I was just your average burnout. Now I’m a kobold in a dungeon where everything wants to eat me—and frankly, I get it. I look delicious.

Reincarnated as the weakest possible monster in the worst possible place, I start with nothing but panic, backward knees, and a skill called Civilization Mimicry—which is sealed. Because of course it is.

But survival isn't the story.

This is the story of what comes after.

Of finding meaning in the scraps. Of building law from ashes. Of kindling memory in a place designed to erase.

Because even if the world sees kobolds as nothing, I’ve seen what we used to be.

And I’m going to bring it back.

Firelight by firelight. Burial by burial. One fragile tradition at a time.

Because if the world wants kobolds to be nothing?

Then I’ll teach it what nothing becomes when it learns to dream.

It wasn't a runner. It was him—the Hero. Quiet, unreadable, holding more tension in his silence than most scouts packed in full after-action reports. I passed him a scroll. He read it, once, slowly. Gave a short nod and left.


The door didn't even close fully before I started pulling up the regional index.


Ashring had been flagged as closed-case some days ago. A cultural hazard, sure, but no longer active. The settlement, the flame events, even the Sovereign's reemergence—all marked as "contained, no expansion predicted."


But the signs had started showing again. Not bright. Not loud. Just quiet repeats. Same shapes, same marks. Whispered references to a "second Sovereign" in places where that title never existed.


I'd thought maybe it was coincidence. Copies. Survivors talk. Rumors.


But then I opened the Silverroot Basin archives.


Chapter 82 - I Knew the Flame Was Trouble