Pain dragged Kazuki back to consciousness—but it was wrong. All wrong.
The pain was different. Not the sharp, clean agony of broken bones and bullet wounds, but a deeper, more pervasive suffering. His body ached with malnutrition, old bruises, and the chafing of iron shackles. His mouth tasted of stale bread and fear.
And the screaming. Gods, the screaming.
Kazuki's eyes snapped open to chaos. He was lying on damp earth, surrounded by towering trees that blocked out most of the sky. The forest was dark despite what seemed to be midday, the canopy so thick that only scattered beams of pale light penetrated the gloom. The air smelled of moss, rotting leaves, and fresh blood.
Around him, people ran in panic. No—not people. Children. Dozens of them, all wearing the same ragged burlap clothing, all with iron collars around their necks connected by long chains. Slaves.
A roar split the air, and Kazuki's head whipped toward the sound. His breath caught.
The creature stood twelve feet tall, its body a nightmare fusion of wolf and bear, covered in matted black fur that seemed to absorb light. Its eyes burned with crimson fire, and its jaws dripped with saliva and gore. Three rows of teeth lined its maw, each fang as long as a dagger. This was no animal—this was something fundamentally wrong, something that violated natural law.
A demonic beast.
Two bodies lay torn apart near the creature's feet—guards, judging by their leather armor and weapons. The beast had killed them in seconds.
"Run! RUN!" someone screamed. A teenage girl with copper-colored hair grabbed Kazuki's arm, trying to pull him to his feet. "Aiden, get up! It's going to kill us all!"
Aiden. The name felt foreign but somehow familiar, settling into his consciousness like a stone dropped into still water. Memories that weren't his began to surface—fragmented, incomplete, but enough to understand.
He was Aiden Blackwood. Fifteen years old. Born in the slums of Thornhaven, sold into slavery by his gambling-addicted father when he was twelve. Three years of backbreaking labor in the copper mines. Three years of starvation, beatings, and hopelessness. He'd been part of a caravan transporting forty slave children to the capital city when the demonic beast attacked.
The beast roared again and lunged at a cluster of fleeing children. Its claws swept through the air with terrifying speed, and three children fell, screaming. Blood sprayed across the forest floor.
Kazuki's assassin instincts kicked in automatically, even as his mind reeled from the impossibility of his situation. Threat assessment: creature is fast, strong, and intelligent. Survivors: approximately thirty children, all malnourished and chained together. Assets: none. Weapons: none. Chance of survival: negligible.
But Kazuki—no, Aiden—he was Aiden now, wasn't he?—had survived worse odds.
He staggered to his feet, his new body protesting every movement. Fifteen years old, but it felt younger due to malnutrition. Weak, underdeveloped, nothing like the trained weapon his previous body had been. He could barely stand, much less fight.
The copper-haired girl was still beside him. "Come on, Aiden! We have to—"
The beast's head swiveled toward them, drawn by her voice. Its burning eyes locked onto them with predatory focus. It opened its jaws and released a sound that was part roar, part laugh—a sound of malicious intelligence.
Time seemed to slow. Kazuki's mind went cold and clear, slipping into the combat state he'd cultivated over fifteen years of killing. The beast would reach them in three seconds. The girl couldn't move fast enough—her chain was tangled with two other children who'd fallen. She would die.
Unless someone stopped it.
Kazuki grabbed a fallen tree branch—too light, too brittle, useless as a weapon. But it was all he had. He stepped in front of the girl, raised the branch, and waited.
"What are you doing?!" the girl shrieked. "Run, you idiot!"
The beast charged, covering the distance in a blur of black fur and murderous intent. At the last possible second, Kazuki sidestepped—or tried to. His new body couldn't move the way his old one had. He was too slow, too weak, too unfamiliar with his own limbs.
The beast's claw caught his shoulder, tearing through cloth and skin. Agony exploded through him, but he used the momentum to spin, driving the branch toward the creature's eye.
The branch shattered on impact, doing no damage whatsoever.
The beast laughed again, that horrible almost-human sound, and raised its claw for a killing blow.
Then something extraordinary happened.
Heat erupted in Kazuki's chest—not from outside, but from within. The same burning sensation he'd felt during his transmigration, concentrated in his core. It spread through his veins like liquid fire, and suddenly he could see—truly see—the beast.
Not just its physical form, but something else. A swirling mass of dark red energy that surrounded it like an aura, pulsing with malevolence. And within his own body, a tiny spark of pale blue light, fragile as a candle flame.
Instinct he didn't understand made him reach for that spark. The moment his consciousness touched it, the spark flared. Power surged through his malnourished body, and for just an instant, he felt strong again.
He moved without thinking, dropping low as the beast's claw whistled overhead. His hand shot out and grabbed a shard of metal from a broken chain, and he drove it upward with every ounce of enhanced strength he could muster.
The shard punched through the softer flesh under the beast's jaw, sinking deep into its skull.
The creature's eyes widened in shock. It staggered back, howling in pain and rage. Black blood, thick as tar, gushed from the wound.
But it wasn't dead. The shard hadn't penetrated far enough, hadn't reached the brain. And the blue spark within Kazuki was already fading, exhausted by that single burst of power.
The beast shook its head violently, dislodging the metal shard. It turned toward Kazuki, and the intelligence in its eyes had been replaced by pure, mindless fury.
"Oh, shit," Kazuki muttered, and the voice that came out was higher, younger, not his own.
The beast lunged again, faster than before, driven by pain and anger. Kazuki tried to dodge, but his borrowed body had nothing left to give. He was going to die. Again. Permanently, this time.
Then an arrow sprouted from the beast's eye.
The creature screamed and thrashed, and two more arrows struck its flank in rapid succession. Kazuki looked up to see figures emerging from the trees—men and women in leather armor, bearing weapons that gleamed with an ethereal light. The insignia on their chests showed a silver sword crossed with a rose.
"Knights of the Thorn!" someone shouted. "We're saved!"
A woman at the front of the group raised her hand, and Kazuki's enhanced vision—still partially active—saw her gather energy from the air itself, shaping it into a crackling sphere of lightning. She thrust her palm forward, and the lightning bolt struck the beast directly in its wounded head.
The creature convulsed once, twice, then collapsed. The dark red aura surrounding it dissipated like smoke, and its body began to dissolve, leaving only a fist-sized black crystal where its heart had been.
The woman strode forward, her armor pristine despite the forest muck, her blonde hair tied in a severe bun. She was perhaps thirty, with hard eyes and a harder expression. She surveyed the carnage with professional detachment—the dead children, the dead guards, the survivors huddled together in terror.
Her gaze fell on Kazuki, still standing with blood streaming from his shoulder, the broken branch at his feet.
"You," she said, her voice cold and commanding. "You wounded it. How?"
Kazuki opened his mouth to answer, but the world tilted sideways. The blue spark had burned itself out completely, and with it went his strength. He collapsed, consciousness fading.
The last thing he heard before darkness took him was the woman's voice: "Interesting. A slave child who can touch mana. Bring him."
Then nothing.