Since coming to this world, I've never once stepped outside the house.
I made sure not to. Deliberately.
Because I was afraid.
If I went out into the yard and looked beyond, my memories would come flooding back in an instant.
That day's memories.
The pain in my side. The chill of the rain.
Regret.
Despair.
The pain of being launched by a truck.
All of it rushing back like it was yesterday.
My legs would tremble.
I could look out the window. That was fine.
I could walk to the yard on my own feet. That was fine too.
But I couldn't go any further than that.
I knew it.
The peaceful countryside scenery spread out before my eyes could turn into hell in a heartbeat.
That picture-perfect image of tranquility would never accept me.
In my previous life.
Back when I was moping around the house, how many times had I fantasized about it?
What if Japan got dragged into a war?
What if one day a beautiful girl suddenly showed up as a live-in guest?
Surely I could give it my all then.
I'd have these fantasies and use them to escape reality.
I dreamed about it over and over.
The me in those dreams wasn't a superhuman, but he was normal.
He did what he could, like anyone else.
He was able to live on his own.
But the dream ended.
If I took even one step outside the house—
This dream might end too.
The dream would shatter, and I'd be sent back to that moment of despair.
That moment where I felt crushed under the weight of regret…
No, this isn't a dream.
No dream could ever be this real.
If someone told me this was a VRMMORPG, that would actually be easier to accept.
This is reality.
I tell myself that, over and over.
I know it.
This reality isn't a dream.
I know that, and yet I can't take a single step forward.
No matter how motivated I feel on the inside.
No matter how fiercely I swear it with my mouth.
My body will never follow.
I felt like I was about to cry.
---
The graduation exam would be held outside the village.
When Roxy told me that, I offered a small protest.
"Outside?"
"Yes, outside the village. I've already arranged the horses."
"Can't we do it inside the house?"
"No, we can't."
"No, we can't…"
I was torn.
In my head, I understood.
Eventually, I had to go outside.
I couldn't stay a shut-in in this world too—that much I knew.
But my body refused.
I remembered it. That moment.
"What's wrong?"
"It's just… well… there might be monsters or something outside."
"You won't run into any around here unless you get close to the forest. And even if you do, they're weak enough that I could handle one by myself. Honestly, Rudy could probably manage too."
Roxy looked at me suspiciously as I kept making up one excuse after another to avoid going outside.
"Oh, now that I think about it, I heard—Rudy, you've never actually gone outside before, have you?"
"Nn… no."
"I see—you're scared of the horse, aren't you?"
"Wh— no, I'm not scared of horses or anything."
I actually kind of liked horses. I'd played Harvest Moon and all.
"Heh heh. That's a relief. You do have some age-appropriate qualities after all."
Roxy had gotten the wrong idea.
But really, saying I was scared of horses was less embarrassing than the truth.
I had my pride.
A flimsy pride, with nothing to back it up.
"Oh well. Up you go."
When I just stood there frozen, Roxy suddenly hoisted me onto her shoulder.
"Hey!?"
"Once you get on, you'll stop being scared in no time."
I didn't struggle.
Partly because of the conflict inside me, but also partly because, well—getting carried like this, just going with the flow, maybe I could just let it happen.
Roxy tossed me onto the horse and hopped up behind me, giving the reins a light snap.
The horse started clip-clopping along.
And just like that, I left the house.
---
It was my first time stepping beyond the garden since coming to this world.
Roxy moved at a leisurely pace through the village.
Occasionally, villagers would stare at us with unabashed looks.
Don't tell me—
My body tensed.
Eyes still scared me.
Blunt, looking-down-on-you eyes, especially.
Surely no one would come up and talk to me in an obviously mocking tone.
No way. There was no way.
The only people in this world who knew me were inside that cramped house.
They shouldn't know me.
Why are they staring?
Stop looking. Go do your work…
Wait…
They weren't looking at me.
They were looking at Roxy.
Some of them even bowed to her.
Oh, right.
She'd built up a standing in this village over the past few years.
Even though anti-demon sentiment was still strong in this country.
In a rural area like this, that tendency would only be more pronounced.
In just two years, she'd become someone who received bows from the villagers.
The moment I thought that, Roxy on my back suddenly felt incredibly dependable.
She knew the way. She knew the people.
If anyone said anything to me, she'd handle it.
Wow. I never thought the girl who peeked into my bedroom and did *that* would end up feeling this dependable.
Gradually, I felt the tension drain from my body.
"Caravaggio seems to be in a good mood. He looks happy to be carrying you, Rudy."
"Is that so."
Leaning back, I felt Roxy's modest chest press against the back of my neck.
Nice.
What was I even afraid of?
Who in this peaceful little village would make fun of me?
"Still scared?"
"No, I'm fine now."
"See? You were fine, wasn't you?"
With my mind at ease, I finally started taking in the scenery around me.
Fields stretching as far as the eye could see, with little houses dotting the landscape.
A picture-perfect farming village.
Quite a spread, too. There were a decent number of houses scattered across a wide area. If they'd been packed closer together, I might have mistaken it for a town.
If there'd been a windmill, I might have thought it was Switzerland.
Oh, there was even a watermill.
Now that I was relaxed, the silence started to bother me.
Whenever I was with Roxy before, there was never this kind of silence.
We'd never been this close physically before, either.
The silence wasn't uncomfortable, but it was… ticklish.
So I opened my mouth.
"Sensei. What grows in these fields?"
"Mostly asuran wheat. It's used for bread. There's also some batilus flowers and vegetables. The batilus flowers get processed in the royal capital into spices. The rest is just your everyday food."
"Oh, those over there are bell peppers, right? The kind you don't like, sensei."
"Th-they're not that I don't like them. I'm just not great with them."
I kept asking questions about one thing after another.
Today, Roxy had said, was the final exam.
Which meant the tutoring was ending.
Knowing how impatient Roxy was, she might leave the house by tomorrow.
If that was the case, today was the last day.
I should talk to her more.
But I couldn't think of anything clever to say, so I just kept asking about the village.
According to Roxy, this village was part of the Fittor domain in the northeast of the Asura Kingdom. Its name was Buena Village.
Currently, around thirty households farmed for a living here.
My father, Paul, was a knight stationed in this village.
He monitored whether the villagers were doing their jobs properly, mediated disputes, and protected the village when monsters attacked.
Basically, he was the village's officially sanctioned bodyguard.
That said, the young men of the village took turns doing their own patrol, so once Paul finished his morning rounds, he was usually home in the afternoon.
It was a fundamentally peaceful village, so there wasn't much for him to do.
As we talked like that, the fields gradually disappeared.
There was nothing left to ask about, and the silence returned for a while.
Then about another hour passed.
The fields had completely vanished, and we were crossing an empty grassland.
---
Grassland stretching all the way to the horizon.
No wait—I could see faint mountains in the distance.
At the very least, this was a sight you'd never see in Japan.
Maybe the Mongolian landscape I'd seen in a geography textbook looked something like this.
"Let's go with here."
Roxy stopped the horse beside a lone tree standing in the middle of nowhere, dismounted, and tied the reins to the tree.
Then she lifted me down.
And we faced each other.
"From here, I'm going to cast the Water Saint-class attack spell: *Thunderstorm Cumulonimbus*."
"Okay."
"I want you to replicate it."
So she was going to use a Water Saint-class spell.
I see—so that was the final exam.
If I could cast what she was about to show me, it would mean Roxy had nothing left to teach me.
"I'll disperse it after about a minute for demonstration purposes, but let's see…
I'll pass you if you can keep it going for over an hour."
"Is this something you only do in an empty area because it's a secret technique?"
"No. It's because the rain could hurt people or damage crops."
Oh.
She was about to summon rain heavy enough to damage crops.
That sounded pretty intense.
Roxy raised both hands toward the sky.
"O grand Spirit of Water, thou who art the Prince of Thunder ascending to the heavens!
Grant my wish, bring forth a savage blessing, and show these meek beings thy power!
Strike the anvil with the divine hammer to reveal thy awe, and fill the earth with water!
O rain! Sweep away all things, annihilate everything!
*Cumulonimbus!*"
She chanted each word slowly, savoring every syllable.
Over a minute passed.
The instant she finished, the surroundings went dark in a flash.
A few seconds of lag, and then the rain slammed down.
A tremendous storm howled to life. Pitch-black clouds crackled with lightning.
It split through the air and struck.
*BOOOM!!*
It hit the tree.
My eardrums rang and my vision blurred.
I thought I was going to pass out.
"Ah!"
Roxy let out a yelp, the kind she makes when she makes a careless mistake.
The clouds scattered in an instant.
The rain and lightning subsided almost immediately.
"Oh no…"
Roxy went pale and rushed over to the tree.
The horse was lying on the ground, smoking.
Roxy placed a hand on the horse and immediately began chanting.
"O gentle Goddess of Motherly Love, mend his wounds and restore his healthy form!
*Ex Heal!*"
Roxy hurriedly applied an intermediate healing spell, and before long, the horse revived.
It wasn't instant death, apparently.
The horse had a terrified expression, and beads of cold sweat covered Roxy's forehead.
"Phew… that was close."
It really had been close.
That was the only horse we had.
Paul took meticulous care of it every day and occasionally rode off with a cheerful grin on his face.
Apparently it wasn't anything special as horses go, but Paul called it a comrade-in-arms he'd shared years of hardship with—right after Zenith, it was the thing he loved most.
And Roxy, having lived with us for two years, knew that full well.
I'd seen her look a little disturbed after witnessing Paul clinging to the horse with a blissful expression.
"C-could you keep this… between us?"
Roxy said, on the verge of tears.
She was a klutz.
She often made these kinds of careless mistakes.
But she worked so hard.
I knew she stayed up late every night preparing lessons for me.
I knew she tried her hardest to project an air of authority so people wouldn't underestimate her just because she was young.
Our teacher is adorable.
If she weren't so much older, I'd want her to be my wife.
"Don't worry. I won't tell Father."
"Mmm… please don't."
Ideally, I'd have liked to meet someone closer to my age.
"Mmm…"
Roxy was half-crying, but she shook her head vigorously and slapped her own cheeks, fixing me with a sharp gaze.
"All right. Give it a try. I'll keep Caravaggio safe."
Incidentally, Caravaggio was the horse's name.
It looked like it was about to bolt from fright, but Roxy's small frame was holding it firmly in place.
Then I noticed Roxy murmuring something.
In the blink of an eye, a wall of earth enveloped both her and the horse.
In moments, an earthen dome took shape.
A high-level Earth spell: *Earth Fortress*.
With that, even a thunderstorm shouldn't be a problem.
Alright.
Time to show off.
I'd blow Roxy's mind with something incredible.
Now then, the incantation was…
"O grand Spirit of Water, thou who art the Prince of Thunder ascending to the heavens!
Grant my wish, bring forth a savage blessing, and show these meek beings thy power!
Strike the anvil with the divine hammer to reveal thy awe, and fill the earth with water!
O rain! Sweep away all things, annihilate everything!
*Cumulonimbus!*"
Got it in one shot.
Billowing clouds began to form.
And at the same time, I *understood* Thunderstorm Cumulonimbus.
Creating clouds in the sky while simultaneously manipulating them in complex patterns to form a thundercloud. That was the gist of it.
If I didn't constantly feed magic power into it, the clouds would stop moving and dissipate right away.
(The magic power is one thing, but holding both hands up for a whole hour is going to be brutal…)
No, wait.
A mage uses ingenuity and resourcefulness.
Did I really need to hold this energy-gathering pose for a full hour?
Right. This was a exam.
The point wasn't to hold the same pose for an hour—it was to create the clouds and then use composite magic to maintain them.
That was close.
I needed to use what I'd been taught.
"Let me think. I'm pretty sure I saw something on TV once about how clouds form…"
The cloud Roxy had created earlier was still lingering.
If I made a tornado spin sideways like that, I could create an updraft by warming the air from below.
And cool the top part too, to increase the speed of the updraft—
Before I knew it, I'd burned through about half my magic power.
Well, but at this point, it should easily last over an hour.
Satisfied, I walked into the dome Roxy had made, surrounded by the downpour of rain and thunder.
Roxy sat at the far end of the dark dome, holding Caravaggio's reins.
When she saw me, she gave a small nod.
"This dome will disappear in about an hour, so you'll be fine as long as the clouds don't vanish before then."
"Okay."
"Don't worry. Caravaggio is safe."
"Okay."
"Stop saying 'okay' and go control that thundercloud properly for a full hour!"
Hmm?
"Control it?"
"Hmm? Did I say something strange?"
"Is… control really necessary?"
"Of course it is. Even a Water Saint-class spell is still a spell. If you don't maintain it properly with magic power, the wind will scatter it."
"I already did something to keep that from happening, though…"
"Huh? ……!"
Roxy realized something and dashed outside the dome.
At the same time, the dome started crumbling apart.
Hey, hey! You need to maintain it properly!
The horse is going to get buried!
"Oh—right, right—"
I scrambled to take over the control and stepped outside.
Roxy was staring up at the sky, dumbfounded.
"…I see. A diagonal tornado pushing the clouds upward…"
There it was—my cumulonimbus cloud, growing endlessly larger.
Even I had to admit it was a solid piece of work.
A while back, I'd watched some special on TV that scientifically examined how supercells formed.
I didn't remember the details all that well, but I'd had a vague image of the process, and I'd built the spell around that. And lo and behold, something pretty convincing had come out of it.
"Rudy. You pass."
"Huh? But it's not been an hour yet?"
"That's not necessary. What you've done there is more than enough. Besides—can you dispel it?"
"Oh, sure. It'll take a little while, though."
I cooled the ground in a wide area, warmed the upper air, created downward air currents, and eventually used brute force with wind magic to scatter the clouds.
By the time it was over, both Roxy and I were soaking wet.
"Congratulations. You are now a Water Saint-class mage."
Drenched but radiant, Roxy made the declaration with a bright expression.
In that moment, a small flicker of omnipotence was born in my heart.
---
The next day.
Roxy stood in the entrance, dressed for travel, in an outfit identical to the one she'd worn two years ago when she first arrived.
Father and Mother looked about the same as when Roxy came, too.
Only my back had grown.
"Roxy-chan, you're still welcome to stay, you know. There are still so many dishes I haven't taught you…"
"That's right. Tutoring may be over, but you helped us during the drought last year too. The villagers would welcome you."
My parents tried to keep Roxy from leaving.
Apparently, while I'd been unaware of it, Roxy had gotten along well with both of them.
Well, she had nothing to do from afternoon to night every day, and if you do something every day, you naturally build connections.
She wasn't like a game heroine whose stats only changed when the protagonist took action.
"No. I appreciate the offer, but this experience has shown me just how powerless I am. I intend to travel the world for a while, honing my magical skills."
It seemed like being caught up to in rank by her student had hit her hard.
She had said before that she didn't want a pupil to surpass her.
"I see. Well… I'm sorry. My son seems to have shaken your confidence."
Paul, that's not the right thing to say.
"No—I should be the one thanking you for correcting my arrogance."
"You've got Water Saint-class magic under your belt now, so I wouldn't call it arrogance."
"Even without such spells, I've learned that with enough ingenuity, one can achieve even greater magic."
Roxy said that with a wry smile, then placed her hand on my head.
"Rudy.
I gave it my all, but I'm afraid I wasn't enough as your teacher."
"Not at all. Sensei taught me so many things."
"I'm glad to hear that… Oh, that reminds me."
Roxy reached inside her robe, fished around, and produced a pendant on a leather cord.
It was made of a green, lustrous metal, shaped like three spears interlocked.
"A graduation gift.
I didn't have time to prepare anything proper, so you'll have to make do with this."
"What is this…?"
"It's a charm of the Migurd clan.
If you ever run into a difficult demon, show them this and mention my name. They *might* be willing to cut you some slack."
"I'll treasure it."
"I said *might*, so don't place too much faith in it."
Roxy offered one last small smile before setting off on her journey.
I didn't realize I was crying.
She had given me so much.
Knowledge, experience, technique…
If I'd never met her, I'd still be sitting here with a magic textbook in hand, fumbling along as inefficiently as ever.
And above all, she had taken me outside.
I stepped outside.
That's all it was.
Just that.
Roxy took me outside.
That alone had meaning.
She'd only been in this village for two years.
She, who by all appearances wasn't particularly good with people.
She, who as a demon would have never gotten so much as a kind look from the villagers.
Not Paul. Not Zenith. It was Roxy who led me outside, and that mattered.
"Led me outside"—it was just crossing through the village.
But for me, stepping outside was undoubtedly a trauma.
And she healed it.
Just by crossing through the village.
She made my heart light again.
Helping me wasn't her goal.
But something inside me had undeniably broken free.
The day before, after coming home soaking wet, I turned back at the gate and took one step outside by myself.
All that was there was ground.
Just ground.
There was no trembling.
I could walk outside now.
She had done what no one else could.
What even my parents and siblings couldn't do in my previous life.
She did it for me.
Not with empty words, but with responsible courage.
I knew she hadn't done it for my sake.
She did it for herself.
I knew that too.
But I would respect her.
That small girl—I would respect her.
I swore it in my heart, and I watched until Roxy's figure disappeared from sight.
In my hands remained the staff and pendant she had given me.
And all the knowledge she'd left behind.
---
But then—
I remembered that I'd stolen Roxy's stained panties a few months ago and they were still in my room.
S-sorry about that.