1. Called a Hero Among the Mountains.

…When I was young.

People called me trash, or a slave.

When I grew a little older, I was more often known by insults like weed or stubborn vermin.

After I had fully grown, I even heard names like Poisonous Snake Spear or Spear Demon.

After reaching the supreme realm, there was even a brief time when I was called by the excessive title of Spear King.

But would you look at this?

“Waaah—”

Now it seems I’m about to be called trash all over again.

About fifteen or sixteen years old, perhaps.

A single boy with a youthful face stood at the foot of the mountain.

“Waaah?”

In a tone filled with disbelief, the boy tried imitating a baby’s cry once.

“Hm. I see. So I’m not that young.”

Chui.

No family name—just the name.

In any case, he had returned.

From the far side of a battlefield where blood and demonic power had mixed together, back into the untainted body of his childhood.

And there was a crowd there to welcome him.

“Die!”

Green Forest bandits.

A vile gang that hid in the mountains, killing travelers and stealing their possessions.

They were in the middle of ambushing an escort caravan passing through the deep mountains.

“…”

Chui rubbed his smooth, beardless chin with his hand.

“So this is it. Come to think of it, this was around that time. When I was working as a caravan laborer.”

Chui was originally from a southern ethnic minority.

After his tribe was wiped out by foreign forces, his childhood self drifted through jobs like menial labor and caravan hauling before eventually enlisting in the army.

After joining the army, Chui crossed countless battlefields.

As for clothing, a single tattered uniform was enough.
As for food, a single rationed potato sufficed.
His dwelling was the battlefield.

He slept with his spear as a pillow, slept beneath corpses, and washed his body in hot blood and cold night dew.

Was it something he was born with, or was it talent awakening?

Wielding nothing but a single spear, he killed countless people—and yet never died even once himself.

Perhaps it was the curse of the dead, who wished him to wander battlefields his entire life and die there.

Even after returning, Chui found himself standing alone on a battlefield like this.

…But still.

Then as now, he could not keep his body still.

It was not his nature to do so, and the world itself never allowed him that luxury.

“What’s with this brat?”

A passing bandit spotted Chui.

Raising the tip of his spear, he spoke.

“Not an escort, huh. A caravan hand?”

Chui did not answer.

He merely stared calmly at the enemy before him.

Bloodshot eyes.
An overloaded body.
A head that didn’t even realize it.

The typical look of someone stepping onto a battlefield for the first time.

A rookie whose eyes had gone wild from the taste of blood had no room to spare for women, children, or the elderly.

As expected, the bandit charged at Chui with spear in hand.

“I’ll kill all those Hojil Escort bastards!”

That was his misfortune.

Kirik—thud!

Chui easily slipped past the spear thrust that had reached the tip of his nose.

Then, using the barehanded spear-grabbing technique he had once trained until his fingerprints wore away, he seized the shaft.

“Huh?”

The bandit’s face went blank.

Then it froze completely.

Puhk—

Because the instant Chui tore the spear away, he drove it straight through the bandit’s heart.

“Martial techniques may be gone, but martial principles remain. This is more than enough.”

Each time he breathed, a sharp heat flared inside his dantian.

However faintly, inner energy accumulated.

The martial arts he had mastered in his previous life were demonic in nature, but they had been indispensable for survival as a low-ranking soldier.

As Chui drew up his internal energy, his gaze turned dark crimson.

Crunch—

He lifted the spear that had pierced the bandit’s heart straight into the air.

His body remembered how to kill.

Just as a person may lose memories but never forget how to breathe, Chui’s body faithfully reproduced the killing techniques of his previous life.

Then—

“Aaaah! You monster!”

From behind came a scream that was closer to a shriek.

Turning his head, Chui saw a bandit drawing a bow and aiming this way.

Ping—thuk!

The arrow shot toward Chui’s forehead.

But—

…

Chui tilted his head slightly, letting the arrow graze past.

From the forehead it barely scraped, a single line of blood trickled down.

It had torn only flesh, failing to pierce the skull.

The bandit had no idea what had just happened, and that ignorance became the cause of his death.

Thwump!

Chui’s spear pierced straight through the archer’s side.

Now two bodies were skewered on the spear.

Still not satisfied, Chui lifted it up as it was.

“What the hell is this lunatic!? Kill him!”

A massive bandit who had climbed up along the ridge swung an axe at Chui.

But—

Crack!

He too had his chest pierced by Chui’s spear and went limp.

The first bandit, the second bandit, the third bandit—all were impaled on Chui’s long spear.

Chui easily hoisted the spear, which must have weighed well over seventy gwan, and slung it over his shoulder.

Drip—drip—drip—

The falling raindrops were bright red.

Carrying roasted bandits made from bandits on his shoulder, no one dared come close from the fourth chunk of meat onward.

They merely retreated in panic, as if they had seen a ghost.

“…Hojil Escort Agency. Brings back memories.”

Chui lifted his head and gazed beyond the dark, rain-soaked forest.

The clash of blades and the dying screams of escorts and bandits were tangled together.

With an unhurried stride, Chui headed into the forest.

The Spear Demon had returned to the mountains.

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