CH 1

Today is the day that I, Elma Edvan, would receive my <Divine Blessing.>

Relatives from the Edvan Household were gathered in the saloon, quietly watching over me.

Divine Blessings; also known as Classes, were powers handed by the Gods to the weak humans for them to be able to counter the demons.

Humans who acquired classes would have their physical abilities boosted, and at the same time, they would also be able to obtain various powerful skills. 

There were various classes you could obtain; a magic swordsman, a warlock, and other different classes with their own fighting styles and roles.

The moment one turns 15, they would be able to receive their <Divine Blessing> on the first day of a new year.

It’s been said that one’s class can be influenced by one’s fate, bloodline and demeanor. In addition, fifteen years prior before acquiring one’s Divine Blessing, was the time the Gods were keeping an eye in order to pinpoint one’s true nature.

The classes of the existing heads of nobilities also had a great impact on maintaining their influence and authority.

The County of Edvan, which, for generations, have had a lineage of sword-wielders, holding the powerful class known as, Sword Saint, had earned respect for properly protecting their territory.

Naturally, as the next head of the family, I am also expected to fulfill that duty.

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“Don’t worry, Elma. I, your father, am well aware that you’ve been diligently working hard for a long time. You are my child, and I am confident that the God of Sword will bestow a powerful class to you,” said the current head of the Edvan Household, my father, to me as he placed his hand on my shoulder.

“Yes, Father, I know. I’m not worried even a tiny bit.” I bowed my head a little at my father as I headed to where the Elder Priest is.

Normally, the <Divine Blessing Ceremony> was held in churches. This time, however, my father asked the Elder Priest to come all the way to our mansion all for the sake of performing my own <Divine Blessing Ceremony.> Furthermore, the priest performing the ceremony for me was the highest leveled priest in the city, with a level of 50.

However, it’s not like the quality of the priest performing the ceremony would influence the Divine Blessing one would receive. But, as my parents wanted me to obtain a good class, they had this wishful thinking and hired the said priest.

But.. you know… I feel a strange sense of deja vu in this situation.. Back then, whenever I saw or learned something, it felt like I’ve had always known it for a long time. Well… It might just have been my imagination..

“Well then, I will now conduct this young boy’s ceremony. <Baptism>!”

The moment the Elder Priest said those words, a bluish-white magic circle started to emerge around me. And then, I could feel a sudden surge of power welling inside my body.

<Baptism> is a skill associated with Holy Magic. Once a human meets the necessary requirements, the skill then would be used to grant them blessings and classes.

“And with this, we’re finished. By now, you should be able to use <Status>“

<Status> is a spatially projected character tree anyone with a class can freely use. It is one’s way of checking one’s class and character attributes.

“I understand. Then… <Status>!” The moment I chanted those words. Light gathered around the palm of my hands and my <Status> appeared.

When I saw what happened, I was kind of shocked.

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As I thought, I know what this is…

Five years ago.. no, it was way more back then.. Yes, before I was even born.

This world is exactly the same as the VR-supported online game, called <Magic World> I used to play back in my previous life. 

It’s hard to believe in various stances but that’s all I can say. 

I know every nook and corner of this game as there are days where I spent more or less 20hrs playing said game.

If I dare say it, my former life’s deep-seated delusions may have brute-forced its way into reincarnation.

As I thought of this, I was both delighted and confident with my triumphant victory.

The delight I was feeling was due to the fact that I had entered the game world I was playing in my previous life. And the confidence of winning I felt was due to the fact that I knew all the classes, skills, as well as the nature of demons.

In the game <Magic World>, the Gods will ask at least 20 questions to the player when creating a character. The results will then be accounted for the creation of the character as well as granting the appropriate class. But apparently in this world, one’s class is decided upon how one has lived before turning 15.

Since newly born babies couldn’t be asked questions about their way of living, the change must have been from the game and reality overlapping with each other.

I am quite confident that I can do well with any classes that I might get.. Still, I want to get my favorite and frequently used class in <Magic World>. I really want… that class…

As I prayed that, I looked at my <Status>.

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――――――――――――――――――――

【Elma Edvan】

Class : Heavy Knight

Lv : 1

HP : 10/10

MP : 4/4

――――――――――――――――――――

The same time I saw what was displayed on my status, a smile crept on my face. 

Victory is mine… The strongest, crappy class well-known in <Magic World>, the Heavy Knight..

Heavy Knight is a class that specializes in defense which protects its allies by luring in enemy attacks to him. Or at least, that’s what they said after it was released.

However, compared to the other defensive classes, the said class wasn’t so versatile and their efficiency in combat was very shitty. The attack power was also very low that you couldn’t even level up properly. It was even said to be the most defective class out of the other worse classes to exist.

After all, the most important point in the game was how efficiently you raise your character’s level.

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Considering those facts, the class was even considered to be removed from the game concept.

Still, there are others who liked it. And after some time the said class was available, an analysis team appeared and thoroughly verified the efficiency of the Heavy Knight class.

After all, it was human nature to try things that’ve been said to be unusable.

Even I, with my curiosity piqued, made a heavy knight sub-character and cooperated with the analysis team to gather information about the class. In the end, the heavy knight has evolved into an extremely technical character that hides behind its defensive speciality.

While you needed a great deal of knowledge, skill, and cleverness when using the class, it had the hidden potential of overwhelming the other strongest classes once you pulled through.

That fact though, wasn’t discovered five years after the game was released. I even abandoned the main character I had been using for a long time and switched to the heavy knight sub character I had created.

In a sense, it may have been natural for me to draw the lucky stick and get the heavy knight class. With how much hard work I’d cultivated into analyzing and training the said class back in my previous life, of course, the God observing me wouldn’t grant me any other class besides it.

“I did it, Father! I’m now a Heavy Knight!”

The ceremony could only be done once, and being able to receive the crappy class I had cheat knowledge of, it was, of course a big win for me.

However, my father was looking at me with a cramped face as I joyfully reported the results to him.

“J-Just now… I heard it wrong, r-right? You said.. S-sword Saint, right?” 

I remembered it late as I looked at my father’s face. 

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Ah.. I messed up. Why did I mix my previous life and this life’s knowledge…?

In this world, strong and easy to master classes are highly favored, while classes that are technical and would only bloom later on are lowly valued. Perhaps, it is because the assessment and evaluation of the classes’ real potential have not progressed.

“…No, that.. uhh…” As I spoke hesitantly, my father, who wore a demon-like face, walked briskly in my direction.

“Oi! Show it to me!” My father stood beside me and peeked at my <Status>.

“H-heavy Knight you say?!?! What the hell does this mean!?! The numbers are so low that you can’t even see a single thing across the <Status> board, not to mention you don’t have a single attack skill let alone learn one!! Isn’t this just a meat shield!? This is totally what you’d call a faulty class!” My father verbally abused me while his saliva was spewing out.

I couldn’t even catch up to what he was saying. 

My father had a selfish way of doing things but, he had treated me, his son, strictly but kindly. I hadn’t expect him to change his attitude this easily.

“P-please calm down for a moment.. my stats are not that low.. My HP and defense are in the top bracket..”

“I have no concern for such things! You even had the gall to put dirt on our family name! How can I possibly explain this to other noble households!? To get a faulty class like that from an Edvan lineage.. This is without a doubt due to your negligence and rotten nature! I can’t even think of anything else but that! You useless idiot bastard!

As my father said this, he grabbed my collar and threw me to the floor. Because of this, I was knocked down hard.

“Gah…! Ughh..” I groaned as I hit my side, causing the air inside my body to be involuntarily drawn out.

Although my father held back, I, who was still Level 1, had received a throw coming from someone who’d been to the front line of the battlefield, defeating countless demons at the same time.

I was at least glad I was still alive, since he could kill me anytime in an instant.

“Haa.. ha… Tch! I didn’t expect something like this would happen.. Still, I’m glad I had the ceremony conducted privately.. Had I made you be ceremonized publicly, your shame would’ve made the Edvan Household lose face!” My father yelled at me as he roughly scratched his head.

“Ugh.. I was wrong to place my faith in you Elma! It’s my misfortune that I have not been blessed with a child next to this good-for-nothing bastard! I should’ve done something a little sooner!”

Our family relatives were silently watching this scene unfold before their eyes.

Just like my father, there were also some of them who were looking down at me.

Some of them seemed to sympathize with me, but they didn’t even interrupt or say a single thing.

After all, the Head of Edvan Household’s words were absolute.

Rather, in this world where one’s class and level holds importance over everything, the influence of nobles and people with authority are much stronger than the country in which I came from, Japan.

The heads of the upper nobilities are all of humanity’s strongest heroes, with powerful classes and absurdly high levels, making it a society where commoners can never oppose them.

That, however, wasn’t how it was in <Magic World>. But perhaps, because of the game world being integrated with reality, it turned out like that. 

“Uhm… I’m also supposed to have my <Divine Blessing Ceremony> today.. Is it fine to do it now?” The person who broke the silence looming over the room was a young black-haired girl. She had wide eyes with long eyelashes and beautiful fair skin. Although she had a somewhat neat face, because of her thin appearance and long groggy disheveled hair, she had quite a sinister aura about her.

She is a daughter of the branch-family of the Edvan Household… In other words, she is the daughter of my uncle, my father’s little brother.

Her name is Maris. I recalled playing with her a few times when I was still a child, but my father somehow didn’t like for me and Maris to see each other and tried to keep us away, so for the past five years I’ve only seen her from a distance and we’ve barely even spoken to each other.

“B-but.. right now is..” The Elder Priest, who was hurried by Maris, said so as he glanced at me. 

He’s probably thinking of delaying it until my father calms down.

“No, it’s fine. Start the <Divine Blessing Ceremony> for her right now.” However, my father suddenly switched gears as he said that to the priest.

At that moment, I somehow had a bad feeling. 

The old priest immediately cast the <Baptism> spell on Maris, just as he had done on me.

When Maris opened her status, her mouth twisted into a faint smile. 

“…Sword Saint, huh.. Sorry Elma-sama, it seems that I had robbed your talent off of you.”

The bad feeling I had before came true.

My father is a highly conceited and arrogant person.

He would sometimes look down on the branch family and would throw abusive words or give unreasonable orders. 

And when my Father had learned that the girl from that same branch family got the Sword Saint class, his worse than usual mood from before had…

“That’s wonderful, Maris! As expected from a member of Edvan Household!” 

My father said as he hugged Maris with tears in his eyes.

“Maris, From today onwards, you’ll be my daughter and become the next successor of the Edvan Household!”

I was taken aback by the situation happening in front of my eyes and could only watch it. The same was true for the other people as well as they were also dumbfounded.

Maris, who was in my father’s embrace, observed his face with her usual emotionless stare.

After that, she turned her head to me and met my eyes.

Then, she distorted her face and made a twisted smile.

“I’ve always thought back then that Elma-sama.. no, Elma had the responsibility of becoming the next successor…” 

As Maris said those words, my father, who had seemed to finally remember me, released Maris from his arms while turning to head in my direction.

“Get lost, Elma! You, who had betrayed my expectations, are no longer my son! Getting a Heavy Knight class as a member of the main family of Edvan Household, you only bring nothing but shame! Leave this mansion at once!”

“B-but, father! As expected, leaving is just too much… Heavy Knight is a strong class you know! I’d definitely make sure the Edvan Household dont lose face…!” 

“Shut your mouth! Do you think what I’d just said was unfair? No! That’s just how f*cked up you’ve become! Don’t let me see your face ever again, and if you use the Edvan family name outside, I’d definitely cut your head off that time!” My father shouted as he threw those words at me in a fit of rage. He didn’t even listen to a single word I said.

And it was on that day that I, who had only little money on me, was chased out from the mansion.