The Sword Empress

When I opened my eyes, sunlight poured through the leaves.

It was so bright I raised a hand to shield them, and then I froze.

The fingers were slender. The little scar that had always marked the back of my hand was gone. I turned the wrist over, clenched a fist, and opened it again. It moved exactly as I willed it to. It still wasn't my hand.

"……What the hell."

Even the voice.

I thought I was only half awake. I cleared my throat and tried again, but nothing changed. Not the morning after ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠drinking, not when I'd had a cold—I had never once produced a voice like this.

I sat there with my mouth hanging open for a long while before I slowly looked down.

A blue outer robe hung from my shoulders. The cloth, worked with a deep pattern, looked expensive even at a glance, but there was no tie to close the front. Underneath, nothing but a strip of white cloth wrapped around my chest. Shoulders and midriff were left bare.

And the body wearing it—

"Wait."

I snatched the front of the robe shut.

"Just—wait."

I couldn't have said how many times I repeated myself.

Closing the gaping robe came first, and even that wasn't easy. Pull one side across and the cloth slid off the opposite shoulder.

"……Did I stop halfway through getting dressed?"

In the end I gathered both lapels in my fists and looked around. Fortunately, there was no one. Only trees, grass, and rock showing through here and there. A little way off, I could hear water running.

When I staggered to my feet, something at my waist struck my leg. A long scabbard. Startled, I looked down and found a sword tied to the black belt around my waist. An actual sword?

I started to check, then turned instead toward the sound of water. There was something I needed to see before that.

A few steps brought me to a small stream in the rocks. I crouched at the edge and looked down into the water pooled between the stones.

A strange woman was looking back at me.

Lustrous black hair. The bangs were cut neat and straight at the brows, and the rest was gathered into a low updo held by two blue-green jade hairpins. Every time I moved my head, the fine chains at the ends of the pins swayed. The lengths left loose on either side fell past my cheeks to below the collarbones. I clumsily tucked back a strand that threatened to touch the water, and only then did the face come clear.

Eyes with slightly upturned corners, amber irises. Beneath a neat bridge of nose, a small, tidy mouth. A face that would have looked cold if it were still. Right now the panic was written all over it.

I touched my cheek, and the woman touched hers. I opened my mouth, and she opened hers the same way.

"……Fuck."

The woman on the water swore with a beautiful face.

I had lived twenty-seven years as a man. Shaving every morning had always been a nuisance, and whenever I went to the barber I asked for the same short cut. Just last night I'd spilled soup from a delivery meal down my T-shirt and tossed it in the hamper.

A body could change like this overnight?

I pinched my cheek. It hurt. I pinched harder, and tears sprang up. Only when I saw the reflected cheek flush red did I let go.

If this were a dream, I ought to have woken by now. Far from waking, all I'd managed was to soak the hem of the robe in cold water.

I was pulling the wet cloth up when my hand stopped. The pattern worked into the blue sleeve caught my eye—the pattern I'd been too rattled to really look at a moment ago. I had seen it before. The black hair, too. The blue-green hairpins. Even this ridiculous outfit.

"No way."

I looked into the water again. The amber eyes wavered.

A novel ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I'd happened to tap in the recommendations while I was lying in bed on my phone. The woman in the illustration printed in that novel.

It had been a wuxia novel. More precisely, an erotic story wearing a wuxia's skin.

The blurb had looked suspicious from the start. Between the talk of heaven-sent fortune and peerless masters, phrases had been mixed in that had no business being there. I'd tapped it anyway, because the art was decent.

On the first page stood a black-haired woman. Against a bamboo grove, hair pinned up with blue-green jade, a blue outer robe over her shoulders. Right down to the white cloth wrapped beneath the robe, she was identical to me now.

Sword Empress.

That was all it said beneath the picture. Not even a name—just a two-character epithet, sitting there by itself. At the time I'd scrolled past without much thought. A woman who used a sword, a master, that was the idea. The clothes were strange, but in a genre like that there was no reason for clothing to be practical.

The problem was that my reading had ended there.

I'd only gotten through the opening of the first chapter. Someone walked into an inn and ordered a drink, and I was tired, so after a few lines I set the phone down. That was the end of it. I didn't know the protagonist's name. I didn't know which sect the Sword Empress belonged to. Whether she was good or bad, or even which chapter she appeared in. All I knew was the face and the clothes. That was everything.

"At least finish the damn thing before you dump me in it."

Saying it out loud ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠only made it more absurd. Reading to the end wouldn't have made me want to come here either.

I got up from the water's edge and wrung out the wet hem. Unlike the impossible situation, the water against my fingers was cold. The wind sliding over bare skin, the earth crumbling under my feet—all of it was far too sharp.

I dug through my memory for a long time. In a situation like this, wasn't the body's memory supposed to come along? A name, say. The road home. At the very least, how to put these clothes on properly. There was nothing. All that surfaced was yesterday's food and a novel I hadn't finished.

I set a hand on the sword's grip. Still, if she was the Sword Empress, she had to be strong. They didn't hand an epithet like that to just anyone. Even if I didn't know how to use martial arts, there was a chance the body would move on its own.

Carefully, I drew the blade a little. My face reflected along the cold steel.

"……."

I slid it back in. I didn't even know how to hold it. Swing it around and cut my own foot, and I'd be in real trouble.

People first. Find something to wear, figure out where this was, and after that look for a way back. Even if I couldn't return to my old body right away, it had to be better than spending the night in the woods.

I looked for a pocket, too. There wasn't one. Not that I had no money—there was no pocket at all. I felt all the way inside the sleeves, and all my hands found was cloth.

"How in the world did she walk around dressed like this?"

Complaining got me no answer. I let out a long breath and followed the stream. Downstream, something was bound to turn up. At least it beat wandering the forest at random.

That was when it happened.

Ting.

A clear chime rang right beside my ear. I turned on reflex. Nothing was there. Instead, a blue rectangle rose in the center of my vision.

I stopped walking.

"……A Status Window?"

I reached out, but my fingers passed through empty air. Turn my head and the window clung to the same spot in my vision. Only then did I breathe a little easier. At least there was something here that might explain this.

"Help. Description. No—first, if I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠want to go back to how I was……"

The text changed before I finished.

I shut my mouth.

The blue window had flushed red, and beneath it new lines had appeared one after another. I read them once. Sure I'd misread, I read them again. My eyes stopped on the second line.

"What?"

Obedience to men's commands.

"I'm supposed to do what?"

Obey. Under that, more words trailed on, the sort of thing someone might have written as a joke. It wasn't that I failed to understand them. I couldn't understand why words like that were floating in front of my eyes. And at the very bottom, there was even a see more.

"Cancel."

I said it at once.

"Cancel it. I'm not doing this."

The window did not disappear. Waving my hand did nothing either. I tried to press the letters and shove them aside, but my fingertips touched nothing. Only the red text remained, hanging in front of my eyes.

"Wait, I never even agreed to this, what are you—"

Something rang inside my head.

Ding.

A sound like metal lightly struck.

In that instant the ground tilted under me. I grabbed the nearest tree. Rough bark bit into my palm. The sense of pain reached my head a beat late.

I blinked. The letters blurred, then sharpened again.

Reading that line, a strange thought came over me.

"……Ah♥"

Only after the sound left my mouth did I realize what I had been made to do.

Then a voice came from beyond the brush.

"The sound came from over here."

A man's voice. Through the branches, a scabbard showed first. Then a man in a dark gray martial uniform stepped into view. He was not alone. Another man followed, parting the brush with a long staff. The same clothes. The same waistbelt. The two of them, walking as they read the traces around them, looked at me at almost the same moment.

The one in front stopped.

"……A woman?"

The man behind him saw the sword at my waist and shifted his hand to his hilt.

"You there. Halt."

The foot I'd meant to draw back stopped dead. I thought I had to stop, and I stopped.

The man standing before me raised his empty hands.

"We are martial artists who were patrolling this area."

I couldn't answer. I looked down at the toes I'd been about to move, then slowly lifted my head.

The two Patrol Martial Artists were looking at me.