A name came to me like a revenant.
It was not the childish nickname I had learned in this body; it was older, sharper—an identity the memory had tucked away until a quiet moment peeled it free. Zeryth Malakar.
The syllables fit my mind like a glove. Zeryth Malakar No flourish, no needless mercy. A name that could be whispered in courts, recorded in books or spat in alleys. It tasted like iron and empty ledger pages.
I let it sit on my tongue and said it. Names mattered. Names were anchors for fate. That single recognition tightened something like a spine in me. I had a name. I had a history I could use.
Beyond the name, the world uncoiled itself in memory—sharp, concrete, useful.
Origin. The world called itself Origin. Not poetic; literal. The single known landmass in a fold of geometry the scholars called a continent. Only one continent had been discovered, and the maps ended at its ragged shores—white edges where charts became rumor. The few who had sailed beyond spoke of mist and silence; most believed the world had a single face to it. A single stage.
A single stage. Convenient.
And there was a door in that stage: Origin Academy.
Children were ordinary until twelve. At twelve they were judged, sorted, and offered a path. Origin Academy accepted those with promise—combatants, scholars, mages, technicians, and the kinds of people who would later become "heroes" in tales. It was where main characters were polished and side characters found roles. It was the crucible of destiny.
Twelve. Two years away for this body. Two years of being a child in a village that would not look twice. Two years for pawns, for instruments, for building scaffolds and traps. Two years during which my name—Zeryth Malakar—would be nothing but a private seed.
I smiled. The System's anchors still hummed; the penalty buffer's red numbers still glowed like a pulse on my sight. But a map had opened.
Origin Academy was the place the story bent around. If heroes were formed there, then heroes could be observed, tested, and—best of all—influenced. The Academy gathered the promising; their routes converged. A single stitch there could rearrange an entire tapestry.
Opportunity, therefore, was obvious.
I walked the village with my new identity lodged behind my teeth. Zeryth Malakar, forgotten child turned silent god. I ran my small fingers over the coin that whispered route-logs and the pin that erased trailing sentences. They were crude tools, but they would do for now.
People moved in routines. The butcher opened his stall at dawn; the magistrate's wife fretted about taxes; children played at the square, dreaming of distant feats they could not name. One by one, I began to slot pawns into the future I wanted.
If I could not enroll in Origin Academy at twelve by birthright, I would make Channels. I would manufacture merit. I could sew documents—an impossible task for a ten-year-old without allies, but not impossible for someone who held the whisper of System-drones and the ability to reforge them into suggestion-tools. A forged recommendation could travel on the back of rumor until it was accepted as truth. A single influential guard's favor could open gates. A single teacher's curiosity, fanned by gossip, could invite a village child to take an exam.
There were cleaner methods, of course. I could, in two years, shape myself into something to be noticed. I could carve out a minor reputation as "the clever boy who saved the village" and let the Academy's scouts misread grit for talent. But such a plan relied on what they measured—tests, feats, feats that responded to rules. The System watched rules. The System loved rules.
I preferred a lattice of denial and influence. Pawns were pliable and messy, and mess hid the true shape of the blade.
For the first step I chose the obvious: placement.
The blacksmith's apprentice—the broad-shouldered youth who admired strength and feared ridicule—would be nudged toward a regional contest next harvest. The gossiping old woman would be fed a tidbit about a talent-scout passing that way. The boy who followed me would be taught a line to say before the magistrate: "My friend has unusual perseverance; please judge him for the Academy trial."
Each whisper was a thread. Each thread could be enough to snag a distant official's attention.
The System noticed my maneuvers in its detached way.
[
Academy Node Proximity. The phrase was delicious. The System had metrics for everything, but proximity meant risk. The world's scripts feared concentrated potential near origin points. It would either tighten anchors or challenge me with distraction. That was the choice the System now faced.
I had plans for both outcomes.
If it tightened anchors, I would feed noise—small, repeated, human noises—until those anchors burned bandwidth and the System's penalties were diluted across many tiny events. If it did not tighten anchors, I would produce a single clear invitation that could be shaped into a forged path for me or for a proxy who would pave the way.
I preferred proxies. Proxies could be made into martyrs, into admitted prodigies, into scapegoats—whatever the long game required. A proxy could open the Academy door; the child could be guided, manipulated, then discarded or elevated as needed.
Two years was ample time to build a small legion of inconvenient coincidences.
That night I sat on the roof and stared at the single pale moon hanging above Origin. It felt small and unchallenging and perfectly arranged to be cut into sections.
Zeryth Malakar. The name fit. So did the plan.
I whispered it to myself, tasting its shape, and then I wrote the first line of the long con in my head.
Step One: Manufacture notice. Step Two: Place proxy into Academy. Step Three: Observe. Integrate. Corrupt when ready.
Simple, clinical, inevitable.
Below, in the sleeping village, my pawns dreamed of glory or coin or gossip. They would wake and move exactly as I had designed—because people are patterns and patterns can be nudged. The System would track their deviations and label them. The Administrator might frown, send more drones, tighten anchors near nodes of suspicion.
Let it.
I had a name now. I had a map. I had two years and instruments made of stolen code and gossip. The Academy would be the hinge of the story; the world would gather its bright things there.
I tapped my forehead lightly, feeling the hum of the reclaimed drone-seed within. It was small. It was mine.
Origin was a single stage, and Origin Academy was a single door. I would not simply wait for fate to hand me an invitation.
I would craft the invitation myself.
And when the heroes were shaped under those high roofs, I would begin to cut.