I...I was rather uninteresting in appearance.
Black hair with a few strands of white.
Black eyes with eye bags under them.
Skin that was pale but not concerning.
And a slim physique, with a scar around my neck.
Leaning against a wall, I ate instant ramen from a cup, the only meal I could have today.
Wearing my comfortable black and yellow tracksuit, I felt the buzzing of my phone in my left pocket.
Taking it out, I was sent a message for my job:
[Bounty: $10,000]
[Target: Marley Crowley]
[Location: #########]
Finally, I can make more money. Would it be enough after it gets deducted from the debt?
This was the unfortunate truth of my circumstances.
My parents were dead, and they had a debt to the mafia.
Unfortunately, since I was their son, I inherited it.
They had no mercy for an orphan who could barely fight for himself.
That was why...I had to shape up.
In the dawn of night, a couple of female thugs had driven a car to a warehouse, where little boys were kidnapped and restrained with tape and rope. Tears welling in their eyes from fear, slightly loosening the tape on their mouths.
"Alright, unload them girls."
They were a bunch of lunatics, grinning while dragging defenseless children within a place no one would find them during the dead of night, where all is masked under its shadows.
"So, these are the boys, huh? They look fresh, really fresh. Rich families, right?"
"Indeed, ma'am. Our background checks showed us their families are reeling in millions."
"Heh, perfect."
Marley Crowley, a wicked woman with the appearance of a crazed psycho, her unkempt brown hair not doing any favors.
Her eyes were filled with twisted glee, glowing brightly with purple color as she laughed, the thoughts of drawing in green filling her brain.
Before Marley could walk back to her seat, the sound of crows erupted from above.
"...crows? Why are they so pissy?"
She questioned, watching through the glass roof as they circled the warehouse, the aggressive caws getting louder, and at that moment...
CRASH
...the sound of breaking glass came after the silence.
A cloaked figure, covered in darkness, made itself known.
In their hands, crowbars were held, shining below the moonlight.
"Who the hell are you!?" Marley yelled, appalled to see someone do something so crazy.
"..."
The silent figure said nothing, but merely began the onslaught.
In an instance, they ran forward like a flash, catching one of the goons off guard.
"What the fuu–"
She was not allowed to even speak as her jaw was broken by the assailant, the hook dug into her jaw from below.
Immediately, he pulled, ripping her jaw clean off.
She cried in panic, but he would not let such a death end there, kicking her in the face into a pile of boxes before continuing.
"SHOOT HIM!" Marley cried.
She clenched her fist in anger, sweating and dripping from her head.
The dark figure ran across the room, using the wooden table as cover, and with his strength, he would lift it, for it was not a heavy table.
He ran forward, slamming it into one of the goons and using that window of a pause to throw his other crowbar at the other shooter.
"Ah!"
She dropped her gun, the tingle from her head distracting.
Giving the figure the time to grab the gun, push all the way to the wall, and unload the entire magazine into her body at point-blank range.
"Ack!"
She could barely register what had happened before the reaper took her life, too, at the hands of this figure.
"...shit. BETTY!" Her voice echoed throughout the warehouse.
"WHAT?" And a voice replied.
A woman of a heavyweight class came from a different room, carrying booze with her.
"THIS GUY IS RUINING OUR CHANCE AT GREEN, KILL HIM!"
Marley Crowley was stubborn. Even against near-impossible odds, she would not let this chance at money go to waste. This was her only chance, her one chance to finally hit it big.
The dark figure turned its head to Betty, and she looked back in silence.
"This is the guy ya'll are struggling with? Piece of cake."
Without a care for the danger this person posed, she walked over, openings all around.
"Look, I don't know why you're here or who sent you, but I guess I have to stop you now. Normally, I don't fight, but you're a problem. Yet at the same time, it's not like you can win, weight classes exist for a reason after all. How about you just go home, and no one has to get hurt? It's easier for both of us."
"B-BETTY!"
"Shaddup!"
"..."
There was no response.
"I should have suspected....."
In the silence, Betty made the first move, going in for a palm strike, but this person expected that, moving as swiftly as the wind on a windy day, but in the process, their hood had fallen off.
"I-It's a...."
It was me.
I was the dark figure.
This is what I was.
I was an assassin for hire.
"Wait a minute, that scar. They call you the Phantom, the assassin who shall not speak."
Marley looked over at her chubby friend, confused.
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"He's known as a great assassin. Remember that drug lord, Magista? He killed him, but in the process, he nearly died from a neck stab, but you survived. Unfortunately, your vocal cords were destroyed, so you can't really make words anymore."
She was right, everything was true, and I couldn't deny it.
It was still a mission I hated greatly for my ignorance.
It was because I was a noob that I could never speak again, and that I let myself be caught off guard.
"Eh, what the hell, I'm still going to kill you...!"
...It was already over. I wasted no time in ending this fight. I had already let it go on for long enough.
"...ain't that some...shit."
The blade of a box cutter was in her neck, and she dropped limp.
Pulling the box cutter from her neck, I used my fingers to wipe the blood off like Ghostface.
Turning my empty gaze to her, she tried to run, but like a shadow, I appeared behind her with my quick agility.
Grabbing her hair, I pulled her down, carving her neck flesh with the blade.
It squirted out like a fountain, painting a disgusting mural on the dirt-stained floor.
She convulsed and struggled for air, her eyes bloodshot and full of desperation for survival.
All I could do was look at her with the eyes of a dead man, pupils hollow and devoid of light.
Going limp, I looked at the hostages, restrained and afraid. Such a sight reminded me of myself, or rather, the day I lost my parents.
The feeling of rope around my body restricting my movement, the cries of my mother when chopped limb from limb, kept alive for a debt my father took.
My damn father thought it was smart to take a debt from the mafia in order to pay off loans, rent, and give us food, working long hours just to pay it back, until he selfishly decided to take his life, leaving the debt with my mom, but since she's now dead, the debt is mine.
The worst thing about this debt is that I will never be able to pay it off in full because the interest has been accumulating over the years. I would be 80 years old by the time I pay it off completely, but only if I pay it off consistently.
With nothing else for me to do, my mission done, I cut them free and walked off into the night as swiftly as the night.
In the morning, waking up in an alleyway, I checked my phone:
[$10,000 Deposited]
[Payments: 98,000]
[Left Over: 2,000]
"..."
There was nothing I could think or say.
This is just how my life was.
I took a shower by going to a gym, ate breakfast, and waited for my next hire at a library.
I heard they have isekai books, although I don't know what those are. That guy said it was about being summoned to a different world...
Knowing this, it made me wonder if such stories could be a reality. A way for me to escape this impossible debt.
In the end, I decided to take a book from one of the shelves in the back, where no one could see me.
That Time I Was Reincarnated as a Sexy Prisoner, Now I Must Get Stronger By Doing Evil Deeds? Why is the title so long?
This was my first time reading a light novel, so maybe I wasn't familiar with how things worked. Maybe this was normal, a trend, maybe?
Just before I could take the book, however, my vision began to blur.
...huh?
My head began to spin and ache, my body felt heavy, yet light, my vision was getting blurrier and shifting as if it was glitching.
What's....happening!? Was...I....poisoned?
Falling unconscious, a green door appeared next to my body, and men in armor, appearing medieval but advanced, pulled me away.
For the next few moments, I could only remember flashes of what they had done.
The flash of my memory, shaking in a stretcher, rolled down a corridor.
The next flash showed doctors with helmets that looked far more advanced than I had known, with hands mechanical and sharp.
But the last few...the last few were of my autonomy being violated...
"Ahhh!"
...The sound of my low-pitched scream erupts.
The feeling of my belly opened, and some sort of organ was placed inside my body, all while still awake.
Sometimes I wonder if that was even real, yet what I saw may have confirmed it did.
I woke up in a hospital bed, the devices next to it alien to me as the technology did not look like it came from a hospital, but rather, more advanced.
Where am I? What...happened to me?
Looking out the window, I could see a bright sky, but I could also see...blimps.
These limps had a screen advertising some sort of crystal for...magic?
Magic? What the hell is that? Wait, when were blimps flying around in New York? I thought that stopped after the Hindenburg disaster?
Before I could ponder any more, the door of my room was opened, and a female doctor stepped inside.
"Oh, you're awake, that's good. If you didn't, I would have needed to use a waking spell."
"..."
"...oh right, I forgot your vocal cords were damaged."
"...!!"
"Unfortunately, it seems the damage to your vocals has been sustained for a long time, since magic cannot heal any injuries that are older than 2 years."
...what the hell is she talking about?
"It's time for you to meet the Emperor. After all, you are in a world alien to your own."
A world alien to me? Am I drugged? Did she kidnap me? My body...it's too weak. Wait, where's my Box Cutter!?
"Oh, and if you're concerned where your stuff is, don't worry, it's currently in a locker, and you will be given it tomorrow when you are discharged. For now, let's help you up."
Little did I know that this would be the start of exploring a world vastly different from the one I had lived in.
A fantasy world filled with magic and mysteries. Creatures once thought to be in fiction, brought to life.