'Urg,'
Everything was dark.
My jaw didn't just hurt; it was a screaming, shooting pain that pulsed with every heartbeat. It felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer to my face and I'd just hit the deck.
I could feel the cold stone against my cheek. Wait—stone? Why was it so cold?
The last thing I remembered was sitting in my office, trying to grind through my boss's impossible expectations. It was the middle of a sweltering summer, and the air conditioner had been broken for a week. It should have been like a furnace in there.
How could I feel this kind of chill? It didn't make sense.
And more importantly, who the hell punched me? I'm a nobody. I never even looked at anyone's girlfriend, let alone did something wrong to one.
So how? Why?
The darkness was wailing in my ears and my eyelids felt like they were made of lead. I couldn't open them.
If only I could—
"Hey, how dare a filthy half-noble like you even look at my sister?"
Who?
Suddenly, I felt a hand grab my collar—or something like it—and yank me upward. My face left the cold ground, and I was dangling.
I fought to open my eyes. It took way too much strength, like I was trying to lift a mountain with my eyelashes.
I managed to crack my left eye just a tiny bit.
Through a blurry, fumbled haze, I saw a faint image. A guy with shimmering silver hair was standing over me. He was sneering, and he was lifting his hand high.
What is he doing?
My brain was so scrambled I couldn't even process the danger. I just stared at that hand.
Slap!
A heavy, stinging slap landed right on the side of my face, sending my head spinning back into the dark.
"Is that it? Is that all the great 'trash' of the von Heist family can do?"
The voice was loud. Arrogant. It sounded like it belonged to someone who had never been told 'no' in his entire life.
As the ringing in my ears faded, the blurriness started to clear. I saw the silver hair again. The silk clothes. The crowd of students in the background, whispering and laughing.
Wait. Silver hair? Half-noble?
A specific chapter from a novel I'd stayed up all night reading flashed through my mind like a lightning strike. My heart skipped a beat, and for the first time, it wasn't because of the physical pain.
This wasn't my office. It wasn't the suffocating summer heat.
The guy in front of me—the perfect, shimmering silver hair, the eyes that looked down on everyone like they were insects under his boot—he looked exactly like the "Hero" from Hero of Aetheria.
The same protagonist the entire fandom hated for the first fifty chapters because he was such an insufferable, arrogant bully before the world went to hell.
It... can't be.
There is no way.
Right?
I forced my other eye open to take a look at myself. If he was the Hero, then I was...
I glanced down at my hands. They were pale, thin, and covered in the dust. My clothes weren't my cheap office button-down; they were a tattered, low-quality version of an academy uniform.
Cian von Heist.
The name hit me like a second punch to the gut.
I wasn't just a random student. I was the "Half-Noble Trash." The guy whose only purpose in the entire story was to be a punching bag in the prologue to show how "arrogant" and "dominant" the Hero was.
What the hell is this? Even dreams have limits.
And this dream was going way too far. The pain was too sharp and the taste of blood in my mouth too real.
I needed to wake up. I had to finish that report before the boss came in to nag me about "productivity" and "synergy." If I didn't turn it in by evening, the only thing hitting my face would be a termination letter.
'I will just close my eyes, and try to wake up.'
I squeezed my eyes shut in an attempt to wake up from this dream.
One.
However, the ground beneath me felt solid. Too solid.
Two.
"Ignoring me now?"
Three!
"You really are as pathetic as the rumors say, Cian."
Four!
After counting to five I tried to open my eyes again.
However, before I could do so and be free from this nasty dream, my head was slammed back onto the hard stone.
"Arg!"
My eyes shot open from the unbearable pain. The impact rattled my brain, and for a second, the world turned into a kaleidoscope of grey and white. All that hope of waking up in a sweaty office vanished, replaced by the crushing weight of a painful reality.
"What's the matter, trash?"
The hero prick was looming over me. He hadn't even broken a sweat. Even his hand, which was gripping my neck, didn't have a single tremble.
"Lost your tongue along with your dignity? You were so brave when you were 'accidentally' walking near my sister's training grounds."
The crowd laughed. I hadn't realized it before, but there were quite a bunch of students gathered here.
I could see all of them had at least a higher status than me—their uniforms were tailored, their boots were polished to a mirror sheen, and their faces carried that specific, effortless arrogance that only comes from generational wealth.
I was the only one on the ground. I was the only one covered in dirt.
"Look at him," a girl in the back whispered. She didn't even bothered to hide her amusement. "He's actually shaking. Is he going to cry?"
"He's probably wondering which of his 'noble' ancestors to pray to," another boy chimed in, leaning against a marble pillar. "Too bad none of them would claim a mistake like him."
The mockery was loud, but to me, it felt distant. I didn't care about the sister. I didn't even care about the Hero's fist that was gonna wind up for a strike any moment that would definitely break my jaw.
My eyes darted toward the sky. It was a clear, beautiful blue. Peaceful.
But I knew.
In exactly nine minutes the sky was going to bleed and tear apart. The first Dungeon Break of the apocalypse was going to happen right here, in the middle of this very courtyard.
And in the original story, Cian von Heist didn't survive the first wave. He was left bleeding on the ground while the "Hero" made his grand escape.
The prick's fist glowed with the faint hum of mana and a smile appeared on his face.
I spat a glob of blood onto his polished boot and looked him dead in the eye.
But I am not in the mood for dying today.