NOTE : We dive right into the action, and are assuming you've checked out the auxiliary volumes for the world building and lore. You can continue without it and it's just so you don't get lost on the terms

.....

A thousand years have passed since the Variants first appeared from the Rifts. God answered the prayers of the human race and gave them a chance to fight back.

He bestowed special marks called crests upon twelve who were worthy, granting them unfathomable power to fend off the wave of attacks.

Well… that's what the church wants us to think.

Man, being man, found a way. And in the present day, large numbers of the population have crests, and those that don't are treated as second-rate.

This was the case with Marcus, who spent most of his life doing odd jobs—until one of those jobs led to his demise.

At the hands of whom??

The son of a major crest-bearing house.

Marcus is reincarnated into the body of his killer and soon finds that despite being from a major house, the boy did not have a crest.

At least, not one that was bestowed upon him by God.

Calvin stopped what he was doing. "I was just leaving."


A silence ensued between them, and Huey's eyes drifted to the photos scattered on Calvin's bed.....


Old pictures, their edges worn from handling. One showed a younger Calvin with his father, both smiling at some kind of metalworking convention.


 Another showed Calvin holding his first Gun.


Calvin noticed him looking and quickly gathered them up, tucking them back into the place he had been searching.


"I'll be coming to St. Helena tonight," Huey said quietly. "To meet with your Magister."


Calvin's hands froze and he turned. "What if I already told her? About you, and abiut everything."


"Like I said before, I'll just have to deal with it."


Chapter 39 - Once it's broken it can never be repaired.