No Longer The Hero | TBATE

Chapter 12 | Reunion (Part 2)

{Arthur POV}

"Long time no see... mom."

I said, greeting my Auburn haired mother who was looking at me with a mixture of shock and denial.

Hearing my casual greeting after being dead for seven years, I saw both my sister and daughter facepalm out of the corner of my eye and wondered if I should have put more emotion into my greeting.

'Faking apathy is one thing, but faking emotions in a convincing way is far more difficult and frankly, not worth the effort.'

However, despite my apparent emotionlessness when I greeted her, my mother only seemed to use my lack of emotion to confirm that it was really me and ran at me with tears in her eyes.

"Wait, mom?"

As my mother arrived at the sofa and pulled me into a hug, I heard the confused voice of the black haired girl who had previously called me hot as she alternated gazes in between my facepalming sister and my sobbing mother.

Feeling my new shirt being soaked in tears for the second time today I felt slightly regretful, but decided to stop being insensitive and patted the back of my mother as she continued to cry.

"Hey wait, Hena explain!"

Looking up from my mother I watched as the black haired girl ran over to my sister and started shaking her shoulders aggressively as she demanded an explanation. Meanwhile I noticed a fifth girl in the room who looked at me with a face filled with confusion, as she seemed greatly perplexed by her mothers actions.

'So she's my little sister.'

"Hena! Who-Is-He!?"

'This girl is annoying.'

Finally getting sick of the girl's incessant pestering my sister looked towards me for help, but I just shrugged with an expression that told her to explain it herself as I didn't feel like dealing with the energetic girl.

"Well, you see..."

She turned her head away from me as her gaze alternated between my littlest sister and the black haired girl, before finally she started to explain.

"...this is Arthur, my twin brother, who, up until about twenty minutes ago, I had thought died after falling off a fairly tall cliff."

Now it was my turn to meet the black haired girl's gaze, but after staring at me for just a few seconds her face turned bright red and she turned back to Athena.

"So how did he survive?"

Hearing that question, even my mother perked up as she turned her red eyes towards her daughter, waiting impatiently for an explanation.

"Well according to him, he was saved by a mana beast, but I'm not exactly convinced."

Then my mother, sisters, and the rest of those present looked at me as they waited for me to respond to my sister's doubt, but I just shrugged, not minding her distrust and said.

"I honestly don't care whether you believe me or not, so if you instead want to believe that I had somehow survived that fall through natural means, be my guest."

My lack of care seemed to upset Athena as she pouted and picked up Sylvie into a hug, looking away in an attempt to make me feel bad.

Sigh...*

'How troublesome'

Step!*

"Hm?"

As I was sighing in self pity, I noticed my still silent youngest sibling walk over to me with a determined expression and stop right in front of me as she locked eyes with me.