Chapter 1: Chapter 0
Confucius spoke not of the bizarre, the valiant, the rebellious, nor of spirits and demons.
- From the Analects, chapter Xue Er
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Whoosh!
The heat is intense.
Buildings ablaze right before my eyes.
Inside and out, the scene is a living hell.
"Aaagh!"
"Save me!"
People, caught in the fiery wrath, scream as flames consume them.
In my hand, a sickle, damp with something, bore the eerie sight of being soaked in blood rather than harvesting herbs.
"Ughhh."
"Help, please!"
Those escaping the inferno rolled on the ground desperately trying to extinguish the flames clinging to their bodies.
But the fire engulfing them wasn't about to be quelled so easily.
Amidst the agony of their flesh burning, they perished.
Despite the horror of the scene, I felt not a hint of guilt.
No. It's more like I didn't even understand what guilt was.
[Cough, cough... Keep your promise.]
[What are you talking about?]
[Never reveal... your true nature...]
[...Grandfather.]
The promise I made to my grandfather before he passed keeps haunting my thoughts.
But it's a promise that wasn't kept.
No, it's more accurate to say it was a promise that couldn't be kept.
"I'm sorry, Grandfather."
I can't stop this until I find 'him'—the one who caused such a dreadful end to my grandfather.
Even if it leads to the very reality my grandfather feared.
The more blood I see, the harder it becomes to control myself.
I wonder what my expression looks like right now?
Even amidst this horrific scene of burning flesh and spilled blood, I can tell my lips are twitching.
This must be the emotion known as pleasure.
"Nature..."
Is evil truly my nature?
Certainly, I feel more at ease than the person my grandfather taught me to be.
It's like being freed from shackles.
"Huff."
It doesn't matter.
Thanks to the smell of blood, I'm feeling refreshed and closer to a clue about 'him.'
Now, it's time to deal with the remaining survivors.
Taking the sickle in hand, I walked toward a few who had survived.
One step, two steps, and they looked at me with eyes filled with fear.
Their terror didn't repulse me. If anything, it tickled my murderous intent.
-Thud!
As I took another step, someone among those terrified yelled out.
"The Sickle Reaper!"
The Sickle Reaper...
It's a nickname that came about as I pursued his trail.
I had killed everyone slightly related to him, and soon people started calling me the Sickle Reaper.
Apparently, because of the traces left by my sickle on the dead bodies, I unknowingly earned a notorious reputation.
All within just a month.
Seems touching upon the larger villages rather than the secluded mountain ones made a difference.
A valuable lesson was learned.
'I need to burn everything.'
So that no unnecessary traces are left on the corpses.
Or maybe I should stop using the sickle altogether?
Forget it. I'll worry about that later; for now, just kill them all.
-Swish!
I raised my sickle towards a survivor crawling on the ground.
"Eek!"
As the survivor cringed with a pale face, I brought the sickle down,
-Thump!
"Ugh!"
Something struck my abdomen with tremendous force, sending me flying backward.
I rolled several times on the ground, but the force didn't subside.
It took a while before I stopped, and an odd strength made me retch.
"Blargh."
-Woohoo!
While I was retching, cheers erupted.
It seemed the terrified survivors were now shouting in triumph.
Despite feeling nauseous and weak throughout my body, I forced myself to look up.
'What the...?'
Puzzled, I saw someone raising their hand, appearing like a hero responding to the cheers of the people.
Then, with boldness, he shouted.
"Indeed, the Sickle Reaper. To withstand a blow of my Three Star Power."
'Three Star Power?'
What on earth is he babbling about?
The only thing I could comprehend from his words was the nickname Sickle Reaper.
"Cough...cough..."
I tried to suppress the urge to vomit.
I didn't know who this person was, but it was clear he was dangerous.
Trying to force myself up, my legs and arms wouldn't cooperate.
"Your evil deeds end here, Sickle Reaper!"
He approached me slowly.
'Dangerous.'
I clenched my teeth.
If I couldn't move, my life was at serious risk.
-Slide!
'!?'
What?
It seemed like he was walking slowly, but suddenly, he was right in front of me.
'Fast.'
How could someone move so quickly? It was almost absurd.
"Hmm."
The middle-aged man let out a grunt.
Up close, I noticed a long scar above his left eyebrow, which I hadn't seen from afar.
In his right hand, he held a sword as black as char, its sharpness unmistakable.
'I need to escape.'
Every sense in me was screaming a warning.
No matter how much I struggled, there was no overcoming him.
Then, the middle-aged man, with a face much colder than before, spoke in a low voice.
"To think the one stirring up trouble was nothing more than a milk-scented teenager."
He felt like a completely different person.
But more than that, another phrase caught my attention.
'Stirring up trouble?'
Then, this man must be...
-Squeeze!
"Argh!"
Before I could gather my thoughts, he had grabbed my throat.
Despite being only seventeen, I was as tall as an average adult man, yet he lifted me with ease.
Looking down at his hand and forearm, I saw no muscle movement.
How could he lift me as though I were a feather?
Puzzled, the man frowned.
"You... haven't trained in martial arts."
"Martial... arts?"
"Do you not even know what martial arts are? Ha!"
The man was astonished.
What was so significant about martial arts that it elicited such a reaction?
"Interesting. A boy who hasn't trained in martial arts survives a blow from me... still alive..."
"Cough, cough, what are you talking about..."
-Thud!
"Ah!"
A burning pain seared through my abdomen.
His black sword had pierced me before I knew it.
The man smirked bitterly and said in a venomous tone,
"Better to kill you now and avoid future troubles."
-Swoosh! Thud!
"Ugh!"
He withdrew the sword from my abdomen and then stabbed my left chest.
Pain and blood surged up my throat as the sword pierced through.
"You should have lived quietly. Why seek death by meddling in affairs?"
"Ha...hah..."
As I struggled to speak, he threw me to the ground.
Then, turning around, he raised his black sword and proclaimed,
"The evil deeds of the Sickle Reaper end here. Everyone, you can rest easy!"
Once again, he acted the part of a hero.
The survivors, unaware of his true nature, erupted in joyous cheers.
The wound in my chest was excruciating, but his hypocritical act enraged me even more.
After all the effort to find possibly my enemy, to be defeated so anticlimactically...
I never stood a chance from the start.
'Grandfather...'
My vision began to blur.
To die without avenging and to join my grandfather...
I'm sure he'll have plenty to say about me breaking our promise...
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone