The academy courtyard buzzed with chatter. Word spread fast—the powerless prince had outsmarted Professor Valen in strategy class. No one believed it at first… until they saw the look on the professor's face.
"Was that a fluke?""He must have memorized it…""Still, that was impressive…"
Kael walked through it all, silent, his eyes low—not from shame, but from thought.
"That wasn't just an answer. That was… instinct.""I saw the entire formation like it was nothing."
Inside him, something stirred. Like a door slightly ajar—memories that weren't his… but somehow were.
🏰 Royal Garden – That Evening
Kael sat beneath the starblossom tree, his mother's favorite spot.
"Kael."
He looked up to see a girl with fiery red hair tied in a warrior's braid, wearing academy armor.
"Lyria…" he said quietly.
She dropped to the grass beside him, throwing a plum at his chest.
"You made a scene today, genius. Proud of you."
Kael smirked, catching it with ease. "Didn't expect you to say that."
"I don't lie," she said. "I just didn't think you'd finally wake up."
They laughed—a rare sound from Kael. She was one of his only two real friends.
Then came the second.
"If Lyria's handing out compliments, the world must be ending," said a melodic voice.
A girl with long silver hair and bright emerald eyes approached, holding a floating orb of water—Elira, the healer, his other friend.
"Still no magic aura… yet you're suddenly outmaneuvering professors?" she asked playfully. "Kael, you hiding something?"
Kael looked at the sky.
"What if… I used to be someone else? Someone powerful. Someone… hated."
The girls froze.
"You mean like reincarnation?" Elira whispered.
"You've been reading too many fantasy scrolls," Lyria said, though her eyes narrowed.
Kael didn't respond. He didn't need to. The faint glow in his eyes—just for a second—told them enough.
👁️ Elsewhere… in the Void Between Realms
A throne of obsidian cracked open. A shadow shifted.
"He's awakening…" came a voice like grinding stone.
Another figure stepped from swirling black flames.
"Zareth… the traitor god…""After all this time… reborn as a mortal?"
A third voice, this one sultry and cruel.
"Let him regain his memories. It'll be so much more fun to rip them away again…"
The gods who once hunted him had begun to stir.
🏫 Back in the Academy – Two Days Later
Kael stood in sword class. He was slow, average at best, but… he didn't care. He was learning. Watching.
Suddenly—BOOM!
A duel exploded across the courtyard. The younger Second Prince, barely a toddler, had accidentally triggered a mana burst.
Students panicked. Wind surged. Magic flared wildly.
Everyone ran—except Kael.
He grabbed a fallen shield, charged toward the explosion, and in one perfectly timed throw—redirected the burst into the training dummy wall.
Silence. Then—
"Did he just… save the prince?""He has no power. How did he calculate the mana flow?""That's not instinct. That's… genius."
His stepmother rushed in, swept her son away without looking at Kael.
His father, watching from above, said nothing.
But far behind them, Kael's mother smiled faintly.
And a whisper brushed his mind again.
"Zareth… the name they forgot.It's time they remember."