kill you if things take a turn for the worse.
I kept that counterargument inside my head.
“Don’t do to others what you wouldn’t want done to yourself,” said Amaryllis.
Is a statement like that really going to wrap this sort of situation up?
“Selena, you have good reflexes, don’t you? You surprised me with how fast you are. But, considering you can move like that, you should have been able to dodge the dog’s attack.”
But that wouldn’t end things. The dog would have kept attacking me so long as it could move. That makes the winner whoever acts first. What she’s saying isn’t realistic. I’m being far more logical. I’m right. But Amaryllis says what I did was wrong.
This environment is far too different from the one I used to live in. Are thought processes different when the environment is different?
Maybe I should just agree. Living here will get more painful if I don’t. I’m not going to happily turn into a moron, too, but this situation requires adaptability.
I failed. I’ll do better next time.
“I’m sorry, Mother. I was so scared by the dog, I just…” I said, tears in my eyes, and Amaryllis hugged me, relieved.
My body stiffened. I’d been hugged many times since becoming Selena, but I still couldn’t get used to the act. There wasn’t much I could do about it. I never did like being touched.
“I know,” she said. “It’s such a big dog. Of course you were scared. But you mustn’t do that again.”
“…I won’t.”
Would she say the same thing if her life was on the line?
Now that I think about it, it reminds me of what the knight who took me down with him said: “I will go down with you, if need be, to protect him.”
She must be cut from the same cloth he was. I can’t understand it.