I was supposed to win.
That's what they'd all said, that's what I promised them, and that's what they'd died believing.
The prophecy. The armies. The title they gave me—Sword God of Nortis. I was the one meant to finish the war. To end the Emperor's reign and carve hope out of ash. Every step had led here.
And yet…
I lay on broken stone, bleeding from a dozen wounds, staring up at a cracked sky that refused to mourn me.
The Emperor stood over me—cloak unruffled, silver armor untouched, like none of this had ever mattered.
"You came far," he said, voice calm. Pitying. "Farther than I expected."
His sword, still sheathed, tapped once against the ground.
"But this is where your path ends."
I tried to speak. Blood filled my throat. I coughed and tasted iron.
His eyes narrowed. "You've nothing left to say?"
I gritted my teeth. "I wasn't supposed to die like this."
"No one ever is. Really it's a shame you have to die here."
He crouched beside me, close enough to feel his breath.
"You were Nortis' great gamble," he said. "But they bet wrong."
I wanted to scream. To spit one last curse. To raise my blade and strike him down if only to prove that fate wasn't finished with me yet.
But my sword hand wouldn't move.
I couldn't even lift my head.
The crimson lit battlefield would be the last thing I saw. Everyone along the way had died for me to be here.
But I never wanted to be here.
And then the world dimmed.
My heartbeat echoed louder than the war had. And with it, came memories.
My life was flashing before my eyes.
Visions of the past, comforting and warm.
Until it wasn't.
I was seeing new memories—not mine. Not exactly.
A cottage on a hill. A woman's laughter. A name I didn't recognize spoken with love.
I blinked, and the battlefield disappeared.
Everything disappeared.
Then, White.
No pain. No weight. Just light—blinding and absolute.
And after that—
Crying.
"Congratulations! It's a boy!"
The world slammed back into focus—but it wasn't mine.
My other senses slowly came back to me.
First sight.
A ceiling of aged wooden beams.
Then smell.
The scent of firewood, herbs, and something faintly sweet.
And finally touch.
My body felt wrong. Smaller. Weaker. Fragile in ways I hadn't been since I first held a sword.
"Look at him," a woman whispered, voice thick with joy. "He's perfect."
"I think he's got your mossy eyes," a man said.
I turned my head, slow and jerky.
Two faces peered down at me—young, smiling, tired in the way only new parents are. The woman cradled me like something sacred.
"Welcome to the world, little Ajax," she said.
Ajax.
No. No, that wasn't right. That wasn't—
I reached for my sword. Or tried to.
Nothing happened.
My arm… was no longer mine. Not the way it used to be. My limbs were short. Clumsy. Weak.
I was… a baby.
A surge of panic gripped me. I wanted to scream—not like an infant, but like a soldier cornered and cornered again.
But my mouth only gurgled.
I was trapped in flesh too soft to hold who I'd been.
____
Days passed. Or maybe weeks. Time blurred when you couldn't walk, speak, or command the respect of a footstool.
They called her Jasmine—my mother. He was Cassian—my father.
I watched them both like a scout watches enemy formations.
Jasmine sang to me while mixing herbs over a fire. Cassian sharpened tools in the yard and taught local boys to fight with blunt sticks. They were kind. Not just kind—gentle in a way that Nortis had never allowed.
They didn't wear banners or crests. No insignias. No political colors. Just cloth tunics and calloused hands. A home that smelled of salt and pine. A world untouched by war.
And then came the beast.
I met him during my first outdoor nap.
A fat, overexcited stray mutt named Wren who leapt onto the bench I'd been left on and promptly sent me tumbling to the ground.
I landed knee-first. It hurt.
Not mortal-wound hurt, but enough to make my fragile body cry.
Jasmine was at my side in seconds.
"Oh, my little brave one," she whispered, scooping me up.
She pressed her hand to my leg—and then it happened.
A glow.
Her hand began to glow.
Pale green. Faint as a sigh, but warm. Healing.
It pulsed from her palm into my skin, and the pain vanished.
I stared up at her, stunned.
Magic.
Real magic.
Not runes or rituals or glyphs. Just… grace. Effortless. Natural. Mana wasn't written into existence here through glyphs, like my old world, it was already all around us, and her magic simply persuaded it to take a new form.
"Showing Ajax healing magic already?" Cassian said, stepping in with a grin.
Jasmine kissed my forehead. "He took a tough tumble."
I wasn't sure what stunned me more—the magic, or the fact that no one bowed to it.
That night, lying in a cradle of wool and cedar, I stared up at the rafters and tried to make sense of what I was.
I had been a legend. A failure. A ghost.
Now I was Ajax.
A newborn.
In a world where magic lived in hands, not war engines.
Where healing was love, not debt.
And somehow, I knew—
This wasn't an accident.
This world had called me.
And I would answer.