A Language for Rain

Rain fell in gentle sheets over the Vaelmir Isles, turning the lake beside the Ryla estate into a mirror of ripples and mist. Somewhere near its edge, tucked under the slanted roof of a broad wooden pavilion, sat a five-year-old boy with his legs kicked up on the railing like he was twice his age and had just finished negotiating a trade treaty.

Arkiz Norzé Ryla.

Black-haired. White-eyed. Soul of a man, body of a child.

At five years old, Arkiz looked… well, unfairly charming for someone who still had trouble finishing his vegetables.

Most kids that age were a mess of snot and bruised knees. Arkiz, on the other hand, looked like he'd walked out of a royal painting someone had forgotten to finish. He took after his mother — clearly. The pale skin, the soft, graceful features, the faint elven angles in his jawline — even his subtly pointed ears—unlike the long, tapering ones of a pureblood elf—carried an unusually elven grace, lending him a quiet sort of elegance.

Even the way his hair fell was suspiciously photogenic: long for a boy his age, ink-black and slightly messy, with a few strands that constantly slipped over his eyes no matter how often the maids tried to trim them.

And those eyes...

White. Not pale. Not silver. White — like moonlight trapped under glass. They weren't blank or fogged like the blind; far from it. You could still see the pupil and iris in the center, faintly outlined like ink on snow, always moving, always watching. Not quite Byakugan-level intense, but close enough that strangers sometimes looked twice.

His eyes didn't glow, not yet. But they didn't need to. When people spoke to him, they could feel something ticking behind them. Like a storm, quiet but coiled.

No one called him handsome yet — five was too young for that. But he was the kind of child who made people pause and think, He's going to break hearts someday.

And with the way he carried himself — feet propped on the pavilion railing, tea gently steaming beside him, and a book balanced on his knees like a lifelong companion — it was clear he was aiming to break a few records early. 

He was currently half-buried under a modest mountain of books smuggled from the family library when no one was looking.

Except his maid. She definitely saw. And just as definitely pretended not to.

He wore a loose white shirt to go with the shorts, his preferred outfit on rainy days like this. Honestly, most of the Ryla family dressed this way — comfort over elegance was practically a family motto. Even his father, a supposed "lord," was usually spotted in sleeveless shirts and ridiculously colorful shorts.

Arkiz had only seen two of his siblings so far, ah maybe three now — Nyra, always climbing trees barefoot, and Maerin, Selis's daughter, who once wore her skirt backward for an entire afternoon and didn't care one bit.

To the rest of the noble world, the Rylas might seem odd — nobles who didn't dress like nobles. But that's what made them Rylas. His father, Raen, had started as a common adventurer before rising high enough through the Omniscript to earn even the snobbiest noble's reluctant respect. He didn't care for stiff collars or long robes. Power didn't come from brocade, he always said. It came from grit.

Arkiz agreed. Especially if grit meant breathable fabrics and a decent waistband.

Velaran — the human language of Vireya — flowed easily in his head now. The letters, the syntax, the weird silent H's that served no purpose except to look ancient and wise. He could read it, write it, and even copy his tutor's angry handwriting when bored.

Most noble kids his age could barely scribble their names. Speaking it fluently was expected — sure. Even toddlers in noble circles were trained to say "My lord" before they could say "Mom."

But writing? That was for seven-year-olds. Maybe eight, if their family was particularly laid-back or wildly rich and didn't need them to read contracts.

Arkiz, though? He had a head start.

Something about his soul — maybe the whole "former adult consciousness tucked into a toddler" situation — gave him better memory retention than most kids. His brain felt like a sponge with a grudge.

Also didn't hurt that Aether flowed through his veins like caffeine in a college student. Not that he could use it yet — he hadn't awakened — but it pulsed there, subtly refining everything. His focus. His reflexes. His ability to remember weird words like "plasmic lattice deformation."

Honestly, the only downside to learning so fast was that his maid now had higher expectations. One time she caught him doodling in a math book and sighed like he'd failed the entire Ryla bloodline.

"At this rate," she'd muttered, "you'll be rewriting the family charter by six."

He was tempted.

______

With a quiet hum of satisfaction, Arkiz reached into the pocket of his soft cream-colored shorts and pulled out a small, palm-sized artifact — shaped like a sleek black hover-drone, smooth and faintly warm to the touch. Officially, it was called the Veritas Lexicon, but he privately called it "Lexi" when no one was listening.

It had taken a week of shameless begging, strategic pouting, and three dramatically staged library sulks to get Lexi from his father. Raen had only caved after Arkiz correctly recited all three founding treaties of the Vaelmir Isles — in Velaran — while upside-down on the couch.

Totally worth it.

The Lexicon was powered by recharged Aether — plug it into a sunwell or aether port, wait a few hours, and it would be back to full charge, ready to untangle the most ancient of scripts. No soulbond required. No risks of it fusing with your spine. Just reliable, sleek utility.

Of course, Velaran — the ancient, lyrical language of humankind — he already had that down.

Reading as always was the real prize. If you couldn't read, you couldn't learn. And if you couldn't learn, well… goodbye secret knowledge of the world, hello awkward social gatherings with old nobles talking about cheese exports.

Sometimes he wondered if learning to read was even worth it. Once he awakened at twelve, the Omniscript would handle all spoken languages anyway. No more language barriers, no more awkward pauses.

But books?

Yeah. The system didn't help with those. Omniscript didn't do your homework. If you wanted to read the ancient secrets of fire mages or the travelogues of merfolk explorers, you had to put in the time.

"Of course the system gives me subtitles, but won't read me bedtime stories."

His maid—Aurela, sweet woman with sharp eyes and sharper secrets—had once read him a bedtime story from a Sylveri scroll. He'd begged to know how she could read that swirly script, and that's how he discovered the Translator.

She'd used it like it was nothing. Which, to her, it probably was.

After that, he'd launched a campaign to acquire one. Raen resisted until Arkiz gave him the look—the one that combined puppy eyes, smug persistence, and a weirdly detailed recitation of how aether recharging stations worked.

Victory was sweet.

He picked up the next book — lighter, thinner, and clearly Elven. The cover shimmered with a soft, shifting glow. Silver-inked letters danced across the title like ripples in moonlight. Sylvari — elegant, impractical, and impossible for him to read without help.

With a flick of his thumb, Arkiz activated the device, touched it to the page, and let it hum softly as it scanned the first lines. The sleek artifact recognized Sylvari instantly and began its conversion—projecting crisp black Velaran letters over a faint white holographic backdrop, hovering just above the paper.

Lexi currently held two languages in its archive: Sylvari and Velaran. That was all Arkiz needed to translate one into the other.

The title, as the Lexicon revealed a moment later, read:

"Cartographs and Currents: The Shaping of Vireya."

"Ah," he murmured with a satisfied nod. "Overpriced. Unnecessarily spherical. Still—useful."

The translated text began to flow seamlessly, revealing diagrams of Vireya's tectonic layout, notes on major leylines, and Aether-rich zones — particularly the southern sea cluster known as the Vaelmir Isles.

Right where he lived.

The rain picked up.

Arkiz smiled.

Ideal life? Not quite.

But a peaceful moment in a world he still barely understood?

He'd take it—for now.

Peace wouldn't last forever.

But five years old was a good age to enjoy the rain.