A/N: Hello Guys, Lord Island here! A new book, not a translation!
Please check the auxiliary chapter before reading!
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BOOOOM!
A violent shockwave tore through the air.
Dust and shattered stone exploded outward as a massive body crashed into the ground, shaking the earth beneath it.
"Huff… huff…"
At the center of the chaos stood a black-haired young man, no older than twenty. He bent forward with his hands braced on his knees, chest rising and falling heavily as he struggled to catch his breath.
"Finally… finally…" he muttered between gasps. "I can go back now. I wonder how much time has passed there… Are the people I know still alive?"
His eyes glowed a vivid crimson, piercing through the storm of debris as if trying to confirm whether the monster before him was truly dead.
As the dust gradually settled, the monster, no, the monster's corpse, came fully into view.
A colossal black dragon lay sprawled across the shattered ground, its massive body unmoving. A deep scar ran across one of its eyes, a silent testament to countless past battles.
The young man straightened himself and stepped forward. Drawing his sword, he precisely carved into the dragon's chest and retrieved a glowing magic stone embedded within.
The instant the stone left the dragon's body, the massive corpse crumbled into ash, dispersing silently into the air.
....
A few days later.
The same black-haired young man stood alone in an empty plain, the vast land stretching endlessly in every direction.
He appeared calm, almost serene.
He wore a plain black shirt, fitted black trousers, and a gray jacket that fluttered faintly in the breeze. His hair had been cut short, sharpening his features and lending him a striking, almost refined appearance.
As the final rays of sunlight slipped beneath the horizon, he closed his eyes. Slowly, he extended both hands forward.
A simple black card materialized in his left hand. At the same time, a sleek, polished black gun appeared in his right.
"Using these two items…" he murmured softly, "I should be able to open a teleportation portal back to my home planet. I just hope I'm successful…"
As if already gazing upon familiar skies, his lips curled upward into a small, genuine smile.
"Heavens above to the Abyss below,"
"I beseech you to guide me…"
"....."
As the chant concluded, a vast amount of mind surged out from his body. The air distorted violently as that power condensed, twisting and folding in on itself until it formed a pitch-black portal before him.
Merely looking at it made one's instincts scream danger, an overwhelming sense of annihilation seeped straight into the soul.
Yet the young man showed no fear. Instead, his smile widened, borderline unhinged.
As the spell neared completion, the portal began draining an absurd amount of mind from him. Even so, his breathing remained steady. Not a single bead of sweat formed on his brow.
The circular portal stabilized at roughly two and a half meters in height, and then it began to shrink.
"Thank you… for everything, Orario," he said quietly, "And thanks to everyone who helped me along the way."
"You helped me, and I helped you complete the last of the three great quests. With this, our relationship comes to an end."
The wild smile faded from his face. Turning around one last time, he gazed at the towering white structure behind him, the massive tower piercing the skies, and the city spread beneath it.
After a brief pause, he stepped forward and vanished into the pitch-black portal.
...
"I remember this feeling…" The sensation felt familiar. "The same feeling as when I first landed in the dungeon beneath Orario… Pitch-blackness everywhere. My body feeling compressed, and I couldn't even sense my body no matter what."
"Ah… this really brings back memories."
.....
.....
.....
It was complete darkness. An overwhelming pressure pressed in from all sides.
I couldn't feel my body at all. No hands. No legs. Just the sensation of being compressed.
Recalling what I had been doing before was easy.
My mission had been simple: assassinate the new minister, the youngest genius the BloodBone Empire had ever produced.
Honestly, it hadn't even been difficult. The so-called genius had grown arrogant, refusing the bodyguards his family arranged for him.
One fire bullet. That was all it took. After completing the mission, I was on my way back to report it, and then,
…and then…
Nothing.
My mind drew a complete blank. At first, I suspected betrayal. That the organization had sold me out.
But no. That made no sense.
It was a massive organization, headquartered in the BlackLight Federation. I was one of their own personnel operating within the BloodBone Empire for almost two years. They wouldn't expose me so carelessly.
The next possibility, drugged or poisoned, then captured.
That didn't fit either. I had been ingesting trace amounts of various toxins for years to build immunity. Most poisons wouldn't work on me anymore.
"Could it have been the BloodBone Empress herself…?"
No. That could be ruled out as well. She hadn't been seen for over a hundred years. And why would she care about some young genius? With no answer making sense, I stopped thinking about it.
By then, the feeling of compression had begun to fade.
Slowly, I opened my eyes. The first thing I saw was a rough stone wall.
Turning around, I noticed an opening behind me, a narrow entrance leading into what looked like an endless corridor.
Looking around, I was inside a small cave, barely two and a half feet tall and about three people wide. It was completely barren, save for scattered rocks on the ground.
I checked my pockets. Everything was still there. None of my items had been taken. That was the good news.
The bad news? I had no idea where I was. I couldn't match this place to any location I had read about or heard of.
Was I in a lich's crypt? Or another mad magician's underground base like the last time?
I pulled out a black metal card from my trouser pocket. My Sp.I.D.M, Spirit Identification Device Module.
In other words, a multifunctional identification card.
It looked completely blank on both sides, but the moment I poured mana into it, the surface lit up, displaying my name and attributes as usual. I could even project the information outward like a floating screen.
I tapped the map icon in the bottom right corner. Nothing happened.
Frowning, I cut the mana flow and tried again. Still nothing.
My unease deepened. I tried other functions, communication, chat, emergency signals and a few more.
Nothing worked except the attribute display screen. This was the worst possible outcome. Someone had modified my Sp.I.D module. That should have been impossible. It only responded to my magic signature.
Even if one could modify the Sp.I.D.M, only the map or the communication options could be modified. The rest of the functions were connected to the central node.
Which meant one thing, I had been thrown into a place completely beyond my understanding.
"Hmmm…" I took several slow, deep breaths, forcing down the anxiety bubbling inside my chest.
Even as an assassin, having faced countless life-and-death situations, I had never been in a predicament this troublesome.
I didn't even know how I got here.
Was I captured? Teleported? Summoned? And my IDM being tampered with… that alone was alarming.
I inhaled deeply again.
The first lesson I was ever taught as an assassin echoed clearly in my mind: No matter the situation, even if you're dying, never lose control of your emotions.
And me? Was I? No, I was far from dying. I pulled out a spare gun from inside my jacket. My main weapon had already been destroyed after the assassination, to not leave any evidence.
From my pocket, I also drew an eight-inch dagger, small, but deadly. After steadying my breathing one final time, I stepped forward.
Slowly. Carefully. Into the only corridor leading out of the cave.