Adapting to a new world took just one day. The value I’d had since childhood—“Well, that can happen”—shone just as brightly here.
It helped that I was naturally unperturbed, but more than that, I’d left behind not even a speck of attachment to my previous world.
No loving family, no friend who was like family.
Ah, if there was one thing to regret—probably the savings I’d scraped together to open a clinic someday. I was planning to pop champagne on opening day.
Anyway, I quickly grasped the shape of this second life that had begun.
What bothered me most was that I hadn’t finished reading the original novel, The Prince of Fire: Descendants of the Dragon Slayer.
The novel was the classic setup: the massive Alberian Kingdom waging a Dragon War against monsters.
I never reached the ending, but I didn’t need to. Humans wrote it; no way they let the dragons win. A hero born in chaos defeats dragons and saves humanity—roll credits.
The problem was my character. The name of the body I’d dropped into was Ceryl Aylos. I had no memory of that name whatsoever.
From what I heard, Aylos was a ruined noble house. Nobles in this world possessed unique bloodline magics, but if they didn’t help win wars or make money, they were no different from commoners.
The Aylos bloodline’s power was to read the direction of the wind.
...They counted that as magic? No wonder Ceryl Aylos had no presence in the original.
When I opened my eyes, I was in the 5th Monster Containment Facility located in the Kerno Forest on the border. “Facility” sounded nice; in reality, it was just a discard pen.
The king, who ruled the country, «N.o.v.e.l.i.g.h.t» had attempted to use monsters in the war against monsters. They dragged monsters in and performed brutal torture under the pretext of military training.
And the 5th Monster Containment Facility was where the triple-failures were sent—untrainable, untamable, unsalvageable rejects.
So none of the monsters in the pens here were normal. The people weren’t knowledgeable either.
Just look at Yangsooni—her body broke down because they weren’t feeding her properly. And they tried to douse a fire-type monster with water. They should dunk their own heads in a dish of water instead.
Fortunately, I was a Senior Administrator here. Though that role was... not exactly satisfying.
“Monster Executioner Ceryl.” I was the one with authority to decide which monsters in the facility would be killed.
Which also meant I had the authority to decide not to kill them.
It took me half a day to calculate that. I thought I wasn’t very shocked, but it was the first day I’d fallen into this world, so I was exhausted.
Work hours hadn’t ended yet, but no one could stop a Senior Administrator from returning early. I went back to the musty room I’d first awakened in.
If this was the cleanest place... what did the monsters’ pens look like?
Lying on the bed, sorting out my thoughts, I remembered there was something about the new me I hadn’t checked yet. I recalled there being a mirror by the door and got up.
With a subtle sense of anticipation—like scratching a lottery ticket I was sure had a winning number—I stepped in front of the mirror.
“...What the fuck is this face!”
Startled, I punched the mirror. I had gotten taller and younger, so I thought maybe I’d get a buff to my looks too.
But the face in the mirror was unsettling. Porcelain skin, sharp eye corners, pomegranate-red lips. Glossy black hair, gemstone-like violet irises.
What was the author thinking creating a boy like this?
If you’re going to make someone stand out like this, at least give him hidden royal blood or some grand-secret warlock identity or something.
“Damn it, everything’s still attached, right?”
I groped lower, and upon confirming the reassuring shape of a proper companion, I was satisfied. Who cares if the face is delicate. A man is defined by presence.
***
The appearance was something I never could get used to, but there was at least one part I liked.
“Ceryl, about the Karbe—once we started feeding it freshly cut grass like you said, it calmed down so much.”
“How did you even figure that out? If it keeps behaving like this, we could train it in no time!”
The heinous duo that had been feeding Yangsooni nothing but hay approached. Apparently they’d been diligently feeding hay thinking they could tame her that way.
The blond idiot and the brown-haired fool. Just looking at them made my chest tighten.
“I have a personal theory.”
“Oh? What is it? Teach us too!”
“That when idiots are diligent, they become a problem.”
Those types are more helpful doing nothing. Better that than showing off with nonsense knowledge.
The colder-than-intended tone was extremely satisfying. As expected, the two blinked in slack-jawed confusion. Even that one sentence seemed too much for them to process.
After several seconds of buffering, the blond idiot flushed red.
“Ceryl! Are you calling us diligent idiots?!”
“Is that a compliment or an insult?!”
How did such people end up as a pair? I didn’t want to speak to them anymore. Time to deploy this face’s special move.
I lowered my chin slightly and tightened my brow. My large eyes showed more white, and my violet irises glowed strangely. Instant crazy-eyes.
I just stared.
The two flinched back on reflex.
“W-Why are you looking at us like that?”
Not even worth answering. I simply held the stare. They exchanged a glance, panicked, and scrambled off.
“Did you see that just now? Ceryl’s eyes were weird...”
“Shh, he can still hear you.”
I can hear everything, you bastards.
Thankfully, the original Ceryl and I shared one critical trait: a lone-wolf disposition that didn’t permit people close.
I didn’t know what circumstances made him live such a lonely life. But thanks to that, no one tried to cling to me.
And instead, I collected very cute, lovable, excellent companion monsters.
“Yangsooni, how’s your condition today? Your horn’s shining so nicely.”
“Meeeeeeh—”
“Oh look at you. Steam coming out of your head—are you that happy?”
“Meeeeeee—”
Humans don’t know gratitude, but animals do.
Somehow, she knew I had saved her from that fever, and she greeted me warmly every time I approached.
She used to cry like a screaming deer when her insides were burning, but now her cry had settled into a gentle trembling tone. It was beautiful.
Her pet name was Yangsooni, but her monster classification was Karbe—a B-rank flame-type.
She used the embers in her fleece to breathe fire. And she distinguished between people.
When other administrators came near, flames burst across her body. Especially when those two hay-feeding idiots appeared, she practically erupted like a volcano.
I once said we could set up a campfire next to her, and they glared at me for it.
But in front of me, she lowered her flames. When I hugged her, she adjusted her temperature to pleasantly warm.
“Aww, so warm. So pretty.”
“Meeeeh—”
I rubbed her black fleece, and her short tail wagged side to side. I’d studied mostly small animals, so I didn’t know much about sheep. Turns out sheep wag their tails when they’re happy.
“With you around, I won’t freeze to death in winter.”
Monsters were intelligent enough to communicate. She understood speech and let the embers in her wool flare with shy delight.
I sat in the musty pen, endlessly petting her head. The sight of her long, vertical red pupils brought peace to my heart.
And whenever I felt like that, an unanswerable question rose up.
“Yangsooni. Why am I here?”
The protagonists in the transmigration stories I knew always had goals. To save the world, or change fate. Or to risk their life and craft a new ending.
But Ceryl had no such sense of purpose. I had lost Berry, so was this divine mercy telling me to live a peaceful second life among monsters?
Twisting the singed curls of her wool between my fingers, I drifted into thought.
Just then, some lower-rank handlers passing by began bickering.
“It’s your shift today. I traded with you last week already!”
“Kallen, please. Help me just one more time? I gag just from smelling the dragon.”
“You think I don’t? Just stuff cloth in your nostrils.”
“You’re serious? Like some scrap of cloth is going to block dragon scent?”
Their quarreling faded quickly. Normally I would’ve tuned human voices out automatically, but today my ears perked up.
Resting quietly against Yangsooni, a strange light returned to my violet eyes.
“...There’s a dragon here?”
