Infancy had passed, but the prison of childhood still clung tightly.
Kael was four years old when he made fire for the first time.
Not with flint or steel. Not with candle wax or oil. With his hands. With his will.
It came in the form of a flicker — brief, almost laughable in its weakness — a thread of heat that danced on his palm and died before even the wind could notice. No one saw it. No one believed it. But to Kael, that spark meant everything.
It meant the door hadn't closed. It meant the laws of this world could still be bent. It meant he hadn't lost everything.
He'd been sitting by the stream that cut through the woods behind the cottage. To Lira and Dren, it was just a peaceful spot where their son liked to play — throwing pebbles into the water, following insects, talking to birds.
But that was just the performance.
In truth, Kael was meditating. Practicing. Failing. Trying again.
The way he'd done in the other life — before the gods fell, before the sky turned black.
He wasn't looking to hurl fireballs or summon storms. Not yet. First, he had to understand the language of this world. Because while the concept of mana existed here, it behaved... differently. It was slower. Wilder. Untrained. It didn't obey force. It rejected command.
It demanded something else — stillness. Emotion. Resonance.
And so, day after day, Kael sat with his legs crossed and his bare feet pressed into the damp grass. He breathed in rhythm with the wind. He let the water's song pull his thoughts toward quiet. No incantations. No ancient runes. Just silence and intent.
He remembered the rush of his past life's magic — the way power would surge from a clenched fist or shouted spell. Here, there was no such reaction. Conviction alone wasn't enough. Magic here was not a tool.
It was a partner.
And one that would not dance until he learned the steps.
So Kael listened.
He listened to the tremble of the earth when the stream overflowed. He listened to the roots of the trees shifting deep underground. He listened to the fluttering pulse of mana moving just beneath the surface — like a fox too cautious to show itself.
When the spark finally came, it arrived like breath on a mirror.
Warm. Brief. Almost imagined.
But it was real.
He felt the shift in the air. He saw the glimmer rise from his palm — no brighter than a candle's dying wick, but his all the same. It faded almost instantly, leaving nothing but a memory and the burn of purpose in his chest.
Kael didn't laugh. Didn't cry. He simply stared at his hand, lips pressed tight, and whispered to himself:
"It's still there."
That night, after dinner and lullabies and chores, he sat alone beside the hearth. The fire inside the cottage was already lit, casting long shadows across the stone floor. Lira rocked a neighbor's baby by the window, humming an old valley tune. Dren, outside, split the last of the week's firewood. The axe rose and fell with a practiced rhythm — thunk... thunk... thunk — like a heartbeat echoing through the walls.
Kael held a stone in his lap, hands folded around it. He wasn't playing. He was focusing.
Testing the connection again.
There was a pull beneath his skin now. Not powerful, but present. A thread, waiting to be plucked. He breathed slow. Reached with more patience than desperation.
What do you want? he asked the mana, not with words, but with his presence.
He didn't command. He offered.
And the energy responded with the faintest nudge — a hum inside his bones, a tingling just behind his ribs.
A whisper, almost:
Closer.
"Kaelan?"
He blinked. Lira stood over him, her face cast in orange firelight.
"Hmm?" he said, putting on a child's daze.
"You're quiet tonight."
Kael gave her a tired smile, small and sweet. "Just thinking."
She chuckled, brushing a lock of hair behind her ear. "You think too much for someone your size."
If only you knew, he thought.
He watched her walk away, still humming, still swaying with the baby as though peace was a guarantee.
Kael knew better.
Days turned into weeks. The snow melted. The rivers rose.
Kael kept practicing.
Sometimes by the stream. Sometimes near the hearth. Sometimes alone in the fields when no one was watching. He made no progress for a long while. But he never stopped.
Because the spark had returned to him — the truth that he could shape this world.
He was not here to exist.
He was here to prepare.
On his third attempt during a thunderstorm, he held a glowing ember in his palm for nearly ten full seconds.
By the end of the season, he could create sparks at will — small, harmless, but obedient.
It was enough.
A few days after his fourth birthday, Kael wandered deeper into the woods than usual. Not enough to worry his parents, but far enough to be alone. He carried no torch. No tool. Just a question that burned in his chest:
Why was it so easy, this time?
In his old world, he'd trained for years before touching raw mana. Here, he was barely four, and already—
"Because you remember," said a voice in his mind. Not his own. Not quite.
Kael froze.
The woods were silent. The wind had stopped.
"Because your soul was never wiped clean."
The whisper faded before he could trace its source. But the message lingered like a breath on cold glass.
He turned toward the stream.
The water wasn't moving.
No birds.
No wind.
Kael inhaled sharply. Reached out with his senses — not just his ears or eyes, but that thread inside his chest. The one that trembled whenever the mana stirred.
Something was watching.
Not close. Not near. But aware.
And for the first time since being reborn, Kael felt the echo of something from the old world.
Power.
Ancient. Waiting.
He turned back toward the cottage, walking slowly, resisting the urge to run.
When he reached the hill above the house, he looked down and saw Lira hanging laundry, Dren fixing the gate. Normal. Peaceful.
But Kael's hands were still warm.
The spark hadn't left him. And now, he knew it wasn't just about learning magic.
It was about remembering why he needed it.
That night, the stars above the valley flickered strangely.
Kael stood barefoot on the back porch, staring up at constellations he still didn't recognize.
But he could feel the cracks in them now. Hairline fractures in the fabric of this world.
And somewhere — somewhere — someone else was looking back.
Kael whispered to the stars, "If you're coming, come soon."
Then he smiled, small and sharp.
"Next time, I'll burn first."