Having spoken, Kino closed his eyes, preparing to continue his eternal slumber.
However, as previously mentioned, those words were not tangible entities floating in the air, but were directly imprinted upon his visual nerves, rendering the act of closing his eyes meaningless—he could see them regardless.
After refusing to sign the contract, the words before him twisted and shifted, appearing in an overwhelming cascade, line after line:
[Contract Signing Failed]
[Abnormal Entity Scan In Progress...]
[Trait: Arrogance]
[Triple Shackles Unsealed]
[Effect: The Mark of the Refuser]
In an instant, the words shattered, and Kino was momentarily blinded by a blazing light. He instinctively opened his eyes and found that the strange darkness around him had begun to manifest indescribable, fluid-like substances, which began to coalesce into a singularity.
As it exploded in a dazzling burst like a firework, he realized—it was the universe's primordial big bang.
Basic particles, chemical elements, light, electromagnetic fields... The silent void began to form matter, an illusionary mirage, stars in motion, time warped into a vector observable as human eyes perceive length, width, and height.
One minute was 60 seconds, one second was 1,000 milliseconds, microseconds, nanoseconds, picoseconds... A moment became infinite, an endless temporal rift stretching beyond measure, transforming into an intangible, howling torrent.
As the flood of time enveloped his body, Kino felt as if the very heavens were spinning, his body floating and sinking like a vessel at sea, seawater pouring into his nose and mouth unnoticed. His senses dulled, and only the rhythmic beating of his heart filled his ears. The black ocean swelled across his vision, with waves rising higher and higher until they consumed him entirely.
...
Darkness...
Chaos...
No warmth.
No sound.
Only the gradual fading of consciousness remained.
When the darkness stretched to its limit, his vision fractured into a tapestry of flickering patterns. Countless specks, like a blizzard of snowflakes, danced before his eyes. A soft, ethereal song seemed to reach his ears, pulling Kino from his slumber.
When Kino opened his eyes once more, he found himself in a dimly lit room. On the table, a filthy oil lamp flickered weakly, casting a faint glow. The walls, yellowed with age, stood as silent witnesses to time's passage. The furniture was old and worn, cracked by years of neglect, and the table was missing several pieces, with traces of woodworm gnawing at its surface.
It was night. Looking through the window, Kino saw an endless stretch of dark sky, while ancient buildings, unmistakably out of place in the modern world, lined the street beneath the glow of torchlight.
He reached up to his forehead, finding no blood or bullet hole, and his body felt no discomfort—everything that had happened seemed like a dream.
"Can't understand human speech, can you?" He felt as though he had been toyed with.
Sign the contract and be reborn, don't sign the contract and be reborn—what's the point of asking?
This time, Kino's rebirth was devoid of the typical "memory flashback." He carried only the genuine memories of his previous life, without the knowledge of this new body's past, and was entirely unfamiliar with the world he now inhabited.
He picked up the oil lamp and surveyed the room. In the corner, he spotted a full-length mirror. He walked over and gazed at his newly reborn self in the glass.
The oil lamp illuminated his dreamlike amber eyes, its orange-red glow casting across his delicate frame, revealing a classical military-style uniform. The collar, left undone, hung lazily open, hinting at the graceful curve of his collarbones, while his skin seemed to shimmer in the firelight.
His appearance had not changed.
It was identical to his past life, with not a single difference.
He examined the uniform on his body and soon noticed a metallic nameplate hanging from his chest. It bore an inscription—Kino, Civil Administrator (Xilin Town).
The script did not belong to any known language from his previous life, yet he could read it effortlessly, suggesting that his brain's reading faculties had been tampered with.
A question inevitably arose in his mind: How had his identity been resolved in this form of transmigration?
Was there already a person named Kino, identical to him, in this world, who had been replaced by him after his arrival?
Or was it that this world never had him at all, and some supreme force had transplanted both his body and soul, artificially inserting him into this reality? Had it used vast computational power to restructure the relationships of everyone around him, allowing him to blend seamlessly into this world?
No matter which scenario it was, the capabilities of the supreme entity were beyond imagination.
As Kino continued his exploration, his consciousness shifted, and suddenly, an interface appeared before him: Reward Points, Evolution Points, Special Reincarnation Talent, Exchange Center, Exchange History...
However, everything was gray, unresponsive to any interaction, as though the system had crashed.
At the top of the interface, a line of crimson text stood out: The Mark of the Rejector.
Below it, an annotation read: Rejecting the Contract renders one unable to accept tasks, unable to complete trials, unable to awaken Reincarnation Talents, unable to exchange items with Reward Points, unable to enhance genes with Evolution Points, and subject to Reincarnation Invasion, becoming a target for Reincarnators' hunting.
Kino quickly grasped that this "Mark of the Rejector" was akin to a debuff or a penalty in a game.
It was like a player who used cheats and was subsequently punished.
He had been punished for rejecting the contract.
"Is rejecting you once really worth all this trouble?" Kino couldn't help but smile.
Amidst the various restrictions, he noticed a crucial piece of information—Reincarnation Invasion, becoming a target for the Reincarnators.
Below, a series of numbers constantly ticked down:
[335:56:01]
[335:56:00]
[335:55:59]
With each passing second, the number would decrease by one, clearly marking a countdown.
335 hours, 55 minutes, and 59 seconds—roughly 14 days remaining, assuming a 24-hour day in this world.
What would happen when the countdown reached zero was not hard to deduce from the current information.
Classical literature or popular fiction, Kino had never been picky about his reading material. He read world-famous classics as well as online novels, and he was no stranger to the concepts of transmigration and endless realms.
In a typical "endless flow" narrative, the protagonist would traverse various reincarnation planes, completing tasks to earn rewards, breaking limits at the brink of death, and gradually growing stronger.
However, because he had rejected the contract and been marked with the Mark of the Rejector, he would not enjoy the privileges of such a protagonist.
Moreover, he had gone from being the one completing tasks to becoming the target of those very tasks.
Once the countdown reached zero, it was easy to guess—an invasion force of Reincarnators would enter this world and hunt him down.
To go from hunter to prey was a devastating shift, a fall from grace. He would surely regret his decision, wishing he had simply signed the contract—yet, that was not Kino's thought.
He found his current predicament rather intriguing. The Mark of the Rejector was not a mere vengeful punishment, but something far more profound.
Because...
His amber eyes subtly shifted, and the interface also changed, revealing a new domain—a vast sea of stars, its nodes split into three columns, standing like three colossal pillars amidst the dense cosmos. Fluorescent light swirled and gathered, gleaming brightly before his eyes:
[Rejector's Trait: Arrogance][Threefold Shackles: Respect, Fear, Reverence]