Chapter 1: Before the Original Story — Becoming the Ultimate Heroine Who Will Take #1

I reach out my hand.

Farther and farther.

No matter how far I stretch it, I can't reach that person.

I keep seeing that hallucination.

I understand that there's something deeply abnormal about it.

And yet, even if it is nothing more than a hallucination...

Even if I can't make out that person's voice or face clearly...

If it means I can see that person again, then just that alone fills me with happiness.

I've forgotten something incredibly important.

No.

Maybe I never had it to begin with.

And yet, I have this strange certainty.

That there was someone.

Someone incredibly important to me.

I can't remember who that person was.

I can't remember why they were important to me.

Even so...

I keep searching for that someone.

This feeling...

This is—

"BWAHAHA! ...Haa... haa... That was close! If I'd taken even a little longer to recover my memories, I'd have actually fallen head over heels! That was dangerous!"

I know.

I understand it now.

If I'd been left like that, "I"—or "me," rather—would have interpreted those implanted feelings as "romantic love" or "affection," and once that happened, there would've been no going back.

Even now that I've recovered "my" memories, just thinking about the protagonist-kun I've never even met makes my heart pound, my breathing grow ragged, and my body heat up.

This is bad.

I have absolutely no intention of discriminating against anyone, but I'm straight.

Well, I suppose there's a possibility that the protagonist could be a female protagonist.

Even so, I have absolutely no intention of letting this develop into a romantic relationship.

The moment I reach #1 in the popularity rankings, I'm going straight back to my original world.

I shouldn't do anything that leaves me with more attachment to this world than necessary.

All right.

I'm calming down.

"I see. So this is what Terra meant by my memories and consciousness becoming mixed together. How troublesome."

I'm both "me" and "I."

The memories of a human and the memories of a spirit are all jumbled together inside my head.

For example, when I try to remember the means of transportation from my previous world, memories of cars and trains come rushing back alongside memories of traveling through magic.

Conversely, when I try to remember what I eat in this world, memories of eating a giant wild boar raw come up alongside memories of "white rice and miso soup."

...Wait.

Now that I think about it, wasn't "I" ridiculously wild?!

What the hell was I doing?!

There's not a shred of heroine-like charm in this!

There's no way a woman this savage and reckless could ever become the #1 character in the popularity rankings.

"Thank goodness I was sent here before the original story began..."

For now, I'll slowly sort through my memories and integrate them later.

First, I'll at least settle on a single first-person pronoun.

The proper, refined "watashi" is certainly a good choice.

However, the masculine "ore" would also work surprisingly well in terms of giving me a distinctive personality.

Considering the character settings I'd created for "myself," there wouldn't be anything strange about having a male consciousness mixed in, either.

"To stand out even a little, I'll stick with 'ore.'"

Then there's the way I speak.

Ever since I woke up, my polite "watashi" speech and my casual "ore" speech have been taking turns coming out.

Of course, since "I" and "me" are completely mixed together at this point, neither style feels remotely out of place.

"I decided to start out with a mysterious-character routine, so I'll use the polite 'watashi' style."

Now, then.

Recalling, mixing, and organizing such a huge volume of memories is more exhausting than I'd expected.

First things first: I need food.

I guess I'll hunt a boar and just tear into the whole thing—

"No. Starting today, I need to learn how to cook properly. Eventually, I'll have to win the protagonist-kun over through his stomach, after all. If I cook for myself every day for the next five years, I should at least become somewhat competent. I have 'my' memories to work with, too."

"...So this is how it ended up."

Right now, I'm sitting there biting into a giant wild boar I'd hunted nearby—the sort of enemy my knowledge of the game tells me is called a magical beast—raw, without doing a single thing to cook it.

What else was I supposed to do?

"I" possessed magical knowledge and the minimum level of combat skills necessary to hunt.

But that's where it ended.

There was no way I could butcher a giant boar using nothing but my knowledge of home cooking in Japan.

I didn't even have salt or other seasonings.

And I had no idea how to use the plants growing around here as ingredients, since they weren't things I'd ever seen in Japan.

Although, to be fair, "I" had always just munched on everything raw.

The instincts of a wild spirit are truly terrifying...

"Even though I've eaten it before, it's annoyingly delicious."

Even after remembering the flavors of all the incredible dishes I'd eaten in Japan, I still genuinely think this.

It's not like the spirit's sense of taste is defective, either.

This boar is simply ridiculously delicious.

Somehow, that makes me even more annoyed.

Anyway, I'll sort through my two sets of memories while I eat.

Hmm, hmm.

Right, right.

"I" was doing that back then—

◇◇◇

"A spirit invasion! A spirit invasion! It's an unidentified spirit not found in any records!"

"Good heavens! What is that thing?! What does it want?!"

"We don't know! We don't know, but according to the people from the Church, it hasn't developed a sense of self yet!"

"Of all things, it had to be a newborn?! So negotiation is impossible, then?! How troublesome!"

"At this rate, the civilians will be harmed! We request permission to kill it!"

"No! There's no need for that! Something of that caliber will be child's play for me! Looking after a newborn is also the responsibility of a grandfather, after all!"

"But, Your Majesty! It's dangerous!"

"Do you know who you're talking to?! I am none other than Adventured, the Adventure King who traverses the entirety of the continent! Hahahahahahaha!! Now, let us settle this in honorable combattttttt!!"

"I remember now...

I attacked a human country..."

Well, the Adventure King was absurdly strong, so I really was casually beaten and thrown out of the country in one-sided fashion.

Fortunately, he dealt with the situation quickly, so there was no significant damage, including casualties.

Come to think of it, that old man is also an already-implemented character who eventually becomes an ally through the gacha.

He's the highest rarity, SSR.

Between his incredible performance and the fact that he's a free-spirited, charismatic old badass, he's an extremely popular character.

...What am I going to do when I eventually meet him again in the protagonist's faction?

Should I bring him some kind of gift beforehand?

Well, establishing a connection with a popular character before the original story begins was part of my plan anyway.

So depending on how you look at it, this might actually work out pretty well.

You see, characters have something called Special Lines.

If you own characters who have some kind of relationship with one another, you can hear special conversations related to their shared history.

So I'll keep barging into the Special Lines of popular characters and make sure everyone knows who I am!

I'll call it the "Ride the Tiger's Coattails Strategy"!

Of course, if the country I'd attacked had belonged to another king...

Say, the Wicked King, for example...

I probably wouldn't be alive right now.

I'd have been killed instantly, and my corpse would have ended up as experimental material for his personal mad scientist.

He might even have kept me alive for it...

Nope.

Let's stop thinking about that.

It's bad for my mental health.

I wonder what other things I might have screwed up?

I began looking back over the memories of my five years once again.

Armor Exclusive to "Tierra As"

『Eclipse Black Robe』　SR (Story Acquisition)

Effect: HP +1000 / VIT +30 / Increases the amount the skill gauge fills when equipped by a "Spirit" (Very Slight)

Description: A black robe worn by someone to conceal their race.

【Trivia】

The protagonist is completely fixated on swimsuits, but there are actually other styles as well. Among them is even something called "Wedding"... though...

Chronologically, it was scheduled to be implemented immediately after the protagonist's transfer, so he (she) doesn't know about it yet.