Three days had passed since Karl arrived in this world, and in those three days, observation became his only weapon.
He could not speak.
He could not ask questions.
So he watched.
From what he had gathered, this world was primarily ruled by humans—humans who possessed abilities far beyond anything he had known before. On the second day, when the horned man carried him outside to buy supplies, Karl had seen someone floating effortlessly in the sky. Not falling. Not jumping. Simply hovering, as if gravity itself acknowledged their authority.
That single sight was enough to confirm it.
This world was not ordinary.
Language, however, was his greatest obstacle. Whatever he tried to say emerged as meaningless babble, childish sounds that carried no meaning. His thoughts were sharp, adult, painfully aware—but his voice betrayed him completely. Meanwhile, everyone around him spoke a foreign tongue he did not understand.
It was infuriating.
It really sucks to be a grown man trapped inside a child's body, Karl thought bitterly.
He sat on the floor, small legs crossed beneath him, staring into nothing. His mind churned relentlessly—reincarnation, death, divine mistakes, second lives. Everything had happened too fast, leaving him no time to process the weight of it all.
There was another thing he had noticed.
Whenever he sat quietly, lost in thought, his parents would stop whatever they were doing and stare at him with absurdly wide smiles.
He did not understand why.
"Look at him," the woman said softly, her voice warm though incomprehensible to him. "He looks so serious."
"Yes," the man replied, amusement evident in his tone. "Every time we leave him alone, he makes that face. As if he's thinking about something far too big for him."
Karl ignored them.
He was doing the only thing he could do—and apparently, the only thing he wasn't supposed to.
One question gnawed at him relentlessly.
How am I sitting upright… when I'm only three days old?
A knock echoed through the room.
The woman opened the door. Another woman stood outside, holding something wrapped carefully—another gift. Visitors came often.
Too often. And every time, Karl noticed the same thing.
Their eyes always lingered on his father.
They admired him openly.
Karl doubted they knew what his father truly was—the monstrous form he had seen at birth.
A sudden chill crawled up his spine.
A cat had appeared beside him.
Its fur stood on end, claws unsheathed, pupils narrowed into sharp slits. It stared at Karl as if sensing something deeply wrong.
Come here, Karl called mentally.
What came out instead were bubbles and broken sounds.
"Bag… bah…"
Instantly, the atmosphere shifted.
His parents stiffened.
The man and woman exchanged a glance—urgent, wary.
Something was wrong.
The woman forced a smile and swiftly closed the door, locking it from the inside. She scooped Karl up into her arms, holding him tightly.
"He can't have those powers," she whispered in her language, voice strained. "He also has the blood of that woman."
Karl barely registered the words. Exhaustion overwhelmed him. A baby's body was far weaker than he had anticipated—it felt uncomfortably similar to his old one.
He closed his eyes.
"Yes," the man replied grimly. "But he also carries his blood."
Ten days later, a miracle occurred.
Karl walked.
On his own legs.
Unaided.
The sensation was indescribable. Balance.
Strength. Movement. Something he had never experienced in his previous life.
It felt sacred.
Alina would be so happy, he thought instinctively.
The thought struck too deep.
His knees buckled, and he fell.
His parents rushed toward him, joy mixed unmistakably with fear in their eyes. A ten-day-old child should not be able to walk—but Karl was not a child.
He was a man who had once been twenty-two years old.
And the expressions on their faces were hauntingly familiar.
Am I going to die again?
Did I inherit another fatal disease?
Three years passed swiftly after that.
They moved constantly. Villages. Towns.
Borders. Always leaving before roots could grow.
By the time Karl was three, his body resembled that of a grown youth. Strong. Refined. Abnormally developed. He leapt from the highest rock into the lake below as cheers erupted around him.
His body cut through the water cleanly.
Freedom.
Each step, each jump, still felt miraculous—even after three years.
He emerged from the lake, water dripping from black hair, sharp black eyes reflecting sunlight. His face was striking, features defined, jaw cleanly sculpted.
The girls bathing nearby did not scold him.
They smiled.
They waved.
"Hey, Azor," one of them called sweetly.
He ran a hand through his hair, retrieved his shirt, and walked away without looking back.
Good thing I'm mentally twenty-two, he thought dryly. A real child would've been ruined by that attention.
Several boys followed him, jealousy written plainly across their faces.
This body was everything his previous one had not been—strong, responsive, powerful.
One of the boys behind him reached out and touched his neck.
Azor turned instantly.
"What?"
The boy froze.
Azor's senses had sharpened unnaturally.
Then everything changed.
The world twisted.
Before him appeared a sea of souls—grotesque, broken, distorted. Their eyes burned with hunger as they stared directly at him.
"What… what is this…?"
The boys around him waved their hands frantically, shouting, but their voices felt distant. Azor couldn't tear his gaze away.
Memories flooded his mind—violent deaths, quiet endings, unbearable sins, fleeting happiness. Too many. Too fast.
The weight crushed him.
Darkness claimed him.
The next day, they were gone again.
Another city.
This time, the was again because of him.
Azor stopped asking questions. His parents avoided answers anyway, and he refused to make them uncomfortable.
In his new room—slightly larger than the last—he sat quietly. His mother entered, her black almond-shaped eyes gentlly landed on him.
She noticed the framed drawing in his hands.
"You're looking at her again," she said softly.
"Why don't you tell me about that girl?"
He placed the frame carefully on the table. It was a drawing of Alina.
"How many times have I told you?" he replied calmly. "She's just a girl who visits me in my dreams."
He guided her out.
His father sat at the dining table, youthful and handsome, flipping through a newspaper.
His mother kissed his forehead gently getting on her toes.
"Mama loves you."
She left towards the kitchen.
Azor touched his forehead.
"I'm not a child anymore."
His father snorted.
"You're stealing all my wife's affection."
"She loves me more than you," Azor replied calmly.