The Everyday
The first month after I took up residence in Balrog’s village passed by in a flash. It was the most calm and tranquil period I’d ever experienced, and all it took was abandoning my duties as a Hero.
“Is something wrong, Koh?”
“Ah, no, nothing.” I’d stopped in my tracks without realizing it. Rei turned to face me from her wheelchair. I gave her a pat on the head to deflect my moment of distraction.
“Ahh...” Rei smiled and visibly relaxed. I’d learned over the course of the past month that she really liked having her head patted like that. Making somebody else happy was honestly really new to me, and I still wasn’t used to that idea.
I’d done a fair bit of helping out since I’d arrived, mostly with manual labor. Word about the boar I took down spread among the townsfolk overnight, and it wasn’t long at all before they started asking me to help carry around crops and materials or drive away wild animals that were threatening the fields. It felt like I was making myself useful, but I wasn’t occupied all the time. Not by a long shot. When I wasn’t busy helping people with their requests, I spent my time in a slow, leisurely manner—and I spent most of it with her.
“Sorry you’re stuck with someone like me all the time, Rei. I’m sure you must be bored.”
“Really, Koh? Have I ever said anything of the sort?” Rei puffed out her cheeks, making a big show of sulking. She was rather prone to somewhat childish mannerisms like that. “I’ll admit that you might not be a very good conversationalist, but that doesn’t keep you from trying your hardest to talk with me anyway! It’s really kind of you, and I appreciate it.”
“You’re giving me too much credit.”
“But that’s not all! Thanks to you taking care of me, my brother and Lyra have been spending a lot more time together recently.” She tilted her head up towards me again, smiling happily.
“What, are they in love?”
“Huh? You haven’t noticed?!”
“I asked a while back, but they denied it.”
Rei paused for a moment. “I’m certain that’s my fault.”
“Yours? Why?”
“Balrog’s always taken really good care of me, but all that time he spends on me is time he can’t spend on himself. Lyra’s always been considerate of our circumstances too—I have an inkling that she’s worried about stealing him away from me.”
“Have they ever said anything like that?”
“They didn’t have to. I can just tell.” Rei hung her head. Most likely, her lack of vision made it easier for her to discern people’s intent and emotions by other means—be it the words they chose or the way they said them.
“That makes sense...”
“But now it’s different! You’re here now, Koh!”
I hesitated. “But I’ve never had a family. I don’t really think I can do a good enough job to take your brother’s place.”
“‘Take his place’...? Koh, has anyone ever told you that you’re a bit dull?”
“No. Most people tell me I’m quite sharp, if anything.”
“Oh, you liar!” I wasn’t lying, though—or at least not intentionally. I was under the impression that I was quite sensitive when it came to stuff like detecting the presence of monsters in the vicinity. Rei started up her usual little sulking routine again, though a moment later, an idea seemed to hit her, and she hung her head once more. “Koh... Do you enjoy spending time with me like this?”
“Yeah.”
“You didn’t even have to think about it?!”
“People tell me that I’m so expressionless, it’s like I don’t have emotions at all, so this might be hard to believe, but I do know how it feels to enjoy something. I’m pretty sure that’s how I feel when I’m with you.”
“W-Well, now I feel all shy...” She hung her head yet again, but this time, she was blushing. She was precisely my opposite, in that respect. Every thought that went through her head showed instantly on her face.
It’s been said that it’s normal to have complicated feelings of admiration and jealousy towards people who have what you don’t, but I’d certainly never experienced any jealousy when I was with Rei. She made me feel calm and relaxed, if anything. Plus, the fact that she couldn’t see my expressions meant that she wasn’t bothered by the fact that I barely had any.
“I wish I could live like this forever,” I mumbled.
“Koh?”
“I was just thinking about how nice it’d be to live without any messy, complicated stuff to worry about. With Balrog, and Lyra, and you... Ah, we’re here.” Rei didn’t seem to have said all that she wanted to yet, but the walk from Balrog’s house to the village’s main gateway only took about ten minutes. I could only stretch it out for so long.
“Oh, hey, Koh!” shouted Balrog with a wave. “Thanks for walking Rei all the way out here.”
“Wait, you’re here?” I replied, confused. “But then, why did you leave Rei at the house...?”
“Oh, no—you’re serious, aren’t you?” interjected Lyra. “Sounds like Rei has it pretty rough...”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” For reasons I couldn’t fathom, Balrog and Rei both sighed. I was under the impression that I was the one who should’ve been exasperated, but it seemed I was misreading something. Right around the end of that brief exchange, I felt a tug on my sleeve.
“What is it, Rei?”
“Whoops, looks like we’re getting in the way. Let’s move along, Balrog,” said Lyra.
“Oh, the tragedy! I knew the day would come that my beloved little sister would treat me with indifference, but alas, now that the time has arrived I find my heart unprepared and broken!” Balrog collapsed dramatically onto Lyra’s shoulder, and I watched the two of them walk away until Rei tugged on my sleeve once more.
“Come on, Koh! Are you really going to ruin a rare chance for some privacy?”
“Yeah, you’re right. Shouldn’t be nosy—I definitely don’t want to bother them.”
She sighed. “Yes, I suppose you wouldn’t. Shall we head out as well?”
“Y-Yeah, sure.” Her reaction struck me as sort of weirdly unenthusiastic, but I moved on anyway, pushing her wheelchair towards the peddler’s wagon that was set up by the village’s entryway.
“Oh, Rei! Good to see you,” called the peddler. “And... Actually,” he started, looking me up and down, “I don’t believe we’ve met.”
“It’s been a while, yes,” replied Rei. “He only arrived recently, but he’s staying in our village for now.”
“Hmm, that so?” The peddler made no effort to pry into Rei’s rather evasive answer and replied with a smile. “You’re a real go-getter, huh, Rei? With company like him around, I guess you won’t be wanting this anymore?”
He pulled a book out from his carriage. Its cover was decorated with an illustration of a handsome knight and a woman wearing an apron. It didn’t have a title written on it, as far as I could see, but I surmised that it was an item she’d requested the peddler to find for her.
“O-Of course I do!”
“Ha ha ha, I’m just messin’ with you! You already paid for the thing, and I’m not in the business of cheatin’ my customers.” In contrast to his teasing, he was very gentle about setting the book down on her lap.
No sooner had we wrapped up our conversation and walked away than another villager strolled over to talk with him.
“Looks like he’s pretty popular around here,” I observed.
“Not many of the villagers here have to leave for work often, so he’s our only real means of bringing in things from the outside world.”
“So that book you got came from outside?”
“That’s right.” She opened the book up to show me, but its pages were perfectly plain and white. There wasn’t so much as a single word printed upon them. When the light hit them just right, though, I could see tiny bumps protruding from the paper’s surface.
“Oh, is that braille?”
“It is! I’m surprised you know about it.”
“I know it exists, anyway. This is my first time seeing it in person. I definitely can’t read it.”
“Hee hee! You’re a little mysterious, Koh.”
“I am?”
“From what I understand, braille’s incredibly rare! My brother’s the one who learned that there’s a form of writing that lets people like me read stories on their own, but there was no hope of finding a book written in braille anywhere near here. He had to ask the local peddler to keep an eye out for them in his travels.” She ran her finger across the first page. I could imagine the book’s story flowing into her mind with that single motion.
“To me, these books are the world.”
“Huh?”
“I’ve never been able to see. Not the beautiful flowers, not the clouds that float up in the blue sky, and not people... My brother and Lyra talk about the boar you caught sometimes, but I couldn’t see that either. But books are different... Their worlds are made up of words alone. I can enjoy them, just like a normal person. So, for me...”
Rei paused and smiled sadly, her words seemingly caught up inside her. Seeing her make that expression brought about yet another feeling I couldn’t quite explain—a painful, aching sensation somewhere within my chest.
“This story’s about a perfectly ordinary girl who falls in love with a valiant knight.” Rei began to speak once more. Maybe my silence made her feel uncomfortable. The content of the book was more or less exactly what I’d imagined, judging by the illustration on the cover. But Rei, of course, couldn’t see it.
“The girl thought of the village she grew up in as a cage, and herself as a bird trapped inside it. Ever since she was born, she saw the exact same sights, day after day, year after year. One day, the knight appeared before her by pure coincidence and took her with him into the outside world. That was how the previous volume went. This one’s supposed to continue the story and tell the tale of the adventures they have in the world he opened up for her.”
“You must be really excited to read about them.”
“I am! But, it also makes me feel wistful... That’s not a feeling I’ll ever be able to experience for myself.”
“Rei...” She hardly needed to say how it made her feel. Her tone of voice and her pained, almost tearful expression as she clutched the book to her chest made it all too clear. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from her.
Rei was a lovely girl. She was bright, cheerful, kind, and considerate to a fault...or at least that’s what Balrog repeatedly told me. In all honesty, I didn’t really have any standard by which to judge that sort of thing myself. That said, I also didn’t have any reason to disagree with him.
I wanted her to be happy. I’d barely spent any time with her at all, and yet I felt exactly the same as Balrog and Lyra. For all we knew, maybe a day would come when a dashing knight would arrive in the village and escort her into the outside world. Something about her made it feel possible. Surely that sort of happiness was waiting for her, someday in the future...
“Hey, Rei? Do you want to go out and explore the outside world with me one day?”
“Huh...?”
“Your world might still be pitch black, even after you leave this village, but... That’s why I’ll be there with you—I’ll see everything in your place, and I’ll tell you all about it. I’ll be your eyes.”
“You’ll be...my eyes...?” Frankly, my mouth was moving faster than my mind was. I only realized what I’d said after it had already popped out, and part of me had to wonder what on earth I was thinking.
I’d always thought that all I was capable of was swinging a sword and slaying my foes, nothing more, nothing less. But I hadn’t so much as touched a sword since I arrived in the village. There was more to my life there than manual labor—I had Rei, Balrog, and Lyra there with me. I didn’t need a special reason or excuse to spend time with them. I could live for something other than killing.
And if I didn’t have to live for war, I wanted to live for the sake of the girl who taught me that I could be more. Even if I did have to take up my sword and return to the battlefield someday, the fighting couldn’t last forever. And when it was over...
“I want to stay with you, Rei. You and everyone else.” I crouched down in front of her and took her hand in mine. The book she’d been holding plopped down on her lap, but she hardly seemed to notice. Even with her eyes closed, it felt like she was looking at me in stunned silence.
“What do you mean, ‘everyone else’? I think you just made my heart skip a beat!” She sounded a bit pouty, but her smile told a different story.
“M-My bad.”
“But it’s just like you to say it like that... It really did set my heart aflutter.” Rei stood up from her wheelchair just a bit too quickly. With nothing to support her, she teetered forward, almost losing her balance, but I caught her before she could fall.
“When I said that I can’t see anything...I might’ve been lying, just a little.”
“Lying?”
“I can’t explain how, Koh, but I just...see you, somehow. Even if I don’t know what you look like, I know that you’re here for me. I can feel your warmth.” She leaned forward, resting her face upon my chest. Her voice quivered as she poured her heart out, stringing her feelings together as carefully as she could, word by word. As each word seeped into me, they grew, kindling a warmth I could feel spreading throughout my very being.
“Koh, you’re my light.”
Me? Her “light”...?
“I love you, Koh.”
“Huh?”
“Even if I’ve only known you for a month, even if we’ve barely had any time to talk...I still love you.”
I knew what she meant. The love she spoke of was the same “love” depicted in the book she’d left resting atop her wheelchair.
I didn’t understand “love.” I knew that there are all sorts of forms of love—love for your friends, romantic love, familial love...too many to count, and I couldn’t for the life of me explain what the differences between all of them were. I was born without that intuitive understanding.
That’s why I didn’t know whether I could live up to the “love” that Rei had conveyed to me. The right words just wouldn’t come to me, and the very few that did stuck in my throat. I couldn’t spit them out.
But even so, the seeds that had been sown in my heart since I arrived in the village were beginning to sprout. They were growing, slowly but surely, and I was growing right along with them. Gradually, they were teaching me what it means to be human.
Before I realized what I was doing, I’d embraced her. Whether that was a deep-seated fragment of knowledge or reflex left over from the me who’d been erased, or an impulse prompted by whatever was growing inside me, I couldn’t say. And in that moment, I didn’t need to know. I knew I’d understand someday. As long as I could be with Balrog and Lyra... As long as I could be with Rei... I knew I would come to realize what the emotions budding within me were called.
I was sure of it.
