Levin's hands trembled as he stared at the ceiling above him. His breathing came in short, sharp gasps that echoed too loudly in the vast chamber.
This was not real. Could not be real.
He had read enough stories, watched enough anime during those rare moments his parents had been too busy micromanaging the empire to micromanage him. Transmigration. Reincarnation. Isekai. Terms he had consumed like escapist fiction during stolen hours in his childhood, before even his entertainment had been regulated and approved.
But this. This was too much. Too vivid. Too real.
The softness of the sheets beneath his fingers felt genuine. The cool air against his skin registered with perfect clarity. The faint scent of incense drifting through the room invaded his nostrils with botanical precision he could not ignore.
His heart hammered against ribs that felt different. Narrower. Younger.
Panic clawed up his throat.
He threw back the covers and stumbled out of bed, legs unsteady beneath him. Everything felt wrong. His center of gravity had shifted. His limbs responded with unfamiliar timing, muscle memory that belonged to someone else entirely.
Levin grabbed his arms, squeezing hard enough to hurt. Solid. Real. He pressed fingers against his chest, feeling a heartbeat that should not exist. He had drowned. Felt the water fill his lungs. Experienced the absolute certainty of death.
Yet here he stood. Breathing. Living.
In a body that was not his.
His eyes swept the chamber again, desperate for something rational, some explanation that did not require accepting the impossible. The celestial murals seemed to move when he was not looking directly at them, stars shifting in their painted courses. The symbols on the bedsheets pulsed with faint luminescence that hurt to observe for too long.
Magic. The word whispered through his mind like blasphemy against everything he understood about reality.
He needed to see. Needed confirmation that this nightmare had limits, boundaries, some tether to sanity that would let him wake up in a hospital bed with his parents standing over him, relief and disappointment warring on their faces.
A full length mirror stood against the far wall, framed in silver that caught light like liquid mercury. Levin approached it slowly, each step deliberate, part of him terrified of what he would find.
He stopped three feet away.
Then two.
Then directly in front of it.
The person staring back made his breath catch in his throat.
Not Levin. Nothing like Levin.
Violet hair fell in a wild mane around a face carved from fantasy itself. Sharp cheekbones that could cut glass. Strong jaw that spoke of aristocratic breeding. Skin pale as moonlight, flawless and unmarked. But the eyes captured him most. Piercing blue, so vivid they seemed to glow with inner light, framed by dark lashes that belonged in paintings rather than reality.
Beautiful. Inhumanly beautiful.
And tall. Levin had been average height, maybe five ten on a good day. This body towered. Six three, easily, maybe more. Broad shoulders tapering to a lean waist, muscle definition visible even through the thin sleeping shirt he wore. Athletic without being bulky, powerful without seeming heavy.
Young, though. Fifteen, maybe just past that threshold. All that height packed into an adolescent frame still growing into itself, all sharp angles and potential not yet fully realized. The kind of build that promised even more height to come.
Levin lifted a hand with deliberate slowness. The stranger in the mirror did the same. He touched his face, tracing features that felt alien beneath his fingertips. The violet hair felt like silk between his fingers, finer than anything natural. The blue eyes stared back with his own confusion reflected in their impossible depths.
"What is happening to me?" he whispered to the stranger wearing his consciousness.
His voice came out deeper than expected. Richer. With an accent he did not recognize coloring the edges of his words, making even familiar syllables sound foreign.
This could not be real. This could not be happening. People did not just die and wake up in different bodies in different worlds with different faces. The laws of physics, of biology, of basic reality itself forbade it.
But the mirror did not lie.
The reflection remained consistent, undeniable, impossible.
The door opened without warning.
Levin spun so fast he nearly lost his balance, heart leaping into his throat. His new body tensed instinctively, muscles coiling in ways he had not commanded.
A woman entered. No, not a woman. A girl, maybe early twenties at most. Dressed in a maid's uniform that seemed both practical and elegant, black fabric trimmed with silver threading that matched the mirror's frame. Her most striking feature was her hair, long lemon green locks pulled into a high ponytail that cascaded down her back like a waterfall of spring leaves caught in eternal sunlight.
She was busty. Impossibly so. Curvaceous in ways that made the uniform strain slightly at the seams, her figure the kind artists spent hours trying to capture. But her hair in front fell across her face in carefully arranged strands, obscuring her features so completely that Levin could not make out her expression, could not read her eyes or gauge her reaction.
She looked toward him.
And froze completely.
For a heartbeat, nothing moved. The air itself seemed to hold its breath. Then she dropped to one knee so fast her joints cracked against the polished floor, the sound sharp and painful in the silence. Her head bowed immediately, hands pressed flat against stone in a posture of absolute submission.
"I greet the Seventh Star!" Her voice rang out with formal precision, each word enunciated with practiced reverence that sent chills racing down Levin's spine.
But beneath that formal tone, he heard something else. A tremor. A carefully controlled terror that made her words shake at the edges despite her obvious training.
She was afraid. Deeply, genuinely afraid.
Of him.
"Seventh Star?" The words escaped him before he could stop them, confusion overriding caution.
The maid tensed visibly. Her shoulders drew up tight, posture radiating alarm that bordered on panic. When she spoke again, the words tumbled out faster, defensive and desperate.
"Seventh Star, you had an acute fever which was very serious. Dangerously high. At some point during your treatment we lost you completely. Your heart stopped. But then suddenly you were revived, though you remained unconscious. After that I had to take care of you every day, monitoring your condition constantly, watching for any sign of decline." Her voice quickened further, taking on an edge that suggested she expected punishment for every word. "I apologize profusely for not obeying courtesy by knocking before entering. I heard movement from the corridor and feared you might have collapsed again. I thought you might need immediate assistance. Please forgive my impertinence. It will not happen again."
She was terrified. Levin could hear it clearly now in the tremor beneath her formal words, see it in the rigid set of her shoulders. Terrified of him. Of whatever consequences might follow her breach of protocol. Of what this Riven person might do to her for entering unannounced.
What kind of person was he? What had this body's previous owner done to make a servant shake with fear at the mere possibility of his displeasure?
He stood there, mouth hanging open, mind completely blank. What was he supposed to say? How was he supposed to respond to any of this? Every instinct screamed that he should comfort her, tell her it was fine, but would that seem suspicious? Out of character?
"Okay," he managed finally. The whisper barely qualified as sound, uncertain and lost.
The maid rose slowly, clearly relieved not to be struck or punished or whatever she had been expecting. She moved toward the bed with quick, efficient movements that spoke of long practice. She began straightening sheets that did not need straightening, fluffing pillows already perfect, hands busy with meaningless tasks that kept her occupied and gave her reason not to look at him directly.
An opportunity crystallized in Levin's racing thoughts.
She thought he had been sick. Delirious with fever. That his heart had stopped and he had been revived. That gave him cover. An excuse for ignorance. A believable reason his behavior might seem different. A way to ask questions without revealing the complete impossibility of his situation.
"Wait." His voice came out stronger this time, though still uncertain.
The maid stopped immediately, turning to face him with that same obscured expression. Her hands clasped together in front of her, knuckles white with tension. Even without seeing her face clearly, Levin could read fear in every line of her body. The way she held herself small. The way her breathing had gone shallow and careful.
He swallowed hard, trying to make his voice gentle. "I... the fever. It affected my memory. Things are unclear. Fragmented. Like trying to see through fog." The lie felt necessary. Survival instinct overriding his usual honesty. "Could you tell me your name? And... who I am? What happened to me?"
Silence stretched between them. He could see her processing, weighing his words against whatever she knew of fevers and their effects. Deciding whether this was genuine confusion or some kind of test designed to trap her into speaking out of turn.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, she bowed. Properly this time, a deep formal gesture that spoke of genuine respect rather than pure fear, though the fear remained threaded through every movement.
"My name is Esme, Seventh Star. I am a personal maid assigned exclusively to your service. I have served you for three years now."
Esme. The name felt right somehow, fitting the green hair and hidden face and careful movements.
"And you keep calling me Seventh Star because..." She paused, clearly trying to decide how much to explain, how much detail was safe to provide. Her hands twisted together. "You are Riven Astravar, Seventh Star of the Astravar Line. Youngest son of the Patriarch."
Riven. The name settled over him like an ill fitting coat, heavy with implications he could not yet understand.
"In the Astravar family," Esme continued, her voice taking on the careful cadence of someone reciting information she had memorized long ago, "the Patriarch's children are titled by stars. Your father, Hugo Von Astravar, has seven sons. Among them all, you are the youngest. The seventh child. Which makes you the Seventh Star."
Seven sons. One father. A family of stars.
Levin, no, Riven, felt the weight of that title settle onto shoulders that were not his, in a world that should not exist, wearing a face that belonged to fantasy.
The Seventh Star.
He looked back at the mirror, at the violet haired stranger who wore his confusion like a crown.
Esme remained nearby, still tense, still holding herself with that careful fear that suggested violence was always a possibility. Her hands stayed clasped tight, her breathing controlled. Waiting for dismissal or orders or whatever came next.
What had Riven done to make her so afraid? The question hung in Levin's mind, unanswered but heavy with implications he would need to uncover.
Somewhere in the distance, beyond the towering windows and impossible moon, this new world waited. Full of mysteries and dangers and possibilities he could not begin to comprehend. Full of people who knew Riven Astravar as someone to fear, even if the reasons remained hidden for now.
But for now, in this exquisite chamber with a maid named Esme who trembled in his presence and a title that meant nothing to him but everything to her, Levin took his first breath as someone else.
As Riven Astravar.
The Seventh Star.
Fifteen years old.
And apparently, someone the servants had learned to fear.