The_One_Who_Was

"Now you see?" she shouted in a mix of annoyance and disappointment. "You can't outsmart Scrients! They're the most intelligent beings across the two realms."

"You're right," I muttered, averting my gaze with a heavy sigh. "I made a mistake. I was too arrogant to think that a mere human like me could fool them."

—BOOM!!

"Heik! Wh-What was that?"

"Hmm? I'm not sure. Maybe you should go and ask the most intelligent beings across the two realms. Oh wait, you can't. I killed them all.”
______

My name is Samael Kaizer Theosbane.

On the last day of high school, I got into a fight with a kid I used to bully.

It was a stupid, pointless scuffle, and in the middle of it, I tripped and hit my head on a rock.

That’s when the memories came flooding in - the memories of another life, of a different world.

Suddenly, everything made a twisted kind of sense. I realized two things.

First, I was in a game I used to play in my past life.

Second, I was a villain. A villain!

Not the cool and mysterious kind, either.

No, my destiny was to be manipulated and die a dog's death!

I was the worst type of cliché: an ungrateful, privileged, insufferable young master. The sort you'd find in those poorly written fantasy stories.

The kind everyone hates — a snobby brat from a powerful noble family who thinks he owns the world just because he was born with a silver spoon lodged in his mouth.

You know the type. The one the hero beats to a pulp to prove his worth.
 Yeah, I was that guy.

And the hero? The hero was the kid I’d been bullying all this time. The same one I got into a fight with.

He was the supposed savior of this damned world.

A world teetering on the edge of destruction, beset by wars, calamities, and a grim future that only I knew.

And at the end of it all, the final antagonist of the game, the undefeatable boss… the Spirit King, was waiting.

But could I even make it to the end?

Could I conquer a game where defeat was the only certainty?

A game that was now my reality!

“Ah, fuck it.”

I had no idea if I could, but I sure as hell was going to try.

Extorting extras, manipulating main characters, twisting the story to my advantage, stealing the hero’s cheat items, killing villains before they could become threats - nothing was beneath me.

Would the main characters be affected? Who cares!

Would the story change? Even better!

All I cared about was me—my survival, my life, my choices.

“I will live this life with no regrets.”

…But as I soon discovered, fate was not easily changed.

And the price of altering one's destiny was steep.

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Right, I forgot to mention — Thalia's dorm was in the same complex as mine.

It made sense. I lived in one of the most expensive buildings on Ascent, after all.

But since she was on the other side of the wing, I hardly ever saw her. And I preferred it that way.

I even made an active effort to avoid her – taking the back entrance, using the stairs instead of the elevator, or anything to minimize contact with her.

But today in my rush to run away from Michael, I'd made one crucial mistake…

I forgot that Thalia had an impeccable talent for showing up in my life precisely when I needed her not to.

And judging by the company she kept today, it was about to get worse.

Alice and Willem stood beside her.

Why they were with her, I had no idea.

From the looks of it and from what I had heard, they were now living together or something?

Catching Up