Torn Asunder by War, A Sword Saint for Tomorrow X The Knight Wizards!! – Chapter 27

Chapter 27
  “This is…”
  
  The moment I stepped through the door, I was amazed by the Japanese-style interior. Despite having wandered into this world only about a month ago, it already evoked a strong sense of nostalgia.
  
  “I heard from the instructors we sent to the Lizel Knight Kingdom that you are Japanese… Fufu, judging by your expression, it seems I was right.”
  
  “I appreciate your consideration. Honestly, I’m happy.”
  “Ah, but please refrain from the tatami room. My legs would hurt from sitting formally.”
  
  Nina, with a smile, turned around and noticed me looking at the tatami room with the zabuton cushions placed on it, and warned me that it wasn’t that way. Indeed, it would be out of place with her bold dress.
  
  ‘If I were to be picky, I myself don’t fit in with the interior either…’
  
  When I came here, the suit that was tattered during the battle in the Great Forest and my belongings at that time were carefully stored in a Western-style chest of drawers in my bedroom. Since my marriage to Izana, I have preferred to wear a knight’s uniform and a coat.
  
  I took off my coat and held it in one hand. My appetite was stimulated by the smell of soba and tempura as I sat down at the counter with the young lady.
  
  “Welcome, Lady Nina.”
  “It’s been a while, Genzo. Have you been well?”
  
  “Thanks to you… Is that the one?”
  “Yes, this is Claude-dono.”
  
  A man in his 50s, wearing a dark blue happi coat, silently bowed his head, so I bowed in return. After briefly exchanging glances, he served us hot tea and returned to cooking.
  
  “He’s an acquaintance from before I was taken in by the former lord. Genzo is stubborn but a good guy.”
  “Flattery won’t get you anywhere.”
  
  He said curtly, draining the hot water from the cooked soba noodles, placing them in two bamboo baskets, and serving them to the table with the dipping sauce and condiments.
  
  “I can’t believe I can eat soba…”
  “I think most dishes can be reproduced if you try hard enough. This place is actually Earth, you know.”
  
  “…What!?”
  
  I stared at her in surprise at her unexpected statement, but she gave me a smug look and told me to wait for a detailed explanation.
  
  So, I tried to integrate the similarities in food and customs that I had felt from time to time, along with the fragmented geographical information I had obtained, to verify the credibility of her words… but I felt it was pointless given the fact that there were magical beasts and dinosaurs, and we were fighting with giant knights.
  
  While I was thinking about such futile things for a while, Genzo finished frying tempura of shrimp, squid, and seasonal vegetables, arranged them on a large plate, and placed pickled vegetables and clear soup on the table.
  
  “Ideally, I would like to serve the tempura one by one, freshly fried, but I thought it would be difficult to have a detailed conversation if I were here… Please excuse me.”
  
  After preparing all the dishes, the elderly man in the happi coat left the cooking area and went outside through the entrance of the restaurant where we had entered, so that he could see us.
  
  After confirming that the door was closed properly, I turned to Nina and was about to ask her for the basis for saying that this world was Earth, but she was skillfully handling her chopsticks, picking up a piece of tempura, dipping it in the tempura sauce, and bringing it to her mouth.
  
  “Mmm, it’s crispy and delicious. Tempura is the best when it’s shrimp.”
  “Ah, yes, it is.”
  
  Seeing her soften her usually stern expression, I decided there was no need to rush and changed my mind. I also picked up my chopsticks and was about to take a piece of white fish from the assortment on the large plate… when Nina blocked it with her chopsticks.
  
  “That’s my favorite, so…”
  “What a coincidence, white fish is my favorite too.”
  
  Since there were enough for both of us, I brushed her aside without hesitation, dipped the secured piece in the tempura sauce, and took a bite.
  
  “Grr, doesn’t he know the words ‘ladies first’? You Easterner!”
  “…There’s a piece for Lady Nina too, you know.”
  
  While grumbling at her unreasonable words, I popped the remaining white fish tempura into my mouth, savoring it thoroughly and enjoying it. I also started eating the soba noodles, glancing at her as she took a small bite of the same kind of tempura that was left.
  
  “So, about this being Earth…”
  “Hmm, it’s a bit complicated to explain in detail, but do you know about the space-time continuum?”
  
  “Adding the time axis to the three dimensions and considering it as a four-dimensional manifold, wasn’t it?”
  
  To summarize the main points, the “space-time continuum” should be something that adds “temporal continuity” to “spatial continuity” and considers it on a cosmic scale.
  
  “Generally speaking, that understanding is fine… Slurp.”
  
  The sound of both of us slurping our soba noodles echoed as we continued our conversation, which didn’t quite fit the current atmosphere. Apparently, according to her conclusion, this world is a parallel world that branched off from the Earth we know.
  
  If a minute change within the space-time continuum occurs at the convergence point, meaning the present, the world will split and parallel worlds will be born.
  
  “It’s a newly derived world, but before it spreads out as a different space-time continuum, there’s also some kind of corrective force, and in most cases, it’s integrated with the original world.”
  
  “So, even if there was a world where I just gave up the white fish tempura, it wouldn’t affect the overall situation, so the world of possibilities wouldn’t expand, and by the time we leave the shop, it would be integrated?”
  
  “Hee… You’re smart. That saves me the trouble of explaining.”
  
  While showing interest, she laughed mischievously and started telling an impossible hypothetical story.
  
  “What if I was a huge fan of white fish, and I couldn’t forgive you for not giving it to me, and I declared war on the Lizel Knight Kingdom in a situation where there are natural enemies of the human race?”
  
  “That might affect the overall situation… Ah, it’s the butterfly effect, isn’t it?”
  
  I suddenly remembered a kind of chaos theory that says even a small event like a butterfly flapping its wings somewhere can lead to an unexpected outcome by accumulating ripple effects.