Calling in sick, Shinka Yūen decided not to go to school.
He already knew what the day held—he'd lived it enough times. The bullying, the pity, the same worn-out interventions from teachers who didn't care and classmates who only watched.
He was tired of it.
Tired of being helpless.
Tired of watching the same scene on loop.
But today… his murky eyes were just a little clearer.
A flicker of something different.
"I regressed," he muttered, blankly staring at the ceiling. "Is this my cheat? Useless, just like me."
Despite the words, his lips twitched into a faint, bitter smile.
"Still… maybe I should make the best of it, huh?" he added, voice quiet, like he was talking to a ghost.
There was something odd this time. Something different.
His senses felt… sharper.
Everything—from the ticking of the wall clock to the texture of the paper beneath his fingertips—had cranked up a notch in clarity, like the world had been upgraded to a higher resolution. It reminded him of that moment just before death, that razor-edge of lucidity when his life was slipping through his fingers. Colors too vivid. Sounds too loud. Smells too sharp. That strange, painful gift of dying.
And yet he was still here.
He turned to his laptop, logged into Amazon, and began ordering.
Nothing fancy. Just low-end gear: a pair of weighted vests, training bands, fingerless gloves, and a set of foam knives. This world, he'd noticed, wasn't quite like the Solo Leveling he remembered from the anime or manhwa. It felt more grounded. More real.
After placing his order, he stepped out into the small courtyard and crossed into a smaller wooden building adjacent to the house. The polished wooden floor creaked beneath his bare feet—once a humble dojo his father had built for swordsmanship, now a dusty home gym lost to time and neglect.
He'd once dreamed of becoming a hunter when he first realized he'd been reborn into Solo Leveling's world. But like many dreams, it faded.
And the gym had sat unused—until today.
He stretched, slowly warming up, pushing his muscles until they ached with that good kind of pain. Then he retrieved two wooden training daggers from the corner rack and began to move.
Step, shift, swing.
It was a Filipino martial art—Kali Arnis. Fluid, brutal, fast.
He trained alone.
With no illusions.
Crackle.
A pinprick of glowing blue bled into the air like spilled paint across glass.
It twisted and spiraled—until a full Gate shimmered into form.
The air buzzed with ominous energy, mana leaking from the rift in gentle waves that made the skin crawl.
"Ah—A Gate!" a nearby pedestrian stammered, pulling out his phone to call the Association.
But before he could even finish dialing, a teenager walked past him—shaggy black hair, hollow gaze, wearing a dull hoodie and weighted gear.
The man stared in disbelief.
He thought the boy was a Hunter. He had to be.
But he wasn't.
He was Shinka Yūen.
And he was tired of waiting.
"Let's see what a Gate's really like," Shinka whispered to himself, stepping through.
The world shifted.
From suburban pavement to damp cave.
From daylight to darkness.
A heavy pressure clung to the air—dense with mana. Shinka could barely breathe, his lungs tightening. The mana saturation was high, far too high for a non-Awakened like him. Prolonged exposure could kill him—not dramatically, but silently. Slowly. Mana Poisoning. Or worse eternal slumber
But he didn't flinch. He pressed forward.
That's when he saw it.
A rat.
Beady red eyes. Matted fur.
Its mouth twitched into a hiss before it lunged at him.
Shinka kicked it aside with a grunt.
But he didn't have time to react—because more followed.
Dozens.
They came in waves. Crawling. Screeching. Snapping.
He swung a kitchen knife, managing to knock a few back—but it wasn't mana-infused. The blows didn't stick. The rats didn't stop.
And then they were on him.
Biting. Clawing. Digging.
His skin tore. His flesh split. Blood spilled.
He screamed, but it didn't matter—his voice was drowned by squeals and shredding teeth.
They burrowed into his mouth.
Into his throat.
Down his esophagus.
They devoured him from the inside out.
One rat's severed head plopped into his gaping mouth, unmoving.
The world darkened again.
And in the silence, a single message echoed:
[You have died.]