I apologize for the delayed updates due to various circumstances.
The manga adaptation of "Adventurer of Another World Reincarnation" has been updated on Magcomi today. There's also a prologue-like Chapter 0, so if you're interested, please give it a read.
"It's already been three years since this child was born..."
In the library, the child sat absorbed in a picture book—
with those tiger ears—
and watching that, I murmured to myself.
"Hmm?"
"It's nothing. More importantly, it's almost snack time, so go see your mother."
"Okay!"
The child replied enthusiastically, tossed the picture book onto the table, and ran off. I put it back where it belonged, then headed toward the dining hall, where the snacks should be ready.
When I arrived, the child had already started nibbling on the snacks, with her mother sitting right beside her... And as usual, Shiromaru, Solomon, and several others were seated around the child, angling for their own share of treats.
As we enjoyed a pleasant, leisurely time, an intruder suddenly burst into the dining hall.
"Yoshitsune~! Were you able to read the book all by yourself~?"
"Eek!"
The intruder was none other than—
the father—
of the child called Yoshitsune: Branca. Grinning with a face so fearsome it could make a crying child wail even harder, he tried to approach his daughter Yoshitsune—but the moment she saw that face, she squealed and hurriedly clung to her mother, Sana.
"There, there, it's okay~. His face might look scary, but he's not~."
With those confusing reassurances, Sana stroked Yoshitsune's back. The child had tears welling up in her eyes but was managing to hold them back. Branca, meanwhile, was completely dejected—merely smiling at his own daughter was enough to nearly make her cry.
"This happens all the time, but seriously, Branca, get used to it or wear a mask all the time!"
Amour, who was sitting across from Yoshitsune and stuffing snacks into her cheeks, pointed at Branca and said something like that.
Meanwhile, Yoshitsune moved away from Sana to put distance between herself and Branca, taking refuge behind me.
"Pfft!"
Amour laughed at Yoshitsune's actions. Amidst this, Branca rose unsteadily and approached Amour. Amour was distracted by Yoshitsune and didn't notice Branca's approach. Then—
"Hyaaaaaah!"
Branca firmly grasped the finger Amour had pointed at him and bent it backward. Amour, whose finger joint was twisted to its limit, screamed desperately and tapped the table.
"That's why Yoshitsune is scared of you."
Sana let out an exasperated sigh, criticizing Branca's actions. Branca looked up as if struck by a sudden realization and turned to Yoshitsune, but it was already too late—Yoshitsune had fled to the far corner of the room to put even more distance between them.
"N-No, that's not it, Yoshitsune!"
Branca didn't even know what was wrong, but he desperately tried to clear up the misunderstanding. However, before he could get close, Sana caught him.
"You stay outside for now."
"Uh... yes..."
Branca, driven out by Sana, left the dining hall looking utterly dejected. Yoshitsune checked two or three times that Branca was gone before moving closer to Sana. Seeing Yoshitsune like this, Amour grinned despite the pain in her finger.
This Yoshitsune was born right before the tournament held the year after I won the championship.
Her appearance resembled neither Amour (nor Sana or Hana), nor did she look like Branca (the one most relieved about that was Amour, who often brought it up until she received a punch from Branca. Incidentally, the one who brought it up second most was Hana). So who did she look like? It was said she resembled Amour's grandfather, who was also Hana and Sana's father—a man named "Crow." Crow was Grandpa Kei's (the Bandit King) real son, but his appearance and personality were apparently more like his mother's: a gentle man. By the way, I was the one who named Yoshitsune.
Why me? Because when Branca and the others went to meet me as I returned from the capital to the south, she was born right then. I joined the naming discussion, but no names could be agreed upon by Branca and Sana. Just as joke names (mostly Amour's suggestions) began to surface, Sana said, "She looks like her grandfather, so maybe a name related to him would be nice." That was the moment the name "Crow" popped into my head first, and the name that came to mind was "Yoshitsune."
When I muttered that name quietly, Sana overheard it, and for some reason, it was added to the candidates. When asked why, I quickly made up a reason on the spot: "Playing on Crow's name as 'Hardship,' I wished for this child to 'always have good things happen to her,' so... 'Yoshitsune.'" For some reason, Hana, Sana, and even Branca nodded, and it was decided to name her "Yoshitsune."
Why did the three nod? Because Crow wasn't the martial type like Grandpa Kei (although Grandpa Kei wasn't purely martial either; he could handle administrative tasks too, but from an outsider's perspective, his physique and stories made him seem completely martial). Apparently, Crow struggled with comparisons when it came to leading the clan.
Well, once he started building and governing the town of Nanao, the clan members came to appreciate Crow's gentle nature, and no one dared look down on him anymore. Still, knowing that history, the three thought "Yoshitsune" was a perfect fit for a great-granddaughter who looked just like Crow.
And while all this was going on, Robot Honorary Viscount had already been handed a notice of discharge and kicked out, and Amour was also thrown out the moment he threw out that ridiculous name.
Whether it was because Yoshitsune had heard all these stories from Sana and the others, she had grown attached to me. On the other hand, though, she apparently had an aversion to her real father, Branca—or rather, she thought of him as someone terrifying.
The reason for that, I believed, lay in the "Martial Arts Tournament" that Yoshitsune had been watching every single year since she was born.
In the tournament the year Yoshitsune was born, Branca placed second in the Individual Battle, second in the Pair Battle, and second in the Team Battle. He teamed up with Amour for the pair event, and joined forces with the top fighters from the southern region for the team event.
Under normal circumstances, he might have been expected to win at least one of those. But in the Individual Battle, I took first; in the Pair Battle, Grandpa and I did; and in the Team Battle, Orasion—Grandpa plus Amour—was the crowd favorite, leaving Branca as the runner-up in every single event. And the tournament results went exactly as the popularity polls predicted. For reference, the following year's tournament saw him place third in the Individual Battle, second in the Pair Battle, and sit out the Team Battle entirely.
Then, this year, I was unable to compete in the Pair Battle, so Branca and Amour's pair became the top favorite—but they failed to place. The Individual Battle once again ended in third for him, and the Team Battle also resulted in third, competing with the top southern fighters.
The reason these results earned Branca Yoshitsune's fear was that there was a problem with his fighting style.
Branca was originally the brawling type—hot-blooded and someone who genuinely enjoyed combat. On top of that, he had poured every ounce of his fighting spirit into the tournament, determined to show Yoshitsune his best side.
As a result, during the tournament, Branca radiated an aura so intense that his opponents might lose the will to fight just from facing him. That translated into his matches as well—they were brutally one-sided beatdowns that made you feel sorry for the other side. This was true whether it was the Pair Battle or the Team Battle.
Of all the competitors in these tournaments, Branca was probably the one who made the biggest name for himself—in the sense that he spread sheer terror. And yet, he still lost to me in each of the finals.
The matches were actually quite close in terms of content, but looking purely at the results, it was a complete defeat. After all, it was three fights and three losses.
Carrying that frustration into the next tournament, he fell to me in the Individual Battle semifinals. He lost to me and Grandpa in the Pair Battle finals. And the Team Battle was skipped because the other members couldn't assemble.
Then, in the tournament he challenged with the conviction that "this year is the year," a chance finally arrived: I wouldn't be competing in the Pair Battle. It wasn't that I had sat out specifically for Branca's sake—rather, just before the Preliminary, Grandpa had thrown out his back. Naturally, swapping partners just minutes before the start wasn't permitted, so it ended up being a regrettable retirement. Apparently, a flood of complaints poured in to the tournament organizers over this, and the fallout reached the royal family—Grandpa got an earful from the Kings, especially Ernest.
The tournament held under those circumstances saw Branca lose in the semifinals to a knight clad head to toe in pitch-black armor. The knight had already been a hot topic since the Preliminary, but being unknown and fighting in a rather unremarkable style had everyone in a frenzy over the massive upset—except I knew the person well, and through Appraisal, I already knew their true identity.
That identity belonged to Din, known as the Black Lion and said to be the strongest knight in the country. Apparently, he had said, "My blood stirred for the first time in a while, so I forced myself to enter."
When Branca regrouped and entered the Pair Battle, he and Amour naturally became the crowd favorites again. Branca was disappointed that I wouldn't be competing, but he still psyched himself up, feeling that his chance had finally come... only for the opponents they drew in the first round of the main bracket to be terrible.
Those opponents were a duo calling themselves the Tiger Mask and the Masked Knight... well, their true identities were Hana and Chris, of course. Branca and Amour had had a vague idea since the Preliminary, but they were riding high on the belief that their moment had arrived, and they were caught completely off guard, suffering a decisive defeat. In terms of the actual fight, Chris pinned down Amour while Hana took out Branca, and then they ganged up two-on-one to pummel Amour. The pair advanced straight to the finals and seized the victory.
Then, in the Team Battle, they drew Orasion in the semifinals and lost—a convergence of bad luck and carelessness. If they had realized the opponents' true identities beforehand in the Pair Battle, the outcome might have gone the other way...
"So then, what were you doing there?"
With Branca having left, the atmosphere was gradually returning to a pleasant one, centered around Yoshitsune, who had resumed snack time. But two people radiated a very different mood. I directed my question to the woman who had been drinking since the middle of the day—one half of this year's Pair Battle champions, Chris. Incidentally, the other was Amour, who was still clutching the finger Branca had injured and grimacing in pain. The finger bone might actually be damaged, so I'd better cast some healing magic on it later. Until then, she could chalk it up to a lesson well earned and reflect on what she did.
"There's nobody decent, I tell you! I thought I'd be swamped with offers if I won the championship, but not a single good prospect has come my way!"
"Again with this..."
The reason Chris had participated in this tournament was, quite simply, to find a boyfriend. Apparently, over the past few years, one colleague after another had gotten married, and she was steadily approaching the title of the oldest unmarried woman in the Knight Order. As it happened, the current record holder was a woman in her forties, but she didn't count because she'd been widowed. There were also four or five women ranked above Chris who were still single, but every single one of them already had a partner.
"So why is it always old men who come up to me?! Even when someone my age does show up, they're either got a terrible reputation, or they're after my money, or they're just looking for someone to take care of their parents... They're all absolutely hopeless!"
"At least nobody's approached you for your body... I mean— how rude of me. In the first place, there was nothing particularly worth boasting about, was there?"
As I stood there, torn about how to respond, Aina appeared from behind my side and said something she absolutely should not have said to Chris... Well, on purpose, of course.
"You're in the same boat, Aina! What gives you the right to talk down to me?"
"How rude. I have more going for me than you do."
"That hasn't changed anything! And you don't have a boyfriend either!"
"...Hmph."
At Chris's accusation, Aina scoffed. Seeing that, Chris stared at her with an expression of utter disbelief.
"W-Wait... you...?"
"Exactly like this," Aina said.
What Aina showed her was a ring, worn on the ring finger of her left hand.
"Aina..."
Chris's voice grew quiet. Aina, displaying a rare look of smug satisfaction on her face...
"No matter how desperate you are for a boyfriend, the idea of buying yourself an engagement ring is just... Nooo..."
Chris was completely floored.
"Even I wouldn't stoop that low... Aina, you're exhausted. Blargh!"
Before Chris could finish her sentence, Aina smashed the serving tray she'd been holding straight into Chris's face.
"That one was definitely your fault, Chris... By the way, it's true that Aina has a boyfriend. I promised not to say his name, but I've met him."
Before Chris could fly into a rage, I preemptively blurted out the fact that Aina had a boyfriend.
"N-No way... The goddess is dead... Or was she just as useless as I thought..."
Chris collapsed to the floor with an expression of utter despair... Actually, I felt like she was using that phrase wrong, and besides, if she really was the Goddess of Love who ruled over romance, she wouldn't just die. If anything, my little announcement might have turned her into an enemy.
Ignoring Chris, who lay sprawled on the floor as though dead, and Aina, who was prodding Chris with a triumphant look on her face, I decided to go back to my snacks.
Incidentally, Aina's boyfriend was someone named Din. Apparently, because of their age gap and differences in rank, they hadn't been able to take the step toward marriage. And it wasn't just Chris who was shaken by the news that Aina had a boyfriend — Aura, who had been eavesdropping from a distance, was also affected. For some reason, Jeanne too.
"Thanks for the meal."
Amid all this, Yoshitsune finished his snacks and headed off toward the library.
"Come to think of it, how long are you planning to stay this year?"
"Let me see... I'm thinking of heading back south within the next week. I want to show Yoshitsune all sorts of things on the way home, and I also have my sister's championship celebration to attend."
Ever since she had gotten to know Hana and the others, she had said we should stay at her place whenever we visited the Royal Capital. Last year and the year before, we'd stayed for nearly a month after the tournament, but this year, since Hana had won the pairs championship, she could only stay for about half that time.
Just to be sure, I asked whether she wasn't going to bring Chris along as her pair partner, but apparently, since Chris was a member of the Royal Guard, it wasn't easy for her to just leave alone and go to another noble's territory on a whim. Chris herself had told me that.
(If she's racked up that kind of track record, she should be able to find a boyfriend in the south easily enough...)
In the south, where people tended to favor the capable, a tournament champion would be treated like an idol. And if that person had partnered with their very own top fighter, it would be even more so.
"Chris really is oblivious in some ways. If she genuinely wanted a boyfriend, she'd have her pick down south right now."
Maybe Aina had read my thoughts, because she was looking at Chris the way you'd look at a hopeless case. Incidentally, Aura — who had received more of that particular gaze than anyone so far — was still frozen solid.
"I'm back!"
While I was observing Aina and Chris sprawled on the floor, a voice called out from the entryway.
"Looks like Amy's back. Which means the other two are probably with her."
Almost the moment I murmured that, the dining hall door burst open. But it wasn't Amy who had opened it — it was Luna, who had been accompanying Amy.
"Lady Luna, that's unseemly."
Aina scolded her thus, but Luna didn't seem to care much. Lately, she'd been picking up some of the King and Lyle's more troublesome habits, which had Maria and the others lamenting.
"Big brother, I'm hungry~"
Luna came trotting over and made a beeline for the snacks sitting on the table.
"Change your clothes and wash your hands first."
I moved the plate of snacks out of Luna's reach and admonished her. Though she grumbled the whole way, she headed off to the room she'd claimed for herself.
"Master, we just got back. The request was a success."
"That's good to hear. There are snacks, so go change first. You too, Tida."
With that, Amy and Tida also headed off to their respective rooms.
Amy and Tida had reached the age where they could formally register as adventurers this year, so they were taking on requests within reason. Well, Amy aside, whenever Tida took on a request, someone from the Royal Guard would go to the Guild ahead of time and select only safe requests with clearly identified clients. Tida disliked the arrangement, but it had been a condition imposed by Caesar-sama and the others when she wanted to become an adventurer, so she grudgingly went along with it.
On another note regarding adventuring matters close to home, Jin and I had risen to S-rank, Branca to A-rank, and Amour to B-rank.
Jin had his tournament results over the past few years and his track record as an adventurer, plus the fact that the Dawn Sword had reached what was thought to be
the very bottom
floor of Seigen's dungeon—all taken into account for the evaluation. Branca and Amour also received their rank-ups in recognition of their tournament results and adventuring activities to date.
As for me, I was recognized for maintaining my undefeated streak in the current tournament, my past defeat of the Dragon Zombie, the subjugation of an Earth Dragon three years ago, the defeat of a Fleet Dragon two years prior, and the conquest of an undiscovered dungeon.
The Fleet Dragon had been encountered by chance when I went to visit Nanao, and I defeated it solo. The undiscovered dungeon was found last year when I visited Nanao again on another request—I spotted a dungeon roughly ten floors deep in the mountainside a short distance away and conquered it on the spot.
The dungeon was relatively young—though still thought to be several decades old—so there weren't particularly strong Monsters, and the boss Monster on the lowest floor, a humanoid Golem, was nothing special. However, because it was an undiscovered dungeon, the mineral resources were completely untouched, causing a rapid economic boom in the southern region—especially Nanao—whose ripple effects spread all the way to the Royal Capital. That became the decisive factor in my promotion to S-rank. It was a rather rapid ascent, but if they didn't promote me, it would hold up the rank-ups of other adventurers, so each time I produced a notable feat, my rank kept climbing.
"Snaaaacks~!"
As expected, Luna was the first one back. Her height had reached the mid-150s in centimeters, and over three years her appearance had matured—except in the chest department—but her personality hadn't changed much. If anything, she'd become even more like the King and Lyle. Perhaps because of that, every time Maria and Isabella met with me, they'd consult me on whether there was some way to train—er, educate her into becoming a proper young lady. Well, every time they asked, I told them "It's impossible, give up," but the two of them couldn't seem to let it go.
"Luna, you're going to get Mom and Grandma angry again!"
Next to return was Tida, who had grown into a handsome man who looked like a younger version of Caesar-sama. His height was approaching 170 cm, and the gap between him and me (my current height is in the high 170s, for reference) was shrinking—so much so that I'd probably be overtaken soon. Lately, his good looks made him popular at the academy and at gatherings of nobles, but apparently he still only had eyes for Amy and never gave other women a second glance (according to Luna). As a result, at a meeting of the royal family excluding Tida and Luna, the topic came up of having Amy adopted by some noble house and engaged (according to Lyle). For the record, the two people who leaked that information to me were each scolded by Tida and Maria, respectively.
"Sensei, here's a souvenir for you."
The last to return was Amy, who was clutching a basket full of mushrooms gathered from the forest where she had gone on her commission. The last time she had brought some back, they had all been poisonous, but this time every single one was an edible variety, so it seemed she had been studying diligently since then.
Amy's height had grown to just under 160 cm, but her chest was apparently on the larger side for her age, and Tida would occasionally sneak glances. Luna seemed quite jealous of this development, and lately she'd been eating nothing but dairy products, which frequently upset her stomach. For the record, Amy herself seemed to be aware of Tida's affection, but at this point she apparently thought of him as more of a close friend (according to Luna). Incidentally, Luna, who leaked this information to me, was scolded by Tida.
"Thanks. It's still early in the season, but these look perfectly edible. Let's use them for tonight's dinner."
While mentally flipping through mushroom recipes, I accepted the mushrooms from Amy. Shiromaru and Solomon, who had come to investigate the contents of the basket at the smell of food, apparently determined they weren't something that could be eaten immediately and switched their attention to Amy and the others' snacks instead.
"Tenma-sama, Albert-sama and the others have arrived."
While I was having Jeanne and Aura help me sort and prep the mushrooms, Aina came to let me know that Albert's group had arrived. They weren't the kind of guests I needed to stand on ceremony for, so I had her bring them straight to the dining hall—and it turned out it wasn't just the usual three idiots. Behind Albert and his group were three associates, figures who had become a familiar sight around here lately.
Three years have passed since the last installment. Tenma had officially become an adventurer, and the seasons were just about to complete a full cycle, so this felt like a fitting milestone.
With three years gone by, there had been various changes—the growth of Tenma, Amy, and the rest of the younger group, Aina and Din getting together, and so on. Jeanne, Aura, and Amour, however, still looked pretty much the same as before.
I hope you'll continue to enjoy *Otherworld Transmigrator Adventurer* on both the Narou version and the manga version going forward.