Chapter 2: Return (1)
“……”
When I opened my eyes halfway, the sight of snow-covered mountains assaulted them with a dazzling whiteness.
….No wonder I had felt cold.
The bone-chilling cold quickly brought me to my senses.
Everything around me was covered in white snow, as though the entire world had frozen over.
There were not many regions on the continent where such a bitterly cold landscape could be seen.
“The Northern Snowy Mountains?”
The Northern Region of the continent, where a brutally harsh winter persisted throughout the year.
“Why am I here?”
Why was I in the Northern Region?
Until just moments ago, I had been in a jungle located in the Southern Continent.
And I had died there.
That would mean I had somehow crossed the entire continent after dying….
“Did the emperor bury me here?”
The Northern Snowy Mountains were my homeland, where I had grown up.
Perhaps the emperor had buried me in my homeland out of respect for an enemy commander, thinking, ‘Though he was my enemy, he was an admirable man’....
As if.
“....There’s no way.”
The emperor would never show such mercy.
What kind of mercy could anyone expect from a slaughter-crazed madman?
More importantly, I had been the imperial army’s highest-priority target for elimination.
Whenever the imperial soldiers saw me, they nearly ground their teeth to pieces.
They gnashed them that hard.
In some respects, the imperial army had been even more wary of me than it was of the Hero and the other champions.
I belonged to a Special Task Force under the Coalition Operations Command.
I was the Special Warfare Unit’s Covert Operations Commander.
As its Covert Operations Commander, I had carried out countless missions.
Consequently, I had not merely disrupted the imperial army’s plans—I had utterly demolished them.
Even desecrating my corpse after my death would not have been enough to satisfy them, yet they had supposedly shown respect to a fallen enemy commander?
That was absurd.
“Did they dump my corpse here?”
That explanation, at least, made some sense. And then, for some reason, I had come back to life.
“There’s no way.”
But that was impossible too.
First of all, the emperor would never go to so much trouble.
If he wanted to dispose of my corpse, he could simply have abandoned it in the Southern Continent.
Why would he transport it across the entire continent merely to dump it in the Northern Region?
More importantly, how could I possibly have survived after my heart was pierced?
“Then what the hell happened?”
I could not make sense of the situation.
I ran a hand over my face to collect myself.
“Hmm?”
……
Something felt strange. It was the scar over my left eye.
“It’s gone?”
……
It was gone.
More precisely, I could not feel the scar beneath my fingertips.
Was I imagining things?
But it was too strange to dismiss as my imagination. After all, the scar over my left eye was not the only one missing.
“The scar on the back of my hand is gone too?”
I had acquired the scar on my right arm while fighting an Imperial Legion Commander.
It was gone as well.
I could confirm that with my own eyes, so this could not be an illusion. Upon closer inspection, it was not only my scars that had disappeared.
“Why are my hands so pristine?”
The calluses I had developed after fighting across countless battlefields had vanished without a trace.
My hands were now white and smooth, like those of a sheltered young nobleman.
It was almost as though I had become someone else.
That was when it happened.
◆Unique Privilege transfer complete!
“...What?”
A translucent message suddenly appeared before my eyes. Afterward, more incomprehensible messages appeared within my vision.
== 「Player Information」 ==
[Name] = Adrian Whitewolf
[Level] = Level 1
[HP] = 71
[MP] = 0
[Stats] = Strength: 0, Agility: 0, Stamina: 0, Mana: 0
[Experience] = 0%
The messages glittered across my vision like the hologram of a magical communication device.
I could swear with absolute certainty. I had never seen anything like this before.
Of course, I had seen magical communication holograms countless times. They were the primary means of communication used by the coalition army.
However, a magical communication hologram was not an easily employed form of magic.
It required several communications mages and a dedicated communications chamber containing numerous magic circles.
It was not magic that could be used in the middle of snow-covered mountains like these.
More importantly, there was the information written within the message.
“Player….?”
These were terms I had never encountered even once in my entire life. I carefully examined every part of the message floating before me.
Player, name, level.
HP, MP, stats, and experience.
“Does ‘player’ refer to me?”
Since my name was written in the [Name] field, that appeared to be the case.
In other words, I had not become someone else.
“Level 1?”
If “level” meant what I thought it did, it was probably a numerical representation of my current capabilities.
That would mean my current level was [Level 1]....
“Only?”
Admittedly, I could not even reach the toes of the Hero Ian when our abilities were compared.
Nor could I deny that I was inferior to the other champions. But that was only because Ian and the champions were monsters.
I was by no means weak.
I had been one of the coalition army’s core combatants and had remained beside Ian until the very end.
Even while the rest of the coalition army and all the champions were dying, I had stubbornly managed to survive.
The imperial army had not called me the “Mad Predator” for nothing.
And yet I was only Level 1?
“What’s wrong with these stats?”
Now that I looked at them, my stats were the most ridiculous part.
Strength, agility, stamina, and mana.
Every one of them was scraping along rock bottom.
“Why are they all zero?”
Of course, I did not know how much power each stat represented.
But zero?
No matter how I looked at it, that could not possibly be considered normal.
“And what is that experience value underneath them….?”
Just as I wondered what the hell was happening—
◆Displaying the player’s acquired skills.
== 「Acquired Skills」 ==
◆Solo Level Up [EX] : The player can accumulate experience and increase their level. Each time the player’s level increases, they receive 1 stat point.
◆Player’s Will [EX] : The player gains immunity to all effects that exceed the player’s mental strength, including curses, illusions, brainwashing, hypnosis, suggestions, and similar effects.
◆Predation [S+] : By consuming the heart of a living creature, the player can absorb that creature’s abilities and convert them into skills. However, doing so consumes mental strength.
Another message suddenly appeared.
My vision immediately changed, and a new message filled my sight.
“What the hell is this….?”
That was when another message appeared.
◆A quest has arrived.
Y@u w%ke up in a str@nge pl*ce!
B%t w@it, d%esn’t th%s pl@ce s#em str@ngely f@miliar?
Y%u r*b y%ur ey#s and c%me to y%ur s@nses, only to—Ugh?!
Y%u re@lize th@t y%u’re in the ‘N%rthern Sn%wy M%untains’!
The N%rthern Sn%wy M%untains?!
H%w did y%u, wh% w@s in the S%uthern J%ngle, end up h#re?!
D%d the emp%ror sh%w y%u resp#ct?!
D%d the emp%ror d%mp y%u in the sn%wy m%untains?!
N%, m%re imp%rtantly, y%u d%ed!!
Y%ur m%nd is a c%mplete m#ss!
Y%u’ve bec%me a f%ol!
Why?
Bec@use y%u haven’t even n%ticed the cr#ature seeking an opportunity to take your life!
It d%esn’t m%tter h%w this h@ppened!
F%r n%w, y%u must surv%ve!
“....What is that supposed to say?”
I genuinely could not understand most of it.
The only comprehensible part was the word [Quest] that had initially appeared.
Ordinarily, a quest referred to a “search mission” assigned to a knight or a prolonged “expedition”.
At least, that was how the word was used on the continent.
If it had the same meaning here, this appeared to contain the details of some kind of mission….
“But what is the mission?”
I could not decipher what it was trying to say.
I wondered if it might be a coalition cipher, but—
“No, it isn’t.”
If it had been one, there was no way I would have failed to recognize it.
I was the Special Warfare Unit’s Covert Operations Commander.
Under the Coalition Operations Command, I had carried out not only special warfare missions but also information and intelligence operations, including gathering, compiling, and distributing intelligence.
Naturally, I knew every cipher used by the coalition army.
Therefore, I could state with certainty that this message could never be interpreted as one of the coalition’s codes.
“Then could it be a cipher used by the Empire—”
No, that could not be it either.
Just as that thought entered my mind—
◆Error: The player conflicts with the contents of the quest.
◆Error: The player’s information has been modified.
◆Assigning a new quest.
+Loading….
It was making a tremendous fuss entirely on its own.
Still, judging from the word [Loading], something appeared to be in progress.
I waited for approximately five minutes.
◆The quest has been updated.
A message announcing that the quest had been updated appeared, followed by its contents.
[You’ve awakened in an unfamiliar place!]
[But wait, what’s this?]
[Could it merely be your imagination that this place doesn’t feel unfamiliar?]
[You rub your eyes and gather your senses, only to—Ugh?!]
[You realize that you are in the ‘Northern Snowy Mountains’!]
[But the Northern Snowy Mountains?!]
[How did you, who were previously in the Southern Jungle, end up in the Northern Snowy Mountains?!]
[Did the emperor show you respect?]
[Did the emperor dump you in the snowy mountains?]
[No, more importantly, you died!!]
[Your mind is a jumbled mess!]
[You’ve become a complete fool!]
[Why, you ask?]
[Because you haven’t even noticed that something is watching for an opportunity to take your life!]
[How this happened isn’t important right now!!]
[First, you must survive!]
“What the hell is this….?”
I could not understand what kind of situation I was in. Just as the quest described, I felt as though I had become an idiot.
But the quest paid no attention to how I felt and simply displayed another message.
◆Beginning the Tutorial Quest [What the Hell Is Going On?!].
== [What the Hell Is Going On?!] ==
[Objective] – Survive.
[Reward] – Unlock Inventory.
[Upon Failure] – Death.
The messages continued appearing however they pleased.
That was when it happened.
Rooooar—!
A tremendous roar struck my eardrums from one side.
Heavy footsteps thundered against the ground alongside that deafening roar.
A gigantic creature approximately two meters tall was approaching me.
The thing was staring at me while drool poured from its mouth….
“An Ice Troll?”
An Ice Troll was a troll mutation native to the Northern Region.
Because it was a mutant species, its population had always been small, making it an extremely rare monster.
It was also a monster that could no longer be found in the wild.
“The emperor should have captured every last Ice Troll.”
Trolls were monsters with outstanding regenerative capabilities.
Because of that, troll blood was extremely valuable as an ingredient in various potions.
Ice Trolls possessed five times the regenerative capabilities of ordinary trolls.
Their regenerative abilities had naturally evolved to help them survive the brutal cold.
Potions created from Ice Troll blood were likewise five times as effective.
The emperor had captured every Ice Troll and used them to produce potions for the imperial army.
Furthermore, to prevent the coalition army from making use of them, he exterminated every wild Ice Troll.
Consequently, no wild Ice Trolls remained anywhere on the continent.
The only surviving Ice Trolls were those bred in the Imperial Palace’s Underground Laboratory.
Even I, who had been born in the Northern Region, had only seen an Ice Troll once.
“Wait, could this possibly be….?”
A particular memory suddenly surfaced in my mind.
It was the memory of the first and last time I had encountered an Ice Troll.
That had happened approximately fifteen years ago.
My father, the head of House Whitewolf, had passed away.
After his funeral, his will was revealed.
My father had left everything belonging to the house to my younger sister instead of me.
I protested, but no one took my side.
Everyone believed that my capable younger sister was more suitable to become the head of the house and ruler of the county than a delinquent who spent his life gambling and indulging in pleasure.
In an instant, I became an unwanted burden.
Unable to endure it any longer, I fled my family home.
Then, after wandering through the snowy mountains for several days—
Rooooar—!
This was when I had seen an Ice Troll for the first and last time.
Even though it had happened more than fifteen years ago, I remembered it vividly.
After all, this incident had completely changed the course of my life.
Therefore, if these truly were the Northern Snowy Mountains where House Whitewolf was located—
And if the creature drooling as it approached me truly was an Ice Troll—
“Have I returned to the past?”
That was the only conclusion I could reach.
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