Chapter 7: Rebirth

The fire's roar was still in his ears — a blazing fury swallowing everything. Heat seared his skin, smoke clawed at his lungs, and the world was collapsing in a storm of ash and flame. I never got to finish Shadow Slave… The thought burned sharper than the flames.

Then, silence.

Cold, biting silence that clawed through his mind.

His eyes fluttered open, but the world was no longer a furnace. Instead, gray clouds roiled overhead, the wind howled like a beast in the mountains, whipping ragged leaves and loose earth around him. Rain spat against his skin, cold and unforgiving.

His body was a prison of pain. A sharp sting throbbed at the back of his head, sticky warmth sliding down his temple. He tried to move, but every muscle screamed in protest. Crawling forward, he stumbled through mud, boots sinking in soaked dirt.

Ahead, a shallow puddle caught the meager light. Bari bent down, breath shallow and ragged, to look into it.

Staring back was not the man who had walked out of Blackgate years ago.

Wide, curious eyes looked up at him — soft, unscarred, bewildered.

He was no older than five or six.

His hand touched his face, smooth and unlined, his fingers trembling.

The storm raged on, fierce and relentless — but inside him, a fierce, stubborn flame still burned. The fire may have taken his old life, but it could never quench his will to fight.

The rain thickened, cold drops mingling with the blood on his temple as Bari forced himself to stand. His legs wobbled like saplings in a storm, barely holding the weight of this new, fragile body. Every joint ached with unfamiliar weakness, muscles thinner and less certain. He felt raw — reborn but broken.

Around him, the world was grey and unforgiving.

The buildings were jagged and alien, their walls cracked and stained, as if the city itself was wounded and forgotten. Narrow streets twisted in labyrinthine patterns, slick with grime and rainwater. The air tasted sour, heavy with the stench of rot and neglect. Broken windows gaped like empty eyes, and the distant howl of wind echoed through deserted alleys.

He blinked against the cold, letting his senses slowly sharpen.

His ears caught the rhythmic drip of water, the harsh rustle of wind tearing through ragged banners hanging limply from rusted poles. Somewhere nearby, the low murmur of a river struggling against the rain — a relentless pulse beneath the city's decay.

He shivered, the weight of his soaked clothes clinging to thin skin.

This wasn't the world he had known — not New York, not the coastal town where he'd found fleeting peace. Time had folded, twisted him into this strange new place. A place that felt ancient, yet alive with an ominous energy just beneath the surface.

His hands trembled as he touched his face — smooth, unmarked by scars or years. He tried to move his fingers, testing the limits of this small body that wasn't his own. The sensation was foreign, distant — like a faded echo of memory.

Memories flooded back in jagged shards. The prison. The fire. Elias. The last moments burned into his soul.

He staggered forward, unsteady steps carrying him into the mist-shrouded streets.

He needed answers — where was he? When was this? Was this another life, or something worse?

His eyes caught a twisted sign nailed crookedly to a post. The letters were strange, carved deep but unfamiliar. His breath hitched.

The sky above was a bruised purple-gray, lightning slicing across in violent jagged veins, and the wind whipped fiercely through the narrow lanes, as if nature itself was angry, warning him.

Pain still throbbed in his head, but beneath it, a spark of clarity kindled.

Bari — no, this new self — needed to survive.

To understand.

To rise again.

Because whatever this place was, it was his new battlefield.

***

Bari's footsteps echoed softly on the wet cobblestones as he pushed deeper into the maze-like streets. Each breath hung heavy in the cold air, mist swirling around him like ghosts whispering secrets he couldn't yet understand.

His eyes darted to every shadow, every flicker of movement, but the city was eerily silent. No laughter, no shouts, no familiar hum of life — only the restless wind that seemed to carry a faint, mournful song.

He reached a narrow alley where faded posters clung desperately to crumbling walls. The characters were strange, curling in shapes that danced just beyond his memory's reach. His fingers traced the paper, brittle and damp.

A sudden sharp pain stabbed his temple, reminding him of the blood seeping down his face. He cupped his hand and brought it to a grimy puddle pooled in the gutter.

The reflection staring back was not his own — or at least, not the man he remembered.

Wide, uncertain red irises peered up at him from the small, pale face framed boy. Tangled black hair made out of silk. His skin pale yet tanned, smooth, untouched by age or hardship. The body beneath his hands was small and fragile, not the hardened frame of the man who had walked free from prison, nor the firefighter who had faced death with unwavering courage.

He was a child.

Five or six years old, maybe four he could not tell.

The cold bit deeper as he knelt by the puddle, trying to steady his racing thoughts.

How? Why?

Questions spiraled through his mind like the storm clouds above.

He pushed himself upright, limbs trembling. The city around him felt less like a place and more like a test — a challenge to unravel and survive.

Ahead, the silhouette of a market square appeared through the fog. Rusted stalls stood abandoned, their once vibrant colors faded to dull ash. Broken carts spilled their forgotten goods onto cracked stone.

Bari wandered closer, senses alert.

A faint scent of something familiar teased his nose — a mixture of wet earth and something sharper, like a faint trace of smoke.

He paused beside a statue, its face worn away by time, but the shape suggested a warrior frozen in eternal battle.

The sky rumbled, and the wind whipped again, scattering leaves and debris in frantic circles.

He shivered and wrapped his thin arms around himself, feeling the chill seep into his bones.

With every step, the alien nature of this world pressed harder against his memory. The weight of the man he was — the fighter, the father, the avenger — seemed both distant and aching close.

Bari knew one thing with brutal clarity: he had been given this second chance.

But to what end?

He had to find answers.

And he would need all the strength left in this small, battered body to face whatever lay ahead.