Morning spilled softly through the bamboo.

  Light filtered down in thin golden shafts, catching in the drifting mist that coiled between the trees. Dew clung to slender leaves, trembling faintly as a breeze whispered through the grove. Each stalk creaked gently—tall, pale-green pillars swaying in slow rhythm, their rustling like distant voices murmuring secrets only the mountain could understand.

  Birdsong rang high above. Distant. Clear.

  And beneath that calm, on the damp forest floor, came the thud of flesh on wood.

  Veylan exhaled sharply, breath white in the chill air. Sweat already slicked his back, dampening his clothes and darkening his collar. His hair clung to his forehead, and the bandages wrapped around his wrists were soaked through.

  He stepped forward.

  The first jump was smooth. The second, lighter. The fifth—he landed harder than he meant to, but held balance. A grunt slipped through his teeth.

  He didn’t rush.

  Each leap was a negotiation—calves burning, wrists aching—between tired legs and still-forming control, between gravity and will. The weights strapped to his calves and wrists didn’t clank like before—his body had begun to move around them, not against.

  By the eighth pole, he was winded. By the tenth, his legs quivered.

  The twelfth —the edge of where he failed yesterday—loomed.

  He pushed off. The bamboo swayed slightly from the gust.

  His foot found the surface. Wobbled. Settled.

  He didn’t pause to smile. Didn’t celebrate. He just moved. Crossed another.

  The fourteenth—missed.

  He hit the ground sideways, rolling hard, breath knocked out of him. Dried leaves scattered as his body thudded against the earth. For a few seconds, he just lay there, cheek pressed to the dirt, watching mist roll past like ghostly waves.

  No anger. No shout.

  Just air—drawn in through clenched teeth. And movement.

  Veylan rose again.

  This time, he didn’t climb back onto the first post. He started from the fifth. One. Two. Three.

  Fell again. Picked himself up.

  He circled back. Started from the seventh.

  Again. And again.

  Each route different, unpredictable. His rhythm was no longer rigid. It flowed—halting, imperfect, but alive. His body remembered where he'd slipped, where he'd leaned too far, where the moss was too slick. He was learning—not just enduring.

  By the time the sun had risen well above the treetops, Veylan’s hands were scraped. Knees bruised. But his breath was steady, eyes sharp.

  He didn’t reach the twentieth pole. Not yet. But he would.

  He dragged himself to the edge of the grove and slumped against a rock—body trembling, heartbeat pounding.

  The wind moved gently through the grove, brushing against the bamboo leaves high above like soft fingers trailing across silk. Between them, the sun peeked—partially veiled, shy through the swaying stalks.

  He leaned his head back against the nearest post, eyes half-lidded, his limbs still trembling faintly, breath finally even. Sweat had dried into a thin film across his skin, sticky and cool in the morning air. His arms draped loosely over his knees, hands slack, but not weak. Just… still.

  His eyes followed the drifting sunlight above, unfocused.

  A single drop of sweat slipped from his jaw to his chest. Cold now. Forgotten.

  His thoughts circled back, uninvited.

  Liora’s voice from last night, taut with quiet worry. Rhen’s silence, heavier than words. Neither of them had wanted this—especially not Liora. If she could’ve, she would’ve torn his name off the ceremonial rolls herself.

  Three years ahead of schedule.

  She hadn’t even said “yes.” Just… fell quiet.

  Rhen, at least, understood. The logic wasn’t hard to see. At ten, Veylan was already stronger than the majority of thirteen-year-olds in the clan. If he won at the ceremony, the recognition might shift the tides. More resources. Some spark to finally shatter this damned bottleneck and move forward again.

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  And the clan would support him—they had to. A young genius was a valuable asset, no matter which family he came from.

  Unless, of course, the hatred ran deeper than reason.

  Veylan’s jaw tightened. His fingers curled around a clump of moss—then loosened, slow, like letting go of a thought.

  He didn’t regret deciding to enter early. But Liora’s face when he said it… it troubled him more than he expected. That silence wasn’t surrender. It was something else. A wall. A quiet grief.

  He let the breath out slowly, as if releasing the weight of her silence.

  The faint sound of footsteps reached him from the misted path behind. Measured. Familiar.

  He didn’t turn.

  No one else came here—not this deep into the grove. Not unless they knew. And from the cadence, the weight of each step, he already knew who it was.

  “And here I thought,” Rhen’s voice came softly from behind, brushing against the hush, “that you’d train like how a kid should.”

  Veylan didn’t reply. He stayed where he was, legs drawn in, one arm slung lazily over a bent knee, eyes locked on the veiled sun between swaying bamboo.

  Footsteps drew closer and closer.

  They stopped a few paces away.

  “How many logs can you cross now?” Rhen asked, his tone even.

  “Twelve,” Veylan said, barely louder than the breeze.

  A pause.

  Then, just two words: “Not bad.”

  It was a simple thing. But in Rhen’s eyes, something stirred—just for a moment. A flicker of pride passed through him—barely there, just enough to make his shoulders shift, as if something in him had exhaled. This wasn’t advanced training. He himself had devised it, years ago. He remembered how long it took him—six months to reach twelve logs. Veylan had taken barely two and a half.

  He stood there for a beat, watching the boy. The early sun caught on the sweat along Veylan’s jaw, gleaming like dew—proof of effort, or something more fragile. Rhen parted his lips, as if to speak further. But nothing came.

  “…Rest properly before starting again,” he said instead, voice quieter. Then he turned, steps slow as he began to walk away.

  Rhen’s fingers twitched against the moss. A breath caught halfway in his throat. Then—

  “You want to say something?”

  The words came so suddenly, Rhen stopped.

  He turned back. Veylan still had his back to him, but his voice had carried differently this time. Not defiant. Not guarded. Just… open.

  Rhen looked at him for a long moment before answering.

  “Yes.”

  He stepped forward once more, this time closer, hands behind his back.

  “This world is a jungle,” he said, eyes not on Veylan, but ahead—at the long bamboos, the slope beyond, the wide reach of sky past the ridge. “And only strength gives one the right to live the way they want. I think you already understand that.”

  A pause. The bamboo swayed. Their rustling barely masked the breath of wind that passed between them.

  “But even so,” he continued, “there’s no need to push yourself this hard. No need to break yourself at this age.”

  His voice didn’t rise. It stayed steady, like the beat of a slow drum.

  “I’ve thought about it. Power, maybe. Status. Resources. Maybe those drive you. But…” He exhaled. “No child trains like this unless they’re trying to outrun something they can’t name. And I can’t help but wonder—what are you running from, Veylan?”

  Silence again.

  Rhen stepped closer, then sat—not beside, but nearby. His presence wasn’t heavy, but it filled the space like a steady warmth.

  “I don’t know what weighs on you,” he said quietly. “But you don’t have to carry it alone.”

  His fingers curled loosely into the earth.

  “As long as your mother and I draw breath, nothing in this world will be allowed to hurt you. And if there’s something you need—no matter what it is—we’ll get it for you.”

  The air grew still.

  Rhen’s voice dropped to something lower than a whisper.

  “We might just be speaking big, I know. But if one day all we can give you… is a moment of peace—then we’ll give that, even if it means giving our lives.”

  A leaf drifted down, spiralling gently before settling on the post near Veylan’s hand.

  Neither of them moved.

  But for the first time, the silence between them didn’t feel like distance.

  It felt like something waiting. Like something soft, trying to bridge the space between a father and the boy who still didn’t know how to let go.

  Rhen watched his son.

  The boy sat hunched, arms looped around his knees, gaze distant. His face—still soft with childhood—should’ve held mischief in his eyes, or that fierce little pride he wore when he thought he’d won an argument. But there was none of that. No spark, no twitch of feeling. Just a flat stillness. Like the emotions had long since worn themselves out.

  Rhen said nothing. He’d already spoken more than he usually did. And, more importantly, Veylan had listened.

  That alone was enough—for now.

  He shifted slightly, preparing to stand.

  “I…”

  The single word, brittle and unsure, stopped him mid-rise.

  Rhen eased back down without a sound, turning his body slightly so he didn’t loom. He didn’t speak, didn’t press. Just waited, his presence steady, the way one might wait beside a frightened animal—quiet, open, unthreatening.

  The moment stretched. A breeze stirred the grove again, fluttering through the bamboo and making them groan faintly. Another leaf drifted down between them.

  Veylan’s voice came at last. Quiet. Flat.

  “Even if I tell you… you wouldn’t believe me.”

  Rhen’s gaze didn’t waver. His expression softened further—no surprise, no confusion. Just patience. But inside, something stirred. Wouldn’t believe? What could a ten-year-old possibly say that would cross that line?

  Still, he didn’t let it show. After two, maybe three breaths, he spoke gently.

  “Why don’t you try me?”

  For the first time, Veylan turned toward him.

  Their eyes met.

  And Rhen saw it.

  Not just weariness, or pain. Not even loneliness. Something stranger. Something that didn’t fit a child’s frame. A weight too old, too vast. It chilled him—not with fear, but with a strange grief. As if some part of his son had walked too far ahead for him to follow.

  Veylan seemed to search his face. As if trying to guess how much of himself he could safely uncover. His lips parted, then closed again.

  A flicker of thought passed behind his eyes—darkly amused, almost bitter.

  If I told the truth…, would they think I’m mad? Does this world even have a name for this kind of madness?

  The silence began to stretch again.

  And then, as if sensing that thought, Rhen said quietly, “You shouldn’t decide what others will do before they’ve even done it.”

  The corner of Veylan’s mouth twitched. Not a smile. Something more fragile. Like the memory of one.

  And then, finally, he spoke—barely louder than the wind.

  “…Do you believe in second lives?”

  The words hung between them.

  Not metaphor. Not spiritual longing. A question rooted in something deeper.

  Rhen inhaled slowly. The breeze rustled again, stirring the bamboo with a whisper that felt like the world leaning in to listen.

  He didn’t laugh.

  He didn’t frown.

  He only answered with a question of his own, voice even:

  “Why do you ask?”

  Veylan looked down at his hands. Calloused. Dirty. Not the hands of a child born into comfort.

  “…Because I remember mine.”

  And for a brief second, the quiet world around them held its breath.

  Back at the house, a soft creak. The door slid open a crack, but no one stepped out.

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  Destiny Reckoning. It’s set in the same universe, and you definitely don’t want to miss it, because the stories will eventually crossover.