Chapter 52

Some people compare life to a road. A single road that keeps going.

If you look back you can see the path you came, and if you look ahead, you can see that it continues far into the distance.

If there are mountains then there are valleys. The road will wind as well.

Sometimes it may seem long, but turn out to be easy in the end.

After I reincarnated into an ogre, the road that I walked was not easy.

You could say that it was full of hardships.

I nearly died when I struggled to bring mana into my body. And as time went on, my rank in the village started to go up.

“It’s probably because I accepted every challenge, even though I had low mana.”

Because it was so low, all the kids that were the same age thought they could dominate me.

And of course, if I let them, I would be at the bottom forever.

And since I had lived in the modern world where equality was the norm, I could not tolerate a life where I had to obey everything that someone else said.

And so I fought in order to maintain my own freedom.

As someone who had low mana, the only way for me to do this was through Gekokujyo.

“In the end, a stronger kid appeared. That’s all.”

In order to maintain my will, I had to fight those who were above me.

In the end, the Gokokujyos continued until I had beaten all of the kids in the village. It was a good memory… Or maybe it wasn’t.

“And yet somehow, it didn’t end there.”

After all, Saifo and Beka kept challenging me, no matter how many times they lost.

The siblings had very high mana compared to everyone else in our age group. And so it was hard to believe that I could win, since there was so little mana that they could detect.

Still, both of them would not quit. And I fought them about a hundred times every year.

“And I won every one of those fights.”

“Hey, Golan. What was that?”

The brother of the idiot siblings—Saifo, came with a stern expression.

It was rare to see him looking so serious.

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t act stupid. I’m talking about your mana. When you were fighting against the Gigant Centaur, you… You had way more mana than me!”

“Exactly. The last time I thought it must be a mistake… What is happening?”

Beka joined us.

The Gigant Centaur’s corpse was behind us.

As was evident, there had been a fight, and I had won.

I had traded places with the other me, and then battled with the Gigant Centaur.

And while the Gigant Centaur was bound up by the chains, it had used all its power to break them. It was not an easy thing to do.

We both had advantages and weaknesses. I had a broken rib, injuries on my arm and leg. And there was a crack in my skull.

On the other hand, the enemy had its front legs broken, an arm torn off, and then his neck was snapped.

It had likely been a close call.

I felt like I would collapse from sheer exhaustion.

Which was no surprise, since it was much higher in rank than an ogre.

If I ever see a Gigant Centaur again, I’ll run.

As for the other me, he must have been quite satisfied. He thanked me and went back inside.

That meant I had to clean up this mess.

“It’s my secret weapon.”

It was going to be hard to trick them, but that’s what I told them.

“I see. So you can suddenly increase your mana level. That’s amazing, Golan.”

“Yes. I thought you were someone else.”

It wasn’t hard to trick them after all.

That being said, did they really not think it was strange that a person could change their mana level like that?

Your mana level was about the vessel that held your mana. Don’t they know that it’s not supposed to be able to just change?