Aiden Wang died without screaming.
The collapse happened in less than a second.
One moment, he was standing at the edge of the dungeon rift, earth-element mana roaring overhead as the frontline collapsed. The next, the ceiling shattered. A wave of corrupted stone crushed downward, devouring spells, steel, and screams alike.
Aiden saw it coming.
That was the cruel part.
He had already calculated the angle of collapse. Already realized the rear support had been sabotaged. Already understood that the people behind him—his party—had stepped back half a beat too early.
They weren't unlucky.
They were prepared.
The last thing Aiden saw wasn't the falling stone.
It was their backs.
Then pain erased itself, and the world went black.
Aiden woke up breathing too fast.
Air tore into his lungs like he'd been drowning. His body jerked upright, hands clutching at his chest, fingers digging into skin that was—warm.
Alive.
He froze.
The room around him was small. Familiar. Cheap wooden desk. Old laptop humming softly. Sunlight leaking through thin curtains. The faint smell of instant noodles and dust.
His room.
Not the reinforced shelter. Not the medical wing. Not the body bag he should have been in.
Aiden's breathing slowed.
He looked down at his hands.
Unscarred. No burn marks. No fractures. No mana backlash trembling under the skin.
Young.
Too young.
Slowly, deliberately, he reached over and grabbed his phone from the desk. The screen lit up.
August 3rd.
The year hit him harder than the collapse ever could.
"…So it worked," he murmured.
His voice didn't shake.
Seventeen years old.
Three months before Universe Awakening Day.
For several seconds, Aiden simply sat there, letting the truth settle. No joy. No disbelief. No hysterics.
Just confirmation.
The future rewound cleanly.
He leaned back against the bed and closed his eyes.
Memories lined themselves up neatly, like files he'd already sorted once before.
Awakening Day.The sky fracturing like glass.The selection of universes.Classes, talents, rankings.The rise of the great families.The fall of everyone else.
And then the long grind of survival.
Aiden had never been a prodigy.
He hadn't awakened a legendary combat class. He hadn't been born into money or protection. His universe—Minecraft, of all things—had been publicly ranked trash-tier.
Fodder.
A joke.
He survived anyway.
Slowly. Quietly. Methodically.
Until survival wasn't enough.
Until people started watching him.
Until they decided he was useful.
And then disposable.
Aiden opened his eyes, gaze sharp despite the young body housing it.
"So the betrayers are still alive," he said softly.
He remembered their names. Their habits. Their tells.
He remembered the exact smile one of them wore as the dungeon gate destabilized. The way another hesitated just long enough to step out of range.
They had called it an accident.
The world had agreed.
This time, Aiden wouldn't.
He stood and walked to the mirror mounted on the closet door.
A thin teenager stared back at him. Black hair falling messily into his eyes. No aura. No mana pressure. No hint of what he would become.
Perfect.
Aiden met his own reflection calmly.
"I don't need revenge yet," he said.
Revenge was loud.
Revenge drew attention.
This time, he would build something that couldn't be taken from him.
Something the world wouldn't understand until it was already too late.
He glanced at the calendar app again.
72 days until Awakening Day.
Enough time.
In his previous life, he'd wasted these months chasing normalcy. Trying to prepare like everyone else. Training his body. Reading guides written by people who didn't actually understand the system.
This time, he knew better.
Preparation wasn't about strength.
It was about position.
Aiden sat back down at his desk and opened his laptop. News articles filled the screen—analysts speculating about Awakening rankings, families announcing sponsorship programs, forums arguing about which universes would dominate the next era.
Magic-heavy worlds. Mythological realms. High-tier fantasy systems.
Minecraft was already being mocked in prediction threads.
"Block game universe? Free resources but no scaling.""Respawn mechanics are capped. Trash.""Anyone who picks it is throwing their future away."
Aiden scrolled past without reacting.
They weren't wrong.
They just didn't understand foundations.
In his previous life, he hadn't either. Not at first.
He closed the laptop and lay back on the bed, hands folded behind his head.
The ceiling fan spun slowly above him.
"I died knowing the future," Aiden whispered."So this time… I'll use it properly."
Outside, the world moved on, blissfully unaware.
Students worried about exams. Corporations prepared contracts. Families prayed for good awakenings.
No one noticed the boy in a small apartment who had already seen the end.
And no one—no one—suspected that the universe they would soon laugh at was the one that would eventually terrify them.
Aiden closed his eyes.
Awakening Day was coming.
And this time, he would be ready.