If someone had told me a week ago that I'd become a Campione—a godslayer—I would've laughed it off and gone back to reading web novels on my phone. But fate, as it often does in the stories I've devoured over the past two decades, had other plans.
It started in Sicily.
I was there on a university-sponsored history trip, chasing credits and escaping the dull routine of lectures. The guide droned on about ancient ruins and Heracles while I wandered away, smartphone in hand, half-listening. That's when I found it—an old stone altar buried in an overgrown patch of trees. It called to me. Not in a metaphorical sense, but literally. A pulse of something ancient and divine throbbed through my body the moment I touched it.
And then... the world changed.
A man—or rather, something that wore the shape of a man—appeared. He was clad in bronze armor that shimmered like sunlight on the ocean. His eyes were stars, cold and distant. He spoke in a language I didn't understand, but I felt the meaning behind every word.
He was a Heretic God. A remnant of myth that had wandered into our world. And I had trespassed on his altar.
The battle wasn't fair. It wasn't even a battle. He unleashed divine flames that scorched the earth, tore apart trees, and turned sand into glass. I should've died. I was human. Mortal. Weak.
But I didn't run.
I remembered every story I'd read. Every protagonist who stood their ground against impossible odds. Maybe I was crazy. Maybe I just didn't want to die with my back turned. So I stood there, screaming back at him. And in that moment of defiance, the altar responded. Power surged up through my feet, into my veins, into my soul.
It wasn't strength I gained—it was concept. I became the inheritor of his myth, the slayer of his divinity.
When I awoke, the world was silent. The Heretic God lay in pieces. And something within me had changed.
I was no longer human.
I was a Campione.
But my story didn't end there.
Buried beneath the altar was something else. An artifact. A mirror framed in obsidian, pulsing with a rhythm that didn't belong to this world. When I touched it, I saw visions. Other worlds. Other universes. Each brimming with gods, demons, and powers that rivaled or exceeded my own.
And one whisper echoed in my mind:
"Walk the paths between stars, Godslayer. Conquer, learn, and ascend."