The battlefield was on fire.
Not metaphorically. Literally.
The sky was a scorched black canvas, torn open by arrows like shooting stars—except these stars had iron heads and lethal intent. Smoke coiled up in thick ribbons, mixing with the cries of dying men and the clash of steel. The stench of burning flesh and churned earth drowned the air.
And in the middle of it all, Cael Ardyn bled.
He was kneeling in the mud, one leg bent under him, the other trembling as he kept himself between the sword and the boy behind him.
A glimmer of silver arced toward him. He raised his arm too late.
The blade sliced deep.
Blood sprayed across his chest like paint on a ruined tapestry.
His grip loosened on the hilt of his own sword. It dropped, clanging dully onto the blood-soaked ground.
But Cael didn't fall.
He refused to fall.
He stayed upright with the last of his strength, body trembling, his entire being screaming in pain—but his eyes didn't waver from the boy behind him.
A boy who had no idea how many times this had happened before.
A boy named Leon.
The Hero.
And Cael...?
"So this is how it ends… again."
"I die, he lives. That's my story. That's all I was ever meant to be."
His vision blurred, darkening at the edges, and his knees finally gave in. He collapsed, half-turning, enough to catch one last look at Leon's shocked face—young, wide-eyed, unready for the destiny waiting for him.
He wanted to reach out. To say something. To scream.
But his mouth filled with blood before he could speak.
So instead, he smiled.
Even now.
Even after all this time.
Even after—
FLASH: A MOUNTAIN
Cold wind howled through the peaks. Snow whipped at his face.
A younger Cael, in a different life, in different armor, stood between a monster and a man holding a shattered sword.
"Run, Leon!" he had shouted, coughing blood.
A beast's fang tore into his side, lifting him off the ground like a rag doll.
"Again…"
FLASH: A SHIP
The deck was broken.
Waves slammed into a burning ship set ablaze by sea serpents.
Another Cael, clothes drenched and burnt, dragged Leon's unconscious body to a life raft, tying him down with frayed rope.
"Just live, damn it."
A mast cracked.
It fell.
Cael was buried beneath.
"Again…"
FLASH: A COLLAPSING TOWER
Stone thundered down from above. The world shuddered.
This Cael shoved Leon forward into a portal of golden light.
"You're the chosen one."
The ceiling caved in.
Darkness swallowed him whole.
"Again…"
No name. No songs. No legacy.
Just a shadow behind the light.
The corpse beneath the hero's feet.
That's who I am… who I've always been…
Back in the present, the world was fading.
The sky—once filled with fire, arrows, and screams—was now only a smear of grey and ash.
Cael's body, broken and bleeding, was cradled in Leon's arms. His blood painted Leon's white armor crimson. His vision flickered like a candle in the wind.
He could still hear Leon's voice, but it was distant now… like an echo underwater.
"Cael—Cael!! STAY WITH ME!! Please, gods—just stay!!"
His name had never sounded so full of pain.
He wanted to answer.
Wanted to say, "I'm okay."
But his heartbeat was slowing.
Everything was growing so... light.
His blood seeped into the battlefield, swallowed by the mud as if it had never existed.
And then—just before the dark took him—his lips moved.
They didn't know what they were trying to say. Neither did he.
Maybe it was "sorry."
Maybe it was "thank you."
Or maybe… just maybe… it was:
"Again."
"Am I cursed?"
His thoughts drifted like leaves in the wind.
Somehow, he was still thinking, even as the world left him behind.
"Why do I always die first?"
"Why am I always the loyal side character?"
"Why do I remember it all?"
There were no answers. Only memories.
Thirty lives. Thirty deaths. Always for Leon.
Mountains. Towers. Storms. Blades. Fire. Poison. Time itself.
No matter the age, no matter the world—
He always died.
"I'm not the hero."
"I'm not the chosen one."
"I'm just the pawn."
A piece on a board, sacrificed in the opening move so the king could advance.
And yet...
"Why did it still hurt this much?"
In the fading light of the battlefield, Leon wept.
He held Cael like something fragile, like something precious for the first time.
His shoulders shook.
"Y-You saved me again, Cael…" Leon whispered, tears cutting trails through ash on his face. "I swear… your name will be remembered."
Cael wanted to believe him.
He really did.
But his smile was bitter, trembling on cracked lips.
"No one ever remembers the pawn."
"They only cheer for the king who survived."
His breath hitched once—then stopped.
And then—
Silence.
No pain. No weight. No battlefield.
Just a void.
A world made of nothing.
He floated there. Alone.
Not dead.
Not alive.
Just… adrift.
And then—time broke.
A strange stillness spread like frost.
The darkness twisted.
The void shivered.
And a voice—not a sound, but a presence—spoke.
Low.
Ancient.
Unnatural.
"Do you wish to change your fate?"
Cael's fading soul jolted.
He turned—or tried to. But there was no body to turn. No eyes to see.
Still, something stirred in him.
A question.
A choice.
The void was no longer empty.
A single thread of light hung before him.
A single red line, pulsing like a heartbeat in the nothingness.
It glowed with one word—just one—but it said everything.
"Rewrite."
He stared at it.
Motionless.
Weightless.
Emotionless.
And for the first time in thirty lives—
He hesitated.
Because to rewrite was not to remember.
It was to defy.
To say no to fate.
To say no to the gods, to prophecy, to sacrifice.
To stop dying.
To start choosing.
And maybe… just maybe…
To finally live.
The voice returned—closer now. Clearer. No longer a whisper.
It was in him. Around him. Beyond him.
"This is your choice, Cael Ardyn."
"Accept death… and fade."
"Or seize your fate—take the thread—and rewrite it."
The red string shimmered with temptation.
It pulsed like it knew him.
Like it had been waiting all along.
Cael's voice came out hollow.
"What's the cost?"
The void didn't flinch.
There was no hesitation.
"Everything."
"Your soul. Your self. Your story."
"You will not be the same."
"Will you pay it?"
His soul trembled.
His mind—fragile after so many lives—splintered under the weight of that truth.
To take it would be to lose everything he was.
But to let it go…?
To fade quietly like always?
To vanish while they cheered for someone else?
His eyes fluttered closed.
And in the darkness, memories danced like falling embers.
Leon's face, smiling, foolish, brave—the one Cael died for again and again.
The others, too—soldiers, friends, nobles—all alive because he wasn't.
His name, forgotten.
His tombstone, unmarked.
A thousand cheers for a hero who didn't know the price.
"If I must become the villain to live…"
His hand reached forward.
Fingers brushed the thread of red light.
"…then so be it."
The thread burned into his palm.
The void screamed.
The world exploded.
A tidal wave of red light engulfed him.
Sigils, glyphs, voices—lives—spiraled around him in a storm of fate unchained.
Time cracked.
Space warped.
And Cael—
Cael laughed.
Not a happy laugh.
Not a kind one.
But a laugh of someone who had nothing left to lose.
And for the first time in thirty lives…
He wasn't dying.
He was becoming.
[✦ SYSTEM UNLOCKED ✦]
Name: Cael Ardyn
Designation: Villain
CandidateStatus: Soul Cost Pending
Rewrite Protocol: ACTIVE
Timeline Divergence: INSTABILIZING...
Beginning New Sequence...