After arriving at the Riyute inn, Naofumi requested a room with two beds to save money, which Ichigo agreed to without hesitation. Once inside, they set down their gear, and Naofumi told Raphtalia to go and bathe. The young girl left, leaving the two men alone in the small room.
As soon as the door closed behind Raphtalia, the atmosphere grew heavy and tense. Naofumi sat on the edge of one of the beds, his eyes narrowed as he focused on Ichigo. He was the first to speak, his voice low and demanding. He wanted to know exactly who Ichigo was and how he had come to master such a peculiar weapon.
Ichigo leaned against the wall, looking down at the Light Metal disks at his waist. "Since I was a little boy, I had these recurring dreams," he began. "In them, a smaller version of myself played with an object—what you call a 'Yo-Yo.' I had those dreams for years, until one day I asked my parents to make me something like it. Back then, it was just a toy made of wood and cloth."
He paused, a faint smile crossing his face. "As time passed, I got better at handling it. It wasn't until a day at the training grounds when I used that 'toy' to disarm a knight, snatching the sword right out of his hand, that everything changed. The Yo-Yo stopped being a plaything and became an experiment. I spent years turning it into a weapon. On my fifteenth birthday, my parents gave me these," he patted the metallic disks. "The same ones I carry now. I've been an adventurer ever since."
The silence returned for a moment before Ichigo straightened up, his expression turning serious. He looked Naofumi directly in the eyes. "Now it's my turn to ask, Naofumi. What are all these rumors about you? The ones saying you... violated your former companion?"
Naofumi's face darkened instantly. His hands clenched into fists, and a cold, bitter aura seemed to radiate from him. Iknew this was coming, he thought, his jaw tightening.
Seeing Naofumi's silence, Ichigo stepped closer. "Look, if we are going to be partners, we have to be honest. We need to know how to trust each other."
"Trust?" Naofumi spat the word like poison. "Because I trusted someone else, my life is exactly what it is now. I was betrayed, stripped of everything, and spat on by this entire kingdom."
"Tell me everything," Ichigo insisted, his voice calm but firm.
With deep skepticism, Naofumi began to recount the events: the summoning, the false kindness of Malty S Melromarc, the theft of his belongings, and the public humiliation in the throne room. As Naofumi spoke, he noticed Ichigo had produced a notebook and a quill with ink from one of his pouches.
"And how did that specific moment make you feel?" Ichigo asked, scribbling rapidly. "When the King looked at you with that undisguised contempt, where in your body did you feel the tension?"
"I felt it everywhere! I felt like the world was closing in on me," Naofumi answered instinctively, caught up in the raw emotion of the memory. He continued describing his isolation and the hatred he felt for the other heroes.
"Interesting... and when you look at Raphtalia, do you see a person, or do you see a tool to prevent that pain from happening again?" Ichigo asked, not looking up from his notes.
Naofumi stopped abruptly. He watched the way Ichigo's quill moved rhythmically across the parchment. Wait a minute...
"Hey! What are you doing?" Naofumi barked, standing up. "Are you trying to give me therapy? I don't need a psychologist, especially not one that fights with toys!"
Ichigo blinked innocently, slowly closing the notebook. "Therapy? I have no idea what you're talking about, Naofumi. I'm just taking notes for our... group logistics." He finished the last line with a flourish and turned the notebook around. "However, strictly as an 'observer,' here is my diagnosis of your current psychological state based on what you just shared."
Naofumi snatched the notebook and read the page:
Patient: Iwatani Naofumi
Preliminary Diagnosis: Severe Acute Stress Disorder: Stemming from systemic betrayal and public defamation.
Hyper-Vigilance: Persistent expectation of betrayal leading to social withdrawal.
Suppressed Empathy: A defense mechanism to avoid further emotional vulnerability.
Recommendation: Frequent rest, venting of frustrations (preferably not at the patient's slave), and perhaps a hobby that doesn't involve being bitten by balloons.
Naofumi stared at the paper, his face turning a shade of red that matched his anger. "I am NOT a patient! And I don't have 'suppressed empathy'!"
"The fact that you're shouting at the only guy who offered you a potion today suggests otherwise," Ichigo said with a wink, leaning back against the wall.
"I'm fine, Ichigo! Just drop it!" Naofumi growled, turning his back.
"You're really not," Ichigo countered, his tone becoming surprisingly gentle for a second. "Tell me something. That bread we ate earlier... how did it taste?"
Naofumi paused. He looked at his hands, then at the floor where the notebook lay. "It tasted like nothing," he confessed, his voice barely a whisper. "Everything tastes like sand. It's been like that since that day in the castle."
Ichigo sighed, picked up his notebook, and flipped it open again. "As I thought. I'm adding a new entry to the diagnosis: Flavor Blindness. It's a psychosomatic response to trauma. That isn't healthy, Naofumi. It's not okay."
Naofumi felt exposed, a sensation he hated even more than the King's contempt. Desperate to move the spotlight away from his own broken mind, he cleared his throat and pointed at Ichigo's waist.
"Enough about me. How is it that your dreams made a toy into a weapon? You said that object didn't exist here."
Ichigo noticed the deflection but decided to play along, tucking the notebook back into his pouch. "I don't know the exact details. In this world, no one had ever seen a Yo-Yo until I started carrying one. But those dreams were so vivid... it was like I was remembering a life I never lived. I knew how the weight should feel, how the string should tension. My parents thought I was a bit eccentric, but they supported me. They were the ones who finally commissioned a blacksmith to make the metal version once I proved I could actually kill monsters with the wooden one."
He looked at the door as the sound of water stopping in the bath area echoed through the thin walls. "Maybe we're both a little 'broken' in our own ways, Naofumi. But at least we're effective."
Naofumi didn't respond, but he didn't kick Ichigo out of the room either. He just sat back down, staring at the shield on his arm, wondering if a "Flavor Blindness" diagnosis was something he could ever actually cure.
Gemini ha dicho
After a few seconds of silence, Ichigo stepped away from the wall and approached Naofumi. Naofumi stared at him intently, his muscles tense, expecting a sudden movement or another sarcastic remark. However, Ichigo did something Naofumi didn't expect at all: he knelt on one knee before him, bowing his head in a posture of absolute respect.
With a solemn voice, stripped of any trace of his usual sarcasm, Ichigo spoke.
"I, Tatsuo Ichigo, swear by my own name that I will follow the Shield Hero, Iwatani Naofumi, and will never attempt against his life nor that of his allies."
In that instant, the air in the room seemed to vibrate. Beneath them, the floor glowed with a pure white radiance, materializing a complex magic seal. The symbol featured a stylized shield at the center, surrounded by elegant, sweeping curves that formed a protective, heart-like frame with flowing ribbons at the base.
The magic circle glowed intensely before fading, but not before leaving a mark on the system. A notification appeared before Naofumi's eyes.
[Oath of Name Detected]
Tatsuo Ichigo's fate has been linked to the wielder of the Cardinal Shield. Consequences of breach: Whoever breaks this oath will lose their name, their identity, and will be degraded to a state lower than human, becoming a being without will or soul.
Naofumi felt a sudden heat on the back of his right hand. Looking at it, he saw a small white light seal appear briefly before etching itself into his skin. The emblem was a geometric insignia: a shield containing an inverted triangle, topped with three small orbs and flanked by rectangular, wing-like structures.
"What... what the hell did you just do?" Naofumi asked, taking a step back while observing the mark on his hand. "Why would you go to such an extreme?"
Ichigo stood up, regaining his light smile, though his eyes still showed a deep seriousness.
"It's so you can trust me, Naofumi. I can't force you to believe me with just words, and we already saw that the slave seal doesn't work on people like us," Ichigo explained, shrugging as if he had just done something mundane. "But it's also so you can heal. You can't fight a war if you don't have someone to lean on without fear of being stabbed in the back."
Ichigo extended his hand, not to attack, but in a gesture of camaraderie.
"From now on, we aren't just party members. We're brothers. And a brother doesn't let the other eat food that tastes like sand forever."
Naofumi looked at the extended hand and then at the seal on his own. This idiot is crazy, he thought, feeling for the first time in a long while that the pressure in his chest was easing a bit. But he's a crazy guy who just gambled his humanity for me.
TO BE CONTINUED