"So, shall we go now, human?" the minotaur asked, his eyes gleaming with the same greed as before as they locked onto Nerion.
Nerion stared at him for a moment, then caught sight of Angelina's corpse from the corner of his eye—her face still wearing that gentle smile.
He wasn't sure why, but the longer he remained in this strange world, the more the splitting pain in his mind began to fade, until it was almost gone. Along with it, the emotions that did not belong to him were growing fainter, and even the sharp ache in his stomach—whose cause he still did not understand—had started to drift away. Yet he could not explain why he had ever suffered from any of it in the first place.
"Can we bury her before we leave?" he asked the minotaur, already knowing the answer would be yes. The beast still needed him to find the so-called sword of his family, after all.
The minotaur narrowed his eyes at Angelina's corpse. He did not care for humans. He and his companion had only followed a voice out of curiosity. Yet now, against all odds, he had stumbled upon such a unique human in the heart of the Primitives' lands.
'Still… this journey wasn't a waste after all. And I think she'll be quite pleased with this catch.' he thought before giving Nerion a short nod.
"Fine. We'll take her and bury her along the way."
He paused, then added, "My name is Rios, so… what should I call you, human?"
'Damn, even this bull has a great name. It seems like this world really has a knack for names.' Nerion thought before answering.
"My name is Nerion. It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Rios," Nerion said, forcing the best smile he could manage under the circumstances.
But the smile quickly faded when he noticed that Rios was staring at his lips with a strange expression—more specifically, at what was on them.
"So, Nerion… how the hell did you survive that poison?" Rios asked, his gaze still fixed on his lips.
'Huh? What's he talking about?' Nerion thought, confused.
Rios's eyes sharpened even further.
"You don't know you were poisoned?" he asked. Then he pulled a small pendant from his pouch. With a flick, it opened to reveal a mirror, which he held before Nerion's face.
Nerion blinked. He had not expected that.
Despite the obvious signs of fatigue and malnutrition, the face in the mirror was… stunning.
His long, straight black hair fell all the way to his elbows, gleaming with a strange and elegant sheen—even more radiant than Angelina's. His nose was sharp and slightly upturned, while his lips carried a natural pink hue tinged with red. His eyebrows were straight and well-defined, giving him a sharp, intelligent look, and his skin had a pale, porcelain-like luster untouched by blemish.
Anyone who looked at him would never immediately associate him with Angelina unless they looked very closely—not because Angelina was unattractive by any means, but because his beauty was so extreme that it overshadowed everything else. And yet that beauty was touched by a certain coldness, born from the natural sharpness of his gaze.
And then there were the eyes.
His heart stopped for a moment.
Those eyes… They were the same scarlet-red eyes he had in his past life.
'What…?!'
His thoughts reeled. 'Could it be that he and the original owner of this body just happened to share the exact same rare eye color?'
'…No. That's impossible.'
Then he remembered something—words spoken by a doctor he had once visited with his parents, back when they had been trying to understand the mystery behind his eyes.
…
"It's a miracle. One in a billion. But… not entirely unheard of," the doctor had said with a wink at Noah.
"Your son is the result of an exceptionally rare genetic recombination. A mutation occurred—one connected to ancient bloodlines about which we know very little, bloodlines tied to the temples of the two oldest civilizations known to humanity. Our conclusion is that he was born from the fusion of two of the most powerful genetic lineages ever recorded."
"Red eyes were mentioned frequently in those ancient temples, which made it clear they had been seen as something distinctive even in ancient times. But scientists had never fully deciphered the phenomenon, so naturally, very little was known about it."
"But don't worry," she had added, her eyes still gleaming with fascination as she studied the boy's scarlet eyes. "This is not a serious condition, nor a chronic one. It's simply… unique. That's the conclusion I reached based on the tests I asked you to run."
…
Back in the ruined cabin, Nerion stared at his reflection.
'What a face.' he thought.
'It'll be useful.'
A faint smile touched his lips. He did not particularly like the overly delicate appearance, mostly because it lacked a beard. Nerion had always liked facial hair—not a thick beard, just enough to give a face a little more edge. He appreciated beauty, yes, but he preferred it with a rougher charm. Thankfully, this body somehow had both: an unnatural blend of ethereal beauty and sharp masculine elegance.
What Nerion did not know was that the original owner of this body had never been nearly this handsome—not even close—and that he himself was, in truth, the main reason behind everything that was happening.
His eyes lingered on his own jawline for a moment, sharp and well-defined… until he noticed a streak of dried foam near his lips.
His expression hardened.
It was the same as Angelina's.
Then it clicked.
'So that's what happened. They gave up on life when the pain became too much.'
He looked down on the body's previous owner with naked disdain.
'There was no way it had been Angelina's idea.'
Based on the scattered memories he had absorbed, she would never have made such a choice. That left only one possibility: the original Nerion had begged her to end it all… and she, with no one else left, had followed her little brother into death.
'Pathetic.'
His contempt deepened with every passing second.
Then he closed his eyes and made up his mind.
"So? What happened to you?" Rios asked again, growing impatient.
"I don't know," Nerion replied.
"Hah?"
The minotaur blinked in confusion.
Nerion did not give him time to press further.
"I really don't. All I remember are hazy fragments of that day—nothing clear enough to explain what actually happened."
It was not a lie. And even if it had been, it would not have changed anything.
"Strange," the minotaur muttered.
He had never seen anything like it. Two people clearly poisoned—one dead, one alive.
Still, he did not dwell on it. It was none of his business.
"Then let's move."
The minotaur bent down and lifted Nerion onto a rickety wooden wheelchair. The craftsmanship was crude and clearly old, as though it had been made long ago by hands now forgotten. Then he gently wrapped Angelina's body in a nearby cloth and placed it on Nerion's lap.
Nerion was caught off guard by the gesture.
But then he noticed the brief, uneasy flicker in the minotaur's eyes as he glanced at Angelina.
'Is he worried the poison might spread through touch?' Nerion realized.
The minotaur grabbed the handles of the wheelchair and pushed it out of the hut.
The moment they stepped outside, the full weight of night descended upon them like a velvet curtain. It was not complete darkness, but a haunting blend of stillness and pale light, as though the world itself had been wrapped in an ancient spell.
Two moons adorned the sky. One hung in the west, clearly closer than the other, its bluish-white glow slicing through the darkness like an icy blade. The second shone in the east like a brilliant white lantern guiding the lost, yet seemed farther away and thus appeared smaller.
For Nerion, it was a truly extraordinary sight—the first time he had ever seen such a phenomenon with his own eyes.
Their mingled light bathed the village in a ghostly white glow tinged with faint blue. The air was heavy with the scent of rain-soaked soil, moss, and the sweet breath of the coming storm. A breeze whispered through the towering trees, mingling with distant thunder, as though the forest itself was holding its breath.
A semicircle of similar huts stood around them, most of them silent, their residents likely lost to sleep beneath the storm's lull. The huts were enclosed by simple fences nearly three meters high.
Nerion turned his head. Beside him walked the minotaur, confident and steady, his massive frame touched by the glow of the twin moons in a way that made him seem less like a beast and more like something carved out of myth.
Nerion, still paralyzed, could not move—but his eyes missed nothing.
A chill ran down his spine.
Not from the cold. From understanding.
This world was clearly anything but simple. Starting with the bull walking beside him, then the slaves and nobles, and most importantly, the thing Rios had mentioned—the source of will. That, more than anything else, did not sound simple in the slightest. If anything, it sounded like the axis upon which this entire world revolved.
Contrary to what one might expect, Nerion felt no despair. If anything, he was eager to walk his own path in this world. He still wanted to reach his goal—and that very goal was the reason he had died. Not directly, perhaps, but the pursuit of it had led him to the place where death finally found him.
Anyway, things hadn't ended too badly… Well, they had ended with his death, but look on the bright side—now he was…
You know what? Never mind.
Just as they reached the center of the village, Rios frowned.
"Where did she go…?" he muttered, closing his eyes in concentration. His frown deepened.
"Who are you looking for?" Nerion asked.
"Lady Mia. She came with me on this trip," Rios replied simply.
"Oh? Looking for me?" A melodic voice answered from behind them. Neither of them had sensed a thing.
Rios turned at once and slightly bowed in respect.
"Lady Mia, this is the human whose voice you heard earlier when we passed through this village."
Then he turned the wheelchair so that Nerion faced the newcomer.
Nerion was mildly surprised by the appearance of the person standing before him.
The woman was stunning. Long black hair flowed like silk, and her figure was beautifully proportioned—neither too slender nor too full, but balanced in a way that radiated grace. She carried herself with the kind of natural nobility that did not need to be announced.
'Is she human like me? Has this brute gone mad, trying to sell a human into slavery in front of another—clearly superior—human? That doesn't make any sense.'
'Still, there was something strange about her.'
Nerion lowered his gaze, but she never took her eyes off him.
"He's quite the looker," she said, studying his face—then pausing at his eyes.
"Yes, Lady Mia. That's exactly what I thought. He'll fetch a fortune if we sell him to the Dark Castle. Beautiful human slaves always do well there," the minotaur replied proudly, clearly pleased with his find.
But Mia narrowed her eyes.
"He's paralyzed? That'll hurt his pri—"
She froze in the middle of the sentence.
Her nose twitched once.
Then her expression changed—twisting into something hungry.
"You. Your scent… it's delicious."
Her eyes narrowed instantly, as though she had been suppressing a terrible hunger for years.
And then—fangs.
Fangs began to emerge.
"What the hell? She's a vampire?!" Nerion's thoughts screamed as he turned toward Rios in confusion.
"Y-yes… Lady Mia is a vampire who broke her chains," the minotaur stammered, glancing at her nervously.
'And what the hell is that supposed to mean?' For the first time since arriving in this world, Nerion was genuinely beginning to lose his composure.
There was something else in Rios's tone too. Fear.
'Even this brutal creature is afraid of this slender woman? So… appearances really do mean nothing here.'
'And what in the world is a chainbreaker?'
Before he could ask, the minotaur took a cautious step forward, clearly intending to calm Mia down with words.
Mia did not let him.
She raised her hand.
Then, with a flick—
BOOM!
CRACK!
CRACK!
The minotaur shot away like a missile, tore through several trees, and finally collapsed in the distance, broken and unconscious.
Nerion was stunned by the sheer violence of it.
He stared at her, his pupils widening as a cold bead of sweat slid down the side of his neck.
'That power… even if I weren't paralyzed, I wouldn't have had time to blink before she finished me off.' he thought, locking eyes with her as he swallowed.
"What terrible luck…" he cursed under his breath, bracing himself for whatever this insane woman might do next. Then he remembered the state of his body and just how monstrously strong she was, so he silently cursed his luck all over again.
Mia turned back to him. Then she knelt before his wheelchair and gently cupped his face in her soft hands, her fingers gliding along his jaw as though savoring a treasure she had no intention of sharing.
"Now the space is ours, my dear," she whispered, her gaze overflowing with hunger and something almost like admiration—as though she wanted to carve his face into her very soul.
And for the first time since arriving in this world, Nerion displayed another emotion he had not shown before.
Disgust.
Not fear.
Not surprise.
Disgust.
Under normal circumstances, Nerion would never have let his inner feelings show so easily. But the string of bizarre events unfolding in so short a time had naturally thrown even him off balance.
Besides, even before coming to this world, Nerion had always despised this kind of woman—the kind that treated you like air until the moment they found value in you, only to start clinging after that.
Mind you, he had never personally been treated that way in his previous world… but you don't have to be robbed to hate thieves, do you?
And Nerion hated it.
But even so… this was hardly the moment to get angry.
He could not even move, let alone resist this beast.