Chapter 1
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 1
Chapter Title: Descent from the Mountain
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“...What the hell is this?”
I had no idea what was going on.
“Why am I inside a stinking dumpster like this?”
A rancid dumpster assaulted my nose the moment I opened my eyes, and there I was, right inside it.
“My house... where’s my house?”
My home wasn’t supposed to be a place like this...
It was a flashy, luxurious penthouse that I’d bought outright with my own cash, no loans attached...!
Where am I? Who am I?
Why the hell was I inside a dumpster?
And my body felt off too. My senses didn’t line up right. My wrists were weirdly thin, my hands small. Scrawny, maybe?
The kind of body you’d see on some slum kid who never got enough to eat.
So why did I have a body like that?
“Ha, haha...”
Fuck.
I had no clue what had gone wrong. I racked my brain trying to figure it out.
For starters, I wasn’t drunk. My head was perfectly clear.
So, a dream then?
Just to be sure, I slapped my own cheek.
Smack—
...Not a dream.
Why the hell wasn’t this a dream?
It had been about a year since I woke up in this world.
A year was more than enough time—hell, it was overkill—to confirm this was a dark fantasy world.
People with freaky tentacles bursting from their backs pulling off terrorist attacks? Plagues turning slums into zombie hives? Yeah.
If this wasn’t dark fantasy, what the hell was it?
No way it was some romance fantasy, healing story, or straight-up high fantasy. No chance.
For one thing, those Apostles of Outer Gods types? Pure dark fantasy fuel.
The Church calls them Demon Cultists... and their visuals? Straight-up nauseating.
That’s crawling chaos right there, no doubt.
No arguments accepted.
Argue and you’re wrong.
Mm-hmm.
“One more today~”
“Keurk!”
“Sh-shit! It’s that mad dog Aren! Run!”
“Why’s that bastard always after us?”
I sliced through the neck of the Demon Cultist in the middle of a human sacrifice ritual.
One thing I’ve learned living in this world.
If you don’t have power, you just lose everything and scrape by.
Yesterday’s cheerful flower shop girl gets devoured by a monster, body found in pieces. The kind neighbor auntie who hands out bread with a warm smile gets gang-raped and murdered by slum thugs.
What a shitty world.
For Yui-hyun, a guy with a peaceful Earth sensibility, it was impossible to swallow.
But if you couldn’t swallow it, you died.
Tragically so.
So I ditched the “peaceful Earthling Yui-hyun” mindset and decided to live as “Mad Dog Aren,” a perfect fit for this crapsack world.
“Gotta do what it takes to survive.”
“Wh-what the hell are you talking about?!”
“Hm? Oh, one more hiding out.”
I lopped off the head of the lurking Demon Cultist without much fuss.
Anyway, in my desperate scramble to survive, I discovered I could see things others couldn’t.
Like those little blue particles floating in the air?
And no surprise—they were mana particles.
Of course. I’m a reincarnator, so I gotta have at least one cheat perk.
That’s the golden rule, right?
Honestly, I’d wanted to off myself plenty of times, but these special eyes kept me alive this long. Not only could I see mana, I could grasp and absorb the principles of any magic, swordsmanship, or martial arts I laid eyes on.
Deconstruct, fuse, understand. Ring any bells?
Thanks to that, I made it this far by exterminating this world’s pest-like Demon Cultists.
Lucky me.
Yeah.
I got lucky.
Real lucky up till now. Lucky to awaken my eyes’ power, then devour knight and mage techniques like a glutton.
I grew at a freakishly fast rate, building a reputation along the way.
But looks like my luck just ran out.
“Boss! He’s over there!”
“No need to capture him! Just kill and bring the head to the bishop! Today’s the day we avenge our kin!”
“““Yes sir!”””
Obsessively targeting only Demon Cultists turned me into their target at some point.
In the end, Aren ran, kept running.
Got a sword in the back, thigh sliced open, gut stabbed through. Somehow I escaped anyway.
But... looks like God’s never on my side till the bitter end.
Stronger than anyone I’d ever seen—way beyond what my current Aren self could handle—a woman stared down at mangled corpses.
...Anyone could see this was a crime scene she’d stumbled on.
Spears made of black mana floated around the woman.
“Hm...?”
The woman looked down at the wounded, ragged Aren who’d burst out.
Instead of wasting time staring, couldn’t she drag me to a priest? Or at least staunch the bleeding herself?
I wanted to scream, do something, anything!
“......Sa...ve... me...”
Blood boiled up my throat like phlegm.
I just wanted to beg to be saved, but the wounds stole my voice.
“You want to live...? Sorry, child, but I can’t do that.”
...If you get it, then save me already.
“No use giving me those eyes. My task today is to kill everyone in this place.”
Right then, a black spear loomed before my eyes.
I didn’t need anyone to explain—she was about to kill me.
In a last desperate gasp, Aren mimicked the woman. Gathered mana, shaped it into a sharp spear, aimed it at her.
But her spear was solid; mine shook like it’d scatter any second.
Crude, in a word.
...
So what? What am I supposed to do...?
Crude or not, what mattered was my obsession with life. That was all Aren had.
The woman stared at my spear, eyes widening in surprise.
“You... don’t tell me you saw this and copied it?”
“...”
No strength left to answer.
But the woman jumped to her own conclusion.
“You really did copy it. Now that I look... you have eyes like mine. Who’d have thought I’d find a child like you here.”
Eyes like hers?
That’s when I realized. Red pupils with concentric rings, like overlapping circles.
She had the same eyes as Aren.
The woman crouched before me, eyes glinting with interest.
“Did you just beg to live?”
“Sa...ve... me...”
“Ho. Such a fanatical clinging to life.”
Weird?
“Not weird at all. Humans are built that way by nature. But you... you burn more intensely than most. Understand?”
No clue.
“Hm. Is it hard to grasp...?”
I want to live.
Desperately want to live.
“I like it. Keep craving like that.”
I want to live.
Want to live, damn it.
So much I still want to do.
Even in this brutal dark fantasy world, I wanted to survive to the end. Surviving a world like this might spark some hope.
...I don’t want to die.
“Yes. That’s enough.”
She reached out from her crouch.
I felt her hand stroking my head.
“Child. Will you become my disciple? If you say yes, I’ll save you myself.”
I nodded without hesitation.
“Heh. Good choice. As promised, I’ll save you. Now close your eyes and rest easy. Sleep one night, and the pain will be gone.”
Last thing I remember: her huge breasts as she crouched.
...Wanna touch ‘em.
Ten years had passed since becoming her disciple—my master, Karen.
Long if long, short if short, but in those ten years, a ton had changed.
For one, Aren was a full-grown adult now.
Growing up under Master, I shot up in height and packed on muscle.
Something like...
Functional muscle?
Grueling training with Master and countless real battles honed me into a body more knightly than most knights.
Height around late 180s?
I’d aimed for over 190, but late 180s was plenty tall, so I was satisfied.
Plus, at that height, I could still look down at Master easily.
Like this.
“Stop staring like that. It’s creepy.”
“Creepy? Your disciple’s hurt, Master. I’m pretty handsome at this level.”
Master snorted, eyeing Aren.
“Handsome or not, creepy’s creepy.”
...Not entirely serious, but Karen kept that to herself.
“So, disciple. What do you want to do from here?”
“Pardon?”
“Ten years as my disciple already. You’ve learned all there is to learn. You’ve even surpassed me in spots.”
“...True.”
What I wanted... hadn’t thought it through much, but a vague idea floated up.
“I want to leave my mark on this world.”
“Hm? A mark?”
“Yes.”
Thanks to Master, Aren was strong.
Strong enough to claim victory even among top-tier experts.
But this was a dark fantasy world. Couldn’t forget that.
“Death could come anytime. So to prepare, I want to leave proof that I lived fiercely in this world.”
“Mm. Good thinking, disciple. So, how do you want to leave that mark?”
Ways to leave a mark on the world? Plenty.
But the surest? Have kids, let the bloodline take root for generations. Family bonds stretch on forever.
...Wiping out a knightly bloodline wouldn’t be bad in that sense, huh.
...
“...Not sure yet.”
“Hm? Not sure, huh...”
Master—Karen—looked at Aren seriously.
“Then descend the mountain.”
“Pardon?”
“Descend and pursue your path.”
“...You mean it, Master?”
“I do.”
So.
“Descend the mountain.”
...I descended.