Volume One: The Beginning

1

　　Boom!!

　　Henry Clark's head started to vibrate.

　　Rumble!!

　　Henry Clark's head shook violently.

　　He was shaking! He moved!!

　　Bang!!

　　His head slammed hard into something solid, and Henry Clark let out a muffled groan.

　　Slowly opening his eyes, he looked with blurred vision at a patch of dim gray in front of him. A figure was swaying back and forth before him, seemingly busy closing the window and tidying things up. To the left of the figure, a window was faintly visible. Outside, with a crack, another flash of lightning lit up the room as bright as day.

　　Ugh...

　　Henry Clark groaned. He wanted to raise his hand to rub the back of his head, but his whole body wouldn't obey him at all. A mix of numbness, itchiness, and pain filled his body. His limbs felt as if they didn't belong to him, lying there senselessly at his sides, like four thin sticks of wood.

　　"Am I dead?" His mind was still a bit muddled. He remembered that, in the end, he had accidentally electrocuted himself while taking a shower, plugging in the power cord with wet hands. He had seen with his own eyes a burst of blue sparks between his hand and the socket, then a strong burnt smell and thick black smoke, and then nothing at all.

　　His mind was hazy, as if all his memories had turned to mush.

　　Henry Clark tried hard to open his eyes wide, wanting to see clearly what was going on around him.

　　Bang!

　　Another violent jolt, and his head banged against the headboard behind him. A wave of sharp pain hit again, and Henry Clark completely lost consciousness.

　　……

　　He didn't know how much time had passed—maybe a day, maybe several days.

　　He finally felt some sensation returning to his body, and his consciousness gradually cleared from the haze.

　　Bang. A soft sound, seemingly the door closing.

　　"Did Mom go out?" his sister's voice asked.

　　"Yeah, she had breakfast first and went to buy some fresh vegetables. I'll be going to your aunt's place in a bit too." A familiar man's voice replied, then fell silent.

　　Henry Clark suddenly realized he was sitting in a small bedroom. In front of him was a rectangular desk, and he was holding a black fountain pen, writing lines of letters on white paper.

　　Bright white light shone in from the window on his right. Outside, a light rain was falling. The red roof of the apartment building across the way was slick and wet.

　　Suddenly, as if a dam had burst, a huge and complex flood of memories surged into his mind.

　　"Ugh..." He groaned unconsciously, clutching his forehead. Countless unfamiliar memories flooded madly into his brain.

　　Garen? Am I George Miller? Did I... transmigrate?

　　He couldn't care about anything else, gritting his teeth against the headache, and quickly browsed through the memories pouring into his mind.

　　This world had a background similar to the European Industrial Revolution. There were cars, there were planes, and there were hot weapons like guns and cannons, but they hadn't yet developed weapons of mass destruction.

　　His identity was that of an ordinary boy named George Miller, sixteen years old, with both parents working as regular employees at a rubber company. He also had a younger sister named Grace Carter. The living environment around him was similar to Europe during the Industrial Revolution, but the appearance of his family and himself made it clear to him that this was definitely not Earth.

　　Because both he and his sister were born with purple-black hair and wine-red eyes. The hair color was inherited from their father, and the eye color from their mother. He had never heard of anyone on Earth being born with such hair and eye colors. And in the history he had learned before, the most powerful countries on Earth weren't China, the United States, or Russia, but the Yalu Federation, the Wiseman Empire, and the Tulip Republic. Otherwise, the world was similar to Earth, with hundreds of countries of various sizes and different systems.

　　Aside from the place names and environment, everything else was similar to Earth. Here, people had to receive a well-rounded education from a young age, from elementary school to middle school to university, without skipping a step. He was currently attending the third-ranked Saint Oriole Noble Academy in his province, which was a high school. He had just enrolled a year ago and was now on vacation. At home, he had suddenly come down with a high fever, and the original George Miller had died, giving Henry Clark, who had just transmigrated, a huge stroke of luck.

　　While sorting through the memories, he absentmindedly changed his clothes. When he came to his senses, he found himself sitting in a small, clean white room, eating a soft cherry cake at a spotless dining table. The palm-sized cake was pale yellow, with pure white cream on top, dotted with bright red cherries arranged in a circle.

　　At this moment, Henry Clark's attention was still immersed in the memories left by George Miller.

　　In those memories, although both George Miller and his sister attended a noble academy, it was only possible because their parents scrimped and saved, working overtime to barely make ends meet. To send the siblings to this school, all the family's daily expenses had been cut to the minimum. The parents couldn't even bear to buy new clothes or jewelry for themselves. All the generous benefits and bonuses from the rubber company had been turned into tuition and living expenses for the academy.