By the time Kairos was able to get a hold of himself, he noticed everything had changed.
The darkness—endless, quiet, and heavy—was gone.
In its place, a vast forest stretched in every direction. Sunlight filtered through thick canopies, casting golden glimmers on the moss-covered floor. The colors were almost too vivid, too full of life, after so long in the void.
Kairos blinked, once, twice. His breath caught in his throat. He took a slow step forward, as if testing the ground beneath his feet. It felt real. The earth was soft, cool.
A mix of emotions hit him all at once. Confusion. Relief. Worry.
Excitement.
His eyes wandered, scanning the towering trees, the far-off shadows. The forest went on for miles, no end in sight. He could smell the greenery, fresh and ancient at the same time.
But then his expression slowly fell back into the familiar. Blank. Emotionless.
A habit from the void. A habit from before.
"Am I… on Earth again?" he asked aloud, voice raspy from disuse.
There was no answer. Only the wind, brushing gently against the trees.
Kairos began to walk.
Even though his body looked the same as the day he died—still twenty-one, still slim and fit from gym days—his movements were different now. Sharper. Balanced. His senses were awake, and his awareness stretched beyond what it used to be.
"If this really is Earth…" he murmured, narrowing his eyes, "I think I could take on even a pro martial artist."
That wasn't arrogance. It was certainty.
His years in the void hadn't changed his body. But they had reshaped everything inside.
Still, for a forest this vast, something was off. He couldn't hear birdsong. No buzzing insects. No rustling animals.
It was too quiet.
Kairos stopped walking and stood still for a moment, tuning his senses outward.
"Strange…" he whispered. "This place is alive, but… where is everything?"
There was no answer.
He sighed and moved deeper into the woods, each step echoing faintly in the silence.
The forest didn't end. The trees barely changed. And yet, he walked.
There was no real destination in mind. Just… the urge to keep going.
He couldn't say how much time had passed. Maybe half an hour.
Or maybe more. Time still felt strange here.
But he wasn't bored.
In fact, there was something stirring inside him. Something he hadn't felt in a long while.
Hope.
The hope of finding another human being.
Someone to talk to. Someone to ask. Someone who could explain where the hell he was.
His boots stepped over roots, through undergrowth, between ferns and fallen logs.
The more he walked, the more unfamiliar this place began to feel.
"This place sure doesn't look like Earth," he muttered, pushing aside a low branch. "And if it is… then where on Earth am I right now?"
Frustration flickered across his face for a moment, creasing his brows.
But he didn't stop.
The forest might've been quiet, but his instincts were honed from decades of martial discipline.
And something was different now.
He could feel it.
A presence.
Faint, distant—but there.
His heart picked up its pace.
Without hesitation, Kairos broke into a run. His footsteps were light, almost silent, despite the thick forest floor. He followed the pull of that presence like a thread in the wind.
It didn't take long.
Just ahead, past a thick curtain of ferns and twisted vines, he caught movement.
Slowing down, he approached carefully, crouching low behind a bush.
And there they were.
Creatures.
Several of them.
About the size of a medium dog, scuttling slowly over the mossy ground. Their bodies were like a strange fusion of beetle and crab, covered in hard, glistening shells.
Some were a deep, obsidian black.
Others shimmered with a dull bronze hue.
But one… one of them stood out, gleaming silver under the light like polished steel.
They looked strong. Heavy.
And dangerous.
Kairos didn't move, just observed.
His breathing slowed as he focused.
"Beetles… no, too wide. Crabs? Maybe. But those horns…" he whispered. "They're like Hercules beetles."
The creatures hadn't noticed him yet.
He didn't know if they were hostile.
But they definitely weren't ordinary.
Kairos remained crouched in silence, eyes narrowed, watching their every movement.
*Why do I feel like I've read about them somewhere…"
Kairos narrowed his eyes as he studied the strange beetle-crab hybrids. Something about their shells, their horns, their clustered behavior—it all tugged at a faded memory.
He tried to dig into the remnants of his mind. But years in the void had stolen more than time. He had forgotten so much—faces, places, even names. Only language stayed with him, and even that only because he'd forced himself to mouth words in the dark, just to remember how it felt to speak.
But whatever he was trying to recall, it wasn't coming back.
"Tch. Forget it," he muttered and took a step forward, eyes still fixed on the creatures.
"I'm not even hungry yet," he whispered to himself, glancing down at his stomach. "But if these things belong to someone and I kill them… wouldn't I get slapped with some ridiculous fine?"
He smirked weakly. It felt almost nostalgic—worrying about money, rules, and consequences.
Still, something wasn't right.
His stamina… it was dropping.
Kairos frowned. In the void, he never felt tired. Never winded. But now, even just this walk had left him a little lighter on breath.
"So my body's aging again," he murmured. "Guess this place doesn't share the void's luxury."
He eyed the beetles again.
Eating a bug was never on his bucket list. Not even once. But he didn't know how deep this forest went or how long it would take to find food.
"Sigh… You know what? Imma give it a try."
With a sharp breath, Kairos lunged forward, his feet gliding effortlessly over the moss. In one clean strike, his palm slammed into the nearest black-shelled beetle.
Crunch.
The creature's shell split at the seams, its insides spilling out in a grotesque mess.
As Kairos leaned down to grab the carcass, a strange sound echoed in his mind—a mechanical, emotionless voice.
"Black Beetle killed. No beast soul gained. Eat the flesh of the Black Beetle to gain 0 to 10 Gen points randomly."
His eyes widened.
"…No way."
The words. The phrasing. The cold tone. It was all too familiar.
"This is… Super Gene?"