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One day, 300 years ago, the world suddenly changed.
An unknown substance seeped into Earth's atmosphere.
Only later did people give it a name: mana.
As a result, humanity suffered a nightmare that wiped out 90% of the world's population.
And after 300 long years had passed, all people in the world came to be divided into four categories.
First, there were the Mana-Rejectors, people who still could not accept mana even after the world had changed—those born with the heavenly curse of mana acting as poison in their bodies.
Because their bodies were incompatible with mana, they usually could not live past their early to mid-twenties; their internal organs, especially their hearts, would rupture and kill them.
In other words, untouchables.
Second, there were the Mana Adapters, those who could accept mana without it interfering with everyday life.
They were, simply put, ordinary people.
Commonly known as the producer class.
Third, there were the Mana Compatibles, those whose physical abilities were stronger than ordinary people because of mana—the new humanity.
When they accepted mana, their muscles, blood vessels, and internal organs became tougher.
In addition, 99% of Awakeners came from among the Mana Compatibles. That was why they were also called prospective Awakeners.
From this group onward, they were effectively the ruling class.
And fourth was the highest stratum mentioned earlier: the Awakeners.
They were one of the supernatural phenomena that could never be explained by science, alongside mana itself.
Once awakened, a tattoo would be engraved on their face.
A mark showing they had connected to the System.
They grew stronger and advanced through the System.
Only Awakeners could face Elite Magical Beasts and Champion Magical Beasts.
To be honest, there was also a fifth type.
Demons.
They were Awakeners whose awakening had gone in the wrong direction.
But Demons were not treated as human, so they were excluded from the discussion.
***
The Samhan Empire.
A rising great power on the Eurasian continent.
Three hundred years ago, it had been called the Republic of Korea.
The territory it ruled was also vast.
That was why it was an empire.
The Japanese archipelago, half of it lost beneath the sea; the broad grain fields of Manchuria; the lush green Mongolian plains and the Gobi grasslands; and the Maritime Province, lined with factories and industrial facilities—all of it lay within the Empire's domain.
Second Lieutenant Kim Taeju of the Samhan Imperial Army was taking a brief rest in a crude barracks on Daechongbong Peak at the Seoraksan Forward Base on the eastern coast, gulping down a cold can of beer.
"Ahhh!"
Now he finally felt like he could live a little.
For someone living on borrowed time, this was one of life's small pleasures.
"Fuck."
The curse came out on its own.
A life where he could die at any moment.
He had wanted to prepare for his end somewhere peaceful, like a resort, but the place where he now stood was a remote frontier where battles with Magical Beasts broke out.
Taeju was a Mana-Rejector.
That was why his life had an expiration date.
For a Mana-Rejector, Taeju had lasted quite a long time.
Even at twenty-nine, he was still alive.
But—
"... Ughhh."
Clutching his chest, Taeju collapsed as a sudden wave of agony struck him.
"D-damn it!"
The attacks came periodically, and starting a few days ago, the intervals between them had begun to shorten.
"Ghk! Guaaaargh!"
He collapsed onto the bed and groaned in pain, but not a single person came into the barracks.
This wasn't something that had happened only once or twice.
If anything, more people wanted him dead.
Because he was trash who could not accept mana.
An untouchable.
And that piece of trash was a second lieutenant in the Samhan Empire.
How?
Taeju's father was Major General Kim Ungbang, a Master.
He even had a territory under his direct rule.
The Paju Territory of the Samhan Empire.
It was not a wealthy territory.
Paju was ordinary and small—poor and unimpressive, if one was being honest.
Even so, his father was a major general, a powerful man with land of his own. So even if Taeju was a Mana-Rejector, why would he drive his own son off to the frontier?
There were complicated circumstances.
Kim Taeju was the rightful heir to Paju Territory.
But unfortunately, Taeju's birth mother had died while giving birth to him.
After that, his father took a new wife.
Honda Mitsui, the second daughter of the ruler of the Kyushu Territory of the Samhan Empire, located on lands once called Japan.
She married into Paju and gave birth to two sons.
From that point on, Taeju's position became ambiguous.
Taeju was a born Mana-Rejector.
A fatal flaw for the heir to a territory.
Perhaps because of that, his stepmother Mitsui had simply left Taeju alone.
At least for the first few years.
After all, it seemed obvious he would die once he reached his twenties.
If things had continued that way, Mitsui might have remained a good stepmother.
But the situation took a strange turn.
He turned twenty, then passed twenty-five, then even twenty-eight—yet he was still alive?
Lady Mitsui began to grow impatient.
Because even Mana-Rejectors did not always die without exception.
On very rare occasions, a Mana-Rejector would suddenly awaken.
And the longer they survived, the higher the chance became.
In fact, when one looked at actual cases of Mana-Rejectors awakening, all of them had awakened around their thirties.
What if Taeju awakened at this rate?
What if he rose from untouchable to the highest class?
Wouldn't her own sons be left abandoned overnight?
So she nagged her husband until Taeju was driven out to the Seoraksan Forward Base.
She argued that it was ridiculous for the son of a general to stay cooped up at home when he was already twenty-nine.
Wouldn't his chances of awakening improve if he got out there, moved actively, and faced Magical Beasts?
Major General Kim Ungbang, his father, pretended he had no choice and accepted it.
In truth, the greatest obstacle to his promotion was his own son, Kim Taeju.
His eldest son was a Mana-Rejector.
The father was a Master, but the son was trash.
It would have been better if he died fighting Magical Beasts.
If he died during a military operation, he might at least receive a medal for distinguished service.
That would help with his father's promotion.
In the end, Taeju was cast out.
To the Seoraksan Forward Base.
"Huu."
Fortunately, the pain in his heart began to subside.
He had endured another day.
Then, suddenly—
"Second Lieutenant Kim, are you in there?"
Taeju sprang up from the bed.
"Second Lieutenant Kim Taeju!"
It was the voice of his direct superior, Lieutenant Jang Indong.
"Destroy beasts!"
"Destroy beasts!"
After exchanging the brief salute—
"I heard groaning from in here just now. Are you hurt anywhere?"
"Ah! I'm fine, sir. I'm feeling better now."
"Good. Keep enduring like that. As long as you survive, an opportunity will come eventually."
Lieutenant Jang Indong was one of the very few people on Taeju's side.
Ever since Taeju first arrived at the Seoraksan Forward Base, he had been a superior who comforted him and looked after him.
But what brought him here?
Lieutenant Jang Indong's expression did not look good.
"Your assignment has changed."
"Changed, sir?"
"From administrative duty to the field. Orders came down from above assigning you to an operation."
"... So suddenly?"
Taeju belonged to the Combat Support Company of the 3rd Battalion, 51st Regiment of the Imperial Army.
Because his physical condition was close to that of a disabled person, he had mainly been handling administrative work.
And now they were assigning him to a field operation?
"I looked into it too, but this can't be refused. The order came directly from Army Headquarters."
"..."
Could this be—
Had his stepmother Mitsui influenced this somehow?
Well, it made sense.
He was twenty-nine and still not dead.
"It looks like even the General's influence doesn't work here."
No.
His father himself might have been behind it.
A general's son dying during an operation.
What a perfect picture.
So die honorably.
"You're still not fit for combat, so let's start you off with reconnaissance missions. Command is out of the question, but I'll assign some squad members to you, so just follow them around."
There was no helping it.
He was a soldier too.
All he could do was obey orders.
"Who knows? You might seize a chance to awaken. It's rare, but even Refusers sometimes awaken."
Lieutenant Jang Indong spoke warmly as he patted Taeju on the back. He was both a Mana Compatible and an Awakener.
After all, a tattoo marking him as an Awakener was engraved on his face.
"Yes, sir! Understood."
Right. Someday, he too would have a day when a tattoo was carved onto his face like Lieutenant Jang Indong's.
If he kept enduring, and enduring.
The next day.
Taeju carried out a reconnaissance mission with the squad members.
Their main scouting area was Jungcheongbong, a peak a little distance away from Daechongbong.
Staff Sergeant Go Youngho gestured and spoke to Taeju.
"That area down there is where the orc village is, sir."
The most common Magical Beasts in Seoraksan were orcs. They had originally been wild boars, but under the influence of mana they had turned into walking pigs.
Since they resembled the orcs from fantasy novels, people simply called them by that name.
"Come over here and take a look through the binoculars, sir."
Taeju observed the orc village through the binoculars.
The mission of the Imperial Army at Seoraksan Forward Base was to keep the orc population under control and prevent them from uniting their villages.
"It's still not breeding season, so it's safe for now."
"I see."
Why not just wipe out a bunch of orcs and be done with it?
Because large-scale battles were a burden.
If the Empire tried to exterminate the orcs, those creatures would unite as well.
Village-level orcs were not that frightening, but a united Orc Kingdom would be an enormous burden even for the Empire.
'Hmm, no unusual movement.'
In truth, it was a simple reconnaissance mission.
They just had to observe through binoculars, attach drone footage, and submit a report.
"What about the drone?"
"Shall I launch it?"
"Yeah."
Clack!
A mechanical sound came from behind him.
At that very moment—
Stab!
"Ugh!"
Something sharp touched his back.
He froze.
His whole body stiffened.
"W-what is this?"
"It'll be bad if you move, sir."
Staff Sergeant Go Youngho pressed a sharply honed longsword against Taeju's back and smiled grimly.
"Don't worry. I'm not going to stab you. Second Lieutenant Kim Taeju will die in a fall after losing his footing during a reconnaissance mission."
"What...?"
"I'm just following orders."
"O-orders?"
"Yes, sir. Orders personally given by the platoon leader."
If it was the platoon leader, then Lieutenant Jang Indong?
"He said to take out the trash. To be honest, the platoon leader was subcontracted too, sir. We're subcontractors of subcontractors."
Damn it!
So in the end, he had been betrayed?
Taeju did not want to die.
Even though his life had an expiration date, he had struggled to survive until the very end.
And now he was going to die like this? Meaninglessly?
The squad members' cold eyes.
They were all in on it.
"Fuck you, you sons of—"
"Oh dear, for someone with no strength, you're pretty spirited."
He desperately tried to draw the mana gun at his waist, but even that was taken from him.
"All right, time to sort out the trash. Destroy Demons!"
"You bastard!"
Go Youngho kicked Taeju in the body.
Thud!
Taeju's body tumbled down the cliff.
***
Some time later, Kim Taeju slowly opened his eyes.
It was dark.
Was it night?
"Ugh..."
It felt as if every bone in his body had been broken.
"Where is this...?"
He was halfway down the cliff.
It seemed he had rolled down and gotten caught on a large tree, which stopped his fall.
I have to move.
Did they think he would just die here?
No matter what, he would survive.
But then—
"Hrk!"
A sudden agony surged from his heart.
The heavenly curse of the Mana-Rejector had struck again.
"Ghk, guaaagh! Ghhk!"
This time it was different.
The level of pain was on another level.
"Y-you fucking...!"
His vision went dark.
It felt as if his heart were about to burst.
Was this really the end?
"... No!"
His body convulsed.
Taeju's eyes lost focus.
They say that when death approaches, memories of the past unfold like a lantern procession.
His father, who had turned away from him out of greed for promotion.
His devil-like stepmother Mitsui.
And his half-brothers, who had always looked down on him and tormented him.
Why were only those faces coming to mind?
He wished he could at least see his mother's face before he died.
Not that he remembered it anyway.
Then it happened.
Another person appeared before him like an illusion.
'Huh?'
An old man with graying hair sat cross-legged with his eyes closed.
Who was that man?
He had never seen him before, so why was he surfacing in his mind?
'... Is this a hallucination?'
But strangely enough, the more he looked, the more familiar the face seemed.
Who was he?
Then, in an instant, the old man's eyes snapped open.
At the same time, he looked straight at Taeju.
Their eyes met.
For a long time, they simply stared at each other.
It felt as though their souls were connected.
At last, the old man smiled faintly.
His eyes said he knew something.
And Taeju realized it too.
Who that man was.
'... Dang Gun-ak?'
That man's name.
But more than that—
The old man's lips slowly parted.
'You are…'
He could not hear the words, but Taeju understood what the old man was trying to say.
'You are me. Me from another world.'
That was right.
The old man was another self.
The same person, sharing the same soul.
His name was Dang Gun-ak.
The other world where he lived was the world of murim.
And in that world, his title was Supreme Poison Demon.