Rows of snowy-white seagulls flew in formation across the azure sky. Driven by the ocean breeze, waves rolled onto the shore, pounding against the sand with tireless, repetitive rhythm.
"An unknown ocean, an unknown deserted island."
Loya sighed, gasping for breath, before collapsing helplessly onto the sand.
He had just spent the last little while running a full circle around the island, tiring himself to the point of exhaustion, only to arrive at this conclusion. He could now be certain of one thing: if this wasn't so elaborate, legendary prank, he had truly transmigrated.
The instant noodles cup, still half-buried in the sand at his feet, was all the proof he needed.
Loya had been a junior office worker, having graduated not long ago and burdened by a grueling work schedule. Over a rare May Day holiday, he had stocked up on bread, instant noodles, and soda, planning to spend the entire night grinding through ga instances with his teammates. He had just walked up to his computer with a hot bowl of noodles, his hand hovering near the power button, when he lost consciousness.
When he ca to, he found himself standing on a golden beach, still holding that cup of instant noodles—the one he'd added a sausage to. Instead of the stifling, stuffy air of his cramped rented apartnt—a mixture of sweat, foot odor, cigarette smoke, and instant noodles—he was t with a crisp, refreshing, and faintly salty sea breeze.
In that mont, Loya had been stunned. His brain had gone into complete lockdown, unable to process the abrupt shift until the tilted cup of noodles spilled, the boiling water scalding his feet and jarring him back to reality.
The fear and anxiety brought on by this unknown situation had driven him to run frantically around the island, desperate to find any sign of civilization or a way to figure out what was happening. To his disappointnt, it was a genuine, uninhabited island—smaller, even, than the old neighborhood where he rented his room. As far as the eye could see, there was only the endless, blue ocean.
Sitting on the scorching sand, Loya shifted his weight. Unable to bear the heat radiating from the sun-baked ground, he pushed himself up with his knees and stumbled toward the shade of a coconut tree at the edge of the beach.
"Did I really transmigrate?"
Loya stared down at his white flip-flops, one of the rubber straps snapped, and muttered to himself in a daze, "Transmigrated without any reason or cause?"
He didn't know where he was, but according to the tropes of transmigration, it certainly wasn't his old world. The familiar people and things were gone; the attachnts and regrets of his past life no longer had anything to do with him.
Suddenly, a wave of agitation hit him. "Are you kidding ! My friend was supposed to carry through the 5-man Heroic raid today! I was getting my paycheck in two days! Couldn't you have let live it up for a few more days? I didn't even get to have dinner..."
At that point, Loya clamped his mouth shut. He rubbed his stomach... indeed, he hadn't had dinner yet!
Looking up at the coconuts hanging in the tree, he swallowed hard, a flash of determination in his eyes.
"I absolutely refuse to be a ghost who died of hunger!"
Loya didn't know if there were any wild beasts in the depths of the island, so he abandoned his plan to explore further. He took off his T-shirt, pulled it taut, and asured it against the coconut tree. Hmm, good... not long enough.
He scanned his surroundings, then sneakily took off his pants, leaving himself in his boxers. He had seen a tree-climbing thod on a variety show once: loop a strap around the trunk and use it to shimmy upward.
"Heave-ho!"
He kicked off his remaining flip-flop, jumped, and hooked himself onto the tree, one end of the pants held in each hand, his feet bracing against the trunk.
"Wait, what was the next step? Free a hand to move the strap up? Wouldn't I fall if I did that?" Loya gripped his pants, baffled.
After a mont of thought, he clamped his thighs against the trunk, took a deep breath, and tried to nudge the pants upward.
Riiiip!
He hadn't even moved ten centiters when, accompanied by the sound of tearing fabric, his jeans—which he had worn for years—split straight up from the cuff. The sudden shift caused Loya to stumble; he looked like he was about to topple backward. Fortunately, he was quick-witted. He released the pants, threw his weight forward, and wrapped his arms around the trunk, narrowly avoiding a fall.
After panting for a while, Loya decided to abandon this unreliable thod. He awkwardly slid down the tree and back to the ground.
His pants were ruined, but it was better than being half-naked. As he pulled them back on, the skin on his inner thighs, rubbed raw by the rough bark, stung painfully. He hissed as he adjusted them.
Just then, he looked down and saw a few small stones at the base of the tree. His eyes lit up, and he picked two of them up. During his climb, he had noticed that while the coconuts looked green and firm, they weren't attached very securely; they bumped against each other as the tree swayed, making a hollow thud-thud sound.
"I don't know if this will work, but I've chosen you! Go, Stone Monster!"
He raised his arm, twisted his waist, leaned back, and threw with all his might.
BOOM!
The mont the stone left his hand, it made a dull thud, followed by what sounded like sothing exploding. Just as he looked up, a piece of green, hard shell dripping with liquid fell from above. He reflexively reached out and caught it.
As he examined the object in his hand, Loya's jaw dropped in an exaggerated expression—much like that famous sloth . "This is... a coconut?"
He hurriedly looked up. Sure enough, the smaller coconut right next to the one he had aid at was gone. Furthermore, the green husks of the surrounding coconuts bore long, jagged scratches, as if they had been grazed by bullets.
"When did I get this strong? Or... is the gravity here much lower than Earth's?" Loya blinked, struggling to process what had happened.
He looked down at the half-shell in his hand. A thin layer of liquid pooled in the center of the white coconut at. He licked his dry lips, decided not to dwell on the strangeness, and tipped his head back to drink it dry.
He finished it in one gulp and let out a long breath. The coconut water was sweet and refreshing, soothing the burning heat in his body and making him feel significantly better. But coconut water alone wouldn't fill his stomach. Loya looked at his clean, fair fingers and tried to scrape the coconut at with his nails.
To his surprise, despite the at usually being tough to remove, it ca away as easily as the cream from an Oreo. A single gentle scrape of his nail yielded a large piece.
"Am I just too strong... or is this a special breed of coconut?"
He didn't have ti to overthink it. The organs in his body, stirred by the coconut water, were in revolt, and the surge of gastric acid made his stomach ache like it was on fire. He needed to eat. He opened his mouth wide and bit off a large chunk of the at.
"Mmm... a bit hard."
He scraped the remaining at clean, then looked up at the remaining coconuts, his eyes shining.
Even though overeating was bad, Loya was so famished that he devoured over a dozen coconuts before finally patting his stomach in satisfaction, leaning against the tree for a nap.
With his hunger satisfied, Loya finally had the leisure to reflect on the changes he was experiencing.
Thinking back to how he had panicked and run around the island, he suddenly realized how incredible that feat actually was. The distance was at least seven or eight kiloters. Running that entire distance without stopping—was this really the sa sub-healthy, hobody office worker? Forget about being "tired to death," even an athlete would have found that difficult.
None of this made sense.
"Could this be the legendary 'Golden Finger' required for every transmigrator?" Loya pondered, letting out a satisfied burp.
What modern young person didn't read web novels? Loya was certainly one of them. In his younger, chuunibyou days, he had fantasized more than once about transmigrating and what kind of cheat he would get. Would it be the Sharingan, a Zanpakuto, or a Devil Fruit? He had even fantasized about abilities from the SOS Brigade.
But he never expected it to be... superhuman strength.
Just then, a transparent blue panel abruptly materialized in the air in front of Loya. He blinked, thinking his eyes were playing tricks on him. He rubbed them and looked again—the panel was still there!
"This is... my Golden Finger?"
Loya's energy spiked, and the drowsiness from his full stomach vanished instantly.
However, when he read the large characters at the very top of the panel, his expression froze. He muttered them aloud:
"Ice. Dragon. Slayer. Mage."
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