Get-Rich-Quick Schemes Are Terrifying (1)
Damn it! I wasn't even aiming for some get-rich-quick scheme!
I dodged the golem's attack and pressed forward. The path of retreat had long since been cut off by gargoyles, leaving me no choice but to keep advancing.
"Why the hell is there a trap like this?!"
The reason I'd fallen into this godforsaken place was nothing special. A newly discovered ruin—I'd snuck in alone, chasing the dream of easy riches.
Any ordinary adventurer would have joined a noble's survey team or a merchant caravan's looting party and safely waited for their share of the dividends. But for an adventurer of my middling skill, those opportunities never came.
Among those middling adventurers, there were always a few who dove headfirst into dangerous ruins or dungeons, gambling everything on a sudden fortune. And I was one of them.
Survey teams and looting parties took time—gathering intelligence, assembling units, preparing supplies. If you slipped in first during that window and found even a single treasure? You could loaf around for months without working. If the rumored ruin was the real deal and you managed to monopolize the loot, you could live the rest of your life without lifting a finger.
Stories circulated among adventurers of someone who'd pulled a powerful magic sword from a dungeon and risen to glory overnight. Hearing those wild rumors, I vaguely thought I might pull it off too.
"Damn it!!"
I swung my sword at a gargoyle that appeared from the side. Clang! I hadn't even set my stance properly—just a crude, mindless slash—and the blade failed to cut through the creature's stone body.
"That was my favorite sword!"
Secondhand, sure… but it had been with me since the day I left my village!
Still—iron snapping just from hitting stone? That made no sense! I'd taken good care of it! I hurled the broken sword at the gargoyle and bolted forward.
"Why do the monsters only come from the sides?!"
There was only one path, and the only place left to run was ahead. The problem was that the farther I advanced, the more monsters piled up behind me—and my stamina was draining fast.
Whose fault was this if not mine? I'd never imagined a trap like that would be waiting right at the start of the ruin.
Sneaking into the newly discovered site had gone fine at first. I'd expected a proper ruin, so finding nothing but a large abandoned house left me disappointed. Still, it looked like a noble's villa, so I figured there might be jewels or something and decided to explore. Then I found a shed, stepped inside—and the floor suddenly gave way. Whether it was a trap or not, the ceiling sealed shut with a grotesque grinding sound moments after I fell, cutting off any chance of climbing back out.
"Blinded by money!"
I didn't panic after falling into the trap. The real problem was that I had almost no supplies left, so waiting for rescue wasn't an option. Even if a survey team arrived and pulled me out, they wouldn't look kindly on someone who'd snuck in ahead of them. And if the ones who found me were nobles? There was a real chance they'd punish me.
So the answer I settled on was to push deeper, break through the ruin, and escape.
"Hah… hah…!"
But the monsters that appeared were far too strong. Stone gargoyles, stone golems—creatures I had no hope of beating with the sword I'd been using or the spear strapped to my back.
"I-If only I could use mana…!"
That was absurd from the start. Freely wielding mana? That would make me Knight Class. If I were Knight Class, scouts would have been after me left and right, and I'd have thrived as an adventurer.
The one silver lining was that the monsters moved slowly, and the path was a single corridor. As long as I kept pushing forward, I could stay alive for now. I had no idea what lay ahead, but if there happened to be an exit? Sprinting straight for it might just get me out.
All of that was pure wishful thinking, of course—but I kept running anyway, desperate to live a little longer.
I had no idea how far I'd gone. My breath burned in my chest, and my legs trembled. Still, I couldn't stop to rest. A glance over my shoulder showed the golems and gargoyles still lumbering after me.
I kept running, and ahead of me something like light began to appear. Whether it was a sign of hope or a pit of despair, I didn't know. I pressed on all the same.
"Wh-Where is this…?"
I burst out of the tunnel into the source of the light and found myself in a vast open chamber. Who would have thought a place like this existed beneath that abandoned house…
The ceiling had to be over five meters high, and the space stretched wide in every direction…
There was no time to stand there gawking. The golems and gargoyles were still coming up behind me.
"Th-This is no time for that!"
I scanned the surroundings for a place to hide or something to block the entrance. Aside from an altar in the center of the chamber and something glowing atop it, there was nothing—so I had no choice but to head there.
"Wh-What is this?"
A massive crystal orb sat in the middle, radiating light that illuminated the area. Mana light, probably? I guessed it was the power source driving the golems and gargoyles. Looking around again confirmed it—there was absolutely nothing else in the chamber.
Please! Please work!
I rubbed the crystal orb and tried to move it. It didn't so much as budge.
"Please!!"
God! Save me!
You brought me to this world—give me one more chance!
Had my desperation reached the divine? Suddenly the light from the crystal orb shifted and began to intensify. At the entrance, the golems and gargoyles kept closing in.
"I don't know what you are, just activate already!"
I kept urging it on, desperate to live.
The light grew stronger by the second until multicolored radiance filled the entire chamber. Then a strange sensation washed over me—an indescribable feeling, as if something were stimulating my entire body. The suddenness of it left me reeling.
What followed was pain.
It wasn't ordinary pain. It was a searing agony, as if my whole body were being torn apart. It hurt so much my mind went blank from the intensity… a pain I'd never experienced before, and curses rose unbidden to my lips.
But the pain was so overwhelming that no sound came out.
Even through the agony I could see the golems and gargoyles drawing nearer. Ah… was I going to die now? If death would end this pain, it didn't seem so bad.
Unable to endure the relentless torment, I toppled backward and saw something glowing on the ceiling.
"A… magic… circle…?"
I didn't know much about magic, but I at least recognized that those diagram-like patterns were magic circles. Had this been a trap too?
The pain seemed to be fading little by little. The problem was that this was not a good thing. Every sense in my body was breaking down, twisting and warping.
A high-pitched ringing filled my ears. Beeeeeep…
I could no longer smell the damp cave air.
My vision blurred until even the magic circle on the ceiling began to vanish.
The cold touch of the floor against my back faded away.
Every sense… every single sense seemed to be disappearing.
And yet the sharp stabs of pain, the heavy ache, alone remained.
I wanted to curse the world. I hadn't left my village just to meet such a pathetic end.
Was this my life flashing before my eyes? Faces of my family from my previous life began to surface.
But only for a moment. With every other sense gone, the pain grew even sharper, and it felt as if my mind itself were being destroyed.
Now I felt nothing at all. Only the pain remained.
God… you went to the trouble of letting me be reborn in another world, and I'm sorry…
I really shouldn't have chased after easy riches…
I could no longer endure the pain and let go of consciousness.
In the very last moment, all that rose in my mind was regret.
A chill seeped into me. Cold… a shiver ran through my body as if a cold aura were clinging to my skin.
"Hah!"
Unable to bear the cold, I sat up—and found myself in a place that felt strangely familiar.
"This is…"
Memories returned one by one. Sneaking into the ruin for easy riches. Falling into the trap. Pushing deeper just to survive. And finally, being caught in that trap magic… the searing agony it had inflicted.
"I-I'm alive?"
The gargoyles and golems had been right on top of me. Had they just left me alone?
And when the magic hit me, my senses had completely broken down under that enormous pain…
"I'm alive?!"
I patted myself down all over. Touch, smell, sight, hearing—everything was intact.
Oh, God! Of course God wouldn't abandon me.
But… had my voice always sounded like this? People say you never really know your own voice, yet something felt off.
My voice should have deepened into something properly masculine after puberty. Instead it sounded soft and delicate.
I raised a hand to check my face—and what I saw was a slender hand.
Where were the calluses from all that training? The hand before me was smooth and soft beyond belief.
There was no way a hand like that belonged to me.
"Wh-What? A m-mirror!"
Panicking, I tried to stand and look for a mirror. My clothes and gear immediately began to slip off. I'd fastened everything snugly to fit my body—why was it all falling away? I had no idea.
Everything was chaos.
I left the falling equipment where it was, clutched at the trousers that were about to slide off, and looked around.
There was no mirror anywhere nearby. Of course not—this was some underground chamber. Why would there be a mirror? All that met my eyes was that damned crystal orb and the altar it rested on.
The crystal's light had dimmed to a soft glow, as if it had spent the last of its power and was ready to finish its role. I approached it anyway, hoping to check my reflection.
And when I saw the faint image of myself in the crystal, I froze.
My face was slender. The lines had grown delicate; the somewhat masculine impression I'd once had was gone, replaced by something soft and fragile.
Of course, it was a crystal orb, not a proper mirror, so I couldn't be sure. Maybe it wasn't even me.
But no matter where I looked, I was the only person in the chamber.
"Th-This can't be…"
There was no one else around… which meant the figure reflected in the crystal had to be me.
A lie. That was me? Impossible. I was definitely a man!
I denied reality and searched the surroundings. Someone had to be playing a prank. The reflection in the crystal wasn't me—it was someone else!
No matter how hard I denied it, reality refused to change.
There was no one else. I was the only person in the chamber.
In other words, the figure in the crystal really was me.
This… this made no sense. I had been a man in both my previous life and this one.
Yet the face in the crystal was unmistakably feminine.
"This can't be happening!!!!"
I didn't want to believe it. It was unbelievable… but it seemed I had become a woman.
Still denying it, I checked my body.
First the upper half. The reasonably firm muscle I'd built through hard training was nowhere to be found. Instead my hands met soft, yielding flesh. A modest chest that fit neatly into my palms.
Next, the lower half. Relying on the faint light, I yanked the now-baggy trousers open and looked down.
The thing that should have been proudly occupying the center of my body was gone.
Nothing that belonged there remained—only smooth, bare skin.
Unable to accept it, I reached down with my own hand. No shaft met my fingers. Only smooth flesh.
"No way, right? This is a lie, right?"
It couldn't be…
I was definitely a man… so why soft breasts and nothing down there?
Those were the marks of a woman, not a man.
I shook my head, trying to refuse it.
There's no way!
Something I'd never even gotten to use was just… gone? And I was supposed to accept that?
A lie!!!!