Ch.0Prologue – The Green World

When I opened my eyes, the world was green.

Nonsense, you say?

Unfortunately, I find it hard to answer that myself.

I can’t even grasp the situation.

I try to move my body, but it won’t budge.

‘What is this? What’s going on?’

I barely managed to roll my eyes to look at my arm and saw something like shackles fastened to it.

The exact kind you’d see in old Western movies.

Why am I wearing these?

No matter how much I racked my brain, I couldn’t find an answer.

And then, I suddenly realized I had overlooked something and rolled my eyes again to look at my arm.

There was nothing there.

I concentrated on my senses.

And I realized something very important.

‘Where did my clothes go?’

Startled, I tried to move to check my body.

Of course, it was a futile effort.

Still, I could tell my situation was quite serious.

Once I became aware of it, I started feeling uncomfortable all over my body.

It’s hard to stay calm, but I tried to assess my current situation.

First, my voice—I can’t speak.

And there’s something pressing against my mouth and nose.

Am I wearing some kind of mask?

‘At least I can breathe without problems.’

There’s no sensation of water entering my nose or mouth, so I figured I wouldn’t suffocate. I rolled my eyes to look around.

‘What the fuck is this place!’

Since the world was filled with green, the outside looked green too.

But the sight of numerous cylindrical objects standing around made me curse involuntarily.

Looking closer, I realized I was also trapped inside one of these cylindrical things.

I unconsciously tried to move my body several more times, wasting energy in vain.

I felt an urgent need to identify what kind of cylinder I was trapped in.

Of course, my body wouldn’t move, and naturally, both body and mind grew tired, wasting energy.

Though I’m not sure if I actually wasted energy since my body didn’t move at all.

As I remained still from exhaustion, I gradually began to get used to this situation.

Indeed, humans are creatures of adaptation.

For now, it didn’t seem like anything would happen to my body.

So I should try to organize what happened before I ended up in this situation.

There might be clues there.

First, I bought a cup of ramen at the convenience store in front of my house.

Then, thinking I should stock up on some ramen, I bought two packs and was carrying them out.

The end.

‘This is driving me crazy.’

Obviously, I don’t have a hobby of walking around naked.

If I did, I would have been immortalized on social media, become a disgrace to my entire family, and had a “moment of truth” with the police.

‘Why am I here?’

Was I kidnapped for human trafficking?

I don’t feel any pain in my body, so I don’t think I was beaten.

Did they use some drug to knock me out?

But do modern human traffickers keep people submerged in green liquid?

It’s not like they’re doing some kind of human modification…

‘Huh? Human modification?’

Green liquid.

Cylindrical objects.

Human modification.

‘Ah.’

I’ve seen this kind of thing a lot.

Like Bio*azard or Kamen Ri*er.

I’m not sure if it appears exactly like this, but these are creative works with many similarities.

Setting aside whether I’ll appear in them or not, the latter at least gives me a fifty-fifty chance of becoming a hero, but the former is definitely problematic.

Because there’s a high probability of becoming a monster or dying as a monster.

At the very least, I don’t want to die being shot by a gun or bazooka after becoming a monster.

I’ve never even had a girlfriend, and if I meet such an end, I wouldn’t be able to rest in peace out of sheer injustice.

‘…Let’s calm down first.’

I’m not a cat; I don’t have a hobby of climbing into containers like this on my own.

And I drank ramen broth, not alcohol, so I was in a perfectly sober state.

So obviously, I didn’t come here of my own accord.

That means someone put me here and imprisoned me.

That person won’t keep me here forever. They’ll take me out eventually.

Alright, it’s all or nothing.

I’ll wait for the right timing.

‘I’m not confident in fighting, but I’ll push with all my might and run away.’

After thinking that, I sang about five songs in my head.

‘About 15-20 minutes have passed.’

Beyond the container, I could see human shadows.

“……”

“……”

“……”

I couldn’t hear their voices clearly. It was natural since I was trapped in a container and there was some distance.

This makes it impossible to determine which country they’re from.

But knowing wouldn’t change anything anyway.

“……”

When one shadow raised a hand, the green world began to change.

The water seemed to thin out.

The green world regained some color as if the concentration had weakened.

Rolling only my eyes, I looked around.

There were multiple containers.

People were inside them.

I couldn’t see properly because I couldn’t move my body, but I clearly saw what looked like a woman’s face and the outline of what might be an elderly person with a hunched back. Even just nearby, there seemed to be differences in height, muscle, and body shape.

It seemed they didn’t discriminate by age, gender, or race.

Everyone appeared to have their eyes closed and heads bowed.

Wait, am I the only one with my eyes open?

Then, how am I able to keep my eyes open?

And I could see the identities of the shadows.

Three people in total.

One was a knight in full plate armor.

For some reason, he had two swords at his waist.

Another was an older man who looked like a priest.

And the man in the center.

A man with platinum blonde hair, slightly long and neatly tied back in a ponytail, with gray eyes.

His overall demeanor seemed proper and neat.

But for some reason, he gave off a chilling impression.

He was tall and also carried two swords.

Seeing two people carrying two swords in a similar fashion, it might be some kind of dress code there.

I was confused about what kind of human trafficking group would kidnap so many people and dress up like they’re in a fantasy world.

How extensively must they operate to gather people of all ages and genders like this?

Is that it? A cosplay human trafficking group?

I couldn’t help but laugh.

If such a criminal organization existed, games, manga, and novels would be treated as social evils that shouldn’t exist in this world.

I carefully observed those people.

There was some distance between them and me.

Above all, they had their backs turned to me, so they didn’t seem to know I had my eyes open.

I couldn’t understand what they were saying, but the priest-like person seemed to be explaining something earnestly while moving his arms.

It was clear that the priest was definitely involved with the kidnappers.

He kept pointing at the people in the containers while talking.

I wondered if this is how fish feel in tanks at the fish market.

Indeed, I’m in the same position as a fish, breathing inside a transparent glass container filled with water, looking outside.

Just without gills.

Suddenly, the platinum-haired man turned around.

“…?”

“…”

Feeling uneasy, I quickly closed my eyes.

Meanwhile, the voices grew a bit louder.

“…”

Then suddenly, there was an unpleasant sound of metal scraping, followed by something shattering, something collapsing, and a loud impact sound near my container.

I almost opened my eyes in surprise.

After some time had passed,

feeling the presence moving away slightly, I opened my eyes just a tiny bit.

The upper part of my container, or rather the upper half, was covered with something red, making it impossible to see anything.

In the lower part that was barely visible, there were what appeared to be the remains of a container similar to the one I was trapped in.

Between them, I could see a person’s legs and arms.

They were positioned at impossible angles.

Placed on the red paint, they were too visible.

‘Why is it so vivid?’

Even while knowing what the object in the container was, I started denying what it could be.

Thinking it was too unrealistic.

Suddenly, my eyes began to close.

Something seemed to be rising from within me, but it was a strange feeling like it wouldn’t come out.

I thought I needed to stay conscious, but my body and mind had already started to disconnect.

Perhaps I didn’t want to acknowledge what those arms and legs really were, despite immediately realizing their identity.

As I lost consciousness, the last thought that crossed my mind, ridiculously enough, was simply that I wanted to go home.