The Black-Haired White Dragon (1)
When Rian opened his eyes, he was somewhere he had never seen before.
He rubbed his eyes and looked around.
"Where... am I?"
Strange peaks of every shape and size crowded the horizon, each one wearing a belt of cloud around its waist. It was the kind of breathtaking vista you'd expect from the Zhangjiajie canyons of China. He was standing on the summit of a broad peak, ringed by countless others like a folding screen of stone.
As if a ghost had taken hold of him, Rian dropped to the ground.
"I-I definitely went to sleep at home..."
He remembered falling asleep in his studio apartment last night as clearly as if it had just happened. What kind of insane situation was this?
He frantically groped toward his pants for his phone — but all he had on was the short-sleeved T-shirt and stretchy underwear he'd worn to bed.
"Am I dreaming?"
Fear seized him. He pinched himself hard, trying to wake up.
It hurt.
So this was real?
Rian's face went even paler.
"You've got to be kidding me."
Something flashed through his mind.
"Don't tell me this is another world? Did I just get dumped into another world?"
Lately, novels and comics about other worlds had been flooding the Korean market. As a college student steeped in that kind of media, his mind went there almost immediately.
"This exotic landscape... this isn't Korea..."
It didn't take Rian long to recognize his situation and accept it. He let out a long sigh.
"Me, an isekai protagonist... that's insane."
The moment he grasped the situation, his survival instinct kicked in.
"What do I do now? What should I do first?"
Rian hurriedly surveyed his surroundings. The summit was surprisingly vast — about the size of eight soccer fields put together, maybe. There was no way down. Cliffs dropped away on every side, the bottom vanishing into nothing.
The truly astonishing part was that the entire peak was a spectacular patchwork of cultivated fields, planted with every kind of crop. In the center stood a log cabin and a barn, along with a pond as clear as a lake. Not far from there, he could see the mouth of an enormous cave.
"Judging by how well-tended these fields are, someone definitely lives here."
Without thinking, Rian plucked a fruit from a nearby tree. It was round and red like an apple, and looked thoroughly appetizing. The sweet scent practically seduced him — it was perfectly ripe.
"God, I'm hungry..."
But.
You shouldn't just eat random stuff in another world. It could be poisonous.
He tossed the unknown fruit aside.
First, he decided, he needed to figure out who lived in that cabin. Anyone who'd settled in terrain this inhospitable had to be someone with serious power.
As for the cabin itself, the architecture was European, not Chinese.
Having become Alice in Wonderland overnight, Rian put his guard up. For now, he'd watch the cabin from a distance.
He flattened himself on the path between the fields and stared at the cabin for a long time.
"Haa... how on earth did I even get here?"
It'd be nice if the person who came out that door wasn't some nasty-looking old man or a hulking, musclebound guy, but a kindly middle-aged woman or a young lady.
"What if it's a monster? That'd be a disaster."
He stared at the cabin with tense, unblinking eyes.
He kept it up for about thirty minutes. The sun beating down was too hot to stay put. He crawled over to a patch of shade and flattened himself again.
Another hour or so passed. When no one showed any sign of coming out of the cabin, Rian's body started to ache.
"This is driving me crazy..."
Should I just go over and throw the door open?
And if a monster comes out?
Then again, anyone who farms for a living might just be a kindhearted farmer...
While a thousand thoughts whirled through his head, his stomach grew hungrier and hungrier. It gurgled. Then gurgled again. He tried to hold out, but his stomach only protested louder as time went on. He was the type who never skipped breakfast.
Rian had no choice but to look around. Fresh crops of every kind, and fruit trees scattered here and there, filled his vision.
"Eating vegetables raw isn't really my thing..."
He smacked his lips, dithering, until he finally picked up the fruit he'd thrown away and wiped the dirt off with his shirt.
"Whoever tends these fields this carefully wouldn't plant a poisonous tree, right?"
He nipped a bit of the glossy skin and tasted it.
"Mmm... doesn't seem poisonous."
His eyes lit up.
"Oh, that's good. Crunchy and sweet like an apple. There's even a hint of cheese."
Reassured, he immediately took a big bite. He polished off the fist-sized fruit right then and there. After checking how his stomach felt, all he had was a pleasant fullness — no pain anywhere.
"I should have another."
He crawled over on his belly and picked another fruit from the tree. Then he crunched into it with a look of pure happiness.
Once he'd finished, the fullness left his whole body pleasantly drowsy. The weather was cool, too. A nap would be perfect. And the view was spectacular...
"Ahh, I can't take it anymore!"
With his stomach full, a sudden surge of courage rose in Rian. He got up and scurried toward the cabin in a crouch.
Even if I get caught, as long as I explain myself properly...
He crept as quietly as he could, pressed his ear to the wall — and heard nothing. No smell of food, either. The chimney wasn't even smoking.
The windows were shut tight. He tried peeking through the clear glass, but the interior was dark, and the sun's glare off the panes just made his eyes water.
Is it empty?
Unable to contain his curiosity, Rian gathered his courage and approached the door. A latch was fastened from the outside, keeping it shut. Proof that nobody was inside.
He unlatched it and went in.
Just as he'd guessed, the place was empty. There was a living room with a bookshelf and a fireplace, plus two rooms with wooden beds. That was it.
The interior was remarkably simple — only the bare minimum of furniture needed to live. A faint layer of dust coated the round table. And not just the table. Dust had settled throughout the whole house. The fireplace, in particular, was spotless, with no sign of a fire having been lit.
"Which means..."
The owner had probably been away for a few weeks.
"No telling when they'll be back."
He clicked his tongue and stepped outside. He headed straight for the cave next to the cabin.
Up close, the cave entrance leading underground was large and wide. But it wasn't as deep as he'd expected. From the mouth, he could already see a vast cavern opening up inside.
Rian stepped slowly inside — and then nearly jumped out of his skin.
In the sunlit cavern sat an enormous skeleton that, at a glance, could only belong to a dragon. It was as large and majestic as a dinosaur skeleton in a museum, radiating a presence so powerful it almost seemed alive.
"That's a dragon, right? It's got to be a dragon. Holy crap... so this isn't some medieval Chinese setting — it's a fantasy world?"
Rian blinked, studying it for a long while, until he noticed a small grave sitting beside the dragon's bones. The flat grave had nothing but a single modest headstone. Something was written on it in a language he couldn't read.
A little grave next to a dragon's skeleton.
"Were they close when they were alive?"
Some heartwarming friendship between a dragon and a human, maybe?
"Might not even be a human. Not my problem."
Rian scratched his head as if it were too much trouble and headed back out of the cave.
"Haa... what now..."
Standing in the sunlight, he pieced together everything he'd learned so far. He stood there blankly, organizing the situation in his head, then scanned the sky around him — and hurriedly hid.
"The cabin's owner either has wings, or they're a mage who can use warp magic!"
That was his conclusion.
From that moment on, Rian flattened himself among the tall vegetable crops and began a thorough watch of the surroundings.
"I have to spot them first. I need to figure out what kind of person they are..."
He kept his eyes wide, scanning the sky in every direction, never letting his guard down in case a portal opened near the cabin. He hid like that for a long time.
But after three or four hours, his initial intensity had evaporated, and he started to slack off.
"Ugh, I only ate fruit and I'm hungry again... ow, lying like this is killing me... haah... why are there ants all the way out here? I'm itching to death."
He wanted to give up more than anything, but he held his position to the end. As he endured that lonely, tedious struggle, the day eventually grew dark — and still the cabin's owner showed no sign of appearing.
"Judging by the dust inside, maybe they went on a trip. Or maybe this is like a vacation home."
In the end, the cabin's owner never came back that night.
Day two in another world.
Zzz... snooore...
Rian, who'd been standing watch until early morning, dozed off without realizing it and didn't jolt awake until that afternoon.
"Oh shit, when did I fall asleep?"
The sky was already spreading with sunset. He frantically looked around — everything was perfectly peaceful. The cabin, its door still shut tight, remained as silent as ever.
"Hoo."
Rian let out a sigh of relief and leaned his back against a rock near the nameless vegetable field. He sat there for a moment, lost in thought, when his stomach gurgled.
He looked around for something to eat. Nearby, a fruit tree hung heavy with fruit. It was the same tree from yesterday.
He crawled on his belly all the way to the tree. Then he picked fruit from the side least visible from the cabin, so the owner wouldn't notice, and took a bite.
As he crunched away, a thought suddenly occurred to him. The cabin's owner might be a bad guy — shouldn't he at least have a weapon?
"Yeah, better than nothing."
Rian finished off a fruit on the spot and immediately set out to find a weapon. He hurried to the barn and peeked inside. A variety of farming tools were neatly arranged.
The astonishing part was that they weren't made of iron — they were crafted from some mineral as hard and transparent as diamond, each one gleaming. Only the handles were wood.
"Wow... is this a jewelry vault or what?"
Rian picked up a hoe for a moment, then switched to a sickle. The sickle looked easier to grip and swing. And it was sharp, too.
He hunched over, crept back to the vegetable field, and flattened himself again. Just like yesterday, all he could do was wait.
Patience wins.
Rian still had energy to spare.