Kael Dravon knew this was the end.
He managed a few more steps before his leg buckled beneath him. He hit the ground hard, one knee striking the rain-soaked cobblestones.
His body was growing colder by the second. The darkness creeping in from the edges of his vision refused to disappear.
At least the rain was doing him a favor.
It washed the blood from his hands quickly enough for him to distinguish which wounds were still bleeding. Three cuts on his left arm, two of them deep. A bullet wound in his side. That was the worst of them. The bullet was still lodged somewhere near his third rib, and he had long since stopped wondering whether it could be removed.
It didn't matter anymore.
Kael dragged himself against the warehouse wall and listened.
Footsteps.
Radios.
The unmistakable rhythm of an organized sweep. These weren't amateurs. They were professionals, moving in coordinated groups, closing every possible escape route.
He counted the intervals between radio transmissions.
Twenty-two men still moving. Possibly more waiting at the perimeter.
One hundred and fourteen.
That was how many assassins they had sent after him.
Thirty had fallen to his pistol before his leg gave out on the Sallow Street fire escape. Another thirty-three had been butchered by the heavy axe he'd taken from a triad enforcer. And twenty-nine...
Twenty-nine had been taken by Marcus.
Marcus.
The name sat in his chest like a second bullet, hotter and more poisonous than the lead buried in his ribs.
Marcus Voss.
His right hand. His oldest soldier. The man who had stood beside him through every war, every betrayal, every bloody step toward the throne of Jade City.
Only minutes ago, Kael had watched him fall.
He remembered the spray of red as two assassins closed in on Marcus. Kael had raised his pistol with trembling hands, unleashing a furious roar as he put a bullet through each man's head.
But in the chaos, a third shooter had found his mark.
The impact had slammed Kael against the warehouse wall.
"FUCK!"
He remembered spitting the word as the world tilted around him.
Now, the remaining nineteen were closing in.
He still had the combat knife tucked into his boot. His right arm was barely functional, but it was enough to hold a blade.
He could still make them pay.
He could make every last one of them regret coming here.
But...
His legs had already made the decision for him.
They weren't responding.
The blood was leaving his body faster than he could comprehend. The cold was spreading, creeping through his fingers, his chest, his throat.
And somewhere in the back of his mind, a thought surfaced.
It was a part of himself he had spent nine years learning to ignore.
A thought he had never allowed himself to entertain.
You could have been more than this.
Not more powerful.
Just... more.
He had built an empire in less than a decade. Climbed the criminal hierarchy from nothing and consolidated Jade City under a single name. He had become one of the youngest men in history to command such power.
His rivals hated him for it.
Some feared him.
Most simply waited for the day he would make a mistake.
But what he hated most, what was eating away at him now as the rain hammered the cobblestones and his body slowly shut down, was that he hadn't seen this coming.
Nobody outside his inner circle knew he was coming to this location tonight.
Nobody.
Which meant the information had come from within.
Someone in his own organization had sold him out. Someone had given away his location, his movements, and his plans.
Someone close.
Someone he trusted.
He wanted to know who.
He wanted to find the bastard responsible and tear him apart with his own hands.
But he wouldn't get that chance.
Kael had no strength left.
He let his head rest against the cold stone wall, allowing the rain to fall directly onto his face.
For the first time in nine years, he didn't try to plan his way out of a situation.
There was a saying that everything flashed before your eyes in the final moments of your life.
He had always dismissed it as something weak people told themselves to make death easier.
Turns out, it was true.
It wasn't dramatic.
There was no music. No slow motion. No grand revelation.
Just images.
The Shatter Ward at fourteen.
The first time he'd held real money in his hands.
The first time someone had looked at him with genuine fear instead of pity.
The wars. The victories. The betrayals.
The faces of people he hadn't thought about in years.
All of it passed before him as though he were watching someone else's life.
Funny.
He had spent nine years building an empire, yet here he was, dying alone in a gutter.
No throne.
No army.
No one left to protect him.
Kael Dravon closed his eyes.
And the Red Devil of Jade City drew his final breath.
March 11th, 2024.
Kael Dravon, the Red Devil of Jade City, died a pathetic death in the gutter of the Rotgut District.
The peace of the void was shockingly brief.
"His fingers are moving! Someone, get the doctor!"
The voice was shrill, female, and entirely too loud.
Kael's eyes snapped open.
Light.
Aggressive, blinding light.
He tried to move his head, but even that felt strangely exhausting.
Ceiling.
Cracked, yellowing paint.
A fluorescent light fixture flickering incessantly above him.
Where the hell was he?
The smell hit him next. Antiseptic, wilting flowers, and the heavy, starchy scent of industrial cafeteria food.
A hospital?
He tried to sit up.
His body responded immediately.
Too immediately.
There was no agonizing scream from his ribs. No resistance from his muscles. No sharp pain from the bullet wound in his side.
His breathing was steady.
His chest was intact.
Something was wrong.
Kael slowly looked down at his hands.
Both arms were there.
He stared at his left forearm for several seconds, waiting for the familiar scars.
Nothing.
No scars from the Copper Gate war. No black ink from the Shatter Ward tattoo he'd gotten at sixteen to mark his first kill.
His skin was smooth.
Pale.
Young.
These were the hands of someone who had never held a weapon, let alone ruled a city.
Panic, a sensation he hadn't experienced in nearly a decade, began creeping into his chest.
He threw his legs over the edge of the bed.
The floor came up faster than expected. His legs were shorter. His body felt lighter. Even his sense of balance was unfamiliar.
"Please, you shouldn't be walking! You just woke up from a ten-day coma!"
A nurse rushed toward him, clutching a clipboard.
Kael ignored her.
He didn't hear her warnings. Didn't care about the hand reaching for his shoulder.
His attention was fixed on the small, grime-streaked mirror bolted above the sink.
He stumbled toward it.
And stopped.
The reflection staring back at him wasn't Kael Dravon.
The hair was flat, dull black instead of his trademark crimson. The eyes were dark and wide, set beneath unfamiliar eyebrows. His face was lean, with sharp cheekbones and a jaw that hadn't fully matured.
He looked eighteen.
Perhaps younger.
A boy.
A complete stranger.
Kael stared at the reflection.
He raised his right hand.
The boy did the same.
He touched his cheek.
The reflection followed.
For a long moment, he simply stood there, trying to make sense of what he was seeing.
Then his eyes dropped to the medical bracelet around the stranger's wrist.
Patient: Ren Ashvale
Date: March 11th, 2026
His fingers went completely still.
He read the date again.
And again.
Two years.
Two entire years had passed since he had died.
How?
Why?
And whose body was this?
Questions flooded his mind, but no answers came.
Behind him, the nurse was still shouting for the doctor. He could hear hurried footsteps approaching from the corridor.
Kael barely noticed.
He looked at the unfamiliar face in the mirror once more.
The Red Devil of Jade City was dead.
But somehow, impossibly, he was standing here.
Alive.
In the body of an eighteen-year-old boy named Ren Ashvale.
And he had absolutely no idea how it had happened.
March 11th, 2026.
Two years after his death, Kael Dravon had returned to life.
This time, as a high schooler.