I Became the Sword Saint in a Munchkin Harem
I was a Hunter.
Unfortunately, I had never received the kind of special protagonist-like ability that was so common in the novels and comics I used to watch before the Cataclysm.
I had simply survived by struggling nonstop. I had hunted instead of being hunted, so that I could live.
After the most wretched struggle of my life, all that remained was a lonely, painful, and unbearably solitary death.
So I closed my eyes.
And when I opened them again, I was in this other world with a medieval background.
It was a fantasy world overflowing with dreams and romance, exactly as I had seen in the stories I devoured before the Cataclysm.
“Lahan.”
That was my name.
“Yes, Father.”
“Sacrifice yourself for your family.”
The word “please” was never even there in front.
It was not a request. It was a clear order.
I was just the third son of a farming family.
After one famine, that was how things had to be in this era.
It was the natural order of the world.
With memories of my previous life, I understood it completely, so I accepted it calmly.
After all, there were plenty of ways to live.
Even if I was sold off as a slave right away, my life itself would not end there.
And because I still had a very special ability, I had nothing to fear.
“Status Window.”
Exactly the abilities I had possessed as a Hunter in my previous life.
Of course, most of them had vanished after I was reborn, but it was still somehow strange that the Status Window remained.
Sharp senses and a healthy body truly gave me a huge advantage in this world.
They allowed me to train without worries and to fight without constant illnesses.
The sharp senses would also prove invaluable in every crisis I faced.
They were essential skills for any Hunter, any hunter of men.
The place I was sold to was somewhere in the Western Region.
Black hair was not rare, but my body price was still a little higher than average.
Still, right now I was nothing more than an ordinary young boy locked in an iron cage, completely worthless.
“Follow me.”
The man who bought me was an aging knight who had retired from service.
His hands trembled as he looked at me as though he were searching for a squire to serve him.
And so, as expected, I became his squire.
I had thought that being a squire would be easy because the knight was kind, but I soon realized it was no different from being an errand boy.
The knight, Carlson, said one day, “I heard you were the son of a farming family. You’re surprisingly quick on the uptake. You look healthy and sturdy.”
The last part was not the warm smile an adult gives to a grandchild.
It was the gruff satisfaction of an old man who had lived his entire life alone, content to keep his body in good condition without any illness.
Several years passed.
One snowy winter night, when the first snow began to fall, the old knight Carlson died.
Before he passed, he left words for me that felt like a final bequest.
“I have no children. No family. I lived my whole life alone and lonely. Let me leave my legacy to you. From now on, you are free.”
The last kindness he bestowed before closing his eyes was the guarantee of his only legacy and my freedom.
I held his hand and mourned his death.
Even though he had been a rotten old man who had used me like a dog for years, this was the first time someone had shown me genuine kindness.
I inherited his estate and his legacy, and I began practicing swordsmanship alone in the backyard of his house.
The sword I held was the longsword Carlson had left behind.
When I was a Hunter, I had stuck strictly to a thrusting military dagger, but since that was gone now, I decided to use the longsword he had left.
The longsword felt a little heavier than the military dagger, yet it was incredibly light in my hand.
Perhaps around one to two kilograms?
It was surprisingly easy to swing and move.
I swung the sword wildly without even knowing the proper way to hold it.
It was different from handling a military dagger.
The legacy Carlson left me was something close to enlightenment, yet I swung the sword calmly until my hands grew used to it.
Whatever you swing, you grow used to it sooner or later.
I had thought the same thing when I handled the dagger.
“Tsk tsk. You’re holding it all wrong. Did Carlson teach you that?”
One day, a man appeared and clicked his tongue, mocking my simple thoughts.
He was an old knight of the same generation as the late Carlson.
“Where is Carlson?”
When I explained everything to the man who had come looking for him first, he said, “I see… so he really left first.”
A deep, bitter sorrow filled his voice.
The knight later visited the grave of Carlson that I had buried in the backyard and expressed his deepest condolences.
Then, after a while, he turned to me and said, “I will teach you how to hold the sword. I will also teach you swordsmanship. Stay here for now.”
The man who looked like Carlson’s friend said that.
While he stayed, he taught me many things.
How to hold the sword exactly. Proper posture. The principles of wielding a sword.
He was only a little bit ahead of me and called himself my second master.
The first was the late Carlson.
He had somehow accepted me as a disciple without hesitation.
“The weight center and strong and weak points of the sword are divided like that. First, you must understand them, then swing the sword. You must know that the sword has both strength and weakness.”
The weak part was at the tip of the sword.
Because the blade grew thinner toward the tip and the tip became sharper, it meant the tip was much more prone to breaking and would feel stronger.
“The head of the sword hilt is called the pommel. Just like I taught you before, hold the pommel with your left hand and swing the sword as if turning the pommel.”
I held the small knob-like pommel with my left hand and the upper part of the hilt with my right, as he had taught me.
With the pommel turning freely in my left hand, the sword’s flamboyance came alive.
I felt a strange sensation.
The sword moved exactly as I wished. It felt completely free.
And the number of things I could do grew.
Mostly because my posture changed, new attacking methods appeared.
“Left foot forward, right foot back. The axis will come naturally. You are not holding a two-handed sword. You are holding a longsword. Find the most comfortable posture for your own body.”
Logan was a very correct guide and an excellent master.
I felt a little sorry for Carlson, who had left only the core, but what he taught me was practical from the very beginning, fitting the era perfectly.
It was like listening to the wisdom of an old soldier who had survived countless battlefields over a long time.
“You need to know swordsmanship of this era in detail. And what I am teaching you are the bones and the core of all those things.”
Master Logan also taught me the principles of sword forms.
“There is something called strike first, strike simultaneously, strike later. It means distinguishing the strength and weakness of yourself and your opponent.”
His words became blood, bone, and flesh.
They fit this merciless, ruthless world too perfectly.
“Remember this well. This is a world of the strong devouring the weak.”
After that, I learned sixteen sword forms, Logan’s mana cultivation method, and the etiquette of a knight.
I bowed my head deeply to him.
The wildness I had naturally learned from fighting as a Hunter was nothing compared to what he taught me. I understood that clearly for the first time in this life.
Even if I had thought I had some knowledge of modern martial arts before and after the Cataclysm, there was a vast difference between learning by myself and learning from someone.
Becoming a genius through self-taught practice was nothing but the words of a storyteller.
Because someone had taught me, unknowingly influenced by them, I had reached the result I had finally obtained on my own. Someone saw only the surface and called me a genius.
On a snowy winter day, Logan came to me and said, “I will say it plainly. Lahan. You are a genius. More than you think. I was silent all this time out of worry that you would be arrogant, but you have completely sublimated and absorbed everything I taught you into yourself. Based on your temperament, I will boldly declare this.”
He said it as if it were something to be said in such a moment, with serious eyes.
“You are not just a genius. You are a calamity.”
“Please use that power in the right place.”
That was the last words my second master left, a final testament, the day after he passed, before he left the sky like Carlson.