Aren sprinted toward the hulking ogre, laughter bubbling from his chest like a lunatic on a joyride. It wasn't just amusement—it was manic delight, the kind that danced wildly in his eyes and echoed across the cavernous chamber. He'd seen heroes fight monsters. He'd watched them level up with absurd bonuses, clutching legendary weapons and looking impossibly cool while doing it.
And while Death—capital D, literal Death—was certainly stronger than any of those heroes he'd observed from the celestial sphere, that didn't mean he couldn't want to be one, just for fun.
After all, what was existence without a little drama?
As Aren neared the ogre, he clenched his fist with the excitement of a toddler discovering a brand-new toy.
And then—he struck.
His fist connected with the ogre's stomach in a clean, direct hit.
THUCK!
"Huh…?" Aren blinked, stunned. His knuckles had landed dead-center on the creature's belly, but there wasn't even a dent. Not a ripple. Not a flinch.
He slowly craned his neck upward.
The ogre was staring down at him, its expression an uncanny mirror of Aren's earlier disinterest—blank, unimpressed, vaguely annoyed.
"Hi…?" Aren offered, tilting his head sheepishly.
A second later, the ogre's massive cleaver came crashing down—not with the blade, but the flat, as if the boss didn't even consider him worth slicing.
CRACK!
The blow landed square on Aren's body and launched him like a bullet across the arena. Blood sprayed from his nose, his mouth, even his ears as he tumbled like a ragdoll, bouncing over the obsidian floor with a series of painful-sounding thuds.
He came to a stop near the far wall, a limp pile of limbs.
"Ahhh… well… that went terribly…" Aren wheezed through broken teeth, a shaky laugh rattling from his chest.
Then he died.
Well…
Not really.
As Aren's eyes fluttered shut, they snapped open again with an eerie gleam. Bones cracked and snapped back into place with unnatural precision, like a marionette pulling itself upright. His organs twisted, reformed, and began pumping blood again like a well-oiled machine. Muscle fibers stitched themselves together in reverse.
The entire resurrection looked like a horror film played in fast-forward.
His body twitched once, twice—then stood straight up on two feet, swaying slightly. The air grew heavy for a moment. Even the ogre paused, confusion flickering across its brutish features. This wasn't healing. This was revival. Violent, uncanny, wrong.
Aren rolled his neck with a dry crack and wiped the blood off his lip.
"Okay… time for a different tactic," he muttered with a half-smile.
But before he could leap recklessly into the fray again—
A voice purred.
"You really are no ordinary human…"
Aren blinked.
The voice had come from Ebony.
The cat.
The cat just spoke.
His gaze snapped to his shoulder, where the feline sat with its violet eyes glowing faintly. And then—its body began to unravel. Shadows peeled away from its limbs like ink in water, the darkness folding in on itself before erupting outward in a cascade of smoky wisps.
When the shadows cleared, a human figure stood in the cat's place.
A beautiful young woman with long raven-black hair and eyes of luminous violet. She wore golden glasses that gleamed in the dungeon's molten light, and her entire presence radiated composed elegance—only barely restrained by the casual black jacket, white undershirt, and shorts that matched her hair and eyes perfectly.
The resemblance to the feline was unmistakable. Ebony… was now Raven.
"Huh…? This vessel didn't tell me that your ki—" Aren began, still recovering from whiplash.
He didn't finish.
The girl cut him off, stepping closer.
"At first, I thought you were a foreigner," she said, her tone flat. "But now it looks like you're actually just an idiot."
She leaned in and studied him like a mildly interesting bug. Without warning, she squeezed his cheeks, her fingers poking and pulling like a curious scientist.
"Hmmm…" she mused, opening his mouth and inspecting inside. "Nothing seems to be abnormal…"
Aren tried to protest, but she ignored him completely.
Before the bizarre examination could go any further, a thunderous roar echoed across the arena. The ogre, now visibly irritated, had had enough. It stomped its cleaver against the ground, sending tremors through the stone, its face contorting in a mix of rage and disbelief.
It had been ignored. By two humans. In its boss room.
"Oh, right…" Raven said with a grin, turning slightly. "Well, just take a look at me, rookie."
With a shimmer of light, a massive scythe materialized in her hand—black metal with silver etchings, wickedly curved and buzzing faintly with power. She rested it on her shoulder with casual ease, like it was weightless.
"The name's Raven. Bit on the nose, I know…" she laughed lightly, brushing hair from her glasses.
"S-Rank Hunter. Remember it. Worship it." She winked.
Then she turned back to the ogre, lightning crackling faintly beneath her soles.
"An E-Rank dungeon boss?" she said with a smirk, her voice lowering into a confident growl.
"Should take five seconds. Maximum."