Chapter 1
Chapter 1
My first memory was a thrill.
'Clink'
"Business is good today."
"..Are you sure this is okay? James hyung said we should never steal from nobles’ wallets."
When I whispered that in a trembling voice, Dex hyung, who had done the job with me, shook the wallet as if to reassure me.
"Hey. It’s fine, brat. There was a knight right there and he didn’t even notice when I stole it openly. Nobles out in the outskirts aren’t a problem. Just tell me what you want to eat."
I had seen with my own eyes what happened to those who broke the rules, so I felt uneasy, but I decided to rely on Dex hyung, who had always protected me.
"..Okay."
The day we first stole a noble’s wallet, Dex hyung took me into the city and let me try something called ‘cooking’ for the first time.
Clean streets and meat stew.
To a slum kid who had always survived on moldy bread, warm and filling food was nothing short of shocking.
Unlike the back-alley people dressed in rags, those who wore clean and stylish clothes planted a new kind of emotion in me, something beyond basic instincts like survival, anger, or sadness.
Ambition.
"Mom… it’s hot…"
"My son. Are you okay?"
Especially things called mother and father kept stirring something hidden deep inside me.
Because those were things I could never have.
A tight feeling in my chest, a frown forming without knowing why. Envy toward others, and a sense of inferiority and smallness toward myself.
I didn’t really know what parents were, but the children my age who had them all seemed happy, and that alone made me jealous.
And so, to me, a child barely six years old, my first ambition and goal was born.
I wanted to become someone who could wear clean clothes and eat meat stew, someone who would not bow even before children who had parents.
My second memory was loss.
The day I turned twelve.
"Hyung… hyung… open your eyes…"
"..."
Dex hyung, who had protected me from a time I could not even remember, closed his eyes one day.
The cause of death was ‘a conflict with another group while begging.’
We fought those who tried to invade our territory, but we lost.
The ones who won the gang fight dragged away Dex hyung, our leader.
And two days later, they threw him in front of the alley.
With both of his eyes gouged out.
I stared blankly at Dex hyung’s corpse, his eyes gone, and cried for days.
When I came to my senses, all the members of the other group were dead in front of me, and in my hand was a wooden stick.
I couldn’t believe the death of Dex hyung, who had been like a parent to me.
But one thing was certain.
Death, which I had taken lightly, was actually something unbelievably terrifying.
So, at twelve years old, I made a vow to myself.
I would not let anyone around me die.
Anyone who hurt or harmed those around me would be repaid in kind.
And so, I became the king of the back alleys.
My third memory was hope.
When I had just turned fifteen, someone called the Mercenary King came to find me and said,
"You. Come under me."
At the time, the Mercenary King had accepted a request to kill me.
To the nobles of the capital, the growing strength of the back alleys was a thorn in their side.
They had no justification to send knights, but they couldn’t leave us alone either.
So they brought in the Mercenary King to kill me and dismantle our forces.
In the end, my back-alley companions stood with me against the mercenaries.
The result was obvious.
Boys who had remained in the back alleys because they couldn’t become mercenaries stood no chance against the Mercenary King’s executives.
"..."
Everyone except me was brutally crushed.
In the place where everyone had fallen, I stood alone against seven executives and the Mercenary King.
Rain poured from the sky, and the ground was soaked with the blood of my younger brothers and the mercenary executives.
The sword in my hand had long since become a rag. My grip trembled, and I began to worry about whether my brothers were alive.
"Huuh."
I exhaled. The dampness of the summer rain and the stench of the sewer brushed past my nose.
It was the smell of death.
But,
in my eyes, there was hope.
A life that fears death yet lives closest to it.
Moments of pain had always made me grow. Whether by my will or not. Pain that couldn’t kill me had always made me stronger.
I grow stronger because I want to survive. The closer I came to death, the farther I became from it.
Especially in fights where life was on the line, I had never once lost. I had never once died.
'Shhk.'
I pointed the sword in my right hand at my enemies.
'Pashat!'
The world began to slow down.
"..!!"
I could see their movements. I could predict their paths.
In an instant, I subdued two executives and picked up two swords that had fallen to the ground.
Dual wielding.
I had never held a sword in each hand before, but facing many opponents, I grabbed two blades.
'Boom!'
I kicked off the rain-soaked ground and charged forward. The rain drenched my eyes, but I did not close them.
Without giving them even a moment, I dealt with the remaining five executives.
"..."
"..."
And then I stood before the last one left.
The Mercenary King.
"Not bad?"
"..."
For a moment, I flinched at the woman’s voice coming from behind the mask, but quickly steadied myself.
Ready to charge at any moment. Ready to counter if she attacked.
I sharpened my senses to their limit, ready to die, ready to touch death as closely as possible.
"..."
For an instant, I saw an opening.
'Pashat!'
Without thinking, I lunged forward at full speed. To die. To kill.
To survive.
But,
'KWAANG!'
'Jjaeng!!!'
The sword I swung with killing intent shattered cleanly against the Mercenary King’s aura.
Aura.
What she released was a turquoise sword aura.
"Hey. First time seeing something like this?"
"..."
A sign of ‘Aura’ that only Swordmasters can use.
Seeing sword aura for the first time cleared my mind.
This was different from any fight I had experienced before.
All my previous fights had been knife-edge battles where the one who struck first survived.
But what I had just faced…
was overwhelming death.
Something unwinnable, like a person stepping on an ant. Something that could not even be called a fight.
I had always won in life-and-death battles.
But here, I was the only one risking my life.
It made me angry.
That we were both human, yet she stood in the position of a predator.
Yes.
That was the feeling.
I wanted to kill her. If I was risking my life, then she should too.
In the face of death, the world should be fair.
Whether someone was born a noble, eating meat stew with their parents in clean clothes, only realizing death at the end…
Or someone like me, born in a damned harem, never knowing my parents or even my own name, living my entire life beside death.
Before death, everything is fair.
I didn’t like the way she looked down at me.
I wanted to turn those eyes into the same as mine.
So,
'KWA-A-A-A-A-ANG!!!!'
"..Crazy."
I used aura as well.
The sword aura that those called candidates for Swordmaster only awaken in their late twenties.
And so, I fought the Mercenary King for a long time.
Releasing aura, clashing aura.
After how many hours, I didn’t know.
'Thud.'
The one who collapsed first…
was me.
"..."
It was the kind of life-and-death battle I had always wanted, so I accepted defeat without resistance.
Just before I died,
"Hey."
"..."
The Mercenary King spoke.
"What’s your name?"
I barely opened my mouth and answered.
"...I don’t know."
"Your parents?"
"I don’t have any."
"Do you remember when you were abandoned?"
"I don’t know."
"..."
The Mercenary King threw aside her half-broken mask.
She shook the rain from her long red hair and let out a sigh.
"You. Come under me."
"..."
"Or just die here."
"Don’t hesitate. Just answer yes. Do you even know how much value what I’m offering has?"
"There’s 200 gold on your head. I’m giving that up to recruit you. So hurry—"
"..If I go there."
She paused at my words.
"..If I go there… can I wear clean clothes too?"
"..."
"If I go there… do I not have to steal other people’s money?"
"..Yeah. You can earn enough money."
"..Then… if I go there…"
I heard later that when she heard my final question, she cried alone that night.
"Do I not have to die?"
My life had always been death.
The moment I acted by risking my life, I was already as good as dead.
Always able to die at any moment. A state where dying wouldn’t be strange.
My question didn’t mean ‘will you spare me.’
It meant…
can I truly escape death?
Can I live without risking my life?
As if she understood, the Mercenary King said,
"..That won’t happen."
"..."
"But."
She smiled.
"Whatever you do, it’ll be less than now. I promise you that."
"So for now… follow noona. Got it?"
"...."
"..Yes."
My fourth memory was realization.
One year after becoming a companion of the Mercenary King, I became the vice-captain of the Lionmane Mercenary Corps she led.
Mercenary work went smoothly. I had always adapted quickly, and hunting monsters suited me well.
If there was a downside, it was that I still lived close to death.
Even that was nothing compared to my past.
The Mercenary King showed me a new, wider world beyond the harem.
Since we mainly took on requests to subdue monsters, I traveled across the continent, broadening my knowledge of the world.
How the world works, the authority of nobles, the importance of money, and the characteristics and histories of noble families.
When I later learned the value of the 200 gold she had given up for me, I couldn’t even meet her eyes out of guilt.
She taught me how to read and write, something a common orphan like me had never known, and many things necessary to live as a commoner.
And to me, who had no name,
"Bel. Your name is Bel now."
She gave me a precious name.
Bel.
And so, I turned sixteen, then seventeen.
The life of a mercenary was satisfying. Enough to make me think I wanted to live like this forever.
After escaping illiteracy thanks to the Mercenary King, my hobby became reading.
There were several reasons.
First, a sense of stability I couldn’t explain. When I read, it felt like I was moving away from death.
Second, it felt cool. Tracing ink on paper with my eyes, one line at a time. That simple act felt strangely impressive.
Maybe I had always longed to read. Kids who could read signs and banners had always looked cool to me.
That day, as usual, I was reading.
"..."
For some reason, I couldn’t focus on the text.
Actually, the problem was the book. Each sentence was stuffed with so many decorative phrases that it was hard to understand.
The Mercenary King had said it was a rare book.
Are all rare books difficult?
Even as I struggled, I kept reading.
'The benevolent goddess bestowed radiant holy glory.'
"..Hmm."
I still didn’t understand the concept of a god.
An omniscient, omnipotent being. Something like that couldn’t exist.
A being that knows all my thoughts, my experiences, my entire world.
That my existence itself is their will.
That they give trials I can endure so I may reach enlightenment.
"..."
A slum life without knowing my parents. The death of Dex hyung. Meeting the Mercenary King. Awakening aura. Life as a mercenary.
A cycle of trials and realizations.
Bel pondered.
Could a ‘benevolent goddess’ really have given such a life?
A life always touching death.
If there were a god who gave me this life, wouldn’t it be closer to a god of war or death?
The benevolent goddess in the scriptures probably governs the lives of noble ladies somewhere.
To live my life and still call oneself ‘benevolent’ and frame it as trials…
That sounds insane.
If I were an omnipotent god, I would have become a god of light.
What I realized from my short but intense life was that life is like a light.
Countless lights, each shining with different colors and intensities.
The life of a slum child who faces death daily without knowing their parents.
The life that child might grow into, a third-rate thug.
The life of a noble’s child I envied.
The life of an ordinary commoner who farms all their life.
The life of a mercenary risking their life for money.
The life of a scholar devoted to study, entering the Magic Tower.
The life of a knight pursuing honor.
The life of a noble staying up all night for their people.
The life of an emperor who must be great for the empire.
Each different light overlaps to form the world.
None of those lights have a reason to shine.
That is life.
This world is not a trial to reach heaven.
It is its own reason.
"Haah…"
Even to himself, Bel thought it was a pointless line of thought.
The fact that followers of the goddess could use divine power was proof enough of a god.
What use were his thoughts?
God exists, and trials were given to him.
That was an unchanging truth.
Bel closed the book.
.
.
.
That night.
'KWA-A-A-A-A-ANG!'
"...?"
A mark of an apostle appeared on the back of Bel’s right hand.