Early July, 1980 – London, Britain
The grandfather clock downstairs had long since chimed eight, yet a solitary, warm light still flickered stubbornly from a secluded second-floor room within the Elms Church Welfare Home.
"God, I really can't take this anymore," muttered the boy.
He stared intently at his youthful reflection in the cracked wardrobe mirror, thoughtfully rubbing his chin. Slowly, he extended a pair of slender, remarkably well-defined hands, flexing his fingers open and closed as though he were trying to physically grasp the empty air in front of him.
Eleven whole years.
It had been eleven grueling years since he found himself marooned in this unfamiliar world. To make matters worse, he was trapped in an archaic orphanage straight out of the 1980s. No computers, no smartphones, not even a decent television set; he honestly marveled at the fact that he had managed to survive this long without losing his mind.
"Alan! Boss! I brought the stuff you asked for!" Before the boy could finish his private lamentation, a frantic, heavy knocking violently shattered the evening quiet.
Alan yanked the wooden door open, his brow furrowed in a deep frown. "What's with all the sudden racket? It's late. Are you actively trying to get us caught?"
"Uh, sorry about that, boss. Hauling this massive box all the way back just completely wore me out," a panting teenager replied. He looked to be about sixteen or seventeen years old, dressed in a severely rumpled button-down shirt paired with well-worn suspenders, his brown hair an absolute rat's nest.
This exhausted teenager delivering the illicit goods was William. He was several years older than Alan and just another forgotten orphan residing within the bleak walls of the welfare home.
"So, what exactly caused the delay tonight?" Alan's frown deepened, a hint of steel entering his voice. "Those thugs from the North-Side gang didn't try to hassle you again, did they?"
"No way, absolutely not. Ever since you handed those North-Side punks that brutal lesson last month, nobody has dared to even look in our direction. We just managed to score a massive haul of good merchandise today and simply lost track of the time." William grinned, digging deep into his trouser pocket and eagerly thrusting out a wad of crumpled banknotes. "Here's our official cut of the profits for the week."
Alan said nothing for a moment, simply reaching out and accepting the cash with a curt nod. "Good work today, William."
He was just about to tear into the cardboard box when he noticed that the older boy was still lingering in the doorway, offering up a highly awkward, nervous chuckle while anxiously rubbing his hands together.
"What is it now?" Alan sighed, wanting to return to his solitude. "Spit it out, I really need to get back to my training."
"Heh, well, you know, it's still pretty early in the evening, so the guys and I thought we might try to relax for a little bit..."
"All right, I understand. You just want to borrow the chess set." Cutting the teenager off mid-sentence, Alan walked over to his narrow bed and pulled a polished wooden box from underneath the mattress. "Remember, this is strictly for casual fun. Absolutely no betting money on the matches, or the Headmistress will undoubtedly confiscate the board again."
"Understood, boss! I'll make sure to bring it right back in a couple of days." William practically snatched the wooden box from Alan's hands and vanished down the dimly lit hallway in a flash.
"Great, another hopeless addict. Teaching those idiots how to play Shogi might have been a massive mistake on my part," Alan muttered under his breath, firmly clicking the heavy door shut.
Rubbing his palms together in eager anticipation, Alan happily tore open the thick packing tape on the large carton William had delivered.
"Ah, beautiful. Spices, real ones...it's been a long time, my old friends," he whispered softly. "Since I have no smartphone and no computer to entertain myself, I'll just have to find my comforts elsewhere in life. I swear, if I had to stomach another miserable day of bland British food, I would physically throw up."
The sprawling box contained absolutely nothing but the specific seasonings and condiments that Alan had instructed William to secretly procure from the large downtown department store.
To this day, Alan Wilson honestly had no concrete idea whether his soul had transmigrated across dimensions or if he had simply been reincarnated. However, in his previous life, he had been a hardened soldier. That ingrained, iron-clad willpower was the exact thing that allowed him to maintain his calm composure and think clearly in this bizarre situation.
He remained entirely unsure if this was even the same version of Earth he once knew. After all, he had abruptly awakened in an impoverished orphanage during a time period that felt distinctly like the late sixties or early seventies. But since he was stuck here now, he would do what he always did: adapt and survive. Armed with the fully formed memories of a grown adult man, Alan was hardly the fragile, sentimental type.
The crumbling orphanage operated under strict church control. William and his rough group of buddies had grown up within these same oppressive walls. They were all a few years older, bigger, and stronger on paper, yet every single one of them obediently answered to Alan.
Why?
Because they simply had no other choice.
During his past life, Alan had served extensively in the military and possessed a deep, enduring passion for martial arts like judo, karate and a bit of mma. Consequently, right from his literal infancy in this new body, he had intensely focused on rigorous physical training. Those deeply ingrained disciplinary habits had returned to him quite naturally.
Armed with a vast, insurmountable gap in combat experience and fighting spirit, a mere nine-year-old Alan had systematically subdued the entire hierarchy of the orphanage. Under his cunning guidance and tactical planning, William's street gang had even successfully launched a highly profitable black-market business outside the confines of the group home.
"Honestly, at this current rate, I'm going to turn into a full-blown syndicate boss in future, doing nothing but collecting shady protection money every single day," Alan quietly mocked himself. He carefully put the precious bottles of sauce away into a hidden cupboard, eagerly planning to cook up a proper meal.
After safely stashing the expensive culinary ingredients, Alan walked back over to the bedroom door and locked it incredibly securely, ensuring the deadbolt clicked firmly into place.
There was one massive, reality-breaking secret that he had meticulously kept hidden from absolutely everyone since his sudden arrival in this timeline.
He legitimately possessed supernatural abilities.
He turned and stared sharply at a heavy, ten-kilogram iron dumbbell resting in the far corner of the room. He pointed his index finger gently toward the metal—and slowly, defying all known laws of physics, the massive weight lifted off the floorboards, suspended entirely by a powerful, invisible energy.
Leaving the iron mass silently hovering directly overhead like a metallic cloud, he calmly walked over to his wooden desk and flipped open a thick textbook.
He personally referred to this dangerous, self-invented daily drill as his "Levitation Training."
Around the age of seven or eight, he had first intuitively sensed that he was fundamentally different from the other children. Once, right after an exhausting martial arts workout, he had desperately wanted a drink of water, and a glass cup from the counter had spontaneously flown straight across the room and directly into his waiting hand.
Thoroughly convinced that he was a terrifying anomaly inside the strict orphanage, he immediately began taking extraordinary precautions. If he were ever discovered by the fanatical caretakers of the church-run home, he knew without a shadow of a doubt that he would instantly be branded a demonic monster or a dangerous heretic.
He pragmatically labeled this inexplicable metaphysical gift a "superpower." Through years of intense, deliberate, and highly focused practice, the ability transitioned from being wildly sporadic and unpredictable to something steadily and consistently usable.
He eventually noticed that immediately after his rigid martial arts stance training, he could control the telekinetic phenomenon far better. This was likely because his disciplined mind entered a perfectly calm, empty state of absolute focus. Drawing inspiration from pop culture, he cheekily coined the strange energy "the Force." To master it, he built incredibly strict daily routines for himself: morning karate forms, deep mental meditation, and intensive evening superpower drills.
At first, he approached the training exactly as he would train physical muscles—utilizing a strategy of progressive, incremental load. He started by lifting small cups, then heavy books, progressing to wooden chairs, and eventually entire tables.
He continued pushing his absolute limits in this manner until, quite suddenly, something deep within the supernatural ability began to feel strangely off.