The evening sky began to dim, casting a golden light that filtered through the thick canopy.
Arin, a seventeen-year-old girl, ran as fast as she could, her breath coming in ragged gasps. The usually peaceful Dragon Tail Forest felt suffocating and sinister.
She didn't care about the scrapes on her legs or the branches that scratched her cheeks. Her mind was fixated on a single name: her brother.
"Arka! Arka, where are you?!"
Her voice was hoarse from constant shouting.
She had been searching for three hours. Arka, he sixteen-year-old younger brother, was only supposed to be gathering firewood near the forest's edge, but he never came back.
A gnawing sense of dread tightened its grip when Arin found an overturned wooden basket and saw that the ground around it was disturbed, a sign of a fierce struggle.
Broken branches and large claw marks were imprinted in the mud. They were the unmistakable tracks of a Grimgor, a rarely seen but extremely dangerous predatory monster.
Arin's tears fell, blurring her vision. She knew her brother was strong, but he was no match for a monster like that. She followed the claw marks that led to a cliff, and there, the sight that greeted her stopped her in her tracks.
At the edge of a deep ravine, Arin saw scattered blood. Fresh blood that she recognized instantly. It was his blood, her brother's blood.
***
A searing pain consumed every nerve in my body. I felt as if I were being stabbed and bitten by a thousand insects, yet I couldn't move a single muscle. Each breath felt like shards of glass shattering in my chest, a struggle just to draw air into my lungs.
Grimgor, a monster that was never supposed to stray into our village's territory, had attacked me. I fought back, but it wasn't enough. The monster's final kick sent me flying off the cliff, and now I lay at the bottom of the ravine, my body broken and bleeding.
I could hear my sister, Arin, calling my name from above. Her voice was laced with panic and desperation. I wanted to answer her, to scream that I was okay, but no sound would come out of my lips. My breaths grew shorter, and my vision began to fade. This is the end, I thought. I will die here, alone.
Suddenly, a strange, cold voice echoed inside my head, and my fading eyes caught a glimpse of an eerie, flickering blue light in front of me.
[Attention: User has reached a critical condition.]
[Soul Resonance has reached its limit.]
[Searching for a suitable Archetype…]
[Archetype 'Prince of the Moon' has been found.]
[Starting activation….]
A strange, translucent screen appeared before me, like an interface in an RPG game. It displayed words and numbers that were utterly meaningless to me.
[ Name: Arka Ardent ]
[ Lineage: Moon Prince ]
[ Level: 1 ]
[ Skills: [Night Breath] [Moon Resonance] [Star Gift] ]
[ Stat Points: 0 ]
I didn't understand any of it; my head felt like it was spinning uncontrollably. I closed my eyes, allowing the darkness to embrace me.
However, instead of empty darkness, a rapid sequence of images flashed through my mind.
A massive city of glass and steel, a glowing rectangular screen in my hand, and cars moving without horses. The images were so real, and suddenly, I understood something.
Before I became Arka Ardent in this world, I was a young man from Earth. I was a student who spent my free time reading web novels.
And this world I now inhabit… is "The Sword Princess and the Light Hero," a fantasy web novel that I adored.
I remembered, not everything: the main hero, the plot, and even the fate of every single character. I knew that Arka, the unfortunate supporting character, was fated to die early in the story, and his death was meant to be the catalyst that would forge Arin, his sister, into a strong and ruthless heroine. She was the one who would truly earn the title of Sword Princess.
I should have died here, but some strange *bug* had occurred. I, the one who was meant to die, suddenly had a status screen.
I opened my eyes and looked at the screen again. The pain in my body was still present, but now there was something else: a new purpose.
I wouldn't die. Not here. And I would change my own destiny.