Adolin felt like his head was going to explode.
Pressure built behind his eyes, like something was being forced into his mind faster than he could process it.
He groaned as his eyes fluttered open. His vision was a blur, narrowed to a tunnel.
It took him a few moments to stabilize his vision.
Then he took in his surroundings.
He was in a back alley, lying in filth. A knife protruded from his chest.
"Ugh. Interesting way to start a second life," he muttered.
The smell returned to him. The place reeked of filth and piss. It wasn't that bad, in the last few months, he'd smelled worse.
Adolin reached for his mana and felt it. The reserves were so small he barely noticed them. Just enough to cast the simplest healing spell he knew.
The knife was stuck in his heart, but he was alive. He didn't question it. He was reincarnated with the Philosopher's Stone.
He gripped the handle, and with a deep breath, he pulled it out.
Without delay, he cast the spell. Isolated spots across his body burned. The wound on his chest burned the most, and soon after, it closed.
"Ugh…" escaped him.
He'd forgotten how strange the spell felt. It didn't flood his body with warmth. Instead, it isolated each wound and healed it individually.
It saved mana, but it always felt wrong.
And this body…It had numerous wounds that had never fully healed.
The spell didn't solve the pressure in his head. If something was wrong with his body, the spell would have fixed it. That only left one thing.
His reincarnation.
Then, when he thought about where he was, the answer came.
Adolin had inherited the body's memories.
At first, it felt weird. He had to think about something specific to get what he needed. He had enough experience with implanted memories, and this didn't feel like it.
He thought about who he was.
The answer came naturally. Like he was recalling his own memories.
The body belonged to Dareth. The boy was barely sixteen and had just awakened his system. He was from the town of Grest. His family was dead. His father was the last to go, two years ago. Illness and not enough coin to treat it.
"Fuck," Adolin cursed.
He wanted to strangle the Demon King. After everything he went through, he was reincarnated in the body of an orphan. Who'd died over his last bronze coin. He felt a bitter taste in his mouth.
The boy had a bad life. He had come to Mith, the capital of the Mithian Empire, to find something better for himself. The little coin he had didn't last, and he was left on the streets.
"Status," Adolin muttered.
A translucent window flickered into existence before his eyes.
[Status:]
Name: Dareth Wood
Race: Human
Mana: 4/30
Level: 3
Class: /
[Attributes:]
Strength: 5
Agility: 6
Endurance: 7
Intelligence: 3
Constitution: 5
Attribute Points Available: 1
He stared at the mana section of the window. It was the first time he'd seen mana reduced to numbers. In his old world, there was no way to measure mana. You just felt it.
The system was a blessing from the goddess.
The bitterness in his mouth deepened.
Dareth's memories of the system didn't seem trustworthy.
His current attributes were those of a normal human—maybe slightly weaker. His level increased when learning new skills. The new skills consisted of everything from learning a new spell to learning a new farming technique. Crafting items successfully also counted toward his level.
With every increase in his level, the blessing gave one point to every attribute, and an additional point that he could use.
It took him a few minutes to find the right questions to get what he needed. Now he had a basic understanding of it.
He looked below the status window.
[New Skill Detected: Precision Healing.]
[Skill Tier: 5]
[Level Increased.]
[Attribute Points Available: 1]
He wanted to test it.
His stomach growled.
Later. He was hungry.
"The archmage who killed the Demon King had to find a job to eat," Adolin said and closed the window.
But the bastard was still alive.
The goddess's blessing worked for him. The only thing he had to do to increase his strength was to cast spells. He just needed time.
He left the alley and looked around the street.
Disgusting.
That was the word that came to him. Rotting food and dead rodents were everywhere. The houses. There weren't any houses. They were shacks people lived in. Most of them didn't even have a door. Somehow, the smell was worse on the street than the alley he'd left.
A few people were lying in their excrement, their skin pale, their eyes glossy. Drugs. It wasn't the first time he'd seen people like this. His old world had them too.
Mana-enhanced drugs.
"Boy."
Adolin looked at the man who called out to him.
"Co-Could you spare some c-coins for the healers?" the man said between weak coughs.
Middle-aged, the spark in his eyes was almost gone. He wouldn't last the night. Adolin could heal him, but it wouldn't fix the addiction. He would be back to the same condition in a few months.
His mana had slightly recovered, and it was enough for a single spell. After that, he would be left without mana for at least an hour.
Cough.
The man kept coughing.
Adolin needed to use his spells to improve his blessing anyway.
He stepped towards the man and crouched. He hesitated. The man's body was filthy, but after glancing at his own hand, the hesitation was gone.
Touching his forehead with his index finger he cast a healing spell that would infuse life force and rejuvenation.
The spell worked fast.
Adolin was gone, moving faster than before. He could hear the man puking behind him. Getting rid of the corrupted mana the drugs had left in his body.
A few eyes turned toward him, but he ignored them and kept walking.
He had to get food. For food, he needed coin, for coin, he needed a job.
But to get a job, he needed to go to the market square or the Craftsman district. The former was in the center of the city, while the latter was on the other side of the city.
He gave up on the market. The place was always crowded during the day. He hated crowds. But if he wanted to go to the Craftsman district, he had to move through the market—unless he went through the harbor first. Going through the harbor, he could avoid half of the market. It was the better option.
He didn't like that.
The only other option was leaving through the West Gate. But he didn't have enough information about the land outside the city. Just that it was dangerous, and Dareth was too weak to even consider leaving the city.
Two bad choices.
He clicked his tongue and started walking in the direction of the harbor.
The walk toward the harbor didn't change much. The only difference was the two human corpses. One recent. The other had been dead for days.
That wasn't his problem. This second life would be his vacation. After he earned enough gold.
After walking for some time, the smell of fish hit him. The harbor was close. The smell brought back bad memories. The open sea. A small cabin, shared by all his party members.
He stood in the middle of the street, watching the edge of the harbor district, when something tugged at the back of his shirt. He turned. A boy was looking up at him with pleading eyes.
"Mister, could you help my mom?" The boy said.
The boy barely reached his leg, dressed in rags and filthy. If he had to guess, he was less than five years old.
The day had to get worse. After some consideration.
"Where is your mom?"
The boy stared at him, not understanding.
He chuckled.
He spoke in his native language, not this world's language. He understood it, thanks to Dareth's memories, but speaking it was another problem.
"Your… mother… where?" he asked again, the words coming out stiff.
The boy smiled, grabbed his hand, and pulled him along. "This way, mister!"
In a few minutes, he was standing in front of a sickly young woman. She was unconscious, but breathing. The low mana pool was making things harder. He had to touch her to check her condition.
He crouched in front of her and checked her eyes. The spark in them was dangerously low, but still there. She had a few more days to live. Two, maybe even three days.
He patted the kid on his head, "She will... be fine."
The kid stared at him with a questioning look.
He couldn't heal her now. He didn't have enough mana for that. How was he supposed to tell that to the kid?
"What... is your name?" Adolin asked.
"Telian, mister! What's yours?" The boy said.
"Ad..."
Was he Adolin or Dareth?
He was inside Dareth's body. Even the system called him Dareth.
He would be Dareth.
It would be harder for his party to find him if he used that name. And he didn't want to see them for the next decade.
"Dareth. Look kid, I can't... heal now."
Telian was quiet, his expression changing a few times "Now?"
"Yes. My mana is recovering."
The boy looked like he had trouble understanding it, so Adolin said, "Tonight. I will heal tonight."
Telian smiled, "Thanks, mister! I'll wait!"
Adolin chuckled, patted the boy's head again, and left.
Adolin stood at the edge of the harbor, where the slums ended, and the harbor began. The problem was still there—too many people.
Taking a deep breath, he started walking.
It was a mess. Shopkeepers yelled, people bartered. The smell was worse. People gave him strange looks and avoided him. It made moving through the crowd easier. Ships crowded the harbor. Sailors shouted as they hauled crates across the docks.
On the left side, he noticed the Temple of the Goddess. The smaller one, meant for sailors and the less fortunate. It was a large building that stood out from everything around it. The courtyard was clean and tidy, filled with trees and flowers. Brick and marble. It didn't belong there. Not among the wooden buildings patched with clay and mud.
He didn't spare the temple a second look. He didn't have love for the divine.
Soon he passed through the harbor and reached the gate to the Craftsman District. It wasn't guarded. He went through.
The Craftsman District felt closer to the temple than to the harbor or the slums. The buildings were all brick, and some of the better ones had marble. Some even had courtyards similar to the temple.
In front of every building hung a sign. Most looked like houses, with shops on their ground floors. Wooden signs, carved with simple images, hammers, shears, swords, and armor. The better ones were painted.
After searching for some time and ignoring the disgusted looks he got, he finally saw a sign with Potions and Herbs carved into it. This was what he was looking for. At least, he hoped. He wasn't sure how things worked in this world.
He stood in front of the shop for a few minutes. It was hard for him to talk to strangers. Even harder now, since he had to ask for a job. Taking a deep breath, he opened the door and stepped inside.
The shop smelled of alchemy. He loved the smell. His house had a similar smell, just more potent.
There was no one out front. He looked over the desk and found a bell. The kind you press. He gave himself a few moments to prepare, and rang the bell.
After almost a full minute, a man came out and looked at him. His face turned angry.
"Get out, worthless brat. This isn't a charity!" The man shoved him out of the shop.
Adolin stared at the door that had just been shut in his face.
That was unexpected.
He gave himself a quick look over and chuckled.
His hands were dark with dirt. His clothes were nothing more than rags, blood covering his chest. Touching his hair, he felt dirt caked in it. He caught his own smell and gagged.
That made sense. He wasn't on the demon continent anymore. He was in the capital of an empire. No wonder everyone stared at him with disgust.
Why didn't that bastard reincarnate him in a noble house?
One thing was clear. He had fallen.
From Archmage… to a beggar.