RE:START
The village stank of rot and ash. Ren Aizawa stood in the silence that came after massacre, surrounded by the charred husks of what were once homes. The corpses of the infected lay scattered. His sword, nicked and dark with dried blood, hung limp in his hand. He didn't shake. Not anymore.
He had used Divine Learner, the skill he'd unlocked in the bandit skirmish. The corpses of those who had retained their soul—fragments even—offered skills upon death. Not all were worth taking. But one... one had glimmered like a buried ember.
[Skill Acquired: Iron Mind - Increases mental resistance and focus during trauma or pain. Learned from "Priest Nall," a soul-bound healer who endured to the end.]
Ren clenched his jaw. The man had used his dying breath to pray for forgiveness—only to be murdered by the very villagers he tried to save.
Now Ren had his resilience.
Yatsu pulsed faintly in his veins, still new, still small. It ached like a stretched muscle. He collapsed onto a rock, his vision flickering at the edges. Learning a skill took from him—not just energy, but something deeper. Like carving grooves into his soul.
Behind him, a groan.
Ren turned fast.
A boy, perhaps ten, hobbled forward, blood caking his jaw. One of the infected. But something about his eyes—clarity, not rage.
"Help... me..."
Ren froze. The skill would trigger if he killed him.
He walked forward, slowly. Crouched.
The child whimpered. His limbs twitched.
"Name?" Ren asked softly.
"...Kael."
Ren closed his eyes.
Then, fast, plunged his blade into the boy's chest.
Kael didn't scream. Just stared. As if he had expected this.
As the life faded from Kael's eyes, Divine Learner ignited.
[Skill Acquired: Ember Pulse - A short-range pulse that heats air to blistering temperatures. Useful in tight proximity. Origin: Kael - Minor Fire Channeler]
Ren's breath stuttered.
He had just killed a child.
And gained power.
—
Later, as night fell, Ren buried Kael's body. Not for redemption. But to keep the wolves away.
He had learned to sleep with one eye open.
He found a ruined church, half-standing, and crawled beneath the splintered altar. Cold winds howled through broken stained glass. Sleep came in snatches.
And then, a voice.
"Another wanderer?"
Ren startled awake.
A woman. Clad in ragged noble robes. Long silver hair matted with ash. Her eyes were violet—and not human.
"Who are you?" Ren rasped.
"I am Elira. Once of the Twilight Crown. Now? Merely passing."
He reached for his blade.
"No need. You stink of Yatsu. Like me. But unrefined."
She knelt by him, uncaring of the filth.
"You're new to this world, aren't you?" she said.
He didn't answer.
She smiled faintly.
"They send you here by mistake?"
He blinked. She knew.
She rose. "This world doesn't want us. But it needs us."
As she left, she threw him something. A blood-stained tome.
"Study that. And when you can kill without flinching, find me in Velhareth."
Ren opened the book. Pages of symbols and diagrams of skills—not magic. Techniques forged in pain and war.
This wasn't coincidence.
It was a map.
—
He moved on.
His next destination: Cindrel Hollow—a minor town known for glasswork and mining. Rumor had it people there had vanished. And where people vanished, monsters usually followed.
Ren arrived after two days of walking. The place was too quiet. Ash filled the wind again. He passed shattered market stalls and blood smears on cobblestones.
And then he saw it.
A man in black robes nailed to the chapel doors.
Carved into his chest: "FEAR THE FORGOTTEN WARD."
The townsfolk were gone. But something lingered.
That night, Ren searched. No corpses. No battle signs. Just... silence.
Until he found the nursery.
Inside were dolls. Hundreds of them. All facing the same way.
He stepped closer—and one moved.
A girl with a stitched mouth lunged at him from the shadows.
He fought. She bled shadowstuff. And when she died—Divine Learner activated again.
[Skill Acquired: Murmuring Veil - Temporarily suppress your presence to those around you. Passive stealth skill.]
Useful. Dangerous. And terrifying.
She had no soul. But the skill came anyway.
Which meant...
...someone had given it to her.
He turned. All the dolls now stared at him.
One grinned.
"Welcome to the first Trial, celestial."
Ren backed out slowly, hands trembling. He fled the building, chest tight.
Trial? Who was watching?
What did they know?
—
By dawn, Cindrel Hollow had vanished from the map. The air warped behind him as he walked away.
He didn't notice the observer above, cloaked in shimmering wings, whispering into a black mirror.
"Subject Ren has passed Phase One. Prepare the Warlord."