You would imagine death is painful, but it is like an unimaginable warmth that comes over you. All the pain you feel, the energy you spend on breathing, every last thread of energy slips away, and you lose your sense of time. It could have been a moment, or it could have been a million years. I guess it doesn't matter at this point.
I awoke to a golden light shining in my face. I did not have a corporeal body; it is more of a spiritual state, weightless and unanchored. Then a presence moved toward me. This was the presence of something that existed in a spiritual state. I was not sure if it was a male or female; it most likely did not belong to the human category; the feeling it gave me was bright and powerful. Its beauty was something the living world isn't built to understand. It had golden hair that seemed to glow, wore white robes, and had clear, bronze skin with a golden hue to it. In its hand was a scroll. I didn't know what it meant, but the sight of it made something deep inside me tighten. The angel lifted a finger and pointed at me. Then the warm feeling was gone, and I had a sinking feeling, as if my soul was being sucked somewhere.
All I could see was darkness. Heavy, absolute. For a moment, I thought, so this is hell. Honestly, it did not surprise me. If anyone deserved to wake up in the pit, it was me. Then a pinprick of light appeared at the end of a tunnel. Instinct took over. I moved toward it, or maybe I was pulled. Hard to tell when you do not have a body anymore. When my eyes opened, I was being held by what looked to be a midwife. My first thought was: Don't pick me up, I am a 200‑pound man. But she lifted me effortlessly, like I weighed nothing at all. Then I realized I did weigh nothing at all, at least nothing close to what I used to. She passed me to a beautiful woman in her 20s, then to a man also in his 20s, both cooing over me, studying me with that soft, stupid awe people reserve for newborns. That is when it hit me. I had not gone to hell. I had been reborn. As a baby.
I read a book on the topic once, which stated that there have been several documented cases worldwide of people being reborn. Supposedly, once the child is around five, their old memory slip away from them. I figured that would happen to me, too. Maybe that was the mercy built into the system: forget the sins, forget the cell, start over clean.
I was born in the spring. I could tell from the smell of thawing earth and the way the air still carried a bite. From the few times they carried me outside, I pieced together the rest. A small village tucked close to the mountains. Somewhere rural. Somewhere old. Europe, maybe, or a place that felt like it had a place that never bothered to catch up with the modern world.
This house sits next to a small wheat field, which was freshly plowed, and little sprouts were poking up out of the ground. A narrow dirt path led to the neighbors, mostly farmers, living on the outskirts of a kingdom that felt more like a story than a government. Beyond the fields stretched an eerie-looking forest, and far beyond that, snow‑capped mountains cut into the sky.
There was no electricity. No running water. You did your business in an outhouse—which, honestly, still beat the bathrooms in prison. The house itself was big, hand‑built from thick timber. One large room downstairs served as the living and dining area, with a bedroom off to the side. Upstairs were two more rooms, all of it smelling faintly of woodsmoke and earth. Cooking was done on a hearth—a squat iron stove that vented out the back of the house. The fire inside it was the heart of the home, crackling and alive, warming the air and tinting everything with the scent of burning oak.
I am the second child in this family; they call me Brandon. I have an older sister, she is about a year older than me, and she is called Anna. Both of my parents are maybe 25. There was my dad, Adam Grayfang. He is a tall man, maybe 6'2", with a muscular build, fair skin, black hair, and blue eyes. My mom, Quin Grayfang, was a lady with a small frame, 5'2", blond hair, and blue-green eyes, the color of which depends on how the light hits them. My sister Anna is a little copy of my mom, and I got my dad's skin, hair, and eye color with my mom's face. One thing that is the same in both lives is the X-shaped scar on my cheek. I had in my old life is now an X-shaped birthmark. My parents often comment about it being a bad omen. I just think its god way of reminding me where I came from.
It was honestly annoying how protective Anna could be. Once I started crawling, she shadowed me everywhere, pulling me away from anything she decided was "dangerous," which in her mind included sticks, bugs, and air. And of course, she did the classic big‑sister thing, telling Mom and Dad what I wanted before I could even try to answer for myself. That part drove me crazy.
But I will not lie: I was grateful for her. After fifteen years of watching my back alone, having someone who actually cared enough to hover over me felt strange, but good. She talked to me constantly, played with me, and dragged me into her little world. Even if I could not talk back yet, it was nice not to be alone.
Thank God for this kid's brain, because I was picking up the language fast. They spoke quickly, almost musically, and even though I couldn't form a single word yet, I understood more and more each day. Speaking was out of the question, I my body was still leaning, so all that came out was the cute baby coos and classic baby babble, but comprehension came easily.
Physical strength was another story. I was a baby, soft and useless, trapped in a body that could not even hold itself upright. Still, during those first few months, I pushed myself. I wiggled, stretched, kicked, anything to get the muscles firing. I wanted to walk as soon as humanly possible.
I drank every drop of milk my mother produced. I knew this was the best thing for my health. And when the time finally came for solid food, I devoured it like a man who hadn't tasted real food in fifteen years. Because, well, I had not. After prison slop, even boiled vegetables tasted like a feast. My mother and father started calling me their "little fat boy," laughing every time I reached for more. They had no idea I was just making up for a decade and a half of starvation rations.
I started with army crawling, then normal crawling, and finally walking. I'd like to say I picked it up fast, but it was the middle of winter, so that would make me around 9 months old, so just a bit above average. My legs still shook like twigs in the wind when I tried to walk. I had a lot of practice ahead of me. One bright, cold morning, I was leaning on the kitchen table, trying to balance long enough to take a few more steps. I pushed off, wobbled forward, and promptly lost my footing. I hit the floor and bumped my head. Before I could even process it, my mom scooped me up. And of course, with an old man's mind in a baby's body, I didn't cry. I just blinked at her while she panicked. All I was thinking was that this is not a big deal, it didn't hurt, just put me down so I can try again. Of course, being a mother, she was not having any of that. She started chanting a soft, rhythmic whisper. "May the mother's blessing come over you, healing." At first, I thought they were really into some kind of medieval role‑playing. It was weird, sure, but people have their quirks. Magic is not real. Then a bright light bloomed from her hand. That was the moment everything snapped into focus. We were not on Earth, not even close. Right then and there, I set a new goal for myself. I was going to learn to read as soon as possible. And once I could read, I would learn everything I could about magic and about whatever world I had been dropped into this time.
My sister had her second birthday sometime in the winter. I still had no idea how the calendar worked in this world, or even what they called the months, so I could not pin down the exact date. But we had a small celebration for Anna all the same. I don't think she understood the concept of getting older, not really, but she definitely understood the extra food and attention. She soaked it up, grinning with her cheeks full, toddling around like she owned the place.
In the winter, Dad went hunting for extra food with Victor Green and his wife, Patricia. Victor and Dad used to be adventurers together; you could tell by the way they moved and the easy way they finished each other's sentences. They also had the occasional feast fight that usually ended with them getting drunk and apologizing to each other. They were best friends, the kind who still shared old jokes and old scars. While they were gone, Mom patched clothes by the hearth, and we kids stayed close to the fire, playing and stealing warmth.
The winter stretched on ninety‑five long days of storms that kept us mostly inside. It felt endless and safe at the same time: the world reduced to the house, the wheat field, and the steady sound of wind against the shutters. Before I knew it, spring arrived, and I turned one. Like Anna's second, my birthday was small and simple, no cake, but Mom made a pie from stored fruit, and we ate it like it was a feast.
Cooking in this world tasted more natural than anything I remembered. Maybe I am biased after fifteen years of slop, but everything felt like a revelation, especially my mom's food, which was the best of all. Her hands could turn a few saved berries and a crust into something that felt like home. One thing is certain: I am grateful. I am part of a loving family now, and God gave me a second chance. I intend to make the most of it.
At this point in life, I was not only walking but running. I did my best to work out my toddler's body with mostly pushups and pull-ups. I even practiced the martial arts forms I remembered from my old life, not to fight but to sharpen coordination and balance. From my parents' point of view, I probably just looked like a two‑year‑old at play, arms flailing and grinning, but inside I was rehearsing moves with the focus of someone who had learned to survive by being ready.
I found three books at home, which told me how rare books must be in this world. Not everyone could read, I guessed that if this place was anything like the Middle Ages, literacy would be a luxury. I was lucky my parents could read, and one of the few joys I'd had in prison was books. Reading had been my escape then, a way to walk past the walls and into other lives.
As any one‑year‑old does, I asked my parents to read to me from their small collection. One book was a story about a princess who meets and marries a demon, giving up everything for love; it read like a fairy tale, all bright and impossible. The second was a basic magic manual. My parents refused to read that one aloud, "too boring for a one‑year‑old," they said, and maybe they were right.
The third book was a history of the last Great War: heroes who fought a demon god, and the rise of the two great human powers—the Makrosan Kingdom, where we live, and the Xeathen Empire. It included a rough map of the world: other countries, some founded by nonhuman races, some mixed, all sketched in ink and shadow. Suddenly, the world felt much larger than our wheat field and the dark forest beyond it. We lived on the very edge of the Makrosan Kingdom. Just past the mountains lay the Beast Wilds, and somewhere in that dark tangle was the Elven Empire, an old place no one had dared enter since the war. Reading had been my lifeline before. Now, with a second chance, those three books felt like keys. I wanted them all.
My father turned out to be the village knight, the man everyone looked to when trouble came. He commanded Springhols' militia, a handful of men who doubled as farmers by day and soldiers by necessity. Most of them trained together once a week to keep sharp. Springhols itself was new, a frontier village carved out on the kingdom's edge.
From what I picked up at the hearth, the king wanted to push the border into the forest and the mountains. Expanding the realm meant founding new villages, appointing a lord or mayor to run them, and recruiting all the skilled labor that a settlement needed. People moved for the chance to climb the social ladder; starting fresh on the frontier was risky, but it offered more opportunity than staying a slave in a crowded city. For many, being a commoner in a small, rough village was a better life than the alternatives.
My dad was an adventurer up until the moment my Quin got pregnant with Anna. That is when Adam traded the road for a steadier life, took the village‑knight post to build a more stable life for his new family. Victor and Patracha followed along. Victor is the kind of friend who'd bled and laughed together, so they decided to settle down together
When Adam and Quin first arrived, there was nothing here but trees and wind. He and a handful of villagers raised the house by hand, timber, sweat, and a lot of stubbornness. The small field next to the house is ours what we plant there feeds us through the year.
As a village knight, Adam is responsible for more than just our patch of land. He keeps order in Springhols, fights the monsters that crawl out of the Forest, deals with bandits when they show up, and trains the militia so the village can defend itself. In return for that service, the nobles grant him a small salary, a house, and the right to farm the land enough to keep a family fed and a village standing. In return for this, he gets a small salary from the nobles that run the domain, a house, and the land to farm. Being the only one, I did not really get to see much of Springhol. From what I hear from my mom and dad, the village grows every day.
Speaking of growing, my parents do not know, but I have picked up a lot of the language, and I am learning to read more and more every day. My parents don't know, but I've picked up most of the language already, and I'm learning to read more every day. Comprehension came first, phrases, rhythms, and the way people shortened words when they were tired, and then letters began to line up into meaning. I steal moments by the hearth, tracing the letters in our three books with a grubby finger until the shapes stop being mysterious and start to hold stories. Reading feels like unlocking a door: every new word makes the world a little less foreign and a little more mine. I practice in the mornings after my workout, sounding out syllables while the house is still warm from the hearth. I am pretty sure this baby brain is wired to pick up languages faster.
My daily exercise was paying off. The USA Army had drilled a morning workout into me long ago, and even in this new life, that routine stuck: push‑ups, pull‑ups, stretches first thing in the morning. It made a difference; my legs steadied, my balance improved, and the toddler's body felt less like a prison.
It was spring, and my parents spent their days planting the fields. My father got called out now and then, usually for thefts or fights, sometimes for a monster attack, and he'd gather his soldiers, with Victor swinging his great battle‑axe at his side. Most of those small problems got handled inside the village; anything bigger went up the chain to the lord's assistant for judgment, which, so far, had not happened. I knew all this because I asked about everything. To the adults, it probably sounded like normal kid questions; to me, it was how I learned the rules of this place.
I played with Anna a lot, mostly because she was my sister and because she liked having someone to boss around. She followed me when I crawled and kept me out of trouble when I tried to poke at things I should not. She tattled, she shared her food, and she taught me the little games the other children played. Having her made the village feel less like a foreign country and more like home.
Before I knew it, summer had come, and the fields were ready for harvest. The days were unbearably hot there was no air‑conditioning, only the thin relief of shade, and the pattern of work and play settled into a steady rhythm. Anna and I spent our days running in the yard, stealing bites of whatever was on the table, and collapsing into sleep with the sun still warm on our faces. Life was quiet for the most part.
When the leaves began to turn, and the village readied itself for winter, I noticed something different about Quin. She was showing again. As a toddler, I blurted it out: "Am I getting a new brother?" They laughed and told me they didn't know the baby's sex yet, but the answer was enough that there would be another child soon. I couldn't help thinking I'd never been this happy. Given a second chance, with a family that loved me and a world that felt like it might hold more than hardship, I intended to make the most of it.
Winter came quickly that year. One afternoon, Anna and I were playing in a mild, ordinary fall, and by night, a storm had buried the world in white. The yard vanished under a single, endless sheet of snow; the house felt smaller and warmer against the wind.
This winter, I set a goal: I was going to read the magic manual. With any luck, I'd be able to try something, anything, though I was still a toddler, and that made it a long shot. Maybe, I thought with a grin, this would be like every fantasy I had ever read, and I would turn out to be an overpowered prodigy. Maybe not. Either way, I had time, a book, and a stubbornness that had survived worse things than cold
It took me a couple of weeks to get through the magic manual. My parents were right — it wasn't light reading. The book was thick with dense explanations, diagrams that looped into other diagrams, and words that felt like puzzles. Still, I forced myself through it, line by line.
I learned that everyone in this world is born with magic. How much you get for your mana pool is mostly random, but family blood matters: children of powerful casters are more likely to inherit strong reserves, while those from weak lines usually have less. It is not absolute, though. Sometimes a family with no obvious talent produces someone with a spark, and sometimes a great line yields a dud. The result is a messy, probabilistic system: chance with a bias toward parental strength.
I also learned that people in this world fall into two broad categories: casters and fighters. Both use magic, but they use it differently. Casters need far more control and precision, especially for outward‑facing spells like my mom's healing magic. They can cast using either a chant or a magic circle. Chants are more common because they are easier to learn, while circles require careful drawing and a deeper understanding of the spell's structure. Either way, the chant or the circle gives the mana a path to follow so the spell can take shape.
Spells casters themselves are divided into five levels:
Beginner Apprentice Intermediate Advanced Master
There are several elemental branches of attack magic, along with many non‑elemental types. healing magic, like my mom's being one of the non-elemental types. No matter the type, all magic takes time, training, and talent to master. Most mages have a natural inclination toward one element or another. Bloodline plays a role here too. If your father is a fire mage, you're more likely to inherit a large mana pool and a natural talent for fire magic. But, just like mana itself, nothing is guaranteed. Talent can skip generations, appear out of nowhere, or fade unexpectedly.
I also learned about the other side of magic — the internal magic used by fighters. Unlike casters, who shape mana outward through chants and circles, fighters channel their mana through their bodies. Most of this is taught through the martial arts of this world, and among humans, the most important discipline is swordsmanship.
There are three major sword schools in the human kingdom:
Dark Style — focused on overwhelming attack Light Style — centered on defense and precision Earth Style — adaptable, balanced, and steady
Humans favor swords, but not every race fights the same way. Different tribes and peoples have their own weapons, their own traditions, their own ways of channeling mana through muscle and bone. Swordsmanship, like magic, depends on talent and physical strength. And just like magic, the schools divide their practitioners into five ranks: beginner, apprentice, intermediate, advanced, and master. But rank isn't everything. An advanced swordsman can lose to a master, and a master can lose to someone with better timing, better instincts, or just a better day. The whole system reminded me of martial arts belts back on Earth — except here, calling yourself "advanced" without the skill to back it up might get you killed. My father is intermediate in all three styles. In my opinion, that's just enough to get your ass kicked, but also just enough to survive it.
After finishing the magic manual, I decided to try a few of the chants myself. The first attempt didn't go well. I pushed mana the wrong way and passed out in my one‑year‑old body. The second attempt went slightly better: I managed to form half of a water ball before it collapsed and soaked my pants. After that, I figured a third try was just asking for trouble. I went back to my routine instead. My days settled into a rhythm: morning workouts, playing with Anna, lunch, and helping my parents with whatever chores a toddler could manage. Meanwhile, my mom grew bigger every day. It might have been paranoia or just old habits, but I caught myself watching for danger more and more. Even as a toddler, I made sure to stand where I could put myself between my mother and anything that might come through the door. It was ridiculous for a one‑year‑old trying to play bodyguard, but the instinct was there, carved into me long before this second life began. I was hoping for a brother the way little boys do, and I could not help feeling grateful. God had given me a second chance, and even if I did not know whether this world had anything like Christianity, I kept praying anyway. Faith had carried me through worse places than this.
Soon enough, we were celebrating Anna's third birthday. Maybe it was because this was my second life, but time felt slippery — before I realized it, spring had come again. My mom was ready to pop, and just a few days after my second birthday, she gave birth to a baby boy named Joey.
The moment I saw him, something in me cracked open. I was overwhelmed with joy, and I made a quiet promise to myself: I was going to be the best big brother he could ever have. This spring felt different from the last one. Now I had a little brother to show the ropes to. I did everything I could within my tiny limits, and of course, I roped Anna into helping me. She loved being the "biggest" sibling, and together we hovered around Joey like two miniature guardians.
That spring was when the monsters from the Dark Forest began to surge in activity. Dad was called out again and again, sometimes to intercept a horde before it reached the village. That was normal for him. Protecting the frontier and leading the militia was part of the job toward the end of spring; he vanished for several days straight.
When the militia finally returned, they were not walking beside him. They were carting him home. Even as a toddler, I knew something was wrong. Dad had a massive slash across his back, the kind of wound that should have ended him. The men who brought him, Victor among them, had hollow, haunted eyes. They looked remorseful, as if they believed they had failed him in the forest. My mother dropped to her knees and sobbed. Then she forced herself upright, wiped her face, and began chanting a spell I had never heard before. This wasn't the gentle healing she used on cuts and fevers. This was advanced healing. "May the Goddess's light shine upon you," a spell so powerful the air seemed to tighten around her as she cast it. Light poured from her hands. The wound closed, leaving behind a thick, angry scar. Dad lived barely, but the spell drained almost all of Mom's mana. She nearly collapsed the moment it was done. Victor knew she was his only chance, and the relief on his face said everything.
Life on the frontier was wild and untamed. That day proved it. Dad took time off to recover. Physically, he was fine, aside from the scar, but he moved more slowly for a while. Eventually, though, the rhythm of life returned to chores, training, meals, and the quiet understanding that danger was never far from our doorstep.
Before I knew it, I was five years old. Anna was six, Joey was four, and the three of us were growing like weeds. I kept trying magic every now and then, but the results were always the same: I'd force the chant out, burn through my mana pool, and pass out as if someone had unplugged me. It didn't take long to accept the truth: I had no talent for external magic. What I did discover was that my body responded better to internal magic, the kind fighters use. That became my focus. I trained every day, working within the limits of a child's body but pushing it as far as I safely could.
I even came up with a theory about why some people are suited for external magic and others for internal. If mana flows like blood, then maybe some people have a stronger flow toward the brain, making them better casters, while others have better flow toward the muscles and core, making them natural fighters. It was just a theory, something I pieced together from a biology book I read back in prison. If prison gave me anything, it was time to read. I added meditation and prayer to my routine, too. Even in this new world, faith grounded me. It reminded me of who I had been, and who I wanted to become.
I also showed Anna the magic manual as any good little brother would. Turns out my sister is some kind of genius. She picked up the incantations without breaking a sweat and had far more talent for spells than I ever did. Within weeks, she'd mastered beginner‑level attack spells for every element, plus basic healing. With Mom being a healer, it made sense she'd inherit that talent too.
Today was my birthday, and we held a big celebration at the farmhouse. Victor came with his daughter, Helen, who was only a few months younger than Joey. Helen was a tiny blond girl with curly hair and bright blue eyes. She was shy and stuck to Joey like a shadow. We had cake, and Dad surprised me with a short sword sized perfectly for my small frame. I was not sure what he was thinking, giving a sword to a five‑year‑old, because Mom immediately yelled at him about how sharp it was and how I was definitely going to get myself into trouble. At first, I was not even sure I could lift it, but when I picked it up, it felt natural, like my body had been built for it. Mom got me a martial arts manual from the ogre tribe, something a traveling merchant had in his pack. It was fascinating, a style built around raw size and strength. Obviously, I did not have either, but I adapted what I could. I used the techniques as a foundation for my own hand‑to‑hand training, and honestly, I thought it was more practical than anything I had seen so far.
The adults drank ale and talked while we kids played adventure. Dad did not let me bring the real sword, so I had to settle for a wooden practice blade. It felt a little lame, but I made do.
We wandered through the fields around the house, hunting the small monsters that lingered near the village, mostly slimes, horned rabbits, and the occasional bird if we were lucky. Monsters were not stupid; they knew better than to come into the village proper unless they wanted to get wiped out. Still, it must have been a wild sight: a pack of little kids running around the wheat fields, killing slimes and rabbits, and pretending to be heroes.We managed to bring back a good haul of horned rabbits. Enough for dinner.
The next day, we had a visitor, an older woman asking about the teaching job Dad had posted at the Adventurer's Guild in Bellmead. Dad explained that he wanted someone to teach his kids reading, writing, and math, and to tutor Anna in magic. They negotiated pay right there at the table, and just like that, our village had a teacher. Her name was Miss Bailey. She looked exactly like the kind of old‑school teacher you'd expect: gray hair pinned into a tight bun, pale blue eyes that missed nothing, and a long, flowing dress that somehow made her seem taller than she was. She had a no‑nonsense attitude that could silence a room with a single look. My daily routine changed overnight. I started with my morning workout, then sword practice with Dad, and after that we had lessons with Miss Bailey. In the evenings, Anna practiced magic while I worked on my own martial arts, mostly jiu‑jitsu forms from my old world, with a bit of karate mixed in. Every night I prayed and meditated, focusing on the flow of mana through my muscles. I'm convinced that's why I was so much stronger than other kids my age. For now, all I could do was keep training, keep learning, and live this strange, peaceful, happy new life I'd been given.