Aughh!!

Why is my stomach so painful?

Did I eat something bad that I actually have to go to the toilet in the middle of the night?

This is so annoying!

Why now, of all times!?

The once heavy sleeper Xidriel Junio Franz grunted in annoyance as he cracked his eyes open. When he tried to move his body, a small, painful groan escaped his lips.

His body seemed to be unnaturally heavy and ached everywhere so badly that it reminded him that one time he got run over by a car before, while his insides twists and churns.

It seems laying on his back, with his stomach exposed to the cold, is bad for his age even though he’s only in his mid thirties; one thing though, he doesn’t remember his bed being this firm and cold…

With his gaze still unfocused, he moved his stiff arm to reach out to grab his thick but fashionable eyeglasses from his bedside table.

However, he grabbed nothing but air.

Confused and irritated by the throbbing pains coursing through his body, Xidriel turned his head to the right to peer directly at where his bedside table used to be, only to realize that he was, in fact, not in his bedroom in his parents’ house anymore.

Instead, what he saw was rustic stonework—the kind normally seen in old churches—against the dim light provided by the numerous candles scattered about the place, each fire wavering slightly from the cold wind coming from outside the building.

With a wary expression, Xidriel pushed himself up and found that he was laying on a cold, stone altar with intricate carvings on its surface.

Frowning at the cold sensation slowly permeating into his skin, as well as slightly getting bothered by something wet coating his fingers and lower back, Xidriel finally looked down on himself.

His heart trembled in fear as he swallowed a scream that threatened to escape his lips when he found out that he was fully naked, his abdomen and thighs drenched in blood; a large amount of his blood had stained the altar’s surface and most of it had stuck to his skin.

Peering closely in the dim lighting, Xidriel realized that not only he was cut open like a frog experiment in a grade school science laboratory class and his innards been pulled out and played with, his body seemed to be regenerating all of the lost parts and closing up slowly like some weird molding clay being stretched and smoothed out.

What exactly is going on here…?

Is he still dreaming…?

He didn’t watch or read anything weird before going to bed to warrant such a gore-ish dream…

Before he could fully go into panic mode, a surge of headache hit him as broken memories that originally did not belong to him resurfaced and started to merge with his own.

He curled up on the stone altar, clutching his head as he pressed his blood-drenched palms against his temples.

He clenched his eyes shut and opened his mouth to let out a stifled cry as the foreign memories forcibly wedged itself into his mind.

Thanks to that, he learned of a name and a brief history of what had transpired before he woke up.

Xidriel Vahagn Sternberg y Hynes, twenty-five years old.

Youngest child of Count Hynes, and considered to be an eccentric fellow by many nobles due to his refusal to be the First Prince’s Advisor. Instead, he studied an obscure craft from a book he found in his grandfather’s library.

Kidnapped by armed thugs on his way to a friend’s gathering and was handed over to a group of cultists.

Stripped of his clothing. Restrained on the altar, gagged and blindfolded.

The scent of heavy incense. Unrecognizable chants.

Something sharp piercing the spot below the cavity of his ribs.

Gagged screams.

The strong scent of blood mingling with the incense.

The blade being dragged downward.

Clammy hands forcibly opening him up and ripping his innards.

Slowly losing consciousness, with resentment and anger being his last thoughts.

Piercing golden eyes against a dark shadow.

A gaping mouth with rows and rows of jagged teeth.

An enraged roar in his ears.

A rush of power entered his body, enveloping him. All of the restraints on his body disintegrating into thin air.

Screams rang out around him, along with the acrid scent of burning flesh.

Silence.

Pure darkness.

Xidriel’s eyes snapped open once the memories settled down, and he slowly unfurled himself and looked down at his hands, his mind whirring wildly at the new information that he had gained.

He…transmigrated?

How is that possible?

Transmigration is something that can only happen in the realm of fiction, like the ones he read online.

It should not have been possible for someone like him, who lived in reality.

He curled his hands into fists as he tried to stabilize his own breathing instead of going into a full panic attack. He experimented on wiggling his toes and touching his face, until he slowly accepted that his situation is not a vivid dream.

Was having the same name as the original owner of this body served some kind of link between them?

Is that how transmigration works in this world?

Is the healing ability his body is showcasing due to the original owner’s hidden ability or is it something he gained when he took over?

He lifted his head to look around the cold place when he couldn’t find any immediate answers to his own questions, wary of any surviving cultists jumping out at him.

He grimaced at the scene around him, which seemed to be something out of a horror movie: circling the altar were human remains, their dark robes either singed or burnt.

Xidriel surmised that whatever ritual they were attempting had backfired, turning them into nothing but a sorry gloop of human meat, with barely any recognizable features.

There was another stone altar opposite the one he was on, and his blood ran cold upon seeing a boy of six or seven years of age lay on top of it, stripped naked like he was.

Once the hole on his abdomen was no longer gaping and making sure his innards were safely cocooned within the reformed muscles and the skin slowly encasing it, Xidriel carefully swung his legs over the side of the altar to look for clean clothes to cover himself.

Surely, the clothes they had stripped him out of are still somewhere in this sacrificial chapel?

He quickly rummaged through the dingy chapel, yet he only found his white shirt, a black underwear, and his brown pants inside a satchel leaning against the wall.

The rest of his outfit and his—no, the original Xidriel’s—favorite brown oxfords were nowhere in sight. Not even his wallet was spared.

Wow, not only did they sacrifice him, they even robbed him of his things!

Why steal from a man who wasn’t even considered to be a successor to the Count’s title?

Or did they give it away to whoever helped them transport him to this location?

Aren’t cultists normally backed up by rich, twisted bastards?

Why don’t they pay with their own money instead of using his?!