Chapter 2 - A new world, a new name, a new life

The first thing she noticed was how heavy everything felt.

Her arms. Her eyelids. Even her breath.

She blinked again—slow, foggy, and uncertain—trying to make sense of the soft, flickering light above her. A lantern, maybe? But the glow was too gentle, and the light looked natural; she was sure it wasn’t fluorescent or electric.

Someone shifted nearby; she smelled herbs, but it wasn’t the sharp, familiar tang of sandalwood or mugwort, but something sweeter, more floral—lavender? No, something like it, but stronger.

"She’s awake again," said a voice. The same woman from before.

The language wasn’t the one she used to know. It wasn’t any language she should have understood.

But she understood it anyway.

Like her mind was syncing with it word by word, thought by thought.

Hana tried to turn her head, but it only wobbled a little to the side. She felt warm fabric pressed to her cheek, a light blanket over her, and the heat of a nearby fire.

A man’s voice spoke next—deep, slow, with something like awe.

“She’s quiet for a newborn. Sharp, too. You saw how she was watching the ceiling.”

“I told you,” said the woman again, laughing softly. “She’s not going to be like the others.”

She tried to speak back—to form a sound, even just a hum—but her throat caught. Her tongue flopped like it didn’t know how to move.

Frustration bloomed in her chest, quick and bright.

The fire crackled.

And then… the room shivered.

Only for a second. A faint pulse of air that rippled across the floor. The herbal bundles above the window trembled. One of the clay cups rattled on its tray.

Silence followed. Not startled silence—reverent.

The woman knelt down and picked her up again.

This time, Hana saw her more clearly. Young, maybe mid-twenties, with tanned skin and sun-faded freckles. A healer? Her clothes looked practical—linen sleeves rolled to her elbows, apron stained with drying herbs.

But her eyes were what Hana focused on.

They weren’t wide with fear.

They were shining with something else.

Wonder.

“She’s already sensing,” the woman whispered. “I told you, Orlen. I told you she wasn’t ordinary.”

The man, Orlen, stepped closer. His presence filled the doorway. Thick arms, broad shoulders, and rough hands that looked used to both hammer and sword.

He leaned in, studying Hana like she was a puzzle half-solved.

“Doesn’t feel like magic,” he muttered. “Feels older.”

“She’s a blessing,” the woman said, as if that ended the conversation.

Hana blinked again.

She didn’t feel like a blessing.

She felt like a seventeen-year-old girl stuffed into a body that couldn’t hold up her own neck. A soul newly fused with a demon’s essence. A walking miracle—or maybe a ticking clock.

Because underneath all this warmth and softness, she could still feel it.

The thing she had taken.

Him.

The demon’s soul slept deep in her chest, coiled like a serpent in hibernation.

She reached for it with her thoughts to check if it was still bound.

And the moment her mind touched it—

A slow warmth answered.

Like a sun rising behind her ribcage.

She inhaled. It came out as a hiccup.

“She moved,” the woman laughed, holding her closer. “Oh, she’s strong. She’s going to be strong.”

Orlen didn’t look so certain. He scratched the back of his neck and grumbled, “Just hope she doesn’t start talking by next week. I’m not ready for that.”

Hours passed. Maybe more.

Hana’s world was a slow blur of sensation—soft voices, dim firelight, the occasional scent of broth or bitter herbs. She drifted between sleep and half-awareness, her body useless but her mind alert.

The woman, whose name she learned was Sera, was kind. Her voice stayed steady, her touch gentle but firm. She spoke to her constantly—even when Hana couldn’t answer.

That helped.

Even when Hana couldn’t move much or speak, hearing Sera's voice helped her anchor herself.

She started cataloging sounds: the way the fire crackled in pulses, the chime of glass bottles in a nearby cabinet, and the rustle of leather boots on wood. After that she started cataloging emotions: the warm ache of hunger in her stomach, the slight dizziness that came after someone fed her a few drops of something sweet, and the weight of sleep dragging her down like a blanket every few hours.

But what she focused on most was magic.

It was here.

Not the quiet spiritual signatures she knew from her world—not incense, sigils, or channeling through herbs and chants.

This was denser, thicker in the air. Like humidity, but alive. It clung to objects. Ran beneath the floor. Glowed faintly when the fire dimmed.

She couldn’t touch it directly yet.

But she could feel its shape.

Mana.

That was the word that kept forming in her head.

This world had mana, and if she was right, her body was already responding to it.

She could almost trace it—when her heartbeat quickened, when her thoughts aligned, there was a faint tingling in her chest, like invisible threads starting to braid together.

That tingling always brought a second echo.

The soul.

Her soul now.

And something else.

The power inside was still too large for her to grasp.

Night returned.

She was bundled in a softer blanket now, resting in a wooden cradle by the hearth. Sera and Orlen had gone quiet—talking in the next room. She couldn’t see them, but their voices drifted back.

“What will you name her?” Orlen asked.

There was a pause. Then, Sera answered.

“Eirian.”

The name struck her like a bell. Hana froze.

“She doesn’t look like a village child,” Sera said softly. “She feels like light under pressure. Like steel waiting to be drawn.”

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

Orlen grunted. “Hope she doesn’t bring trouble.”

“She is the storm. Trouble wouldn’t dare.”

Hana didn’t understand the name at first.

Eirian. A word of old magic, from a language she did not yet know.

It meant silver flame.

***

The light above her was gentler than the one she remembered.

It came through wooden slats in the roof, soft and golden, filtered by what might’ve been linen curtains. The shadows it cast swayed gently, dancing to a rhythm she didn’t recognize, like leaves fluttering in a wind she couldn’t hear. For a long moment, Eirian—still Hana, still herself—lay perfectly still in her cradle, letting the world unfold.

She tried to roll. Her body wobbled helplessly to the side. Her arm—her tiny arm—twitched, barely enough to lift from the blanket before gravity reclaimed it.

A grimace tugged at the edge of her mind. She hadn’t expected this part to be so frustrating. She was used to nimble fingers drawing perfect circles in salt, steady hands laying down rune cloth, and the fluid precision of years of learned ritual. This body? It drooled. It hiccupped. And worst of all, it wouldn’t cooperate.

Still. She breathed in.

Something about the air told her she wasn’t on Earth anymore.

Not just the scent—though that was different too, like firewood and herbs and sun-dried moss—but the texture of it. It had weight. A current.

Mana.

She couldn’t touch it yet. But it surrounded her.

A thread here. A strand there. It pooled beneath the floorboards and flowed behind the walls like heat behind stone. Not refined. Not focused. Just present, in a way that no city apartment or school gymnasium could match.

Hana—no, Eirian—focused inward.

She hadn’t lost herself in the transition. Her soul was intact. That much she was sure of.

And somewhere inside it, deeper than her thoughts could reach, was the other soul.

The demon’s.

She didn’t try to interact with it, not yet. She could feel that it was resting. Wounded maybe, or suppressed by the strange rules of this body. But it still burned. A heat at the center of her chest that pulsed in time with her heartbeat, only half-awake.

She blinked slowly and let her eyes adjust to the room.

Thatched ceiling. White-plastered walls. A hearth near the far end of the room, stone-built, with a cookpot hanging over low coals. The soft murmur of a wind chime from outside. She could just barely see the curve of a doorway and the edge of a shelf filled with folded linen and small glass bottles.

A home. Someone’s real home.

Footsteps moved nearby—light, practiced. Sera.

Eirian had come to know the rhythm of her steps already, even in the short time since… her rebirth. It was strange how quickly the mind adapted. Her old life had operated on schedules and rituals—class, meals, prayer sessions, shop hours. Now her world was measured in feedings, warmth, and the cadence of the woman who picked her up with a humming tune every morning.

Sera appeared in the doorway, sleeves rolled, a strip of cloth tied around her forehead to keep her hair back.

“There’s my little star,” she cooed, kneeling beside the cradle. Her fingers brushed gently over Eirian’s cheek. “You’re wide awake today.”

Eirian blinked at her.

She wanted to answer. Something simple. Yes. Or I’m trying to understand everything, and I can’t move my arms right. But all that came out was a soft sound—half breath, half gurgle.

Still, Sera seemed delighted.

“You’ll speak soon,” she whispered, lifting her carefully. “I know it. You’ve got eyes like someone who’s already seen too much.”

She sat in a chair near the fire and cradled Eirian against her shoulder. The warmth of her skin, the gentle sway—it was oddly soothing. Like the spiritual resonance baths her mother used to prepare for her after intense rituals. Familiar, even though it wasn’t.

Her thoughts wandered—inevitably—home.

Was it even still there?

The moment she'd taken the demon’s soul into herself, everything had gone dark. There had been no pain—just fire, then silence, then the overwhelming sensation of falling. A soul untethered. The transition had felt instant, but time in soulspace was strange. Elastic.

Was her mother still holding her body? Screaming her name? Repeating chants over and over, trying to draw her back?

Or had she thought Eirian died?

She had been impulsive when she took the decision without thinking about her mother; now, looking back, she realized that maybe she hadn’t made a good choice.

The thought lodged like a splinter in her chest.

Her mother had been strict, yes. Unyielding at times. But she’d also loved her fiercely. You’re my brightest student, she’d once said, tracing Hana’s forehead with a thumb dipped in ink. You’ll surpass me one day, and I’ll be proud to step aside.

And now, what? She was just… gone?

Eirian closed her eyes and reached with her soul. She remembered the techniques her mother taught her, the ones that were for linking.

When a spirit was adrift, when a soul needed to find home, her mother taught her how to create a line—a thread of thought and memory and emotion—and cast it like a net.

She gathered her mana. She reached outward, and when that didn’t work, she did it upward, but it hit nothing, like trying to shout across a canyon that had no far side.

Her throat tensed.

She didn’t cry. She couldn’t—not the way babies did. But something inside her twisted. That same emptiness she used to feel as a child when her mother left to perform longer rituals alone. The ache of separation.

Sera, sensing something, adjusted her hold and started humming.

Eirian breathed in. Again. Slowly. The warmth in her chest flickered.

And something inside her responded.

The demon soul, but it didn’t speak; she could feel its fire curled gently around her core, like a silent acknowledgment.

Eirian stared at the flickering shadows on the ceiling. Somewhere beyond the walls of this cottage, a world waited.

But today, she would lie still. She would watch. She would learn.

Because she hadn’t let go to give up.

She had survived.

***

The sky outside turned silver before dawn.

Eirian didn’t sleep much—not in the way babies were expected to. Her body drifted in and out of shallow dozing, but her mind never shut off. Every flicker of wind against the window or whisper of leaves caught her attention. Every footstep Sera made across the floor became part of a new internal map: one step toward the hearth, two to the shelf, pause—mortar grinding, herbs again.

She wanted to remember everything.

Because it kept her from thinking about what she’d lost.

But that night, in the moment just before dawn, her control slipped.

Sleep took her deeper than it had before.

And she dreamed.

Not of this place, with its flickering hearthlight and wooden beams—but of the shop, of her mother’s world, of her home.

Jang’s Spirit Remedies & Blessings stood exactly where it always had—in the narrow alley beside the closed-down bookstore and the overly bright nail salon. The hand-painted sign swayed gently in the wind. The charms above the door whispered and spun, casting dappled light on the sidewalk.

But something was wrong.

There was no sound.

No smell of incense.

She stepped forward—though she had no legs, no form.

The door was ajar. She pushed it open with a breath.

Inside, everything was too clean. The floor was polished. The shelves were full. But the herbs were dry. The candles were unlit.

And there, at the back of the room, her mother stood.

Paintbrush in hand. Hair twisted up in a jade pin. Wearing her ritual apron. Eyes closed.

Silent.

“Mama,” Eirian whispered.

But her voice made no sound.

She stepped closer, trying to reach out, but her mother didn’t turn.

“Mama, I’m here—”

The figure began to dissolve, like sand carried by wind, drifting into the empty air.

“No—!”

She lurched forward, reaching—

And woke.

Her body twitched in the cradle. Her small hands clenched, though they barely curled into fists. Her breath came in short huffs—panicked, fast. A hiccup hit her chest. Her lungs ached, even in this tiny frame.

She wanted to scream. Not because she was scared of this place—but because she’d left her mother behind.

I didn’t mean to leave her.

The fire stirred slightly.

She exhaled slowly, and she felt how her chest calmed, even if her mother was out of reach… Hana had brought a piece of her, all of her knowledge, the training, and even her will. That wouldn’t vanish. Her mother had passed on more than blood. She’d taught her how to stand in a world that didn’t understand her. How to survive without being seen. How to speak in quiet magic.

And here—now—Eirian would do the same.

She would grow, but first she would learn how this world worked and maybe find a way back, if not to return, then to tell her mother she lived.

That she chose to live.

The door creaked gently sometime later, and Sera entered the room with a soft cloth in her hands. Her expression shifted when she saw Eirian awake again.

“Oh, you poor thing,” she murmured, reaching down. “Bad dreams already?”

She picked her up and held her close. Eirian’s body sagged into the warmth.

“I wish I knew what goes on in that little head of yours,” Sera whispered. “You always look so serious. Like you’re thinking more than I ever will.”

Eirian made a soft noise. A half-sigh, half-hiccup.

She couldn’t say anything yet, but she would, sooner than anyone expected.

Because this world was saturated in mana, and she could feel it responding to her even now—buzzing faintly at her skin, like threads brushing over cloth.

She’d need to learn its shape.

And then twist it into something she could use.

Because somewhere, in a different world—between sigils and the scent of sandalwood—her mother was still lighting candles for her daughter.

And Eirian would light one back.