Published: July 25, 2025
Now, although I was determined to absolutely make a book, I couldn’t get my hands on any paper.
From a Japanese perspective, if I went to a home center, I could buy 500 sheets of copy paper for around 200 yen, but in the life I was living here, my father’s entire monthly salary would be spent on just one piece of parchment.
One piece of parchment means the largest piece made from a single sheep’s skin after it’s been peeled and shaved, sold as parchment, and then cut into more manageable sizes. The piece I found at my father’s workplace was about the size of an A4 sheet.
Even if I tried to cut and use one piece of parchment, I could only get about 5 to 8 sheets out of it. Simply put, parchment is way too expensive—commoners like me can’t afford enough parchment to write a book.
In other words, before I can make a book, I need to make paper.
But the thing is, I only have the kind of knowledge about paper-making that I read about in books. After all, paper was something you could just buy at a store.
Not just supermarkets and convenience stores, but even the school store stocked loose-leaf paper and notebooks. I grew up in a world where you’d be given notepads or diaries as freebies and calendars were giveaways from banks. Flyers and unnecessary direct mail were immediately treated as trash.
Now, no matter how unnecessary an ad might be, I’d read every corner of it, and I could confidently say I’d make use of every blank space.
How lavish it was, living in a world where paper was so easy to come by.
Long live Japan! If I’m going to be reincarnated, Japan is where I want to be.
On top of that, there’s no machinery here to make paper. Without machines, everything has to be done by hand.
You might think, “Well, it’s only natural if you were reincarnated into another world without machines,” right?
Or you might think, “You have the knowledge from books, so just do it!”
…but really, think about it.
I’m a hopeless Japanese girl who loved reading but found even everyday household electrical appliances bothersome. Could someone like me suddenly start making paper by hand? Moreover, my body is that of a toddler, fragile and sickly, with extremely limited abilities and permissions.
Conclusion.
It’s impossible.
But it’s too soon to give up.
There’s a long history on Earth with political and economic necessities that have pushed record-keeping. Paper made by machines is a relatively recent invention.
In other words, the older the history, the more possible it might be for me to replicate it.
Hmm, what did they do before machines?
I stretched my five-year-old little girl hands—as big as they could go—and frowned in thought.
Ancient civilizations, ancient civilizations… Speaking of ancient civilizations, there’s the Egypt civilization!
And Egypt civilization means papyrus!
Long live Egypt civilization!
With that mental association, I came up with the idea to imitate papyrus and make a kind of papyrus substitute. If it was an invention from ancient times, maybe even my small hands could manage it.
Surely they used some plant—straight stalks or grass fibers… or something like that. There are plants here, too. Surely the forest has plenty of plants that could serve as raw materials for paper.
Alright, the forest. Let’s go to the forest.
Only when it comes to books am I ridiculously quick on my feet—I astonished and yet was lamented by my family and Shuu-chan.
As soon as I thought of it, I asked Tulli to take me to the forest.
“Tulli, I want to go to the forest too. Together…”
“Eh!? Myne!? No way!”
Before I could finish, she rejected me. It was like she didn’t even consider it.
Plus, she said “no way” instead of “no,” which felt like “no room for reconsideration,” and that stung my heart.
“Why not?”
“Well, you can’t walk, right? You can’t even walk to the gate, so going to the forest is absolutely impossible. When we get to the forest, we have to pick up firewood and look for nuts, and there’s no time to rest. Besides, you can’t climb trees, right? On the way back, you’d be tired but still have to carry heavy loads, walking back before the gate closes. No matter how tired you are, there’s no time to rest. See? It’s impossible for you.”