When I first opened my eyes after death…

There was no guillotine, no rope, no execution yard.

All I saw was a pale wooden ceiling… and the sound of a woman weeping in a dark corner.

I was wrapped in a white cloth.

Small… fragile… unable even to cry aloud.

“He doesn’t have the eye color…”

“Another son? Who’s the mother this time?”

They whispered, as if I couldn’t hear.

But I heard everything.

I understood everything.

Even though I couldn’t lift my head,

I was still me—Severin Duke Kairam.

Or rather… his ghost.

I had returned to the beginning.

Years passed… or something like it.

Time was slow, heavy, as if I was being dragged through it.

I grew…

Slowly.

But the fire in my chest never once dimmed.

In my third year, when I was barely taller than a sword,

The moment of trial arrived.

Six of us were lined up in the Cradle Yard—

Me and five of Heunkel’s other sons… my brothers.

But I was the youngest…

The weakest-looking.

The least valuable.

“Is that a child too? He can barely speak.”

“But the rule is clear… If he’s reached three, then he’s part of the Blood Awakening Rite.”

They said their words while I stared at the cradle…

Like one staring into the jaws of an ancient beast.

The Cradle of Blades…

A land of dust and rust, scattered with old weapons like forgotten graves.

Each blade a witness to those who walked this path before me…

Broken swords… abandoned spears…

And every stone either held the story of the victorious, or echoed the screams of those who failed—or died before me.

At the far end of the yard stood a stone gate,

Covered in red moss… like rotting flesh.

And behind it…

A sound… faint, damp, like a breath rising from the earth’s lungs.

The River of Crimson Dawn.

“Severin Duke Kairam,” the guard called out, his voice devoid of emotion.

“Without sponsor, without inheritance, with nothing but yourself…

If you wish to be counted among us, let the river decide.”

I walked.

Small steps…

My feet sinking into the soil…

My body swaying with each step, as if it didn’t belong to me.

But I didn’t stop.

I didn’t blink.

Invisible gazes passed between me and the weapons…

As if they were watching me from inside the iron.

A child? Or bait?

I stumbled—nearly fell—but I steadied myself.

I was no ordinary child.

I was the one who returned from hell.

At the river…

I removed my robe.

The water… red, warm, and strange in scent…

Like the blood of Kairam itself,

As if time had melted into it and become liquid.

And it wasn’t just the color—the river itself reacted.

It granted strength to those who entered:

Iron bones, steel skin, heightened endurance… even enhanced magical abilities.

But of course, it all depended on the person.

This river was both a blessing and a beast.

If one couldn’t withstand its power, it would tear them apart… and they would die.

I entered step by step…

Every cell in my body screaming—

As if exploding from within.

I submerged completely, forcing myself to stay in for as long as possible.

I even opened my mouth and drank from it.

Then… everything went dark.

I woke up on the shore, drenched…

I didn’t know how long I had been in there…

All I knew was that I emerged.

I raised my head and saw my reflection in the water.

My eyes…

They were no longer brown.

They were crimson.

Glowing red—

As if blood itself had chosen to live inside them… forever.