Why did the song stop? I reached for the radio, fumbling the buttons, but to no avail. It just stopped completely.

I frowned. There was something odd with the road ahead as well, like it was frozen in place.

Everything was strangely immobile, even though I was supposed to be driving at a high speed. Within the limits, of course. I always did right by the law, you know.

But before I could congratulate myself any further, a loud horn boomed against my left ear.

Startled, I turned to the noise.

Yellow headlights. A massive truck was coming towards me.

I pressed the pedals, yanked at the wheel, screamed as loud as I could...

But we were frozen in place by some strange force. Not even my screams had sound to them.

I died.

An image flashed in my mind’s eye. Some sort of enormous bright crystal. It went away as quickly as it came.

The world darkened.

What the hell was that?

[Choose class]

Was I dreaming?

[Choose class]

Shut up, would you?! I just died; can’t you leave me alone for a second to process my feelings?! You sound like my boss!

I was shocked by my own response. I’d never done that before.

Dying was truly a traumatic experience.

[The system will choose Yoshihiro’s class.]

The what is going to what for me?

[Demon Lord. Name: Akuma. Level: 10.]

Am I in hell? Are you a demon? Who’s Akuma?

[Welcome to Asturias, Akuma.]

Was the voice calling me Akuma? Why? But never mind that...

Did I just die listening to Taylor Swift?

My consciousness faded.

⚔️ ⚔️ ⚔️

Something prickled at my butt. I opened my eyes, somewhat groggy, the room around me blurry, and looked down. I was laying naked on a bunch of hay.

Maybe I passed out drunk, and all that dying business was just a booze-induced nightmare.

I looked around as my vision cleared...

Where did I find a barn to pass out to begin with?

I stood up from my prickly bed, but I was thrown off balance immediately, as the ground seemed further away from me than I remembered.

Weird. I was taller.

And as I looked at my hands that were clearly not mine—I had lady hands, people always told me—the barn front gates swung open, making me jump at the noise.

A dozen toothless figures in medieval-looking clothes stared at me, bunched up at the entrance.

“I told you I heard something!” the woman at the front said.

“Oh, don’t start! Just because you were right this time, it doesn’t erase the other hundred times you were just crazy!” said the man I assumed was her husband.

She growled, seemingly ready to beat the man up with the rake in her hands.

But she didn’t. Instead, she turned to me. It was dark, but the menacing look in her face was clear as day.

“We can do this the easy way, or the hard way, chupacabra.”

Chupa-what?

“Wait, wait!” I raised my hands, realizing they all had dangerous-looking farming tools in theirs. “I’m not whatever that is! I was just drunk, and I passed out, and I-I...”

I began to hyperventilate.

They fell silent. Maybe my ineptitude for basic breathing made them realize I was harmless. I was glad.

But something changed in the woman’s eyes. It was unnatural.

Hatred turned into fear—a mad, murderous fear.

She raised a shaky finger towards me.

“It’s a d-demon lord!”

Again with this?!

“I’m just an accountant!”

The husband spoke.

“He must have just been born! Kill him while he’s vulnerable!”

They began to march forwards in unison, trembling pitchforks and rakes in hand.

“Oi! That’s not funny!”

They want to kill me. They absolutely want to kill me.

I desperately searched for my inhaler, but then I remembered I didn’t even have pockets.

Oh, no. I’m going to die. For good this time. What do I do?

[Skill points available to allocate: 10]

You again? Be useful for a change and tell me what to do!

[Choose level 0 skill.]

I grabbed my hair. I was longer too... and blonde?

This is not a good time for this nonsense!

[The system will choose Akuma’s Level 0 skill.]

Wait—

[Level 0 skill: Dismiss.]

Huh? What’s that?

The voice went quiet.

It didn’t matter. The angry farmers were almost on me.

“Get him!” the woman said.

They charged, screaming like madmen.

I’m not going to die again—that sucked!

The charge had poked gaps into the disorderly mob’s body. I aimed for those gaps, dashing towards the open exit behind them, in hopes these long legs could run faster than they could swing.

I could see the night sky already. A relieved smile grew on my face as I ran.

But something cold and sharp dug on my side, making me gasp in pain.

There was a rake head attached to my bleeding stomach.

I yanked it off with a yelp, and shoved the farmer away, struggling to believe what had just happened.

Why did these elderly people hate me so much? I didn’t understand.

I just ran into the cold night, confused, holding my wound, as they ran after me.

⚔️ ⚔️ ⚔️

It was dark and scary as hell. Horrible noises came from deep within the woods I was in, not wolf-like howling, they were more like wet snarls. Was that the chupacabra the farmers talked about?

The thought sent shivers down my spine, even though I didn’t know what it was.

But I was shivering for other reasons as well.

I was cold, naked, losing too much blood.

Even though I had escaped my aggressors, it seemed I was about to die again anyways.

How ironic.

My eyelids began to close on their own, as I couldn’t keep them open any longer, the full moon disappearing behind black curtains.

I was starting to get used to this.

A familiar bright light dazzled me again. The crystal was back.

“Why do you keep dragging me here?” I asked the crystal.

I wasn’t mad, I knew it was just a thing. An object. But its presence was so great that it could be easily considered an entity on its own.

It didn’t answer, though.

I approached it, as there wasn’t anything else around me, just darkness and the crystal.

My features contorted into a frown as I got close; there seemed to be a shadow within the thing itself.

A human shape, in fact.

Long green hair, blue skin, eyes closed as if asleep, breasts.

Then I remembered that the voice that called me strange things undoubtedly belonged to a woman.

“Was that you?” I asked.

[Error. Demon Lord Akuma lacks permission to interact with the system.]

Her eyes didn’t open, her lips didn’t move, but I knew for certain that the voice came from her. I felt it in my soul.

“I told you, my name’s Yoshihiro.” I looked around. The poor girl seemed to be trapped there. “Is there something I can do to help? Maybe I can break you out from the outside somehow?”

[Error. Only the avatar may awaken the system.]

“The what now?”

The world trembled violently around me, as if the crystal went into shortcut.

[Error. Error. Error. Err—]

My eyes opened with a gasp, cold air filling my lungs.

The full moon above.

“You’re awake, master! You’re awake!”

A short, hunchback creature hopped around me joyfully. His hands were glowing with a yellow light.

“Please don’t hurt me,” I said.

The creature stopped, looking at me in shock.

“Never, master, never! Mog has searched far and wide for Your Evilness.”

I winced when he stretched his glowing hands towards me.

“Mog cast heal on master!”

I frowned.

“Heal?”

He nodded.

I checked my wound...

It was gone.

⚔️ ⚔️ ⚔️

I was in a palace. Like, a literal palace. But the whole place was kind of... ominous, to say at least.

Stone statues of creatures that gave me the creeps everywhere. There were also those ugly snarls I heard at the forest coming from somewhere within the palace. More evil-looking, hunch back, bald creatures like Mog hovering about the place—they talked in a strange tongue between themselves.

Mog was fine, though. He gave me some expensive looking, embroidered medieval clothes, fit for a lord.

I put them on and went in front of the mirror.

Aham. Now I was certain.

That handsome guy, with long blond hair, red eyes like rubies, wasn’t me. At least not the Yoshihiro that I knew my whole life. Maybe he was this Akuma the crystal woman talked about so much.

Maybe I was this Akuma now.

Mog was smiling wide at me with a mouthful of rotten teeth as if he knew that already.

I smiled sheepishly back at him.

⚔️ ⚔️ ⚔️

Thanks for reading Chapter I: Reincarnated in a world that hates me.

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