The Awakening Tower seethed with noise.
Jericho remained kneeling on the polished floor, the faint afterglow of golden glyphs still shimmering around his body. His chest burned, his breaths were shallow, and yet the voices around him were deafening.
"A slave?" one noble shouted, voice cracking in outrage. "Did I see correctly? That was a slave!"
The priests gathered near the ceremony platform clutched their staffs, their jeweled orbs flickering nervously. "This should be impossible," one muttered. "The system doesn't recognize slaves. It never has."
Knights stood stiffly in polished armor, hands hovering over their swords. Their eyes flicked between Jericho and their lords, awaiting orders. The law weighed heavy on their shoulders.
And above, in the balconies packed with commoners, the laughter erupted.
"Cowboy!" a man jeered. "A relic class!"
"They said he awakened? Bah! The world has a cruel sense of humor."
"Trash class for trash blood. How fitting."
The overseers glared at him with murderous hatred. This should not have happened. In their eyes, he had ruined everything, drawing noble wrath upon them just by existing.
Jericho kept his head lowered. His lips parted slightly as he drew ragged breaths. The echoes of ridicule bounced around him, stabbing deeper than any whip ever had. But beneath all of it, one sound pulsed in his ears:
[System Activated… Binding with host: Jericho Black.]
The voice had spoken his name.
His real name.
"Kill him," a noble hissed, spittle flying from his lips. "Before this spreads—"
"No," a knight interrupted firmly. "The Law forbids it."
The noble whirled on him. "Law? He's property!"
The knight didn't flinch. "Once awakened, one cannot remain a slave. This law is older than the kingdoms themselves. Break it, and you risk rebellion across the Twelve Thrones."
Murmurs rippled across the hall. Even the furious nobles could not openly defy that decree.
The priest raised his staff, his tone heavy with reluctant acceptance. "By the Law of Awakening, this one is free."
The words echoed, final and binding. Jericho felt the weight of invisible chains shatter. For the first time in his life, he was no longer a slave.
Yet the looks around him said it plainly: they would rather have killed him.
"Very well," the noble sneered. "Let him rot in his so-called freedom. He'll beg for death soon enough."
The knight escort shoved him down a corridor into a small chamber lit by floating mana lamps. A clerk sat at a desk, lazily scribbling in a large tome.
The knight grunted. "Register him."
The clerk didn't even glance up. "Name?"
Jericho's lips trembled. The word felt foreign on his tongue, buried under years of silence.
"…Jericho." His throat burned. He forced it louder, steady this time. "Jericho Black."
The clerk smirked faintly as he wrote. "Class?"
"Cowboy."
The quill scratched across parchment. "Figures." He slammed the tome shut. "Next."
That was it. Years erased by a single line in a book. Jericho Black, registered as a free man… but forever branded trash.
The Awakening Tower doors slammed behind him. Jericho staggered into the cool night air, the bustling city sprawling before him. For the first time, no shackles bound his wrists. No overseer barked at his heels.
He was free.
And freedom was terrifying.
He had nothing. No food, no shelter, no allies. His rags barely clung to his scarred frame. The streets teemed with torches and laughter, but none of it was for him.
"There he is!" someone jeered from across the square. "The awakened slave!"
"Cowboy!" another mocked, holding their fingers like guns and mimicking a bang. Laughter followed.
Even commoners sneered, as though his freedom had stolen something from them.
Jericho kept walking. Every whisper and chuckle stabbed at his back. The night stretched long, cold, and endless.
[System Online.]
Jericho stopped in his tracks, heart hammering.
[Integration complete. Cowboy Class synchronized.]
[Demon Body Physique bound.]
[Unique Path unlocked: Void Cowboy Dictator.]
Words scrolled across his vision, invisible to the rest of the world.
[Quest Issued: Survive your first night as a free man.]
[Reward: Cowboy Skill – Void Marksmanship (Lv.1).]
[Failure: Death.]
His stomach twisted. "Death?" he whispered.
The voice was silent.
Minutes crawled by as he wandered the alleys. Hunger gnawed at him, cold seeped into his bones. He had nothing but the promise of death if he failed.
Then, the System whispered again:
[Opportunity detected nearby. Follow my guidance.]
Jericho stiffened. "Opportunity?"
[Yes. Strength. Close. Follow.]
His body moved before his doubts could take root. His steps carried him deeper into the twisting alleys, the noise of the city fading behind him.
The System guided him unerringly through the labyrinth of shadows until he stood before a crumbling wall, moss clinging to its cracks.
Nothing. Just stone.
"Where's the—"
The air warped. A deep hum rattled his bones. The wall pulsed, rippling like liquid.
Jericho stumbled back as the crack widened, darkness blooming outward. Before he could react, the void sucked him in.
He screamed, clawing at the air, but there was no resistance—only the pull of nothingness.
Too Late
Inside his vision, his Status Panel flared.
[You have entered a Hidden Portal.]
[Survival conditions unknown.]
Jericho's heart dropped. The System hadn't told him this. It had tricked him.
The world outside vanished in a rush of shadow. His body was torn into the void.
And then—silence.