VIREL LUDIN'S POV:
It's been five years since I first opened my eyes in this world five years since I realized I had been reborn into the body of a boy named Virel Ludin.
The life of a child wasn't so bad at first. No hunger, no war, no screams echoing through the battlefield. Just laughter, the smell of stew, and my mother's warm embrace. But peace has a way of feeling… hollow when you've already lived once before.
Every day since, I've been trying to gather mana. Not because anyone told me to because I had to. Because I refused to live another life being powerless.
In my past life, I couldn't use Qi. Now, in this world, it was mana that mocked me.
Fate really does have a cruel sense of humor.
---
I started small, sitting cross-legged in the quiet of the study room. Dust motes drifted in the afternoon sunlight, and I could almost pretend they were tiny mana particles floating inside me. The first few months were spent just feeling them those thin, nearly invisible threads of energy that hid beneath my skin like whispers.
Slowly, carefully, I began to guide them. Each attempt was like trying to herd smoke with my bare hands. The particles slipped through, scattered, and faded the moment I lost focus. It was maddening.
But I didn't stop. I couldn't.
Books said that mana would naturally gather around the solar plexus over time, forming a core once a child reached adolescence. That was a decade too long. I had already wasted one lifetime waiting for power to come to me. This time, I'd force it into existence.
---
Day after day, I repeated the ritual.
Breathe in. Feel. Gather. Compress.
Sometimes, my parents would peek in.
My father would grin, toss me into the air like a sack of potatoes, and say, "You'll grow strong, boy! Ludins don't stay small forever!"
He'd use mana to strengthen his arms, and the next thing I knew, I'd be staring at the ceiling mid-flight, questioning my life choices.
And my mother… she was gentle but intense. Always watching, always hovering.
Sometimes I'd catch her looking at me like she was trying to memorize my face. Other times, I'd swear she was just waiting for an excuse to pinch my cheeks again.
Between her affection and my father's overzealous training ideas, I learned to stay quiet, to act my age, and keep my practice hidden.
---
The process of condensing mana wasn't easy.
In theory, it was simple draw the scattered mana inside the body toward the solar plexus and compress it until it forms a crystalline core. In practice, it was like trying to force the wrong sides of a magnet together. The more I pushed, the harder it resisted.
Still, after five years of work, I finally felt it movement.
The mana inside me wasn't slipping away anymore. It was flowing, trembling, pulling toward my center.
My heart pounded. For the first time, I could see faint blue light tracing along my veins, gathering in my chest. My body felt warm, alive like lightning was humming through my blood.
"This is it," I whispered. "Just a little more."
I pushed harder.
And then
BOOM!
Pain.
Raw, blinding pain exploded through my body, as if my insides had been torn apart.
I collapsed, my vision flashing white. My chest convulsed, and it felt like someone had shoved a burning iron into my lungs. The mana I'd gathered didn't form a core it rejected me. Every thread of energy I'd pulled together shattered, reversing course with terrifying speed.
The phenomenon called 'Mana Recoil'
It felt like the universe itself was pushing back, screaming you don't belong here.
My veins burned. My skin cracked with light. I could hear a high-pitched ringing that didn't exist anywhere but inside my skull. For a second, I thought I saw something shadows twisting behind my eyelids, fragments of my old self reaching out through the void.
I remembered that final moment of my past life the cold steel, the blinding pain, the voice that whispered, it's over.
And yet here I was, dying again, clutching my chest on the study floor, surrounded by the scent of burnt air and ozone.
"Vir!?"
My mother's voice shattered the haze.
She burst through the door, panic twisting her face.
Her hands glowed with soft green light as she knelt beside me, pressing against my chest. The warmth of her healing magic washed over the pain, but the damage ran deeper than flesh.
My core or what little I had was cracked. I could feel it, like a shattered mirror deep inside me.
"Stay with me, my love, please stay with me," she whispered over and over.
I wanted to answer her, to tell her not to worry, that I'd been through worse… but my lips wouldn't move.
---
When I woke, it was dark. My head rested against something soft, and I could hear quiet sobs nearby. My father's voice rumbled through the silence.
"I told him not to push himself," he muttered. "He's too young."
"He's not supposed to have a core," my mother said bitterly. "The doctor was right… forcing it could've killed him."
So, I'd failed. Again.
I closed my eyes and laughed silently to myself. I had spent years trying to escape weakness, and in the end, I had only proven how powerless I truly was.
Maybe that's what I deserved for trying to defy fate with nothing but stubborn will.
---
Days passed before I could sit up again. Every movement made my chest ache. My mother never left my side, and my father… well, he pretended not to cry when he thought I was asleep.
When I finally managed to speak, my voice came out hoarse.
"Mom… am I broken?"
Her hands trembled, but she forced a smile. "No, sweetheart. You're just… special."
I wanted to believe her, but deep down, I knew better.
Still, I wasn't done.
Broken or not, I was alive.
And as long as I could move this body, I would keep fighting whether through mana or through steel.
Maybe I was born without a core. Maybe I was cursed.
But a sword doesn't need magic to kill.
---
That night, when everyone was asleep, I sat up and stared out the window. The moonlight spilled across the wooden floor, silver and cold. My body still ached, and I could feel faint cracks of mana flickering in my chest unstable, fragile, like a scar that never healed.
But I smiled anyway.
If the world refused to give me power, then I'd carve my own path with my hands.
If mana rejected me, I'd learn to wield the rejection itself.
I wasn't the kind of man who stopped after dying once and I wasn't about to stop now.
This was only the beginning.