I opened my eyes to darkness.
My back was slumped against the cold wall. Iron cuffs bound my wrists, the chains clicking as I moved. Pain bloomed through my limbs – sharp, deep, unrelenting.
Where am I?
My mind was blank at first. Nausea coiled in my guy. Then –
A memory.
Jinden City.
A SS-class monster tearing through buildings. Its pnevma distorted the air like a heat shimmer. I remembered charging at it.
Then nothing.
As my eyes adjusted, the room came into focus. Stone walls. Straw scattered across the floor – bedding, or the closest thing to it. Blood stained the edges. Some of it was mine. No windows, just a slit in the ceiling letting in a thin shaft of light.
Did I die? Is this the afterlife?
Pain in my ribs answered that. No. I was alive. Barely.
I shifted, lifting my hands. The chains held, but there was enough slack to see my arms.
I froze.
They weren't mine.
Too thin. Muscles – gone. Skin pale, almost grey. Bruises layered over older bruises. My hair was short now, tangled, filthy.
This wasn't my body.
Something was wrong.
I forced myself to breathe, slow and steady. Think.
Another flash –
The monster. The fight. I was close to death. Then… a portal. It opened right in front of me. Light swallowed everything.
And then I woke up here.
Transmigration?
Outside, a voice cut through the silence.
"Is she dead?"
I didn't move.
"She should be screaming now. Should we check?"
Keys rattled. The doors creaked open. I dropped back into the straw, closed my eyes, kept my breath shallow.
Footsteps.
Two of them.
Even blind, I felt them enter. My senses were dulled but intact – habits from years as a hunter. I reached out quietly, scanning for pnevma.
And paused.
Their pnevma felt… wrong.
Not strong. Not empty either. Just stagnant. As if it wasn't flowing – just sitting still.
Still, both held small reserves. Maybe D-class. I could've crushed them in my real body. But now?
I wouldn't last three moves.
One of them stepped closer. I felt his finger hover near my nose.
"She's just sleeping," he muttered exhaling.
"Is it going to be bad if she ends up dead?" one of the guards asked.
The other didn't respond. Footsteps retreated. The door slammed shut, and the lock clicked into place.
I opened my eyes again.
Would it be a problem if I died?
Not a random prisoner, then. Someone wanted me alive. For now.
I waited. Counted five slow breaths. Then I pushed myself upright.
Pain stabbed through my side, sharp enough to blur my vision. I clenched my jaw and forced the air back into my lungs.
I closed my eyes and reached inward, searching for pnevma.
It stirred.
Sluggish. Fragmented. Like trying to draw water through broken glass.
But it moved.
Relief loosened something in my chest. This body – ruined as it was – could still hold pnevma. That meant I had a path forward.
I focused, guiding the current inward. Anchor. Breathe. Soften the noise.
The technique was old. One of the first I learned as a hunter. Crude but reliable. Meant for stabilizing the core under duress.
It worked – partially.
The flow inside me remained jagged, like a shattered circuit forced to carry power. But after a few minutes, it stopped flaring in every direction. My ribs still ached, but I could breath without grasping.
Good enough.
The pnevma in this world felt…familiar. Not exactly the same, but close enough to recognize. That narrowed the possibilities.
----
Days passed.
With each cycle, my pnevma grew more stable. My senses returned, sharper than before. I tracked the guards – five in rotation, same times each day. They didn't say much. Sometimes they opened the door to check if I was still breathing.
I didn't scream like the last occupant.
I wondered how she survived this long.
And another thing.
The pnevma in this place felt dense. Saturated. Like the monster zone I used to hunt in – regions warped by too much energy. Places that are called to beasts like a beacon.
It gave me a bad feeling.
I pushed the thought aside. It didn't matter. Monsters or not, I needed to recover. I needed answers. About this world. About this body. About what happened to mine.
That was why I noticed it.
A shift.
Subtle, but wrong.
The silence stretched too long. The footsteps were lighter. Not the usual pair that dragged outside my cell. A different weight, a different gait. Whoever it was didn't belong.
The pattern had changed.
And that meant something was coming.
The door opened.
A man stepped in like he owned the room.
Twenties, maybe. Well-groomed. Jacket tailored close to the frame – dark velvet, shoulders stiff, silver buttons dulled in the low light. His hair was slicked back, not a strand out of place. Confidence radiated off him like heat.
Two servants followed. Plain uniforms. Silent. Their eyes stayed low.
This wasn't a routine check.