The village of Seolhyang celebrated the Day of the Dragon as it had for generations—with noise, fire, and a devotion that bordered on collective hysteria. The drums had been thundering since dawn, hammering out a rhythm that even the deaf must have felt vibrating in their bones. Red and gold banners snapped in the glacial wind blowing down from the Hoeryeong Mountains, bearing the effigy of the Hwangryong, that golden dragon who had founded the Empire four hundred years ago and whose descendants continued playing enlightened tyrants from their palace of stone and gold.
Men danced through the narrow streets, their painted wooden masks depicting the Four Guardians. Cheongryong, the azure dragon. Baekho, the white tiger. Jujak, the vermilion bird. Hyeonmu, the turtle-serpent. Children ran between their legs, laughing and screaming, waving lanterns of oiled paper that cast dancing shadows on the dark wooden facades. The smell of grilled meat mingled with that of cheap rice wine and incense burning before improvised altars.
It was the kind of celebration where you forgot you were poor. Where you pretended that winters weren't so long, that harvests hadn't been meager, and that ducal taxes hadn't gone up again this year. You danced, you drank, and you shouted prayers to gods who never answered. And all the while, in a small cottage at the edge of the village, Choi Eunbi screamed.
She screamed as if her voice could push back the pain. As if the Guardians, in their divine indifference, could hear her over the drums and decide that yes, perhaps, this woman deserved a little mercy. But the Guardians were busy elsewhere, or didn't exist, or simply didn't give a damn. The pain, however, was very real.
Choi Mansoo stood outside, his hands clenched around the handle of his axe. He wasn't working. He wasn't moving. He stared at the closed door with the intensity of a man trying to bore through wood by sheer force of will. Inside, his wife was fighting something he couldn't battle in her place, and it was driving him mad.
The midwife—an old woman with a hunched back who smelled of medicinal herbs and smoke—had shut the door with a sharp gesture two hours earlier. "Out," she had said. "You're just getting in the way."
So he waited. And while he waited, the village kept dancing.
Another scream. Higher. More desperate. Mansoo took a step toward the door, stopped, and stepped back. His hands trembled. He had killed men, once. Not many. But enough to know what it was like to watch someone die. He had survived things he never talked about. And yet here, in front of this goddamn ordinary wooden door, he felt as helpless as a kid.
The scream cut off abruptly.
The silence that followed was worse than the screaming.
Mansoo dropped the axe. It fell into the melting snow with a dull thud. He didn't hear it. He could hear nothing but the buzzing in his ears, the beating of his heart pounding against his ribs as if trying to escape.
Then another sound. Faint. Wet.
And after...
Nothing.
No crying.
The first thing I perceived was the burning.
Not a fire burn. Not a white-hot metal burn. No. Something worse. Something fundamental. The air. The air itself burned my lungs, as if every molecule of oxygen were a microscopic blade lacerating my alveoli from the inside.
I tried to scream. I couldn't.
My body didn't belong to me. It refused to obey. The muscles wouldn't respond. The nerves transmitted nothing but that atrocious sensation of simultaneous cold and burning, as if someone had plunged me into a frozen lake before throwing me into a blaze.
Sounds. Muffled. Distorted. Women's voices, high-pitched and disturbing, speaking a language I understood without understanding. Words that made no sense. Or made too much.
And then, in the sensory chaos, an image.
A face.
Eyes. Amber. Like honey frozen in time, shining with an inner light that had no place in this world of pain and darkness. A perfect face. No. Not perfect. Too real to be perfect. Features that bore the traces of past smiles, of tears shed, of restrained anger. A face I knew without ever having seen it.
Serin.
The name exploded in my mind like a thunderclap. Not a memory. Not a thought. An absolute certainty, branded with a hot iron into the part of my brain that controlled breathing and heartbeat. Serin. Serin. Serin.
Who was she?
I didn't know.
Why did that name resound like a prayer, like a curse, like the last thing I would have spoken before...
Before what?
The image wavered. The amber eyes blurred. And in their place, void. No. Not void. Something worse than void. A conscious emptiness. A hole in my memory where years, decades, and an entire life should have been. All that remained were fragments. Sensations. The bite of cold on a bare blade. The smell of blood mixed with mud. The weight of armor that was no longer there. The metallic taste of defeat in the mouth.
And that face. That goddamn face with amber eyes looking at me from a place I couldn't reach.
"He's not crying."
A voice. Close. Real. Hoarse with worry and exhaustion. The voice of a woman who had been screaming for hours and now murmured with the delicacy of someone walking on broken glass.
"He should be crying. Why isn't he crying?"
Other voices. Reassuring. Lying. "Some babies are like that. It'll come. Give him a minute."
Baby.
The word took a moment to register. Baby. I was... a baby?
No. Impossible. That was absurd. I was... I was...
Who was I?
The void answered with its usual silence.
The pain, however, did not fall silent. It intensified. The burning in my lungs transformed into an inferno. My body—this tiny, weak, pathetic body—convulsed. My limbs flailed without coordination, like those of a puppet with half its strings cut. And somewhere, in a corner of my mind that still refused to surrender to panic, a thought imposed itself with crystal clarity.
I am dead.
Not a hypothesis. A fact.
I am dead, and somehow, I have returned.
But why? And more importantly, why like this? Why in this newborn body that didn't even know how to breathe properly? Why with this void in my head, this total absence of personal memories, while my skills—the reflexes, the instincts, the tactical knowledge—remained carved into my muscles like scars?
Hands. Warm. Soft. They lifted me. Handled me with a gentleness I probably didn't deserve. A voice—the same as before, hoarse and tired—murmured something I didn't understand. No. That I didn't want to understand.
Because if I understood, if I accepted, then I would have to admit that this woman was...
"My little one. My son. Breathe. Please, breathe."
My... mother.
The word rang false. Foreign. Like a garment tailored for someone else. I had had a mother. Once. In a life I couldn't remember. She had probably been...
The void slapped me. Reminded me that I knew nothing. That I was a ghost dressed as a baby, an impostor squatting in the body of a child who should have had a chance to live his own life.
But the choice wasn't mine. I hadn't asked for this rebirth. I hadn't wanted it. And yet, here I was. Prisoner of this new and useless flesh, with only the face of a woman I didn't know for company and a name that haunted me like an unkept oath.
Serin.
Another spasm. The pain reached a peak. And somewhere, in the chaos, my body found the rhythm. My lungs inflated. The air entered. Burned. But entered nonetheless.
I didn't cry.
Crying would have been a relief. Crying would have meant I accepted. That I was what they thought I was—a baby, a blank slate, someone who deserved the tears of joy now streaming down the face of this exhausted woman who held me against her as if I were the most precious thing she had ever held.
But I wasn't that baby. Not really. I was... something else. Something is broken. Something that should never have returned.
So I kept my eyes open. And I looked at her. This woman with black hair plastered down by sweat, cheeks hollowed by fatigue, and eyes shining with tears and something that looked dangerously like love.
She smiled at me.
And I, in my stubborn silence, promised myself that one day, I would understand. I would understand why I was here. Why that face with amber eyes haunted me. And above all, I would find a way to find her again.
Even if I didn't know who she was.
III.
The midwife had hands like tanned leather and eyes that had seen too many deaths to be easily moved. She examined me with the clinical efficiency of someone who had done this hundreds of times. Checked my fingers. My toes. Counted. Nodded. Palpated my skull with surprising gentleness for someone who looked like she had been carved from gnarled wood.
"He's healthy," she said finally. Her voice carried the rocky accent of the mountains. "But..."
There was always a "but." That was universal, apparently. Even in this life, in this world, there was a goddamn "but" hanging in the air like a sword of Damocles.
"But?" repeated Eunbi. Her voice trembled. She still held me against her, as if afraid I would disappear if she loosened her grip.
The old woman frowned. Her wrinkles deepened further, transforming her face into a topographic map of worry. "He's not crying. And his eyes..."
"What about his eyes?"
"They're tracking. Already. Look."
She leaned toward me. Moved slowly to one side. Then the other. And indeed, my eyes followed her. Not by reflex. Not by instinct. By choice. Because I wanted to see. Understand. Assess.
A mistake. I realized it immediately from the silence that settled.
The midwife stepped back. Her expression changed. Something between fascination and fear. "That's... unusual. Newborns don't do that."
"Is it serious?" Eunbi's voice rose an octave. Panic surfaced.
"No. No, it's not serious." The old woman collected herself. Smoothed her clothes with a brusque gesture. "Some children are just... different. More alert. That's all."
Liar. She didn't believe it herself. But she knew it served no purpose to frighten a mother who had barely just given birth. So she lied. Politely. Professionally.
"May I let your husband in? He's been waiting for hours. The poor man must be worried sick."
Eunbi nodded. Her fingers mechanically caressed my hair—or rather the dark fuzz that covered my skull. "Yes. Yes, of course."
The midwife went out. I heard her muffled voice through the door. "You can come in. Your son is healthy."
Footsteps. Heavy. Hurried. The door burst open, banging against the wall with poorly controlled violence.
Choi Mansoo entered like a man expecting to find a battlefield. His eyes swept the room—Eunbi, me, the blood-stained sheets, the bowls of hot water, and the used linens. He was looking for danger. The enemy. Something to fight.
He found only an exhausted woman holding a silent baby.
His face crumpled. The tension left his shoulders. And for the first time since I had opened my eyes in this world, I saw someone who looked like an ordinary human being. Not an adversary. Not a threat. Just... a relieved man.
"Eunbi." He approached. Knelt beside the futon. His hands settled on his wife's shoulders with a tenderness I wouldn't have thought possible from someone with scars like his. "Are you alright?"
"I'm alright." She smiled. Tired. Happy. "Look. This is our son."
Mansoo lowered his eyes to me.
And I looked back at him.
Mistake number two.
His eyes—dark brown, almost black in the dim light of the oil lamp—widened slightly. Not much. Just enough for me to notice. He froze. Like someone who had just seen something they didn't expect to see. Something that didn't belong there.
"Mansoo?" Eunbi's voice betrayed her concern.
He blinked. Shook his head imperceptibly. "Sorry. It's just... he's not crying."
"I know. The midwife says it's normal. That some babies are like that."
"Yes. Of course." Mansoo extended his arms. "May I...?"
Eunbi hesitated for a fraction of a second. Then she gently placed me in her husband's arms. Mansoo held me with the caution of someone handling an unexploded bomb. Awkwardly. As if afraid of breaking me.
And while he held me, I continued watching him. Observing. Analyzing.
The calluses on his hands. Not those of a farmer. Not only. There was something else. Traces of weapon handling. Sword, perhaps. Or spear. The scars that ran across his bare forearms were thin and precise—the kind you get in combat, not in a farming accident. The way he held himself, even kneeling. Balanced. Ready. Like someone who had spent part of his life expecting something to jump at him.
This man was not a simple peasant.
"He has your eyes," said Eunbi softly. She had lain down, exhausted, but kept her gaze fixed on us.
"Mm." Mansoo didn't seem convinced. "And your nose, I think."
"What are we going to call him?"
A silence. Mansoo looked at me again. His eyebrows furrowed slightly. "Hyeon," he said finally. "Choi Hyeon."
"Hyeon." Eunbi tested the name. Smiled. "It suits him."
Hyeon. 玄. Mystery. Darkness. Something deep and unfathomable.
An appropriate name for someone who had no right to exist.
Mansoo gently placed me back in Eunbi's arms. "He's perfect," he said. His voice carried a conviction he couldn't have felt. "You did well."
"We did well," she corrected.
He smiled. A sad smile. Like someone who knew the world was darker than he wanted to admit but who tried to find light anyway. "Rest. I'll get some hot water."
He went out. And in his wake, I felt something that resembled relief.
Because he knew. Not consciously. Not yet. But a part of him had seen. Had understood that something was wrong. That this silent baby looking at him with eyes too old wasn't what he should be.
And sooner or later, we would need to have a conversation.
But not today.
IV.
The midwife came back one last time before leaving. She brought clean linens and a bowl of water to wash with. She busied herself in silence, efficient, her gestures betraying decades of practice. Eunbi had sunk into a light sleep, exhausted beyond words. I stayed awake. Because apparently, babies who don't cry don't sleep either.
"Here." The old woman held something out to Mansoo, who had just returned with a bucket of hot water. "He was clutching this in his fist. I couldn't get it away from him until he let go on his own."
Mansoo took the object. Turned it between his fingers. "A pendant?"
I couldn't see from my position—my mobility was limited to random spasms and blinks—but I felt something. A warmth. Not physical. Something else. Something that resonated in my chest like a tuning fork struck in silence.
"It's strange," said the midwife. "A newborn can't grip something that tightly. And yet, when I got him out... his fingers were white from squeezing it so hard."
Mansoo didn't respond immediately. He stared at the pendant with an intensity that could have melted metal. "Jade," he murmured finally. "Good quality. Where did it come from?"
"I don't know. He was born with it." The old woman shrugged. "Maybe a good luck charm left by his grandmother? Some families have traditions."
"We don't have those kinds of traditions." Mansoo's voice was flat. Neutral. But something in his tone suggested he was thinking very hard about something he didn't want to say out loud.
"Then it's a mystery." She stood up and gathered her things. "Keep it. It might bring luck to the child. The gods know he'll need it."
"Why do you say that?"
She stopped at the threshold. Looked back. Her eyes settled on me one last time. "Because this child is different. I saw it in his eyes. And different children... they attract attention. Not always the good kind."
She left without waiting for an answer. The door closed gently behind her, leaving behind the silence and the smell of incense and medicinal herbs.
Mansoo remained motionless for a long moment. The pendant hung from his fingers, attached to a fine chain of tarnished bronze. He raised it toward the light. The jade sparkled—a pale green glow, almost liquid, that seemed to pulse in rhythm with something no one else could perceive.
Except me.
I felt it. That warmth. That resonance. As if this carved piece of stone was connected to something deep within my being, in a place my amputated memory couldn't reach.
Serin.
Her name exploded again in my mind. Not thought. Felt. As if the pendant itself was screaming it at me.
Mansoo approached. Leaned over me. "Why do you look at me like that, little one?" he murmured. His voice carried a mix of worry and... something else. Recognition? Mistrust?
My eyes didn't leave him. Because I couldn't look away. Because it was all I could do—observe, analyze, and try to understand this world into which I had just arrived like an uninvited intruder.
"You have the eyes of someone who has seen too much," he said finally. "But that's impossible. You were just born."
He closed his hand over the pendant. "I'll keep it for you. Until you're old enough not to swallow it."
He slipped the chain into his pocket. And with it, the warmth faded. Not completely. But enough that I felt... empty. As if someone had just removed a part of myself I didn't even know I possessed.
Mansoo sat down near Eunbi. Put a hand on her shoulder. Watched her sleeping face with a tenderness that violently contrasted with the scars that ran across his arms.
"What kind of life have I given you, little Hyeon?" he murmured to himself. Or maybe to me. Or to the indifferent gods who presided over this masquerade. "Born on a festival day in a lost village. With only a father who flees his past and a mother who deserves better as your inheritance. And now this pendant..."
He took out the jade again. He looked at it as if he could read its history in the stone. "Where do you come from? What are you?"
He was no longer talking about the pendant. He was talking to me.
But I had no answer. Not yet. All I had were questions. Baseless certainties. Memories that weren't really memories. And a name. One single goddamn name that resonated in my head like a curse and a promise intertwined.
Serin.
Outside, the village continued to celebrate. The drums hadn't stopped. The lanterns still danced in the glacial wind. The drunks sang off-key hymns to the glory of the Golden Dragon, who had founded this shithole empire where people like Mansoo had to hide in mountain villages to escape things they no longer wanted to remember.
And I, Choi Hyeon—or whoever I really was—stared at the dark thatched ceiling, wondering how long it would take me to understand. How long before this pathetic body could stand up, walk, talk, and do something other than breathe and shit and be a living burden on two people who hadn't asked for any of this?
In the darkness of my new body, a single certainty shone: he had to find her. Even if he didn't know who she was.
Even if the whole world had to burn for it.