A Manager...?

'Huh?'

But fate... betrayed all his expectations...

Literally, nothing happened...!

No unbearable pain, no otherworldly knowledge come into his brain, and no sense of extraordinary strength flowed in his body.

Heck! Even now he couldn't feel his legs. He was still feeling as sickly as ever.

'Does it need more time to adjust to my body?'

'Fuck!!!!!!!'

A sense of panic and hopelessness crept up in his heart.

Arthur shook his head, trying to calm his mind and trembling hands.

"Luna, we are not fighting. It didn't work! It is possible that it needs more time to assimilate in my body either that or it never gave any powers to humans..." His voice was low in distress. "We need to escape!" He looked at Luna, his face very serious.

Luna seeing his serious face, nodded. She closed her eyes and sighed.

It was true these monsters were strong, she knew it in just a glance. Their odd resemblance to humans told her that they were pretty high-ranked as well.

She couldn't fight these, she wasn't strong enough.

A magic circle materialized but this time only below Arthur. Arthur's eyes widened as he looked into Luna's. He recognized that look, the same self-sacrificing look his parents had when he saw them last time.

"No no no no no nooo!! Don't think of anything stupid, and come with mee, Lunaaaaa!!!!" He yelled.

"I am the older one, Art. Listen to me for o-once!" Luna smiled, tears rolling down her cheeks.

He stated that it might need time to assimilate in his body, if she could buy a few more hours for him, then she'll happily sacrifice herself.

"It's only a month's difference!" Arthur cried. "Fucking Dammit Noo! I said come with me, daammit!" Arthur screamed his lungs out, choking on his own tears and tumbling down his wheelchair in order to get away from the magic circle to be with her.

He is a calm and calculating person usually, but sometimes certain situations make him let his emotions take control of him.

Situations like this.

Luna smiled helplessly, 'He never listens, huh...'

She crouched down and leaned in a hug. He hugged her back, holding her with all the strength his weak body could muster.

Luna patted him, calming him down a little, and herself as well as she felt his warmth for one last time.

She then took him in a deep kiss, Arthur's eyes widened in surprise, but he soon relaxed and closed his eyes, tears running down more than ever.

So, she had such feelings for him, huh...

A second later, the soft and wet sensation vacated his lips... He couldn't even say goodbye!

He was teleported to a place unknown to him.

Sniveling, he climbed up on his wheelchair, cursing the whole Devil race in his mind. First, those bastards killed his parents, and now...

'No, she's strong. She may have just separated herself from me so that I won't become a dead weight to her, yeah! She must have teleported herself elsewhere, somewhere safe... Please, god!'

Arthur took deep breaths trying to clear his mind and think next course of action.

Just like every existence in this world, he didn't know the procedure to gain power from the OM-Orb but he swallowed it since somehow doing that made the most sense to him, at that time.

But not even ten minutes had passed, and a familiar magic circle appeared in front of him.

His eyes lightened up. It was Luna's!

However, instead of her alone, another figure was with her. It was holding her from her behind her neck, a thin black stripe connecting the figure's and Luna's forehead.

Blood trickled from Luna's mouth and the hole in her stomach, her eyes completely lifeless.

She was dead.

Luna was his only family in this whole world. They grew up together, played together, and cried together. They mourned when her parents died, they mourned when his parents died. She was his last strand of hope in this damn devil-filled world. She was the reason he was what he is.

Even though their life wasn't all flowers and sunshine, they had each other. He was her everything and she was his everything in this vast world.

He knew they couldn't always be together. He knew that he would die sooner or later. But never in his wildest dreams, he considered her death earlier than his.

Arthur's heart seemed to stop, his blood boiled, his breathing wavered, and his eyes became bloodshot. This much rage, Arthur has never felt this much rage.

The bastard Devil had used her fading consciousness to get to him!

The one-horned, muscular, and oddly human-looking Devil disconnected the black stripe from Luna's head and threw her like a rag. Her use was over, the Devil didn't need to touch a filthy human more than necessary.

"Ah, this other filth has hidden the OM-stone inside his body... sigh... I'll have to decapitate him and then shake his body holding it upside down to extract the stone." The Devil slowly made his way toward Arthur, too lazy to rush at him. "Sigh, more work!" His voice was nonchalant and smooth yet deep.

"Haaahhhhhh!!!" Arthur yelled, his mind swamped and his heart devastated by all the rage and sadness.

The next moment, Arthur's world turned upside down. 'Ah, that mot**fuc** beheaded me already, huh.'

His head fell on the cemented ground, rolled a few meters then his vision went dark.

Nothing much... A pitiful cripple who had lost everything lost his life as well. Though a few months earlier.

---

Arthur's view changed...

Darkness was all Arthur could see when he finally gathered enough courage and opened his eyes.

'Is this where the dead finally go? Afterlife perhaps?' He mused. 'Or have I gone blind?'

But it didn't feel like his vision had failed him, so it was probably just another location...

He didn't know, but he did care. He would very much like to see his loved ones again... and Luna... if it was possible.

Noticing he still had his body, although naked, and unfortunately, even after his death he couldn't feel his legs, he sighed audibly.

Suddenly with a spark, a penguin appeared in front of him. Two stark yellow spotlights fell from above simultaneously, one on him and another on the cute stuffed toy-like penguin. Enlightening only two existences in this vast darkness.

The blue penguin with a red beak was donned in a black three-piece suit and a tie.

"Apologies for the late arrival, dear newbie! I am Barnes, your personal managerrr!"

The Blue Penguin, named Barnes, raised its chin in pride.

"You don't know how happy I am to actually get a compatible Mercenary! I have waited for so many eons to finally get to do something. Oh, dear~ newbie, you don't know how boring it is there up there~ There was literally nothing you could do but wait there in that pure white space. Ah, fuck those proctors, forcing me to take those stupid examinations. I swear if I meet them again, I'll kill them! Hu?" The penguin which spoke like the chatterbox it was, finally paused.

Arthur was frowning in bafflement, 'This thing's alive? It's not a robot? And why does it speaks so much!?'