For several seconds, there was nothing.
No darkness.
No light.
No sound.
Then Eden heard voices.
Faint at first.
Distant.
As though they were coming from the other side of an enormous wall.
"Damn it, Isaac! You knocked him out!"
A burst of laughter followed.
"Who cares? He’ll wake up."
"You hit him pretty damn hard."
"Shut up."
Another voice joined them.
"Guys, seriously. Just wake him up."
Eden frowned.
’Wake me up?’
His thoughts felt sluggish.
Heavy.
He couldn’t remember where he was.
Couldn’t remember why there were voices around him.
The last thing he remembered was—
Aprodius.
The dungeon.
His arm.
Blood.
Mendax.
The golden stairs.
That strange smile.
And...
...His death.
Eden’s mind jolted.
His eyes snapped open.
The first thing he saw was the sky.
A clear blue sky.
The second thing he saw was a fist coming toward his face.
SMACK!
Pain exploded across his cheek.
Eden’s head snapped sideways.
For several seconds, he simply stared at the concrete beneath him.
His cheek burned.
His ears rang.
His thoughts finally began catching up with his body.
"Holy shit," one of the voices muttered. "He’s awake."
"See?" another said. "Told you."
Eden slowly raised his head.
Three young men stood around him.
One of them was rubbing his knuckles.
A tall guy with short black hair, a broad build, and a smug expression.
Eden stared at him.
His heart stopped.
’...Huh.’
His silver eyes widened.
He knew that face.
He had seen it hundreds of times.
Maybe thousands.
That stupid grin.
Those narrow eyes.
That arrogant posture.
The same face that had haunted his college years.
"Isaac...?"
The name escaped his lips before he could stop it.
Isaac raised an eyebrow.
"Enjoyed your little beauty sleep?"
Eden didn’t answer.
He couldn’t.
His gaze moved past him.
The concrete floor.
The metal fence around the edge.
The faded markings on the ground.
The old ventilation units.
The stairwell leading down into the building.
His breathing slowly became uneven.
He knew this place.
He knew it better than almost anywhere else in the world.
His eyes widened further.
’No way.’
He scrambled to his feet.
His legs nearly gave out.
He caught himself with one hand against the ground.
’How...?’
His voice was hoarse.
Isaac laughed.
"What, Can’t even stand up straight now? We didn’t even target your legs Dumbass."
Eden ignored him.
He turned around.
The city stretched out beyond the rooftop.
Buildings.
Roads.
Cars.
People.
Everything looked normal.
Almost too normal.
He looked back toward the three men.
Then toward the rooftop entrance.
Then toward the city again.
His heartbeat accelerated.
’This is...’
His voice trembled.
’This is the college.’
Eden stared at the three Men in front of him.
His mind raced.
His gaze dropped to his hands.
Young.
Unscarred.
No old wounds.
No calluses from years of dungeon raids.
He touched his face.
Smooth skin.
He looked at his arms.
No scars.
No injuries.
No missing arm.
His fingers trembled.
’I’m alive..?’
He slowly backed away from the others.
’I’m alive.’
His mind struggled to accept it.
’I’ve regressed.’
Then another thought struck him.
’Mendax.’
The mysterious man from the stopped world.
His exact words.
"I will bestow my authority upon you."
Eden’s breathing stopped.
His eyes sharpened.
’Does that mean...’
He had no idea if it would work.
He had no idea if what happened had been real.
But he remembered the familiar runes of the system.
’Status.’
Nothing happened.
Eden frowned.
’...Status.’
For a moment, there was nothing.
Then—
A faint golden rune appeared in front of his eyes.
Another followed.
Then another.
Lines of glowing symbols assembled themselves in the air.
Eden’s pupils shrank.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[STATUS]
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Name: Eden
Age: 19 Years old
Level: 1 [F-Rank]
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Attributes
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Strength: 10
Agility: 10
Vitality: 10
Essence: 10
Perception: 10
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Skills & Authorities
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Devour [A] — Consumes the target and their Essence. A perfect consumption may allow the user to absorb the target’s skill.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Eden didn’t move.
He simply stared.
His brain refused to process what he was seeing.
’...’
His voice was barely audible.
’A-Rank.’
His eyes moved toward the skill again.
Devour [A].
His old skill was gone.
The pathetic ability that had condemned him to thirteen years of suffering—
Gone.
Replaced.
By an A-Rank skill.
Eden swallowed.
’It was real.’
’Mendax was real.’
’The regression was real.’
He looked at the Level displayed before him.
Level 1.
F-Rank.
A laugh escaped him.
Quietly at first.
"Hah..."
His shoulders began shaking.
"Hahahaha..."
The three men exchanged confused glances.
Eden covered his mouth.
He couldn’t stop.
A grin slowly spread across his face.
He laughed harder.
"HAHAHAHA!"
Isaac stared at him.
"What the hell?"
Eden lowered his hand.
His silver eyes were wide.
Not with fear.
With exhilaration.
"I actually did it."
Isaac frowned.
"Did what?"
Eden didn’t answer.
He looked at the status window again.
Nineteen.
He was nineteen.
Three years younger than when he had awakened in his previous life.
Three years.
That might not sound like much.
But to Eden?
Three years was an eternity.
And more importantly—
He had an A-Rank skill.
An actual A-Rank skill.
Eden clenched his fist.
His body felt weak.
His attributes were pathetic.
Ten in everything.
The body of an ordinary F-Rank awakened.
But the feeling inside his chest...
That was different.
’Hope.’
Something Eden hadn’t felt in years.
No.
Something he hadn’t felt in decades.
’I have another chance.’
A strange warmth spread through his body.
He almost wanted to cry.
Instead—
He laughed.
Isaac scratched his head.
"Did we hit him too hard?"
"I think so," one of the others answered.
"I didn’t know he’s go nuts after just a few hits."
"Nah," the third said. "He probably just snapped."
Eden slowly turned toward them.
The smile remained.
Isaac stepped forward.
"You done laughing, edgelord?"
Eden looked at him.
Isaac.
His first bully.
The man who had spent years making his college life miserable.
The same man who had awakened at just Eighteen years old.
The same man who had possessed a C-Rank skill.
And the same man who had once treated Eden like an insect.
Eden remembered him.
Every insult.
Every shove.
Every beating.
Every time Isaac had taken advantage of the fact that Eden was weaker.
Every time Eden had swallowed his anger because he knew he couldn’t fight back.
Memories flashed through his mind.
Then Eden smiled.
’Funny.’
He had spent thirteen years dreaming of becoming stronger.
Now he was standing in front of the exact person who had made him feel powerless.
And somehow—
This felt almost nostalgic.
Isaac cracked his knuckles.
"You’re creeping me out."
He stepped closer.
"Maybe I should hit you again."
Eden’s smile widened.
"Go ahead."
Isaac blinked.
"What?"
"I said go ahead."
For the first time, Isaac looked genuinely confused.
Then his expression twisted.
"Fine."
He pulled his fist back.
But before he could swing—
Eden moved.
His palm slammed into Isaac’s chest.
BOOM!
Isaac’s eyes widened.
His feet left the ground.
He flew backward several meters before crashing onto the concrete.
The other two men froze sharing confused glances.
Pushing Isaac back was practically impossible to them. For Eden however, something like this was laughably easy.
Thirteen years of dungeon combat had taught him how to read movement.
How to recognize balance.
How to identify an attack before it happened.
How to use an opponent’s momentum.
Isaac had telegraphed his punch.
His shoulder moved first.
His hips followed.
His weight shifted too far forward.
Eden had simply stepped inside his range and pushed.
Nothing complicated.
Nothing impressive.
But to someone who had never fought properly?
It was enough.
One of the remaining bullies swallowed.
"Uh..."
The other looked at Eden.
"Get him!"
Neither sounded convinced.
Still, they activated their skills.
One’s fists became surrounded by a faint gray Essence.
[Skill: Iron Knuckle — E-Rank]
The other man’s legs glowed blue.
[Skill: Quick Step — F-Rank]
They charged.
Eden sighed.
’Seriously?’
The first swung.
Eden leaned backward.
The fist passed inches from his nose.
He stepped forward and drove his palm into the man’s jaw.
Crack.
The man staggered.
Eden caught his wrist.
Pulled.
Knee to the stomach.
Elbow to the back.
The man collapsed.
The second suddenly appeared beside Eden, using Burst Step to accelerate.
Eden ducked.
The kick passed over his head.
He pivoted.
Grabbed the man’s ankle.
Pulled.
The man fell face-first.
Eden stepped over him.
A single strike to the back of the neck.
The man went limp.
Eden stared down at them.
"That’s it?"
His voice carried genuine disappointment.
He hadn’t even broken a sweat.
’I’ve fought hundreds of monsters stronger than these guys.’
He glanced at his own body.
’I guess experience really is terrifying.’
A groan came from behind him.
Eden turned.
Isaac was standing.
Slowly.
Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
His expression had changed.
The arrogance was gone.
Something else had replaced it.
Anger.
"Eden..."
Isaac wiped his mouth.
"You think you’re funny?"
Eden’s smile disappeared.
Isaac’s Essence began to rise.
Orange light crawled over his body.
Eden’s eyes narrowed.
He knew that color.
He knew that skill.
’It’s phas—’
Isaac vanished.
BOOM!
Eden barely moved in time.
A fist passed beside his face.
The wind alone made his cheek sting.
Isaac appeared behind him.
Another punch.
Eden ducked.
A kick.
He jumped backward.
Another strike.
Eden twisted away.
’Fast!’
Isaac was much faster than before.
His body was wrapped in orange Essence.
The attacks weren’t merely faster.
They were harder to read.
The orange Essence shifted around his body depending on the movement.
Eden finished his earlier thought out loud.
"Phase Shift..."
Isaac grinned.
"Regretting it now?"
Eden’s expression darkened.
Phase Shift.
A C-Rank skill.
A skill Eden had seen countless times throughout his first life.
It allowed its user to shift between offensive and defensive modes.
A dangerous skill.
One that had made Isaac considerably stronger than his actual rank suggested.
Isaac rushed again.
Eden blocked.
Pain exploded through his arm.
He staggered.
’Damn.’
Another punch.
He dodged.
Another.
He ducked.
Another.
He twisted sideways.
Isaac was relentless.
Eden’s mind worked desperately.
Offensive mode.
The orange Essence was concentrated around Isaac’s limbs.
That meant increased attack power.
Defensive mode.
The Essence spread evenly across his body.
Eden remembered.
He had seen this skill dozens of times.
But knowing a skill and fighting against it were two different things.
Isaac threw another punch.
Eden saw the opening.
He stepped inside.
His fist slammed directly into Isaac’s face.
Boom!
Pain shot through his hand.
"...Ugh—"
Isaac hadn’t moved.
Not even an inch.
The orange Essence had spread across his face.
Defensive mode.
Eden’s knuckles throbbed.
Isaac grinned.
"That hurt?"
Eden stared at his swollen hand.
Then at Isaac.
Isaac laughed.
"You really thought you could beat me?"
Eden’s expression hardened.
Isaac’s fist slammed into his stomach.
"Gah—!"
Eden flew.
His back crashed against the concrete.
The air left his lungs.
He rolled across the rooftop and came to a stop.
He coughed up blood.
Red liquid splattered across the ground.
Eden slowly pushed himself up.
His chest burned.
His body hurt.
His vision blurred.
Isaac approached.
"You got lucky earlier."
Eden wiped blood from his mouth.
He stared at Isaac.
Then at his own hands.
’Damn it...’
’...I’m too weak.’