Chapter 1: A Different World
"Let's make a kebab out of his backpack!"
After getting beaten by his school bullies, Noah thought they would finally give up on him.
He wanted to spend the rest of his day aching from their punches, but one bully suddenly brought up the idea of "kebab," which meant turning his backpack inside out.
Sneering, the bullies emptied Noah's backpack.
Amid the falling textbooks, his worn-out glasses case dropped to the floor and opened on impact.
One lens cracked, hurting Noah more than his throbbing bruises.
He bit his lip and closed his eyes.
'Mother will yell at me…' he thought.
She always yelled whenever he came home with bruises and dirty clothes.
Since glasses were more expensive than clothes, he kept them deep in his backpack during breaks, but the bullies had to do this damn kebab.
As if sensing his pain, a bully laughed.
"Hey, look, his glasses!" he said, then stomped on them without hesitation.
Noah's heart shattered.
How did he end up here, all alone in the bathroom with bullies towering over him every day for no reason?
He only wanted a quiet, normal life in school, then escape reality at home, until he could be independent.
Yet that felt impossible now.
He couldn't talk back to them.
They were taller, stronger, and no one wanted anything to do with him, including his parents.
He wouldn't be surprised if they kicked him out today.
It was his eighteenth birthday, after all.
Would he even survive in the adult world?
'Maybe there's no place for me in this world…' Noah thought.
At that moment, reality warped around them.
The school bathroom changed into a cold cave.
Noah felt the rough ground beneath his back.
Darkness filled every nook and cranny.
His four bullies looked around in confusion and fear.
Two started yelling, thinking someone turned off the lights, while the other two tried sticking together.
They ignored Noah, whose heart pounded louder and louder.
Strangely, he wasn't afraid.
His own heartbeat calmed him, as if someone whispered that everything would be okay.
He closed his eyes.
Dark tendrils emerged from his body, wrapping him in a cocoon.
Unbeknownst to him, his body was awakening.
He had appeared in a world where people awakened their abilities at eighteen.
By a strange twist of fate, Noah arrived here on his eighteenth birthday.
His bullies weren't so lucky.
They were all still seventeen, with one turning eighteen in three weeks.
Something growled nearby.
"W-what was that?!" one bully shouted.
"I don't know!" another yelled.
"Don't scream, idiots!" a third hissed.
A rodent the size of half an adult stood at the cave's entrance.
It had long black teeth that seemed to hide in the darkness.
Its tail ended with a sharp tip.
Standing on two legs, it brandished its paws and quickly spotted the four frightened humans.
They had no energy, which meant easy prey.
They wouldn't be as tasty as the stronger humans raiding its home, but flesh was still flesh.
The rodent pounced and rammed into them, biting deep into one bully's leg.
"AHHHHHHH!" the victim screamed and fell on his ass, clutching his wounded calf.
Blood dripped in abundance after the rodent's tail sliced his forehead.
While his screams echoed, his friends panicked and ran in all directions.
They banged on the cave walls, unable to see the single exit where the rodent waited.
Anyone who tried to escape became its next victim.
Suddenly, the rodent stopped toying with them.
It turned and noticed the dark cocoon.
It hadn't sensed it before, but now it felt strong energy coming from it.
Inside the cocoon, Noah heard the screams and realized something was hunting his bullies.
He felt no sympathy for them.
It was as if karma finally caught up with them, and he was finally getting help.
He then realized he was the one who had awakened powers here.
That was when he heard someone tearing at the cocoon.
"You must be in there, loser!
Get out!
It's mine!
You don't deserve it!
You're shit no one wants!
You exist to get bullied and stomped!
You die here, not me!"
Those words pushed Noah to break free.
He tore through the cocoon and emerged to a world he could see perfectly in the dark.
He no longer needed glasses.
One bully was on the ground near the cocoon, stunned by Noah's sudden appearance.
He reached for the cocoon's edge, but Noah stomped on his hand, crushing it.
"AHHHHHHHHH!" the bully screamed, even louder than before.
Meanwhile, the rodent continued slaughtering the others.
Noah remembered the insults he just heard and felt something shift in his heart.
He was done staying quiet.
He looked down at the trembling bully.
"I really want this rat to stay alive so it can eat all of you," Noah said. "Then it can shit you all over the place."