Life Is a Single Strike
"Hey, Lucy! Get those beams moved over there!"
"Lucy! Why are you so slow? You don't want today's wages?!"
"Lucy, bring me the pliers!!"
…Coming. I'm coming, you bastards.
I'd already lost track of how many months I'd been at this.
Dawn shifts as an adventurer weren't enough to pay down the debt, so I'd started grinding manual labor at an imperial construction site on top of it.
Every time I hoisted another stack of heavy lumber, my lower back screamed.
Heh. Maybe I should just die.
A debt of one hundred million gold.
Ever since I'd transmigrated into the dating sim my friend had wrecked.
For months now, I'd been working my body to the bone just to survive.
"Good work, Lucy. Heading out early today, huh?"
"All thanks to you, foreman. Thank you, sir…."
After clocking out, I'd return to the manor, rest for thirty minutes, then head straight back out for adventurer work.
How on earth had things come to this?
Work, manor, work, manor, work, manor.
Back in the real world, even with just a convenience store part-time job, I could laze around my studio apartment gaming all day.
Instead of a romantic isekai transmigration, I was stuck repeating days straight out of hell.
I never should've told that bastard my apartment door code… shit.
He'd installed the newly released dating sim, Two Heart Academy, left it running, and—
I still remembered, vividly, the disaster that unfolded while I was out working a quick shift.
The friend who had sneaked into my apartment.
He'd sent engagement invitations to all four famous noble heiresses at once.
The game only had one heroine route per playthrough, but.
He'd even downloaded illegal bug files, trying to force a harem with all four heroines.
The result? Utter catastrophe.
Thanks to the developer's airtight system, built precisely to counter such bug files.
My friend's dream of a harem paradise died on the spot. The four heroines of the noble houses, moving exactly as the system dictated, retaliated against the protagonist's family with crushing political pressure.
In no time, the protagonist's family — a rising star in swordsmanship — had collapsed into ruin.
And so I transmigrated: one hundred million gold in debt, with a father gone half-mad with despair, the family head, the elders, and the maids all having fled in the dead of night, the game state completely wrecked.
I've paid off five hundred thousand, so that leaves… ninety-nine million, five hundred thousand gold.
Aaagh, I can't see the light at the end of this tunnel!
It felt as though my future had sunk into eternal darkness.
After finishing my adventurer work and dragging myself back to the manor in the dead of night, I collapsed onto my bed and wailed.
"Ghhhh… Status window."
He really was a protagonist, huh.
Slicing through monsters of equal or greater rank on adventurer jobs, his body had been visibly growing stronger by the day.
An ordinary swordsman supposedly trained until the age of thirty just to reach 3-Star.
This was protagonist-tier talent, all right.
I guess bloodline counts for something, even if the family name is ruined.
The Fafnir family, the protagonist's house, was originally written as a great sword dynasty.
Plenty of people chose to become magic swordsmen, blending spells and blade, to push past their limits.
But the protagonist's family had received the blessing of the sword itself — the lore said that mastering magic would only dull their blade.
Still, what the hell is that Seven Deadly Sins stat supposed to be?
I'd never read a single strategy guide, so I had zero information on this game's data.
Whether I was doing adventurer work or hauling lumber, my Strength and Agility climbed — but that 'Lust' stat never budged, up or down.
Look, I get that it's some special protagonist-only stat… but so what?
Debt had already forced me to withdraw from the Academy.
Joining a knight order was impossible too — I was credit-blacklisted.
A life with no answer except raw talent.
What good was a special stat if it couldn't smash through this situation?
Suddenly my life had become so miserable that tears welled up.
"Sniff… Damn it, what kind of isekai life is this?! Sob…."
This couldn't go on.
I refused to end my life having done nothing but repay debt.
Amid the despair, a fierce resolve kindled in my chest.
"That's right — I can't go on like thiiiiis!"
I stopped crying and sat up in bed.
For all that the family had fallen, we were still nominally a protagonist's house. Something had to have been hidden away.
"We dig. We dig up anything and everything that might be worth money!"
"…And I've heard it said, somewhere or other, that a special power only the protagonist can use is hidden somewhere within the family. Normally you'd receive it by clearing a hidden quest, but with the family ruined, no quest is coming. So I'll have to find it myself!"
Rudy ransacked the manor, the training grounds, and the family library.
Then, while combing through the already-picked-clean underground storage, he noticed something strange.
Isn't this way too cramped to be the basement warehouse of a great sword family?
A underground storage of barely three hundred square feet.
Stone walls on all sides — and yet somewhere, a cool breeze seemed to be flowing through.
If this sealed little vault were truly all there was, there was no way air could circulate.
Let's see… going by the clichés, you run your hands along the walls like this and something turns up.Thud!
"Ha!"
After groping his way along the stone walls for a good while, a hollow, sunken sound rang out — and a hidden chamber revealed itself.
Just as Rudy suspected: the Fafnir family's secret vault.
"Nice! If things go well, maybe there's treasure stashed in here — not enough to clear everything, but enough to pay off half the debt!"
A tiny space, barely large enough for one person.
At its base lay a magic circle, drawn as if in chalk.
It says… to offer blood?
A small note, scrawled in chalk beside the circle.
Rudy did as it instructed, nicked the tip of his finger with the dagger he'd brought, and.
Let a few drops of blood fall onto the magic circle.
Plop. Plop.
His blood trickled toward the center of the circle.
And then—
Whoosh!
"Ugh…!"
Rudy clapped both hands over his eyes against the brilliant light that erupted without warning.
The magic circle had activated.
It was an elaborate working that would have detonated an explosion spell, devastating everything nearby, had the blood not carried the DNA of a pureblooded Fafnir.
Naturally, Rudy had no way of knowing any of that.
Swallowed up by the circle as it flared to life in a blaze of light, Rudy was whisked away to somewhere else.
In an instant, the space beneath his feet had changed. Rudy stood there for a moment, blinking foolishly at his surroundings.
A s-secret chamber…? As expected — a place where something's hidden.
A long, narrow space, stretching endlessly in a single straight line.
He'd arrived in some kind of underground complex.
The cool draft blew stronger here, and Rudy had no idea where exactly he'd been transported.
"…Gulp."
It was all or nothing now.
He had no idea how dangerous this place might be, but there was nothing to do but press forward.
Spend a lifetime dying in debt, or strike it rich in one go and turn his life around?
Obviously he had to choose the latter. Rudy had to go on.
.
.
.
.
He'd been walking maybe two hours.
A sound drifted out of the darkness that had been silent the entire way.
…What's that?
Rudy didn't let his guard down.
Skeletons or liches could come swarming out at any moment.
If this was a secret vault the family had hidden away, there was no telling what dangers lurked within.
Shff.
Rudy pulled down the visor of the armor he'd come wearing and hid his face.
Clank. Clank.
Footsteps echoing from the darkness beyond were growing louder.
The tension was mounting.
Rudy quietly raised his sword.
[…Kyaaaaah!]
The presence finally revealed itself.
It was neither skeleton nor lich.
Translucent, deathly pale skin, and long, tangled hair reaching down to its feet.
Human in shape, but its ghostlike form evoked a horror film.
Drool trailing from between grotesque fangs.
Exhaling a bone-deep chill, it began to walk slowly toward Rudy.
A Changgwi…? Given the cold it's radiating, ice-attribute.
Rudy had overheard it once in a streamer's playthrough of Two Heart Academy —
that guardian-type Changgwi monsters often appeared in underground ruins where treasure or ancient tomes were hidden.
Figures. There's definitely something down here.
[Kyaaaaaaaaaaah!]
The moment it spotted Rudy, the Changgwi spewed freezing air and charged with murderous intent.
Light flashed along Rudy's blade.
Crack-crash! Bam! Boom!KRA-KOOM!!
[Kyaaaaah—!]
Bad luck.
The Changgwi now facing off against Rudy.
Its estimated realm: 4-Star class.
I can cut it with aura, but that thing's movements are way too fast—!
Rudy barely deflected the razor-sharp icicles the Changgwi hurled at him.
For an instant he swung his aura-wreathed sword in rapid arcs, but the creature was so quick it dodged every single one.
Maybe that was only natural.
Rudy's current swordsmanship realm was 3-Star.
A Changgwi whose attacks were further empowered by an elemental attribute was simply beyond his ability to hold back.
To be fair, Rudy had achieved 3-Star swordsmanship at seventeen — a prodigious feat.
But that was only impressive for his age.
KRA-KOOM!
Rudy's strike smashed harmlessly into the stone wall.
Waste any more aura and I'm finished.
At this rate, the aura in his dantian would burn out completely, and the Changgwi would kill him.
It was time to make a decision.
"All right — if there's treasure down here, then a difficulty like this comes with the territory."
Rudy's straining body erupted in an explosive leap.
Movement unmistakably different from before.
The Changgwi seemed startled by the agility of a man going all-out to end this.
KA-KAANG!
The creature swiftly blocked his blade with an ice spear, flash-freezing the moisture in the air.
Damn it, I meant to finish it in one strike…!
No time.
Rudy poured out the wild, feral swordsmanship he'd forged through years of dangerous adventurer work like a madman.
His swings were ravenous and vicious, utterly unbefitting a great sword dynasty —
the Fafnir family's foundational techniques fused with everything he'd learned on the streets, producing something utterly feral.
KA-GA-GA-GA-GA-GA-GA-GAK!
The Changgwi's ice spear shattered under the barrage, re-formed, shattered again, over and over.
The re-formation time — I'll strike through that gap!
It was a brutal battle of slaughter, each of them trading the other's life back and forth.
Rudy had roughly one minute of aura left.
He had to end it within that window.
He had to, and yet….
"…I didn't end it! Agh, damn it!"
Rudy was screwed.
The moment that minute ran out, his swollen muscles shriveled like X's in midwinter and gave out entirely.
His aura was spent.
[Kyaaaaah!!]
"H-hold on a moment, sir. Let's talk this out."
Shameless as ever, after beating the thing half to death not five minutes ago.
Crack! Crunch! Bam!
Rudy took the counterassault head-on.
A kick to the gut. An ice spear through the arm.
The Changgwi, thoroughly enraged, spent a good while beating Rudy to within an inch of his life.
About five minutes passed.
"Ghhk… God damn it all, I should've just grown stronger first…."
Limp and shattered from head to toe — everything except his head, anyway.
Slumped against the stone wall, all Rudy had left was to curse his own misfortune.
"If I'd known I was going to die anyway, I could've at least lived a little while paying off the debt… sob… this is how it ends, huh!"
[Kyaaaaaaaah!]
"Ghk!"
The Changgwi drove a savage kick into Rudy's face.
Fortunately the blow missed his jaw, sparing him a knockout.
But Rudy felt the agony of his face caving in under the creature's monstrous strength.
Twang! Clatter.
His helmet was knocked loose and went rolling across the floor.
And then—
[Warning. Lethal threat detected.]
[System will activate automatically to protect the holder.]
[Converting a portion of the Lust stat into Charm……]
Whoosh!
On the verge of death, a baffling system window flickered into being — and light blazed from Rudy's face.
[Kyaaak!?]
The Changgwi shielded its face from the sudden flash.
The system's grand plan: blind it with light, then run?
So Rudy assumed — though he didn't have the strength to so much as stand.
Arm fractured, magic power and stamina both drained to nothing.
Rudy let out a hollow, bitter laugh and muttered.
"So the grand power of my 'Lust stat' turns out to be… my sparkling face. A trash-tier build if there ever was one. Heh."
Rudy cursed his friend all over again — the bastard who'd set his character's core stat to Lust.
"Fine! Kill me, then! Either way I die, so what difference does it make? Come on, have at it!"
Rudy squeezed his eyes shut and lay back, baring his belly like a man inviting the blade.
A brief silence fell.
"……."
[………]
What the hell.
The silence was so unnerving that Rudy felt something was off.
…It's not killing me?
Rudy cracked his eyes open and peered ahead.
And there it was.
[Kiiiii….]
Both eyes wide and deep blue, cheeks flushed pink.
The Changgwi was covering its face with both hands, shyly.
…??????