Today's sky was just like yesterday's, dull, heavy, and cold.
People hurried by, their faces never turning.
Perhaps they were afraid that if they looked at me too long, the color of my eyes would infect them, turning dark red like embers on the verge of dying out.
I stared at my reflection in the school window.
A pale face, tangled black hair, a uniform that had lost its color.
I... didn't even know why I still came to this place.
No one was waiting for me at home, and no one was waiting for me here.
Maybe it was just a bodily habit, not a desire of the heart.
"Look, the demon eyes is coming again."
"Are you sure he's even human?"
The laughter pierced my ears, but it didn't hurt anymore.
I'd lost the ability to feel pain, at least the kind that came from the outside.
All that was left was emptiness, cold, and the sound of my footsteps echoing alone in the long corridor.
I used to think life would change if I was patient enough, good enough, strong enough.
But the world doesn't know the word "enough."
It only knows who's on top and who's being trampled on.
I lowered my head, passing them like a shadow.
Sometimes I thought, maybe I wasn't supposed to be here.
Maybe the red in my eyes wasn't a curse... but a sign that I came from another place.
——
That afternoon, the sky looked like it was about to collapse.
A drizzle fell, tracing the dull streets that were so familiar to me.
I walked home aimlessly, crossing a small alley where motorcycle gangs often gathered.
I knew I should avoid it, but fate had a strange habit of always pulling me in the wrong direction.
"Hey, that kid ran this way, right?"
"Catch him, don't let him escape!"
I saw her.
A little girl running in fear, her clothes torn, her tears mixed with mud.
And behind her, four men with the eyes of hungry wolves.
I didn't think twice.
My body moved before my mind had a chance to refuse.
"Hey!" I shouted, my voice cracking in the rumble of the rain.
"Let her go!"
They turned, and in an instant, I knew I was going to die today.
But for some reason, there was no fear in my chest.
Maybe because I'd been dead for a long time already.
A punch hit my face, then a kick, then something sharp pierced the side of my body.
The sound of rain mixed with the girl's faint cries.
I didn't know who was hugging whom, but I smiled faintly before everything vanished into darkness.
...silence.
But not the usual silence.
I felt light, as if my body had crumbled but my soul was floating.
In that darkness, there were two lights spinning: one white, shimmering softly, one black, pulsing like a living heart.
Both collided, spinning around me, then piercing my chest at once.
"You will bear the two sides of the world, O torn soul."
"Reborn not as a redeemer, but as a determiner."
I wanted to ask who they were, what it meant, but the voice had already vanished.
All that was left was a blinding light and a strange warmth on my skin.
Like... I was breathing again.
The first air I inhaled felt foreign.
There was a scent of earth, forest, and wildflowers.
The sky above seemed too blue to be Earth.
Someone spoke in a soft voice, like a song.
"Aresh... Falkenvar. That's a beautiful name, isn't it?"
I didn't know who the woman was.
I was just a baby in her arms.
But when my eyes opened and the world first saw me...
Everyone there stared in horror.
Red eyes.
Just like in my previous life.
But this time... I felt that something inside them was ignited.
Not a curse, but something waiting to awaken.
"Two souls in one vessel. Light and shadow."
I was reborn.
As Aresh Falkenvar, the red-eyed child from another world.