"So, why are you here, Father?"

  After the commotion in the interrogation room, Rashion had given some orders to Garundel and Payalka, taken off his jacket and draped it over Amashiro's head to hide his face, then brought him here—the King's private reception room.

  Immediately after Rashion, Norgaar, and Amashiro settled onto the sofas, Rashion's first words were naturally that, but...

  "I don't know."

  "What?"

  At Amashiro's casual answer, Rashion was dumbfounded.

  "I have no idea why I'm here either."

  "He's gone senile..."

  Norgaar muttered, and Rashion nodded with a worried expression, saying "I see..."

  "I haven't! You ungrateful sons. I clearly remember everything up until just before being arrested here."

  "Oh? Then what were you—"

  At that moment, the room's door suddenly burst open and a small figure flew in, leaping onto Amashiro's lap.

  "Grandfather!"

  "Huh?"

  A calico Felinoid girl jumped onto his lap and clung to Amashiro's neck.

  "G-grandfather? Me?"

  Following the girl, a Siamese cat noblewoman in an elegant dress entered the room with graceful steps.

  "Now, now, Princess Asha, that's not proper behavior.

  ...It's been a long time, Father."

  Following Norgaar, more Felinoid who seemed like they shouldn't be here kept appearing, and while feeling bewildered, Amashiro barely maintained his sanity and responded.

  "Don't tell me... are you Isha?"

  "Yes, Father. I've longed to see you!"

  Abandoning her graceful demeanor the moment the door closed, the noblewoman—no, Isha—came running with thundering footsteps and clung to Amashiro just like the girl before.

  "Good grief, if you act like that, you can hardly tell Asha off for bad manners, can you?"

  "Silence, Your Majesty.

  No, since we're before Father, should I call you 'Oniisama'?"

  While Isha straightened her posture after releasing Amashiro and engaged in a battle of sarcasm with Rashion, Amashiro looked down—his mouth still agape—at the pattern on the back of the girl's head still clinging tightly to his neck. It was one he remembered.

  "...Asha?"

  "Yes! Grandfather!"

  "Oof."

  The face of the Felinoid girl turning toward him with a beaming smile was unmistakably his youngest beloved daughter, his cat Asha, but...

  "Asha, why 'grandfather'? Not 'father'?"

  He tried protesting timidly, but—

  "What are you saying, Father?"

  "That kid's been calling you 'old man' since her previous life, remember?"

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  "Oh my, Oniisama Norgaar? Wasn't it 'grandpa'?"

  "Grandfather is grandfather!"

  With that magnificent four-hit combo, Amashiro was inevitably defeated.

  "No no no, I picked you up from the roadside when you were a nursing kitten and raised you with cat milk? Even if not 'mommy,' I should be 'daddy'... right...?"

  "But Daddy is right over there."

  Asha pointed at Rashion.

  "Hey, Asha. That's rude, you know?"

  Rashion gently scolded her with an affectionate gaze.

  "...Huh? Rashion, you're her..."

  "Father. And Isha is my wife and this country's queen consort."

  Just as he was about to say "but you were siblings..."—Amashiro remembered that none of his cats had been blood-related.

  Rashion, a Russian Blue, taken in from an acquaintance.

  Norgaar, an American Shorthair, adopted after seeing a post seeking a foster home.

  Isha, a Siamese, taken in from a shelter for abandoned cats.

  And as mentioned, Asha, a calico who'd been wandering as a nursing kitten, protected and became his youngest.

  All four were complete strangers—or rather, stranger cats?—yet they'd lived together happily as family without caring about such things, so he'd naturally thought of them as "siblings" and his children.

  And now, through whatever accumulation of coincidences, they'd all reincarnated in the same world, in the same generation, and become a real family...

  "A miracle... perhaps."

  "Pardon?"

  "That you all reincarnated as a real family... it seems like nothing short of a miracle.

  Compared to that, me being able to come here is a trivial matter.

  No no no, but still, did all of you have memories of your previous lives?"

  "Ah, about that... we didn't remember from the start.

  In my case, the moment I saw Norgaar, born as my real younger brother, I remembered my previous life."

  "I remembered when Oniisama asked me 'Do you remember me?' when I was old enough to understand."

  "As for me, when I met him for the first time as my fiancé, I remembered and called him 'Oniisama'... It was so sudden that I was terribly embarrassed. And Princess Asha..."

  "The moment I saw Daddy and Mommy's faces, I understood everything!"

  At Asha's proud declaration, the royal couple smiled wryly.

  "That's what she says, but we don't know if it's true. In any case, we had no idea what she was saying until she could speak coherently."

  "That's why I hate you, Daddy!"

  "Indeed. His Majesty is that kind of person, so he's easily disliked."

  "You two..."

  While Rashion gave them a half-lidded stare, Norgaar interjected.

  "Look, I'm all for family harmony, but aren't you forgetting something important?"

  "Ah, right. So, Father?"

  Amashiro, who'd been watching the family gathering with warm feelings, was startled by the gazes suddenly turned toward him.

  "Hm? What is it?"

  "No, I was asking how you got here. In my case, I could go there using the thaumaturgy of World Crossing, but what did you do? You did say Chikyu doesn't have such arts, didn't you?"

  "Ah, that. As far as I know, no."

  "But you said you remember everything up until just before appearing here, right?"

  "I do remember, Norgaar. Certainly, Rashion had eaten all of 'those treats' that were in the house..."

  "Wait just a minute! Father, what did you just say?"

  Isha's tone suddenly became somewhat rough.

  "Huh? That. You know. 'That smooth paste treat.' Your previous lives' favorite..."

  The moment he started to say it, Amashiro felt a strange chill.

  "Oni. I. Sa. Ma. Your. Maj. Es. Ty?"

  "Big bro?"

  "Daddy?"

  "F-Father! That doesn't matter right now!"

  Everyone was emanating bloodlust, and while Amashiro absentmindedly thought the earlier chill was because of this, Rashion frantically spoke, his words becoming a complete mess.

  With an expression that said "as if I care," Amashiro continued talking.

  "So, he'd devoured about 20 of them on the spot and still looked like it wasn't enough, so I rushed out to buy more."

  "Twenty?!"

  Amashiro nearly burst out laughing remembering the scene of the cat Norgaar and the others surrounding and hissing at Rashion for eating 20 by himself, but he held it in and continued.

  "So, I bought a whole box, and thinking we'd have dinner together, I even bought sushi and came home, only to find you'd disappeared.

  I understood intellectually that the thaumaturgy might have had a time limit, but... what about my feelings of not being able to say goodbye? Was I just supposed to think it was a dream?"

  In the end, Amashiro vented his lonely feelings at Rashion.

  The reason he'd been looking for chances to tease Rashion from the start was to dispel those lonely feelings.

  "That's not it, Father. When I said goodbye to you in my previous life, you looked so pained..."

  "Even so, leaving without saying anything was cruel, I think."

  "That was cruel."

  "Yes, cruel of you, Oniisama."

  "Daddy's cruel!"

  "Wait, aren't you lot resenting something else?"

  Watching Rashion flail about feeling isolated and helpless, Amashiro couldn't help but smile wryly—he couldn't stay angry even if he wanted to.

  "Anyway, when I tried to put the box I'd bought in the closet, the next moment I was standing in a corridor here, still holding the box. What happened..."

  "Wait, you came here still holding the box of treats?"

  Facing Isha, whose eyes blazed brilliantly as she asked, Amashiro pulled back a little.

  "Y-yes? Though when people who seemed to be soldiers here arrested me, they confiscated it..."

  SLAM.

  "Captain Garundel! Where are you?!"

  The moment Norgaar flew out of the room, Amashiro heard his shouts rapidly fading into the distance, and having no idea what was happening, he sat there in a daze, unable to close his dropped jaw.

  "What on earth is going on?"