The morning after my encounter with the Aberration, I woke to the sound of crackling fire and the distant voices of villagers outside.
Every muscle in my body ached. My legs throbbed from overusing mana, my arms felt like lead, and my ribs were sore from the fall I had taken when dodging the beast's claws. But despite the pain, I felt something else.
Satisfaction.
I had survived.
But more than that—I had killed.
Not out of malice. Not out of necessity. But because I had to win.
The battle had been short, but it had taught me something crucial: this world was not safe. The idyllic life of the village was a lie, a fragile peace hiding dangers lurking beyond the trees.
And my father?
He knew.
The wooden door creaked as I pushed it open, stepping into the main room where my father sat by the fireplace, sharpening his hunting knife. The rhythmic sound of metal against stone filled the silence between us.
He didn't look up.
"You're awake," he said simply.
I nodded, moving stiffly to sit across from him.
"What was that thing?" I asked, wasting no time.
He paused mid-motion, then set the knife down with a sigh. His gaze was unreadable, but I caught a flicker of something in his expression. Not surprise. Not concern.
Expectation.
"You already have an idea, don't you?" he said.
I hesitated. I did. The way the Aberration had moved, the unnatural intelligence in its gaze… it was wrong. A thing that didn't belong in this world.
"It wasn't an ordinary beast," I said. "It felt… corrupted."
My father nodded slowly. "You're not wrong."
He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "That thing you fought—it wasn't the first, and it won't be the last. Creatures like that have been appearing for a long time, but most people refuse to acknowledge it. They believe it's just nature running its course. That monsters are simply… monsters."
He exhaled sharply. "They're wrong."
I frowned. "Then what are they?"
My father studied me for a long moment before speaking.
"Things that were never meant to exist."
A chill ran down my spine at his words.
I had assumed the Aberration was just some mutated beast, an outlier of the natural order. But the way my father spoke of it—it wasn't something random. It was deliberate.
"You knew it was out there," I said. "Before I even told you."
He nodded.
"I didn't know exactly what it was, but I felt it. The forest is different when something like that moves through it. The balance shifts."
I clenched my fists. "Why didn't you tell the village?"
His expression darkened. "And what would that do? Have a bunch of untrained men and women panic? Go into the woods with pitchforks and get themselves killed?"
I couldn't argue with that.
"They wouldn't believe me anyway," he muttered. "People don't like to think about things they can't explain. They'd rather pretend the world is simple."
I understood that mindset well. In my past life, the masses had preferred ignorance over truth. They had trusted their rulers blindly, even as those same rulers wove lies into their reality.
But in this life, I would not be blind.
"So what do we do?" I asked.
My father's lips curled into a small smirk.
"We train."
The next week was relentless.
My father had always been a patient man, but now that I had proven myself capable, he wasted no time pushing me beyond my limits.
Before, my training had been light—understanding balance, feeling mana, controlling my breath. Now?
Now it was about using it to survive.
We started simple.
"Your mana is raw, unrefined," he explained as we stood in the clearing behind our house. "Right now, you're using too much at once. It's like pouring an entire bucket of water when you only need a sip."
I nodded, adjusting my stance. "So I need to regulate it."
"Exactly. Control isn't about strength—it's about efficiency."
He tossed a small wooden dagger toward me, and I caught it clumsily.
"Lesson one," he said. "Weapon reinforcement."
Mana reinforcement wasn't like casting a spell. It wasn't flashy or obvious. It was subtle—a careful layering of energy, strengthening a weapon without overwhelming it.
"Most people think magic is about making things explode," my father said, smirking. "And yeah, that works if you want to burn through your mana in seconds. But a real warrior?"
He twirled his own dagger in his hand, his mana flowing through it so effortlessly it was nearly invisible.
"A real warrior makes every bit of power count."
I closed my eyes, focusing. I had already drawn mana into my limbs before—this was no different. I reached inward, guiding it toward the wooden blade in my grip.
At first, nothing happened. The mana resisted, as if unsure of where to go. But then, I felt it—the way my father had described. Not forcing. Not commanding. Just… guiding.
The blade hardened in my grasp.
It wasn't much. Just a thin, almost imperceptible layer. But when I opened my eyes, my father was nodding in approval.
"Not bad," he said. "Not great, but not bad."
I exhaled. "What's next?"
His smirk widened.
"Lesson two. Dodge."
I barely had time to react before he moved.
I learned quickly that my father wasn't going easy on me anymore.
The moment I dodged his first strike, I realized something crucial—he wasn't just a hunter.
He was a fighter.
His movements were too precise, too practiced. He wielded the wooden dagger like an extension of his own body, faster than someone his age had any right to be.
For the first time since being reborn, I felt genuine adrenaline.
I ducked. Pivoted. Parried when I could. But he was relentless. Every mistake, he punished. Every hesitation, he exploited.
"Too slow," he muttered as his foot swept my legs out from under me. I hit the ground hard, gasping.
Before I could rise, the tip of his dagger was at my throat.
"Dead," he said simply.
I scowled. "You didn't hold back."
He laughed, pulling back and offering me a hand. "Of course not. You think that thing in the woods was going to go easy on you?"
I took his hand, my grip firm.
"Again," I said.
He smiled.
"That's my boy."