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2024-10-29 19:42:56“Kazama-kun I… I love you”
Standing under the cherry blossoms Kazama felt like the time stopped for him at that moment. He couldn’t comprehend what he had just heard. Aino? Love him? What?
He looked at Aino’s pink lips, almond green eyes, snow-white skin and slightly flushed cheeks. Maybe she really confessed to him? No, no he shouldn’t get ahead of himself. Today was windy so she might have just felt a little cold and it might have been the wind playing a trick on his ears.
*Thump*
Still, all this self-rationalization couldn’t stop his heart from beating furiously.
“Kazama-kun?” Seeing Aino fidget nervously in front of him while waiting for his answer made Kazama’s heart beat even more furiously. So this was all real and he wasn’t imagining anything?
*Thump* *Thump*
Oh no! While he was making her wait Aino must have been dying from nervousness. He needed to give his answer as soon as possible. As Kazama opened his mouth he still couldn’t believe that his springtime of youth had finally arrived.
*Thump* *Thump* *Thump*
Kazama opened his mouth to say yes but no sound could be heard. That was when Kazama finally noticed that the world around him started to spin.
*Thump* *Thump* *Thump* *Thump*
Kazama watched Aino rush towards him while the world started to go black. As he was fainting there was only a single thought on his mind.
Fuck… why now of all times?
“Have you done any strenuous physical activity lately?”
A stale air that smelled like antiseptics, white-lifeless fluorescent light hanging in the ceiling and a leather bed that burnt skin. He was back at this cursed place once again.
“Not one. Just walking to school as usual”
As Kazama answered the old rugged doctor he was checking Kazama’s patient chart and frowning to himself. Both of them were aware that they were just going through the motions and he couldn’t find anything.
After all, they already knew the answer to Kazama’s predicament.
Congenital Heart Deficiency
CHD for short.
This was the name of the curse Kazama had been afflicted with since his birth. Without going into details too much when he was still in his mother’s womb his heart had developed poorly so now his heart could stop working at any second.
“Well, with this we should be able to apply for a request to up your priority for a heart transplant”
Kazama just smiled in a self-deprecating manner. He knew that it would get rejected again anyway so why should he bother getting up his hope? In this country, doctors only cared about having clean records. This meant they would never do surgeries which they felt could fail. This way they could boast about how they had the best doctors in the world while in reality, they wouldn’t have as many surgeries under their belts as western doctors.
He didn’t know if this was the correct approach but at least to him, this was something terrible. He didn’t even know if he could wake up tomorrow morning but the doctors kept refusing his request for heart surgeries with excuses like he was still underage, or that his heart could still hang on for some time so they should focus on more urgent cases bla bla bla
“Kid, you listening to me?” asked the doctor seeing as Kazama was daydreaming.
“Hm? Oh yeah, I think you said something about upping my medication?”
“I don’t believe you did but who cares. You are right, now with this dosage you shouldn’t have any troubles with your heart for the time being but it will damage your heart even further in the long term. That’s why we need to get you a new heart as soon as possible”
“Yes doc, I got it. So when can I leave?”
“You should stay under supervision for the night but you can get discharged tomorrow morning. I got a call from your parents they said they were going to leave the convention as soon as possible and get on a flight home.”
“Then do I need to wait for them to arrive before I can get discharged?”
“No worries, I have a stack of release forms with their signatures on them. I also got permission to use one from your parents over the phone and recorded it. So you guys can’t sue me if something goes awry”
“Pfft, like hell we would ever sue you” Kazama laughed at the rugged doctor's antics.
“I know but just in case” the doctor also started to laugh with him.
He was just trying to relax Kazama and set his heart at ease. Doctor Aizawa was a long-time friend of their family and even if something happened to Kazama his parents would never blame him.
Certainly, Kazama didn’t even know if he could wake up tomorrow morning but the doctor was acting like it was already a given, trying to instil confidence in Kazama.
Thinking about it like that he had really come along a long way. He was already 16 years old so there were only 2 years left for his heart surgery.
In fact, him living right now could be called a miracle. When he was just born, doctors didn’t even expect him to live past two weeks. That was also the reason why his father had postponed naming him till he was six months old when doctors finally told his parents that Kazama should be able to make it to adulthood if he took care of his body along with some medication.
Hearing that his father had named him Katsuo which meant victory. His reasoning behind that was he wished that Katsuo could keep winning against his fate and live a fulfilling life. He was cheering him on his own way.
So this was the story behind his name Kazama Katsuo.
As Kazama thought about random stuff he slowly started to fall asleep unconsciously.
Kazama walked out of the pharmacy with a white plastic bag in his hand. It contained his new medication. His parents still haven’t arrived home yet. Due to the martial arts convention, there weren’t any empty seats on the flights.
Oh yeah, is it a bad time to mention why his family was at a martial arts convention?
It was because the Kazama family was one the last proper martial dojos left in this country with a complete heritage. His father was the disciple of the previous family head who was Katsuo’s grandpa from his mother’s side. So he was basically a live-in son-in-law and took his mother’s surname.
Both his parents were reputable martial artists and the oldest child of the family was born disabled. Such a cruel trick of the fate isn’t it?
At least they had his little sister who could inherit the family, or at worst her husband could but Katsuo had no doubt that she would be the one inheriting it since she was a prodigy when it came to using her body.
Katsuo couldn’t help but envy her. That was supposed to be him. If only it weren’t for his heart he would be the martial genius of the family. This wasn’t just some form of self-denial either.
Once when he was a wee little kid he had seen his father train in their martial arts style Shin-ryu karate. At the time he didn’t know about his heart so he had copied his father’s moves as they seemed fun and he could. But his heart acted up and he was rushed to the hospital. Ever since then, Katsuo had been banned from getting close to the training hall. But he could still remember those moves to this day. If only his heart was strong enough.
Some days Katsuo just wished he would get hit by a truck and die. That way he could get reincarnated in a different world with a healthy body. Then he could bring down any evildoer with his fists of justice. He could even marry a princess and become a king.
While imagining his life as a royalty something at the corner of his vision caught his eye.
In the middle of the road, there was a girl with jet-black hair in a white one-piece dress. She was just standing there and looking around.
It was weird because one, it was early spring and she didn’t seem cold despite her clothes. Secondly, she looked like a foreigner.
What was she doing here?
Her white dress looked like it could belong to a patient so she might have escaped from a mental institute?
Probable.
The fact that she looked around curiously like a newborn fawn didn’t help her case either.
Or she could just be a weabo who came to visit his country and was in awe of its beauty.
This was also probable.
Well whatever the case, it was better to stay away from her. That was when she and the weird girl locked eyes.
*Hoooooonk*
Katsuo saw a sports car speed through the street towards the weird girl. But the girl didn’t seem like she had any intention of moving and instead she had started to smile at him like she had just found a treasure.
“What are you doing? MOVE!!”
Seeing the girl not move an inch Katsuo couldn’t take it anymore. He dropped his medicine and dashed towards the girl.
He jumped at her and the duo rolled on the asphalt road while the car rushed past them.
While they were rolling around Katsuo’s life flashed through his eyes. He was only a 16 year old virgin. He was going to die without even holding a girls hand!!... Wait? He was hugging a girl right now would that count?
*THUD*
Katsuo secured the girl in his embrace as they crashed into a lamppost.
His back was hurting but he looked at the girl in his embrace and she still looked fine. Maybe just a little bit of disoriented.
*Thump*
Oh no!
Katsuo started to despair. He recognized this beat.
*Thump* *Thump*
“Call… an ambulance…”
As he gasped for air Katsuo managed to utter these words before collapsing.
While his vision was disappearing, Katsuo could hear the girl mutter something. Even though the words sounded foreign he could somehow understand them.
“Black star of the void?… he should do just fine”
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Katsuo gave it a thought and agreed to help Roy with finding his kidnapped sister. According to him aside from the mayor, there was no one else they had any enmity with so that was Katsuo's first clue, Gail said she could ask around about her to her old contacts and Sven decided to do his own thing. When asked what he meant by that Sven said just leave it to him and brushed him off. He had never questioned before maybe Sven also had some connections with gangs here but that was impossible as he was from Horwaard. However, when Katsuo thought about where to ask about the mayor he noticed a crucial problem in his plans. He didn't know anyone in Dawn. His sister and Kalrune had already returned to their countries. He wasn't some gruff noir detective who could understand how everything went down by piecing together some rumour either. So Katsuo thought about his own advantages. For one, he was a transmigrator with a lot of popular culture knowledge when it came to isekai genre. So he as
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After his party members returned Katsuo started to talk with the boy to learn about his situation."So you said your sister was kidnapped?" He asked the boy cautiously. From his get up he looked like a beggar but his face was well defined despite the bruises so there was a high chance that his sister was a beauty as well. That would explain why his sister was kidnapped but Katsuo had no intention of getting ahead of himself. It was better to hear the situation first-hand from the concerned party."Yes, today she was kidnapped by a bunch of ruffians. I don't even know who they are and why they targeted us. Please help! I am begging you. If the money is not enough I can find more."The boy started to speak in haste. He was really panicked but what he said was of no help at all."I wanted to ask about that. This money is too much for a beggar like you. Where did you get it?" Gail asked as she grabbed the pouch and checked its contents. "No, that is money left from my grandfather's inher
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As expected, Denstria accepted the terms of the deal and Kalrune left for Oedl soon after, leaving Katsuo and Sven to embark on their long-awaited adventurer life finally. "How could you forget about me *Sob*," said Gail while grabbing Katsuo's fur coat and sobbing. "No no, how could we forget about you? If we did such a thing what kind of a person would we be? We just had something important going on so we couldn't come to pick you up. Right, Sven?" Katsuo lied as naturally as he breathed. Aria peeked under Katsuo's shirt and wrinkled her nose. "Ugh, stinky. Playmate who is this? She smells awful" Aria said as she covered her nose with her tiny little paws. Hearing that Gail got self-conscious and smelled her armpits but she couldn't smell anything. She as a budding young lady was very disturbed by such accusations. "I don't smell" Gail grumbled and pulled down her hood even further to mask her face. You know, just in case. "Of course, you don't, that was just Aria being...
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Chapter 37
"Uhm, are you sure about this?" Katsuo couldn't hold back his curiosity and asked after leaving the meeting. "About what? Saving hundreds of thousands of lives?" "But just like that fatty said isn't the Greywulf estate your ancestral home?" This was the part that eluded Katsuo. He was from a lineage of martial artists and their family held onto their traditions for centuries. So selling their ancestral home was something he couldn't imagine. That was why he wanted to ask Kalrune how he did it. "Home is where you make it. Also, I wasn't joking when I said Greywulf estate is its people and not the land. My father would also agree with me. After all, he was the one who taught me this. Being a noble means 'being responsible for your subjects'." As Kalrune spoke about his father his face brightened up. Katsuo could see that Kalrune treasured him greatly so this made him curious about the strongest man on the continent Brevok Greywulf. Just what kind of person was he? A cold Duke of the
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Chapter 36
"My supervisor accepted selling Greywulf estate to you," said Kalrune as everyone in the meeting looked at him in shock."Come again?" asked the fat mayor of Dawn while wiping his forehead with a handkerchief. "You heard me right. Kingdom of Oedl decided to 'sell' Greywulf estate to Denstria" Kalrune repeated himself."Of course, since you have a legitimate casus belli this land belongs to Denstria so we will withdraw but as we were the ones that were taking care of it for so long you guys need to pay us for our services. After all, if it were not for the 'current' Greywulf house the land would already have been ravaged by the monsters long ago. So it is only right that you guys pay us."The glasses guy from Denstria frowned while pondering. This was out of his considerations for how the meeting would go. He didn't know who came up with this ingenious idea but they surely got him. He even suspected that there might be a spy amidst their ranks otherwise it would be impossible to come
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Chapter 35
Kalrune was pacing around in his room thinking about how to stop this impending war. This time Denstria was coming at them for real without any intention of stopping with measly threats. Otherwise, they wouldn't have pulled out the trump card they had been hiding for centuries. The question was why now? There were times in Oedl's history when they were way weaker than they were now. In other words, this plan was something in the making for a long time.At first, Kalrune had thought this was going to be another small skirmish to cull the forces of Greywulf Duchy as after Archmage Karrion's death his father became the undisputed strongest man in the world so of course this reputation had its pros but that was about it.Now Denstria was aiming for swelling Greywulf whole... but why?Even as a person who was born and raised in Greywulf estate Kalrune couldn't see any point to this.Sure it was acting as a shield against Denstria but even if they took down the Greywulf estate they would ju
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Chapter 34
Katsuo unwillingly hugged his sister Tharnel. Truth be told he didn't know how to treat this sister of his. If he said they were close that would be a lie, but if he said they didn't get along that would be one as well. Their relationship was complicated. "Woah, I missed you, little brother! You have grown bigger since I last saw you. But you seem a little thin. Are you eating okay? Don't tell me you get so wrapped in your training and forget to feed yourself. Didn't I tell you to take better care of yourself?" Tharnel started nagging Katsuo as she gave him a firm hug. Well, the distance between them was only awkward for Katsuo. For Tharnel, he was her one and only little brother. "Ugh, no. It's just that my muscles have become more compact so I look thinner... you also know that Sensei would never let me skip a meal right?" Katsuo mumbled as he pulled away from her hug. "You still call mom Sensei?" "It's... just... I don't know it's complicated okay?" "Why though? She only sa
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Chapter 33
Katsuo nervously walked behind the elven strider. He tried to read his status window but as usual, the damn thing didn't work when he needed it to work. As they walked forward Katsuo remembered what he had learnt about striders. They were a subclass of warrior profession but they had extremely harsh requirements so usually only elves could become one, which made sense considering elves were the ones who created the profession.The speciality of striders was their endless regeneration. He wasn't sure about its authenticity but he had heard once heard from Aranel that even if you decapitate them master rank striders could grab their heads and reattach them and keep fighting like nothing happened.Of course, their fighting style also was one that favoured mutual destruction.They didn't care if their arms were chopped as long as they could leave one wound in their enemy. In this way, they sounded like berserkers but unlike those glass cannons, these guys were anti-aircraft cannons.