Chapter 2
Chapter 2
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Translator: crow
Chapter Title: EP.1 – My Story
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I was a slave.
At birth, before I was even three years old, my parents sold me to a slave trader.
I don't resent them.
...No, to correct myself, I don't even remember what my parents looked like.
I was sold off right around when I started to speak. How could I remember their faces?
The only clear memory I have is toddling after the slave trader, sucking on my fingers.
Young slaves sold well.
They were popular with spellcasters, supposedly for human experiments.
Or was it because the greedy pigs in the temples had a taste for children?
Either way, they sold like hotcakes.
I ended up sold to a spellcaster.
The slave trader called me an "unlucky bastard," but if I think about it, getting sold to a mage seems better than ending up as some old pervert's plaything.
Ten years as a spellcaster's slave.
Out of a hundred slaves brought in, I was one of the three survivors—no, one of the three test subjects that made it.
The mage's experiments involved extracting cells from magical beasts and implanting them into human bodies, all in pursuit of human enhancement.
Kids who couldn't adapt to the cells or withstand them either burst open or turned into something that was neither human nor beast, then got tossed into the incinerator. That was just business as usual in the lab.
My body was weak back then, but my will to live was strong.
The will to survive.
I had that.
Even at that young age when I barely understood death, I craved survival. I desperately endured the experiments and started delivering the results the mage wanted.
I showed remarkable adaptation to the genes of two magical beasts: the Human Dog and the Man-Eater Ghost. The mage was thrilled.
...And then the mage tried to dissect me.
Splat!
"...Huh?"
Crunch. Can a person's head really burst that easily?
It was my first kill.
Slaves aren't supposed to be able to kill their masters, but I learned then that the slave brand doesn't activate if there's no intent to attack. I had just thrashed reflexively without murderous intent, and that casual smack killed the mage.
A miraculous fluke of coincidence and luck.
...Or maybe the mage's mistake played a part?
I mean, I'd been infused with Man-Eater Ghost genes—aka troll genes. Who in their right mind grabs a scalpel to dissect a kid with a monster's strength?
No wonder spellcasters get so much contempt. Every last one of them is out of their damn mind.
Anyway, with the master dead, I was automatically free. I tried to slip out of the lab.
"Well, well, what's this interesting little thing?"
"...Ah."
Unfortunately, I didn't make it.
I should've been quicker, but it just so happened to be the day a certain organization funding the mage came to visit. The mage croaked right in front of them, and they caught me in the act.
"Kid, pick your option. Come with me? Or die right here?"
"...I'll come along."
"Smart kid."
The organization backing the mage.
They were none other than the Black Moon Assassins.
Age thirteen.
I became an assassin.
The assassin organization wanted powerful soldiers.
Soldiers with magical beast abilities and top-tier assassination skills.
Word was, they were plotting to overthrow a kingdom.
Assassins trying to topple a kingdom? Looking back now, the world really had gone to hell.
Still, I was useful enough to survive. They raised me as an assassin, and for the first time, I lived like a human.
Even if it meant enduring inhuman crap every day—like eating poison to build resistance or getting tortured to toughen up against it.
But having proper meals, a real bed to sleep in... that taught me what it meant to live humanely.
So I held no grudges against the organization.
About five years—that's how long they invested in turning me into a professional assassin.
"Prepare for the mission."
"Understood."
"No. 9 and No. 10 are coming too. No. 8, you keep an eye on them."
"...Yes, sir."
Back then, my name was No. 8.
Meaning there were seven ahead of me, which was only natural.
The organization wasn't stupid. Did they really pin their kingdom-toppling hopes on just one mage?
They'd backed plenty of spellcasters, so the group had no shortage of freaks like me with bizarre physical prowess or mystical powers.
For reference, No. 9 and No. 10 were the other two survivors from the same experiments.
We got along like fire and oil.
The organization's nature made camaraderie impossible, but they especially hated that I—a younger kid—had a higher number.
...Childish punks.
But maybe because they were so childish...
"Die, No. 8!"
"If only you weren't here...!"
No. 9 and No. 10, seething with inferiority, attacked me. I charged back to survive.
It was a brutal fight, but I gained the upper hand.
They needed to learn this.
"If you wanted a higher number, you should've worked harder than me."
Splat!
"Gahk!"
"H-How...?"
"Why do you think I have a higher number? Get smarter in your next life."
Of course I had the higher number. I was clearly stronger than them.
Idiots like them wouldn't even grasp why.
"Whew, now what do I do?"
I'd killed them both successfully, but I wasn't happy about it.
Murder being this hollow and bitter—if I was glad, I'd have been certifiable right then.
But behind the bitterness came worry.
These were prized assets the organization had nurtured. Killing them like this...
Wouldn't the organization come after me?
Fortunately...
"Huh?"
When I returned to base, the organization had been utterly crushed.
The kingdom had caught wind of the coup plot and sent its army to wipe out every assassin group.
I couldn't believe it at first.
The organization was seriously powerful.
So I checked every hideout and safehouse I knew of, but they were all burned to ash. And decisively...
"...Those guys sure know how to stick it out till the end."
I saw the instructors and executives all beheaded and impaled on spears. That's when it sank in.
Ah, the organization's done for.
Age eighteen. Finally, I was truly free.
Two years later.
I moved to another country for a fresh start at my second life, but what I learned for sure was that the world is merciless—far harsher than even life in the organization.
Is this just how the world works?
"Fucking hell."
Life was so tough I spat that first vulgar curse I ever learned like it was my mantra.
From scraping together money to maintaining relationships and hunting jobs—everything was a grind.
I tried all sorts of work, but in the end, my best skill was swinging a blade. So I chose the one job I excelled at.
"Hey, rookie, you're too damn slow!"
"Yes, sir, coming now!"
I became a mercenary.
More precisely, the runt of a mid-sized mercenary company.
"Where've you been scraping by, kid?"
"Just alleyways and backstreets."
"Yeah? Your footwork screams assassin."
"Me?"
"...Tch, guess not. My bad. Must've been mistaken."
"Nah, no need to apologize for that, haha."
...Sharp as ghosts, these guys.
I figured mercenaries were just day-to-day hustlers, but damn, they had good instincts and eyes.
Makes sense—that's how they eat.
From then on, I worked to shed my assassin habits: gait, tics, everything.
Of course, I kept what was useful.
Skills and habits that came in handy stayed.
Four years grinding as a mercenary, shedding the rookie label, fighting in a few warzones, living blade-for-hire...
Splat!
"Gahk!"
"You bastard sons of bitches!!"
This damn life of mine.
The client stabbed us in the back, and the company got stoned to death.
I took a rock to the head and went down, vision blurring.
'...Play dead.'
This wasn't enough to kill me.
This body's no joke!
Die from a few rocks?
'Can't win this.'
Even if I unleashed every hidden trick and ability, a handful of us couldn't beat trained soldiers.
Best to play dead and wait it out. I trusted my freakish regen and tough hide to endure the stoning and boot-stomping.
Don't judge me for letting the others die. I'd put up with their weird stares every time I picked up soap—me not killing them myself was mercy.
Self-justifying like that as my head throbbed...
'...Man, I want a cola.'
A buried memory resurfaced.
Not from this life—from my previous life.
Age twenty-four. I realized I was a reincarnator.
'...No reincarnation perks?'
Sadly, after surviving, I spent five hours trying every trick to summon a status window. Nothing.
"Fucking hell."
Should've left the memory buried.
The company got wiped out. When I reported the client's betrayal, the Mercenary Union hit back hard.
Mercenaries might be called heartless butchers who'll do anything for coin, but contracts are sacred. Betray one, and the industry doesn't let it slide. Ever.
Skimping a few coins? Only payback in blood.
The Mercenary Union turned the client's territory into a wasteland. Everything plundered, stripped bare.
Especially the client's kin—sold into slavery or forced to suicide.
Probably figured they couldn't hack slave life.
'...Time to retire.'
Awakening past-life memories made me queasy about the looting and atrocities I'd shrugged off before.
It was minor, nothing I couldn't handle, but instinct told me ignoring it would erode my humanity.
Some delicate sensitivity bullshit.
"Gonna become a civil servant."
I decided to quit and started studying.
Being able to read got you into any territory guard easy.
But after seeing the Mercenary Union trash that fief...
I aimed higher: kingdom soldier. No chance of it crumbling.
"Local civil service? Nah, gotta be the capital bureaucrats!"
Not regional bias, mind you.
Don't get the wrong idea.
Anyway, I crammed my ass off, gave it my all on the exams, and finally...!
"Ho, you're a cut above."
"Huh?"
"A talent like you wasted as a grunt? The others must be blind. You're in the knight order starting today."
"...?"
I didn't become a soldier. I became a late-bloomer knight.
"Well, shit..."
Age twenty-seven. The birth of Knight Lee Han.