There was no light where he awoke—only cold, and a silence so vast it screamed.
At first, he thought it was death again. A second eternity. But then came the pain—sharp, real, alive.
He clawed his way from the earth like something buried wrong, dragging in his first breath with a snarl.
Mud, blood, roots tangled in his fists.
He coughed hard, body spasming with every beat of a heart that wasn't his. His bones were younger, unscarred. Muscles raw and unfamiliar. But the memories—those stayed.
Liora's face.
His brother's blade.
The fire.
The lies.
He stumbled to his feet, naked and slick with rain. The forest around him buzzed with magic, old and wild. His body felt like a vessel—unstable, humming with power he didn't yet understand. Power that hadn't belonged to him before.
He looked at his hands.
"Not just reborn..." he murmured, voice low and dangerous. "Reforged."
A strange symbol burned itself briefly into his chest—six interlocking circles, each with a unique sigil.
The Harem Seal.
He didn't know what it meant, not yet. But he could feel them—threads of fate tugging at his soul. Lives bound to his. Desires. Danger. Destiny.
Then he heard it: footsteps.
Not far off. Delicate. Cautious.
His first encounter in this world.
And fate, as always, was watching.