Chapter 1: The setting

It appears that I have been reincarnated. Whatever, my past life was only met with disappointments anyways, may as well try to live a good life this time.

So it appears that I've been born in a world that is full of magic. In the world I originate from, there wasn't any magic as far as I knew, so that is something.

Couple of years have passed and I've grown pretty acquainted with my new life. Unfortunately, I was born with a condition that makes me unable to cast any magic. The reason for this is that this condition infinitely consumes mana of the user, meaning that there is no mana for me to use. It is a rare condition and people with this condition are often trained to be anti-mages, so that's what I'm going to do.

Well, I say that I'll do it, but it isn't really a choice since my parents in this world just sent me to a place where they train anti-mages, be it people with this condition or not. This all happened when I was about five years old in this world, so it all became quite fast.

Couple of years later, I'm now 10 years old and I somehow managed to graduate early and be sent out on a mission to subjugate mages. This time at least I have a choice in the matter, though I'm currently thinking of becoming an adventurer in the adventurers guild. Sadly I have to wait two more years until I can sign in as one, so I'll just take contracts in this school for the time being.

Year later, one of the girls, who declared me as their rival early on, proposed to me. I don't know what to think since I haven't really been looking for a relationship. I turned her down of course, but now all the boys in my school look at me weirdly all the time. Luckily, I only sleep in the barracks and eat at the cafeteria nowadays, so the interactions are fairly rare. Still, it is a pain in the ass. I wonder if that girl was popular or something.

Around a year later, I finally managed to enter the adventurers guild. As a parting gift, the principal gave me a mask that will hide my appearance so that I don't have to worry about walking in public if I become famous. Well, they did say that I will become famous and that it was a question of "when" rather than "if". Unfortunately, the mask only will hide my face since all magic items lose some of their usability when worn by a person with my condition. Normally it was supposed to alter your voice beyond recognition and make it so that people have a hard time describing my appearance, but I don't get any of those. Whatever, I told them that I appreciated the gift and promised to make it my adventurer persona.

But to the adventurers guild business, I got a recommendation from my school, so signing in wasn't that difficult. I only needed to show them my physical prowess and I was good to go. It appears that the training I received from that school was pretty useful since I got full marks from the person who evaluated me.

Normally you'd also need to show your magic aptitude, but due to my condition and the recommendation from the school, it wasn't something that I had to participate in. Though I heard that even people with my condition have an aptitude for certain types of magic even though they cannot utilize it. I was a bit curious to know what my aptitude was, but I decided that I can live without knowing it.

Two years have passed and I've become an S-rank adventurer apparently. I have no idea how that was possible, but I suppose that defeating a demon king has something to do with it.

I don't get it though, while the demons may be considered a tad bit barbaric to us humans, you can talk to them like any other person. The reason I even beat the demon king was because he was in one of the bars yapping and causing a ruckus. They didn't know that it was a demon king and just called me to deal with one random drunk, but after I dispelled the illusion, it turned out to be the demon king himself.

After his disguise was dispelled, he decided to cast a destructive spell that would have swallowed the whole town I was staying in. Luckily with my skills, I was able to disrupt the spell enough to apprehend the demon king.

While he was spouting profanities at me when I was handing him to the guards, I could see that he was mostly angry because he was so embarrassed by how things turned out. Maybe he just tried to erase the town because of sheer embarrassment.

The demon king had to pay a lot of fines from his own pocket and he was severely reprimanded by the demon queen. It did cause a lot of political squabble amongst the human countries and the demon kingdom, but it seems that all turned out well in the end.

I also received a letter where the demon king called me for a formal meeting. I attended and he profusely apologized. He turned out serious after a while and called his daughter to the room.

He then said that "Since you managed to beat me, one of the strongest beings in this world, I grant you the honor of dating my eldest daughter Elis." She was astonishingly beautiful, probably thanks to her mother's genes, but I simply responded "Nah, I'm good." And started leaving.

This caused a ruckus in the demon king's castle and I then learned that the demon princess learned to handle her embarrassment just like her father. I must admit, I was almost killed. The demon king also was near death's door, more closely than I was frankly.

Needless to say that the castle had to be remade, though it appears that it wasn't an uncommon occurrence, so the people there were used to it by now. What an interesting group of people. Is it part of their culture? Who knows.

There was also a prophecy that the door to another world would open sometime in the future, so people were both warry and excited about it. Me personally, I didn't give a damn. As long as I could drink my coffee whenever I wanted, I was all good.

It also bears to mention that I have become somewhat of a coffee enthusiast. I go to cafes around the world and try to experience everything that is on their menus. It is given that I have to spend some time in one place in order to be able to experience everything the cafes have to offer to me. I have tried every cafe in the capital of the country I have lived in so far and some other towns. Thankfully, the mask has helped me a lot, since I can spend the time drinking coffee and whatever is served with them at the time just like any other random person.

Oh, by the way, my adventurer name is Shade and my real name in this world is Anthon.

It was about a month later when I turned 18 in this life that the portal to another world opened. A quick settlement was built by the people from the other world and I went and checked the place a couple weeks in. I was a bit stunned when I saw that they were just like the people in my past life. The time setting, I mean. And what's more, some of the people had my family's insignia with them, which made me doubly confused.

That insignia was used as the logo of my family's company in my previous life. It was a huge company and I was the person who was supposed to inherit it after both grandpa and mom were gone, but they were alive when I died back then and it was decided that my younger sister would inherit it. I tried countless times to protest it and prove that I was the worthy successor, but nothing got through my grandpa's head, so eventually I just gave up.

But enough about that. As I watched from a distance, I also saw other types of insignias together with the US military. It seems that the people from my old world are fighting over who gets what in this new world. My guess is that they are fighting over resources.

They have made connections with the ruling class of this world and from what I heard, they are planning to make an exchange of people. I suppose that they want to deepen their relationships by allowing people from each world to visit the other. I took note of that and inquired further through my connections as an S-rank anti-mage Shade.

Through my connections, I managed to get into the exchange program with some special privileges. 

Around 18 years and 6 months, I found my way back to my old world. I was told that magic has been hidden in this world for quite some time and it was made public to the world shortly before the gate was opened.

First order of business… Go to my favorite cafes that I had in my previous life and see how well they fare compared to the cafes in the fantasy world.

Second order of business… Figure out how much time has passed in my old world.

Third order of business… Figure out what kind of games they have now and play them with my heart's content.

Fourth order of business… See how my previous family is doing and has the old man died yet.

Fifth order of business… figure out why my old family's company was one of the first people to make contact with the fantasy world.

Sixth order of business… Come in terms with how things currently are and say proper goodbye to the old family that still remains.

Seventh order of business… Finally settle in and retire at the age of 18. I have been saving a ton in the fantasy world, so I might be able to get a pretty good deal in my old world. Granted, I don't know much about the current market and how hard inflation has hit.

Eight order of business… Die a peaceful death this time.

These are my commitments now that I found my way back to my old world.