Chapter 2: Awakening in the Past
Lin Feng woke to sunlight streaming through a window that shouldn't exist.
His studio apartment didn't have windows on that side. In fact, his studio apartment barely had windows at all—just one small one that faced a brick wall three meters away. But this light was warm, golden, the kind that only came from an unobstructed eastern exposure in the early morning.
He sat up, and immediately everything felt wrong.
The bed was too small. His body felt too light. And when he looked down at his hands, they weren't his hands at all.
They were a child's hands. Small, smooth, unmarked by years of typing and the occasional paper cut. He turned them over, staring at palms that had never known calluses, fingers that looked like they belonged on a doll.
I'm dreaming, Lin Feng thought, his heart beginning to race. This is some kind of dying dream. My brain is flooding with chemicals and creating hallucinations as I bleed out in that alley.
That had to be it. He'd read about it before—how the dying brain sometimes created elaborate fantasies in its final moments, desperate escapes from the reality of death. Some people saw tunnels of light. Some saw their whole lives flash before their eyes.
Apparently, his brain had decided to regress him to childhood.
He swung his legs over the side of the bed—a bed he suddenly recognized with a jolt of impossible nostalgia. This was his childhood bed, the one with the blue rocket ship sheets that his mother had bought when he was seven. The sheets were still here, still the same, slightly faded from washing but unmistakably the same pattern.
His feet touched the floor, and the sensation was so vivid, so real, that doubt crept into his certainty. Dreams didn't feel like this. Even lucid dreams, the few he'd managed to have, never had this level of detail. He could feel every fiber of the carpet beneath his feet, could smell the faint scent of his mother's cooking wafting up from downstairs—something with eggs and scallions.
Lin Feng stood up, wobbled slightly—his center of gravity was all wrong, his body too small, too unfamiliar—and made his way to the mirror hanging on the back of his bedroom door.
The face that stared back at him was his own, but also not his own.
It was him at eight years old. Round cheeks that still held baby fat. Eyes that seemed too large for his face. Hair cut in the terrible bowl style his mother had insisted on because it was "easier to maintain." He'd hated this haircut, had begged her to let him grow it out, but she'd refused until he was ten.
He reached up and touched his face, watching the reflection do the same. The skin was smooth, no trace of the five o'clock shadow he'd been sporting in the alley. No lines around his eyes from years of staring at computer screens. No small scar on his chin from a cycling accident in college.
This was impossible.
"Lin Feng!" His mother's voice carried up the stairs, and hearing it sent a shockwave through his entire being. "Breakfast is ready! Don't make me come up there!"
His mother.
His mother, who in his original timeline—was that the right term? Original timeline?—would be fifty-six years old, graying, with permanent worry lines etched into her forehead from years of struggling to make ends meet as a single mother after his father died.
But if this was real, if he was really eight years old again, then his mother would be... twenty-eight. The same age he'd been when he died. And his father would still be alive.
Lin Feng's legs gave out, and he sat down hard on the floor, his small body shaking.
This isn't a dream. This can't be a dream.
"Lin Feng! Now!" His mother's voice had taken on that edge that meant she was about to come upstairs, and nobody wanted that.
He forced himself to stand, forced his child legs to carry him out of his room and down the stairs. Each step felt surreal, like walking through a memory made solid. The handrail was at the wrong height—or rather, the right height for an eight-year-old. The family photos on the wall showed him as a toddler, his parents young and smiling in a way he'd almost forgotten.
And there, at the bottom of the stairs, standing in the kitchen doorway with a spatula in her hand and an exasperated expression on her face, was his mother.
Young. Healthy. Alive.
Lin Feng felt something break inside his chest.
"There you are," she said, her voice carrying that particular tone of maternal exasperation that he'd taken for granted for so many years. "What were you doing up there? Staring at yourself in the mirror again? Come on, the eggs are getting cold."
He couldn't speak. His throat had closed up, and his eyes were burning in a way that had nothing to do with the morning light.
His mother's expression shifted immediately from exasperation to concern. "Lin Feng? Are you okay? Do you feel sick?"
She crossed the distance between them in three strides and pressed her hand against his forehead, checking for fever. Her hand was cool and soft, and smelled faintly of the hand cream she always used. A scent he'd forgotten. A sensation he'd lost.
"No fever," she murmured, but her brow was still furrowed. "Did you have a nightmare? You look like you've seen a ghost."
I died, he wanted to say. I died alone in an alley, betrayed and bleeding, and somehow I'm here, and you're here, and I don't understand what's happening.
Instead, what came out was: "I love you, Mom."
She blinked, clearly startled. They weren't that kind of family—affection was shown through actions, through packed lunches and help with homework, not through words. Saying "I love you" out loud was something that happened maybe twice a year, on birthdays and holidays.
But then her expression softened, and she ruffled his terrible bowl-cut hair. "I love you too, silly boy. Now come eat before your father gets home and eats everything. You know how he is after morning training."
Father. Right. His father.
Lin Feng followed her into the kitchen in a daze, his mind reeling. The kitchen was exactly as he remembered it from his childhood—smaller than it seemed in his memories, with the chipped tile that his father kept saying he'd replace and never did, the refrigerator covered in his childish drawings, the table with one leg that was slightly shorter than the others and wobbled if you leaned on it wrong.
His mother set a plate in front of him: scrambled eggs with scallions, a piece of toast with butter, and a glass of milk. The smell alone triggered a cascade of memories, each one hitting him like a physical blow. How many mornings had he eaten this exact meal? Hundreds? Thousands? And when was the last time he'd even thought about it?
He picked up his fork with a hand that trembled slightly and took a bite. The taste was exactly right, exactly as he remembered, and for a moment he could only sit there, overwhelmed by the simple fact of eating his mother's cooking again.
"Better?" his mother asked, watching him with that concerned look mothers had, the one that saw through everything.
Lin Feng nodded, not trusting his voice.
The sound of the front door opening made them both look up. Heavy footsteps in the entryway, the thud of military boots being removed, and then his father walked into the kitchen, still wearing his training uniform, sweat darkening the fabric across his chest and back.
Lin Feng's fork clattered onto his plate.
His father. Tall, broad-shouldered, with the kind of presence that made rooms feel smaller. In Lin Feng's original timeline, his father had died when he was twelve—a training accident, they'd said, though the details had always been vague. His mother had never really recovered from it, and neither had their family finances.
But here he was, alive and healthy, grinning as he grabbed Lin Feng's mother around the waist and planted a kiss on her cheek despite her protests about his sweaty state.
"Morning, buddy," his father said, reaching over to ruffle Lin Feng's hair the same way his mother had. "You're up early. Usually I have to drag you out of bed for school."
School. Right. He was eight years old. He'd be in... third grade? Second grade? The details were fuzzy. His childhood felt like it had happened to a completely different person.
"He's acting strange," his mother said, though her tone was affectionate rather than worried now. "Told me he loved me completely out of the blue. Maybe he's coming down with something."
"Nah," his father said, dropping into a chair and immediately reaching for the food. "He's just growing up. Boys get emotional sometimes. I remember when I was his age, I once cried because I thought our dog was lonely."
"We didn't have a dog," his mother pointed out.
"Exactly. That's how emotional I was."
They laughed, and Lin Feng watched them with a feeling in his chest that was too big for words. This moment. This simple, ordinary moment of his parents teasing each other over breakfast. In his original life, he'd probably been at this table, probably barely paying attention, focused on whatever kids focused on at eight years old.
Now, knowing what he knew, having lost what he'd lost, this moment felt impossibly precious.
"You feeling okay, Lin Feng?" his father asked, his expression turning more serious. "You're being awfully quiet."
"I'm fine," Lin Feng managed to say, and was startled by how high and thin his voice sounded. A child's voice. His voice, but also not his. "Just... thinking."
"Dangerous activity, thinking," his father said with a grin. "But I guess that's what makes you smart. Your teacher says you're top of your class in math."
That was news to Lin Feng—or rather, it was old news that he'd completely forgotten. Had he been good at math as a child? He must have been, though by high school he'd been decidedly average, and college had been a struggle until he'd found his niche in programming.
His mother stood up and turned on the small television on the kitchen counter, a habit she had of watching the morning news while they finished breakfast. The screen flickered to life, showing a news anchor with perfect hair and a too-bright smile.
"—in other news, the Portal Defense Force announced yesterday that the newest recruitment drive has exceeded expectations, with over fifty thousand applicants for the Mecha Pilot training program—"
Lin Feng's attention snapped to the television so fast he nearly gave himself whiplash.
Portal Defense Force. Mecha Pilot.
What?
The screen switched to footage of something that made Lin Feng's breath catch in his throat. A massive humanoid machine, easily fifteen meters tall, painted in military gray and bristling with weapons. It moved with fluid grace that shouldn't have been possible for something so large, raising one arm in a salute as the camera panned past.
"—the new Tier 8 units have shown remarkable improvement in Land of Origin operations," the anchor continued. "General Zhang Weimin stated that humanity's territory has expanded by two percent this quarter, pushing back the Zarn Empire's—"
"Dad," Lin Feng said, his voice coming out strangled. "What is that?"
His father looked at him strangely. "What, the mecha? You know what a mecha is, Lin Feng. You play with your toy mechas every day."
"Humor me," Lin Feng said, his heart pounding. "Explain it."
His mother frowned. "Are you sure you're feeling alright? Did you hit your head or something?"
"Please."
Something in his tone must have convinced them, because his father's expression grew more serious. He leaned back in his chair, studying Lin Feng with the kind of intense focus that he usually reserved for his military work.
"Mechas are soul-bound combat machines," his father said slowly, as if explaining to a much younger child. "Every human has one in their soul space. They mature and manifest when you turn eighteen. The stronger your potential, the more powerful your mecha becomes. Pilots with awakened mechas defend humanity's territory in the Land of Origin against the other races competing for resources."
Each word hit Lin Feng like a hammer blow.
Soul-bound machines. Land of Origin. Other races.
This wasn't his world.
Or rather, it was his world, but it was different. Fundamentally, impossibly different.
"The Land of Origin," Lin Feng said carefully, testing the words. "That's... the place beyond the portals?"
His father's frown deepened. "Lin Feng, did you hit your head in school yesterday? Should we take you to a doctor?"
"I'm fine," Lin Feng said quickly. "I just... I had a really weird dream. Everything feels a little mixed up."
That seemed to satisfy them, though his mother still looked concerned. She turned back to the television, which had moved on to other news—something about a territorial dispute between two corporations over mining rights in some zone of the Land of Origin.
Lin Feng sat there, his breakfast forgotten, his mind racing.
This wasn't a dream. This was real. Somehow, impossibly, he'd been given a second chance. But not just a second chance—he'd been sent back to a world that wasn't quite the same as the one he'd left.
A world with mechas. With something called the Land of Origin. With other races and portals and soul-bound machines that manifested at eighteen.
He was eight years old now. That meant he had ten years before his mecha would awaken.
Ten years to prepare.
Ten years to figure out what the hell was going on and how to use it to his advantage.
The voice from the void between death and life echoed in his memory: Use it wisely.
Lin Feng looked at his small, child's hands, still holding a fork over a plate of eggs.
In his previous life, he'd been a programmer. His power had been in code, in systems, in seeing patterns and creating algorithms that solved problems.
If this world had mechas, if it had soul space and awakening ceremonies and combat machines that defended humanity...
What could a programmer do with that kind of system?
A slow smile spread across Lin Feng's face, the first real expression since he'd woken up.
He had ten years to find out.
"Lin Feng, you're smiling like a crazy person," his mother said, breaking him out of his thoughts. "Are you sure you're okay?"
"I'm perfect, Mom," Lin Feng said, and for the first time since dying in that alley, he meant it. "I'm absolutely perfect."
His father exchanged a glance with his mother, the kind of look parents shared when they thought their child was being weird but not dangerously so.
"Well, finish your breakfast then," his mother said. "School starts in an hour, and you still need to brush your teeth and get dressed."
School. Right. He was eight years old. He had to go to elementary school.
The thought should have been depressing—the idea of sitting through classes designed for children when he had the mind of a twenty-eight-year-old man. But instead, Lin Feng felt a surge of excitement.
He'd spent his first life wasting his potential, dying for nothing in an alley.
This time would be different.
This time, he had knowledge. He had experience. He had a programmer's mind in a world that apparently had soul-bound machines.
This time, he would be ready.