Kaian walked to the excalibur and looked at the people, grinning furiously and shouting.

“Come and watch me humiliate these worthless peasants! I will show everyone what I’m capable of!”

In all his rage, he didn’t even notice the people were smiling at him condescendingly. He grabbed the sword’s hilt and pulled with a single arm, intending to show off.

It didn’t move.

Kaian’s smile wilted slightly and he grabbed it with both of his hands, putting most of his strength into it.

It didn’t move.

The people’s smiles turned into full blown laughter and Kaian’s happy expression melted away, revealing a scowl. Kaian stepped closer to the sword and started giving it his all. The people could hear loud grunting soon enough.

And that wasn’t all, villagers with especially good hearing noticed a cracking noise and their faces grew horrified. Kaian started producing an ungodly amount of sweat, feeling like his blood itself was starting to burn. The stupid rain didn’t help.

Nonetheless, he didn’t stop. He couldn’t fail. He was the fated one! The hands around the sword tightened, resembling an iron lock.

Crack

A man who was laughing with disdain slowly stopped, his mouth falling down on the ground. He noticed the sword shake!

“D-did he just…?”

The others also noticed the movement and their eyes widened.

“This shouldn’t be possible!”

Nobody had an idea on how the blue-haired man did it, after all the sword was a …!

Kaian didn’t hear the laughter quiet down and transform into discussion because he was putting 110% of his effort into getting this goddamn sword out of the rock. His muscles tore apart from the strain, hurting more than ever before.

Despite that, he was close! The sword was begging to be let free and Kaian would grant it its wish! With a final scream, the sword dislodged and flew from its prison, sending chunks of rock all around.

Kaian did it! A truly insane expression found its way onto his face and he reveled in the shocked gazes of the villagers. They were afraid, shocked, confused…? Wait. Something was wrong.

Glancing at the sword, the blue-haired man’s face changed. It was no longer proud or happy. It was empty, like the man’s soul disappeared. It didn’t stay that way for a long time. It took him a while to process everything, Kaian frowned. Then he grit his teeth, madness burning in his eyes.

Finally, he threw away the “sword”, realizing he had been played. It was not a sword, the entire thing was carved out of stone. You couldn’t pull a sword out of a rock if the entire thing was rock. This meant that there were no winners, only losers.

And Kaian was one of them, the biggest loser around. His hand slid under his cloak and pulled out a dagger. His legs started moving in the direction of the villagers who provoked him, the dagger sho-

BOOOM

The world started spinning and Kaian found himself lying on the floor, perplexed. He tried to move, but he couldn’t do anything.

“Oh, oh, oh. What do we have here?”

A middle-aged man with a blue robe entered his vision. He crouched and deeply looked into Kaian’s eyes. Kaian tried struggling before the man’s eyes flashed blue and he felt himself calming down. He was being forced to be calm, to be rational.

“I see. Some sort of a split personality, huh? Hmm, I can’t do anything for you, the only solution would be learning magic yourself. But still, such a good subject.”

His pupils glanced at Kaian’s hair and turned gloomy.

“I cannot believe that someone blessed by mana could become this way, so embarrassing.”

After uttering this, he stood back up.

“Well, I think you’ve had enough of the atmosphere here. Don’t come back unless you want to die.”

Kaian tried to protest, to do anything. But he couldn’t. The rain that was falling down all around him gathered into a hand that carried him outside the village, throwing him into the mud like garbage.

As he lay there, his arrogant side started cracking up, its confidence decreasing. And for the first time since it appeared, it voluntarily gave control to the rational side.

Dazed, he stood up, looking back at the village. When he came in, he didn’t expect such humiliation. And despite the regular Kaian being in control, he still hated that he got beaten without being able to do anything, he wanted to do something about it.

He clenched his fists and turned around sharply, leaving the place of embarrassment. Without power, he couldn't do shit.

…

Kaian walked on the road, sometimes going into a nearby forest and hiding in the shade to rest. He met people who walked like him, people who rode in carriages and he even met a mage once. Though, that one just slid away on some of a surfboard and Kaian didn’t manage to ask him anything.

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It was interesting to see someone utilize the rain that was nearly constant at this point, but the water wasn’t pleasant at all.

He spent some time walking and thinking about… well, everything, until he started feeling off. It was like an itch appeared on his right side and something was scratching it at the same time. Kaian squinted and grabbed at his orange blood before stopping.

“...I’m an idiot,” he muttered, sighing and touching the stone in his pocket.

“Vexi, Amount.”

“109”

“....Wow”

He didn’t realize that he had stacked so much. It was probably from the bandits and the various monsters he killed on the way. He shivered at the thought of killing people now that the normal him was back. So he did what he did before, he forced it out of his mind, he intentionally forgot about it.

Kaian didn’t really give it much thought and bought a 100VP form. The more expensive the better, right?

[Vexi, Wolf…]

Once again, he grew smaller. It wasn’t by much anymore, did that mean that he was getting stronger? Kaian decided to check out how he looked in a puddle, noticing that he didn’t look like a wolf at all. It made him wonder how Vexastone decided on the names.

He had dark eyes and his mouth was split into four parts. The mouth resembled a lizard more than a wolf. If he had to compare it to something, it would be like the alien from, well, alien except split in the middle.

The rest of his body at least had fur, though it was also split by parts without it. They were bright green which contrasted against the dark fur. It made Kaian recall the channels that led water into the sewers. Apparently, they served a similar purpose on his body as the water started flowing through them and landed on his legs.

It made Kaian feel confused, like he was looking at two of himself when he was only one. He shook his head and snapped out of it. Lifting his head and looking into the forest, he slowly started walking towards it. The words of Vexi were swimming around in his mouth, ready to be used.

Thankfully, there was no need.. Yet. He spent a while walking straight before he noticed a well. Pretty weird, he thought, what is a well doing in the middle of a forest? He looked into it and seeing that nothing was wrong, he changed into a human, determining that there was no danger.

The well was built from stone, had no roof and was completely empty. Kaian wasn’t very sure about how useful it was. Why build it here? Well, whatever, he had better things to do.

Kaian turned around and started walking, getting hit by the unusually powerful rain. He didn’t get very far before a chilling thought occurred to him. It was raining and the well was empty, dry, even.

He shivered and slowly started turning his head. Only now did he notice the trees around it. They were bent, crooked and the slits on the bark looked like mouths laughing at Kaian.

Not very calming, he’d say. Completing his head maneuver, he noticed that the well was missing and that there was a piece of paper on the ground where it used to be.

“Fuck me,” the changer proclaimed, hastily touching the stone and shifting into his newest form.

He felt the rain run on his body, granting him energy. Instinctively, he knew what to do with it and he focused on his legs which started splitting apart. It started with them and continued up the body until there were two of Kaian. Both of them were a bit smaller than the original, though.

One swerved and ran towards the paper while the other just booked it out of there. Naturally, the real Kaian was the one who dipped. He was not about to risk it for some paper and disappear like the well.

Weirdly, nothing odd happened and his not so illusory illusion managed to grab the paper with no issues. It ran up to Kaian and melted into water, some of which got absorbed back into him.

“Huh. Didn’t expect that.”

Another thing he didn’t expect was the brutal headache that followed. It was so bad that Kaian had to change back and even then it didn’t leave. He rubbed his temples and lifted up the piece of paper.

“Dear diary, It’s the first day of June and I fell in love with a slime… Wait, I can’t read.”

Kaian chuckled at himself, it was definitely a sign of mental instability, and wandered back on the road. The paper looked like it was ripped out of a cover, perhaps a page of an actual diary. Kaian squinted his eyes and stored it into his inventory for the ridiculous cost of 2VP.

Finally out of danger, Kaian sighed and the pressure melted away. He hoped that he would reach the city as soon as possible.

…

Over time, the road started becoming bigger and more people started using it. Kaian had no idea where they came from since he was walking the road from the start, but he didn’t really care. They most likely lived somewhere around the road.

What he cared about, however, was that after his escape from the well, his arrogant side started forcing itself into control again. Despite that, it still didn’t recover from the blow it suffered so the control was weak and temporary.

Kaian thought about what he could do to eliminate the ‘evil’ him and wasn’t able to think of anything. Was magic really the only way? Maybe all this was a result of some trauma. No, nothing traumatizing happened to him, nothing.

Dispelling these thoughts, he looked around. There were multiple people traveling next to him, aside from that, the surroundings were plains of some unknown green crop. He was definitely close now. Though, he wondered how he didn’t go mad yet.

Everything was so boring. He was stuck with himself and his thoughts. Kaian was so boring.

…

Thankfully, he was right, it was close. The city revealed itself before Kaian’s eyes and he stopped, amazed.

The walls surrounding it were made of blue stone with wooden shacks on top. Every 5th one was a shack that was obviously of higher quality. Kaian also felt a weird attraction from some of these.

The shacks had roofs that resembled sheds, the water fell on these and poured down them into the city. Kaian wondered what the water was used for. It rained too often so they had to have tons of water even without this.

The gate leading into the city was also made of stone with the ‘door’ being some blue wood. Honestly, Kaian was getting sick of blue at this point. He spotted a teenager in the mage robe and that certainly didn’t help his nausea.

At least the guards who inspected people seemed to share Kaian’s sentiments as they stood far from the young mage.

Kaian smiled and went to stand in the row that led into the city. It went by quickly as they only checked for weapons and soon came Kaian’s turn.

“Hands up.” the older guard ordered.

Kaian put his hands up into a T and stood there obediently.

“..Fuck, It’s a hunter.”

“Not again. Hey, are you certified?”

Naturally, Kaian wasn’t and when the guards heard his response, they weren’t surprised.

“Wait, I have an idea. Dain! Stop slacking off and lead this kid into a hunter’s guild so he can get certified.”

“....fuck off” Dain the mage muttered.

“Huh?!”

“I’m going, I'm going.” he threw his hands in the air with a defeated attitude and gestured at Kaian.

Kaian stepped behind him, officially entering Teim as a nameless hunter.

But they would come to know him soon, all of them would.