Grit coated the broken earth, while dying embers glowed faintly across the scorched battlefield. The stench of burning flesh and ash hung heavily in the air, as if the land itself wept from the carnage it had witnessed. What was once a proud mountain now stood fractured, its jagged stone ridges clawing toward the sky like the last remnants of a broken crown.
And atop this shattered ground, a single man stood.
He was like a primordial statue among the ruins, tall and unmoving, with a dark, mighty staff gripped tightly in his hands. Around him, a swirling current of purple energy danced and curled into the atmosphere, distorting the air with a strange and ominous heat.
His face was bloodied, bruised, his clothes torn, and yet—his expression burned with something wild. His lips curved into a grin that teetered between insanity and euphoria, his battered form radiating an overwhelming presence. His eyes, sharp and glowing faintly, swept across the field of death beneath him.
There were corpses—hundreds of them. Mutilated. Burnt. Broken. The wounded groaned where they lay, clinging to life while others had long slipped into eternal stillness.
Different sects. Rival martial clans. Followers of long-forgotten deities. Monsters from the deepest corners of the earth. All now reduced to bodies at the base of this ruined peak.
They had come together—every one of them—for one purpose: to end the life of a single man.
And yet, they failed.
This man was Fang Zhen.
The greatest martial artist the world had ever known.
He didn't smile because he had defeated his enemies. No. This joy... this fire in his veins… came from something far deeper.
From how far he had come.
"I was born defective, wasn't I?!" he bellowed, his voice echoing over the charred stones with madness and triumph. "Unable to cultivate mana, laughed at by all!"
He cackled, a twisted grin stretching across his blood-smeared face. "Now look! I stand at the summit of the martial dao! A man feared so much that not just sect leaders, but even ancient deities crawl out of their tombs to kill me!"
His staff crackled with raw energy, purple lightning arcing off its surface, shattering what few rocks remained whole.
But even as his victory stood undeniable, Fang Zhen's body began to betray him.
His fingers trembled violently, the staff slipping slightly in his grasp. His legs wobbled beneath him, no longer able to bear the weight of his blood-soaked triumph.
"Damn it!" he growled, staggering as his knees buckled. Blood dripped from his lips—no, more than a drip—he coughed, and a torrent spilled forth, painting his chest red.
He collapsed.
Falling back-first onto the rocky ridge with a brutal thud, the mighty Fang Zhen finally lay still.
'After all that show... I can't believe I'm dying like this,' he thought, struggling even to keep his eyelids open. His blurry vision focused on the crimson blood moon that loomed above, watching silently like a cold, uncaring god.
He had reached a power greater than anything the world could contain. And yet—
'This is the limit of the human body, isn't it.'
He coughed again, violently, as if his soul were trying to escape through his lungs. Blood poured from his mouth in thick spurts.
He was dying.
And there was nothing he could do.
'I'm not—done just yet... I'm too close... Just one more opponent... And I can become the king of martial artists... Please... body... fight back... I don't want to die just yet…'
---
Drip!
A splash of cold water struck his face.
Was that it?
No—wait.
Why is it so cold all of a sudden?
Everything was dark. He couldn't see a damn thing.
What the hell is going on—
"WILLIAMS! LISTEN, YOU BRAT!"
Suddenly, his senses returned like a crashing wave. His eyes snapped open.
He wasn't on the battlefield anymore.
He was in… a room?
A pristine room at that—far too elegant to belong to a battlefield hospital or the prison of some righteous sect.
Golden chandeliers glittered above, hanging from a pearl-white ceiling. The floor was covered in red carpet so soft it looked like it had never been walked on. Tapestries lined the walls, all detailed with noble crests and family emblems.
In front of him stood a man, mid-forties, furious and soaked—holding an empty metallic bucket.
'Well… now I don't need an explanation for why it's so cold,' Fang Zhen muttered in his thoughts, ignoring the man's scowl and trying to piece together what had just happened.
'This isn't a dream. I know what dreams feel like. This is too… real. Have I been captured? Some noble family trying to ransom me?'
"LORD WILLIAMS!" the man bellowed again, and in a fit of rage, he hurled the bucket at Fang Zhen's head.
But Fang Zhen wasn't about to let something as foolish as a bucket hit him.
With a calm flick of his foot, he kicked it mid-air, redirecting it right back into the man's face.
The clang echoed through the room.
"GAH!" the man cried out, stumbling backwards and crashing to the ground, clutching his bleeding nose.
Fang Zhen narrowed his gaze. "Know your place, young lad," he muttered coldly, eyeing the man with contempt.
But then something strange happened.
He looked down at his own hands.
Small.
Delicate.
Smooth.
No calluses. No scars. No sign of the years of brutal training, of sword cuts or shattered bones.
'What… sort of baby hands are these?'
A surge of dread washed over him as he slowly looked at the rest of his body. His legs were thin. His chest narrow. His limbs frail.
'I look... malnourished. Outrageous! What sorcery is this?! Am I shrunk?'
His heart pounded as a terrifying thought crept into his mind.
'Did I reincarnate?'
His eyes scanned the room until, almost as if guided by fate, they landed on a tall mirror resting in the corner.
Without hesitation, he ran toward it.
What he saw made him freeze.
'What the hell is this… This isn't me. Where is my body?!'
In the mirror stood a stranger.
A young boy, perhaps twelve or thirteen years of age. Scrawny. Pale. Jet-black hair instead of the snowy white that had marked Fang Zhen's legend. A face so thin it looked like he hadn't eaten in days. His eyes lacked the fierceness he once wielded.
He looked pitiful.
And worst of all…
He looked powerless.
[Ding!]
[You have successfully been reincarnated]
[Host: William Alaric]
Fang Zhen blinked.
Then again.
And again.
'William Alaric? Who the hell is that?!'