Chapter 4
Ugh... ugh.
...Ugh?
It doesn't hurt?
Ding-
[You have obtained the body of Piranian 'Revita'. Would you like to use this name?]
--------------------
Accept(Y) Reject(N)
--------------------
...What?
W-What is this...!
The moment I opened my eyes, a yellow, translucent message appeared.
Before I had time to examine the changes in my body or anything else, I stared blankly at the words floating before me.
'Accept and reject...'
"Are you kidding me?"
It was going to pick the answer it wanted anyway... so why did it keep giving me choices like this?
Still, thinking I'd give it one more try, I brought my finger to the button.
"No."
Yeah. If it really had given me a new body, at least let me change my name.
Flash!
[Please enter a new name]
"Oh, nice! A name? A new name..."
...But how am I supposed to enter it?
A keyboard appeared, but every character on it was one I'd never seen before.
They looked like an alien language, or maybe hieroglyphs.
If you were going to install a Korean patch, you should've done it properly. What the hell was this supposed to be?
...Ugh?
At that moment, something forced its way into my head. Then, all of a sudden, I could read some of the characters on the keyboard.
W-What...
The changes continued.
The pronunciations and symbols of the characters I'd just seen.
And a vast amount of knowledge associated with them began pouring in all at once, like a surging tide.
'Ngh... Aaaah!! Stop! Stop!!"
It felt as though I were forcing a large body into clothes that didn't fit.
I clutched my head, which felt ready to split, and waited for the anomaly to stop. A short while later,
my condition stabilized again, as though nothing had happened.
"Uuugh... Could you at least turn on a light before coming in..."
Huh?
"Wow—are you kidding me?"
As soon as I could read the characters, an explanatory message caught my eye.
-'Korean' keyboard conversion [Y/N]-
Seriously, what the hell. What am I supposed to do when you write 'Korean' in your own language?
Although I could read it now, I had no interest in the alien language, so I immediately converted it to Korean.
"Let's see, next... There was even a voice recognition function. I didn't need to struggle to type it in after all."
......Right.
First, let's decide on a name.
I held up both hands, showing myself the backs. The emerald-colored nails, as though painted with nail art, caught my eye first.
A lustrous, beautiful color.
Aside from that, they looked no different from an ordinary human's hands.
Pale, delicate, soft, and small hands.
'A woman? Her voice, her hair... Her sex is definitely female.'
"And this ring..."
The ring I'd wanted so badly to take off. I distinctly remember returning it to Mira.
'Haha.'
No matter how I looked at it, wasn't this Mira, judging by the circumstances? Had she sucked the vitality out of my original body and even put on some weight? Her skin was unbelievably soft and smooth.
….
After looking at it for a moment, I came to one conclusion.
‘She’s a monster.’
A hundred percent a monster. No matter what kind of Hunter they were, I'd never heard of or seen anyone being mummified and then recovering.
This body was probably some kind of undead.
If an undead had sucked the vitality out of my original body and recovered, everything fit.
Damn it.
…Could I live as a monster? And not just a male monster, but a female one.
Although I didn't feel any urge to kill people, just because I was okay with it didn't mean other people would be.
The moment people found out I was a monster, life would get boring.
"Well... I should at least be grateful I came back from the dead. I just have to avoid getting caught, right?"
There was no point worrying over something I couldn't answer. I decided to keep working on my new name.
…Was it Revita?
I could probably combine it with my own name. What should I use?
Nabita...? No, that won't do. It could be misunderstood depending on how it sounds.
Vita Ji-hoon?
Refreshing. Get lost.
Let's see, let's see.
Na Ji-hoon.
Revita.
"Narebi...?"
Then another message appeared.
Ding-
['Would you like to use 'Naraebi'?]
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Accept(Y) Reject(N)
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"No, not that 'rae'...! Never mind. Fine."
It hardly makes a difference anyway, so who cares? Accept!
Ding-
[From now on, your name is 'Naraebi']
Great, now that I had a name, it was time to properly figure out what was going on.
I stood up, dusting off both legs. Fortunately, I was wearing at least a faded white rag.
And only then did I notice something sticking out prominently.
'Breasts...?'
Strange.
My eye level was much lower than usual, yet something barely as tall as an elementary-school kid had breasts...?
"Hmm..."
Though no one was watching, I felt embarrassed for some reason and pulled the rag up for no reason.
It was as if I felt some innate female instinct within my body.
Or maybe it was because I'd always been far removed from masculinity...?
"...What am I even saying? Ugh—I'll just leave it. No one's watching anyway."
"Cough, cough!"
...Oh, what now?
No sooner had I finished speaking than I heard a man's cough behind me. I turned around, tilting my head, and saw Kim Young-hak collapsed with severe injuries.
That raised a question.
We'd definitely fallen together, so why was only he hurt like that?
The strange thing was that the wounds were too deep to be bruises from the fall.
They were unmistakably the marks of having been slashed by something.
"K-Kim...$^%"
…? My voice won't come out?
Ding-
[Emergency Quest]
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The body offered as a sacrifice
was insufficient.
To prevent the body from collapsing, use the skill
'Claw Blades' to kill C-rank Hunter Kim Young-hak.
Then absorb the essence.
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Reward: Permanently learn the skill 'Claw Blades'
Failure: Mummification of the body
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Huh?
"What?"
.....What kind of plot development is this all of a sudden? I've never killed a person before!
Just then, Kim Young-hak stood up as if he'd been waiting for that and began glaring at me. Blood streamed down his entire body, making him look grotesque.
"K... heh... You monster bastard."
No! I'm not a monster!
I desperately tried to force the words out, but my voice still wouldn't come.
On a hunch, I tried speaking in monster language, and...
{I'm not a monster! Calm down, you crazy human!}
"Heh-heh, who knows what you're saying. Anyway, you're dead! Raaah!!"
The system seemed to be acting as if it wanted to encourage the misunderstanding.
Kim Young-hak squeezed out the last of his strength and charged at me, while I frantically raised both hands, not knowing what to do.
'What do I do..! What do I do...! Block him? Dodge?"
"C-Claw Blades!"
The emerald-colored nails lengthened with a shhk. Terrified, I swung them wildly.
"Kyaaah!!"
Shhk-!!!
"Kugh...!"
Clutching his neck, Kim Young-hak staggered past me. He wobbled a few steps before pitching face-first onto the sand.
...Thump!
As expected, another message appeared.
[You have defeated an enemy. Approach the corpse and use the 'Absorb Essence' skill.]
It was a message without an alarm sound. As if it were only meant to provide additional information, it vanished quickly as soon as I finished reading it.
'A skill...?'
I awkwardly approached Kim Young-hak's corpse.
'Absorb Essence'
Was I supposed to say it aloud?
Piiing-
...!
Even though I'd only thought it, light rose from the corpse.
It looked like a kind of jewel.
After floating in the air for a moment, it was sucked straight into my chest.
"Ugh! What was that!"
I ran my hands over my body, but nothing seemed to have changed. Still, it felt much easier to breathe.
I didn't know what it was, but I didn't want to consume that guy's essence... Could I really not avoid it?
I plopped down where I stood. One chaotic event after another had happened, and I needed time to rest.
I stretched out on the sand and stared blankly at the sky.
"......Let's sort this out one thing at a time. First, right. I need to move somewhere else."
It would be a serious problem to be nearby when Kim Young-hak's corpse was discovered.
Never mind that I was the one who killed him—this body clearly seemed to belong to a monster.
'Those nails that stretched out...'
If this is a game system, then this should work, right?
"Status Window!"
Flash!
[Apprentice Pygmy Sculptor Naraebi]
LV.1
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Vitality: 30 (+5)
Intelligence: 150 (+50)
Strength: 30 (+5)
Agility: 50 (+5)
Dominance: 7 (+5)
Remaining stat points: 10
(+5 upon leveling up)
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Status: Insufficient Essence
(Only 30% of your actual stats' power
can be exerted.)
HP:170/170
MP:600/600
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Hoh... Amazing.
But what kind of body is this that its Intelligence is so high?
Without thinking, I touched the word 'Intelligence' on the status window.
Once again, flash! The yellow box changed.
[Intelligence]
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A stat required for using
sorcery and dominion.
Base stat: 100
Piranian's Ancient Ring effect
+50
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…What is this?
I raised my right hand. The stat points granted at each level-up were only five.
Yet a single item raised it by a whopping fifty.
I didn't know much about the system yet, but even at a glance, I could tell the item had absurdly overpowered specs.
If this really was the game system I thought it was, this had to be incredible.
'Sorry for calling you a burden. I'll never take you off for the rest of my life.'
I clenched my fist and brought my lips to the ring. Then my mana was sucked away with a shluurp.
Ding-
[Summoning the stored Pygmy Warrior.]
…Huh?