Chapter One: Soul Transcending into a Strange Realm

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(To all readers preparing to embark on this journey, please be sure to read the “Work Background” section first to understand the context.)

Snow lay upon thin soil, beside a silent, unmarked tombstone.

With an empty grave, he buried everything of his past.

From a disheartened office clerk who died suddenly, to the lingering memories of a hunted medieval minor noble, he had been struggling to survive for a year in this unfamiliar, wild forested valley of Central Europe.

A year’s time had slowly fused him with this era, known as the darkest age, and fully merged him with the body that retained its original owner’s memories and abilities. The former name had been selectively forgotten—now he was Art Wood Wells, the son of a Lombardy baron stripped of his title and lands, a hunter lost in the wilderness of the southern border of the Duchy of Burgundy.

Three years ago, the original owner of this body, eighteen-year-old Art Wood Wells, gravely wounded, fled north with his father, who had been dispossessed of his lands and title, to escape enemy pursuit, retreating into this dense forest.

In early winter last year, the original Art suffered a severe injury from a fall off a cliff while hunting with his father. Trapped in the valley with scarce medicine, he soon perished one dark night from lack of treatment. At that very moment, from another dimension, the recently deceased soul of the clerk entered this body, which still retained faint memories.

Miraculously, the lifeless Art revived, but soon after, his father, consumed by hatred for the massacre of their family and overwhelmed by despair, passed away. On his deathbed, Old Wells handed Art his lifelong knightly sword, urging him to swear to cleanse their disgrace and restore the family’s honor...

For a year, the soul that had crossed time and space had lived instinctively in this forest, surviving by hunting.

He could not foresee the world ahead because his previous life was unfamiliar with the history of this era, and he sensed vaguely that this world was merely a parallel space, something resembling yet not quite the same.

Arriving in such a realm, perhaps all he could do was continue hiding in this wild valley and forest, wasting away his life...

Until two days ago, when a severe illness nearly claimed his life at the gates of death. Surviving that ordeal awakened him, and he resolved not to merely drag out this second chance at life...

...

Bending over, he cast the final handful of snowy earth onto the grave. He touched the wooden marker and silently vowed, “Burying the past completely, from this moment on, I am Art Wood Wells, and I belong to this age.” Without looking back, the soul who named himself Art lifted the hornbow leaning against the stone and strode into the depths of the forest.

No matter the grand ambitions in his heart, survival was the immediate priority...

...

Beneath a wolfhide felt hat, a pair of hawk-like eyes quietly scanned the surroundings. Suddenly, he raised a hornbow and released an arrow coated in armor-piercing tips—

“Puff!” A wild boar, pierced through the eye socket by the sharp arrow, howled in pain and bolted wildly, shrieking as it fled.

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Art sheathed his bow and hurried after the boar.

After a long chase, the boar finally plunged the arrow deep into its brain through frantic collisions, collapsing with a heavy thud into a snowdrift, twitching its limbs.

Catching his ragged breath, Art dashed forward, drew a hunting knife gleaming with a dark red metallic sheen, and stabbed it through the boar’s neck into its heart. In moments, the snow was stained a deep brownish red...

In the snow lay a heap of boar entrails and fresh blood. A figure hoisting the boar, its tail brushing fir branches, vanished into the forest depths, leaving behind only a series of footprints blurred by the sweeping branches...

Smoke curled upward in a thin wisp. Deep within the forest, beside a wooden cabin by a creek, Art cleaned the boar’s liver, the icy water dripping from his long tied hair like icicles.

After slaughtering his prey, Art immediately buried most of the entrails but usually kept the liver.

Carrying the cleaned liver, he entered the cabin. Compared to the piercing cold outside, the cabin was surprisingly warm. Rough-hewn logs formed thick walls; the thatched roof was tightly sealed. A stone hearth blazed fiercely in the center, filling the small room with waves of heat.

At the back was a wooden bed layered with dry grass and animal hides. On the walls hung a hornbow and an oak longbow, a leather quiver full of arrows, and a short sword about two feet long. Animal pelts adorned every inch of the walls.

Several pieces of boar meat simmered in a clay pot, bubbling with enticing aroma.

Art tossed the liver into the pot. When the broth boiled, he crushed a small pouch of coarse salt into the stew, then ladled a spoonful to his lips. The scalding soup warmed his stomach, spreading a comforting heat through his body...

The hearty pork meal filled him with immense satisfaction after his recent illness.

Night fell, and the forest grew even quieter.

Art pulled a large wooden chest from under the bed, unlocked it, and lifted the lid slowly. Inside lay a finely crafted chainmail, gleaming silver in the firelight. He cupped the heavy armor in his hands, feeling its cold weight and strength.

Using a piece of oil-soaked linen, he polished each iron ring of the chainmail, his mind drifting as he pondered how to fulfill the original owner’s lifelong vow...

Outside, a wolf’s howl shattered his thoughts. Rising, Art took down the short sword from the wall, grabbed a one-and-a-half-foot hunting knife from the table, wrapped himself in a bearhide coat, and stepped outside to check the wooden traps around the cabin’s perimeter fence.

Returning indoors, he brushed snow from his hat, closed the wooden door, and fed the fire with fresh logs, stoking the flames.

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