The morning air in Buena Village carried the familiar symphony of a community awakening. Roosters crowed from wooden coops while the distant clang of hammer on anvil echoed from the smithy where my father had already begun his daily work. The scent of dew-soaked earth mingled with wood smoke from chimneys, creating that particular fragrance that marked the transition from night to day in our humble corner of the world.
I kicked at loose pebbles on the dirt path, watching them scatter into the tall grass that bordered the village outskirts. The sun had barely crested the eastern hills, painting everything in soft golden hues that made even the most weathered thatch roofs appear touched by magic. It was the kind of morning that should have filled a six-year-old with simple joy, yet something twisted in my stomach as we approached the forest edge.
"Come on, Claude! We're gonna be late!" Somar's voice cracked with excitement as he jogged ahead, his sandy hair bouncing with each eager step. The boy was practically vibrating with anticipation, though for what exactly, I couldn't say.
Mike trudged beside me with less enthusiasm, his cleaner clothes and softer hands marking him as one of the village's more fortunate children. Where Somar and I bore the calluses and dirt stains of children who worked alongside their parents, Mike's family could afford to keep him focused on learning rather than labor.
"What's the rush anyway? It's just that weird girl again," Mike muttered, kicking at a stone with the toe of his well-maintained boot.
The casual meanness in his words made something cold settle in my chest. We'd done this before—cornered Sylphiette when she wandered too far from the village center, thrown pebbles and called her names until she ran away crying. It was what boys our age did to those different from ourselves, wasn't it? So why did the thought of it make me feel sick?
The forest clearing came into view as we crested a small hill, dappled with morning light filtering through the canopy above. Ancient oaks spread their gnarled branches like protective arms over the grassy space below, their leaves rustling with the whispered secrets of wind and time. Birdsong echoed from the shadows—thrushes and larks weaving melodies that spoke of peace and safety.
It was a place that should have been sanctuary.
Sylphiette sat beneath the largest oak, her distinctive emerald hair catching sunbeams like captured starlight. Her small fingers worked with practiced delicacy, weaving flower stems together into something beautiful and ephemeral. There was a gentleness to her movements that spoke of hours spent in solitary creativity, finding wonder in simple things that the rest of us overlooked.
"There she is," Somar whispered, crouching behind a cluster of bushes heavy with morning dew. "The weirdo."
The word hit me like a physical blow. I watched Sylphiette's gentle smile as she admired her handiwork, the way her eyes sparkled with innocent joy, and felt an overwhelming wrongness about what we were planning. She was just a child like us, seeking beauty in a world that offered her little kindness.
Before I could voice my growing discomfort, Somar was already moving. "Hey, pointy-ears!"
Sylphiette's head snapped up, her large green eyes widening with the primal fear of prey spotting predators. The flower crown slipped from her fingers, forgotten as she scrambled to her feet with the desperate grace of someone who had learned that running was often the only option.
"We told you not to come here!" Mike added, his voice trying to sound grown-up and important. He scooped up a handful of small pebbles from beside the stream that trickled through the clearing. "This isn't your place!"
The first pebble sailed through the air, striking Sylphiette's shoulder and making her stumble backward. She looked up at us with wide, frightened eyes, tears already forming.
"Stop it!" she pleaded, her voice barely above a whisper.
But Somar was already scooping up mud from the stream bank, grinning with the mean satisfaction that children sometimes found in picking on those who couldn't fight back. The mudball was aimed right at her face.
It never reached its target.
A sphere of crystal-clear water materialized in the air between us, intercepting the mud with a splash that sent droplets scattering in all directions like liquid diamonds. The water hung suspended for a heartbeat, perfectly round and gleaming, before launching itself directly at my head with startling speed and purpose.
The impact was gentle—water, after all, was soft. But the moment it touched my forehead, something inside my mind shattered like glass struck by lightning.
Crack.
The sound echoed through my consciousness as fragments of something vast and incomprehensible came flooding through the fissures in my awareness. Not pain, but a fracturing of something I never knew was whole. The memory of lives I'd never lived—or had I?—crashed over me like a tsunami of experience and emotion.
Vorpal Rabbits, crimson eyes gleaming in dungeon darkness, their horn-like protrusions slick with blood—my blood. Fifteen times they had torn me apart, fifteen times I had died screaming as teeth found flesh and bone.
A blade singing through air—not my blade, never my blade—before claws ripped my arm away in a shower of gore. Children scattered around me, their small bodies broken, their voices silenced forever because I was too weak, too slow, always too slow.
Flames dancing around small hands, beautiful and deadly, before betraying me utterly. Fire feeding the Ancient Troll's massive frame as its fist descended, crushing ribs to powder, ending another failed life in darkness and despair.
I gasped, clutching my temples as the cool morning air suddenly felt stifling around me. The familiar sounds of the forest faded into a distant hum as my vision blurred with tears I didn't remember shedding.
The taste of monster blood, bitter poison on a dying tongue. The weight of failure, heavy as stone in my chest. The sound of my own screaming echoing through corridors of bone and shadow.
Moving pictures with bright colors flickered through my mind—a story called 'Mushoku Tensei,' featuring the very people who stood before me now in flesh and blood. But how could I know a story about real people? How could I remember watching something that was happening to me?
The images cascaded through my consciousness without order or reason. They weren't memories—not exactly. They were more like echoes of trauma, incomplete and conflicting, carrying emotions that didn't belong to me but felt intimately familiar. I saw myself older, standing amid ruins that had once been home. I felt the weight of a sword in hands that had mastered every style. I experienced the crushing despair of watching everything I cared about crumble to dust despite my desperate efforts to prevent it.
"Three people gathering together to bully one. You're the worst!"
The voice cut through the chaos in my head like a blade through fog. I looked up through my tears to see a small boy with brown hair, pointing a tiny wooden staff in our direction with the confidence of someone far older than his apparent years. Despite his diminutive size, there was something ancient in his green eyes, a gravity that seemed impossible for someone so young.
Rudeus Greyrat. The name came to me unbidden, along with fragments of knowledge that made no sense. A prodigy. A genius. A boy carrying the soul of a man who had lived and died and somehow found himself reborn in this world of magic and monsters.
But how could I know that? How could I know any of this?
"So, you're that kid from the knight's place!" Somar's voice cracked with a mixture of fear and false bravado. "Get out of our way!"
Another water sphere formed in the air near Rudeus, this one larger than the first, spinning lazily as mana coalesced into physical force. Somar responded by hurling more mud, Mike joining in with desperate enthusiasm born of panic. The clearing filled with the sounds of splashing water and wet earth striking flesh, but I heard none of it clearly.
The memories—or whatever they were—continued their relentless assault on my consciousness. Each fragment brought new confusion, new questions that had no answers.
Which memories are mine? Which deaths were real? How many times have I failed?
I saw three distinct versions of myself drowning in the swirling chaos:
The viewer, sitting in darkness before a glowing screen, watching animated figures move through adventures that felt more real than reality itself. This version carried the weight of foreknowledge, the burden of seeing endings before beginnings.
The survivor, standing amid ruins that had once been home, blood on his hands and failure in his heart. This version knew the taste of ash, the sound of screams, the feeling of arriving too late to save anyone who mattered.
The child, small and confused and trying desperately to reconcile impossible memories with an innocent present. This version—me, I thought—was drowning in experiences that belonged to others, struggling to find solid ground in a sea of contradictory truths.
"Which death was real?" I whispered to the morning air, the words torn from my throat by a despair I didn't fully understand. "Which life had meaning?"
Without understanding why, I began to cry—not just for confusion, but for children whose names I remembered but had never known. For battles fought with skills I'd never learned. For deaths that felt more real than this sunlit morning. The tears came in great, heaving sobs that shook my small frame and drew stares from the other children.
Through my blurred vision, I could see scenes playing out like fragments of nightmares made manifest. A blade in my hand, moving with deadly precision until the moment it failed. Flames dancing at my command, beautiful and terrible, until they turned against me. The sound of my own voice pleading with creatures that had no mercy, begging for death as they tore me apart piece by piece.
The mudball fight ceased as everyone turned to look at me, confusion and concern written across their young faces.
"I couldn't save them," I whispered, and the words carried the weight of failures that stretched across lifetimes. The weight of children I'd watched die, of monsters I'd failed to defeat, of a village consumed by light while I stood helpless. "I was too weak. Again and again, too weak."
"Are you okay?" Sylphiette's voice was soft, concerned. She had moved closer while I was lost in my visions, her earlier fear apparently overcome by worry for a boy who had come to torment her. The kindness in her gesture cut through my confusion like sunlight through storm clouds.
I looked up at her through my tears, seeing both the frightened child she was now and the scattered fragments of other possibilities—her emerald hair streaming with blood as darkness claimed her, her gentle smile fading as monsters closed in, her voice calling my name as I failed to reach her in time.
They were all real. Every death, every failure, every moment of helpless watching as everything burned.
"I'm sorry," I whispered, the words tumbling out before I could stop them. "I'm so sorry, Sylph."
The nickname felt natural on my tongue, though I had no memory of ever using it before. Sylphiette's eyes widened in surprise, but there was no anger in them. Only confusion and something that might have been the beginning of forgiveness.
The weight of future knowledge pressed down on me like a physical burden. I knew what was coming—the great disaster that would scatter this peaceful village to the winds in seven or eight years. I knew the paths these children would walk, the pain they would endure, the choices that would define their lives.
But knowing and preventing were different things entirely. I had tried before—how many times?—and failed each time. The memories of those failures burned in my mind like acid.
"How boring. Let's head back," Somar muttered, his earlier enthusiasm dampened by my breakdown and Rudeus's display of magical power. I could see the tremor in his hands, hear the slight catch in his voice that spoke of fear poorly disguised as bravado.
"What are you doing there, Claude? Let's head back!" Mike's command carried the authority of someone desperate to return to normalcy, to pretend that magic and tears and strange behavior were things that happened to other people.
I pushed myself to my feet, brushing dirt from my clothes with hands that still shook from the memory fragments. The earthy scent of the forest floor clung to my clothing, grounding me in the present moment even as parts of my mind seemed to exist in times and places that hadn't happened yet—or had happened too many times already.
"See ya later, Sylph," I called over my shoulder as I followed the other boys back toward the village proper. Her eyes followed me—gentle, curious eyes that seemed to see more than they should. In some of the memory fragments, those same eyes had looked at me with terror as the Rabbits closed in. In others, they had been empty, lifeless, staring at nothing as her blood pooled beneath green hair.
I shuddered and forced myself to focus on the present, on this timeline, on this chance to maybe, finally, get it right.
The walk back passed in a blur of half-remembered conversations and fragmented sensations. My mind felt like a shattered mirror, each piece reflecting a different version of reality—all of them ending in failure, all of them ending in death. By the time we reached the main village road, the sun had climbed higher, burning away the morning dew and replacing it with the kind of heat that made dust dance in the air like tiny spirits.
Somar's house came into view, its humble timber walls and patched thatch roof speaking of a family that worked hard for every copper coin. His mother was waiting for us in the doorway, her eyes glinting with something predatory as she raised her hand and delivered a sharp slap across her son's face.
"You little monster!" she snarled, but there was something calculated about her anger, something that spoke of opportunity seized rather than genuine outrage. "Bullying that poor child! What will people think of our family?"
I watched the scene unfold with a mixture of present confusion and impossible foreknowledge. She would drag Somar to Paul's house, I knew somehow. The knowledge felt like déjà vu and prophecy rolled into one, another fragment of lives I'd never lived but somehow remembered.
Our cottage looked exactly the same as always—humble timber walls weathered gray by years of rain and sun, a thatched roof that needed repair, small windows that let in just enough light to chase away the shadows. But even these familiar sensations felt strange now, overlaid with memories of this same house consumed by light, reduced to ash and memory in the span of a heartbeat.
Inside, the familiar scents of my mother's cooking filled the air. Root vegetables and herbs simmered in an iron pot over the hearth, filling our small home with warmth and the promise of sustenance. But even comfort felt different now, filtered through the lens of loss and the knowledge that all of this would be taken away.
"Claude?" My mother looked up from her work, concern creasing her weathered features. Lines of worry that spoke of a hard life lived with love and dignity. "You look pale, dear. Are you feeling well?"
I wanted to tell her about the memories flooding my mind like water through a broken dam. I wanted to explain the impossible knowledge that now filled my head, the weight of seeing endings before their beginnings. I wanted to warn her about the light that would come, the disaster that would tear our family apart. But how could I make her understand something I didn't comprehend myself?
"I got into trouble today," I said instead, choosing the simple truth over the incomprehensible one. "We were bullying Law's daughter."
The disappointment in my parents' eyes hurt worse than any physical punishment could have. They were good people, my mother and father—simple folk who worked hard and tried to do right by their neighbors. They deserved better than a son who carried the weight of lives he'd never lived and failures he'd never experienced but felt with agonizing clarity.
My father set down his eating bowl with deliberate care, the kind of movement that spoke of controlled emotion. "Claude," he said, his voice heavy with disappointment, "why would you do such a thing? We raised you better than that."
The words cut deep, but they also sparked something else in me—a kind of desperate cunning that felt both natural and foreign. If I was going to carry this burden of knowledge, then I needed to use it. I needed to become stronger, more capable, if there was any hope of changing the disasters I could see approaching like storm clouds on the horizon.
In the memory fragments, I had been strong—a sword saint whose blade could cut through anything, a mage whose flames could melt steel. But strength alone hadn't been enough. It was never enough.
"I know it was wrong," I said carefully, letting genuine remorse color my voice. "That's why I want to make it right. I want to learn to protect people instead of hurting them."
My mother's expression softened slightly, but my father remained skeptical. "And how do you plan to do that, son?"
"I want to learn swordplay," I said, the words coming out in a rush. "From Paul Greyrat. He's the best fighter in the village, and if I'm going to be strong enough to protect people, I need proper training."
It was a calculated gamble, one that relied on my parents' respect for Paul's abilities and their desire to see me channel my apparent aggression into something constructive. I held my breath as they exchanged glances, having one of those wordless conversations that long-married couples developed over years of shared experience.
The muscle memory of sword forms flickered through my mind—Alex's legacy, the phantom skill of a life I'd never lived but somehow mastered. If I was going to save anyone this time, I needed every advantage I could claim.
Finally, my father nodded slowly. "If Paul is willing to take you on, and if you promise to apply yourself properly, then we'll consider it. But this had better not be just another childish whim, Claude. Training with a sword is serious business."
I felt a surge of triumph, quickly suppressed. The first step in my plan had succeeded, but I was still far from my goal. I needed strength—real strength, not just the shadow memories of skills I'd once possessed in lives that might have been dreams.
The next morning, I set out early to find Paul during his patrol of the village. The sun was still low on the horizon, painting the world in shades of gold and amber that made even the humblest cottages look touched by magic.
I found him near the eastern gate, checking the simple wooden barrier that marked the boundary between safety and the wild lands beyond.
"Hey, Paul!" I called out, forcing a cheerful tone though my stomach churned with nervous energy. The words felt strange on my tongue—was this really just a chance meeting? Or was it desperation disguised as coincidence?
Paul turned at my voice, his hand resting casually on the pommel of his long sword. The weapon caught the morning light, throwing bright reflections that danced across the packed earth of the road. He was a handsome man, I had to admit—the kind of features that belonged in heroic tales rather than rural guard duty.
"Oh... hey kid, who are you again?" Paul looked at me with a puzzled expression, his eyes narrowing slightly as he tried to place me among the village children.
Perfect. His confusion gave me the opening I needed.
"Hey, you didn't even remember me!" I said, trying to sound hurt while fighting back a grin. "I'm one of the kids your son got into trouble with yesterday." The careful balance of hurt and cheekiness came naturally, as if I'd practiced this conversation before.
"What a rude brat," Paul muttered, his cheeks coloring slightly with embarrassment as he tried to remember who I was.
I pressed my advantage, the words coming out in a rush. "You're not Somar, and I heard that Mike was taken to another place. So, you should be Claude." Paul's finger snapped as the memory clicked into place, satisfaction evident in his voice.
"Heh, so you do remember stuff," I said with a cheeky grin, pleased when his eyebrow twitched slightly at my boldness.
"So, what is it, kid?" He questioned me with genuine puzzlement, shifting his weight as if preparing to continue his patrol.
This was my moment. I drew in a breath and spoke with all the earnest determination I could muster, knowing that everything depended on this request.
"Can you teach me swords?"
The directness of my request clearly surprised him. Paul's eyes widened slightly, and I could see him reassessing me, trying to figure out what kind of child would make such a bold request.
"Why?" The question was simple, but I could hear the genuine curiosity behind it.
"Because I know I will need to know them," I said, and something in my voice made him take notice. "I couldn't do anything to help when your son confronted us yesterday. I was weak, and weakness helps no one."
It wasn't the complete truth, but it wasn't a lie either. I had been weak in that moment—weak with confusion and the overwhelming flood of memories. But more than that, there was something driving me, an urgency I couldn't fully explain.
Paul studied me for a long moment, his eyes searching my face for something I wasn't sure I understood. Finally, he spoke.
"You want to take revenge? Against my son?"
The question caught me off guard with its bluntness. I could see his hand drift instinctively toward his sword hilt, the protective father emerging despite his casual demeanor.
I decided to take a calculated risk, sensing somehow that Paul appreciated boldness over deception.
"Yep, can you help me do it?"
The absurdity of my small frame threatening his prodigy son hung in the air between us. For a moment, I thought I had miscalculated, that he would be offended by my presumption. Then his mouth fell open slightly, and I realized he was more dumbfounded than angry.
A heartbeat later, he threw back his head and laughed—a rich, genuine sound that echoed off the nearby houses. He pounded my back with enough force to make me stagger, though I could tell he was holding back his true strength.
"Sure, I'll teach you till you can beat Rudy! I don't expect you to do it, though, since my son is a genius," Paul said, his voice rich with smugness and paternal pride.
Perfect. He had taken the bait exactly as I had hoped. Now came the dangerous part—something was telling me I needed to say more, to plant ideas that might matter later.
"Look at you, showing off about your son," I said with a playful roll of my eyes. "But everyone says you're mean to Rudeus 'cause you don't get his magic stuff."
The words hit their mark. Paul's expression shifted, becoming more serious as he considered what I had said. Something about his reaction told me this mattered more than I understood.
"What do you mean by that?" he asked, his tone carefully neutral.
I shrugged, trying to look like any kid repeating village gossip. "People talk, you know? They say you want him to be like you with swords and stuff, but he's better at magic. Mom says that's like trying to make a fish climb a tree."
Paul was quiet for a long moment, processing what I had said. Finally, he nodded slowly.
"You're sharper than most kids your age, Claude. Alright, I'll teach you. But if you're serious about learning swordplay, you need to understand that it's not a game. Training will be hard, and I won't go easy on you just because you're young."
"I understand," I said, and meant it. Something deep inside me whispered that I would need every advantage I could get, though I didn't understand why.
"Good. We'll start tomorrow at dawn. Meet me at the training ground behind my house, and don't be late. Oh, and Claude?" He fixed me with a serious look. "If you're really doing this to get revenge on Rudeus, you'll be disappointed. My son is special—more special than you can imagine. But if you're doing it to become stronger, to protect people instead of hurting them, then maybe you'll surprise me."
As I walked home that evening, the setting sun painting the village in shades of gold and crimson, I reflected on what I had accomplished. The first step in my plan had succeeded, but it was only the beginning. I had secured training from one of the best swordsmen in the region, planted seeds that might prevent future conflicts, and begun the long process of becoming someone capable of changing fate itself.
But the memories continued to swirl in my mind like leaves in a whirlwind—fragments of lives I might have lived, possibilities that felt more real than reality itself.
That night, as I lay in my narrow bed listening to the sounds of the village settling into sleep, the nightmares began in earnest. I saw fields of blood and ash, heard the screams of the dying, felt the weight of failure crushing down on me like a physical burden.
I saw Vorpal Rabbits closing in, their crimson eyes reflecting my terror as teeth tore flesh from bone. I felt the Ancient Troll's massive fist descending, crushing the breath from my lungs as flames flickered uselessly around my broken body. I heard children calling my name as darkness claimed them, their voices growing fainter with each repetition until only silence remained.
I saw the village consumed by light, saw faces I loved twisted in agony, saw myself standing helpless as everything burned. Over and over, the same failures, the same deaths, the same crushing weight of being too weak when it mattered most.
I woke with tears on my cheeks and my parents hovering over me, concern etched deep in their weathered faces. They couldn't understand what was happening to me, but they held me until the shaking stopped and whispered prayers to gods whose names I couldn't remember.
"Which one is the real me?" I whispered into the darkness, but there was no answer.
Only the weight of knowledge I shouldn't possess, the phantom pain of deaths I'd never experienced, and the growing certainty that I would need every fragment of memory, every scrap of impossible understanding, if there was any hope of saving the people I loved from the disasters I could see approaching like storm clouds on the horizon.
This is something that I would know in the future, but today...
A Miko had been born—not in the traditional sense of a shrine maiden, but in the ancient, forgotten meaning of the word. A vessel of memory, a bridge between what was and what could be. A seer of things unseen, carrying the burden of knowledge across the boundaries of time and possibility.
The water that had struck my forehead had been more than simple magic. It had been a catalyst, awakening something that had slumbered in my bloodline for generations untold. The convergence of mana and moment had shattered the barriers between parallel possibilities, allowing memories from other versions of myself to bleed through into my consciousness.
I was not a reincarnator in any traditional sense. I was something else entirely—something both more and less than a soul reborn. I was a nexus point where multiple streams of possibility converged, carrying within my small frame the weight of countless deaths, endless failures, and the desperate hope that this time—this time—I could change everything.
The village of Buena slept peacefully around me, unaware that their fate now rested in the hands of a six-year-old boy who carried the memories of futures that must never come to pass. Tomorrow would bring the beginning of my training, the first step on a path that would either lead to salvation or to a failure even more complete than the ones I remembered with agonizing clarity.
But tonight, I could only lie in darkness and wonder which version of myself would prove strong enough when the moment of truth finally arrived. The memories whispered their secrets in the space between sleeping and waking, and I listened with the desperate attention of someone who knew that every fragment of pain, every echo of death, might be the key to preventing a catastrophe that had already happened in worlds that must never be.
Time would tell which Claude would emerge from the convergence of possibility—the viewer, the survivor, or the child. But whatever the answer, I would be ready.
I had to be.
The alternative was unthinkable.
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