Muichiro was jolted awake by the dull thud of chopping wood.
He looked down at the axe in his hands and realized he had stopped for quite some time. He hurriedly swung his arms, striking the tree before him.
But even though he moved quickly, that cold, sharp-tongued voice rang out at once.
"You even lose focus chopping wood. You space out doing the work that puts food in your belly, and you still want to kill demons?
Sure enough, the 'Mu' in Muichiro stands for nothing-no ability, no purpose."
The boy standing beside him looked so much like him that he had even mistaken him for another version of himself.
They had the same small, slender build and long hair.
That was Yuichiro, his older twin brother.
But rather than twins, they seemed more like enemies carrying a grudge from a past life.
Yuichiro often had a terrible attitude, and his words spared no one's feelings. Ten-year-old Muichiro was always hurt by his coldness.
But that was all right. After all, since their parents had passed away, Yuichiro and Muichiro were the closest people to each other in the world.
Two ten-year-old boys, making a living by chopping wood deep in the mountains.
"So stop having those grand dreams about becoming a Swordsman and roaming Japan. Just chop your wood. That's the fate people like you and me are stuck with for the rest of our lives."
Yuichiro coldly tossed out those words, shouldered a tall stack of firewood, and headed down the mountain.
"Brother!" Muichiro lowered his eyes like a puppy that had been scolded. He shouldered his own load of wood and hurried after his brother.
His brother had always said hurtful things, but never to this extent.
Ever since... that lady had arrived, his brother had