The training grounds of House Verant were huge.
Kaelen stood at the edge of the dirt field, a flower in hand, his posture deliberately loose, and watched the young knights spar. The morning sun glinted off polished armor. Steel rang against steel. Spectators lined the walls.
He had been summoned here by Aldric, ostensibly to observe the training of the house knights. In reality, it was another humiliation the useless son made to watch the capable ones, to measure himself against their strength and find himself wanting. The brother had always done this.
Forty-three knights in the main yard. Another twenty in the archery range beyond. Average skill level: competent but unexceptional. The captain is the only one with real combat experience his footwork gives it away.
He catalogued it all with the efficiency of a man who had spent decades assessing threats. The knights were strong, well-fed, well-equipped. But they trained for tournaments, not war. Their forms were beautiful but predictable. Their strikes were powerful but telegraphed.
In his original body, he could have cut through them in seconds.
In this body…
He flexed his fingers. The muscles responded, stronger than a month ago, but still pathetically weak. His mana pathways were barely functional, his reflexes were those of a civilian, not a hunter.
The gap between what he knew and what he could do was vast. And every day, it grated against him like a blade against bone.
A window flickered in the corner of his vision.
Kaelen's breath caught, he had not seen it since the void since the red text that had announced his death and reincarnation. He had assumed it was gone, a relic of whatever process had dragged him into this world.
But there it was. Pale blue, translucent, hovering at the edge of his sight.
[System: Initializing…]
[Error: Connection to Sovereign unstable.]
[Limited functionality available.]
[Status: Partial awakening.]
His heart rate did not change, his expression did not shift. But beneath his skin, the hum spiked, a sharp pulse that made his teeth ache, it had felt his change in emotion and responded.
There would be time to investigate the system later. For now, he needed to observe, to learn, to understand the capabilities of the people around him.
He let his gaze drift across the training yard, and the window shifted.
[Target: House Verant Knight-Captain Garrick Vale]
[Rank: C (Provisional)]
[Combat Efficiency: 67%]
[Notable Skills: Heavy Blade Mastery (Adept), Shield Wall (Advanced)]
[Threat Assessment: Low]
Kaelen's eyes narrowed. The system was evaluating combat potential. Ranking it and giving him data he could use.
He looked at a his brother.
[Target: Sir Aldric Verant]
[Rank: B (Provisional)]
[Combat Efficiency: 74%]
[Notable Skills: Sword Mastery (Adept), Noble Combat (Advanced), Intimidation (Expert)]
[Threat Assessment: Moderate]
B-rank. Provisional. In his original world, B-rank hunters were dangerous. Here, apparently, the scale was different. Or the system was calibrated to something else.
He looked at his own hands, the window did not shift, no assessment of his own capabilities.
Limited functionality. Partial awakening.
He would need to understand what that meant and what it was that brought him to this world.
Aldric finished his bout with a flourish, his sword carving a silver arc through the air. The spectators applauded. The knights cheered. Aldric basked in it, his chest heaving, his smile wide.
Then he turned to Kaelen.
"Well, little brother? What do you think? Impressed?"
The question was a trap. If Kaelen said yes, he was admitting his own inferiority. If he said no, he was challenging the golden son. Either way, Aldric would have an excuse to humiliate him further.
Kaelen chose a third option.
"You move well," he said, his voice mild. "Your footwork is solid. But you're over-rotating on your backhand. It leaves your left flank exposed for a full second after the strike."
The yard went silent.
Aldric's smile froze, the knights exchanged glances. The spectators leaned forward, their breath held.
Kaelen had not meant to say it. The words had come out before he could stop them, he almost bit his tongue, the instinct of a hunter, trained to analyze, to correct, to improve. In his old life, he had been a teacher as much as a killer. Breaking down forms, identifying weaknesses, pushing his students past their limits.
That instinct had just cost him.
Aldric's face shifted through several expressions before settling on cold amusement. "Is that so? And what would you know about footwork, brother? You can barely stand without a wall to lean on."
Laughter rippled through the knights. Aldric's smile returned, sharper now, a blade testing the edge of a wound.
Kaelen let his shoulders slump. Let his eyes drop.
"You're right. I don't know anything. I was just repeating something I heard once. From a trainer. When I was young."
The lie was smooth, practiced. He had learned to lie in dungeons, to mask his intentions, to appear weaker than he was. This was no different.
Aldric's eyes narrowed. For a moment, Kaelen thought he had pushed too far—that the golden son had seen something behind the mask.
Then Aldric laughed.
"A trainer. Right. The same trainers who gave up on you when you couldn't hold a sword without crying." He turned back to the knights, dismissing Kaelen with a wave. "Come. Let's show my little brother what real combat looks like."
The knights resumed their drills. The spectators turned away. Kaelen was forgotten again, a piece of furniture at the edge of the yard.
He let out a slow breath.
That was close.
But the system had not been idle. As Aldric had turned away, another window had flickered in Kaelen's vision.
[Skill Recognized: Combat Analysis (Passive)]
[Proficiency: Master]
[Note: Current body cannot support this skill at full capacity. Efficiency reduced by 83%.]
Eighty-three percent. He had lost more than four-fifths of his capability. And yet, even that fraction had been enough to see what the knights could not.
He looked at Aldric again. The system provided a new assessment:
[Adjusted Threat Assessment: Low-Moderate]
[Vulnerabilities Identified: 7]
[Critical Weakness: Left flank, 1.4 seconds after backhand strike.]
Kaelen stored the information and said nothing.
The training continued for another hour. Kaelen watched, catalogued, learned. The system provided data on every knight who passed through his field of vision their ranks, their skills, their weaknesses. It was more information than he could process in one session, more than he could safely act on with his current limitations.
But it was a start.
As the session ended and the knights dispersed, the Captain approached him. Garrick Vale was a solid man, broad-shouldered, his face weathered by years of service. Unlike Aldric, he did not sneer. He looked at Kaelen with something that might have been curiosity.
"You saw the backhand," Vale said. His voice was low, meant only for Kaelen's ears.
Kaelen looked up his eyes showing the right amount of confusion. "What are you talking about?"
"You saw it, the rotation." Vale studied him with eyes that had seen battle,. "That's not something a person with no sword knowledge would notice."
It was like he had made up his mind but Kaelen was more stubborn than he thought.
"Sir I really don't know what you are talking about," he said.
"Ha ha, I will keep your secret don't worry, the knights here have not been in dungeons so the do not know how a real fight looks like."
"Uhm, okay." He moved a side looking at knight with enough disgust to make a normal person move away.
Vale's expression did not change
"You're not what they say you are."
Kaelen met his eyes. "Really? They say I am a drunk and last time I checked I did break my head from drinking."
Vale looked at Kaelen for a long moment, then turned and walked away without another word.
Kaelen watched him go.
The system flickered:
[Potential Ally Identified: Garrick Vale]
[Loyalty: Uncertain]
[Note: This individual may be cultivated.]
That night, alone in his room, Kaelen finally turned his full attention to the system.
He sat cross-legged on the floor, his breathing steady, and willed the interface to appear.
It did.
[System: Verant-01 (Limited)]
[Host: Caelus Verant (Vessel Occupied)]
[Original Designation: Kaelen Voss, S-Rank Hunter]
[Status: Degraded. Recovery in progress.]
[Available Functions:]
Combat Analysis (Passive) – Master (83% degradation) Target Assessment – Active (Limited to visual range) Status Monitoring – Partial (Self-assessment unavailable) Skill Registry – Locked
[Locked Functions Require:]
Mana pathway restoration (0% complete) Sovereign connection stabilization (0% complete) ???
Kaelen read the information twice, committing it to memory.
The system was a powerful tool.
Mana pathway restoration. Sovereign connection stabilization.
The first was his responsibility. The second… he will understand it slowly.
He closed the interface and reached for his mana pathways.
The familiar spark flickered. The pain flared, he held his ground, breathing through it, forcing the thin trickle of power to move through the damaged channels.
[Mana Pathway Restoration: 0.3% complete]
The window appeared and vanished. Kaelen smiled grimly.
Progress.
He closed his eyes and continued the work.
The hum woke him at midnight.
Kaelen sat up in bed, his heart pounding, his senses screaming. The room was dark, the house was silent.
[Warning: Sovereign connection fluctuation detected.]
[Source: Unknown.]
[Distance: Approximate. City-wide.]
City-wide. The presence was not in the estate. It was somewhere in the capital. And it was reaching for him.
He rose from the bed, moving to the window. The city glittered below, thousands of lights flickering in the darkness. Somewhere in that maze, something was watching.
He closed his eyes and let the hum rise. Let it pulse. Let it reach toward the presence that had brushed against him earlier.
This time, the response was immediate.
A window blazed in his vision, red text burning against the darkness:
[Connection Detected.]
[Designation: ???]
[Status: Active.]
[Warning: This connection cannot be severed.]
Kaelen stared at the words.
He looked out at the city, at the thousands of lights, at the darkness between them.
Somewhere out there, someone was connected to him. Someone who made the hum spike, who made the system activate, who made his heart beat faster without his permission.
He did not know who and he did not know why.
The red window flickered once, then vanished. The hum subsided to its usual murmur.
Kaelen did not sleep. He stood at the window, watching the lights, and waited for dawn.
Across the city, in a manor of black stone and silver shadows, the Duke of Valtor rose from his bed.
His chest was tight, his pulse was racing. And in his mind, a single word echoed, repeated, would not fade:
Kaelen.
He did not know the name, he had never heard it before. But as he stood in the darkness, staring toward the district where the lesser houses made their homes, he knew with a certainty that had no rational foundation that somewhere in this city, someone was looking back at him.
He smiled. It was a predator's smile, sharp and hungry.
Found you.
The thread between them pulsed once, strong enough to make him smile.