The Tanaka Family Reincarnates - Chapter 3
Chapter 3 – Safe
“What is Japanese? Milady,” Martha asked with a strange look.
“It’s a foreign word. Maybe from the Far East?”
I answered halfheartedly, because on this world’s map, the East is an unexplored land. Even the most expensive maps did not depict the whole expanse of this world.
“More importantly, are Father and the others okay?”
Martha had said earlier that they were safe, but I wanted to make sure.
“Other than yourself, Young Lady, everyone regained their consciousness in an hour and carried on with life as usual the next day. It seems that everyone only ate a little… Young Lady is the only one who ate the entire thing…”
She’s implying that I am a glutton. But they were matsutake mushrooms, you know? In my past life, I didn’t eat them often. Even if I didn’t have those memories, I would eat matsutake by instinct!
“But everyone is being a little strange… They all have a perplexed look on their face, even though they should be accustomed to Young Lady’s eccentricities.”
Hey Martha! What do you mean, ‘eccentricities’!
Martha was always so cold… Couldn’t she be more gentle, since I had just recovered?
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Young Lady will be 12 years old this year. Even though you will live in the royal capital from next year onwards, Martha is worried! Please stop having interests in insects, or mushrooms, or insects-“
Crap! She was nagging me again.
This would take a while… Martha hates insects too much.
Upon my uncle (father’s younger brother)’s graduation from the Royal University, our family took the opportunity to shift away from governing the county[1] and live in the royal capital. Our land was on the borders, so it took 15 days by carriage to travel to the royal capital.
[T/N 1: It is implied here that Emma’s uncle takes over the governing duties, freeing Emma’s family to settle in the capital.]
Our main industry was silk goods, from sericulture to weaving, so we produced silks of fine quality. There had been changes in the royal capital’s fashion trends, and silks from Count Stuart’s Palace were being praised as the highest quality products within the clothing industry.
Thus, I, who was born and raised in this county, was good friends with silkworms. It’s not my fault. The usual excuse floats to my mind.
“Besides silkworms, doesn’t Young Lady also collect caterpillars, centipedes, spiders, and spiders?”
I stayed quiet… why mention spider twice?! Does Martha have some kind of grudge against spiders? … It didn’t make sense.
In our backyard, there’s an insect shed, commonly known as ‘Emma’s Shed’. It is too big and too imposing a building to be called a shed, however.
Other than for the purpose of accommodating Emma’s hobby of researching silkworms, the shed was built to collect and breed any insect that could spew out thread, as well as all kinds of insects that she found.
To Emma, it was a hobby that she enjoyed privately, but as the servants (mainly Martha) started complaining, and the scale of her research gradually expanded, Emma’s father, who doted on Emma, had it built a year ago.
“Huh, I haven’t taken care of my treasures (insects) for ten days.”
I started getting agitated at this shocking fact… There was enough feed to last 2, 3 days, but if it had been 10 days, they might have started eating each other. Silkworms were in a separate research room, but I kept other insects in the same room.
I wonder if that beautiful violet spider is okay…? That spider, found in the forest two weeks ago, was my favorite. I remembered that I used to walk around and show it to everybody.
“Young Lady…”
Martha’s eyes looked even colder than before. I won’t ever forget the way Martha had screamed when I showed her the spider.
A knocking sound interrupted Martha’s nagging, and Martha went to open the door. Such convenient timing, it must have been…
“Nee-sama[2], I heard that you had awakened, so I came to see you.”
[T/N 2: Sibling terms used to show respect will be preserved in the Japanese form for convenience, i.e. Elder Brother – nii/onii-san (san may be replaced by chan, sama or other), Elder Sister – nee/onee-san ]
The one who had unexpectedly appeared at the door was… an ethereally beautiful young boy. No, that’s my younger brother, William. He has blond hair and purple eyes… which were inherited from Father. There was a big insect cage in his hand.
“I’m sorry, I had completely forgotten about the insects… while nee-sama was unconscious, the silkworms survived since they were in a different room, but in the room with all the other insects, only this spider remained…”
It’s too late, my treasures have already been eaten by my other treasure… Grasshoppers, praying mantis, crickets, centipedes, millipedes, pill bugs, et cetera, a great battle royale must have unfolded between them… I wished I could have observed that great event.
“Uuh… It’s a pity, but there’s no helping it…”
Inside the insect cage, the violet spider moved with a rustling sound. This was my favorite child.
The victor of the battle royale was this kid, huh.
Is it just me…? It’s a little? …kind of…? I feel like it has grown so much bigger.
Eight round pupils(?) were looking this way.
Yeah, you did nothing wrong. Sorry that I couldn’t feed you…
I took the insect cage, wanting to assess the spider’s condition.
Because the spider had always been treated affectionately, when it saw Emma’s face, it approached Emma too.
“Eeeeek!”
Upon seeing the spider come out of the cage, Martha ran away… It seemed she would not return for a while. As usual, Martha just can’t understand how great the spider is.
Even so, younger brother… To use your sister’s treasure to clear people out, what a guy!
Well, …to say clearing people out… more precisely, chasing Martha away…
William had been looking this way with a searching gaze for a while now…
I want to say it, but I can’t. I want to hear it, but I won’t. I want to know, but I don’t want to know. Unable to decide, I hesitate.
The thought that I had, maybe… they, too, were thinking the same. William held my gaze and opened his mouth like he had realized something.
“… Mina-nee?”
Emma realized it too and said, “…Peita?”
Then, in unison,
” “Have we reincarnated into another world ?!!” “
???
Author’s note : The disappointing younger brother appears.