Fairy Tale Chronicles - Volume 1, Chapter 4

In the back of the forest lives Allen, the antisocial wizard. He is feared by the people around him and called the “Demon Lord”.One day, while living out his life as a hermit, he finds a young girl named Charlotte who collapsed. Although innocent, she was accused of evil wrongdoings, had her engagement broken and was forced to flee her country.Upon hearing that, Allen recalled the bitter experience of being betrayed by a party he once believed to be his companions. Hearing the story of the 17 year old’s exploitation, Allen decides, “I’ll let her live in my mansion, and I’ll teach her all sorts of bad things…”

In a world where power is marked by glowing runes and monsters bleed through the fabric of reality, **Ryu** is nothing—an orphan with no name, no status, and no hope. Beaten down by nobles who wield their divine-given strength like a whip, he survives on scraps and stubborn defiance.But when a black rift—an anomaly unlike any ever recorded—appears in the dead of night, Ryu faces a choice: die a beggar, or risk everything by stepping into the unknown.Inside, he finds a nightmare. Kolasis, a legendary predator, hunts him through a twisted forest. The rules here are simple: kill or be killed. To survive, Ryu must forge himself into something sharper than the claws of monsters and crueler than the nobles who cast him aside.Yet the rift has its own secrets. The same power that could make him a legend might also break him—if the monsters don’t tear him apart first.