Hey, I'm Kaito. I'd just like to point out how common and how shitty death-loops are. I'm running for my life as we speak from the knights that killed me earlier. I gave it another go pretending to be an actual demon to maybe… scare them into talking? Yeah, I can see how that clearly wouldn't work. This is how it went down.
"Knights defending the noble! Put down thy weapons before I execute all of you, spilling blood is pointless when we could talk."
Silence.
Then the noble stood up, dressed in his luxurious clothing. Disgusting. "That demon dare threaten the prince of the kingdom?"
Huh? This wasn't a scene in ROTD. Oops.
"Kill that foul demon!"
"So you see… It was a joke! A joke!"
They did not put down their weapons. I was in quite the situation. So, with all my might…
I turned on my heel and sprinted. Dashing through the forest back the way I came.
That is exactly how I ended up in this situation. Though, my luck wasn't great. Of course I slipped on some mud and what should have been a simple fall, was me getting flipped upside down and falling onto my head.
Crack
I tried catching my breath. My second death. The pain seemed to really double when I came back. I held back on vomiting this time since it wasn't as bad as getting my head lopped off. It was the same old forest, back as I always am. I guess I should probably figure out magic in this world.
You see, in ROTD the author got lazy, there wasn't some special system of magic, you had the generic types of earth, fire, water, dark, light, and so on. There was a power system however. Each person in this world had their own system in a way, realistically, like a game it was more of a status window where they could upgrade their level based on exp and talent points.
Like a game, the higher your level, the more talent points, the stronger you are. Increasing agility was my go to followed by strength or endurance. But what was the most important was mana capacity. It's true you could use magic, anything you could imagine as long as it fit the attribute. However, it was embarrassingly weak if you are a low level, with limited capacity, it absolutely crushed the power of any spell as to not run your mana to 0, if it does, you might die. It is practically a life force in this world.
Now, the system of power may have been weak, and lazily done, it was the main character that made it popular on earth. Everyone seemed to love him because he was overpowered. But I hated him.
He had so much power, yet allowed people to die, he refused to use his power unless it was for selfish reasons and got something out of it. Sure it was entertaining to a degree, but at one point you'd have to question who the bad guy was in the story. The whole plot is the idea of 8 kingdoms.
There is a 9th kingdom falling apart, and that's the one I need to find my way into so I can talk with the goddess that rules the kingdom. In short, each kingdom has their own god or goddess. Each ruling over a certain race, however they are all at war with each other, obviously humans being the weakest. The idea is that the protagonist goes and defeats all these gods and goddesses, presuming they are evil. No backstory, no real reason. Under the assumption of, for humanity, he slaughters the kingdoms, but is crowned a hero and creates peace. Or does he?
Anyhow, I should probably figure out how to use my status window so I can grasp my level.
I brought my hand forward, as though I was to summon something and yelled out "Status!"
Nothing.
I stood there feeling a bit dumb.
Hey, Zero, what is this? I don't know if you can hear me, but fix this.
Silence.
The wind whooshed and the trees waved with the wind. Am I just crazy?
Bing
Mail notification
So, there was a status window, but mail? That wasn't a thing in ROTD, well whatever.
"Open" I said.
When the mail opened, it was a notice from Zero. Kaito, sorry for the long wait on your status window, I had to rework it so I could contact you from time to time. As a little bonus for your wait, and pathetic second death… You will be boosted to level 10 instantly. With that, good luck, also, please don't act like you have a mental illness. Just think of the status window and it will appear… It was quite the laughing experience…
Wait, seriously? Level 10 already? And wait a minute. I can't help but feel like I was being made fun of in that mail.
Well whatever, I put 6 of my talent points into agility, 3 into strength and 1 into endurance. My mana pool wasn't that low, perhaps it was a further present from Zero. Might as well try it out a little and see what I can do. I brought up my hand and said "fireball!" to which a ball of fire shot out of my hand.
Wait, I'm in a forest, it'll burn down! Uh, uhm- "WATER!" And so water also shot out of my hand and put out the fire. I tried many more attributes and interestingly enough, I could do all of them. How main character like. I avoided finding civilization, I chose to fight monsters this time to gain exp and get stronger so I can defend myself.
Nighttime came and they began to appear. I was confident, I developed a vibration blade made of mana. Basically it was wind around my hand that moved extremely fast to create a sharp like blade. On the outside it looks like a solid translucent white blade, however it's just wind at a fast rate infused with mana, creating that translucent hue. Sadly with my mana pool it is at most the length of a kitchen knife.
The thing about these monsters is that they were disgusting, edgy author. The first monster that I ended up fighting was a wolf, it was rotting, its insides basically spilling out, it was called a rot wolf (horrible naming skills). In short if it even grazes you, you will be infected with rot.
An easy battle, I developed an agility skill known as dash step. It's similar to teleporting but its range is literally as though I dash behind something. In short, as it charged at me, I dashed behind it and slashed through the middle with my mana blade (I'm actually good at naming… right?). As my hand slashed through the rot wolf I felt its flesh and everything and…
"GROSSSSS!" I yelled in disgust, I started shaking my hand to remove all the residue, I mean it was rotting, get it off! +20 exp.
Sadly, yelling was a mistake, I attracted a lot more wolves, to be exact, 6 of them. I was hoping more wouldn't show up, or any other kind of monster.
I decided to get it over with quickly and dashed upwards, then pointing my hand at one wolf and, "Fireball!" Shooting a ball of fire straight into the stomach of the wolf. +20 exp. One down, 5 more to go.
I dashed through 3 of them, slashing each one right down the middle. I had to be proud of my mana blade, it worked very well. Without noticing, one of the wolves jumped behind me and bit at my hoodie. I was lucky enough for it to barely miss my skin, but that was my favorite hoodie!
Getting lucky I quickly brought my hand up and sprayed water on them using water magic, then froze them using cold wind. This way the remainder was immobile. With that I simply punched the last two frozen wolves and they shattered. +100 exp.
After that it seemed calm. It was strangely clear, I couldn't see any other monsters. I traversed the forest. It was eerie in the dark, and I still had to figure out what to do in finding my way to the kingdom. With prior knowledge it should be easy, but a forest is a forest. There was no real map in ROTD.
I kept pushing through the forest until suddenly I heard voices. Humans again. What could they possibly be doing out at night? Humans in ROTD are afraid of monsters, they regularly avoid the night, especially the forest. Unless…
I decided to get closer and when I reached them… I was right.
Slave traders.
Three bandits with a carriage clearly covered up to hide the slaves. I decided to listen in on their conversation, though to be fair I was already about to attack them. If there was one thing I hated in any world, it was slavery.
"What sour luck, only one slave we could find."
"That's quite a'ight this girl here will pack us a good amount of money. A vampire after all…"
"Won't that make her a dangerous slave though?"
"Not at all, she has been starved of blood for enough time. No matter how strong it is, it can't fight back when food is needed."
Disgusting. As they talked to each other. It wasn't a human, but a vampire being treated like this? Regardless of the reason, I couldn't stand it. I grew angry. But killing a human… Could I really do it?
Even though I've done it before back on earth…
Anyway, I don't find pleasure in killing humans, what should I do? Perhaps talking? Not with those nasty weapons at their side. I don't think I have much of a choice. I'll try knocking them out instead.
I leveled up a fair amount from the wolves, level 13 wasn't that high, I spent the 3 talent points gained from my 3 level ups and put them all into strength. Now I could definitely knock out some bandits with a good hit.
I snuck up on the one in the back, poor loner, this is why you can't be alone in the dark. I chopped the back of his neck and he fell to the ground with a grunt. The other two hadn't noticed chatting away about the money they'd make off the vampire girl. Poor girl… Vampire or not.
I then dashed forward and slashed the ankle of one of them with my mana blade, causing him to drop and scream in agony, to end that suffering I chopped the back of his neck and used heal. I wasn't a murderer.
Quickly spinning around I sent a kick straight into the other bandits face. I think I saw a tooth flying. Sorry bud, find a new career path and learn from your mistakes okay? As soon as I knew he was knocked out I went to the carriage to check inside.
In the dim carriage, she sat bound by rusted chains, her wrists marked by the weight of her restraints. Her long white hair, unkempt and tangled, cascaded past her hips, contrasting sharply with her pale, almost translucent skin. Her crimson eyes, dull yet piercing, stared blankly ahead as though lost in a distant place. Her petite frame seemed far too fragile to be treated like this. However something felt extremely off about her calm, though clear traumatized state.
Nonetheless I went in and broke the chains off. To calm her, I said, "I'm Kaito, don't worry you're safe now."
She glanced up at me slowly, as if perhaps seeing hope. She didn't trust me, no, but she saw hope in the fact I had freed her. She made no attempt to attack me, even though she was filled with hunger. I patted her head, "It's alright, may I ask for your name?"
With her voice, barely above a whisper, "...Alice"
"Alice? I see. A pretty name that suits a vampire."
She flinched at the mention of her being a vampire. I don't know what it was. Perhaps the fact that she seemed so fragile, or how much I hated that the protagonist of ROTD would probably leave her to die, or just kill her seeing her as a monster. I could never. I was going to protect her and help her 'till she is ready to go off on her own.
I guided her out of the carriage where the bandits were still knocked out.
"Well, I'm not particularly sure where to go, might as well find shelter 'till morning."
As I spoke, Alice simply nodded in my direction. I could tell she was wary of me, but again, what else did she have? Poor girl.
As I pondered her mistreatment I had failed to notice a very small detail. One of the bandits was missing. At that moment, I almost lost everything.
In a split second as I turned to look at Alice, the bandit ran at her with a knife. Sick fuck! I yanked Alice to the side keeping her safe and slammed my foot into the bandit's face knocking him out. It definitely broke a few teeth.
"EEEK!" Alice yelped.
What was she worried about, I turned to see her scared face.
"K- Kaito… your…" Before she could finish I looked down at my hip.
Another bandit had awoken and stabbed me in the hip. I was bleeding out.
"You dare steal our product?!" He yelled.
I tried getting mad, but the stab, I should have put more points in endurance. That's when it hit me. Something horrifying. Killing humans in the world of ROTD grants you 350 exp points, and more if they are higher level or nobles. I think I knew what I had to do, but… I didn't want to be a murderer.
I considered dying and letting it happen, preparing better next time. However, it is not worth dying like this, the pain I have to endure, and what if I really die? Maybe my death-loop has a limit. Either way I didn't want to die, death wasn't fun, I had it happen to me three times now. I wasn't just going to kill myself or let myself die just because I can come back.
Then...
The other bandit that I had kicked, grabbed Alice. I don't know what went through me but my vision got blurry as the bandit twisted the knife. Something about hearing Alice scream flipped a switch in me. I looked down towards the bandit trying to kill me and…
+350 exp.