--------
Chapter 1: Hero?
--------
Kamijou Touma woke up with a muffled groan, his body aching and sprawled on a hard, cold ground. A wave of conflicting sensations overwhelmed him as his eyes snapped open.
Pain throbbed through every fiber of his being, forcing him to sit up abruptly, clutching his arms around his torso in an attempt to dull the agony coursing through him at that moment.
It was a pain unlike anything he had ever experienced. It felt as if molten magma flowed through his veins, his nerves twisting upon themselves.
Every movement gave him the sensation that space itself was distorting around him, warping. His skin was sticky and wet.
Blood. His own blood.
A hysterical, hoarse, pain-laced laugh escaped his lips, accompanied by a small spray of blood that stained his chin.
"Where... where am I?" he murmured weakly, struggling to his feet.
It was yet another surreal situation he found himself in, but this time, something was profoundly different—terribly wrong. The first detail he noticed was the smell: a sharp mix of smoke and burnt flesh, so intense that it stung his nose.
Slowly, he lifted his gaze and took in his surroundings. He was in the middle of a devastated landscape: collapsed buildings, streetlights bent as if they were made of plastic, and flames illuminating the night with an eerie glow.
The sky was black as pitch, heavy with dense, murky clouds that seemed to press down on the earth. An oppressive shadow enveloped everything, and in the distance, Touma saw what remained of the city.
There was no visible light, only a desolate mass of ruins, interrupted by raging fires that rose beyond the destroyed skyscrapers, vomiting smoke into the sky.
For a moment, he remained still, crouched on the ground, his head throbbing with pain. Then he took a deep breath and stood up, scanning the horizon.
"It's time to move..." he murmured through clenched teeth, his voice hoarse and weakened.
He took a step forward, only to suddenly stop.
"What the hell..."
The words died in his throat as he stared in disbelief at the ruins around him. Reality felt like a twisted nightmare—hell on earth.
He stood there, stunned, for a few seconds before shaking his head and clenching his fists.
I have to move. I can't stay here.
As he started walking, his body protesting with every step, a sudden thought shot through his mind.
"Index! Othinus!" he shouted with all the strength he had, his voice scattering into the eerie silence of that desolate wasteland.
There was no answer. No sound, no sign of life.
He was completely alone.
Touma stopped, his breathing heavy, and let his gaze wander toward the horizon. He remembered nothing before this awakening—no crazy experiment, no magician looking for trouble.
Only a black hole in his memory, waking up in a nightmare, and a loneliness tightening around his heart—one he hadn't felt in a long time, or at least, had done his best to ignore.
"A perfect world if I didn't exist..." Those words kept echoing in his mind, like a broken record repeating endlessly, making his head spin.
Touma shook his head forcefully, trying to drive away those absurd thoughts. He couldn't afford to be overwhelmed by his emotions at that moment.
He knew he had other priorities. Instead of standing there brooding over his fate and the unsettling sensation that was devouring him from within, he had to act.
He had to help someone, do something concrete. He couldn't allow himself to be swallowed by loneliness and torment.
With a sheer effort of will, he focused on his circumstances. He needed to find a way out of this situation, to make sense of everything that was happening.
But if there was one thing Touma knew how to do, it was to act even when everything seemed lost. He wouldn't allow negative thoughts to hold him back—just like every single moment of his life.
Looking around, Touma realized just how terrible the situation was. The city he once knew now looked like a living nightmare.
The streets were deserted, and the silence that enveloped them felt heavy, as if the entire place had been swallowed by a terror he couldn't comprehend.
There was no sign of life, only the echo of his footsteps resonating in an eerie void.
"At least this isn't Academy City..." he thought, trying to find a silver lining, but his mind couldn't focus on anything other than the growing sense of oppression surrounding him.
His luck seemed worse than ever—an endless chain of misfortunes. You'd think that, just once, he could catch a break. But no. His life seemed destined to be an ongoing nightmare, one after another.
He walked through the empty streets, the silence broken only by the crackling of flames. There wasn't a single soul in sight, yet the air was heavy, almost suffocating. It wasn't just the smoke—there was something unnatural, something that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.
"This isn't good," Touma muttered, clenching his right fist tightly, his eyes sharp and intense. A growing sense of frustration burned inside him.
"Whatever happened here… I need to find someone who can explain it to me." His teeth ground together, and moments later, the frustration finally took over, filling him with an uncontrollable tension.
With a swift movement, he started running forward, hoping to find any survivors in this hell. Covering a hundred meters at a speed far beyond that of an ordinary person, he pushed himself toward the city looming in the distance.
And everything he saw only fueled his panic and frustration, the helplessness of being unable to do anything to help.
A few moments later, Touma came to an abrupt stop, his breath ragged as he took in the scene before him.
Rubble and piles of broken stone lay everywhere—no survivors in sight.
His instincts made him shift to the side just in time to dodge a lightning-fast sword strike that would have hit the spot where he had stood just moments before.
"Tktktktktk!" The sharp sound rang through the air, and glowing red eyes stared at him from behind a skull as white as bone. The creature, wielding a long blade, stood before him, ready to attack.
"What the hell?" Touma muttered, furrowing his brows for a moment.
But that wasn't all. At that moment, dozens of armed skeletons began emerging from the alleys, making their way toward him.
"No, wait," he thought, shaking his head and looking more closely. "Are those really human skeletons?!" He finally realized it, and an unpleasant sensation seized his chest.
Just then, Touma felt a sudden sense of danger. Instinctively, he ducked, narrowly avoiding an axe strike that grazed the side of his neck.
"That was close..." he murmured, and with a swift movement of his right hand, he grabbed the skeleton by the jaw. With the familiar sound of shattering glass, it crumbled to dust, its body disintegrating under the force of his grip.
Even though he was used to strange situations, the scene made him flinch. His usually impassive face twisted into a grimace of discomfort.
"This isn't normal..." he thought to himself.
Typically, the dead return as vengeful spirits or ghosts, driven by their own will. But when they are resurrected by someone else, they become zombies or skeletons, depending on the state of their decay.
Another skeleton stepped forward, its hollow sockets staring at him with a mocking expression. It wielded a rusted sword that groaned as it was lifted.
Immediately after, a second skeleton rose, then a third, and so on, until a dozen skeletal figures surrounded him.
"What the hell…!?" Touma exclaimed, taking a step back.
His words seemed to draw the skeletons' attention, and they started moving toward him with slow, unsteady motions. The grinding of their joints rubbing together filled the air—a grotesque sound that made Touma's skin crawl.
"What insane misfortune…" he sighed, clenching his right fist. "Why do these things always happen to me!?"
His eyes quickly analyzed the situation.
There were about twenty skeletons in total, each group wielding different weapons—swords, spears, even bows. Their appearance was far from random; someone or something must have awakened them.
And this situation reeked of dark magic.
One of the skeletons charged, raising its sword in a stiff yet deliberate motion. Touma acted on instinct, lifting his right arm to block. The moment the blade struck his hand, a burst of blue energy erupted, instantly destroying both the weapon and the skeleton.
The rest of the skeletons hesitated for a moment, evaluating the threat before them.
"Alright, I can handle this," Touma said, clenching his fists and shifting into a combat stance. "This isn't the first time I've fought something absurd!"
The skeletons reacted in unison, all charging at once. Touma dodged an incoming strike and countered with precision—his right fist slammed into another skeleton with the sound of breaking glass, reducing it to dust.
But there were too many of them, and no matter how quickly he moved, fighting them all at once seemed impossible. He dodged a spear that barely missed his side, then immediately crushed another skeleton with a well-placed kick.
However, for every enemy he took down, three more took its place. Fatigue was starting to creep in, but Touma wasn't one to give up easily.
"Damn it…" he growled, scanning the area for an opportunity. "I need to find a way to turn this around, or I'll end up becoming one of them."
With the undead tightening their circle around him, Touma realized he would have to push himself even harder to get out of this.
...
Touma wished he could say that fighting skeletons had improved his mood.
But that wasn't the case at all.
If it had been his past self, just one of those skeletons would have been enough to put him down. But now, fighting them had been easier than expected.
Not only could they barely withstand his blows, but they also couldn't inflict any real damage on him. Which meant… he had improved.
Ever since meeting Index and getting involved with the magical side of the world, he had changed. Honestly, he wanted to be amazed at the fact that he had just fought magically animated skeletons… But at this point, he was too exhausted to care.
"What do I do now?" he thought, staring at the scattered remains of the undead. He strongly doubted that any of them would be able to get back up.
But the real question was something else: what the hell had happened to bring the world to this state? What catastrophe had ravaged the city, leaving it in ruins? Who—or what—had unleashed such hell?
Touma clenched his fists as his mind desperately tried to piece everything together. Had some Magic God interfered with reality? Had someone used a power beyond human comprehension to alter everything?
The mere thought made him grit his teeth. If this really was the work of a higher entity, then he would once again have to face an opponent who toyed with people's fates as if it were nothing more than a game.
"I just hope I can find someone..." Touma muttered, shaking his head as he tried to suppress the whirlwind of thoughts flooding his mind.
He felt lost, but standing still and thinking wouldn't give him any answers.
He had to move.
His gaze settled on the mountain in the distance, where he could make out the remains of a temple—or at least what was left of one, given the state of the city.
The ruins were wrapped in a gloomy atmosphere, as if the entire place had been swallowed by a dark power that had left behind only destruction and silence.
If there was a place to start searching for answers, that could be it. Temples were often tied to mystical events or sources of energy, and with everything that had happened, he couldn't rule out the possibility that something important was hidden there.
He took a step forward, determined to set off, when—
"Why do these things always happen to me!?"
A female voice shattered the silence, ringing loudly through the air. It came from a street ahead, near a large, partially destroyed building.
Touma's eyes widened slightly. He turned sharply and began running in the direction of the voice, destroying every skeleton that got in his way.
There, amidst the fire and rubble, he saw a woman with white hair, dressed in light magician's robes. She was kneeling, her face twisted in frustration and panic.
With a swift motion, she raised a hand and extended her fingers in a knife-like formation. An instant later, a barrage of red magical orbs shot through the air like bullets, striking the skeletons pursuing her.
Three of them were hit—one in the face, the other two in the chest. They shattered instantly. But that was only a small fraction of them. The others quickly scattered, surrounding her from all sides.
The woman kept firing frantically, her eyes wide with panic. Her aim was shaky, her movements erratic.
From the corner of his eye, Touma noticed a skeleton that had crept up on her without her realizing.
"Tktktktktktktktktk!" Its bones creaked as it lunged at her. She saw it at the last second and froze.
"Help me, Lev!" she screamed in terror.
But before the skeleton could bring its sword down on her, Touma's fist slammed into its torso with explosive force. The undead crumbled instantly, shattering into countless pieces.
Touma positioned himself beside the girl, who stared at him with wide golden eyes, stunned. The skeletons around them continued to move, but none dared to step closer.
With a frustrated growl, Touma clenched his fist.
"Are you okay?" he asked, flashing a grin. It probably came off more arrogant than he intended… but he couldn't help it.
At least he had managed to save her. And, for once, this absurd situation seemed to be taking a slightly less disastrous turn.
------
Marvel: I'm Spider-Man in this Damn Reincarnation: 1 advanced chapters
Hybrid Man (Ichigo Si/WC Fic) 1 advanced chapters
Son of Li Qiye?: 3 advanced chapters
patreon.com/Demon_King22
Chapter- 16: Shocker - Chapter- 17 (Incoming)
Chapter - 11: Future Choices
Chapter - 7: Hobby - Chapter - 8: New Hunt - Chapter - 9: Past unknown
On the other hand, if you want to see something specific in the next chapters, or even just have some good advice for the story as a whole, I am always willing to read a comment if it is constructive criticism.
If you see any mistakes, I would be grateful if you would point them out to me, so that I can correct them when I have some spare time, and make the story as complete as possible for myself and especially for you.
To facilitate a clearer understanding, I've retained pictures of the respective characters. Your feedback is always valued, and if you have any suggestions for the upcoming chapter, please feel free to comment—I'll be sure to respond as usual.
Please leave a review if you like the story.