The sky was on fire.
Fighter jets screamed overhead, slicing through the thick gray smoke that covered the whole battlefield below. Their sleek silhouettes vanished into the clouds only to reappear moments later—dropping air bombs that howled like banshees before erupting into deafening explosions. Fire bloomed across the battlefield. Exact opposite to the icy fear crawling through the bones of every man still breathing.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Artillery shells rained from distant hills, tearing the earth apart. Trenches collapsed. Vehicles overturned. Infinite numbers of corpses of soldiers lay sprawled in unnatural positions, faces twisted in agony. The air was filled with the stench of sulfur, blood, and gunpowder. Burst fire crackled from bunkers.
Here and there, isolated sounds
pop… pop… pop
Sounds of single-fire shots from rifles rang out in the distance.
Screams of dying persons and of the injured pierced through the chaotic battlefield.
Visibility was nearly zero. Thick plumes of smoke curled upward from burning vehicles, tanks, and bombarded places. Fires danced like demons among the debris, licking the sky with orange tongues. The ground trembled with each blast, as if the very world was trying to shake off the plague upon it.
And in the middle of it all, lying against the remains of a crumbled wall, was Senior Major Rowan Smith.
He was 38 years old. A seasoned soldier. A leader respected and loved by his men.
And now… a dying man.
His left leg was gone, torn apart by an airstrike an hour ago. A bandage slowed the bleeding, but it was a losing battle. A bullet hole punctured his right chest, just below the collarbone, and blood soaked the front of his uniform like a red flower blossoming across his chest.
His breathing came in short, shallow gasps. Each one felt like it would be the last one.
Rowan coughed—wet and metallic. He could feel his heartbeat slowing, the warmth of his blood dripping into the scorched soil beneath him. Around him, his unit had been annihilated. Friends. Comrades. Young recruits with dreams that would never see another sunrise.
The end was near.
And yet, in these final moments, it wasn't the pain that haunted him.
It was the regret.
"Damn it… Why wasn't I better?"
Rowan closed his eyes, his face grimy with dirt and sweat.
He thought of the war—not just the one he was dying in, but the one that never should have happened. A neighboring superpower, ranked third in the world in modern military strength, had launched an unprovoked invasion on his homeland. A small, peaceful nation, not even in the top hundred in global power. It had no vast army. No powerful allies.
Just dreams. Forests. Rivers. Mountains. Beauty.
That beauty was now being reduced to ash.
"We were never supposed to win," he thought bitterly. "But we had to fight. Someone had to stand."
He thought of his wasted youth. Of the ambitions he buried. Of his decision to marry the woman he loved—only to learn, too late, that love could be a one-sided poison. His wife had been beautiful. Intelligent. But also cold. Ambitious. Manipulative. To her, Rowan's loyalty had been a weakness, not a virtue. Her family had always looked down on him. In the end, they broke his spirit long before the battlefield could break his body.
"I should've lived differently. Trained harder. Aimed higher. Loved smarter."
"I should've become strong… before it was too late."
"I wish I could save this country."
He clenched his fist weakly—barely able to hold the motion.
And then, in the smog-filled air, something impossible happened.
A soundless chime. A soft glow in front of his fading eyes.
A floating panel of light appeared in the air—translucent, digital, like a desktop monitor hovering in the air.
⸻
[Conviction Detected.]
[Candidate Profile: Rowan Smith | Rank: Senior Major | Age: 38]
[Mental Integrity: High | Moral Standing: Honorable | Combat Record: Verified]
[You have been chosen.]
[You will be given a second chance.]
[Your body may have failed, but your will has endured.]
[Reinitializing Timeline: -28 years.]
[New Age: 10]
[Location: Armath High School, Capital Region]
[Good luck, soldier.]
⸻
"…What…?"
The panel flickered. The world spun. His vision went white.
His last breath was not of pain… but of disbelief.
⸻
THUMP!
Rowan jolted upright, his hands shooting forward as if trying to catch a falling grenade.
But there was no explosion.
No smoke. No blood. No pain.
Just… silence.
The sound of ceiling fans. Distant marker pen against a whiteboard. The squeak of chairs and murmurs of students.
His lungs filled with air which was easy, clean, almost unnaturally fresh.
He looked down.
Two legs. Both of them.
Smooth skin. No scars. No bullet wounds. No pain in his chest.
His hands were small. His arms were thin. His voice—when he gasped—was higher.
He was young. Very young.
He looked around, heart hammering. Students were seated in rows. A whiteboard at the front of the classroom read:
"ARMATH HIGH SCHOOL – CLASS 1-A"
One student leaned over. A boy with a buzzcut whispered, "Oi, Rowan! You good, man? You were spacing out."
N..Nick? asked Rowan.
"Yeah, what? Why are you acting so strange, Rowan?" asked Nick.
"Umm... it's nothing."
"You two. Don't gossip. Rowan and Nick, last warning for you," the teacher shouted from the front.
Rowan slowly looked around, hands trembling—not in fear, but in shock. Every detail around him was burned into his memory. The cracked tile on the ceiling. The classroom walls.
This was real.
"I… I'm back. I'm really back. Twenty-eight years ago. Ten years old."
⸻
And just like that, the weight of a second life dropped onto his young shoulders.
He had time now. Time to train. Time to prepare. Time to grow into the man he could become if he wanted to—not for glory, not for revenge, but to protect the country he loved. And to enjoy his life fully.
This time, he wouldn't waste it.
This time… he would rise.
But... what's with this panel?
To be continued.