The train to the Western Front was loud, cold, and smelled of cheap tobacco and stale fear. For Bartholomew, it was a smell that instantly triggered a deep, visceral anxiety, yet it was also strangely comforting. He'd lived with this scent for decades in his first life; it was the smell of his true element.
He sat with Private Davies, the recruit whose life he had unknowingly saved back in Boot Camp, and Private Miller, a boy from the city who looked too soft for the wool uniform he wore. They spoke excitedly of glory, medals, and the decisive Allied victory that would surely come by Christmas.
Bartholomew said little. He watched the flat, dreary landscape slide by, and he focused on the hum of his E-Rank Aether Gem. It felt marginally stronger than the F-Rank piece he started with, thanks to the small boost in Endurance and MP he'd earned through the stress of Boot Camp. He was still a weak mage, but he was no longer the weakest. He had to prepare his mind, because the environment he was entering—the chaotic, magi-mangled hell of the trenches—would soon begin testing his sanity.
I need a trauma. A big one. Something I can survive that will propel me to Rank D.
He knew exactly what the first, most common failure on this sector of the front was: The Tunnel Collapse. The enemy's low-grade Earth Runes were designed not to kill soldiers, but to destabilize their bunkers, trapping them for an easier kill later.
Tunnel Vision
The transfer to the trench network was abrupt. They arrived at night, disembarking into a miserable landscape of mud, wire, and darkness, lit only by the occasional flare. The noise was constant: the thump of artillery, the persistent crackle of defensive Aetheric barriers being charged, and the rhythmic psss-shhh of poison gas dispensers being tested.
Bartholomew and his cohort were assigned to a relatively stable section of Trench Sector 31B, a cramped, sandbag-reinforced line of mud walls. Within hours, they were integrated into the watch rotation.
Bartholomew was tasked with basic Aetheric Monitoring. His job, simple enough for an E-Rank mage, was to maintain the charge on the primary forward Deflection Rune, a basic shield painted onto a metal plate that covered a communication trench entrance. It was tedious work, requiring only the slightest trickle of MP to sustain.
His unit commander, Sergeant Hayes, a tired man whose uniform was permanently stained with clay, pointed him toward the position. "Keep that blue light steady, Private. That rune fails, and the lads in that communication line are exposed to magical shrapnel."
Bartholomew looked at the rune—an ancient, complex design that was notoriously difficult to keep stable in the mud and cold. He instinctively ran his Logistik passive.
[CURRENT DEFECTION RUNE: AETHERIC STABILITY 78%. EFFICIENCY 55%. WARNING: LATENT TERRA-WAVE RESONANCE DETECTED.]
The message was clear. The enemy was actively trying to collapse the tunnels.
This is it. The test.
He knew, with the clarity of a veteran who had seen this failure a hundred times, that the rune itself was poorly designed for tunnel defense. The earth runes would hit the weak spots near the base, and the entire wall, including the rune, would collapse, trapping and killing the men inside.
The Trigger
Bartholomew had to trigger the memory—the trauma—to access the specific knowledge of the counter-tactic. He needed stress, not just the background anxiety of the trench.
He began to intentionally overcharge the rune. He fed his MP into the plate faster than necessary, pushing the dull blue light to a blinding white. Sergeant Hayes immediately noticed.
"Bartholomew! What the blazes are you doing? You'll burn out the matrix!" Hayes roared, sprinting toward the trench entrance.
Bartholomew ignored him. The fear of insubordination was nothing compared to the overwhelming terror of the 1919 Verdun Tunnel Collapse memory that was now rushing forward, consuming his sight.
The smell of trapped diesel and crushed rock! The screaming! Sergeant Davies and the men crushed by the weight of the collapsed earth!
The memory was pure, raw panic. He was there, watching the wall buckle. But the memory didn't just contain horror; it contained the solution. As the wall in his mind began to crumble, the image of a stabilizing reverse-rune—a simple, small geometric shape carved into the floor of the trench—flashed across his sight. It was a secret, ad-hoc fix known only to certain veterans.
Hayes grabbed Bartholomew's shoulder just as the earth around the communication trench entrance began to tremble violently. The enemy's terra-wave had hit.
"Stop, Private! The earth rune is hitting us! You're going to kill us!" Hayes screamed, pulling at him.
Bartholomew reacted instantly, driven by the panic of the flashback. He shoved Hayes aside and dropped to his knees. Using his field knife, he carved the reverse-rune geometry—a single, powerful S-curve—into the cold, muddy floor right next to the failing defensive rune. He didn't chant; he simply poured the last of his MP into the ground carving.
The moment the last piece of MP drained from his system, the trembling stopped. The blue light of the main Deflection Rune flickered once, then stabilized, glowing with a soft, steady hum. The earth, which had been threatening to buckle, settled into place. The attack was neutralized. The men in the communication trench were safe.
Bartholomew collapsed, completely drained, the terror receding as quickly as it had come. He was left panting, covered in mud, but alive.
Reward and Reprimand
Sergeant Hayes stood over him, breathing heavily. He didn't yell. He couldn't. He had felt the ground shake, felt the energy spike, and witnessed the uncanny, instantaneous stabilization.
"What... what did you just do, Private?" Hayes whispered, staring at the small, crude S-curve carved into the mud.
"Sir," Bartholomew gasped, adopting the panicked, slightly unhinged persona Vance was counting on, "I don't know, sir. I saw the ground moving, and I saw that shape. I just knew if I didn't cut that shape, we'd all die. It was a terrible feeling, sir."
Hayes knelt down, peering at the S-curve. It looked like nonsense, but the energy readings on his own Gem confirmed the Aetheric stability was now at 99\%.
The reaction from the WLS was immediate and satisfying:
[TRAUMA RESPONSE SUCCESSFUL: TRENCH COLLAPSE AVERTED. +150 EXP Gained.]
[LEVEL UP! E-RANK \rightarrow D-RANK (Serviceable Mage)]
[Endurance: 17 \rightarrow 25]
[Magic Power: 55 \rightarrow 75]
Bartholomew now had enough power to manage a low-grade C-Rank Gem safely, putting him far above the average front-line mage. He had survived his first trial and grown stronger.
Sergeant Hayes did not report him for insubordination. He reported him as a "Field Instinct Specialist" with an "Uncanny Knack for Stabilizing Terra-Wavies." He knew he had a living lucky charm, and he wanted to keep him.
The New Reality
Over the next few months, Bartholomew repeated the pattern. He would use his foreknowledge to anticipate a critical, high-risk failure point—an artillery barrage, a gas attack, a specific enemy runic pattern. He would induce the necessary level of stress to trigger the trauma, and then use the resulting knowledge to perform an impossible feat of counter-magic or tactical correction.
He rarely fought the enemy. His true battle was internal, a constant, exhausting dance with his past self.
1915 Mid-Year Status: Bartholomew was already a D-Rank mage. He received a slightly better-grade Deflection Gem and was promoted to Corporal for his invaluable, albeit eccentric, service. He was known throughout Sector 31B as "Lucky Bart" and was constantly sought after by commanders desperate to protect their own trenches.
He hadn't escaped the front lines, but he had solidified his position. He was not cannon fodder; he was a strategic asset. Major Vance's plan was working perfectly, and Bartholomew, despite the terror of the flashbacks, was growing exponentially more powerful. He was surviving the early years of the war not by fighting, but by knowing.
He knew the grind ahead would be worse—five more years until 1920. But every scream of the artillery now sounded like a promise, a necessary evil that paved his path to power. He was trading his sanity for his life, and perhaps, eventually, for peace.
What was the price for the next level? He closed his eyes and awaited the next inevitable trauma.