Chapter 1
The air in the room felt suffocating, as if the oxygen had been forcefully expelled from the space. Not because there were no windows or vents, but due to the presence of the figure sitting in the center: Ferwel Noxes.
Nine men and one woman knelt with their gazes glued to the floor, arranged tightly in a straight line before a carved black wooden chair. No movement whatsoever. Even their chests rose and fell at the barest minimum—just enough to stay alive.
Amidst the choking silence, Ferwel Noxes rested his elbow on the armrest. His index finger lifted, then fell against the hard wood.
Tap.
An echoing pulse traveled across the stone walls.
Tap.
The throat of a man in the front row bobbed roughly, swallowing his dry saliva.
Tap.
The tapping stopped. The silence crept back, thicker than before. Ferwel lifted a thick, folded piece of paper.
"Count Elvion Ornen."
His voice was flat, without a high decibel, yet the ten backs before him immediately stiffened.
"Thirty-six years old. One of our inside spies."
The rustle of paper was heard as a page was turned.
"The Neltan Kingdom has identified him." Ferwel paused. His eyes locked onto the bottom line of ink. "The arrest will happen soon."
No lips parted to reply. Those kneeling there knew exactly the impact of that information: the secrets of Noxes stored in Elvion's head would be exposed under Neltan's torture devices.
The paper in Ferwel's hand was dropped.
Smack.
"He cannot be captured." His voice remained in the same range—cold, without any tremor of anger or hesitation. "He must die before the Neltan Kingdom can even touch him."
At the end of the line, a man's pupils lifted a few millimeters from the floor. Just for a second.
Ferwel's gaze shifted straight at him. The man immediately slammed his face back onto the cold tiles, his shoulders hunching to suppress his trembling. No reprimand. No swinging of weapons. Yet the silence in the room was enough to affirm one fact: Ferwel Noxes's words were the absolute baseline that could not be altered.
Ferwel looked away. "Ryudien Noxes."
A sixteen-year-old boy kneeling in the middle of the line lifted his head. His black hair fell past his forehead, covering half of his blazing red irises. A thick scar ran roughly from his left cheek, past the cheekbone until it almost touched the corner of his eye.
"Yes."
"Go to Count Elvion Ornen's residence." Ferwel stared right into those red irises. "Finish him."
Ryudien did not flinch. No questions about strategy or an escape route escaped his mouth.
However, as Ryudien began gathering strength in his legs to stand—
"Ryudien."
His movements locked. Ferwel leaned his back against the chair, his gaze dimming without a shred of humanity.
"Do not disappoint me."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop several degrees in the blink of an eye. Ryudien's fingers curled, clenching his fists until his knuckles turned white.
"Understood."
He exploded into motion, striding swiftly out of the room. The thick wooden door swung shut, ending with the metallic click of the lock.
A flood of silver moonlight showered the grand bungalow's courtyard. Count Elvion stepped out of his vehicle with dragging steps. His eyelids were swollen, a sign of sleep deprivation after a long business trip, but lines of a smile still lingered at the corners of his lips. In his right hand, he held a suitcase and a thick briefcase.
"Welcome home, dear," greeted his wife, stepping out of the main doorway with a wide smile, reaching out to take the items with the help of a servant.
"I'm home," Elvion exhaled, his shoulders slumping as a sense of safety seeped into his chest.
He stepped into his private office to place the bags on his desk. His steps abruptly died.
On the velvet sofa shielded by the shadows of a pillar, a young man sat with his legs crossed.
A cold sensation crept rapidly from the soles of Elvion's feet up to the nape of his neck. That face—the long scar and red eyes—was far too familiar in his line of work.
"Are you Master Ferwel's envoy?" Elvion asked, his voice trembling slightly as he steadied his breathing to calm his accelerating heartbeat.
"You failed," Ryudien cut in. His eyes did not blink, utterly devoid of pity.
Elvion's hands shook violently, the bags slipping from his grasp to the floor. "Tell Master Fer—"
Slash!
His airway was severed. Elvion's line of sight suddenly spun awkwardly before his vision crashed against the carpet. Above him stood a headless body spraying thick liquid into the air.
A few seconds later, the office door swung open. His wife stood frozen, holding a glass cup of cold water on a tray. The tray slipped from her grip, crashing onto the floor in a shower of shattered glass.
Her eyes widened in horror, staring at her husband's head resting lifelessly a few inches from her feet.
"Ahhhhhhhh!!!"
A piercing, shrill scream echoed through the bungalow's corridors. From outside, the heavy thuds of boots echoed across the living room as a line of guards rushed in. Amidst the chaos, a twenty-four-year-old young man radiating an oppressive aura stepped in. His striking silver hair and piercing blue eyes cut through the tension, his heavy combat gear and flowing red cloak commanding absolute authority—the Fifth Strongest Warrior, Damnern Solv.
"Semi Angel!" Damnern shouted.
A bead of golden light exploded from his left shoulder, forming a giant, brightly glowing wing. The holy light swept away all the shadows in the office.
The guards pointed their blades at Ryudien. Without batting an eye, Ryudien waved his hand in the air. The air around him warped, forming dozens of sharp steel blades that instantly sped forward.
Metal pierced flesh. One by one, the guards' bodies collapsed onto the wet floor.
Damnern focused his gaze, golden geometric patterns expanding in his pupils as his Judgement Eyes activated. However, as his eyes swept over Ryudien's neck, there was no holy thread visible encircling the teenager's neck.
This isn't him…
Without wasting a second, Damnern's sword shot straight, piercing right through Ryudien's chest. The teenager's body did not bleed; instead, it shattered into black dust that scattered into the air.
A clone.
Crash!
The office's glass window shattered to pieces as Damnern's body shot out, burning through the night air and soaring into the sky.
In a narrow alley hidden from the streetlights, Ryudien clutched his heaving chest while walking briskly.
Damnern Solv… In the exact same place at the exact same time? The situation is really not in my favor. Clashing directly with the Number Five rank on the Strongest Warrior list.
Ryudien gritted his teeth as he slipped behind the trash bins. If only my Clone Manifestation wasn't bound by a distance limit, I wouldn't have had to put my real body this close to the target area.
Fifteen minutes later.
From hundreds of meters up, Damnern's eyes caught the movement of a black-cloaked figure moving too fast through a quiet alley. Damnern's body plummeted sharply, crashing into the ground right in front of the alley's exit.
His Judgement Eyes flared up again.
A glowing red thread was tied securely around the cloaked man's neck before him.
"You're the one," Damnern said, hiding any fluctuation in his tone.
Ryudien looked up slightly, tilting his head. "What do you mean, sir?"
"Still trying to deny it?"
Blades of metal thorns erupted from underground, speeding toward Damnern's chest. However, the young man merely flicked his hand to catch the metal with ease.
"Tch!" Ryudien clicked his tongue, stepping backward.
"Judgement Sword…"
A crack of light opened in the air beside Damnern, and from within it, he pulled out a long, brightly shining sword.
Ryudien abruptly released the limiters on his energy.
"Clone Fragmentation!"
"Other people's lives are just numbers to someone like you, aren't they?" Damnern said as the terrified screams of civilians began echoing from nearby alleys.
"You'll never understand…" Ryudien retorted, his lips turning bitter. "Those standing at the top will never understand the feeling of being trampled at the bottom."
Ryudien's shadow swelled before splitting into twenty identical figures. All of them leaped and sprinted in different directions, braving the darkness like a pack of roaming wolves. Amidst the chaos of the copies, Ryudien's real body sprinted away with whatever stamina he had left in his legs.
There is no opening to win against a Strongest Warrior rank...
A gust of cold wind hit the back of his neck. Damnern was already there, swinging his sword downward.
"SWITCH!!"
Slash!
Ryudien crashed onto the ground, his fingers clutching his stinging neck while the clone that replaced his spot melted into dust.
Cold sweat dripped from his chin. Impossible...
He leaped up, but the moment he blinked, Damnern's figure had already vanished from his front sight and reappeared behind him.
"Switch!"
Slash… Slash… Slash…
Flesh and his cloak were sliced. Every time Ryudien transferred his consciousness to another clone's body, the reflection of Damnern's holy light was already waiting for him at the landing point.
How… how does he know my original position?
Ryudien's chest heaved rapidly, his breathing turning erratic. The golden light from Damnern's wings in Ryudien's eyes now morphed into the silhouette of a black, spiked monster with a pair of blazing red eyes thirsting for life.
This man… is not human.
A final desperate plan erupted in his mind. Ryudien let one of his clones keep moving as bait, while his real body leaped out of the shadows right behind Damnern.
Damnern's sword of light pierced through the bait clone.
"Tch!"
Ryudien pushed the absolute limits of his remaining stamina, summoning a giant iron scythe and swinging it in an arc toward Damnern's neck.
"Die!!"
But, the gleam of Damnern's sword moved faster than the swing of his scythe, having already breached the safety distance and touched the skin of Ryudien's neck.
"SWITCH—!!"
He reached out with his mind, desperately searching for a vessel, a duplicate, anything—only to find empty air. The final clone was gone.
Time seemed to stretch agonizingly slow. Ryudien stared at the sparks of holy fire dancing along the blade that was now cutting into his throat. His body stiffened, refusing to listen to any more commands from his brain.
Slash.
The world spun wildly as his head was separated from his shoulders and flew into the air.
His fading consciousness sent a series of trembling questions into the dark: Is this the end? What does happiness actually feel like? Why was I born if only to be a tool? Why… was I never given any space to feel at peace? Fate never once took my side… Heh… My luck has always been terrible…
A streak of warm liquid flowed from the corner of his eye, dripping onto the earth.
"Now… be happy."
A soft whisper vibrated within his ear canal before all the colors, the sound of the night wind, and the stinging pain on his neck vanished, sucked into an eternal void.
However, that eternal silence shattered abruptly.
Ryudien's mind was slammed by an overwhelmingly intense pressure. His entire existence felt squeezed, crushed, and forcefully pushed through an incredibly tight and searingly hot passage.
Wait… what is happening? My body should have been completely destroyed by that sword!
A final push freed him from the crush. A sharp, freezing sensation stung the entire surface of his wet skin. Air invaded his respiratory tract, burning his lungs which had never pumped air manually like this before.
Ryudien tried to regulate his breathing using internal energy control techniques, but his muscles failed to respond. The violently expelled air pushed against his vocal cords, producing a sound that was foreign to his own ears:
"Uwaaa! Waaah!"
Whose voice is this?! That… came from my throat?!
He forced his eyes open, but his eyelids were glued shut by a thick liquid. Ryudien tried to summon his power to launch a rescue clone, but his energy reserves were completely empty. Not a single trace of magic current flowed.
Panic erupted. He moved his left arm to check the severed neck. But, the raised limb appeared wobbly and out of control, short, smooth, and entirely lacking the muscle structure of an assassin.
What happened to my body?!
A soft cloth wrapped his entirely stiff physique. The thick liquid coating his skin was wiped gently. The metallic stench of blood and iron that had been his life's companion was now gone, replaced by the piercing, fresh aroma of floral oils and herbs.
Ryudien mustered all his focus to open his eyelids.
The glow of an oil lamp cast a blurry image. Giant shapes floated around him. When his vision finally began to center, he saw a golden-blonde woman with a pair of green eyes radiating deep tenderness, cradling him on her chest.
"Shhh, my darling Elyra... Mama is here," the woman whispered, gently stroking his cheek.
"Look at her blue eyes, My Lady," said a maidservant beside the bed, clasping her hands to her chest. "So beautiful."
"Truly beautiful," replied the blonde woman—Elina—without tearing her gaze away from the baby's face in her lap.
"Congratulations, Lady Elina."
"Welcome to the world, Little Miss Elyra."
Ryudien—now trapped within the tiny physical form of a baby girl—released a reflexive cry he couldn't hold back.
"Waaah!"
Her tiny chest heaved violently.
I… was reborn? This woman… is my mother?
As his tiny body was rocked gently by Elina, Ryudien stared at the unfamiliar carved wooden ceiling above him. His new physique was too weak to process the shock, fear, and disbelief racing through his mind.
Yet, from the cracks of that helplessness, another feeling crept up—cold, thick, and sharp. One name was eternally etched in his mind, unerasable even though his life had been snuffed out once.
Damnern Solv.
Just wait… no matter how many years it takes… I will track your steps… and I will make you pay.
The clock showed two in the morning.
Ryudien—now the baby named Elyra—suddenly opened her eyes in the dark. The bungalow was eerily quiet. Only the moonlight pierced through the thin curtains, casting long shadows across the nursery floor.
She lay completely still, her teenage mind trying to detect the source that had jolted her awake.
The sensation emerged—a heavy presence standing right next to her wooden crib.
Slowly, Elyra rolled her eyeballs to the side. Every blood vessel in her body seemed to freeze over.
A pair of cold eyes stared down at her. The same face. The same broad shoulders.
Damnern Solv.
The man's clothes were smeared with dried bloodstains, standing motionless in the dark room.
He managed to track me this closely?!
Terror overrode all of Ryudien's logic. Seeing a giant hand reach into the crib, Elyra instantly unleashed her loudest cries and screams, arching her tiny back while sobbing uncontrollably.
The large hand paused for a second, before gently touching the baby's cheek.
"Oh… this little one is quite fussy," Damnern spoke, his tone shifting into something incredibly soft and warm, far from the icy voice he had when swinging his sword.
He leaned forward, gazing at Elyra with tender eyes.
"Don't cry, Elyra."
"I'm your papa."
…Huh?
To be Continued...