"You! Julien! All you ever do is draw and zone out like your soul's somewhere else."
Léa, with her twin ponytails bouncing, fired off the words like a machine gun, cutting right through the boy next to her who was busy sketching.
"You're… Léa? Oh—wait, what's wrong?"
Julien lifted his head. His eyes were that rare olive-green, the kind you see on leaves right after rain.
Léa didn't even glance at him. She stared off into the poetic distance and kept going.
"Julien, you're a nice guy… but I don't want to be your girlfriend anymore."
A loud buzz exploded inside Julien's skull—not because of the classic "nice guy" rejection card, but because it felt like someone had just crammed an entire hard drive's worth of information straight into his brain.
"What did you say? What's happening?" Even though his head was spinning, he hadn't lost it completely. He fought the dizziness and managed, "Girlfriend? Since when?"
"You only care about bugs and drawing leaves. But Kevin can actually hang out with me all the time." Léa didn't notice anything weird about him; she just assumed her words had crushed him.
"Kevin said we can apply to Saint-Louis Royal Middle School together later—not some random school in England."
"Kevin said he'll pick stars out of the sky for me."
"Kevin can give me things you never could."
"So… we're breaking up."
If those lines had come from two adults, they'd sound almost normal. Coming from a pair of ten-year-olds? It was straight-up ridiculous.
"Kevin's lying to you. You can't pick stars—they'd burn your hands." Julien's mind was drifting; something like a library had just flickered into existence inside his head. He could only mumble whatever came out.
"No way! Kevin says you can catch them with a telescope!" Léa stomped her foot. "And he can even recite The Little Prince by heart! Can you?"
"I can," Julien nodded absently. "But the Little Prince says the really important stuff can't be seen with your eyes—you have to look with your heart."
"Hmph! Then look with your heart and tell me if I'm actually mad!" Léa jumped up, spun around so her back was to him, and shouted, "I'm telling everyone Julien Black is a total freak! He even said yesterday that grapevines can dance by themselves!"
The other kids burst out laughing.
Julien wasn't angry. He didn't even have time to reply.
Because the floodgates of memory had just been blasted wide open.
September 17, 1990. Bordeaux, France. Château Vigne Noire — Black Vine Estate.
Autumn on the Right Bank of Bordeaux. Sunlight poured down like melted amber over the rolling vineyards. The leaves on the vines glowed copper-red; the Merlot grapes hung full and heavy, like polished amethysts. Harvest season. The moment every winemaker lives for.
Today, Château Vigne Noire was officially awarded the title of Premier Grand Cru Classé A in Saint-Émilion.
That put it shoulder-to-shoulder with Cheval Blanc, Ausone, and Angelus—another dazzling jewel on the Right Bank crown.
In front of the manor house, under a century-old plane tree, several white silk marquees had been set up.
A towering champagne tower glittered. Waiters glided between guests with silver trays: foie gras with figs, truffle tarts, and glasses of the estate's 1985 vintage red—inky as the night sky, rimmed with pomegranate glow, velvet-smooth on the tongue, yet finishing with an elusive coolness, like swallowing a thread of moonlight.
Guests had flown in from everywhere: Parisian critics, New York collectors, Tokyo tycoons, London aristocrats. They murmured in quiet awe.
"Unbelievable… a family estate jumping from obscurity to the top tier in just thirty years."
"I heard the owner is British? Only moved here twenty years ago?"
"Yes—Alphard Black. Very reclusive, though. His wife Elodie Black handles most of the day-to-day. She's from the famous Moreau family—their holdings are all over France."
"So this mysterious Black guy really hit the jackpot marrying into that."
"Don't be too harsh. The estate's been around for over a century. It's only since Mr. Black took over that the quality started skyrocketing. Look—he's coming over now."
A tall, distinguished man in his mid-fifties approached, smiling, wine glass in hand, nodding and chatting as he went.
Silver threaded his neatly trimmed hair and beard. He wore a perfectly tailored dark-green wool suit; the silk tie carried subtle silver vine patterns.
On his left ring finger: a plain band engraved inside with words only his wife would ever read:
In vino veritas, in amore libertas.
(In wine there is truth, in love there is freedom.)
"Those eyes… just like his name, Alphard—the lonely serpent star. It's like the whole universe is hiding in his pupils," one middle-aged lady sighed dreamily.
No one there knew that "universe" belonged to a pure-blood wizard who had been blasted off his family tree.
Out in the back garden, far from the main party, a little "children's corner" had been cordoned off with colorful flags and balloons. Small tables held juice, macarons, and mini sandwiches.
A handful of six- and seven-year-olds were digging in the sandpit, playing treasure hunt.
An old cast-iron bench faced the endless green waves of the vineyard stretching to the horizon.
The freshly cut lawn still carried the crisp scent of dew. When the breeze slipped through the vines, it turned rich and warm, carrying the sweet perfume of green fruit kissed by sun.
Maybe the gardener forgot to shut the irrigation gate last night—right now a thin silver thread of water was creeping along the furrows, quietly soaking the whole hillside until it shone.
The boy and girl had been sitting together on the bench under the oak, skipping the little kids' games.
The boy wore a navy suit, tie slightly askew. He held a grape leaf in his left hand; his right had been sketching vein patterns in a notebook with a pencil.
But now he'd frozen, staring at the vineyard, then back at the girl. Confusion swam in his eyes, like someone waking from a very long dream.
The girl was Léa Dupont—Julien's elementary-school classmate, daughter of a local wine merchant. Bright, lively, usually got along great with him. Good friends.
The boy's full name: Caelum Julien Black. Ten years old. Grandson of the estate owner, Alphard.
Because his grandfather came from an ancient British family that named everyone after stars, his father was Altair Étienne Black (Altair being the brightest star in Aquila).
Caelum is a constellation name too—the Sculptor, or "the changer." Julien was just the French middle name tacked on.
And right now… it all came rushing back.
Previous life: Yu Lian.
Born in early 21st-century China to university-professor parents. Comfortable life, emotionally distant home.
Quiet, precocious kid. Obsessed with reading—especially astronomy and classical literature. In university he practically lived in the library; people jokingly called him a walking encyclopedia.
Majored in physics, but secretly took "Introduction to Western Esotericism" because, as a child, he'd devoured the entire Harry Potter series and became convinced another world had to exist.
1980? No—for him it had been 2025.
Late one night in the library, racing to finish a paper titled Quantum Entanglement and the Concept of "Sympathy" in Ancient Alchemy: A Comparative Study.
Thunderstorm outside. Exhausted, he leaned back and muttered, "If magic were real… that would be something."
Lightning struck an ancient tree on campus. Current surged through outdated wiring straight into the library.
His last memory: the obscure fan-compiled book in his hands—The Black Family Genealogy Compendium—suddenly blazing with blinding white light…
Next thing he knew, he was crying in a private birthing room at a Bordeaux winery in 1980. He'd become Caelum Julien Black.
For ten years he'd told himself he was just "mature for his age." He knew the alphabet early, recited multiplication tables, explained heliocentrism. Adults called him clever. He never showed anything strange.
Until today.
"So… I really did transmigrate."
The realization hit like a tidal wave, smashing through every mental barrier.
And in that exact moment of emotional chaos—
Magic broke loose:
Pebble at his feet rose slowly, hovering three inches off the ground.
The plastic shovel in the sandpit flipped over by itself and pointed due north.
Nearby fountain water spun backward, briefly forming a perfect water lotus.
Léa's butterfly hair clip unfastened on its own. Her long hair floated upward.
She screamed in terror:
"Mommy! Julien's cursing me with witchcraft!"