Lowtide Village was not a place heroes came from.
It was a place that smelled of salt and old wood, where nets were mended more often than dreams were spoken aloud. The sea decided most things here—when people ate, when they worked, when they stayed indoors and waited for storms to pass.
Axiom grew inside that rhythm.
By the age of three, he could walk the docks without falling. By four, he knew which planks were loose and which ones held fast. No one taught him these things directly. He learned the way everyone in Lowtide did—by watching, by listening, by making mistakes that hurt just enough to remember.
He was quiet, but not withdrawn.
He listened when people spoke. He helped when asked. When fishermen came back with torn nets, he sat nearby and handed them tools without being told. When storms rolled in, he stayed close to the houses instead of wandering off like other children.
People noticed.
They just didn't know what to do with it.
Old Marek was the first to say it out loud.
"He's not normal," the fisherman muttered one afternoon, chewing on a pipe he never lit.
"None of us are," replied Hana, who ran the communal kitchen. "That's what living here does to you."
Marek shook his head. "No. I mean… he watches the sea like it's talking."
Axiom, sitting a few steps away, pretended not to hear.
He didn't think the sea was talking.
But it did change its tone.
There were others who shaped his days.
Hana, who fed half the village and scolded everyone equally, taught him that strength without kindness made people lonely. She never asked him where his parents were. She simply gave him extra food when he worked hard and less when he slacked.
Toren, a dockhand with a ruined knee, showed him how knots worked and why shortcuts failed when waves got angry. Toren laughed a lot and cursed even more, but he never lied.
"Truth's heavy," he liked to say. "But it floats."
Axiom remembered that.
And then there was Lysa.
She was older—nine when Axiom was five—and fearless in the way only children who hadn't been broken yet could be. She raced him along the shore, climbed rocks too steep for common sense, and once tried to stab a crab with a stick because it "looked smug."
She lost.
Badly.
Axiom dragged her away before it could pinch her again.
"You didn't have to do that," she said later, sulking.
"Yes, I did," he replied.
She stared at him for a moment, then grinned. "You're boring. But you're useful."
That was the first compliment he ever received.
The world beyond Lowtide existed mostly as stories.
Sailors passed through, bringing rumors of strange islands, dangerous waters, and Marines who looked the other way when coins changed hands. They spoke of pirates with powers that bent reality and of seas where compasses went mad.
Axiom listened carefully.
He knew these stories.
But he did not chase them.
Not yet.
Knowing the shape of the future did not mean rushing toward it. That was something his past life had taught him well—sometimes too well.
Inland, the Galeheart Wilds waited.
Axiom did not go there yet.
Not really.
Sometimes he walked just far enough to feel the wind change and then stopped. The forest felt… attentive. Not hostile. Not welcoming.
Aware.
Animals near the edge were different—leaner, tougher, eyes sharper than those closer to the village. Even the birds flew differently, gliding low when the wind shifted instead of fighting it.
Axiom watched from a distance.
Patience came easily to him.
By the time he turned six, people had stopped trying to guess what kind of man he would become.
They simply accepted that he was already a little different.
He didn't panic when a small coastal sea monster surfaced near the docks one evening—an armored, shark-like thing that sent fishermen scrambling. He helped pull nets back while others shouted, eyes tracking the creature's movement until it disappeared again.
Later, while people argued about lost catch and damaged boats, Axiom quietly asked Toren,
"Do they taste good?"
Toren blinked. "What?"
"The monsters," Axiom clarified. "If you catch them."
Toren stared at him for a long moment.
"…Yeah," he said slowly. "They do. Better than normal fish. Why?"
Axiom nodded to himself.
"Just wondering."
The year turned.
The wind shifted.
And on the morning Axiom turned seven, the Galeheart Wilds went silent.
That was when he stepped past the edge for the first time.
That was when the stream froze.
That was when he met someone who did not belong to Lowtide Village—or to Tempest Isle at all.
But that part of the story had already begun.