Days of Abuse!
Ever since I was born into some unknown other world, every single day had been pure hell.
The insane old bastard who picked me up and raised me had forced me into training since I was a tiny kid—sixteen hours a day at an intensity that felt like it would melt the muscles right off my bones. Even when I was supposed to be resting, I wasn’t allowed to actually rest. He’d insist I stay in a constant state of tension for “mana training,” and he even claimed sleep itself was part of mana circulation, hounding me about it nonstop. It was literally 365 days a year, 24/7, no holidays, no mercy. Brutal training every waking—and sleeping—second.
“Gramps! I can’t do this anymore! My legs have gone completely numb! It feels like my muscles are melting off! I don’t want to do this!”
“But even right now, Aran, your arms and legs are still moving diligently! Your mouth says you hate it, but your body is being honest!”
“That’s only because if I stop moving my limbs I’ll fall down the mountain with these steel bars tied to me and die, you lunatic!”
“You crazy, fucking, senile old bastard…! Just wait until you fall asleep! I’ll grab a knife and slit your throat! Watch your back at night, got it?!”
“Mmm! Instead of giving up or crying like a little girl, you’re sharpening the blade of revenge against me! Excellent spirit, Aran! Face your training with exactly that mindset!”
“Gramps! This is straight-up child abuse! You don’t want to get arrested either, right?! I won’t even tell anyone about all the fucked-up shit you’ve done, so let’s just stop this here!”
“Look at you, picking up all sorts of words! But you’re mistaken. I am training you in a thoroughly appropriate manner for the situation. There is zero chance of me being arrested for child abuse, so don’t worry.”
“Does this look like something I shouldn’t be worried about?!”
“At this rate I’m going to die tomorrow. An orphan raised by a psychotic old psychopath, abused my entire life, dying miserably like a dog in the gutter—I won’t even be remembered by anyone…”
“That’s not true, Aran! You will live through tomorrow, and the day after, and next week and the week after that, and you will keep training just fine! Even if you do die, I will clearly remember how well you endured all this training until now, so don’t worry!”
“Heh… hehehe… Yeah, I can’t escape this place. I’m going to have to roll around with that stinky old man until the day I die. In that case, I might as well gladly train and build up the strength to cut that damn geezer’s head clean off.”
“Aran… You’ve opened your eyes. That attitude is your true duty.”
Even though I was clearly alive, I had gone through all five stages of grief with my entire body. That was me—Aran. I had spent my days in nonstop training with that psychotic old man. The training was so horrific it defied description. One year, two years, three… After passing the five-year mark I stopped counting. I had once been no bigger than the old bastard’s thigh. Now I was taller than him, my voice had deepened after hitting puberty, and my build had grown monstrous—nearly twice his size. The moment I realized I had muscles that looked ready to burst and possessed truly monstrous strength, every single day became an attempt to attack the old man.
He had been gone unusually long this time, probably because something came up. Left alone in the cabin, I began meditating—the habit I had somehow developed after living here for so many years. Just imagining the old man seeing this and smacking his lips with “As expected, your body is honest, Aran” sent chills down my spine.
I drew the clean mana floating in the air into my body, expelled the mana that had accumulated and was slowly being used, and continued the circulation for a long time. My body felt lighter, and I could sense the vessel that held my mana expanding. I had spent my entire life in this cabin on the mountain and had never seen anyone except that battle-crazy old bastard, so I didn’t know how strong normal people were. But maybe… maybe I had become ridiculously strong without realizing it?
While I was meditating with that meaningless hope, I heard footsteps approaching from far away.
“!”
The instant I heard someone coming closer, I stopped meditating, grabbed the war hammer I often used during training, wrapped it in mana to hide my presence, and waited quietly. The sound grew closer and closer. The moment the owner of those footsteps reached the cabin and opened the door—
“Die, you fucking old bastard! Tahat!”
I swung the hammer down at the crazy old man’s head with every ounce of strength I had. A full-power strike meant to turn his skull into crushed tomato.
Thud.
But the war hammer I swung with all my might was effortlessly caught in the old man’s bare hand. I immediately paid the price.
Wham!
“Guh!”
His palm strike slammed into my solar plexus. I vomited on the spot and collapsed pathetically to the floor. Damn it. Strong? I couldn’t even take down one withered old man.
Having subdued me with ease, the old man brushed his hands off lightly and laughed.
“Heh heh heh. Aran, my boy. You’re still a hundred years too early to kill me.”
“Kehk… cough…! Just you wait… cough! I’m definitely going to cut your head off… cough!”
“Yes, yes, keep working hard. Anyway, Aran, wipe that disgusting vomit off your face and get ready to leave.”
“Leave? Where are we going?”
“The Imperial Palace.”
“...... The Imperial Palace?”
We boarded a train headed for a destination I knew nothing about except that single clue—the Imperial Palace—and sat facing each other. I had been living in this world without even knowing what era it was, simply doing whatever I was told. But since there were trains, civilization seemed fairly advanced.
Once we were seated and the train started moving toward our destination, the old man finally told me many things he had never mentioned before. I had asked countless times where we were and why I had to endure this insane training, but he had never given me a proper answer. At least now I learned that the mountain where the cabin was located was called Mt. Ksir.
I was twenty years old, for fuck’s sake.
‘Mt. Ksir… Mt. Ksir… Why does that name sound familiar?’
The name of the mountain I had lived on felt strangely familiar. I repeated it to myself several times but couldn’t quite recall why.
“Do you remember when you turned eight and I gave you a single knife, dropped you in the mountains, and made you survive alone for thirty days?”
“You call that training?! You abandoned a snot-nosed brat in the mountains and left him there, you rotten old bastard! Do you have any idea what I had to do to survive?! I even roasted and ate goblin balls!”
“But you survived. That’s what matters. Aran, do you know what kind of place Mt. Ksir is?”
“The most horrific place in a world where a deranged, dementia-ridden old man picks up children and dresses up physical and mental abuse as training.”
“The reason is wrong, but it is indeed the most horrific place in the world.”
Look at this shameless old bastard.
“Mt. Ksir has an abnormally high mana concentration. Most ordinary people who go there can’t last a single day. They either die from mana poisoning or their bodies twist and mutate into grotesque monsters. On the other hand, monsters absorb all that immense mana and become incomparably stronger than their counterparts from other regions. The vast majority of people couldn’t even handle the goblins you used to hunt and roast the balls of.”
The moment I heard that, I drew the knife from my waist again and aimed for the old man’s throat.
“Then that means you—who lived there—are not human but a monster! I knew it all along! Die, you evil creature!”
Before my blade could even touch his neck, he lightly caught my wrist and twisted it sideways.
“Kyaaaaagh!”
While I screamed from my twisted wrist, the old man continued speaking with a smile.
“Foolish boy. What I said applies to ordinary people. For someone extraordinary like me, it is an excellent training ground. And if I, who lived there, am a monster, then what does that make you?”
“...... Huh.”
“To my eyes, you are far closer to a monster. You know I occasionally left you here and disappeared, right?”
“It was an irregularly occurring festival.”
When I answered crookedly, the old man grabbed my nose and shook it.
“Heh heh, look at this boy’s cheeky tone. I need to teach you more manners before we arrive and you cause trouble.”
After that, the old man’s etiquette education continued for a while. Only after he had tamed me did he resume his explanation.
“The reason I left periodically wasn’t just to report in. More than anything, I needed stability myself.”
“Stability?”
“Yes. Even I eventually reach a point where I can no longer endure staying on that mountain for long periods. No matter how much I expel the mana from my body, the amount I absorb is greater, so a limit eventually comes. That’s why I periodically descend the mountain to purge the mana that has accumulated to the brink, then return.”
“Wait a second. So this damn old man told me to train by myself, shoved me into the cabin, and then crawled down the mountain whenever he needed stability for himself?”
Another round of etiquette education followed. I grumbled, full of dissatisfaction.
“You could have taken me outside with you. It was too dangerous to even think about going down, so I’ve lived my whole life on that mountain without ever seeing the outside world.”
“If it had been necessary, I would have. But you didn’t need that process.”
“How could you know that?”
“At my level, I can tell with one look. For some reason your constitution itself is unaffected by that environment, so you had no need to stabilize. It is an incredible blessing.”
I snorted and shot up from my seat.
“Ha! So you finally recognize my true worth, you damned old bastard! For someone with such an amazing ability like me, get on your knees right now, crawl on all fours, and lick my toes. If you do that, I’ll specially reduce the sin of abusing me all this time and end it with a clean decapitation—”
The third round of etiquette education followed.
“Your physical ability may be outstanding, but everything else is still a long way off, you fluffy little brat.”
“But why me of all people? There must be plenty of other people in the world who could do it.”
“......”
The old man closed his mouth for a moment and stared at me quietly before answering a beat late.
“It was too annoying to go look for someone else. At my age, why would I pass up a pumpkin that rolled right into my lap and go searching for another?”
“This rotten old bastard.”
I still couldn’t fully accept it, but at least I now understood why he had been so obsessed with training me so brutally. Now it was time to confirm something more important…
“Old man, I have a question.”
“What is it?”
“I roughly understand the reason now, but why did we come down from the mountain? Did I start showing signs of poisoning?”
The old man shook his head.
“No. But you are already twenty. If you stay cooped up on the mountain training alone any longer, you won’t be able to adapt to society, will you?”
“Pretty sure that’s already happened thanks to a certain someone?”
“Ahem. Staying on the mountain that long would reduce efficiency anyway. Before it’s too late, I want to help you establish a place for yourself in this world and create an environment where you can fully display your ability.”
“So what is it? And first of all, what do you mean by ‘the Imperial Palace’? Which imperial palace? Explain properly for once.”
The old man took a badge from his pocket and showed it to me.
A badge far blacker than ordinary black, engraved with the image of a crow with blood-red eyes.
“......?”
I felt like I had seen this picture somewhere before… The strangely familiar badge still didn’t ring any bells no matter how I looked at it, so I shook my head. The old man put the badge back in his pocket and spoke.
“It’s only natural you wouldn’t know. Listen well. People refer to someone like me as the Emperor’s hidden number, the unseen, the Emperor’s shadow. We assist His Majesty the Emperor, carry out the most secret tasks, and protect him. Those in the know call us the secret agents known as Blood Crows. For the past decade and more, my mission was to train you and raise you into a fine talent. Now that you’ve reached a respectable level, how about you establish yourself in our empire and work for the imperial family?”
Blood Crow? It was an uncommon name, so the memory grew clearer. I asked one more question to resolve my final doubt.
“Then the Imperial Palace we’re going to…”
“It is the Imperial Palace in the capital of the Paulia Empire.”
The moment I heard that name, all the puzzle pieces clicked into place. I was inwardly horrified and spat out a curse.
Wait, fuck… This was a rofan world?