In a dimly lit room, a seventeen-year-old boy sat hunched over his desk, studying with quiet determination. The reason was simple: his unit exams were starting next week. He wanted to be prepared—no, more than prepared—and to protect his hard-won place as the number one student in his class.
After another fifteen minutes or so, his tired eyes blurred over the lines of text. He finally closed his books with a soft thud and pushed himself up from the chair. He switched off the lights, letting the room sink into darkness, and made his way to bed.
But once he lay down, his mind did not return to formulas or dates or definitions. Instead, it drifted to a girl. She was his friend, someone he had quietly fallen for almost a year ago. Unfortunately, she already had a boyfriend.
"Should I just confess?" he muttered into the darkness.
He had tried so many times to tell her how he felt, but every time they met, the words lodged in his throat. No matter how hard he pushed himself, he could not say it. A part of him was terrified that if he did, the fragile balance of their friendship would shatter.
"Forget it," he whispered at last. "I'm going to tell her how I feel, and I'll deal with whatever comes after."
With that final resolve, his tense body relaxed, and sleep slowly pulled him under. He did not yet know that this would be his last night on Earth.
***
Somewhere in a vast, soundless darkness, a pair of eyes opened.
He did not feel his chest rise or fall, yet he felt no discomfort. No air, no cold, no warmth—just emptiness.
"Am I dreaming?" he wondered. Everywhere he looked, there was only blackness. The last thing he remembered was lying in his bed. Everything about this should have been a dream, but some instinct buried deep inside whispered that it was not.
Time lost meaning. He could not tell whether he drifted there for a second or an eternity. Then, without warning, something seized him—his body, his soul, he could not tell—and dragged him away through the void.
When he opened his eyes again, the darkness was gone.
He felt strange. Small. Weak. As if his entire body had shrunk to the size of a doll—or a baby. The realization hit him like a shock: he could not move properly, his limbs were tiny, and his vision was slightly blurred.
The first thing he saw was a woman's face hovering above him. She held him carefully in her arms, her expression tired but gentle.
"Congratulations, my lady," she said with a warm smile, turning her head to the side. "It's a healthy boy."
From somewhere to her right came the sound of labored breathing. After a brief pause, a hoarse female voice replied, "Let me see him."
The maid—because that was what she clearly seemed to be—stepped forward and passed the newborn into someone else's hands.
A new face filled his vision. Another woman, her gaze cool and distant, looked down at him. Unlike the maid's soft eyes, hers were sharp, assessing, as if she were examining an object rather than a child.
After several seconds of silent scrutiny, she finally spoke a single word.
"Passable."
She held him for a moment longer, then casually handed him back to the maid. "Put the baby in the cradle and take care of him. Tomorrow, he will be tested before the patriarch and the other members of the clan. I hope his talent meets the minimum requirements. If not, he'll be discarded like the others from those lowly concubines."
Having said that, she turned away, her footsteps fading as she left the room.
The maid's expression tightened for a heartbeat, but she did not protest. She carefully placed the baby in a small wooden cradle and began tending to him as ordered.
Hours passed. The newborn lay quietly in the cradle, his eyes wide open. No one in the room noticed that behind that innocent gaze was not the soul that originally belonged to this body, but that of a boy from an entirely different world.
The baby—Brian, as he had been known on Earth—had been thinking ever since he opened his eyes in this unfamiliar place.
"So I've been reincarnated," he thought silently. "From how the maid called that woman "my lady," this seems like some kind of feudal society. And from what she said about a test tomorrow and "talent," it sounds like people here have special powers or cultivation of some sort."
His newborn body already felt heavy with exhaustion, but his mind clung to one last bitter thought before sleep claimed him.
"All that studying… all that preparation… completely wasted."