The sound of rain tapped softly against the classroom windows. A steady rhythm — soft but insistent — that blurred the view of the gray city beyond. Droplets crawled down the glass like tiny comets, catching brief reflections of neon signs from the buildings across the street.
Inside, the classroom was warm, crowded, alive with chatter. Laughter burst from the back where a group of boys compared sports scores, jostling each other with mock punches. A pair of girls squealed over photos on a phone, whispering about some idol. Desks rattled as classmates shifted, traded snacks, scribbled half-hearted notes.
And by the window sat a boy.
His chin rested on his hand, elbow propped on the desk, eyes fixed on the rain instead of the blackboard. His name was Shun Yamamoto.
From the outside, nothing about him seemed strange. He had friends, technically — acquaintances who would sometimes text him about assignments or ask for notes. He had a family that fed him, a small apartment to return to. A "normal" life, if you measured normality by the world's standards.
But none of it mattered to him.
The laughter, the gossip, the weekend plans. It was like watching a play he'd already seen a hundred times, the actors repeating their lines while he sat in the wrong seat.
His eyes unfocused, the window becoming not glass but a canvas. On it he painted another world in his mind: a sky filled with dragons, their wings blotting out the sun. Forests of silver trees whispering to elven mages. Stone fortresses rising above seas of banners, armies clashing below. Magic swirling like storms, danger lurking behind every corner.
His heart beat a little faster at the thought.
A place where every step meant adventure. Where his existence wouldn't be a footnote but a story worth telling.
His gaze dropped to the half-finished worksheet on his desk. Lines of equations stared back at him, meaningless symbols scrawled in pencil. His pencil rolled off the page and stopped against his knuckle.
Instead, I'm stuck here, he thought. School. College. A job. Grow old. Die. That's it? That's my life?
His lips twisted into a bitter smirk.
He lowered his voice, speaking to no one in particular. "If only reincarnation was real."
The rain kept tapping against the glass. The laughter in the room swelled and faded. No one heard him.
But the words hung in the air like a spark waiting for tinder.
✦ The Death
Time marched on.
Asura Satomi grew taller, his uniform changing from middle school to high school, then to a suit and tie as he stepped reluctantly into the workforce. The days blurred together, his reflection in mirrors older, wearier, but never more alive.
He studied when told to, graduated because he was expected to, and took the first job that would accept him. He commuted with strangers, ate instant meals alone in his small apartment, and fell asleep each night with the hum of his computer still filling the silence.
He was never fired. Never praised. He showed up, he worked, he went home. A cog in a machine that neither cared nor noticed if one gear turned slower than the rest.
Sometimes he would glance out the train window, watching children laugh on the platforms, their lives still unburdened by expectation. He would remember his own youth, the nights he had prayed for a different world, and he would laugh bitterly under his breath.
But as the years passed, even that laugh faded. His dreams were worn thin, tucked away like old manga volumes gathering dust on a forgotten shelf.
And then… he died.
There was no warning. No grand accident. No flashing lights or screeching tires. He didn't collapse heroically in the middle of the street saving someone else's life.
He simply closed his eyes one night, too tired to finish his reheated dinner, and never opened them again.
It wasn't glorious, nor tragic.
Not the fall of a hero, not the noble sacrifice of a knight—just a quiet end to an ordinary life.
The boy's soul drifted through darkness, unmoored, unseen.
No one mourned him. His neighbors didn't notice until the rent went unpaid. His coworkers muttered briefly about how quiet he had been, then replaced him in the schedule. His family wept for a time, then life continued its march without him.
Forgotten by the world he had once prayed to escape, Asura's spirit sank deeper into the void.
Carried away by currents unseen, he wondered dimly if the wish he had whispered a thousand times before bed had reached anyone at all.
If I die… please, let me be reborn in a world of magic.
In the endless dark, the prayer echoed still.
✦ Another Life
A spark of warmth pulled him back.
Not the empty silence of death. Not the neon glow of the city he had left behind. But something else—soft, muffled, alive.
There was a heartbeat. Slow, steady, like the beating of a drum from far away. It echoed through the warm darkness, surrounding him. Another sound followed: a muffled voice, soft and distant, speaking words he couldn't quite understand.
And then he realized.
This is… a womb.
He was weightless, suspended in warmth, tiny arms curled against his chest. A rhythm of life passed through him, comforting, gentle.
His heart raced. So this is it. Rebirth. It's real. I wasn't just dreaming. My prayer… it worked…
Joy swelled in his fragile chest. He would have cried if he could. All the manga and anime he had devoured flashed in his mind: the hero opening his eyes in another world, the baby destined for greatness, the second chance he had longed for.
But before he could rejoice, something went wrong.
The warmth faltered. A sharp pain seized his chest, crushing, unbearable. His heartbeat stumbled, stuttered. His body was too small, too weak. The life within him clung desperately, but the threads were unraveling.
"No…" His voice did not exist here, but his soul screamed. "Not like this! Not again!"
The muffled voices outside grew frantic. He could feel the vibrations of a woman's sobs, the tremor of panic in another voice. The steady drumbeat that had surrounded him began to weaken, slow, fade.
His light flickered.
His world collapsed.
And then—silence.
The thread snapped. The warmth disappeared. His body crumpled into nothing.
The soul slipped free once more, torn from the fragile shell that had failed to hold it.
His first reincarnation had ended in a miscarriage.
Why…? Why again…?
The boy's heart wailed into the void, but no one answered.
✦ The Second Birth
Yet fate was not finished with him.
A gasp tore from his tiny chest. His lungs convulsed, burning as they dragged in the cold night air for the very first time. He cried — raw, unrestrained, as all newborns do when they arrive in the world.
The sound echoed against stone, sharp and thin.
His eyes opened to darkness. A broken ceiling stretched above him, cracks revealing a pale, indifferent moon. Shadows clung to the corners of the ruined temple, wind whistling through shattered windows.
But no one came.
No mother's trembling arms.
No father's calloused hands.
No warmth.
Only silence, wind, and stone.
If he could speak, his first question would have been: Why am I alone?
The wail of the newborn faltered into hiccups, then dwindled. His golden eyes, wet with tears, glimmered faintly in the dark. His small fists clenched at nothing, as though trying to hold onto a promise already slipping away.
And then — footsteps.
A slow, deliberate rhythm. Heavy boots striking broken stone. Each step reverberated through the ruined hall, too precise, too calm for anything human.
A figure emerged from the shadows. Cloaked in black, his form towered over the child, the hood hiding his face in darkness. Yet his presence was enough to still the air. It pressed down like a storm cloud, suffocating, ancient.
The infant quieted. Not out of comfort, but out of instinct — some primal recognition that what stood before him was a predator beyond comprehension.
The figure knelt beside the child. From beneath the hood, two crimson eyes gleamed like coals in the night. He studied the newborn in silence, as if measuring, weighing, judging.
At last, he extended a clawed hand. With a casual flick, he dragged a talon across his own palm. Dark blood welled, but instead of dripping, it hissed — tearing the air itself.
Reality split open with a shriek. A black rift widened, its edges licked by flames that burned without heat. Beyond it lay another world: towering spires of obsidian, banners of silver and black whipping in a crimson sky, the fortress of demons.
The man's arms reached down, lifting the child as though he weighed nothing. For a moment, the newborn whimpered — then stilled in those inhuman arms.
Without a word, the cloaked figure stepped into the rift. The portal snapped shut behind him with a sound like shattering glass.
The ruined temple was silent once more, as though it had only dreamed of the child's cry.
✦ The Demon Realm
The world beyond the rift was not meant for human eyes.
Black skies bled crimson, as if the heavens themselves had been wounded. Obsidian towers clawed at the sky, their jagged edges lit by rivers of molten fire that flowed through the cracks of the earth. The air was thick, heavy, saturated with mana so dense it thrummed in the bones.
The cloaked man strode forward, the newborn clutched securely in his arms.
Before him stretched a vast fortress carved of stone darker than night, its walls lined with battlements and the banners of a silver fang upon a black field. Torches of blue flame lit the gates, their unnatural fire casting shadows that seemed to writhe and breathe.
The great doors parted. The hall inside was endless, a cathedral of darkness. Pillars carved with runes spiraled upward into unseen heights, and the floor gleamed like polished obsidian, veins of crimson pulsing faintly beneath its surface as though the castle itself was alive.
Rows of soldiers flanked the path forward. Each wore armor of black steel, horned helms obscuring their faces. Their presence was suffocating, each one radiating a pressure that would break mortal men. Yet even they bowed low as the cloaked man passed, lowering their blades in respect.
At the far end of the hall, a throne loomed. Forged of obsidian stone and crowned with spikes, it rose above the chamber like a mountain. Shadows coiled at its base, writhing as if alive.
The man carrying the child slowed, then finally stopped. With one hand, he lowered his hood.
Horns like jagged crowns rose from his head, black as midnight, gleaming faintly in the firelight. His face was chiseled with cruel strength, the lines of it carved by centuries of battle and command. His eyes—crimson and burning—glowed with such intensity they seemed to pierce through the soul.
And upon his brow rested a crown wrought from midnight steel, etched with runes that pulsed faintly like living veins.
The soldiers slammed their fists against their armor in unison.
"The King," they intoned, their voices echoing like thunder.
The newborn blinked up at him, golden eyes wide, tiny hands trembling in the open air.
This was no savior. No guardian angel.
This was the Demon King.
And the child, cradled in his arms, would soon be known not as an orphan abandoned to the void…
…but as his blood.
✦ The Mirror
Months passed within the Demon King's castle, each one carrying with it whispers of the impossible child.
By five months, the boy could already form words, his tiny voice echoing through obsidian halls in ways that startled maids and soldiers alike. By eight months, he conversed as though he had lived two lifetimes, speaking with a clarity and sharpness that unsettled even seasoned knights. His intelligence was unnatural, frightening even, and yet when he laughed, it was the bright, unrestrained laughter of a child discovering the world for the first time.
One evening, while wandering the endless corridors under the half-watchful eyes of nervous attendants, the boy stumbled upon a forgotten chamber. Dust lay thick across stone carvings of demons long dead, but in the center of the room stood a mirror — tall, framed in black steel etched with runes that glimmered faintly in the torchlight.
He froze.
For the first time since his rebirth, he could truly see himself.
The child stepped closer, small hands brushing the frame. The reflection gazed back at him, both alien and familiar.
Two sharp horns jutted from his head, curving faintly upward from the sides barely reaching his forehead. Pale white hair, soft yet shimmering like frost, spilled across his brow. And his eyes — golden, bright and cold — reflected endless night, as if they contained within them stars that no human had ever seen. His skin was warm, light brown, a shade that seemed to rest between worlds: not entirely human, not entirely demon.
The boy tilted his head, studying his reflection. For a long moment, silence filled the chamber. Then, slowly, his lips parted.
He whispered the name he had been given, his voice reverent, as though by saying it he was claiming his place in this world:
"…Asura Satomi."
The sound of it lingered in the chamber, echoing faintly against the stone. His small hand pressed to the cold surface of the glass, fingers brushing his own reflection.
The boy who once sat forgotten by the window of a classroom was gone.
This child, horned and golden-eyed, was something new.
The grandson of the Demon King.
✦ The Dream Realized
Once, there had been a boy who sat by rain-streaked windows, his chin resting on his hand, watching a world that would never notice him. A boy who cursed his fate as ordinary, his name destined to be forgotten, his life fated to fade like countless others.
That boy had prayed for something more.
And now, that prayer had been answered.
He stood reborn in a land not drawn on maps, not bound by the logic of the world he once knew. The sky burned red, towers of obsidian split the heavens, and creatures of myth walked freely in the open air.
Demons. Magic. Swords. Kingdoms locked in eternal struggle.
Everything he had once only seen in the glowing frames of manga, in the words of light novels, in the flickering colors of anime—now spread before him in reality.
This was no longer a dream.
This was no longer a wish.
This was his world.
The boy clenched his small fists. His golden eyes gleamed against the crimson light of the Demon Realm, the horns on his head marking him as kin to monsters.
This time… I will not waste my life.
His heartbeat thundered in his chest, not with fear, but with exhilaration.
This time… I will carve my destiny with my own hands.
The boy's lips curled into a smile that was far too sharp for his age.
The high school student who once prayed for reincarnation was gone.
In his place stood Asura Satomi—
Grandson of the Demon King.
And his story… had only just begun.