A month. Thirty days. Seven hundred and twenty hours of repetitive, grueling, soul-crushing, and yet inexplicably satisfying training. If someone had told me back in my previous life that I'd find joy in waking up before dawn to swing a stick at the air for four hours, I'd have laughed. And then I'd have asked what kind of isekai protagonist nonsense they were on. Yet here I was, exactly thirty days into my new existence, and the routine had become as natural as breathing. More natural, actually—I was still getting used to having lungs again.
The orphanage had not improved. Helga was still a black hole of maternal warmth. The food was still a war crime disguised as nutrition. The other kids still avoided me like I carried the plague, which, to be fair, I kind of did. The Curse of Fear was a passive aura of "nope" that made every living creature within a certain radius decide they had urgent business elsewhere. The orphanage cat, a mangy thing named Scraps, had once made eye contact with me from across the room and promptly launched itself out a window. I didn't even know cats could operate window latches. Apparently, existential terror is a powerful motivator.
But the neglect? The neglect had become my greatest ally.
Helga hadn't checked my room once in the entire month. Not a single "how are you doing, creepy child?" Not a cursory headcount at mealtimes. I could have been dead in the woods for weeks, and the only clue would have been the gradual reduction in the orphanage's bread consumption. It was, objectively, terrible childcare. Subjectively, it was the gift of absolute freedom.
Every morning, I slipped out before dawn. Every evening, I crept back in after sunset. My room remained exactly as I left it—a barren closet with a lumpy mattress and a grimy window. No one noticed. No one cared. I was the invisible orphan, the ghost in the attic, the child-shaped void that everyone instinctively ignored.
It was perfect.
The training itself had become a well-oiled machine. The Sword God's Daily Routine was my bread and butter—three thousand two hundred movements of pure, blade-worshipping masochism. Vertical slashes, horizontal slashes, stabs, and connective flows, all executed with the kind of mechanical precision that would make a factory robot jealous. The Basic Swordsmanship skill had skyrocketed from Level 7 to Level 68. The Transparent World, my built-in combat cheat code, had climbed from Level 3 to Level 61. I could now perceive the world in a state of near-constant slow motion, tracking the flight paths of individual insects and predicting the movements of startled woodland creatures before they even knew they were startled.
The Daily Mana Refinement quest had been equally transformative. Every day, I sat in that mossy clearing, cycled 900 MP through my core, and ground away at the impurities like a cosmic janitor with a toothbrush. The sensation never got less unpleasant—it was still the spiritual equivalent of sandpaper—but the results were undeniable. My core had slowly, painstakingly transformed from a lump of coal into something that actually resembled a gemstone. The Black core, once a cracked and sludgy mess, now gleamed with an inner light that was almost... pretty. Almost. It still had a long way to go, but the progress was visible.
The numbers told the story better than I ever could.
My level had jumped from 2 to 9. Each daily cycle of both quests had delivered 200 EXP like clockwork, and the system's experience curve, while steepening, hadn't been able to keep up with my relentless consistency. I'd charted the requirements carefully: 200 to hit level 3, 400 for level 4, 600 for level 5, 800 for level 6, 1000 for level 7, 1200 for level 8, and 1500 for level 9. I'd crossed that last threshold just yesterday, the system's celebratory ding feeling almost anticlimactic after so many repetitions. Now I sat at Level 9 with a handful of overflow EXP and a daunting 3000-point requirement looming between me and double digits.
My stats had inflated accordingly. Each level-up had pumped five points into every attribute, and the daily physical conditioning—sprints, push-ups, tree-climbing, and increasingly creative forms of self-torture—had piled on additional gains. The growth had slowed in the past week, my body adapting to the workload, but I'd still managed to push everything past the 50-point threshold. For a five-year-old, I was an absolute unit. For an adult, I was still terrifying. For a mana beast? I was the reason they checked under their beds at night.
The skill gains had been the most dramatic. Basic Swordsmanship was now Level 68, a number that, if translated into real-world competence, probably put me somewhere in the "could duel a knight and win" category. Basic Transparent World at Level 61 had turned my vision into a permanent bullet-time effect. Basic Mana Manipulation and Basic Mana Perception had both broken past Level 60, finally living up to their names after a month of intense use. I'd even picked up a few new tricks along the way: Stealth at Level 58, born from my daily sneaking; Climbing at Level 55, thanks to the many trees I'd scaled; Running at Level 60, a natural consequence of sprinting through the forest at maximum toddler velocity; and Sense Intent at Level 57, a sixth sense for hostility that had saved me from exactly zero actual threats but felt cool to have anyway.
And then there was Minor Core Refinement, sitting at Level 47. The lowest of the bunch, but arguably the most important. Every level had increased the efficiency of my purification, allowing me to squeeze more progress out of each mana cycle. The 3% daily gains had held steady, though I'd started to notice diminishing returns as the impurities grew thinner and more stubborn. Today, I was about to shatter that ceiling entirely.
I sat cross-legged in my clearing, the familiar moss cushioning my legs, the familiar fallen log at my back, the familiar Stick (now Stick XIV, because I went through training weapons like other kids went through crayons) resting beside me. The morning sun was just beginning to filter through the canopy, painting the world in shades of gold and emerald. A bird that had somehow grown accustomed to my fear aura chirped tentatively from a nearby branch. We'd reached an understanding, the bird and I. It didn't flee in terror, and I didn't practice my stabs on it. Mutual respect.
"Alright, core," I muttered, closing my eyes and focusing inward. "Let's finish this."
The Black core pulsed at the center of my chest, a sphere of condensed mana that had undergone a month of intense spiritual scrubbing. The progress bar, visible in my system interface, read 97%. Three more percent, and I'd hit full purification. But I wasn't going to stop there. I was going to push through to the next stage entirely.
I reached for my mana, pulling a massive stream from the core. The Minor Core Refinement skill activated on instinct, the mana cycling through my channels and slamming back into the core with the force of a tidal wave. The impurities—those stubborn, clinging remnants of spiritual grime—scraped away under the pressure.
-100 MP. -200 MP. -300 MP.
The bar ticked upward. 98%.
I kept going. The mana flowed out, looped back, crashed in. The cycle repeated, each revolution wearing away another layer of corruption. The sensation was more intense than usual—the remaining impurities were deep-seated, the kind of gunk that had been there since birth, and they did not want to leave.
-500 MP. -700 MP. -900 MP.
99%.
One more push. I gritted my teeth, pulled out every scrap of mana I could safely channel, and slammed it home. The core shuddered, a spiritual earthquake that rattled my entire being. For a moment, the world went white. Then black. Then a deep, crimson red.
DING!
DING!
DING!
A cascade of notifications exploded across my vision, so many that I had to mentally bat them aside to see what was happening. The core in my chest was no longer Black. It had transformed, the impurities burning away in a final, cathartic flash. The new core was smaller, denser, and glowed with a dark red light that pulsed in rhythm with my heartbeat.
[Congratulations! Your mana core has evolved: Black Core → Dark Red Core!]
[Core Purification: 100% Complete!]
[Due to core evolution, maximum MP has increased by a factor of 10!]
[New MP: 100,000 / 100,000]
[Congratulations! You have achieved a significant milestone! Bonus rewards: +10 Gacha Points, +10 Trait Tokens!]
[New Total Gacha Points: 69]
[New Total Trait Tokens: 10]
I opened my eyes, gasping. The forest around me seemed sharper, more vivid. I could feel the mana in the air now—not just sense it with Mana Perception, but actually feel it against my skin, a gentle, omnipresent hum. The Dark Red core was a massive upgrade, and the MP boost alone was staggering. A hundred thousand mana points. I was a walking magical reservoir.
But the rewards. The rewards were the real prize.
I pulled up the system interface, my heart pounding with excitement. Ten Trait Tokens. I'd never even seen a Trait Token before, but the system was happy to explain: they could be used to purchase new traits or upgrade existing ones. A quick glance at the available options revealed a dizzying array of possibilities—enhanced senses, elemental resistances, passive regeneration boosts, and stranger things that defied easy categorization.
One trait immediately caught my eye: Mana Recovery.
[Would you like to purchase the trait 'Mana Recovery' for 1 Trait Token? This trait grants passive mana regeneration. Current level of regeneration with your existing traits (Slowed Mana Regeneration) is effectively zero. This trait will begin to offset that penalty.]
I didn't even hesitate. "Yes. Absolutely yes. Take my token."
[Ding! Trait Acquired: Mana Recovery Lv 1! Passive MP regeneration: 10 MP per hour.]
Ten per hour was... pathetic. I had 100,000 MP now. At that rate, refilling my reserves would take over a year. But I still had nine tokens left, and the upgrade option was right there.
"Upgrade Mana Recovery. Put everything into it."
The system chimed as I poured tokens into the trait, each level increasing the regeneration rate exponentially. By the time I'd spent all ten tokens—one to purchase, nine to upgrade—the trait had reached Level 10, and the numbers were much more respectable.
[Mana Recovery Lv 10: Passive MP regeneration: 2,000 MP per hour.]
Two thousand an hour. With my hundred-thousand-point pool, a full recharge from zero would still take about fifty hours—a little over two days. That was infinitely better than the months-long timeline the Slowed Mana Regeneration had saddled me with. Between this and my stockpile of mana potions, I was finally, mercifully, no longer operating on a magical shoestring budget.
I let out a long, satisfied breath and flopped backward onto the moss. The canopy swayed gently overhead, leaves rustling in a breeze I could now feel the mana of. It was a beautiful day. A breakthrough day. The kind of day that made a month of grueling, repetitive, soul-sanding training feel entirely worth it.
"I am," I announced to the bird, which had not fled despite my outburst, "a genius. A tiny, terrifying genius."
The bird chirped something that might have been agreement. Or it might have been a warning about an approaching hawk. My Sense Intent didn't register any hostility, so I chose to interpret it as praise.
I had 69 Gacha Points burning a hole in my inventory, and the temptation to spend them was almost physical. I pulled up the Gacha interface, a flashy, spinning-wheel display that practically screamed "gamble responsibly" in the most irresponsible way possible. The system offered three options: Single Pull (1 Point), 10x Pull (10 Points), and 100x Pull (100 Points).
"What's the difference?" I asked the system. "Besides the obvious math."
[Single Pull: Basic gacha odds. 10x Pull: Slightly increased luck modifier. 100x Pull: Guarantees at least one item of significant personal utility. The universe will conspire to give you something you actually need.]
Sixty-nine points. Not enough for the big one. I could do six 10x pulls and have nine left over, or I could save up. Patience had gotten me this far. Patience had purified my core. Patience could wait a little longer.
"I'll save," I decided, closing the interface. "A hundred pulls or nothing. The gacha gods respect commitment."
The bird chirped again. I was starting to think it was mocking me.
With my core breakthrough complete and my new traits secured, I allowed myself a rare moment of leisure. There was a small pond near the edge of the clearing, a placid pool of rainwater and runoff that reflected the sky like a murky mirror. I'd avoided it for most of the month—why bother looking at myself when I already knew I was a malnourished orphan with the fashion sense of a potato sack? But today felt different. Today, I wanted to see.
I walked to the pond's edge and peered down.
The face that stared back was... not what I'd expected. The original Alexander's memories painted a picture of a scrawny, hollow-cheeked child with haunted eyes and the general vibe of a Victorian ghost. But the reflection in the pond showed something else entirely. The scrawniness was gone, replaced by lean, wiry muscle that made me look less like an orphan and more like a miniature martial artist. My skin, once pale and sickly, had tanned to a healthy bronze from endless days in the sun. My hair, a mess of dark tangles, had grown longer and wilder, giving me a feral, forest-child aesthetic that I honestly kind of dug. And my eyes—my eyes were sharp. Focused. Alive.
But the real change was subtler. The Curse of Fear had left its mark. There was something in my gaze that made even my own reflection feel a prickle of unease. A weight. A presence. It wasn't hostile, exactly. It was just... intense. The kind of intensity that made small animals flee and grown men cross to the other side of the street.
I grinned, and my reflection grinned back. The expression was a little too wide, a little too knowing. I looked like a child who knew exactly what he was capable of.
Which, to be fair, I did.
"I look," I said to my reflection, "like a protagonist. A protagonist who needs a haircut, but a protagonist nonetheless."
I spent a few more minutes by the pond, enjoying the simple pleasure of existing. It was strange—in my previous life, I'd never been one for quiet contemplation. I'd always been chasing the next episode, the next chapter, the next distraction. But here, in this world of magic and monsters and daily quests, I'd found a kind of peace in the grind. The rhythm of training. The satisfaction of progress. The slow, steady march toward becoming something more.
Of course, all good things had to end. And this particular good thing had an expiration date: the orphanage.
I'd been content to use Helga's neglect as a shield, slipping in and out unnoticed while I built my strength. But now that my core had evolved, now that my stats were comfortably superhuman, now that I could throw a punch hard enough to crack stone and swing a sword fast enough to blur the air... I had options. And one of those options was leaving this dump behind and starting my actual adventure.
But before I left, I had a promise to keep.
The other orphans.
I hadn't interacted with them much—the Curse of Fear made that difficult, and the established social dynamics of the orphanage made it even harder. But I'd observed them from the shadows, watching their dull, hollow expressions as they shuffled through their daily routines. They were neglected. Malnourished. Trapped in a system that didn't care if they lived or died. And while I couldn't exactly adopt them or lead a rebellion (I was five, and also terrifying), I could at least make sure they were taken care of before I vanished into the wider world.
I owed that much to the body I'd inherited. The original Alexander might have been quiet and weird and tragically forgettable, but he'd been one of them. A product of this broken, neglectful place. The least I could do was leave it a little better than I'd found it.
"Alright, Alex," I muttered, pushing myself up from the pond's edge and brushing moss from my tattered clothes. "Time to do some reconnaissance. And then... time to leave."
The bird chirped one last time as I walked away. I waved over my shoulder.
"See you around, feathered friend. Try not to get eaten by anything while I'm gone."
The forest swallowed me up, as it always did, and I began the familiar trek back to the orphanage. Tomorrow, I'd start investigating. Tomorrow, I'd figure out how to help those kids. And the day after that—or maybe the day after that, depending on how things went—I'd be gone. Out into the world. Ready for whatever this "fun" version of TBATE decided to throw at me.
The grin crept back onto my face, unbidden. Life was good. Training was good. And the future?
The future was going to be legendary.
STATUS SCREEN - END OF DAY 33
Name: Alexander (LEX)
Race: Dragon-Human Deity Hybrid
Lifespan: 5 / 2,000
Level: 9
EXP: 480/3,000 (To Next Level)
Class: None
MP: 100,000 / 100,000
HP: 10,000 / 10,000
Elemental Affinities: Wind, Fire
Trait(s): Curse of Fear, Slowed Mana Regeneration, Mana Recovery Lv 10 (2,000 MP/hour), Reincarnated, True Demon Slayer Mark, Sword God Incarnate
Core Stage: Dark Red Core (100% Purified)
Template Integration:
Dragon God Orsted: 0.51% (+0.30% from 30 days of Mana Refinement quests)
Yoriichi Tsugikuni: 4.10% (+3.00% from 30 days of Sword God's Daily Routine)
Stats:
Perception: 120
Strength: 68
Constitution: 83
Agility: 70
Resistance: 58
Charisma: 73
Vitality: 75
Stamina: 81
Luck: 1050
{Status Points: 190}
Skills:
Basic Mana Manipulation Lv 62
Basic Mana Perception Lv 61
Basic Swordsmanship Lv 68
Basic Transparent World Lv 61
Minor Core Refinement Lv 47
Stealth Lv 58
Climbing Lv 55
Running Lv 60
Sense Intent Lv 57
Special Skill(s):
Reincarnation Technique (From Orsted) (MAX)
Inventory:
Gacha Tickets converted to Gacha Points: 69 total
59 from daily quest completions
10 bonus from core breakthrough
Small Mana Potion x82 (accumulated surplus from daily Sword quests, and simple daily quests)
Small Stamina Potion x28 (accumulated from daily quests)
Copper Coins x187 (daily quest rewards,stealing, minus minor expenses for better food and clothing repair materials)
Wooden Training Sword x1 (carved from ironwood branch, a recent upgrade from Stick XIV)
{Store: Locked - Requires Level 25 & a Class}