Dying was not dramatic.
There were no swelling violins. No slow-motion epiphany. No poetic last words.
Just headlights.
Just the sickening realization that this was it.
And the single, stupid thought echoing in his head:
I never even tried.
Music had always been "later." Singing was something he did alone, late at night, headphones on, pretending the walls weren't listening. He told himself he'd start after college. After stability. After safety.
After.
The universe, apparently, does not accept "after" as payment.
Then came darkness.
Then—
Crying.
Not metaphorical crying.
Actual, very small, very loud crying.
He was aware before he could understand why. Awareness arrived first. Language returned next. Memory followed like a tidal wave.
He didn't panic.
He just stared at the ceiling with newborn eyes and thought, I either unlocked New Game Plus… or this is the weirdest coma dream ever.
Years blurred.
He learned to walk again. To speak Japanese. To switch between English and Japanese as easily as breathing. He learned that his mother, Mina Okada, smiled like she knew more than she said. That his father, Ezekiel Morgan, shook his tiny hand with proud disbelief and whispered, "You're going to do incredible things."
He learned that Kuoh was real.
And when he heard that name for the first time, something inside him went still.
Kuoh.
He remembered the plot. The factions. The devils. The Sacred Gears.
He also remembered that in the original story, normal human boys did not live long if they wandered into the wrong alley at night.
"Okay," he muttered at age seven, staring at his reflection. "So I'm either insane… or this is that anime."
He tested gravity. It worked.
He tested pain. Also worked.
He tested something else when he was ten.
It happened by accident.
He was angry.
Not at his parents. Not at the world.
At himself.
He had just finished singing quietly in his room, voice trembling, and halfway through the last note he stopped. The same old fear crept in. The same hesitation.
What if I'm not good enough?
The thought disgusted him.
His chest tightened.
Heat spread under his skin—thick and heavy, not like adrenaline. Something deeper.
A crack of light split the air in front of him.
He didn't scream.
He stared.
Something was forming.
Metal. Shape. Weight.
It slid into existence like it had always been there and reality was just catching up.
A sword.
Long. Elegant. Heavy with presence.
He knew that design.
His breath left him in a whisper.
"No way."
He reached for it.
The moment his hand wrapped around the hilt, knowledge slammed into him—not information from outside, but recognition from within.
"I know you," he said softly.
He absolutely did.
He had spent hours with a controller in his hand swinging something almost identical across demon-infested landscapes.
"That's not funny," he muttered to the empty room. "You cannot be serious right now."
He rotated the blade slowly, inspecting it. It felt balanced. Familiar. Like muscle memory he shouldn't have.
He swallowed.
"Soul Armory," he murmured, feeling the name settle into place like a lock clicking open. "You're pulling from memory."
The sword shimmered, then dissolved—not disappearing, but folding inward, sinking into him. Into something deeper than bone.
He could still feel it.
Like a weapon stored behind his ribs.
He exhaled slowly.
"Okay," he whispered. "Either I've completely lost it… or I just unlocked Devil May Cry DLC in real life."
He did not, at any point, assume he himself was like Dante.
That would have been absurd.
Right?
Years passed.
He tested things carefully. Strength that shouldn't exist. Speed that bent expectation. Wounds that healed too fast.
He did not tell his parents.
He noticed how his mother sometimes watched him with unreadable eyes.
He noticed how when he pushed himself too far, the air around him felt heavy—predatory.
He did not dig too deep.
Some truths arrive when they are ready.
High school came quietly.
Kuoh Academy stood ahead of him now, tall and orderly and deceptively normal.
Students passed by laughing. Complaining about homework. Talking about clubs.
Elijah adjusted the strap of his bag and stared at the gates.
"So this is where it starts," he muttered.
He knew the timeline. Roughly. He knew which events would spiral into chaos. He knew which supernatural idiots loved to monologue.
He also knew one critical thing.
He wasn't the protagonist of the original story.
That meant variables.
That meant divergence.
That meant freedom.
He smiled faintly.
"New life," he murmured. "No regrets."
A group of boys brushed past him loudly.
"Hey, you're blocking the entrance."
"Sorry," Elijah replied smoothly, stepping aside.
One of them glanced at him. "You a freshman?"
"Unfortunately."
They laughed and walked off.
He exhaled and stepped through the gates.
The air felt normal.
Too normal.
He could feel it beneath the surface—the dormant currents of power threading through this town like fault lines.
He slipped a hand into his pocket and felt nothing.
But inside, deeper than muscle and bone, steel rested.
Waiting.
"Rule one," he murmured to himself. "Do not speedrun the apocalypse."
A pause.
"Rule two… talking is not a free action."
Somewhere in the building ahead, he could feel it.
Something not human.
He tilted his head slightly.
"Let's try the peaceful route first," he sighed. "I'd really like to join the music club before fighting fallen angels."
And with that, Elijah Okada-Morgan walked into Kuoh Academy.
Not as prey.
Not as protagonist.
But as a quiet hybrid carrying steel in his soul and songs in his throat.
The timeline, whether it liked it or not, had just gained a variable.