Re:Zero Kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu

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Oooooh I"ve been waiting for this chapter ever since I first started doing Arc 6!!! >_

I definitely plan to finish this chapter, but whether I"ll do more of Arc 6 will depend on whether we get closer to Rem waking up once the next few j.a.panese chapters come out ❤

-TC

――A choice, the cruellest choice, was eating away at Natsuki Subaru.

There was the sound of something charring in the depths of his chest.
Perhaps, it was his humanity, perhaps, it was his faith in himself, or perhaps it was his feelings towards "Natsuki Subaru", or all of these things, all of them burning.

Pinning the girl beneath him with his hands around her neck, receiving her mocking jeers, Natsuki Subaru was on the precipice of deciding his, and "Natsuki Subaru"s, fate.

[Subaru: ――――]

He couldn"t hear his heartbeat. He was panting, but his lungs weren"t moving. He was driven into a corner, but not a drop of cold sweat appeared on his forehead.
Surely, that was because Natsuki Subaru"s body wasn"t really here in this place.

Perhaps it was the book he read, it must"ve sent his spirit here without his body―― his mind churned over such irrelevant thoughts to escape the reality before him.
And so, with his mind drifting off into the distance, a brief calmness returned to Subaru.
But this time, this s.p.a.ce, and this person before him would not grant Subaru this respite.

[Louis of Gluttony: Say, what will do, Onii-san?]

The girl beneath him looked up at the rigid, hesitating Subaru and let out a s.a.d.i.s.tic sneer.
With her gaze peering into Subaru"s black irises, she stuck out her tongue as if to lick his eyeball.

[Louis of Gluttony: Pinning a helpless little girl beneath you with your hands on her delicate neck, doesn"t it make you excited? Or, judging by Onii-san strength, maybe you"ve already done this countless times before?]

[Subaru: ――gh]

[Louis of Gluttony: You"re trembling, a~aah that"s so cute. Will you really be able to make such a super super important decision in this state?]

Tilting her head with her back to the floor, Louis gave Subaru"s wrist a kiss. Her blood-curdling gestures, her impa.s.sioned gaze, and her unsparing words all reminded Subaru of yet another scene.
It was a scene, a cruel scene, that Subaru had witnessed once before. ――Except this time, it was in reverse: No longer from Subaru"s perspective, but from the perspective of the girl he faced then.

It was Subaru pinning down himself, his face wicked, his stranglehold tightening.
It was exactly the same scene as when "Natsuki Subaru" strangled Meili to death――

[Subaru: Uu]

――The moment he realized the resemblance, Subaru"s entire body and face tensed.

[Louis of Gluttony: ――So, you have done this before?]

[Subaru: Quit! Quit joking around……]

[Louis of Gluttony: I"m not joking. Or rather, Onii-san"s the one who"s not being serious? You should be serious, be frank, be honest, and love yourself a little more, Onii-san]

[Subaru: ――――]

[Louis of Gluttony: Yeah, that"s it. You should love yourself. Come on, love. ――Just like all the people Onii-san cares about want you to, you should love yourself, Onii-san, go on]

She spilled these shallow words in her flirting tone.
Did she really want him to listen to her? Or did she lack the ability to sympathize with others all along? Was it intentional, or genuine? Was she mocking him or comforting him?
It was impossible to tell. Everything about Louis Arneb was unreadable.

Unreadable, utterly unreadable.
In Louis" own words, her words are like fallen leaves precariously resting on a rippling water"s surface. All of them are arbitrary and twisted, and only by severing the illusion might one see them as they are.
Or actually, to be putting any weight on what she confided in him is, in itself, dangerous.

[Subaru: What you…… said earlier, do you have any proof?]

[Louis of Gluttony: Proof?]

[Subaru: You said if I restore "Natsuki Subaru", my current self will vanish, do you have any proof of that……!]

[Louis of Gluttony: Nope. No. Nah. Nada. None. Not at all. Never. We said no already, right? So absolutely not. …….Does that make you feel better?]

[Subaru: ――――]

[Louis of Gluttony: We"re going around in circles, Onii-san. Of course, we can"t talk about anything we don"t know. If me and Onii-chan and Onii-sama die, does that really mean everything we ate will come spilling back out? ――Honestly, I"ve never given back something I ate before, so I don"t know. I mean, it"s already eaten, after all]

"Aaah", Louis opened her mouth, revealing her sharp canines and her crimson tongue, as if urging Subaru to look into her throat to see that there was nothing inside.
Memories of other people, and what other people remember about you: The act of stealing, "Eating", those memories probably wouldn"t leave any physical trace behind.
Yet the phrase "Eaten" left Subaru with an incredibly heavy impression.

[Louis of Gluttony: So what will it be, Onii-san?]

Louis asked Subaru once more.
All the while, Subaru"s hands remained wrapped around Louis" neck. He didn"t apply any force, nor did he loosen his grip. Simply kneeling there, doing nothing, Subaru began to question his own existence.

[Subaru: Gh, kh……h]

Death is scary. Terrifying.
But this was a different terror from the four “Return by Deaths” Subaru had experienced thus far.
This time, Subaru must wager very soul upon this question, and the loss of his existence hangs on this balance of death.

Although, that"s what "Death" was supposed to be in the first place.
When you die, you lose your conscious existence, with no chance for redos.
So Subaru doesn"t really have the right to complain when he"s being granted redos to fix his mistakes.
"To be, or not to be" The very fact that he was given an option was already a luxury.

But still, this is his own life.
Being made to choose whether or not to extinguish his own existence, Subaru felt his heart ripping with every pa.s.sing second.

[Subaru: ――――]

Subaru had died four times already in this Parallel World. Each shortly after the last.
Tossed into this unfamiliar world in front of strangers he"d never met before, he was hounded by inescapable calamity until he was chased into death.
The total length of time he"d spent conscious couldn"t have been more than two days.

So short. So short a time. ――And yet, outside of the two days spent in this Parallel World, Natsuki Subaru had lived for seventeen years in his original world.

His father. His mother. His friends, few as they were, and as ambiguous as their relations.h.i.+ps may have been, would nevertheless greet him when they met. Thinking further back, he"d had some good playmates in elementary and junior high, as well as plenty of familiar neighbors.
Unfortunately, he could never manage anything well. And Subaru"s life was rife with problems.
But in spite of these problems, he had abundant time to correct them. Although it never came down to life or death, Subaru fought hard on his own grand stage.

The road he took to get here, those experiences, and those acc.u.mulated memories, must he give them all up?

When "Natsuki Subaru" returns, all of those would still be there. But this self, who is even now reminiscing on those times, would be gone.

His promise to Ram, his oath to Meili, what Echidona"s forgiveness marked within his heart, Julius" call to arms, Beatrice"s affection and trust, and Emilia"s――

――Would this self, who had fallen in love with Emilia, disappear?

[Subaru: Don"t……]

This realization, without the slightest hyperbole, was ripping Subaru"s body to shreds.
A crack appeared on his cheek, and spider-web patterns spread from his wrists wrapped around Louis" neck. It didn"t hurt, and no blood seeped from the wounds. Incredibly, within the cracks, there was only dark abyss. No flesh nor bone, but only a bottomless, unnatural darkness.

It would seem that his prediction was correct. This isn"t his physical body.
Subaru"s real body isn"t here. This body isn"t real. It"s but a projection of his emotions, and that"s why it is crumbling and collapsing.

The cracks began to widen, and their surfaces began to fall.
Surely, this is nothing more than an impostor"s sh.e.l.l named "Natsuki Subaru" wrapped around Natsuki Subaru.
Flake by flake, it fell away, while his facade fell with it.

[Subaru: I don"t, I don"t, I don"t…… I don"t want…… to]

[Louis of Gluttony: Right. Naturally]

He shook his head in denial, desperately rejecting the terror of his impending death―― or rather, his fear of irrevocable loss.
Why must he lose everything now? When he"d only just realized that he"d fallen in love with the one he loved.

[Subaru: I don"t……]

[Louis of Gluttony: Mm, mm. Yes. I understand. I know. I hear you]

[Subaru: I don"t want…… to]

[Louis of Gluttony: It"s Onii-san"s life, after all. Why should you hand it over to someone else?]

[Subaru: I, want to…… stay, with everyone……]

He wanted to stay with everyone for a little longer.
He loved them. He had grown to love them. It"d only been two days, and more than once he"d been consumed by doubt, suspected them, wanted to kill them, and wanted to run away from them.
But Subaru had grown to love them nonetheless. And right now, he loved them all.

When he was with them, they treated him as someone precious, and, if this continued long enough, perhaps he"d even grow to love his loathsome self some day.
Thinking this way, he began to think ahead.

Subaru, who all his life had been looking backwards, finally perceived a ray of sunlight ahead.
Why must he part with it now?
To do such a thing is――

[Subaru: ――I don"t want to]

[Louis of Gluttony: Right. That"s right. ――So, what do you want to do?]

[Subaru: ……I, want to be me]

[Louis of Gluttony: Yes, Onii-san is Onii-san. There"s nothing wrong with that. You"ve taken it. It"s like a game of musical chairs, and the one seated in the chair at the end is King]

[Subaru: ――――]

[Louis of Gluttony: Defeat your adversary, push him away. Acknowledge yourself. Acknowledge your existence. Proclaim at the top of your voice: "I am the real me!" ――That"s how it should be!]

Directly beneath him, close enough to feel each other"s breaths, Louis howled.
As if to swallow him―― no, literally moving to swallow him, she bit down upon his wrist, carving her admonition into Subaru alongside vivid pain.

Gazing into his wavering black pupils, Louis Arneb screamed.

[Louis of Gluttony: Acknowledge it! ――To Onii-san, "Natsuki Subaru" is nothing but an all-familiar stranger!]

She barked for him to acknowledge himself.
Don"t do something so ridiculous as dying for someone else.
Why? Why should anyone sacrifice their life for somebody else?

――After all, it isn"t him, it"s an impostor pretending to be him: Someone he must expunge from his world if he wants to be with the people he loves.

To give away all of those precious, irreplaceable memories of the days he spent with everyone.
Can there be anything more stupid than that?

[Louis of Gluttony: So, kill him! Slay him! Murder him! Slaughter him! Execute him! Eliminate him! Exterminate him! End him! Finish him! Destroy him! Annihilate him to nothing!]

[Subaru: Natsuki… Subaru……]

[Louis of Gluttony: ――Because Onii-san is the one and only, irreplaceable Natsuki Subaru!]

[Subaru: ――h]

The one and only, irreplaceable Natsuki Subaru.

The one who took Beatrice"s hand, who bickered with Ram, who made Meili pout, who balked at Shaula"s frankness, who smiled with Echidona over their random banters, who trusted Julius with his back, who received Patrasche"s unconditional love, and who earned the right to exist at Emilia"s side.
If all of these belonged to that "Natsuki Subaru", then Subaru must kill that man.

[Subaru: ――――]

Suddenly, something blurred into his vision.
His spirit was directly influencing his body, and he could now vividly feel his heartbeats and his lung-straining breaths.
But the most powerful sensation of all was his irrepressible tears.

Was it for rage or grief, envy or jealousy, guilt or fear?
What could be stirring up such pa.s.sions inside him? Subaru couldn"t explain it at all. He couldn"t explain any of it. And yet in his vision, obscured by tears, Subaru saw it.

[Subaru: ――――]

Someone was standing there, gazing down at Subaru and Louis.
Watching Subaru pinning Louis to the ground with his hands around her neck and tears welling in his eyes.
Who, who is it? There was only one person Subaru could think of.

[Subaru: ……So, did you get scared and finally decided to face me, "Natsuki Subaru"?]

The figure did not answer.
Standing on the pure white floor, backed by the pure white world, the faint figure only stared at Subaru.
Faced with that suddenly manifested figure, Subaru allowed the tears to roll down his cheeks, and,

[Subaru: I…… I, don"t want to disappear. I don"t want to die. So, I……]

[Subaru: I want to stay here with everyone. I love everyone. So, I……]

[Subaru: So, I……]

As if trying to find an excuse, he went on sobbing.
Just like when he first placed his hands around Louis" neck. ――Subaru didn"t want to lose himself, and so he made his decision. That was what he wanted to explain to this figure.
And that is also why he must kill this figure before him, wearing the same face as himself.

To him, "Natsuki Subaru", is nothing but a familiar stranger.
So Subaru has the right to do this.

Natsuki Subaru must kill "Natsuki Subaru", and take his place in the sun――

[Subaru: So, I"m not you! You and I are……!]

Different. He wanted he say, and renounce him once and for all.
But the moment he was about to――

[Louis of Gluttony: …..Who"re you talking to, Onii-san?]

Stunned, he widened his eyes as Louis interrupted with that question.
She tilted her head and followed Subaru"s gaze, trying hard to see if anyone was there. But she only furrowed her brows and rattled her sharp canine teeth.

[Louis of Gluttony: ――There"s, there"s no one there. Who"re you talking to, Onii-san?]

[Subaru: ――――]

Though her rattling teeth, Louis muttered, looking perplexed.
That expression gave way to a look of displeasure, and then to a look of trepidation,

[Louis of Gluttony: This is our place…… no one should be intruding. Quit talking to someone else when you"re in here…… Onii-san belongs to us…… us!]

Louis"s tone was almost pleading, but Subaru paid her no mind.
His consciousness, his attention remained focused on the figure who never left his sight. In his tear-obscured vision, the figure"s outlines gradually became clear.

Who is this figure he just couldn"t make out?
Little by little, between the clearing outlines, Subaru saw that the figure was smiling.
Shaking his head, desperately blinking, he yearned to see that smile more clearly――

[???: ――Why do you have to choose only one?]

Came the question.
In an unfamiliar voice, a voice that shouldn"t be here.

It was a smile he had never seen before―― it was a blue-haired girl standing there, smiling at him.
In front the speechless Subaru, without breaking her smile――

[Rem: ――Stand up!!]

――The girl opened her lips,
――And scolded Natsuki Subaru in the harshest voice in this world.

※　※　※　※　※　※　※　※　※　※　※　※

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Oooh I"m so excited I could explode >_

It"s been so long since Rem showed up, I"ve been waiting for this moment ever since I started doing Arc 6…

I"ll definitely finish this chapter, but I"ll decide whether or not to do more Arc 6 depending on how the next few j.a.panese chapters play out ❤

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(I"ll post fan art in a bit! The thumbnail is by HaruSabin)

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