Gacha Familia – Chapter 1: "Born of Fire, Fed by God"
Death is silent. Not cold. Not bright. Not even painful. Just quiet.
Then came the pull.
Like a string wound around the soul, snapping taut. Reality fractured, and I was no longer me—or rather, no longer the man I had been. My name had been Kazuki on Earth. A man of ambition, vice, and desire. A man who spent hours rolling the digital dice in Fate/Grand Order, fantasizing about heroes and goddesses alike. I died with little ceremony—an accident, I think. I don't remember. Only the weight of the world falling away, and a new one rushing in to take its place.
[System initializing…]
[Welcome, Kael Elion.]
Then came the pain.
Birth
I awoke to screaming. Mine. Hers. The world's.
It wasn't symbolic or clean—it was blood, pressure, and fear. I was being born. For the first time in two lives, I was pulled from a body into the world—raw, exposed, helpless. Flesh tore. Breath came sharp. Air slammed into my lungs like knives.
The woman who bore me was beautiful—even through the haze. Sweat-soaked silver hair clung to her cheeks, her brow furrowed not with pain, but concentration. Control.
And then I was in her arms. Held. Cradled. Seen.
"He's quiet," she said softly, not surprised. "His eyes… they're too still."
I looked up—and I knew her. Hera. The Goddess of Family. Cast down after the death of her Familia. Abandoned by Orario. Lost in shadow.
She pressed me against her breast with practiced care, and something in me ached.
The Dream of Flesh
Those early days blurred—heat, softness, and slow motion. I couldn't speak. Couldn't walk. I could barely move. My body was infantile, but my mind… My mind was fully intact. Every memory. Every desire. Every regret.
I had loved women. Wanted them. Tasted them in every shape and form. Now, I was nursed.
Held against Hera's soft, flawless skin, suckling for survival—yet overwhelmed with shame and longing. Her scent, her heartbeat, her fingers running over my scalp… It was divine. I could feel my infant body reacting in ways I couldn't control.
This body is weak. But my will… is not.
The worst part? Hera knew. Her eyes—piercing, celestial—watched me not as a mother, but as a goddess who has seen all forms of desire. She sensed the strange duality in me, the too-calm gaze of a newborn who should not be so aware.
But she said nothing. She just… held me. And I fed.
A Second Mother
On the seventh day, I saw her. She stood beside Hera like a shadow given form—taller, leaner, with a gaze that cut deeper than knives. Silver hair to her waist. Sharp eyes. A warrior's stillness.
Alfia.
My mind reeled. I knew the name. I knew what she had done—what she was supposed to have done. The sister of Zard. The mother of Bell. Dead from illness in the original timeline. But here—alive. Here—mine.
"He has your eyes," Hera murmured to her, brushing fingers across my cheek.
Alfia looked down at me. Cold. Appraising. I wanted to scream, "You're beautiful." I wanted to tell her who I was. I wanted her to hold me like Hera did.
Instead, she hesitated—then reached down and took me into her arms. She was warm. So warm.
Feeding
Alfia did not nurse me often at first. Hera was the one who cradled me, bathed me, lulled me to sleep. But when she did—when it was her breast I suckled from—my infant body trembled with unfamiliar heat.
She was different. Not gentle like Hera, but firm, restrained. She held me with tension in her fingers, as if unsure of this role, of this bond. Yet her body… her body responded.
I pressed my lips to her, and instinct merged with something darker, something older. I want to make her feel good. I want her to smile. To sigh. To let go.
And sometimes, just for a moment, I felt her body shudder beneath my mouth. She never said a word. But her breath would catch. Her arms would tighten just slightly. And then she'd pull away too early, always too early.
I didn't cry. But I remembered.
The Village
The village they raised me in was small—isolated in the forests west of Daedalus Street. No walls. No Dungeon. Just hills, trees, and old stories.
Hera hid her divinity behind veils. The villagers called her "Mistress Hestia," believing her to be a minor deity in exile. Alfia was her bodyguard, her "priestess," but no one dared speak to her unless summoned.
And me? I was Kael—the strange child born under moonlight, with silver hair and steady eyes. The villagers whispered that I was touched by fate. They were right.
System Awakening
It happened on my 33rd day. A fever took me. My small body convulsed, heat rushing through every cell. Hera and Alfia were there—hovering, watching, whispering.
Then the world cracked.
[GACHA SYSTEM: CHALDEA CORE INITIALIZED]
[Template Compatibility Confirmed]
[Heroic Spirit Repository: Link Established]
Unique Skill: Fatebound Soul
You retain memories across incarnations. You attract convergence.
Special Ability: Template Sync
Gain combat experience, instincts, and abilities from summoned Heroic Spirits.
Status: Falna Locked – Awaiting Divine Inscription.
The air pulsed around me. A sigil burned itself into my chest—faint, but eternal.
Alfia's eyes widened. "What… is that?"
Hera touched her shoulder. "The world is shifting."
They said no more. But in the following days, I caught them watching me more closely. Alfia lingered longer. Hera seemed more distant. Like they were waiting for something. So was I.
The Hunger of the Mind
I began to dream. Not as a child. Not in soft nonsense or flickers of sound. But real dreams—vivid and unfamiliar.
In one, I stood in a city of glass and snow, a red coat wrapped around me. Knives at my side. Instincts not mine—yet mine—carved into my bones. "You have inherited my sight." "Now carve your path."
In another, I faced monsters with a bow of light. Felt calluses on fingers that had never trained. Heard a voice: "My path was one of regret. You—choose differently."
I awoke with sweat, despite my body still being a babe. My eyes saw more than they should. My reflexes were… sharpening. I wasn't just remembering. I was becoming.
Between Two Flames
The more I fed, the more I watched them. Hera: warmth, affection, infinite patience. Alfia: restraint, tension, and subtle affection she wouldn't name.
I learned them. I learned how Hera's voice dropped half a note when she cradled me. How Alfia's fingers twitched when I suckled too long, yet never pushed me away. I became the bridge between them. The only child they would ever raise together.
And even as my mind whispered things no child should think… I loved them.
The First Whisper
On the 40th day, a whisper echoed through my mind: "Summon."
A faint, golden glow drifted behind my closed eyelids. A circle of light—unformed, incomplete.
[1x Template Ticket Available]
[Awaiting Falna to unlock Heroic Spirit integration.]
It wasn't time yet. But the door was opening. The world of gods and monsters had taken me in.
And I—Kael Elion, son of Alfia, child of Hera's blessing, inheritor of fate and fire—was ready.