Prologue

There are many things I want to say, but I'll get straight to the point. I was a writer. Not a famous one, but a writer of fantasy novels with a devoted following.

Of course, that was before I reincarnated.

I still had no idea why I'd suddenly been reincarnated, but I remembered my death clearly.

I was writing a novel as usual when, all of a sudden, my heart began to ache, and soon I couldn't breathe.

It was probably a heart attack. Since I lived alone after moving out, no one could have helped me.

Well, it's not like I was particularly sorry about it.

As soon as I entered university, my family got into a traffic accident, leaving me all alone. In a way, you could call it a lonely death.

The only thing that really bothered me was that I hadn't finished the work I was writing. My death would presumably become known, but all I could feel was regret toward my readers.

So, as soon as I realized I had been reincarnated, I planned to write a new work based on my memories of my previous life, if only to stave off boredom.

That was before I realized this was the world commonly called 'fantasy.'

"...What could I do."

I might as well shelve it and just live my life.

Fortunately, in this medieval-era world, I had been born a noble.

Though my domain consisted of nothing but quiet countryside, it had everything I needed, and being born a noble was hundreds of times better than being born a commoner.

Commoners might be called commoners, but they were the lower class, unable to even think of defying the nobility.

I was also born the youngest rather than the eldest son who would inherit the family, so I had no reason to get caught up in pointless power struggles and was enjoying a leisurely second life.

"Hmm..."

And now, returning to the present, time had flown by and I was sixteen years old.

I was lying on a soft bed, reading a thick book.

Reading had been one of my hobbies in my previous life, so I naturally took it up here as well.

The problem was...

"Fuck. What does this even mean."

Every single book was a work of literature. Or should I just call them poetry collections stuffed with poems by poets?

Even romance novels—the supposedly popular kind—were so obscure in their expression and readability that I couldn't understand them.

If I had to put it in terms I'd understand, they were like Korean college entrance exam English questions packed with pointless words—the notorious English exam that even native English speakers supposedly couldn't solve.

"Damn it. No wonder only nobles read this stuff."

I angrily tossed the book aside. Reading every sentence required solving a puzzle, and it gave me a headache.

It would be so much better if they just wrote things so an image would pop into your head—bam!—at once. The even funnier part was that reading was considered basic cultural refinement among nobles.

And it went something like this...

-Have you read this work? What do you think of this part?

-I've given it some thought, and this is what I think. What about you, Count?"

-I disagree. Therefore...

You read a book and then hold a hundred-minute debate about it.

When I asked my parents, they said it was a way to test how deep one's education was. It was so absurd I couldn't even laugh.

More than anything, nobles had such strong opinions that arguments—and even fights—often broke out when people disagreed.

When I heard that, I gleefully ripped into them in my head, thinking, What a bumper crop of bullshit.

'To these people, my previous life must be fantasy, right?'

I gazed up at the ceiling and muttered inwardly.

This world had monsters, as well as elves, dwarves, beastfolk, demonkin, and all sorts of other races.

The traits of each race were a little different from what I knew, but there were similarities to a degree.

Elves were supposedly close to nature, dwarves were dexterous, and beastfolk resembled animals.

Demonkin, however, were a little more unusual. The people of this world rejected and despised them as the 'cursed.'

Demonkin were descendants of the 'demons' who, in the distant past, had driven this world to the brink of destruction.

If that were all, you might think it was a trite story, but the problem lay in the demonkin's unique racial trait.

Perhaps because they inherited demon blood, if they failed to overcome their own 'desires,' they would turn completely into 'demons.'

Once they became demons, they were nothing more than monsters that destroyed anything and everything in their path.

Because of this racial trait, those with close ties to demonkin met tragic fates, and even demonkin cursed their own destiny, longing to live as 'humans.'

That said, even without turning into demons, their innate power was so formidable that they had established a nation of their own, exerting both large and small influences on the surrounding countries.

"Hmm..."

I think I may have just thought of something interesting.

This world had gods, as well as clergy who borrowed the gods' power. What if I connected the demonkin and the clergy, who stood in contrast to each other?

It sounded more interesting than I'd expected.

'After all, tragedy is what leaves the deepest mark on people's minds.'

Perhaps a love that could never come to pass. A love story between a cleric and a demonkin would draw quite a bit of attention.

Then I'd hit them with a spectacular twist. Say, one of them became a demon to protect the person they loved, or threw away their own life to stop the other.

For the record, in my previous life, readers called me a professor at Satan University. People also commonly called me a sadist.

"Oh. This is pretty good."

After reading nothing but books like Korean SAT English questions, I needed something simple and easy to read.

But rather than hope such a book would appear in this era, I might as well write it myself.

With nothing else to do, I sprang up from the bed where I'd been lying and headed for the desk.

'Damn. If I mess this up even once, I'll have to write it all over again.'

Given the era, pencils hadn't been invented, let alone proper ballpoint pens.

So I had no choice but to write with ink and a nib, though fortunately, paper was quite well developed.

Once I had finished preparing everything, I pondered how to write the opening.

Language wasn't a problem either. When I thought in Korean, it was automatically translated into this world's language, and the grammar itself was identical to Korean.

"First, let's keep the setting simple..."

Writing a fantasy novel in a fantasy world felt strangely surreal.

I was only writing as a hobby because I was bored, and my attitude was that if it worked, great, and if it didn't, so be it.

My family was wealthy enough that I had no need to make a living as a writer.

"All right. This should do."

I began writing with a light heart.

Even though this was a fantasy world, to me, as someone who had been reincarnated, it felt like writing an ordinary fantasy novel.

'They won't complain about this, will they?'

If push came to shove, I could show it to my family and let them decide whether it was worth publishing, so I had nothing to worry about.

"Ah. Just in case, I should add that the whole story is fiction, even if we take the setting as it is."

This is fantasy, after all. Mm-hmm.

*******

'Demonkin' are the descendants of demons. This is an immutable truth and the curse laid upon them.

Horns, practically the symbol of demons, blood-red eyes, and even black mana that emanated an ominous aura...

Every one of these traits resembled demons, and since they became true demons when they lost their reason, people shunned them.

Because of this, even when they established a nation, other countries refused to recognize it, trembling at the thought that they would have dealt with them long ago if not for their absurd power.

The demonkin quietly endured this wretched discrimination as well, but continued to work hard so they could live as humans.

Yet whenever they got the chance, demonkin who transformed into demons caused harm, rendering their hopes ever more distant.

That was how things stood—until one book appeared in the world.

-A writer who ushered in a new paradigm in literature. Who could they be?

-An epic of a hero who will be talked about forever. Yet tragedy and sorrow lie within.

-Expression and readability so vivid that scenes spring directly to mind. A book easy for anyone to read, regardless of status.

The Chronicle of Xenon.

It was a novel published one day without warning.

At first, people thought it was just another literary novel, but after rumors spread that a certain noble had stayed up day and night reading it, it gradually began to circulate by word of mouth.

The overall story was about the great demon who had driven the world to the brink of destruction in the distant past, the group seeking to resurrect that demon, and the hero who stopped them.

On the surface, it looked like an ordinary heroic epic, but its deep connection to the demonkin drew attention.

-A book that speaks for the demonkin's sad fate and loneliness.

-It expressed the hopes of demonkin, who lived lonely lives as half-human, half-demon beings accepted by neither side.

-The ending of 'Sakran' moved the hearts of countless readers. He sacrificed himself as a human, not a demon.

Especially after the section about one demonkin's sacrifice, the newspapers were filled with nothing but that story. It was said to have moved people so deeply that even those normally devoid of emotion sobbed as they read that part.

More than anything, stories emerged that even people who normally hated demonkin could not hold back their sorrow and pity.

-The unjust and discriminatory treatment of demonkin. Is it truly right?

-They are people who want to live as humans, not demons. We are the ones who turned them into demons.

More surprising was how dramatically people's views of demonkin had changed.

Originally, most people treated demonkin as demons, but after The Chronicle of Xenon was published, their views changed by 180 degrees.

They went from ticking time bombs that could go off at any moment to pitiful people yearning to be human.

From demons, they became beings who had been saddled with a miserable fate from birth.

In light of this unbelievable change, even the nation of demonkin, 'Helium,' released its thoughts on The Chronicle of Xenon.

-I don't know who they are, but I would like to offer my heartfelt thanks. This person understands the demonkin's tragic destiny better than anyone.

-The phrase, 'The heart that cares for someone while overcoming one's desires is true sincerity.' This single phrase taught all demonkin self-restraint.

Even the king of Helium, feared by the world as the 'Demon King,' conveyed his gratitude to the author of the book.

As the story progressed, the author who kept countless people on tenterhooks was currently...

"W... what the hell is going on."

I was sitting there, dumbfounded, as I read the newspaper.

"But... there's still a while before I finish it...?"

What am I supposed to do about this?