CHAPTER 1 – THE TWIN WHO NEVER WAS
The smell of iron and perfume hit him first.
He was walking out of the mall, phone in hand, music still humming through his earbuds, when a scream cracked the air like shattering glass.
A man in a torn hoodie held a knife to a woman's chest near the escalator. Everything around them froze the crowd, the music, the world.
He didn't think.
He just moved.
"Hey!" he shouted, sprinting.
The man turned, eyes wide. The blade flashed once.
Pain bloomed like fire across his ribs.
He slammed into the robber anyway, driving him backward until both crashed through the railing. The last thing he saw was the woman's terrified face as security rushed in.
Then—nothing.
Darkness.
---
A voice floated in the void, calm and amused.
> "You died faster than most of your kind."
He opened his eyes. There was no sky, only a swirl of endless stars. His body was weightless.
"Where… am I?"
> "Between. Call me what your stories call me ROB, Random Omnipotent Being. You humans have an interesting imagination."
He blinked. "So I'm dead."
> "Correct. But you did something… irritatingly noble. I find that entertaining. I can send you somewhere else if you're willing to play my game."
A glowing panel appeared before him: three spinning roulettes of light, each filled with shifting symbols and words.
> "Three gifts. Each spin decides one.
But since you sacrificed yourself to save another, I'll let you choose how to shape them."
The first wheel shimmered into a mirror-like screen. His reflection stared back—ordinary, messy hair, tired eyes. The mirror rippled, waiting.
He smirked. "If this is a second chance, I'll take it properly."
He touched the surface, molding the image: snow-white hair falling to his shoulders, violet eyes that gleamed like amethysts, the height of a giant, the sculpted body of a warrior. He looked like something drawn from legend Gojo's sharp calm with the strength of Toji's rage.
> "First gift: Customizable Form. Locked."
The second roulette spun violently, symbols flashing swords, spears, bows, hammers until it froze.
> "Second gift: Mastery of All Weapons, to the limit of your new physique."
The third wheel hummed, darker this time, and when it stopped, black scales of light wrapped around him like liquid armor, forming a shape both ancient and futuristic.
> "Third gift: Adaptive Nanotech Armor, designed from your imagination. You seem fond of something called 'Daemon Blackfyre.' Fitting."
He gazed at the armor black as night, trimmed with silver veins that pulsed faintly like dragonfire. It moved when he breathed, alive.
"Why give me this?"
> "Because your world was boring. The next one is not.
You will wake in a land where dragons once ruled, where fire and blood decide kingship.
Live, conquer, or die again—it amuses me either way."
He frowned. "A land with dragons… you mean"
> "Westeros. Essos. Names you've read in fiction. For them, it's history. For you, destiny."
The stars trembled. Heat washed over him like a tidal wave.
> "One more thing," the voice said.
"You were not created there. You were stolen. A twin whose birth was cut from time itself. The weirwood seer traded his soul to bring you across. Remember that debt."
His vision fractured into flame and ash.
He felt weight again—stone beneath his palms, sulfur in the air, a heartbeat thundering in his ears.
When he opened his eyes, a crimson sky burned above a shattered city.
Mountains spewed smoke in the distance; rivers of molten rock carved through black ruins.
Valyria.
> Welcome, Aenar Targaryen, the voice whispered.
Your sister's dragons have stirred the world. It's time for yours.
He stood, the black armor clinging to him like a second skin, violet eyes gleaming against the inferno.
Somewhere far across the sea, a young woman would soon meet a horse-lord named Drogo.
And on this cursed continent, her twin took his first breath as the wind howled through Valyria's bones.