We followed the reports of a blood-stained traveler to this remote village, pushing through the night to close the gap. What we found upon our arrival was surprising, yet in a dark, twisted way, it felt almost expected. It was as if death itself was trailing this man. Just like the last time I had come close to him on that mountain pass, there were corpses everywhere.

  The village looked as if it had been systematically raided by a disciplined group of bandits. Traces of a desperate struggle were etched into the dirt of the main road, and many bodies were sprawled face-down, clearly cut down while trying to flee for their lives. The heavy, oppressive silence of the morning was punctured only by the muffled sounds of crying echoing from behind locked doors. Not a single living soul was visible in the streets.

  The villager who had acted as our guide—the one who had run all the way to our town to report the criminal's presence—froze the moment he saw the carnage. His face went ashen. This was his home, and in a settlement this small, every corpse cooling in the dust was an acquaintance, a friend, or a relative. He had come to us last night, frantic, informing the guards that the man we were searching for was resting at the local inn. He told us the villagers were planning to keep an eye on him, to hold him there until the law arrived. We followed him back, and this scene was the result.

  I was certain this was Han's doing. He was the man who had survived a two-to-one slaughter against bandits; he was a survivor who left no one else alive. The villager guide suddenly broke into a run toward a nearby house. High-pitched cries erupted from within as he approached, and we followed him to ensure no enemies remained inside. We found him sobbing, clutching a woman and a small girl. The three of them held onto each other with a desperate, bone-deep terror.

  I waited until their initial hysteria calmed enough for them to speak. Slowly, as they realized the "monster" was gone and the soldiers had arrived, people began to emerge from the other houses. They gathered around us, their voices overlapping in a frantic attempt to tell their stories. Most of them had remained barricaded inside, listening to the sounds of the slaughter. Some men who had been part of the initial mob had managed to retreat and hide. They claimed the culprit had stayed in the streets, never forcing his way into a home, which was the only reason they were still breathing.

  According to their account, Han had started attacking and killing without discrimination. They claimed they were only trying to defend themselves and that he had hunted them down even as they begged and ran. They insisted they had done nothing to provoke such a demon. I listened with a grain of skepticism; it was a biased story, and I was well aware that the villagers had been the ones to "poke" him first. By sending a runner to the town while Han was trying to rest, they had essentially cornered a dangerous animal.

  “Okay. Let’s look around to see if he is still here,” I ordered my squad. “The most likely place is the inn.”

  “Understood, Sir Nareth,” they replied.

  All five of my companions were more experienced in the field than I was. But because I held the rank of Knight and possessed noble lineage, I was the designated leader. They followed my orders with professional respect. As we approached the inn, the adventurer in our party—a man with sharp instincts—suddenly signaled for us to halt. He pointed toward the corner of the building. We moved silently, weapons drawn, and as we rounded the side of the structure, we saw a figure. He was already moving, sprinting toward the dense forest that bordered the village’s southern edge.

  “Use the device! Quickly!” I shouted as we broke into a chase.

  The man was fast—unbelievably fast. Even though he wasn't quite hitting the speeds reported by the city guards in Velshara, he was moving with an effortless agility that made the distance between us stay frustratingly constant. He was heading for the woods, likely hoping the undergrowth would help him lose us.

  Fortunately, we were equipped for a long-range scouting mission. As long as we didn't lose his trail, we could pursue him for days. But as we reached the treeline, the scholar responsible for the magic device let out a sharp, choked gasp.

  “W-what is this?” she stammered, her eyes fixed on the glowing interface of the Almiranth device.

  “What’s the problem?” I asked, not slowing my pace.

  “His job... it can’t be right. You said he was a swordsman!”

  “He is,” I insisted. “He showed me his intelligence card himself on the mountain. I saw it with my own eyes.”

  She looked up at me, her face pale with a mixture of bewilderment and fear. “But the device... it’s saying his job is... it says he’s a Hero.”

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “WHAT!?”

  The word hit us all like a physical blow. We stopped dead in our tracks, replying in a stunned unison. The Hero job was a thing of legends and epic poems. It was said that whenever someone with that job appeared, the very foundations of the country would shift. Wars would start or end, and kings would rise or fall. This was no longer a simple criminal hunt.

  “Everything has changed,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “We have to inform the Lord immediately. A Hero... either he must be recruited or he must be eliminated. We cannot handle this alone. Let's retreat for now.”

  “Are you sure, sir?” the adventurer asked, looking toward the dark woods. “We’ve trailed him for ten days. Shouldn't we try to secure him now while we have the chance?”

  He had a point. We had invested so much time and effort into this pursuit. But the risk was too high. “I am sure,” I said firmly. “He is extremely dangerous. I believe our party could take him down under optimum circumstances, but the opposite is also possible. If he truly is a Hero, the Lord may want to find a way to bring him to our side rather than seeing his head on a pike. We report first.”

  “I understand,” the adventurer replied. “Do we depart right away?”

  “We should, but we haven't rested since yesterday. We pushed through the night to get here. Let’s take a few hours at the inn to recover our stamina, then we head back to Velshara at full speed.”

  We returned to the village, and I ordered four of my companions to rest. I asked the adventurer to accompany me as I did a final sweep of the village. There were dozens of dead to deal with, and I felt a duty to bring some semblance of order back to the settlement before we abandoned it. The villagers had finally come out of their homes in force, realizing the "monster" had fled. Among the crowd were the men who had survived the fight—some were limping, others were covered in minor wounds, their faces still etched with the trauma of what they had seen.

  With the adventurer’s help, I organized the villagers. We spent the next hour collecting the bodies and treating the injured. I briefed the village elders on how to handle the census and what to tell the next patrol that passed through. I was satisfied with the work, even if it felt like a small gesture against such a large tragedy.

  By noon, I decided it was time to wake the others. I turned to find my adventurer companion to tell him we were leaving.

  “Kyaaaa!”

  A woman’s piercing scream shattered the midday quiet. My heart skipped a beat. The adventurer was a man, and my other companions were still at the inn. The scream had come from a nearby alleyway, right where the adventurer should have been stationed.

  I sprinted toward the sound, rounding the corner of a small house. Before I could even process the scene, a shadow lunged at me. I reacted on pure instinct, drawing my sword to block a horizontal slash. Because I was caught off guard, my balance was unstable; I had to bend my body backward to absorb the force of the strike. The impact was staggering—it felt like being hit by a charging bull.

  The momentum of the block left me exposed for a fraction of a second. A follow-up swing whistled through the air, and I felt a sharp, cold bite as the steel parted the leather and flesh of my thigh. I grunted, forcing my weight onto my good leg and taking a defensive stance.

  That was when I saw it. My companion—the man I had traveled with for ten days—was lying on the ground. He was motionless, sprawled in a massive, spreading puddle of crimson. And standing over him was Han. He held a sword in one hand and a shield in the other, his eyes focused on me with a chilling, vacant calm.

  My vision went red. The man had murdered my friend. I roared, gripping my sword with both hands and attacking with every ounce of my strength. Our blades clashed in a series of frantic, metallic sparks. With every strike, I realized just how outclassed I was. He was strong—absurdly so. But for some reason, he stayed on the defensive, merely parrying my blows or stepping back to reset.

  After a few dozen seconds of the exchange, he began to counter. His attacks were heavy and lightning-fast, threatening to shatter my guard with every impact. The only thing keeping me alive was his lack of formal technique. He didn't move like a trained swordsman or a knight; he moved like a brutally powerful orc warrior who just happened to be using a human's equipment. He relied on raw stats rather than the "finesse" of a job.

  I knew I was losing. My stamina was flagging, my breath coming in ragged gasps. I had to use my trump card now or I would never get another chance. I waited for him to shift his weight, then I activated the Knight job’s most potent skill.

  “Pressure!”

  A wave of invisible force erupted from me, designed to crush the will of the opponent and slow their movements to a crawl. For three seconds, Han’s speed was significantly decreased. This was my opening. I ignored all thoughts of defense, launching my body forward in a desperate, all-or-nothing lunge. I aimed for his chest, putting every remaining drop of my mana and stamina into the strike.

  I saw his balance shift. I saw the opening. I felt the satisfying, cutting sensation as my blade moved toward his vitals. For a heartbeat, I thought I had won.

  Then, the world began to spin.

  It was a strange, disorienting sensation. I saw Han looking at me—his face was still emotionless, his eyes tracking my movement. I saw the adventurer lying in the blood puddle. And then, to my utter bewilderment, I saw my own body. It was leaning forward, frozen in the middle of a stabbing motion.

  There was something profoundly wrong with the image. My body looked strong and capable, but it was missing its head.

  Everything seemed to move in slow motion. I noticed the way the sunlight caught the spray of blood in the air, the way the dust settled on my boots. But as the realization of what had happened finally pierced through the shock, the world began to dim. My consciousness fractured, and within a heartbeat, everything went dark at the speed of light.

  [Edited]