THIS IS MANGA SPOILER 😕 DO YOU WISH YO CONTINUE READING THIS NOVEL?

IF YOU DONT WANT TO GET SPOILE PLS LEAVE TY AND SORRY HEHEHE......

im going to continue now.....ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO CONTINUE THIS? DONT HATE MEH IM JUST SAYING THIS IS SPOILER IN MANGA CALLED "ASCENDANCE OF BOOKWORM"

My name is URANO MOTOSU , and I am 22 years old. I love books. I really love books. I love books more than I love getting enough food.

I love how the printed words let me reach out and touch another person’s ideas, their fantasies. My heart dances along the roads of thought laid down by the author, and I can’t help but smile. Absorbing the vast knowledge contained within just a single volume always leaves me feeling like I’ve grown as a person. The whole wide world, which I have never seen with my own eyes, is at my fingertips, stacked neatly within the shelves of bookstores and libraries; isn’t it intoxicating? The fairy tales of foreign lands, the glimpses of life in distant times and places, the reaches of every branch of history… when I absorb myself in a book, time evaporates around me.

Psychology, religion, history, geography, education, folklore, mathematics, physics, geology, chemistry, biology, art, fitness, language, fiction… All of humanity’s accumulated knowledge and insight has been tightly packed into these books, and I love each of them from the bottom of my heart.

Encyclopedias, stretching to fill the entire shelf; the collection of literature, with every volume in place; specialty magazines that look so simple on the cover, but hold such advanced contents; colorful periodicals full of photographs; countless novels, written with fastidious prose; light novels, lacking any depth but still selling fantastically; huge picture books, intended for children; manga, the comics that are the pride of Japan; comics and magazines published by and for fans… the rustling of each turning page is more intoxicating than the finest wine.

I also love the smell of the darkest corners of the library archives, where the dusty, even a little musty scent of ancient books fills the air. Just slowly breathing in the smell of old books sends waves of ecstasy crashing through my body. The smell of new books is equally irresistible! The smell of fresh ink on new paper tells me that there is something new waiting to be discovered between those pages, and just thinking about it fills me with excitement.

I want to live my entire life surrounded by books. If I can, I want to spend the rest of my life in a dark, but well-ventilated archive, where the books are shielded from the sun’s damaging rays. I’d spend every second I could reading, inseparable from my books, until my skin became ghostly pale, my body weakened from lack of exercise, and I forgot so many meals that I had to be pulled away by force. I want to die buried in books. I don’t want to quietly pass on in bed! Being smothered to death by a mountain of books would make me so unbelievably happy.

…Well, I should use the past tense here.

Because, just a little while ago…! There was a big earthquake, and I was crushed to death underneath a pile of books! Maaan, really, out of all my wishes to grant, why this?

I really did want this, but I’m not really feeling like God did me any favors here. I had just gotten my librarian certificate, and had somehow managed, in this age of unemployment, to find a position at a university library!

God, please. If I can, I’d like to be reborn. There’s still so much more for me to read. Even in my next life, I want to read.

So, make me a librarian. Let me spend each day surrounded by books. Of course, I know that working as a librarian won’t let me read all the time. It’s a job, and I’ll be busy, and I know that. But still, other jobs won’t let me spend the entire day surrounded by books. Just being surrounded by books will make my happy. The intoxicating smell of ink and paper… who else could appreciate these feelings? Who else can feel this fluttering of my heart that occurs whenever I find myself looking back at all of this amassed history, these words written to preserve the insights of man, a uniquely human labor of the mind that is as old as writing itself?

If I can just read, that would be fine. Please, God. If you’ve heard my wish, please let me be reborn. When I am, I can read again.

Bang! Bang! A sound like someone striking the floor or a table rattles me awake, as wherever I was sleeping starts to wobble back and forth. With every oscillation, a shot of pain blasts through my skull like I was being punched in the head, and I let out a small moan.

Shut up… please… shut up…

The irritating noises and vibrations didn’t stop, continuing at a steady rhythm, not letting me sleep at all.

I’m kept awake, painfully aware of the vibrations reverberating within my spinning head. I plug my ears, hoping it will go away. Moving around feels strange, like my body isn’t doing exactly what I tell it to. All of my joints are sore, and I feel feverish all throughout my body, like I’d come down with the flu.

“Ugh…”

I need my glasses if I want to figure out what’s going on. With my eyes screwed shut, I feel around for the glasses I always keep near my pillow. My entire body feels a little bit numb, and my arm’s movements are sluggish. As I squirm, something beneath me rustles with a sound like grass or paper.

“…what’s making that sound?”

The voice that comes out of my mouth sounds too high, almost childlike. It might because I’m ill, but it’s not at all the voice I’m used to hearing. Even though I want to do nothing more than sleep off this fever, I can’t just ignore this many abnormalities around me. I slowly open my eyes. My field of vision is warped, thanks to this extremely high fever. I don’t know if it’s the tears in my eyes helping me see in place of my glasses, but everything is much clearer than it usually is.

“Eh?”

The first thing I notice is a ceiling that, while it may have originally been white, has been stained black with soot. Some number of thick, black beams hold it up, across which a spider has build an enormous web. This is absolutely nothing like any room I remember.

“…Where am I?”

I look around the room, keeping my head perfectly still so as not to shake the tears from my eyes. It’s obvious, from what I see, that much of what’s around me is entirely unlike the Japan in which I was born and raised. Just from the architectural style of the ceiling, this isn’t a Japanese-style building, it’s Western. Furthermore, it’s not a modern, steel-framed construction, but something much older. The bed I’m on is hard, and there’s no mattress beneath me. Instead, I seem to be lying on some kind of cushion made of a prickly material. Through the dirty cloth that covers it, I smell a strange scent. On top of that, my body itches here and there, like I’m being bitten by ticks or fleas.

“W… wait a second…”

My most recent memory is being crushed under the weight of countless books, and I don’t remember getting rescued at all. At the very least, I don’t think any hospital in Japan would put a patient on top of a sheet this dirty. Timidly, I try to raise my hand over my head so that I can see it, and what I see is the small, slender hand of a child. I live a lifestyle where I was shut indoors with my books all day, so the untanned and almost unhealthy skin was no surprise, but at twenty-two years of age my hands were, of course, those of an adult. Completely different from these small, malnourished-looking hands before me now. These small, child-like hands that I can open and close at will. As I move around, my body does not feel at all like I’m used to it feeling. At this shocking realization, my mouth goes dry.

“…What’s going on?”

It’s possible that I might have reincarnated. God might have heard my dying wish and given me new life, so that I may read again. This is incomprehensible. I want to know more about the world around me, so I lift my heavy head and slowly push my feverish body upright. My sweat-soaked hair sticks to the side of my head, but I pay it no mind as I look around the room. I see more bed-like platforms like the one I’m on, the dirty cloths on top of them, and a few boxes full of various things… but no bookshelves.

“There’s no… books…”

The only door in this room swings open. In an instant, the pounding noise reverberating through my head goes away, only to be replaced by the sound of footsteps as somebody outside bustles about. I really have no idea what’s happening. Based on the beams across the ceiling, the state of the walls, and the kinds of furniture in this room, I feel like this is something out of European history. There’s nothing around me to indicate modern civilization. Is this an extremely backwards country, or have I somehow slipped through time and wound up in the past? If only I knew; if I did, I’d have a lot easier time figuring out my next move.

“…Am I hallucinating in my final moments?”

As worried tumble around my feverish head, a woman appears in the doorway, having heard me moving around and talking to myself. She is wearing a triangle bandana tied around her head and is in her late 20s, judging by the condition of her once-beautiful face. Her general facial features are pretty enough, but all of the dirt ruins it. If she were to wash her face (and her clothes), she’d look half-decent, but it’s such a shame that she is the way she is now. Generally, I don’t worry too much about someone’s appearance (or my own, really) as long as they keep themselves clean; if they’re filthy, though, I really wish that they’d put a little effort in, otherwise their beauty just goes to waste.

“Maine, %&$#+@*+#%?” says the woman in a language I don’t understand.

At the sound of her voice, someone else’s memories burst through my consciousness, and I let out a small cry. In the blink of an eye, several years’ worth of memories crowd into my mind. The sheer pressure of it feels like it’s churning my brain to a pulp, and I grab my head in pain.

“Maine, are you all right? You didn’t wake up for the longest time! I was starting to get worried.”

“…Mom?”

A few memories bubble to the surface. The woman who came to check on me and is now gently stroking my head is my mother, and my name is Maine. I don’t know how I suddenly started to understand what she was saying; this deluge of information has left my mind in shambles. Honestly, I wish this could have waited until I was feeling a little better. Sure, I wished that I could be reincarnate so that I could keep reading, and sure, it looks like I have, in fact, been reincarnated, but it’s not like I’m just going to meekly accept that this woman in front of me is suddenly my mother.

“How are you feeling? It looks like you have a headache,” she says.

The fingers of the hand she places on my forehead are stained with green and yellow spots. Does her job involve working with dye? I remember that workers back in Japan that worked with indigo dye had similar stains on their hands. I don’t want to let this so-called mother, who I simultaneously know nothing about yet somehow remember, touch me, so I flinch away from her outstretched hand, bury myself in the stinking bed, and screw my eyes shut.

“…My head… still hurts. I wanna sleep,” I say.

“Oh, rest well.”

As my mother left this bed-filled room, I started to think deeply. Between the dizziness from my fever and the disarray in my head, there’s no way I could just quietly get back to sleep.

“I’m not mistaken… I died, didn’t I?”

Unbidden, an image of my own mother floats to the surface of my mind, and I silently apologize that I’ll never see her again. She’ll probably be furious, screaming “how many times did I tell you that you had too many books?!” while choking back tears of grief. I raise a sluggish arm and wipe a tear from my eye.

“I’m sorry, Mom…” I whisper, an apology that will never reach her ears.

I reluctantly let go of that image, and start to carefully sort through the memories of this child, Maine, that had been dumped into my head. Her latest memory was of having an extremely painful, painful fever, so painful that she couldn’t bear it. It seems to me like, somehow, the Maine who used to own this body died, and I possessed it in her place. Oh, or maybe I was actually reborn in this world, and the delirium of the fever is causing the memories of my past life to resurface?

“It doesn’t matter, either way. I’m going to have to live as Maine from now on, there’s no way I can change it…”

Since that’s the case, I need to sift through Maine’s memories to learn more about the situation I’m in; otherwise, my family might start to get suspicious. However, no matter how hard I think, Maine’s memories are those of a little girl with still-developing language skills, and there’s a lot that her parents said that she didn’t really understand. She didn’t know what they meant! She’s missing a lot of useful words from her vocabulary, so most of what she remembers is cryptic and ambiguous.

“Whoa, no… what should I do?”

From Maine’s childish little memories, I’ve figured out what I do know. Her family consists of four people. Her mother is the woman who was just in here. She has an older sister, Tory. Her father has a job that’s something like a soldier.

And, most importantly, this is not Earth. From the image in Maine’s head, underneath the bandana that her mother was wearing, her hair is a rich green, like jade. You might think that she’d have to dye it to get it that color, but it really is naturally green. It’s such an unnatural color that I almost kind of want to check to see if it’s a wig. It seems really unlikely, though, that she would be some kind of cosplayer who always wears a green wig and dirty clothes; it’s much more realistic to think that I’m in some sort of alternate dimension.

Incidentally, Maine’s sister’s hair is blue-green, and her father’s hair is blue. Maine’s own hair is a deep navy blue. Should I be grateful that my hair is close to black, or should I be sighing at my cosplaying family? Regardless, this house doesn’t seem to have a mirror, and no matter how much I dig I can’t find a clear image of what I look like, apart from my hair color. Well, based on what I know about my mother and father’s looks, and what my sister looks like, I guess I don’t look half bad. I’m also, without a doubt, filthy.

“Ughh, I really need a bath. …Do we even have one?”

Realistically, my appearance isn’t my biggest concern right now, it’s my living conditions. It seems like the family that I’ve been reborn into is mind-blowingly poor. Just from looking around, things seem pretty bad. The cloth that I, a sick child, am wrapped in is extremely threadbare and worn-out. Even for hand-me-downs from my sister, this is too cruel. I briefly thought that this might be some kind of abuse, but according to Maine’s memories even her mother’s clothes are sewn together out of rags, and her sister’s are much the same. This is the standard for my new family. My father’s work clothes are relatively solid, with only a few patches, but even so he was only ever provisioned one uniform, and that was several years ago.

On top of that, this house doesn’t seem to be stand-alone. The wall closest to me is made of some kind of brick, and through it I can hear footsteps climbing up and down stairs and the voices of people who I presume are our neighbors. Perhaps this is some kind of housing complex or apartment building?

So, about this reincarnation business… aren’t I supposed to be reborn as some kind of nobility, so that I don’t have to worry about living a difficult life?

I breathe a heavy sigh at the rest of my conditions. I may have had a perfectly ordinary lifestyle back in Japan, but that was massively different to what I’m facing now. I don’t know what era or what country I’ve been born into now, but Japan was a nice place to live, overflowing with wonderful things. Comfortable fabrics, soft beds, books, books, more books…

“Aaah, I want to read a book. Reading always helps my fevers go down.”

No matter how dire my circumstances, I’ll be able to endure it as long as I have books. I place a finger to my temple and concentrate, searching through my memory for books. Where in this house could the bookshelves be?

“Maine, you awake?” A voice suddenly breaks through my concentration. A girl, about seven or eight years old, is walking towards me with light footsteps. According to my memories, this is Tory. Her blue-green hair is carefully woven in a simple braid, but I can tell at a glance that it’s extremely dried out and in bad need of washing. Just like her mom, she’s a little dirty all over, and I really want her to wash up. She’s wasting her adorable face.

I may be thinking that, but it’s the opinion of an outsider from Japan, a country with a high standard of personal hygiene. Even if you’re poor, you still want to maintain a healthy living environment; otherwise, you’ll fall ill, then you have to see a doctor, then you’ve spent money you don’t have.

I really don’t care that much about that right now, though. There’s exactly one thing that’s on my mind.

“Tory,” I ask, “could you bring me a ’book’?”

Based on Tory’s age, there must be about ten or so picture books in the house. I may need to be resting to get over this sickness, but I can still read. Reading books from an alternate dimension is, right now, my highest priority above all else.

“Tory, please!”

Tory looks blankly at me, her adorable little sister, with her head tilted to one side. “Huh? What’s a ’book’?”

“Wh… uhh, it’s a thing where ’words’ and ’pictures’ have been ’written down’…”

“Maine, what are you talking about? I didn’t understand, what did you say?”

“I told you, a ’book’! I want a ’picture book’!”

“What’s that? I don’t really understand…?”

It seems like I might have accidentally used Japanese words in place of words that Maine doesn’t know. No matter how hard

I try to explain it to Tory, she just stands there with her head cocked to one side and a dumbfounded expression on her face. Even if I were to just say “get me a book” in Japanese, there’s no way she would understand. I have to dig up this vocabulary, and fast.

“Ugh, fine! ’Translation function, engaaaaage!’” I yell.

“Maine! What are you getting so mad about?!”

“I’m not mad! I just have a headache.”

Getting mad at Tory for not understanding me would be an extremely childish thing to do. …I did, though.

First off, I need to start focusing everything I’ve got to listening carefully to what people around me are saying and, little by little, start to memorize all of the words I hear. Between Maine’s young, flexible brain and my own 22 year old college graduate’s intuition, memorizing vocabulary should be easy… in theory. At the very least, if I think back on what I went through when I was learning other languages so that I could read foreign books, it wasn’t unmanageably difficult. The zeal and love with which I dedicated myself to my books was enough to drive other people away.

“…Are you angry because you still have a fever?” asks Tory. She reaches her hand towards my forehead, probably to feel my temperature. Without thinking, I grab her filthy hand before she can touch me.

“I’m still sick, won’t you get sick too?” I ask. Although I’m pretending to show concern for my sister, I’m really just trying to stop her from doing something disgusting. I really don’t want Tory to touch me with those filthy hands, so I’m employing this adult technique to avoid it.

“Oh, I guess so. Take care!”

Safe. If she were clean, she’d be a great older sister, but right now I don’t want to be touched at all. If this is the situation I’m in, then I’m going to have to pound the concept of hygiene into their skulls. If I don’t start improving things around here, I don’t think I’ll be able to survive. According to these memories, Maine has always been a weak child, and was bedridden and feverish far too often. I have too many memories of this bed.

If I’m going to be able to read to my heart’s content, I need to first make sure that I’m healthy and that my environment is sanitary. This family is way too poor, so if I get sick nobody will be able to call a doctor. Even if they did, from the looks of this place I can’t imagine they’d be any good, so I definitely don’t want to have to be in their care.

Mother calls from another room. “Tory, come help me with dinner!” “Yes, mother,” says Tory, and runs away with a pitter-patter.

Judging from the angle of the sunlight that streams through the window, it probably is time to start dinner preparations. Tory looks like she should still be in elementary school, but already she’s helping out a lot with the housework. What a state of poverty this is, for children to be relied on for manual labor.

“Ugh, this is bad…”

The thought of what my life will be like when I grow up is really depressing. No matter how I think about it, I’m going to be stuck doing housework forever. I’m not going to very much time for reading. Housework was already a huge bother when I was still in Japan with all of its convenient appliances; is a useless woman like me who spends all her time reading even able to adapt to life like this?

Bang! Bang! An intermittent, lively sound reverberates through the room. Mom said it was time to work on preparing dinner, so that’s probably the sound of cooking, but what in the world is happening out there? I can’t see anything from where I am, but at the same time I really don’t want to know that badly.

I have to stay positive! I’m not going to waste this reincarnation. There are books here to read that I could have never read on Earth! My first order of business is to take care of my physical condition. With that decided, I slowly close my eyes.

“I’m home!”

“Hi, Father!”

I hear clanging sounds, like metal plates rubbing against each other. My father has returned home, just in time for dinner. Maine is still too feverishly sick to eat, so I gradually drift off to the sounds of the happy family meal in the other room. As my mind slips into the dark, there’s only one thought on my mind.

Ah, I don’t care what it is, I just want to read a book.

***PLS SUB LIKE AND COMMENT TY

hope you enjoy***

Chapter 3: Home Exploration

After three days, my fever finally went away, and I’ve slowly recovered enough to be able to keep some food down. What I’ve been eating has been finely chopped vegetables floating in bland soup. It’s okay for now since I’ve been sick, but I don’t think I’ll be able to stand it once I’m healthy again. Also, I’m pretty used to being called Maine by now. I’m going to have to live as Maine for the rest of my life, so I need get used to it quickly.

“Maine, you done?” asks Tory as she comes in to check on me.

“Yeah.”

I hand my empty dishes over to her, and quietly lie back down on my bed.

“Get some rest, Maine.”

In these last three days, I haven’t even left this room! I’ve only ever gotten up to use the restroom, and after that I’m always brought right back to bed. Isn’t that too harsh? On top of that, I said “restroom”, but it’s really just a chamber pot kept in the bedroom. It’s extremely embarrassing! Also, not only does the rest of the family use this same chamber pot, but when they’re done, they just fling the contents out the window! And, of course, there’s no bath, either! I couldn’t stand it after a while and tried to wipe myself clean, and everyone looked at me as if I’d gone instane. This lifestyle… I can’t take it anymore!!

It’s not like I can do anything about it, though. As a very young, sick child, even if I were to run away, there’s no way I’d be able to live the kind of life I’d want. I still have the mind of an adult, so this much is obvious. I’m not going to heedlessly run away, no matter how much I hate this situation. Judging from what I’ve seen in here so far, I don’t think the outside is going to be much better. I have no idea if there’s any child protection services or shelters or anything like that around here, and even if there were I don’t know if they’d be any improvement over this place.

If I run away from the filth here, all that’ll happen is that I’ll spend my last few days running around the streets, getting covered in falling waste, and finally dying on the side of the road. What I need to do is focus on getting better so that I can then work on improving the conditions around here.

My first goal is to get well enough that I can get out of bed without people being mad at me. ……Well, it’s a start.

Then, before anything else: books. The first step towards improving my environment is definitely finding books. If I have a book, then I’ll be able put up with all of these grievances. I’ll persevere! And, so, I have decided that today I’m going to go explore this house. I’ve gone too long without reading a book; I’m starting to feel the edges of withdrawal.

Give me a book! Raaagh! I’ll cry! A grown woman will burst into tears in public!

Since I’ve got an older sister, I should be able to find around ten picture books somewhere in here. Unless I’m mistaken, I don’t think I actually know how to read this language, but at least I can look at the pictures and try to puzzle out the meanings of each word.

The door opens quietly, and Tory sticks her head in. “Maine, you sleeping?” she whispers. I lie quietly in my bed, and she nods in satisfaction. Every time I’ve woken up, I’ve slipped out of bed in search of a book, only to collapse as I wandering around, so Tory has taken it upon herself to keep a close watch on me. When our mother leaves in the morning to go to work, she leaves Tory in charge of my care. Tory has been desperately trying to keep me in bed, and with my tiny body, no matter how much I try to run I can never break free from her grip.

“I am absolutely going to ‘dominate’ you,” I mutter.

“What was that?” asks Tory.

“…Hm? Oh, I just want to get big.”

Not really understanding the real meaning behind my answer, Tory gives me a troubled smile. “If you get healthy again, you’ll get bigger! You’re always so sick that you’re not eating, so even though you’re five, people still think that you’re three.”

Oh, am I five, then? With an atypically frail build. This is the first I’ve heard of it. I can’t remember any birthday parties, so I couldn’t figure it out for myself. Or, maybe, could there have been parties that I just don’t recognize, since I don’t know the language very well?

“Tory,” I ask, “Are you big?”

“I’m six, but everyone thinks I’m seven or eight, so maybe I’m a little big?”

“Ahh.”

We’re only a year apart, but what a difference in physique. Surpassing her might be extremely difficult, but I can’t give up just yet. I’m going to eat right, take care of my hygiene, and get healthy.

“Mom’s gone to work,” says Tory, “so I need to wash the dishes. Really, don’t get out of bed! If you don’t sleep, you won’t get better, and if you don’t get better, you won’t grow any bigger!” “Okay!”

In preparation for sneaking out, I’ve been playing the good kid ever since last night so that Tory will let down her guard a little bit. I’ve been waiting patiently ever since for her to finally leave me alone and go somewhere else.

“Right, I’m going now. Be good and stay here, okay?”

“Okaaay!” I answer, the picture of obedience.

Tory closes the door with a clack. I wait quietly as she grabs the box full of dirty dishes and heads out the door. I don’t know where she goes to wash the dishes, but she’s always gone for about twenty to thirty minutes. It looks like each home doesn’t have its own water supply, so there’s probably a well or fountain for public use.

Heh heh heh… Now, get out!!

From what I think is the entranceway, I hear the clunk of a turning lock, followed by the fading sound of Tory’s footsteps on the stairway. I wait until I can’t hear her at all anymore, then quietly get out of my head. I grimace as I feel the grit of the floor bite into my bare feet. Walking around barefoot in a house where everyone wears shoes is profoundly disgusting, but Tory, in an attempt to stop me from walking around, hid my shoes, so I have no choice. Searching for a book is my top priority, I have no time to worry about the defilement of my feet.

“If they’re in here after all, I might have spoke too soon…”

In this bedroom where my feverish self has been locked away, there are two beds, three wooden boxes full of clothing and other miscellaneous things, and a few baskets with other sundry items. In the basket next to my bed, there’s a few toys made from wood and straw, but no books. If there’s a bookshelf, it would probably be in the living room.

“Yyyuck…”

With every step I take, the gritty floor grinds into the soles of my feet. It’s customary here to walk around the house with shoes on, so I know that even if I want to complain, it’s not going to do very much good. Even still, the customs of Japan have been so thoroughly ingrained in me that it’s going to be next to impossible to adapt. If I’m going to keep living as Maine, though, there are a lot of things I’m going to have to get used to.

“Grr, too high…”

I’ve hit the first major obstacle in my home exploration: the bedroom door. It’s not as if I can’t reach the knob at all; if I stand on my tiptoes and reach as high as I can go, my fingertips just barely brush the bottom of it. Turning it, however, is a much bigger problem. I glance around the room, looking for something to use as a stool. My gaze settles on the wooden box my clothes are stored in.

“Hnnnngh!”

If I were an adult, moving this box would be a piece of cake, but no matter how hard I push and pull, my little hands can’t budge it. I could maybe flip over the basket that holds my toys, but it doesn’t look like it would be able to support my weight.

“Man, I’ve got to get bigger soon; there’s too much I can’t do right now.”

After looking around the bedroom some more and thinking over my options, I decided to try folding up my parents’ bedding and standing on that. There’s absolutely no way that I’d let my own bedding touch this grimy floor that people walk on with boots, but my parents are used to living in conditions like this so it’s absolutely fine to use theirs. If it’s for the sake of finding a book, making my parents a little upset is no big deal at all.

“Hup!”

I stand on my tiptoes on top of the folded bedding and grab the doorknob. I twist with the entire weight of my body, and the knob turns. The door swings open with a creak… right towards me.

“Wha?!”

The door swings right towards my head with great force. I frantically let go of the knob, and stumble backwards.

“Who-o-o-o-a!”

With a clatter, I tumble off of the piled-up bedding and hit my head.

“Ow…”

I clutch my head as I rise to my feet. I notice that the door is still slightly ajar! My headache is only just another sacrifice to the cause.

“I did it! It’s open!”

I leap forward, stick my fingers into the crack, and pull the door the rest of the way open. I see that my parents’ mattress has slid across the floor, and it’s left a clean track behind it… but I’ll pretend not to notice for now.

“Aha, the kitchen!”

I leave the bedroom and find myself in a kitchen. “Kitchen” in the modern sense of the word might be a little, generous; this really looks more like an old-style cookhouse. In the corner I see a stove, with a cast iron pot sitting on top, and something that looks like a frying pan hung up on the wall next to it. A clothesline runs across the room, from which a grimy-looking cleaning rag hangs. Anyone trying to wipe something off with that rag is surely only going to make it worse.

“It’s no wonder I’ve got a weak constitution with sanitation like this…”

In the center of the room is a somewhat small table, two three-legged stools, and a box that seems to be being used as another stool. On the right side of the room is a wooden cabinet, probably being used as a cupboard. In the corner opposite the stove sits a large basket, filled with raw vegetables that look almost like potatoes and onions. There’s a sink here as well, with a large jug of water next to it. The sink is probably filled by pouring water from the jug; it looks like there really isn’t running water here.

As I finish looking around the room, I notice two more doors besides the one leading back to the bedroom.

“Ohoho, which one is the right one?”

This kitchen really doesn’t look like the kind of place where I’d find a bookshelf, so I open one of the other doors that head out of the kitchen.

“Hm, a storage room?”

Beyond the door is a room that’s crammed full of a mess of tools and things that I’ve never seen before. Everything’s on shelves, but things are piled on them so haphazardly that it doesn’t look like anything in here is used very much at all.

“Wrong one, huh…”

I give up on this room and head over to the second door. I reach up and pull on the knob, but the lock only clunks dully against the frame. I rattle the door again and again, but there’s no sign of it giving way at all.

“Don’t tell me, this is the door Tory went through…? Eh? Both were wrong?! Neither were right?!”

Suddenly perplexed, I mumble aloud to myself. This is a two-bedroom apartment with a kitchen… but no bath, no toilet, no running water, and no bookshelves. No matter how hard I look, I can’t find another room.

Hey, God, do you have a grudge?!

In all of the light novels out there about reincarnation, the vast majority of them dropped the protagonist amongst the rich and noble, and very few of the remainder place her in abject poverty. I have the memories and sensibilities of a modern-day citizen of Japan; there is no way I’m going to be able to live in a house with no bath, no toilet, no running water.

On top of that, the thing that I was most worried about: I can’t find any books. I looked all through the storage room and couldn’t find anything even remotely resembling a book.

“…No way, are books expensive?”

On Earth, before the invention of machines that could print books easily, books were ridiculously expensive. If you weren’t a member of the highest echelons of society, your opportunities to read books were few and far between.

“I’ve got no choice. If it’s come to this, right now, I need to find words.”

Even if I don’t have any books, it’s still possible for me to start learning to read. There could be newspapers, pamphlets, magazines, calendars, even advertisements! There absolutely has to be something around here that has at least one word written on it somewhere.

At least, there would be in Japan.

“…Nothing! Absolutely nothing! Not a single thing! What kind of house is this?!”

I have gone through every item on every shelf of the storage room and the cupboard, and not only have I, of course, still not found any books, but there hasn’t been so much as a single letter printed on anything at all. Printing aside, I can’t even find a single piece of paper!

“What the heck is… this…”

Blinding pain blasts through my head, as if my fever had come roaring back. My heart pounds in my chest, and I am deafened by the sudden ringing in my ears. I crumple to the floor, as if the strings holding me up were suddenly cut. My eyes are so hot.

Dying, crushed by books, had been my dream; being reincarnated, well, that’s okay too. But how am I supposed to live like this? What am I to live for? I hadn’t even thought that I could be reborn into a world without books. Why was I even born?!

Tears run down my face as I struggle to find a reason to keep living.

“Maine!! What are you doing up?! You shouldn’t have gotten out of bed without your shoes!” shouts Tory, as she walks into the kitchen to find me crumpled on the ground.

“…Tory… there’s no 'books’…”

Even though I want to read so badly, there’s no books. I have no idea why, or even how, I’m going to keep living on.

“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” asks Tory, concerned, as I lay there with tears constantly streaming from my eyes. There’s no way for me to explain. She can’t even see that not having books is a problem, how could she understand my feelings?

I want a book.

I want to read.

Hey, is there even anyone out there who would understand?

Where can I find a book?

Please, someone tell me