I will be the Strongest

Prologue 2

When Lucifer disappeared, the ocean waters returned to their place. Daniel sank for many meters after his fall, but he didn't die. He couldn't see or hear anything that was happening around him. But the pain still persisted, and it lingered for a long time.

"Maybe I'm already in hell...?" he speculated.

But, no. That wasn't the truth.

It had been some time since the pain had stopped. Daniel found himself in darkness, without sight, smell, or hearing, but his touch still worked. No, he was many times better than before. When the warmth that surrounded and engulfed his body disappeared, all that remained was the cold of the ocean. His body was still almost completely immobile, but slowly, it returned to normal.

First were the tips of his fingers, and then their extension. And probably, that's what kept him alive during that time. No, not alive, it would be more accurate to say that thanks to this, he managed to reach dry land in the shortest possible time, right? After all, even with the various monsters haunting those waters, none of them managed to inflict a single scratch on Daniel. And yes, they tried.

"Huh? What was that?"

First came small and medium-sized monsters, maybe even sharks among them, some of the few remaining in the oceans; monstrous beings, almost completely modified by the large amount of mana in those waters. They tried to attack Daniel with everything they had, their claws and teeth were sharp, and the hunter could feel it every time they made contact with his body.

"Argh! ...Damn!"

Being a hunter, Daniel had been hurt by monsters many, many times before. However, somehow, this time, something seemed very different. He wasn't injured by those monsters at all, of that he was sure.

Daniel couldn't see, but after some time, using his sense of touch, which somehow seemed to have been incredibly enhanced, and something new, a "ability" he didn't possess before, "mana detectioneading," the hunter gained an almost perfect "vision" of everything around him; at least, everything that had life.

With this vision and almost perfect control of his touch, Daniel could easily say that those monsters didn't hurt him. In a way, it seemed that they couldn't even do that; so where did this pain come from? Over time, everything became clearer; he finally found an answer, a reason for so much pain.

Peripheral "vision" was indeed incredible because with it, Daniel could easily "see" for kilometers, but, like everything in life, even this had a price. And this price was simple; mana reading wasn't efficient enough to "see" so far, but he couldn't say the same about his body's senses, his sensitivity, which apparently had been raised to a level beyond what should be possible.

Controlling the sensitivity of his body, the pain that Daniel had been trying to get used to for a long time disappeared. But as a consequence of this, in response to the complete inhibition of his touch, the range of his "vision" decreased drastically, reaching something around 1000 square meters only.

And then, a little after the first monsters gave up attacking him, and a little before the movements of his fingers returned, the second wave of monsters came to him. This time it was a little different, stronger, more intense. Those monsters were incomparably stronger than the ones that came before.

Even with the inhibition of his touch, Daniel felt with extreme clarity how large and sharp those monsters' teeth were. Unable to defend himself or retaliate against the attacks, completely helpless in that situation, all that was left for him was to endure it all. In his "peripheral vision," all the space around him was quickly being filled with increasingly larger beings.

After some time, strange sensations took over his body; something was different, but he couldn't tell what it was. Until suddenly something changed; something ancient had returned, but now with great improvements.

"Huh? Is this..."

Suddenly, a horrible smell, simply rotten, completely filled his nostrils, and at that moment, Daniel understood: "My sense of smell is back!"

Thanks to that odor, which seemed to be rotting his body from the inside out, the urge to vomit was so strong that he didn't realize, but for a moment, for a brief moment, Daniel was able to move one of his fingers: the right index finger.

"How can a simple smell have an effect like this?! What is this?!"

How long did it last? Less than the period his touch was activated? Maybe more? Or perhaps it was the same amount of days, weeks, or months? Maybe, in reality, not more than a few hours had passed, but Daniel had no idea; he was sure of only one thing: to him, it seemed like an eternity.

After the obstruction of his sense of smell, Daniel returned to pay attention to his surroundings, and with that, he noticed that the number of monsters attacking him after that period had significantly decreased.

"Maybe they fought among themselves..?" He wondered. But soon a possible answer to that question came to his mind: "No, that's not it!"

Something seemed strange, and activating a bit of his touch, so he could "see" everything around more clearly, he was sure. The monsters surrounding him weren't attacking him; in fact, they were desperately swimming in the opposite direction of where Daniel was, but something didn't let them even leave the place.

"This doesn't make sense. The big ones are no longer here, so what's causing this...? Why are they so afraid?"

In the vast ocean, a place where depending on where you look, you seem to be seeing something infinite, a gigantic whirlpool emerged from the waters.

"Even "looking" so far, I can't see what's causing this. Is there something that can do something like this...?"

Along with the monsters circling nearby, Daniel was slowly absorbed by the intense whirlpool.

"Great... besides that creature, is there something big enough to cause this...? Damn! Not on land..."

After the emergence of portals, the ocean became a place overrun by monsters. Not every hunter had a useful skill to use underwater, and facing such a disadvantage, hunters couldn't exterminate those creatures. Over time, the ocean became the home to a new ecosystem filled with frightening and deadly creatures, perhaps more so than those on land.

In the sixth year, speculations arose about which monsters could still appear, which would be the most challenging to deal with. Among the many mentioned, one name stood out in the aquatic environment: Kraken. In the seventh year, rumors of sightings began to emerge even among the non-awakened. "I saw something while walking near the beach. It was enormous, larger than anything I had ever seen before. It looked like a huge island, but after some distracted time, I looked again, and it was gone. Could it be a new monster? Could it be the Kraken?"

"No, no, no, no, no... it doesn't exist; it was just a legend used to scare the fools who still thought about entering the sea even with monsters roaming freely."

Descending at great speed, Daniel's body was among the monsters caught by the whirlpool.

"But some time ago, Leviathan was also considered just a legend... But seriously? The Kraken?"

When close to entering what, for many, would be one of the main entrances to hell, for a brief moment, his sense of smell was elevated to the limit, and Daniel, who couldn't smell anything, received something back. The movement of his mouth had returned, and with it, his voice, making room for his first words after so long, which bubbled out of his mouth like small air bubbles, bursting upon reaching the surface. Now, what did he say, when unfortunately no one could hear him? What was the chosen word to be said after so long? The answer tends to be more disappointing than one can imagine: "Damn!" That was the first word said after so long.

From all sides and at every moment, something always tried to squeeze him. Being inside a monster longer than anyone would like, the reason was obvious: the creature was trying to digest him.

"Just like the other times, I must completely block my voice... which I'm already doing, right? Keeping my mouth shut, silent. Now, I must force it to the limit... but, just shouting normally or using mana to reinforce my words? No, actually..., is that even possible?"

After so long, Daniel stopped wondering about how much time had passed, which made him calmly proceed in his attempt to raise his voice to the limit. His first attempts to implement mana into his words were absolute failures.

"For my voice to have returned, my sense of smell should have gone through this same stage... But when?"

Daniel didn't know how to cause the implementation of mana; after all, it happened more than naturally. He wouldn't even have noticed if his voice hadn't returned at the same moment, but his body clearly remembered each step.

First, starting with the nervous system, and then the olfactory cells, moving to the nasal cavity, and ending, in the end, covering all the nasal passages completely. It wasn't just a simple strengthening; it was a dual action: at the same time these parts were strengthened, especially the nervous system, to withstand a larger and denser amount of information, they also had their sensitivity dramatically increased, to the limit, so that his sense of smell reached the limit.

The result? Daniel was met with such a rotten smell that it resulted in an apparent strong physical pain. The pain was so much that, again, without realizing, he was able to forcefully move his right index finger.

"What happened? Am I... being expelled?!"

Suddenly, the odor disappeared, the pain caused by it was replaced by the enormous pressure of his body being quickly lifted to the surface. Again, naturally, upon reaching the surface, emerging as a large amount of air from the fortified lungs, passing through the vocal cords in the larynx, the words quickly passed between his lips and could be heard by the world outside: –Damn! Did I just get digested?!

How loud were those words? Daniel couldn't know. But the result was obvious; his hearing had returned.

At first, all that could be heard were the sounds of the sea waters, the ocean waves, and, finally, some monsters that came to try to attack Daniel but, with successive failures, ended up giving up and leaving.

Having a small understanding of how mana implementation works, expanding the range of hearing was the "easy" part of the process. It wasn't immediate, but compared to other times, there was a clear reduction in time. Now, the inhibition... that was the, let's say, complicated part of the process, and perhaps it took even more time than the others, as when Daniel managed to complete it, he was already on a vast deserted beach surrounded by a gigantic wall.

Lying on the sand with the sea waters coming towards him several times, hitting his feet and sometimes reaching his hair, and with the scorching sun warming his body, Daniel opened his eyes and saw something simply phenomenal: the moon set right before his eyes. Not as commonly seen in the sky, but so close that he could touch its surface if he raised his hands.

Closing his eyes, one of the steps had already been fulfilled; now there was only one left, the expansion of his vision.

Starting in the brain, passing through the optic nerve and the retina cells, the crystalline, the pupil, ending the whole process in the corneas. Daniel slowly opened his eyes. It was instinctive; the moment his eyes met the center of that gigantic ball of plasma, witnessing the nuclear fusion of hydrogen atoms before him, the thermal sensitivity of his body was raised to the maximum. In that moment, indeed, it was as if Daniel were in..., no, at the center of the sun.

At that moment, thanks to his vision and bodily sensitivity, unbelievably, Daniel was at the center of the central star of the solar system. The pain caused by 15 million degrees couldn't be compared to anything he had experienced before. Compared to that, the attacks of the monsters when he was in the open sea could be compared to bites from small ticks.

The sensation of his skin, organs, and bones simply ceasing to exist infinitely, a pain so great that it prevented him from even trying to open his mouth, ended only when Daniel was "pulled" back to land, to the beach where, in fact, his body was.

–Aaaaaahhhh!– the screams of despair woke him from his trance –Help! Please, someone!–

After a few moments, Daniel opened his eyes again, but even with them open, everything was so dark. Sunbeams passed through small cracks and made him realize; his eyes weren't just closed, by instinct, he had covered them with one of his hands.

His movements had returned, but Daniel didn't even have time to show his relief and joy. Hearing the screams, he jumped to the top of the great wall that surrounded the entire beach and saw minotaurs, A-rank monsters, massacring various people—men, women, and children. For a moment, that sight reminded him of the failed raid against the Leviathan, the torn bodies in the streets echoed, in his mind, the bodies floating in the ocean waters that day.

As the sole survivor of a completely one-sided m******e, Daniel returned differently. On November 27, 2021, the day of his resurrection in a country he had never visited before, 9 years after his "death" and 4 years before the birth of another "monster" in this same country, the first irregular emerged.