"Why aren't I crying? Uh-oh."
Instantly, Kim Gyeong understood.
He was a baby. And he wasn't crying.
From any normal perspective, this would look… strange. Concerning, even. People would naturally wonder if something was wrong.
But why would he cry?
He was a fully grown man. Mentally, he was twenty-nine. Factor in his time in the white void, and he might as well be thirty-nine. Almost forty.
Still, the situation was undeniably problematic.
'What should I do? Cry? How does one even…? I can't just cry on command, can I? Would making any sound suffice?'
He steeled himself to attempt something when he felt the Midwife wrap him snugly in cloth.
'Don't tell me…'
His eyes widened in alarm, then immediately turned bloodshot.
'Oi! Don't you dare do what I think you're about to do, you fat woman!'
She ignored his mental protests. With a practiced motion, she raised her hand, and landed a sharp smack on his bottom.
Pap-!
The impact echoed.
Kim Gyeong's body shuddered, and before he could stop himself, a cry escaped his tiny mouth. He glared at her with every ounce of indignation he could muster.
'That fucking hurt! Goddamn you!'
He had never felt so humiliated in his entire life. Even being yelled at by managers didn't come close.
'You think you can get away with this? Fine. If that's how you want to play it, then I'll play dirty too.'
With grim resolve, he slowly relaxed the muscles he barely understood how to control. The result was immediate and catastrophic.
Both his bladder and bowels betrayed him at once, and everything he had bottled up was unleashed onto the unsuspecting midwife.
…Long story short, she was splattered with dirty baby fluids.
The woman froze. Her brows knitted together in visible displeasure as she stared down at the mess coating her clothes.
Meanwhile, little Kim Gyeong giggled.
"Hehehe…"
Of course, to everyone else, it was nothing more than incoherent infant noises. But to him, it was the sweet sound of victory. A perfectly executed act of revenge.
"This little fiend," the midwife muttered with a frown. "He's quite energetic. At this rate, he might grow up to be a troublesome fellow."
His mother stiffened, worry flashing across her exhausted face. "Nanny… there's nothing wrong with him, right?"
The midwife shook her head after a brief examination. "Nothing that I can see. You shouldn't worry. Although rare, some babies don't cry much at birth. And even if something were wrong, I'm confident in my abilities. There are no injuries. He's perfectly healthy."
With that explanation, she handed baby Kim Gyeong off to another woman to be cleaned.
The little culprit, however, continued to giggle, utterly unapologetic. Deep down, he was immensely proud of his handiwork.
A perfect ten out of ten masterpiece.
After washing her face with warm water and a cloth, the midwife grumbled under her breath, something along the lines of, "I smell like shit and urine," before clicking her tongue and turning to glare at him.
Kim Gyeong met her stare head-on, a faint smirk tugging at his lips.
"…"
"^^"
Several seconds passed in silence, the two locked in an unspoken standoff.
The midwife narrowed her eyes for a moment, then let out a helpless sigh. Shaking her head, she turned back toward the woman resting on the bed.
"Oh dear, he really does look like his father, doesn't he?"
His mother, Elizabeth, smiled weakly. "I suppose he does."
"For some reason," the midwife continued, "I have a feeling he'll grow up with a very different personality from his father."
Elizabeth blinked. "Hmm. Why do you think that?"
"Nothing," the midwife replied quickly. "Forget I said anything."
Elizabeth tilted her head in mild confusion. Seeing her reaction, the midwife sighed again and scratched the back of her head.
"Well then… have you decided on a name for him?"
"A name?"
"Of course. You do know you have to give him a name, right? Don't tell me you haven't thought of one yet."
"Ah, that…"
Elizabeth lowered her head.
'Huh?'
Her strange reaction did not escape the sharp eyes of Kim Gyeong. She looked distracted, distant, as if her thoughts were somewhere far away.
Perhaps it was simply exhaustion from childbirth. Or the lingering stress of pregnancy.
Yet somehow, he felt there was more to it than that.
He just could not tell what.
"…"
Elizabeth remained silent, her gaze unfocused. After a long moment, she slowly lifted her head and looked at him.
Then she spoke.
"Noctis."
The midwife blinked and tilted her head. "Noctis?"
For the first time, Elizabeth's expression brightened into a wide genuine smile, seemingly lighting up the entire room.
"Yes... I'll name him Noctis."
At that moment, Kim Gyeong's second life truly began in earnest.
† †
Five moments passed in a flash before he realized it.
Kim Gyeong, now living under his new identity as "Noctis," spent his days doing absolutely nothing. Life was peaceful, almost absurdly so. He had no responsibilities to speak of and was largely left to his own devices.
All he needed to do was eat, sleep, poop, and occasionally perform the required baby routines such as making incoherent noises or grabbing at nearby fingers.
It did not take long for him to learn the true importance of crying.
Apparently, it was a baby's universal language. Hunger. Discomfort. A dirty diaper. Everything was communicated through tears.
Naturally, to someone who was mentally a respectable adult, this was nothing short of damning.
And deeply embarrassing.
But what choice did he have?
A man still needed to eat, after all. And his control over his new body was laughably poor. In the end, he had no option but to rely on the assistance of others.
Excluding that, there was another problem tied to his new routine.
Boredom.
He was painfully bored.
There was nothing of importance he could do as a five-month-old baby. He could not walk around with his underdeveloped muscles, nor could he meaningfully interact with the world beyond lying there and staring at ceilings. To make matters worse, there was a maddening itch at the back of his neck that refused to go away, irritating him without end.
He was certain it was because of how often he had scratched that exact spot back in the white void.
It seemed his bad habits had followed him even into a new life.
A truly cruel joke.
On the bright side, he could manipulate Ki and his own inner ether even as an infant. Otherwise, he would have gone insane from doing absolutely nothing.
'Come to think of it… where exactly is this place?'
From what he had seen of the outside environment, the mansion he lived in was nestled along a mountainside, surrounded by dense forest. It was massive, castle-sized in scale, and constructed mostly of wood. However, its walls were reinforced with unfamiliar materials, giving them an imposing sturdiness that suggested both wealth and power.
At the moment, he was cradled in the arms of his new mother, peeking around as she walked through the mansion while speaking softly to him.
Little did she know that Noctis could understand every word.
'The language of this world isn't that difficult. It even has many similarities to Earth's languages, and the main common tongue is essentially English. Could this be one of Earth's countless variants?'
Contrary to his initial assumptions, the nature of this world was far more complex than he had first believed. There was only one Earth, but it had different alternations which possessed their own history. The most accurate way to describe it was as a network of divergent timelines and notions, collectively forming something known as a "Worldview."
The history of one Worldview differed entirely from another.
Even if some shared superficial similarities, they were still fundamentally distinct at their core.
That was precisely why there existed so many Gods of the same concept, multiple Gods of War, multiple Goddesses of Love, multiple Rulers of Death and countless others besides.
All of them were true.
He knew all of this because C had once explained it to him in her usual, almost casual manner.
Witch of Immortality, C...
'Tsk. Damn it.'
Unfortunately, despite five months having passed, the memory of that witch's betrayal still lingered, leaving a bitter taste in his mouth.
She was someone he had spent an entire decade with. How could he possibly forget her so easily?
'It's best not to think about her for now.'
That was the conclusion Kim Gyeong ultimately reached.
Just then, a voice muttered nearby.
"Oh? So this is one of my latest grandchild, is it?"