The first thing I saw after I was reincarnated in a fantasy world is a serene ceiling and candles illuminating the room instead of LED bulbs.
The clothes were woven from silk and brocade and judging by the dull wooden utensils, it's clear that they're far removed from Earth's civilization.
But hey… it's a fantasy world, so I guess I'm rich, right? It's a nice reincarnation for an overworked poor orphan.
There was one thing that convinced me I was noble. It was my mother's beauty.
"My baby...."
My biological mother's dazzling smile as she looked at me. How could that face not be aristocratic? My future love life would be trouble-free.
~Year 3~
I'm out of the cradle and out of the room. The world outside was so big and huge, for a toddler.
"Young master!"
Mona, my nanny, gasped and picked me up. And that was how my first adventure ended.
I shouldn't have dreamed of an adventure at this point.
If I had known that real adventures are 100% real and 100% muddy, I wouldn't have gone through all that trouble.
~Year 6~
Apparently, the house I was reincarnated into is one of the most famous in the kingdom, The Grand Duke of Dragonia.
The family was founded by a legendary knight who slayed an evil dragon and bathed in its blood. The family has produced four kings since the kingdom had an elected monarchy.
~Year 8~
I was expected to learn to wield a sword as the next knight of the kingdom.
I was excited. A fantasy knight! Would I be able to draw a sword and put aura on it?
The man who would teach me was Sir Gordic, a Holy Knight sent from the royal palace, but who was he?
Huh? Holy knight?
~Year 10~
It hurts. My whole body feels like it's going to break.
I chose the knight's path, and now I'm getting beaten up by Gordic the Macho every day.
It was nice to be a squire in the Grand Duke's favor, but every day was spent learning to wield a sword and ride a horse.
Holy knights…yeah, they're like sword masters in fantasy.
While the knights of this world are a bit different from my fantasy knights, the Holy Grail Knights are truly monsters that are far from human.
However, in order to become a Holy Knight, you must complete quests through training, become a knight of the kingdom, earn prestige and honor, and drink holy water by being chosen by the Holy Grail?
You had to be strong, honorable, and faithful to become a Holy Knight, an Otherworldly Sword Master.
Damn it… I'm not religious.
~Year 14~
Every day is a pain.
Aside from the bone-crushing training there's a sense of accomplishment, though, because I can feel myself growing stronger with each passing day. It was bearable.
The problem was discipline and study.
I was a strong contender to be the next Grand Duke. Naturally, I had to learn everything there was to know about being a duke.
How to rule the people, how to carry out the law, the philosophical debates between justice and law, how to treat a lady, and even how to study the Bible.
In this world, there are many gods, and you pay tribute to them at their temples and do as they say.
Gods…how fantastical.
But me… I'm supposed to be recognized by the Goddess of Justice or something to be chosen for the Holy Grail?
~Year 16~
I was wandering the world now.
What? Isn't a 16-year-old a middle schooler? Coincidentally, I'm considered an adult in this world.
The first requirement to become a Holy Grail Knight is to leave your training, protect the people of the kingdom, and complete an honorable quest.
To fulfill that quest, I must find the goddess's alter ego. How do I find it?
Just go around the kingdom and do my best to honor her, and she'll find you. I'll be damned.
~Year 17~
Today I slaughtered some orcs. Sons of bitches, warlike brutes. They invade the kingdom's borders on a random day and kill our people. If it weren't for them, the kingdom would be a peaceful place.
Along the way, you cut down the orcs with Sir Gildus, Sir Antoine, and Gunnar the Animated Woodman, the guardian of the forest.
"Thank you, knights, thank you!"
"Tend to the wounded and set the woods straight. The sword of the kingdom and the favor of the goddess be with you."
I'm worried. The farmers have had a good year, and their taxes have kept the kingdom afloat, but the country has too many enemies.
There are too many non-humans around.
~Year 20~
I met a goddess.
I'm not kidding. It was real. God was real.
Wasn't religion supposed to be a way to enlighten and organize the ignorant?
Heaven? Hall of Fame? Dinner with the gods? Weren't they all myths?
The current king has been alive and ruling the kingdom for 110 years, but I thought he was a Holy Knight who did some kind of transmogrification trick.
My current master, Sir Gordic, was a 90-year-old Holy Knight.
"Leon Dragonia, son of Archduke Wulfric Dragonia, I grant you a quest to prove your honor and faithfulness."
"Yes, by the command of the Goddess!"
During my fourth year as an apprentice knight I have finally met the Goddess's alter ego. Arianna is real!
I've slain orcs, torn goblins apart, slayed hordes of evil wizards and defended the realm's territory.
It wasn't all bad. Rather, it was good. The ringing of my name, the accolades, the admiration and respect that came with each honor made me shrug.
Sir Gildus, son of Galbat the Warnight. Lord Antoine, Guardian of the Mines, and Gunnar the Tree Man, who was only two meters tall when I first saw him, but has since grown to be a five-meter Tree Giant.
I have been recognized by the Holy Grail and made a Holy Knight.
~Year 27~
I am the youngest Warknight.
I've decapitated an Orc Warlord and wiped out a savage barbaric tribe.
The orcs would come in hordes of 100,000 or 200,000 whenever they attacked.
The first thing I did when I became a Warknight, with the freedom to wage war and call my own knights, was to attack the orcs.
I buried 700,000 of the damned green-skinned bastards, men, women, and children. It made my blood boil.
~Year 35~
The honorable Fourteenth Lionheart King, living saint and demigod Argent Majesty Lionheart has died. He died in battle against a Great Demon summoned on the fringes of the Empire.
Orcs are a pain in the ass, but now demons were running amok. Those damned Imperial mages and their inquisitive minds leading them astray in their study of the dark arts.
This is why people must believe in God and live a faithful life.
It is because of their inherent curiosity and their futile pursuit of truth that the Great Devil has sliced a hundred thousand people into pieces.
Apart from that, we needed to elect a Holy Knight to succeed King Lionheart, who died honorably while helping the nearly destroyed empire.
"Holy Knight Leon Dragonia."
"Arianna."
The Goddess herself descends and nominates me. Apparently, this is the first time in the kingdom's history that the Goddess has directly chosen a Holy Knight.
Beheading the Great Demon must have been a great honor.
It is an honorable path and a demanding position, but I cannot let my knights and people down.
I am now Archduke of Dragonia and King of the Lionheart Kingdom.
I was implanted with the heart of a lion, a holy relic bestowed by the Goddess, swore to protect the Grail, and took up the holy sword and lance to slay the enemies of my kingdom.
~Year 80~
Much has happened in the meantime.
There have been three great battles against the orcs, and a strange curly goblin who became a great demon.
I could have ripped its guts out, but I was unlucky and it escaped through the Demon Gate.
"Your Majesty, the Imperial School of Black Magic is said to be conducting experiments again!"
Are they insane? Imperial bastards, what is wrong with them these days?
The Empire's self-indulgence and distrust have reached a peak lately.
The annual pilgrimage to the Great Hall of Gods has been canceled, and a bunch of stupid theocratic independents have taken up residence.
It's all the fault of the pagan bastards from the north. We didn't have enough soldiers, so we took in barbarians and their beliefs.
In the Lionheart Kingdom, they'll live their entire lives as lowly serfs and die like pigs, but they're treated like people.
I feel like I'm watching a group of trolls in a group task.
~Year 98~
The Imperials have gotten their act together!
The Emperor's bastard son, performing the secret sacrificial rituals of the Evil Cult because he didn't want to die, has summoned a Chaos Lord to the Imperial capital!
The young cub, barely seventy years old, wanted to live forever, so he killed three million people in the capital!
"Ha...."
I summoned the knights, holding the holy sword that was still oiled by last year's killed orcs blood.
~Year 121~
The world is ending.
I have done my best, I slayed demons on behalf of Arianna, the goddess of justice, and sent priests of Demera, the goddess of fertility, to rebuild the farmlands.
Heto, the god of iron and blacksmithing, provided armor and swords for the Holy Knights, and Petos, the god of war and flame, descended upon me to burn the ashes of the battlefield.
In the twenty-third year of the Divine War, a war that began because of the imperials, and slowly led to the destruction of the world.
"Lord Leon."
"Lord Antoine."
The appearance of my arch-rival remained youthful.
As I spoke, by the grace of the Goddess, I looked no different than I had a century ago.
"Be proud, Antoine. Your father has died an honorable death and gone to the feast of the gods."
"Yes...."
I see the soldiers and knights looking at me, comforting the son of a dead father. The final battle… no, the final resistance was starting as I heard the thudding of the earth as the enemy marches on, and the mixed emotions in my people's eyes.
Horror, fear, helplessness, despair.
Alas, Goddess.
Master of the Grail, who has given this lackluster creature a lion's heart, and whose holy sword is lit with a brilliant fire here are thy lambs trembling with fear.
Women soothe their weeping children and swallow their tears, young men clutch the dying embers of war in their hands and knights try to leave seeds of hope in the blood-soaked wilderness.
But not me, lord of the holy sword, lance, and chalice.
I know that I will not be able to stop the evil that stretches beyond the horizon.
Goddess…My Goddess…What shall this foolish knight do?
"Do as thou wilt."
"...."
"My knight. My dear, honorable knight. Your goddess will be with you to the end."
The Goddess is with me.
I will indeed meet my end, and it will be an honorable one.
"For the Goddess, for honor and for Lionheart!"
That winter in my 121st year we fought against the ten million demons that infested the earth.
Barbarian serfs were expended as meat shields, and soldiers armed with spears and shields and knights of glory fell with honor.
Holy Knights ascended one by one, slaying demons until their last breath.
Only I, the agent of the pantheon, chosen by all the gods slaughtered demons alone to the end.
I tore apart countless Demon Lords and Archdemons and shone the divinity of the Holy Knights upon them.
~Year 217~
Winter is not yet over.
~ Year 256~
The last remaining Demon Gate was destroyed and hundreds of thousands of demons looked at me with desperation in their eyes as they lost their escape route.
"Lowly demons! You are now trapped in this world with me, and I will annihilate every last one of you!"
I am not trapped! You're trapped with me, you fucking things!
~ Year 300~
"Holy shit, I've never seen a gate like this before, where the hell am I?"
"Relax, Ha-ri, it's been 13 years since we've seen an Unmeasurable Gate. We don't know what we'll find."
"I know… but what is there in this world that can't be measured?"
"I don't know…Isn't there some kind of high-level demon?"
"Don't say such horrible things."
I was only 300 years old when I encountered Earthlings.
TL Note: I'll just add this here so that readers won't get confused.
Demon Ranks:
-Lesser Demons/ Low-level demons
-Mid-level demons
-Greater Demons/ High-level demons
-Archdemons
-Demon Lord (Lord of Chaos is the title of a lord)