Ashen didn't miss his old life.
Not the concrete floors, not the bitter metallic taste of blood in the air, and not the suffocating walls of the Blackblood Dynasty's regime.
Back then, he'd been nothing. A discarded child, picked up by the state like so many others, branded with a so-called "support talent" at birth—Script Master. Just a glorified clerk, capable of perfect handwriting. That was it.
And because of that, no one had ever looked at him twice.
No one... until the day everything changed.
A rift explosion—violent and sudden—ripped through a research facility near where he worked. Most died instantly. He should have, too.
Instead, something inside him snapped. Maybe it was the surge of mana released from the rift, or maybe the system itself glitched under pressure. Either way, the next time he woke up, his talent had shifted.
His projected potential jumped from E-rank to B, and along with it came a strange new skill:
Eye for Worth.
At first, it didn't seem like much. Just a faint red or yellow glow surrounding things and people. It didn't offer numbers, stats, or deep insights—just a simple aura.
But that was enough.
Enough to spot liars, enough to know when someone was hiding something. Enough to determine who to avoid—and who to kill.
From that point on, he vanished.
No real name. No face in the system. Just a quiet ghost in the underbelly of a brutal society. He became Nameless.
************
"Kai," she said one day, rocking him gently in her arms.
He gurgled softly, and the woman chuckled.
"See? He likes it."
The caretakers called him Kai, a name one of the older women picked after he reached for her necklace with an almost theatrical sparkle in his eye. She'd laughed and declared, "He's a Kai. Don't ask me why—it just fits."
And no one questioned it.
From that moment on, he became their little star.
The days passed quietly. Caretakers drifted in and out of the nursery with gentle hands and soft voices, and Kai—nestled in warmth and stillness—watched everything.
It was strange how… calm it all was.
In his old life, peace had been a setup until his retirement. A trap. A silence before betrayal or death. But here, no one was watching him with suspicion. No one came bearing hidden knives or orders masked in kindness. Now the year was 2010—calculated as 2010 years since the apocalypse. He was born 20 years earlier than his previous birth.
"Good morning, little sunshine," one of the foster mothers cooed as she lifted him from his cradle. Her hands were warm, the creases of age lining her fingers, but her touch was gentle, practiced.
Kai responded the only way he could—he leaned forward and gave her cheek a small, wet kiss.
She laughed, breathless. "Oh! Aren't you just a darling?"
He giggled, bright and clear, and the woman looked as if her heart might melt then and there.
They always melted.
He made sure of it.
Another woman, younger and slightly rounder, peeked in through the nursery door. "He got you too, didn't he?"
"Got me?" the first one blinked, still smiling.
"That kiss thing. He's been doing it to all of us. Like he knows exactly what we need after a long shift."
The older woman turned back to Kai, eyes narrowing in playful accusation. "Are you charming us on purpose, little man?"
Kai just smiled again, letting his head drop lazily on her shoulder. The answer was yes, of course, but they didn't need to know that.
He had learned through their idle conversations—dozens of voices, speaking softly over his head as if he couldn't understand them. But he could. He understood everything.
It was one of the largest operating orphanages, located just outside Beijing Prime, a ruling megacity under the Council of Terranova. That alone was significant. But there was more.
It also functioned as a research centre, backed by one of the most powerful associations left in the world: the New Healers Association. Medicine, alchemy, potion brewing, support abilities—everything outside of direct combat had found a home here.
The woman who ran it, he'd learned, was called Sophia. A retired healer, now ancient in age, but still sharp. She didn't visit often, but whenever she did, the air in the halls changed—calm, like old trees, firm but gentle. He hadn't seen her up close yet, but he would. Eventually.
There was comfort. There was food. And there were people who seemed to care just because… they cared.
But comfort could become a prison if you weren't careful.
So each night, after the nursery lights dimmed and the quiet fell over the halls, Kai took stock of himself—of what he had, and what he was hiding.
And then, on the 25th day since he'd opened his eyes in this new body, the moment finally came.
His eyes closed. A breath in. A pulse of thought.
And the familiar flicker of something old and strange echoed within.
He pulled up his status.
═══════════════════════════════════════
STATUS: NOT AWAKENED
═══════════════════════════════════════
NAME: Kai
AGE: 0
RANK:----[ POTENTIAL_S-RANK ]
Level : 0
Mana:1000/1000
█ ATTRIBUTES
- Strength: 1/100
- Agility: 1/100
- Vitality: 1/100
- Intelligence: 5/100
- Wisdom: 3/100
- Perception: 3/100
- Charm: 10
- Luck: 7
█ SKILLS
-veil (- Ex -):
Type: Passive / Active (Mana Consuming)
A supreme concealment skill that hides all traces of one's true potential, abilities, mana signature, and status even from the most advanced detection or appraisal skills. Unless consciously lowered further, it automatically masks the user's projected rank as F. Even SS-Rank Appraisal can't break through. No one knows how this skill was created — it simply exists beyond known systems. Ultimate stealth ability.
Current Limitations (Awakening not yet achieved):
Cannot use Ultimate Stealth
Mana Consumption:
2 mana per activation
- Script Master (F-Rank): The ability to adapt
Type: Passive
writing and scripting styles with perfect accuracy.
Considered "worthless" in combat situations.
- Eye For Worth (SS-Rank):
Type: Passive / Active (Mana Consuming)
Allows the user to identify the worth of objects and people by revealing a unique color.
Warm Yellow: Indicates positive value, good intentions, or beneficial traits.
Dark Red: Indicates negative value, danger, or harmful traits.
Current Limitations (Awakening not yet achieved):
Only shows the color aura (yellow or red) without additional detailed appraisal.
Mana Consumption:
Uses 0.5 mana per activation.
█ EXPERIENCE: 0/100
█ STATUS: Healthy
═══════════════════════════════════════
His breath caught.
For a full second, the world around him seemed to be still.
Ex.
The designation blinked quietly beside his Veil skill, and for once, even he—former assassin, cynic, survivor of impossible odds—felt the weight of true astonishment. He didn't move, didn't twitch. Just stared at the glowing panel only he could see.
That wasn't just high. That was unheard of. Unmeasurable. A tier reserved for the realm of absurdities that didn't fit within the defined system.
The strategist in him should have kicked in. Should've started calculating risk versus reward, and analyzing implications. But for the first time in two lifetimes, there was no plan, no answer.
Just awe.
"…What is this body?" he thought, quietly. And for the first time since being reborn, not as a weapon or a ghost in the crowd, but as a child given a second chance—he felt a flicker of genuine wonder.
And then there was his mana pool—1000. For a baby, that wasn't rare. It was only seen in monstrously talented nobility.
And the Eye for Worth ranked SS… quietly sitting there beneath it all.
The wonder faded, replaced by something else entirely. A slow, creeping sense of utterly vicious amusement began to bubble up within him. The sheer, ridiculous overkill of it all, gifted to... this. A helpless infant assassin.
He giggled again, the sound helplessly cute, almost choking on the sheer, cosmic irony of it all. An unkillable ghost with unreadable potential, stuck in diapers. The universe definitely had a sick sense of humor. And right now, trapped in this ludicrous state, he couldn't help but appreciate the punchline.