Chapter 1
I am dying.
The cool night breeze, the half-risen moonlight, and the senses honed as an assassin all whisper the same thing.
That I will soon die.
I looked around.
Between the garden trees that looked as soft as sheep's wool, numerous narrow paths branched out.
But there was no path of life to escape through. Only paths of death reeking of the stench of demise.
"Raon."
I raised my head at the voice heavily pressing down on my heart. A middle-aged man with long, frost-combed silver hair came into view.
It's him.
Derus Robert.
Because of this single man, the head of the Robert family, the entire massive garden exuded a dense killing intent like a swamp of death.
"Yes."
I swallowed dry saliva and opened my mouth.
"You have shown results worthy of your position as the head of Shadow. Thanks to you moving in the shadows, the family's growth has accelerated even more."
"I only did what I had to do."
I neither feigned joy nor feigned displeasure. I bowed my head like a wooden doll devoid of emotion.
"However, Raon."
He opened his mouth in a low voice.
"Do you think shadows need freedom?"
Derus reached out his hand. His shadow cast on the floor reached out its hand identically.
"A shadow only needs to follow its master. It doesn't need thoughts, emotions, or a heart."
"That is correct."
"Knowing that, why did you move on your own?"
Derus's rapidly chilling voice tightly constricted my heart.
"How did you break the brainwashing?"
Goosebumps rose chillingly down my spine. I bit my tongue to keep from looking surprised.
What?
I hadn't acted any differently from before, so I had no idea how he knew the brainwashing was undone.
"Speak. When and how did you break the brainwashing?"
For him to go this far meant he already knew everything.
"How did you know?"
I bit my lip and raised my head.
Brainwashing.
That was the method the Robert family used to operate the assassination squad 'Shadow'.
They kidnapped or bought children, killed their emotions, applied brainwashing, and used them as assassins for their entire lives.
I, too, was under brainwashing, but thanks to a fortuitous encounter I obtained by chance, I was able to break free from those vicious shackles.
"Because you were preparing to escape from the family."
Derus continued leisurely.
"I placed two leashes on the assassins of Shadow, including you. The first is brainwashing, and the second is..."
"Keuk!"
At the pain of a saw tearing through my lungs and heart, a scream burst out before I knew it.
"It's the Rage Worm. The bug I put inside your body is devouring your heart according to my command."
"R-Rage Worm..."
The Rage Worm is the worst kind of curse that can even grasp a slave's emotions.
It seemed Derus had used the Rage Worm to realize I was trying to escape the family.
"Y-You act all fair and just, but on top of brainwashing, you even fed me a Rage Worm? You vicious bastard!"
"It's not viciousness, it's thoroughness. Actually, you did break the brainwashing, didn't you?"
Derus smiled with the affectionate gaze he showed to the outside world.
"They say everyone wears a mask to live. My mask is just a little thicker and more special than others'."
"Derus Robert..."
I gritted my teeth. Enduring the pain as if my heart was splitting in half, I forced my body up.
I can't die without doing anything.
I was kidnapped at an age I can't even properly remember and raised as a hunting dog and assassin in the shadows of the Robert family.
I lived having lost both emotions and heart, but obtained a fortuitous encounter and barely managed to escape the brainwashing.
I thought I could finally live by my own will, but what returned was not a key to escape the iron bars, but shackles of death.
I don't know what sin I committed to have to live such a dog-like life.
Damn it!
Red water filled the dried-up well of my emotions. It was the first anger I had ever felt.
"You stand up in that state?"
A slight wavering bloomed in Derus's eyes.
"I won't die an ugly death until the very end."
I gripped the sword hanging at my waist.
The sense of death I felt upon entering the garden hadn't changed.
I will die here.
If I'm going to die anyway, I won't just go quietly. At the very least, I'll take an arm—no, I'll inflict even just one wound before I die.
"Uwaaaaah!"
I detonated the aura brimming in my dantian and thrust my sword forward.
That moment.
The extending blade snapped in half with a crack.
Clack.
I heard the sound of the necklace around my neck falling to the ground.
The world spun, Derus's cold eyes overturned, and the moon stood upside down.
Ah....
I finally realized. My neck had been severed by Derus's sword.
But an assassin's sword is not all that meets the eye.
The chilling aura hidden behind the broken blade flew towards Derus's pale face.
"Despicable."
Derus waved his hand as if annoyed. With a light gesture like swatting a fly, the final sword strike was extinguished like a candle flame.
As expected....
Derus was a martial artist hailed as the continent's strongest. It was only natural that I couldn't beat him.
He is strong, and I am weak. It can't be helped. Yeah, it can't be... like hell!
The anger spreading from the bottom of my chest boiled up like lava.
It was infuriating to have been toyed with by Derus my entire life, and it was maddeningly regrettable that I couldn't complete the 'Ring of Fire' obtained through my fortuitous encounter.
I can't die like this.
God or devil, it doesn't matter.
The moment the rage to strip off Derus's mask and sever his neck by any means filled my entire body, my world froze in red.
* * *
"Hmm..."
Derus Robert raised his right hand and frowned.
'I clearly blocked it.'
Even though he perfectly blocked the sword strike that trash thrust at the end, a small wound opened on the back of his hand.
A bleeding wound; he didn't know how many years it had been.
'It's absurd.'
The bastard undid his own brainwashing, endured the pain of the Rage Worm, and even managed to wound him.
He was bewildered by what had gotten into the hunting dog he raised as a consumable.
'However.'
Raon was already dead. He was a guy who defied common sense, but there was no need to pay him any more attention.
"Clean it up."
As Derus turned his back, martial artists hiding in the shadows of the garden leaped out and approached Raon's corpse.
Wuuung.
Raon's necklace, submerged in dark red blood, emitted a blue light, but no one could see it.
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* * *
Reincarnation.
A fantastical concept that most don't believe in, even while thinking it exists.
Raon, too, did not believe in reincarnation.
He spent his entire life under brainwashing, and when he broke free from it, he was too busy preparing to escape the Robert family to even consider such absurdities.
He thought dying was just the end.
But....
"Sunshine, look here!"
A beautiful woman with red eyes and soft blonde hair flowing over her shoulders shook a blue rattle.
"There's a red one too!"
She also held out the red rattle in her left hand.
Clack clack clack!
He frowned at the sound of the two rattles clashing, but the blonde woman didn't stop her hands.
"Haa."
Raon let out a small sigh and reached out his hand toward the rattles.
"Yes! Come this way!"
The blonde woman smiled brightly and twirled the rattles even more enthusiastically.
Only two things were visible in his field of vision right now. Arms plump like sausages, and the woman shaking the rattles excitedly.
'I still haven't gotten used to it. To think those arms are my arms, and that person is my mother...'
That woman's name was Sylvia. It was still hard to believe, but I had reincarnated as that woman's child, retaining the memories of my past life as an assassin.
At first, I naturally considered it a dream.
I thought it would all be over once I took a nap, but no matter how much I slept, this bizarre dream wouldn't end.
As the suspicious days passed and reached the 100th day, only then did Raon accept the fact that he had reincarnated.
"Sunshine! Over here!"
"Aoo!"
As he slowly crawled toward the rattle, Sylvia backed away little by little.
"That's right! Just a little more!"
Raon crawled unsteadily after Sylvia and reached out his hand toward the rattle.
"Abu..."
But unable to overcome the heavy weight of his head, his body tilted to the right.
"Heok!"
Sylvia threw away the rattles and threw her body to hug him just as he was about to fall over.
'She's fast.'
Her body was swift. He couldn't feel any aura, but it seemed she had learned a decent level of martial arts.
"Were you surprised? It's okay. It's okay."
Sylvia patted Raon's back lightly.
"Aoo."
Raon waved his hand. He was expressing that it was okay because he wasn't surprised at all, but her patting didn't stop.
"Our sunshine. Shall we look at the pretty flowers with mom?"
Sylvia, carrying him on her back, approached the window and opened the curtains. Warm sunlight streamed down softly like a cotton blanket.
'To still be called Sunshine...'
The 'Sunshine' Sylvia called him was naturally not a name, but a pre-birth name.
She said the family head had to come and name me, but he must be damn busy since he hasn't even shown his face.
Unavoidably, even now, 100 days later, I was still called by my pre-birth name, Sunshine.
'Hoo...'
Raon looked around while held in Sylvia's arms.
The room was large enough to run around in, the walls were covered with luxurious sea-blue wallpaper, and a magic lamp hung from the ceiling so light came in even at night.
Since he was in the body of a baby who slept for more than 20 hours a day, he couldn't grasp much, but he knew one thing for certain.
This is a rich household. And quite a prestigious family at that.
'Not bad.'
If I was going to be reincarnated anyway, a family with money or power was better than an ordinary one.
'Because I have to get my revenge.'
The chilling sensation of my neck being cut by Derus was still vivid.
I thought my emotions had all been worn away while being raised as an assassin, but perhaps because the memory right before my death was so intense, the anger and desire for revenge against that bastard remained certain.
'Still, I mustn't be hasty.'
Raon breathed calmly and settled his mind.
Since he had only lived in this room so far, he didn't know where this was or what his position was.
It wouldn't be too late to prepare for revenge after grasping the situation first.
The most important element of an assassin's virtue was patience, and he was an assassin once called the best.
He could endure emotions and desires for revenge as much as needed.
'Besides.'
Through the fortuitous encounter in his past life, he obtained the sword art 'Ring of Fire' of the swordsman who was called the continent's strongest 1000 years ago.
If he trained in the 'Ring of Fire' from now on, he might be able to kill Derus Robert through a head-on confrontation rather than an assassination.
For that day that would surely come, he had to endure and endure again.
'That being said, I'm getting sleepy again...'
Held in Sylvia's arms and bathed in the warm sunlight, sleep came pouring in.
To get sleepy without even thinking much; a baby's body was inconvenient in many ways.
"Is Sunshine sleepy? Then let's go sleep-sleep."
Sylvia smiled radiantly and slowed the hand patting his back. It was when he was nodding off and his neck was about to give way.
"Lady Sylvia!"
The door opened without a knock, and Sylvia's direct handmaiden entered.
"T-The family head is coming!"
"Father?"
Sylvia, hearing the handmaiden's words, was startled and widened her eyes.
'Father?'
Seeing her call him 'Father', the head of this household wasn't her father, but her grandfather.
"S-Should we at least prepare now..."
"It's already too late. He has arrived right outside!"
"Oh my!"
Sylvia and the handmaidens panicked and stomped their feet.
Thud.
From outside the half-open door, stiff footsteps echoed, enough to make one's body shrink back.
'Who on earth is the family head?'
Raon slowly opened his eyes and turned his head toward the door.
An old man with red eyes and brilliant blonde hair swept over his forehead approached. At his overwhelming gait, Sylvia and the handmaidens trembled.
'Ah...'
The moment he saw the old man's eyes, the flow of time slowed down. It was to the point where his surroundings felt blurry due to his overwhelming presence.
"F-Father."
"Is this the child?"
The blonde old man who stopped in front of Sylvia gestured with his chin, his gaze holding only coldness.
"Y-Yes."
Sylvia nodded heavily and held Raon out to the family head.
'Ah...'
Raon's round eyes widened. Looking at the family head's face from the front, he felt like he had seen him somewhere before.
'Blonde hair and red eyes. And an old man with a frigid impression as if draped in ice... Ah!'
Lightning struck his small head.
The King of Northern Annihilation, Glenn Zighart!
The master of the family called the pinnacle of the continent was looking down at him.
A gasp naturally escaped from his small mouth.
It seemed he had reincarnated into the strongest family on the continent.