It was dark. Excessively dark to see anything. Where was I? What even happened to me? Am I still alive? Several questions were running through my mind, and then.

Those questions were enough to jump-start my mind again.

My name was Otani yuu. Just another 35 years of age in a suit. And when I shoved my best friend aside on the street, some random freak shot me. Nice I remembered all of that. Which meant I must be fine.

The atmosphere around me was completely dark, as if I were blind. Even if I had tried to figure out where I was, it would have been futile. That was the extent of the darkness. But rather than simply sitting somewhere, it was better to try. So I gave a quick scan at my surroundings.

Bloop!

Hah! As inevitable. Nothing odd to be seen out here.

Wait! Did I truly escape that trembling death? When I opened my eyes for the last time, I knew I was being transported to the hospital. Now that I think about it, what I blurted out there was genuinely embarrassing.

Kill me, please.

Whatever the case, I do possess consciousness, don't I? So I must be all right.

A reality suddenly struck me like a thunderbolt with millions of volts.

Whoa, whoa, judging by this darkness. Am I unconscious or has anything like my backbone been broken? Or is it a well-known lucid dream? Or did I suddenly go blind?

No! I screamed.

Who's going to feed me? Who is going to replace my underwear?

No! I hollered once more.

No...no.. wait. It is best to thoroughly consider your options than to panic in this way. No need for panic, that wasn't like me anyway. I was known for having a savvy and composed mind in entire college. In a manner like of Buddha. The last time, I overreacted, was during the finals of my middle school, and all I did was to shit in my pant.

So let's divert from these unwanted thoughts. Even though I can't think nearly as well as others can, I can still do that. Whenever I began going ballistic, I generally found it accommodating to think of some cheerful events. That was the thing I mentioned earlier.

.....

Blink..Blink...

Ah! Nothing comes to mind. Then, what can I do? What should I do? ....

"S.... Shimada." It naturally slipped, and continued, "Where is he?"

He should be around if he was next to me when I was being transported to the hospital. I panicked, my head darting left and right as nothing more than to search him.

Huh! I'm sure that if I had been in a ward, I would have been welcomed with cold air. Though, when I opened my mouth, a warm, slick ooze flooded.

Bloop! Bloop!

"WACK!" I spewed as a intrinsic reaction.

Bloop! Bloop!

I quickly gulped down more of that slimy stuff. I felt like I was drowning. Or, is this a dream and I'm in hell? That thought crossed my mind at that particular moment.

I began to panic aggressively, my both hands fluttered to extreme.

"Mmmm...."

Huh?! What exactly is this? Just moving my hands downwards was exhausting. To put it another way, it was neglecting my hands.

Are my hands fashioned into branches in hell? I could sense how flimsy and insignificant my hands were.

Maybe even more dense than my body was the liquid. My hands refused to budge even a millimetre, no matter how forcefully I tried to move them. When an air-filled plastic bottle doesn't submerges in water, it behaves likewise. Simply put, the density was overwhelming.

On the one hand, because the area was already scorching, the concentrated movements quadrupled the temperature. Secondly, I was drowning in the slime liquid in a rapid way.

"Mmm.."

Now, even though this was odd, I couldn't give a damn about it. All I wanted was to get away from this misery. I experienced what people who drowned must have felt. Not to mention that I was probably in an even hazardous circumstance.

My movements were brisk. You might think that I should have given the situation more thought. But that wasn't the case this time. As a human, I could care less about minor thoughts. It was clear that I was in a panic, acting like I were a novice swimmer drowning in water. My dead soul in the hell was drawing closer to death, too. I could swim, therefore it would have been amazing if I had been drowning in water. But this specific moment was neither accepting nor giving me any time to think about it.

"CRACKKK...!"

I heard something. It wasn't voice precisely, yet something like violent commotion came straightforwardly into my ears.

To be honest, it made me extremely happy. I was in absolute darkness, and was dying only a moment ago. No signs pointed to save my life. At least this demonstrated that I wasn't going to die or in any hospital.

The first thing I noticed were the flashing white lights. It swelled until it filled my entire range of vision. Despite the fact that it was as hazy as a dream, it instilled hope in me. My eyes, which were covered with blank white lights, opened midway through. That hope of brightness became too much for my eyes to bear. So I squinted in anguish as the world before me darkened once more. However, unlike before, it was unable to make me feel helpless.

I followed the rays that I had vaguely envisioned to the map that I had processed in my mind. The map could vanish at any time. As a result, my odds of survival could be reduced.

Inside my tiny head, a plethora of options began to emerge. I merely held up the faintest hope that it may be among possibilities. And there, at the source of that magnificent light, was the answer to it.

It appeared that distance was two heads of mine between us. Undoubtedly suspicious. How did they manage to get my head to fit here exactly? This must then be hell, right? I wouldn't want to take a chance if it is. Who knows—there might be a more horrifying penalty?

""BANG!""

Ouch! Seriously, what was that? Despite being struck by a muddy thing, my shoulders were strong enough to break it. Huh-ha-ha. Seems like the Lucifer-made casket couldn't withstand my powerful strength.

"Hdada bdgha." A strange yet recognizable sound got louder.

Do they know anyone I know?

They had a similar voice, but their speaking style or language was completely foreign to me. It wasn't even a language that I was familiar with. In fact, none of the words I heard matched it. Well, for my own benefit, I had to study a few languages. And even though English was my second language, it was the one I knew the most about. I had to do that because of my field of employment.

"Acusheibs savh Bevz." The voice kept going. The dominating black eyelid transformed to a full brown yellow. And the frigid air struck me across the face.

Hu....Hu... it's cold, maybe because I came from Goo, it was freezing at there.

I reached the source, to sum up.

I threw the flavourless liquid out of my mouth and nose while making a noise. All I could sense was relief at that instant.

My eyes slowly started to open after that. The white light was as unbearable to my eyes as it had been before. It was therefore best for me to carefully open my eyes. I struggled to open my eyes as the first blazing beam came in. However, each step made it easier for my eyes to acclimatize to the brightness. To fully open the eye, I had to take three steps. It seems that I had been here for quite some time. So was I in any kind of advanced technology?

"Uh!" I said as I focused and balanced my vision.

What I had thought up to this moment was immediately dispelled by the scene in front of me. None of the possibilities fit what I was seeing.

It would have been more accurate to call it a black-and-white reality. I could see something was blurring the scene in front of me. However, a young woman was gazing intensely at me. She was grinning evilly. A true devil stood in front of me. She stood about six feet tall and had two noticeable horns on her forehead. White skin, completely black hair, and fully dark eyes.

Is she in command? I pondered.

A man who was larger than her was nearby; his hair was dressed in a white wig, and his cruel grin was directed at me. His gaze was fixed on me.

"Fuck! My gut feeling was correct." I yelled.

Those words were supposed to be heard as usual, yet they sounded completely foreign.

Have they been able to charm my voice? I am truly doomed if it happens.

No! I suddenly started sobbing uncontrollably.

They resembled demons in every way. Two goat-like horns, complete black and white covering, and an evil grin. They are the devil, correct?

My tears streamed down like water. I should have perhaps stayed there. What the heck did I do to deserve this, anyway?

I stopped screaming as I pondered it. Isn't that correct? I'd never committed a sin in my life. So what brought me here?

I started to sob once more.

Upon hearing my cries, the lady hastily hurried over to me. Not only did she run here, but so did the male demon. It was too foggy to determine with any degree of accuracy if they had come to kill me. As a result, I closed my eyes to block out whatever was in front of me. Opening eyes might have been preferable. Because they would have taken more precautions to punish me if I had opened my eyes. Let us just pray they don't kill me.

I opened my eyes after that to find myself on the female devil's hands. What? She did something unusual enough to make a 35-year-old feel sick.

"Hey! You, woman! That's ridiculous! Don't open it, I told you! There should be a limit to your punishment!" I yelled, yet a gentle word rang in my earbuds.

What exactly is going on here? That same female devil was taking one of her private parts. The male devil was standing at her shoulder, directly over her, smirking wickedly. He was really front about how nice it made him feel to witness me sobbing.

"No!"

"..." It entered my mouth.

The silky raggy thing ejected a gentle sweet, accentuated with almond flavor, that entered the taste buds, as if a nibble of chocolate was there.

This is unacceptable!

At that moment, I experienced a profound sensation of embarrassment, but in some parts of my mind, it helped me feel at ease. For an old person like me, that was very horrifying. However, it passed me with a chilly wind. That brought out all of my worry and anxiety. Then, for a brief period, the anxious brain up until this point calmed down.

.....

...

...

..

.

After over three hours, I was still falling into the pitch-black abyss. I was filled with countless thoughts. Although I realized by this point that they had never attempted to harm me, I still wanted to slap those demons.

I couldn't understand how anything up to this point could have possibly happened. This posed the question: "Where was I even?" At first, I imagined this location to be hell, which had apparently been destroyed by circumstances. The second hypothesis was that perhaps Shimada and my uncle tricked me. No, it wasn't realistically viable to do this. It wasn't a joke—it was too true. They also didn't have any money to play such a cruel joke on me.

So let's summarize what has occurred thus far. It all started with a shot. To the hospital I was being hurried. My eyes then open here all of a sudden. The location seemed strange. My vision was too hazy, my earbuds were picking up a strange language, and most importantly, the world was in black and white. People varied greatly from one another. Oh, and by the way, according to all accounts, I couldn't hear. This was thus another key point.

Even though it was irrational to think in this way, this was the only response that made sense at this point:

"""' I was born again."""""

In this way, the reality of my situation had finally sunk in. I was reborn in a different world.

I had no clue about what I was like. All I could think was that unquestionably a sort of imagination beast I knew all about. Was I sort of Chicken? The thing "my surroundings were all black-white" made impossible to know what I looked. But I knew, I was something similar to chicken.

*

A few days have passed since I arrived in this world atypically. How many, I couldn't tell exactly. Being a regular person, it seemed inconceivable to me that it would take place at some point in the future.

In any case, let's go on to the primary idea. It was absolutely bizarre, like water turning into oil, to find an old man like me resurrected into this tiny body. Every assistance a toddler would require had to be given to this small body. I needed to urinate, eat, and most importantly, I required the highest level of care. I appreciate that devil girl for looking after me.

I guess it's best to call her my mom from now on.

Well, my vision remained unchanged from before. With my ears still not functioning, all I could see was in black and white. Mom remained the same so. My events had always focused around this type of stuff. The environment I was in felt curiously bizarre enough that every time the warm turned to cold, I bursted my ass off. I was in charge of my body, yes. However, it was a normal reaction. The body can be responding to the sun's calming effects. And nobody knew it better than my body did.

Thus this was sufficient to drive a 35-year-old man crazy. At some point, the result of my frustration caused my mother to spend the entire night with me. I felt so much shame over that. So, starting at that point, I changed to fit my parents' routine.

.....

.....

....

..

.

As of now, the time I spent here felt excessive. According to my calculations, it had been a month since I arrived to this conclusion.

I was actually in a room with a lot of wonderful and opulent characteristics. The walls were serious and brightly colored in a golden hue with a touch of red as well. It was brimming with various accoutrements. It would probably be over 30 or more if I started it.

From the entrance of room, to the top left corner was my softest bed. The designs of bed were intuitive: it had a bowl-like shape and was composed of the most flexible solid. The large windows, which seemed like a TV, were just next to my bed. It was too low where the window ended. If I were to stand in front of it, I would be able to witness the breathtaking scene, which included the captivating shiny nursery packed with restrictions, yew trees, and the gravelled street convergent with the bermuda field in a happy world. As the spectacle progressed to its peak, the lengthy massive colliding with dull blue sky appeared to be a conflict between green and blue colours. By the way, my vision started to return to normal at this point.

I could see practically all secondary colors, including red, blue, yellow, and green.

This home was a mansion, too. My room was located on the second floor. The way things stood, the distance was too dreadful for a small body to manage. My dad was the one who was hired to drive me around. Quite a facility I got there. Hehe.

My appearance came next. A wonderful, large mirror was located in the middle of a wall in my room. There you go. My entire body was purple and had jagged point scales. I had four tiny legs, which were strong enough to support me, but they couldn't go any farther. In other words, I could walk around my room. Similar to this, my wings were tiniest that it was better to refer to them as buds.

And that's how I discovered I had been reborn in this world as a dragon. A western dragon, perhaps. To be honest, it kind of sucked to be a monster who was once a human.

Uh.. It wasn't the time for it. I suppose I should just accept it. Accept that my soul had been reborn within a monster from another world, complete with all of my previous life memories. But why did I have all of my memories from my previous life? It was a little perplexing. Not that I was complaining, but who could imagine someone being reincarnated with all of their memories—to say nothing of that insane dream being true?

The chances of this happening looked astronomically low to me. But.... it happened...

So, yep, I was born from an egg and had been living with my parents. Oh! It was already late, but my mother's name was Elsa and my father's name was Rhine. If I had to guess based on their appearance, I'd say they were in their twenties. But they weren't that young. The reason was straightforward—dragons were supremely strong creatures with the greatest lifespans in my prior reality. So it would be a good guess to say they were in their ninth century. Of course, compared to my prior existence, they were a zillion times older. My 35 years old would be considered to be young. Nevertheless, they were still my parents. The primary factor that changed was having guardians in my current life, which was definitely a joyous actuality.

....

...

...

..

.

The days passed like a rapid transition of mother nature, and it had been one year since I realized I was a dragon. My bodily components were almost developed at this stage. I was able to distinguish between various colors like yellow and blue and light and dark, as well as hear clearly. I could taste the various flavors of this world. And let me tell you, this planet was home to a wide variety of spices. Naturally, it also applied to my nose. I was able to get a good lung of air. Hah...

Apart from that, I still wasn't able to walk correctly. If expressed as a percentage, I would estimate it was close to 70%. Awesome, right?

Lastly, I had started to talk. And because the words were a complete combination of Roman, Greek, Japanese, Korean, and finally Mandarin, it was somewhat challenging to learn. No, that was far more difficult than learning a complete semester of engineering.

You have no idea how difficult it was for me. The circular words, which appeared to be the same at first glance, were spoken differently. Various vocabularies for different worlds. That was the worst.

But none of my actions had ever been quick; it seemed abnormal. My brain might have been a better learner because I had a new body. Given my modest size and experience, I had advantages and opportunities to speed up my learning.

As a result, I frequently learned something new about the world by listening to my family members chat.

Overall, they were excellent guardians who continually paid attention to me in every detail, which greatly increased my level of happiness. Now, we shouldn't diverge from the topic at hand.

After questioning my parents for a year, somehow. The different kinds of species in this planet were something I knew. The three main categories of living things in this world of magic and sorcery can be predicated on their capacity for reproduction. First, there were many species that shared a lot of traits with humans and had the ability to conceptualise. Races like dwarves, other forms of pixies, mythological creatures, and beastmen and women were among them. They sided with humans the majority of the time.

Along with it, there were races like goblins, harpies, and others that were hostile to humans and treated as monsters as a result. The main difference was that although these organisms had reproductive abilities equivalent to humans, they lacked brains. But in each case of [Evolution], their knowledge reserves grew, thus this only applied to a limited extent.

The idea that animals may be intelligent is quite unsettling.

This hostility wasn't innate to their biology, so crossbreeding was possible.

Lastly, was the "mana-born being". The catch-all word for creatures that evolved from mana-monsters and people that manifested themselves as beings of mana. They were knowledgeable and capable of regeneration, but only within their subspecies. Crossbreeding was thus impossible. These included long-lived races like vampires, giants, and demons. They were all equally capable of procreating, albeit they did so infrequently because their powerful magical forces rendered them high immortal, eliminating the need to leave behind heirs.

Furthermore, these mana-born weren't so much antagonistic to humans as they were feared and desired for their abilities. However, it persisted that all races were engaged in a struggle to preserve their living species. The level of threat had been used to categorize these diverse monsters. The mana-higher born's ranks were crammed with pretty potent skills, all of which were capable of leveling a human village by themselves if they so desired. Not the kind of people you'd want to live nearby.

Dragons also lacked the ability to reproduce, which was never problem for our species. The explanation was sensible: Dragons don't need to. But in my instance, I was clearly a unique case. Why do you inquire? Because my father belonged to the divine dragon, the highest species of dragon. And my mother was a divine dragon, even more magnificent than my father. Not that they were special just because they were divine dragons. But the reason was actually because divine dragons could take on Human form. They could mate with just about anyone. It meant that in terms of reproduction, they were at the top of the reproduction chain. That's why I said I was exceptional.

Anyway, these species were thought to be among the most strong in the world, as well as the most remarkable and superior. To take into account, there were unique species of dragons in the many dragon races. Most dragons belonged to one of three types: divine, emperor, or dragon. The rankings' potential and power also changed. My parents and I were definitely Divine dragons.

The disparity between these three species was also the coolest and most fascinating aspect. Every species' differences in skills, prowess, and mana were distinct. Their differences, if I had been able to evaluate them, would have been comparable to those between stars and planets. I had no idea there would be such a drastic difference between similar races.

Even though these statistics were distinct to look at, my advancement lagged behind it. This was undeniable; my parts developed more quickly than those of humans. The evidence for it came from the current circumstances.