The Silent Guardian (Akagami no Shirayukihime)

The Silent Guardian

Blinking in shock and disbelief, the girl stared silently at the bathroom mirror, blue eyes uncharacteristically wide. She slowly reached out a hand and pulled at a lock of blonde hair, marveling at the color, but was highly confused since she didn't have blonde hair last time she checked. Her body is also now more slender and fit, a far cry from her rather plain appearance in the past.

She had thought that waking up to a majestic room and not her old creaky bedroom was the strangest thing that ever happened to her. Looking in the mirror now, it was clear that she was wrong, because this isn't her body.

Judging by its very familiar appearance and the fact that she had found a set of equally familiar clothes and a sword back in the bedroom, there is really no mistaking that this body belongs to someone she had previously thought was just a work of fiction.

The body of the swordswoman and one of the closest aides of Prince Zen Wisteria, Kiki Seiran.

She backed away from the mirror, watching as the reflection of the woman did so as well. There is no denying it; this is real indeed.

She leaned against the wall heavily, suddenly feeling too weak on the knees; she had always considered herself a very levelheaded and adaptable person, but this is just pushing things too far. Her mind quickly scrambled for reasons and theories as to why and how this could even be happening.

Dreams came as the number one possibility. Perhaps this was just a dream; after all, she's had quite a few of those adventurous dreams, though this is the first time it was set in an anime. The second was reincarnation, which she originally thought is downright impossible.

However, if it is true, then that just means she had died, a fact she had a hard time believing. The last thing she remembered was sleeping in her room. Did she die in her sleep? If so, how? She never had any fatal diseases. Perhaps, a heart attack?

She pinched herself hard, and was resigned when she felt a sharp throb from that part of her skin. Not a dream, then. That means the second theory was what happened to her, unless there are other possibilities out there which she forgot to consider.

One thing is clear though. Whatever happened to her, whoever had done this to her, they knew what they were doing. Kiki Seiran was a master swordswoman, so it doesn't seem like a coincidence that the person who replaced her is a long-time practitioner of the Japanese sport Kendo, and is a skilled swordswoman herself.

'Though fighting with swords is probably significantly different here', she mused as she went back to her bedroom, 'From what she knew of the anime, they don't treat it here as a sport; sword fighting is a necessary survival skill in this world.'

Unless Kiki has a certain style, she was confident she could hold her own for a while until she relearns everything again from scratch. The problem was her own life. She doesn't know much about Kiki's past except that she's a nobleman's daughter and the heir of the Seiran family. She is also one of Prince Zen's closest aides alongside Mitsuhide Louen and typically has a stoic and serious personality. That pretty much sums up everything she knew about the woman.

While she has no doubt that she could act as close as she could to Kiki's original personality and could probably handle the sword as best as she could, there is still a far bigger problem.

She silently sat at the edge of Kiki's bed, feeling too stunned to move. How could she do this? Her knowledge of the kingdom of Clarines, the Wistal Castle, and the people currently living here is beyond limited, and even if she could figure it out, everyone will surely notice that she changed one way or another.

... Should she just tell everyone about what happened?

She inwardly scoffed, 'and get treated like she was insane? No thank you.'