Awakening by the Spring
Death was supposed to be silent.
Death was not quiet for Charles Alden Vale. Gunfire broke the stillness. Each shot rang, sharp and final. Betrayal struck. Elena's name escaped as he fell. He remembered his promise: blood would never be shed in vain. He thought his story was over. The sky watched his last act. Was this the end? He thought so.
Wasn't it?
But death brought no peace. Chaos spiraled: flashes of light, confusion, then a final scream—code and soul merged. Silence. Deep, unyielding silence.
A silence so deep it felt like the end of self. Until something shattered it.
A gasp.
He sat up, gasping. Wild air. Crisp, primal. Not smoggy or sterile.
He coughed, the rasp tearing his throat. He clutched damp moss, digging into loam and slick stone.
Where am I?
Next, the smell: rain on bark, pine, moss, and stone. The air felt alive.
The ground beneath him pulsed softly.
A trickle of water ran nearby. Leaves quivered, not from city clamor. Insects chirred strangely. Even the birds sang hauntingly, unsettling them.
He groaned as he rose. Ribs ached. His head throbbed. His body wasn't damaged; it just felt alien. Unfamiliar.
Not heavy enough.
Too young.
"What…?"
He opened his eyes to a strange sky. Odd stars. A huge moon lit the forest. Shadows moved, slow and eerie. One star shifted—blue to green to violet. Here, even the stars lived, magic moving in the ground.
He forced himself upright, trembling. Pain flared at his temple—a swollen welt, dried blood, and a deep ache below his navel.
Instinct drove him toward the sound of water.
His legs buckled, weak. He followed the stream, forcing through brambles and past glowing fungi and moss-crowned arches.
Then he found it.
A spring.
Cradled in stone, half-hidden by reeds, the spring glowed in moonlight. He knelt and gulped icy water. It burned, then soothed. He drank again.
Hands trembling, he splashed water on his face.
The sting was electric, knifing through pain and confusion. He stared into the pool.
And froze.
It wasn't his face.
The man he was—Charles Alden Vale, Sigma Psy CEO, strategist—was gone.
A boy looked back at him.
No older than fifteen.
Silver-white hair framed pale skin. His eyes, glacial sapphires, glowed faintly. The face was patrician, unmarred by hardship or the passage of time.
The boy was beautiful.
Too beautiful.
But the eyes held pain—his pain, not fear.
That's me, he realized. That's me now.
He staggered back from the spring.
And then it came.
A memory surged into Charles's mind—alien, intrusive, not his own. For a moment, it felt as if he were being pulled away from himself, into another's past. He realized it was Charlemagne Ziglar's life, not just a vision but memories emerging alongside his own. The distinction between Charles Vale and this stranger's identity began to blur irrevocably.
A forest.
Sunlight through gold leaves. The hunting grounds of Zephyr, Ziglar estate. Charlemagne Ziglar walked hand in hand with Amelia, his fiancée.
He had trusted her.
He had loved her.
Their lips met beneath a bough of flowers. Confidential. Sacred promise. Then the strike—impact at the belly button. In an instant, Qi became tense. Sharp agony. The dantian he possessed was broken.
He gasped, collapsing to his knees. His best friend turned traitor. Marcus smirked, dropping from the trees.
Resonating words:
"You're weak, Charlemagne."
"You were always a placeholder."
"This is mercy."
He was struck in the head by the pommel of Marcus's sword.
Then total darkness.
As the confusion settled, the realization struck him. He now inhabited the body where Charlemagne Ziglar's memories had started to unfold alongside his own. Two identities—Charles Alden Vale and Charlemagne Ziglar—coexisted in one vessel, their boundaries uncertain.
Charlemagne Ziglar. Third son of Duke Alaric. Forgotten. Mocked. Left to die in the forest.
But his soul had clung to life.
And now, he was here.
Charles collapsed onto the moss, chest heaving.
In a low voice, he murmured, "I was betrayed. Twice."
He had placed his trust in two lives. They had stabbed him in the back in each.
Leaves shivered in the breeze. Towering trees loomed, vigilant and ancient, presiding over this wild world.
It was there in the air, the earth, and the way the stars appeared to be watching him.
Magic. Care and nurturing. Cultivation.
No planet has ever known anything like that.
His fists were tightly clenched.
His fingers curled into fists.
This wasn't a second chance.
This was a war for his soul, his future, vengeance.
He remained Charles Alden Vale.
He was also Charlemagne Ziglar, the boy whose mind, memories, and body he now shared—two lives blended, spirit and flesh interwoven by fate.
And the world would burn rather than let him be betrayed again.
Vultures in the Trees
The forest had grown still.
Not the silence of peace but the hush before a predator strikes its prey.
Charles's senses stretched in the strange silence. Even the wind seemed to pause. He crouched under the branches near the spring. His heart pounding, when he heard something:
Voices.
Muffled at first, then clearer as boots crunched softly through wet underbrush.
"…swore he'd be dead. No way anyone survives a ruptured core like that," a male voice muttered.
Charles crouched further behind a mossy rock. Eyes narrowed. His body trembled with Qi disruption. Unarmed, untrained in this form, he clenched his teeth.
A second, sharper—female. "You saw the force of her strike. Amelia is Level Five. He barely reached Level Two before she broke him. It was over at the start."
There was a pause. Then a softer chuckle. "Maybe if we're lucky, the wolves finished the job."
Charles's fingers dug into the moss. So they had sent others to confirm the kill. Cleanup. Witness suppression.
Vultures.
He peered out.
Three figures stepped out from between the trees. They were all young—maybe just a bit older than he looked now. Each wore dark gray robes with silver trim. A crest adorned the shoulder, stitched in indigo. He didn't recognize the symbol.
The leader, a tall, wiry youth with crimson-tipped hair, carried a short blade loosely in his left hand. His eyes swept the forest with casual arrogance.
Another—a girl barely older than Charlemagne's body—tossed her blond braid. 'He's not alive. Amelia and Marcus made sure. Baron Gayle sent us to check the corpse before reporting to the estate.'
He was right.
He was right.
Amelia Gayle. Marcus Drekor. The betrayal wasn't impulsive—it was calculated. Commissioned. Political.
The third, shorter and tense, clutched a trembling scroll.
"Do you… Do you think House Ziglar will notice he's gone? I mean, he is the duke's son, right?"
The leader sneered. "The third son. The frail one. Ziglar sent no search parties. Our mission is to erase all doubt."
A cold pit formed in Charles's stomach.
So either the Duke hadn't noticed, or he didn't care.
He resisted the urge to confront them. Not yet. This body was fragile, Qi destroyed. Amelia's strike had shattered his cultivation.
The crimson-haired one turned toward the spring, stepping closer.
Charles slipped back, heart pounding. His foot hit a stone—it rolled, clicking against a root.
The girl spun. "Wait. Did you hear that?"
The three froze.
Charles stilled.
A breath. A second.
The leader narrowed his eyes and raised his blade. "Search the area."
Charles's pulse spiked. Too close. No choices. Think! He didn't have to win. Only survive. Get away.
His fingers found a heavy branch—not a weapon, but enough.
Footsteps got closer. The stone made a crunching sound when it hit the leaves.
Charles let out a slow breath, then...
A howl.
Far away, but basic. From the ridge, it was low and deep.
The three froze again.
"…shadow wolves?" the girl asked, her voice tight.
The smaller boy paled. "We should go. Now. If they catch a scent..."
The leader cursed under his breath. "Fine. Let's mark the site and report back. Ziglar's runt is dead enough for politics."
They turned around and ran away, disappearing into the woods like ghosts.
Charles waited for five minutes. Ten.
He rose, legs shaking, only when he was sure they were gone.
He looked in the direction they had come from, then in the direction of the deeper woods past the spring.
He had no allies.
No power.
No plan.
But he had clarity now.
They wanted him forgotten. Buried in silence.
But he had risen, and the next time they saw him...
He would be the one who hunted.
Charles left the spring. The cold night made his breath foggy. The woodland, silver-lit, brimmed with surprises.
He limped, clutching his flank. Each step strained his resolve; agony from the shattered dantian bit within.
But it wasn't only pain.
There was nothing there.
He sensed only a void where his Qi once resided. His dantian shattered. His spirit splintered. Here, he was exiled from cultivation.
And yet… something stirred within him.
A spark. Faint and warm. Buried beneath the devastation.
He paused under ancient trees. Closing his eyes, he inhaled the wild air. For a second, he felt it again.
A flicker.
Not Charlemagne's.
His.
Charles Alden Vale's soul brimmed with knowledge. Fury. Determination. Ambition burned within. In this new form, his spirit strained—fighting to connect and anchor.
"Don't you dare stay broken," he ground out.
He knelt in the moss. He didn't know the world's rules, but he knew energy from his research. Instincts from years of training took over.
Focus on the fragment.
Not the hurt. Not the defeat.
The spark.
He dragged his mind inward, plunging into a lake of icy fire.
The world around him disappeared.
He was standing in the void, a place inside himself where nothing moved save a swirling storm of dull light and broken Qi threads. Broken meridians. Ragged channels.
But there it was.
A single ember, floating in the abyss.
Small. Faint. Gold-red. Cracked.
But burning.
It pulsed once, as if acknowledging him.
Charles reached toward it not with hands, but with will. With identity. With everything that made him who he was.
The ember flickered. Responded.
Then surged into him like a dying sun reborn.
He gasped—lungs seizing, spine arching. A brief burst of heat bloomed in his chest and then settled low in his abdomen, just beneath the wound. Not a full dantian. Not even a third.
But something new had taken root.
The tiniest core of reclaimed Qi.
He landed on his side, breathing hard. Even though it was cold outside, he was sweating on his forehead. His vision blurred, but he still managed to smile fiercely.
"I'm not done."
He rolled over and looked up at the stars. His body was still weak. Still broken. But the ember would get bigger. He would give it food. Take care of it. And when it was powerful enough, he would make something better than any farming method had ever thought of.
A mixed method.
Made with soul. Bound by memory. Driven by the system.
The Sigma Way.
Charles got up. He concentrated on sensing the frail strength within him. He needed some time to himself. Things to use. Information. And most crucially, keeping things secret.
People might think that Charlemagne Ziglar died in those woods.
Amelia and Marcus will sleep soundly for now, thinking they won.
He would get up. Not as a noble who has lost face. Not even as Charles Vale comes back to life.
But as something new.
A phantom forged in betrayal. A strategist born in silence. A weapon sharpened in the dark.