"No one cried when I died the first time.
No one even knew."
Hospitals don't feel like prisons.
Not at first.
The walls were white. The nurses were kind. There was a television in the room, though it was black and white, books, even a window. But the days drag on, and the nights longer. The beep of the heart monitor is the only companion. And eventually, you forget what air without antiseptic smells like.
Lee Hyeon—or rather, the boy who once bore that name—lived within those white walls for thirty-four years.
He was raised in the hospital bed from the time he was five.
By the age of ten, both his parents were deceased—car accident.
By age twenty, people stopped visiting.
At thirty-nine, when his heart eventually failed, he was utterly alone.
He never kissed anyone. Never dated a girl. Never set foot in a classroom. Never watched snow fall behond the window. Never strolled through a crowd, or held a hand without a layer of latex gloves in between.
His entire life was a slow, quiet fade.
No war. No grand finale. Just silence.
And yet—
Death wasn't the end.
He awoke into a world bathed in blade and blood.
A realm of qi, sword sects, demons, and sacred beasts.
He was not Lee Hyeon anymore.
He reincarnated, both physically and spiritually, into a different universe——the Murim world.
A world in which arms reigned supreme, and power equaled justice.
And for the first time, he stood. Walked. Ran. Fought. Loved. Killed.
He rose not as a man—but as a myth.
They called him Jin Rak.
BLACK the Nameless Demon God.
A warborn monster who held back the tide of hell itself when demonic forces invaded the realm.
He died on a battlefield beneath a sky of flame, clutching a broken blade, his body shattered after sealing the Abyss Gate. His enemies thought him erased.
But fate still had more in store for him.
Year: 2030. South Korea.
The world has changed again.
Ten years ago, tears in reality began to open—Gates.
From them poured monsters that modern weapons couldn't scratch. Humanity crumbled.
Then came the Awakened.
Humans granted power beyond reason.
They became the new defenders—Hunters.
Some selfless. Others greedy.
All necessary.
Now, the world hangs in the balance between order and devastation. Cities are controlled by guilds. Corporations own dungeon rights. And behind every door, secrets compound.
In a C-rank dungeon on the fringes of Icheon, this is revealed.
In the icy heart of a secret chamber, left undisturbed for centuries—a man sleeps.
Not dead.
Not alive.
A relic of another world.
His name has been forgotten.
But when his eyes open again…
"Wait, how are you so strong"
"Please spare me, please"
"Can you become one of the academy instructors"
"Dad..."
The world will tremble.
BLACK: Demon God Awakening