The crying didn't come right away.
Noah Vale entered the world in silence—wrapped in blood, grief, and something colder than death. The midwife panicked at first, gently shaking his fragile body, whispering desperate prayers. Then, a breath. A whimper. A cry.
He was alive.
But the woman who brought him into this world… wasn't.
Elira Vale lay still on the crimson-stained sheets, her eyes half-open, her final breath long gone. Her hand remained outstretched, as if reaching for the son she never got to hold.
From across the room, a man stood motionless. Noah's father—Lord Corven Vale—his face like carved stone, unreadable and cold. He didn't cry. Didn't kneel. Didn't look at his son.
He looked at his wife.
"You took her," he whispered, voice hollow.
The midwife turned. "My lord—"
"It should've been him."
She froze.
"You hear me?" Corven said, louder now. "It should've been him."
Noah cried louder, as if sensing the blame already shackled to his name.
A Lifetime Earlier…
Elias Corwin had once been a scholar, a mage, a man who chased knowledge no one else dared touch. But he lived a hollow life. He spent his final years alone friends gone, family buried, love lost. And in the end, when his body failed him, not a single soul stood by his side.
"I wasted it," he had whispered with his last breath. "All of it."
He died with regrets too heavy for the grave.
But the world does not always forget a soul that still burns.
And so, something ancient reached out and offered him a second chance.
Now…
Elias opened his eyes again—but not as himself.
He was a child now. A newborn. A boy named Noah.
He felt the loss of the woman who birthed him. Felt the hatred in the man who called himself father. And though his memories were cloudy, one thing was painfully clear
This life had been cursed before it began.
Three weeks passed. The manor was cold. Silent. The child was left to cry alone.
And then it happened.
Corven Vale stood in his private study, a small obsidian sealstone clutched in his hand. An old mage beside him hesitated.
"My lord… to seal a child's Gate… he'll never wield magic, never rise in rank, never join the Guard—"
"He doesn't deserve the path," Corven muttered. "He took Elira. That's all he'll ever be remembered for."
The mage hesitated, then raised the seal.
In the nursery, Noah blinked. A strange chill washed over him. His tiny limbs stilled. A surge of energy gathered… then vanished.
The Gate was sealed.
No chance for power. No path to greatness. No purpose.
But inside the child's soul, Elias stirred.
He had wasted his first life chasing knowledge, ignoring emotion.
Now? Fate had chained him to a powerless body.
But Elias had learned one truth before he died:
Power is nothing without meaning.
And this time… he would find it.
Even if it killed him again.