2026-01-02 21:53:42Hot water poured down over his body the moment he turned the handle.
Soren froze for a split second, then laughed under his breath. No waiting. No rust-colored trickle. No boiling uncertainty. Just clean, endless heat cascading over his shoulders and down his back. Steam filled the bathroom as he tilted his head back, eyes half-lidded, letting the water wash away sweat that no longer smelled like blood or rot. His body this new body was solid. Muscular. Strong in a different way. Not forged through endless combat alone, but well-fed, intact. He stared at his hands as they might vanish. “I’m really… back.” When he stepped out, a towel draped over his head, he pressed a button on the wall. Whoosh. Cool air flooded the room instantly. Soren inhaled sharply. Air that didn’t stink of ash or decay. Air that didn’t scrape his lungs raw. He walked to the window and pulled the curtain aside. A clear blue sky stretched endlessly above towering buildings. Cars moved in neat lines far below. People walked laughing, arguing, living without swords in their hands. “This is great,” he murmured. “It’s nothing like that filthy place.” His reflection stared back at him from the glass between city and self. Twenty years had passed. On Earth too. “…What should I do first?” he muttered. “Games maybe” A piercing alarm cut through the air. Testing. Testing. Attention all residents. Soren’s smile vanished. An erosion point has appeared within the apartment complex. Please evacuate to the underground shelter immediately. “…What?” The floor trembled. Screens around the city lit up, showing footage of the impossible space cracking like brittle glass, people screaming as something unseen dragged them downward. “An erosion point…?” His chest tightened. “What the hell is going on?” He was already moving when the building shuddered again. Cracks spread across the pavement outside like spiderwebs. People ran. Something climbed out. Soren leapt down the stairs two at a time, heart pounding. “Damn it…!” He shook off whatever had chased him through the hallway and skidded to a stop. A kid stood frozen in the chaos. “Hey!” Soren grabbed him by the arm. “It’s dangerous here. Get to the shelter now.” The boy stared at him, eyes burning with strange resolve. “I want to kill them.” “…What?” “Didn’t you see where the monsters went?” the kid said. “Come with me.” Soren stared. Idiot. But thirteen years. Thirteen years since this had begun. Doors are opening at random. Monsters are pouring out. No warning. No pattern. “So you’re telling me,” Soren said slowly as they moved, “that nobody knows when or where these things show up?” “Yep.” The unfairness twisted something deep in his chest. “So that hell… followed me.” He clenched his fist. “…Damn you, goddess.” The boy kept talking about hunters, guilds, rankings, and weapons streamed on something called MeTube. Apparently, people fought monsters now. Regular people. Just like that other world. Are we repeating the same mistake…? Soren’s senses sharpened. Five presences. No six. One hiding. “…Figures.” His new body wasn’t weak. Not exceptional but enough. And he’d fought worse odds blindfolded. Mana stirred in the air. He stopped dead. “…That’s mana.” It shimmered faintly thin, unrefined, but real. “So Earth has it too.” Heat sparked deep within his chest. Engraved into my soul. Flash. Black fire tore through the air. The monsters didn’t even scream. Steel-less strikes crushed bone. Paradox Flame clung, devouring until nothing remained. The kid stared at him in silence. “You’re… amazing, mister.” Soren exhaled slowly. “Innate ability, huh,” he muttered. “That’s what you call it here.” The flames didn’t fade until the last corpse was gone. “…Persistent,” he noted dryly. Shelter doors burst open as people poured out. A woman in luxury jewelry grabbed the boy, checking him frantically. Soren stepped back. Another explosion rocked the structure. Monsters tore through reinforced walls. Panic erupted. “I really didn’t ask for this…” Soren whispered. He looked at the kid again. “Why?” he asked quietly. “You’re rich. You could hide. Why fight?” The boy met his gaze. “I lost my dad.” Soren didn’t interrupt. “There isn’t anywhere safe on Earth,” the kid continued. “So I’ll become the strongest hunter and erase every erosion point.” Soren studied him for a long moment. Then nodded. “You’ll never save the world.” The kid stiffened. “…Because I will.” Soren turned toward the chaos, eyes sharp. “If you want to survive know your enemy.” The ground trembled again. And the game began.
Previous Chapter
Latest Chapter
The First Enemy on Earth
The thing that stepped through did not belong.That was the first thought everyone in the chamber shared, even before fear had time to fully form.It was not large in the way monsters from erosion points were large. It did not tower or roar or dominate the room with brute presence. Instead, it stood just over two meters tall, its form composed of layered geometry that constantly shifted and corrected itself, like reality was trying to redraw it every second.It had a shape close enough to human to be disturbing.Two arms.Two legs.A head.But nothing aligned properly.Edges blurred. Angles bent where they should not. Parts of it flickered in and out of existence as the distortion field wrapped around the gate struggled to hold it together.The moment both of its feet touched the chamber floor, every sensor in the room screamed.ENTITY STABILIZATION: PARTIALSYSTEM INTEGRATION: INCOMPLETETHREAT LEVEL: UNKNOWNNo one moved.For one second.Two.Then the thing turned its head.Not towa
When the Door Opens Too Wide
The gate did not stabilize.It stretched.At first, it was subtle. The white-black center pulsed a little longer than before, the edges of the ring flickering as if struggling to maintain shape. Then the distortion deepened, and the air in the chamber changed in a way that no machine could measure properly.Pressure.Not physical weight, but presence.Han felt it in her bones before any system reported it.“Jaewook.”“I see it,” he said, voice tight. “The distortion lattice is holding, but something is pushing against it from the other side.”Lyra took a step forward, instinctively placing herself between the gate and the rest of the room. Her hand tightened around her weapon, electricity whispering faintly along the blade.“Is it him?”Han shook her head once.“No.”The gate pulsed again.This time, something stayed.A shape pressed against the threshold, not fully visible, like a shadow cast from the wrong direction. It was too large to be human. Too structured to be a beast. It loo
The Ones Waiting on Earth
On Earth, the first thing people felt was not hope.It was impact.The Hunter Association’s underground research facility shook so violently that dust rained from the ceiling in pale sheets. The experimental gate chamber, which had once been a cold white vault full of expensive equipment and tightly controlled ambition, now looked like the inside of a machine that had survived a lightning strike. Half the monitors were cracked. Three auxiliary cores had burned out completely. The smell of scorched insulation and ionized air clung to every breath.And still, no one left.Director Han Seoyun stood at the center platform, one hand braced against the railing around the gate pit as impossible geometry flooded across the surviving screens. The data was not arriving in human language, but after weeks of studying fragments from Soren’s interference events, her teams had become disturbingly good at recognizing intent hidden inside alien structures.This was not random.He was sending them a de
A Door Earth Was Never Meant to Open
The strike from Earth did not behave like the road.It did not cut cleanly.It did not correct.It tore.The burst slammed through the sealed chamber in a column of unstable force that looked half like light and half like a wound. Where it touched the Empire’s architecture, the road did not simply break. It recoiled. Entire sections of geometry folded in on themselves as if rejecting the foreign energy that had been driven through the gate.For the first time since the system had manifested, the central authority staggered.A jagged hole had been punched straight through the layered structure of its chest. The flowing bridges forming its body trembled violently, trying to reconnect, trying to reassert the perfect order that had defined it from the start.They failed.Not completely.But enough.Soren stood on a fragment of cracked geometry and let out a slow breath through his nose.“There,” he murmured.“Now you’ve got a problem.”The countdown for sector erasure faltered.Not stoppe
Earth Answers Back
The central authority reacted at once.All across the sealed chamber, the architecture tightened, as if the road itself had suddenly become aware of a knife pressed against its throat. The calm voice that had narrated the entire battle without emotion now carried the faintest edge of urgency.“Unauthorized gateway synchronization detected.”Soren looked almost pleased.“There it is.”Behind the fractured gate, the ancient presence shifted in the darkness. The vast, old signal watching from its prison had been amused before. Curious, even. Now it seemed genuinely interested.“You connected to your world.”“Yeah.”The countdown to sector erasure did not stop.“Sector erasure begins in twenty seven seconds.”The void armored entity moved first. It did not lunge at Soren. It pivoted toward the lattice itself, raising both hands as new bands of geometry spread from its body into the surrounding structure. The system was no longer trying to crush him directly. It was trying to intercept the
The Strategist's Real Move
For the first time since the battle began, Soren stopped smiling.The central authority’s voice echoed across the sealed chamber with absolute calm.“Global correction protocol initializing.”The words carried far beyond the chamber.Across the Empire’s network, ancient bridges connecting thousands of conquered worlds began shifting simultaneously. Massive segments of the road locked down as the system prepared something far larger than a localized correction.Soren understood immediately.“They’re going to wipe the whole sector.”The ancient presence behind the gate answered quietly.“Yes.”The void armored entity remained still now, its cracked armor slowly stabilizing under the system’s control. The entity no longer attacked.The system had decided brute force was no longer efficient.Now it would remove the entire battlefield.Soren rubbed the back of his neck.“That's… inconvenient.”The ancient presence spoke again.“You awakened a conflict older than your species.”“Yeah.”Sore
You may also like
His Biggest Secret
ijay17.1K viewsEarth Is In Trouble But With The System, Escape Earth..
Raishico13.9K viewsDestroyer of the Dao
Evanscapenovel27.7K viewsThe Hero of Vengeance
DovahKean16.8K viewsThe Godslayer's Return
Tyna Morrin1.1K viewsJin Mu: THUNDER UNLEASHED
Mide393 viewsTHE CHOSEN ONE (Reunion)
Kim B16.5K viewsScorned Son-In-Law:System of the Forgotten Heir
Oluwatomilola361 1.7K views