Chapter 2: The Start of the Next Life
When Kye opened his eyes, he found himself laying in a beautifully adorned bedroom with many people looking at him anxiously. Among the concerned were many women dressed in servant clothing alongside several young ladies who wore exquisite dresses. Kye felt his own hand be grabbed by someone beside him. Turning his head slightly he met the gaze of a woman with hazel eyes and a gentle look. Her light brown hair was cut short in a bob and her skin was flawless. Tears began to well in her eyes as she hurriedly embraced the awakened Kye in her bosom.
"sob... My darling little man. You've finally awoken... do you have any idea how worried I was!?"
She held Kye's face in her hands as she looked directly into his eyes. Kye could infer from the current situation that the body he was reincarnated into was not his originally and that the owner of this body had likely passed on in whatever accident had bedridden him. The woman in front of him was this bodies mother which meant that this was now his mother. While his father in his past life was a big influence on his life, he never had a maternal figure as his own mother died in childbirth and his father did not remarry.
Feeling such pure feelings of love helped Kye reconcile the feelings of guilt that bubbled to the surface of his heart at taking this child's body for his own selfish purposes. Before Kye could respond the door to the spacious bedroom was flung open and a man in a heavily decorated military outfit revealed himself. He was very tall and broad-shouldered with a well-groomed beard that matched his cropped black hair. He rushed over to the side of the woman and placed a hand around her shoulder while maintaining eye contact with Kye. The man was clearly Kye's father in this life.
"My boy... are you feeling okay now?"
Kye gave a small smile to his father.
"I have a slight headache but other than that, i'm fine."
His parents just looked at him in shock and Kye was bewildered. Why would a simple sentence cause such a reaction. Before he had time to ask he was embraced by both his parents as they both cried. His father finally broke his quiet sobbing and raised his head to the sky.
"My son can speak!!! Thank you goddess for answering my prayers! My son isn't a cripple anymore!"
Kye now understood why he was reincarnatied into this body. This family had prayed for their son to get better but was crippled since birth. By putting Kye into this body, Alayah fufilled her own wishes as well as those of this family. Kye smiled and hugged his parents back. Kye swore in his heart that he would give these loving parents a son they could be proud of and that he, despite not being their actual son, would accept them as his new family. He tightened his hug as his parents looked at him lovingly. This time would be different, of that Kye would make sure.
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Kye was given some time alone in his room as his parents still worried that he might still be sick. With the time to himself, he decided that looking through his past memories would be for the best. He discovered that his father's name was Frey Runewalker, the Archduke of the Runewalker border territory. Kye knew of the Runewalker territory from his past life as one of tough people and traditional ways. Though they might have been traditional, they honoured military strength more than most as due to their position as a border territory, they kept a large standing force to deal with invading armies or the hordes of monsters that threatened the rest of the Alioth Kingdom.
Knowing that he was now part of such a prestegious family filled Kye with mixed feelings of pride and pressure. The expectation for him to perform as the son of a famed military house would be immense but should he rise to the occasion, a large amount of prestiege would be afforded to him. With Kye now being only 5 years old, he had a fair chance of gaining some skill with a weapon if he began training soon.
"I guess the next big question is what crest will I receive when I mature."
In his past life, Kye had received two crests, those of the arcanist and mechanist. In his age, these professions were seen as useless and so, despite having two crests, he was seen as lesser by society as a whole. But now Kye had observed his room some more, he noticed lights that emitted no smoke and no heat, the room was sufficiently lit without candles which was unheard of in his era.
Gingerly getting out of bed, Kye made his way to one of these lights that adorned the walls in decorative sconces. Much to his shock, within the sconce was a small crystal shining brilliantly! Kye didn't hesitiate to pull the crystal out of the sconce and examine it closer. This was exactly what he was experimenting with before he died! This material was known as clearstone and was usually regarded as useless but it had immense magical potential. Kye infused magical essence into his stones but this one seemed to use the less pure substance of light mana.
Mana was categorically the most pure form of mana but Kye had discovered faint similarities between all kinds of mana in his past life and had suspected that there was something even more fundamental to mana that they could not comprehend. This is what Kye called magical essence in his papers as he lacked the time to come up with a proper term. This essence was adaptable and many times more powerful but refining mana was impossible to even the most high class of mages. Yet Kye had made a device using his talents as an arcanist and mechanist to extract this essence from the mana that flowed in the air.
With this clearstone imbued with mana, it meant that arcanists now had found jobs as only a talented arcanist could use mana in such a way. While a mage used a magic circle and runes to activate a magic spell, an arcanist was skilled in manipulating mana. However an arcanist could not draw mana from the air by themselves so they could not use spells like a mage so they had to use a catalyst. This catalyst was usually some kind of beast core with a specific element but these were expensive and could be used to forge more specialist equipment for knights and such which meant being an effective arcanist was extremely expensive and in war time, the kingdom would confiscate arcanist's beast cores to make equipment for their soldiers.
But if these clearstone lights were now used, then perhaps the perception of arcanists had shifted into a more positive light. Kye was enthused by this revelation and happily put the clearstone back and climbed into the bed. He had to get some sleep in so that he could start training soon. In this life, Kye wanted to be someone strong, someone that could protect the people he cared about. And to that end, he wanted to work on finding friends and living a more social life than he did before.
Kye pulled the blanket up to his shoulders and closed his eyes. The soft glow of the lights in the sconces bathed the room in a gentle light that one of the servants would no doubt come in and turn off later. Kye settled into the comfortable mattress and finally drifted off to sleep, dreaming about the wonders that awaited him in this life.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone