Prologue
Ten years ago, a strange child was born in an unnamed frontier village. The child in question was not born to the human race but to a powerful race known as the daemon race. Daemons are race of people blessed with great strength and proficiency in magic. Appearance wise they look very similar to a human. That is if one ignores the pointed ears and horns on their foreheads.
A daemon's horn is not just a symbol of them being from the daemon race it actually plays an important role in their ability to use magic. Meaning, without a horn a daemon would find it very difficult to use magic. Though an extremely rare case, children without horns were born from time to time. And the strange child born in the unnamed frontier village is among those extremely rare hornless daemons.
The daemon child inquestion was named Raine, named as such by his father because he was born during a rainy day. His father that goes by the name of Cyrus is one of village hunters while his mother, Sui (a former hunter) is the village pharmacist and physician. He also have an older sister named Cloudia (born during a cloudy day), and a younger brother named Sunny who was born just five years ago on a clear, sunny day.
As mentioned earlier, Raine is a strange boy who was born without a horn despite being a daemon but that is not what makes him strange. You see, Raine have a great secret that even his family is not aware of---he is a reincarnator.
Raine, or rather, Raine's soul did not belong to this world (Aldus) but from a more technologically advance world called Earth. After taking his own life, Raine was reborn as a daemon child without horn with all the memories of his past life fully intact.
Thanks to the memories of his past life, Raine possessed knowledge and maturity unbefitting of his age---thus labeling him as a strange child.
Being born without horn, Raine could not use magic much to his dismay. But during an event five years ago, the boy was finally able to use magic.
What was that event you ask?
It was an assault from a revengeful wyvern.
Five years ago, a prideful wyvern made the areas surrounding the frontier village its territory. It attacked a farm in the outskirt of the village but suffered defeat from the hands of farm workers and suffered terrible wounds---forcing it to flee for its life. Being proud as it is, the wyvern secretly returned for a vengeance and either from coincidence or fate, ambushed two daemon children---the sibling Cloudia and Raine.
The two almost died the encounter with the wyvern but thanks to a great deal of luck and Raine's desperate attempt to save his older sister (resulting in his awakening), the children managed to narrowly escaped death.
After that encounter, Raine found out that he could now control mana and use magic though considerably weaker in comparison to his sister or even other daemon children his age. Despite this drawback, Raine was still very satisfied and made good use of his time to practice his craft.
A lot of things also happened to the boy, his family and whole village during the last five years. First, his sister Cloudia went to the capital to enter the Royal Academy. Second, Raine got himself a little brother---who thanks to Cyrus' weird naming sense went by the name of Sunny. Third, Raine finally gave in to his desire for the convenience from his former world and decided to bring them into this world.
Of course, Raine only brought forth things that he considered not "too out of place" for this world's current level of civilization like the knowledge of how to make an aqueducts, water pump, indoor plumbing and the likes.
But how could a boy of ten know all of those things?
You see in his previous life, Raine was an engineer and so these things are not outside of the scope of his knowledge. And earlier it was mentioned that Raine have ALL memories from his previous life, and that was no exaggeration. For some reason, Raine could recall EVERYTHING from his previous world which includes knowledge he learned from books and the internet. Meaning, if he really wanted, Raine could even introduce electricity, the internet, and even guns into this world.
Fortunately, Raine still have commonsense and decided against it as he considered them too advance for this world. Worrying that the advance knowledge from his previous world could have adverse effects in the development of his new world, Raine sealed everything that proved to be too advance or dangerous.
Nonetheless, what he brought out still greatly improved the lives of the villager. The greatest improvement though was to the health and hygiene of the villager which was Raine's main target in the first place. Of course, it was only possible thanks to his parents who went along with his ideas. Without their full support, his ideas could only remain as such---mere ideas.
The frontier village greatly transformed thanks to Raine's (plagiarized) inventions. Anyone who left the village before the transformation would be greatly surprise and would thought that they entered the wrong village like what Cloudia experienced after she returned home for a vacation from school.
Her dumbfounded look that day was quite a sight to see which she blamed on Raine and her parents for keeping the changes in the village a secret from her. But she quickly forgot her anger after experiencing the convenience of Raine's (plagiarized) inventions for herself. She loved the convenience so much that she almost didn't want to return to the capital but Raine and her parents managed to change her mind in the end.
Anyway the last five years was very eventful to say the least, and now that Raine reached the age of ten, he too would have to go to the capital to attend school.
Chapter 1
*Rustling noises.
The bushes rustles then moments later....
*Twang!
A large horned rabbit jumped out of the bushes only to be hit by a bolt straigth to the head.
*Thud!
The horned rabbit fall to the ground with a thud and twitches for a few seconds before stopping. Not long after a figure approaches the horned rabbit. It was a young boy holding a small crossbow. The boy have impressive features: red hair, amber colored eyes, and sharp features despite looking slightly childish. One could easily tell that the boy would grow into a splendid looking adult in the future. Another thing to note about the boy is his pointed ears---a telling that he is not human.
The boy question was none other than Raine from the daemon race.
Raine stared at his quarry, a horn rabbit and smiled. The meat from the rabbit is very tasty and its horn and felt could be sold for a decent price to the travelling merchants. Taking the rabbit by its ears, Raine returned to the place where he hid the other animals he hunted. Looking at them, Raine nooded satisfied. He caught quite a bit today and the sun is still high in the sky--showing that it's only noon.
If he wanted, Raine could continue hunting but decided to just go back home early. He has other important things to do today.
Using a sturdy branch, Raine tied his quarry into two bunches and hang them on ends of the sturdy branch. If one only look at boy's body build, they would agree that he wouldn't be able to carry all of those dead animals alone. But Raine's no ordinary person for he possessed extraordinary strength thanks to his race. Raine carried his quarry with ease and exited the forest.
An hour later he returned to the village. On his way to his house, he was greeted by the villagers who saw him which he returned with polite nods and smiles.
"That's an impressive haul you got there my boy," a short but stout looking male dwarf praise.
"Ah, good morning Mr. Dargo!"
Raine put down his quarry and greeted the dwarf with a large smile on his face. "I got lucky today," Raine explained.
The dwarf named Dargo raised an eyebrow hearing the boy's explanation. "Luck? Isn't it because of that thing on your back?" Dargo said while pointing on the crossbow on Raine's back with his chin.
"Yeah. This thing is really amazing. It's thanks to the crossbow you've made for me that I could catch this much prey in a single day." Raine agreed with the the dwarf's assumptions. The crossbow really did made hunting much easier.
The dwarf crossed his arms and shook his head disapprovingly. "You shouldn't discount yourself too much," Dargo responded.
Certainly the crossbow did play a big role in the success of the hunt but without the necessary skills the back it up, a tool no matter how well made will remain just a tool.
"Also, I might be the one who made it but without your knowledge, I woudn't be able to make something so impressive," the dwarf continued.
"Even if you say that...I didn't do everything myself though...."
Raine scratch the back of his head awkwardly. Dargo spoked the truth, the crossbow that Raine had been using was made using the method from his world.
Using magic, Raine seperated and combined the necessary minerals to create the ores for some of the crossbow's components. And by again using the knowldge from his previous world, he cured the wood that would be used as the crossbow's main body.
Unfortunately, despite having the knowledge how to make the crossbow he didn't have the necessary skill needed to make it himself. Therefore, he asked the village blacksmith, the dwarf Dargo, to make it for him. And after giving the dwarf the method to make the crossbow he wanted. Dargo without questioning Raine, followed the instruction from the boy to the letter---creating what the dwarf claimed to be one of his best work to date.
Now one might ask why a dwarf known for their skills in blacksmithing and crafting unquestionly follow the instruction of a young boy whose age is several decades less than his?
The answer to that is simple. Dargo is among the few in the entire village that is aware that the improvement made in the village during the past few years was all due to Raine himself.
You see to protect the boy from prying eyes, it was agreed upon (by Raine, his parents, the village chief and other important figures from the village) that they would give the credits of the inventions that greatly improved the village to an unknown master that also served as the boy's teacher. And this excuse served Raine until now.
Once news of Raine's inventions spread thanks to the merchants and peddlers, a great number of interested people came like a flood. Many of these visitors were merchants that didn't have prior dealings with the village. Even the local nobles came personally to see the spectacles for themselves. And once they experienced the usefulness of the inventions business offers started pouring in. These merchants and nobles were no fools and knew that they could make a large fortune if they could buy the rights to these inventions.
Unfortunately for them no matter how much money they offered, the villagers refuse to sell the rights to Raine's inventions. The interested parties even started using bribery and threats to force the villagers’ hands but failed miserably in the end. To begin with the frontier village have the backings of the crown itself. And many of its older residents of the village have been assigned by the king himself to develop the undeveloped lands of the frontier.
Many of the older residence of the unnamed frontier village used to be former officials and soldiers who served the daemon king in the previous war. After the war, these old daemons wanted nothing more than to live in peace with their families. Knowing this, the king sent these people to live and develop the frontier where they would no longer be embroiled in the politics of the capital.
Despite being sent in the middle of nowhere, these old daemons still have some political powers and influences though they almost never use it. But if they do find it necessary to use their political powers and influences, even nobles would become very wary of them.
Raine knew and made use of these facts. Knowing that his inventions would certainly cause an uproar once introduced, Raine made a deal with these old but influential daemon to protect himself and his family. Raine didn't even need to put much effort at convincing these people as they readily agreed to his request. Of course, the fact that these old guards wanted nothing more than to see the village prosper played an important role in the negotiation as well.
Another thing that played a big role in the negotiation process was the fact that these daemons are old grandpas and grandmas, as such, they are especially fond of children---treating every child born in the village as their own grandchildren.
When Raine was born, the whole village was shocked when they found out that the child is without horn. Worried that the child might be ostracized and bullied because of this reason, they ordered the villagers to ignore the fact that Raine is hornless and treat him as they would a normal daemon child. This is one of the reason why Raine wasn't bullied.
"By the way, you're going to leave the village three days from now, correct? Dargo asked.
Raine nodded at Dargo's question. Raine leaving the village is by no means a secret. Every daemon child that reached the age of ten is required to go to the kingdom's capital to study. This is the law and Raine is no exception.
"Fred will arrive in three days and I would be joining his caravan."
Fred or Frederick is a daemon merchant that visits the village once a month. He is also one of the merchants that received the right to sell some of the products that Raine invented. The villagers considered him trustworthy as he always gave them fair prices for his merchandise.
Raine had met the man many times already and he too considers him worthy of his trust. Hence, the boy chooses to use his caravan to travel to the capital.
"Considering your intellect, this might be an unnecessary advice but you must be careful when you arrived at the capital. You should be safe inside the academy but once outside, anything could happen."
Dargo gave the boy some advice once he reached the capital. On the frontier, no one would do any harm to the boy but the same could not be said of the capital. All kinds of people could be found there and a person of Raine's talent would be taken advantage of if he is not careful.
Raine promised that he would not let his guard down no matter where he is which made the stern dwarf smile.
Saying his goodbye to Dargo, Raine walked towards his house. He went around the house to the back storage so that he could process the animals he hunted. But before he could even do anything the back door opened and a small figure tackled him.
"Hey!"
Raine was startled by the sudden attack but did not try to push away the small figure hugging him.
"Welcome back, big brother!"
A cute, wide-eyed boy greeted Raine with a big smile on his face. Raine gently pinch his little brother's check with a wry smile on his face. The small "attacker" is Sunny, Raine's adorable little brother.
"How many times do I have to tell you not to do that? You could accidentally hurt yourself, you know?"
Ruffling Sunny's hair, Raine gently chastised his little brother but the little boy's reply made Raine helpless. Sunny loved to tackle and hug the member of his family. Raine, Cyrus, Sui, and recently even Cloudia who Sunny rarely sees fell victim to the little boy's antic.
Of course, Raine and his entire family didn't find the child's antic annoying. They are simply worried that he would hurt himself in the process.
"No worries, I'm strong!" Sunny declared in a childish voice.
"Yes yes, that you are but you still need to be careful, you hear?"
"Kay!"
Raine wasn't really sure that Sunny understand his worries but decided to just let it go. Anyway, Sunny only acted this way to the members of his family so it's no big deal, really.
Raine played with his little brother a bit and then proceed to disamantle his prey while little watched with interest. Having a child dismantle animals while an even smaller child watched seemed wrong at a glance but in the frontier this is very normal.
After dismantling his catch, Raine took the best parts of the animals to be used for that night's dinner while he stored the rest in the back storage. That night Sui cooked a feast from Raine's catch.
Three days quickly passed and the time for Raine to leave the village finally arrived....
To be continued...
