Back at the adventurer's guild, the weight of the riverbank refused to lift.
Elara sat alone in the corner of the common room, hands folded tightly in her lap, staring at nothing. The golden glow she usually carried the same soft light that had once healed broken bones and soothed fevered brows felt dim tonight. She kept replaying it: the father's final gasp, the son's low, broken "Leave," the way the young man had held the body like it was the only thing tethering him to the world.
She had seen death before. Monsters. Bandits. Even comrades lost in battle.
But this… this was different.
It was quiet. Personal. Unnecessary.
And the voice that single word had cut deeper than she expected. Not anger. Not hatred. Just… exhaustion. A man who had already buried too much.
She pressed her palms to her eyes, trying to push the memory away.
It wouldn't leave.
Across the room, Raymond leaned against a wooden pillar, arms crossed, staring at the floorboards. He wasn't the type to brood — he was the summoned hero, the one who charged forward, who believed every problem had a sword or spell to solve it. But tonight he felt small.
The stranger's voice echoed in his head: "Leave."
Not shouted. Not threatened.
Just… done.
Like Raymond and his party were nothing more than background noise in someone else's tragedy.
He hated that feeling.
Kufa, the boisterous warrior who usually filled every silence with laughter, sat unusually quiet at the bar. His massive shoulders slumped. He kept turning his empty tankard in his hands, staring at it like it owed him answers.
"I didn't mean…" he muttered once, then stopped.
No one answered.
There was nothing to say.
Haldir the sharp-eyed archer whose arrow had flown true and terrible stood abruptly.
"I need a drink," he said, voice flat. "Anyone coming?"
It wasn't really a question.
Kufa looked up. "Yeah. I'm in."
Raymond pushed off the pillar. "I'll come."
Beatrice the mage whose spells had scorched the clearing hesitated, then sighed and stood. "Fine. But I'm not carrying you home when you pass out."
Elara stayed seated.
She didn't trust herself to speak yet.
The four of them walked to the tavern across the street a dim, smoky place called The Wandering Flame. Inside, the air was thick with ale and roasted meat. Haldir ordered a round of dark stout without asking.
They sat in a corner booth, away from the bard's half-hearted lute.
No one spoke for the first few minutes.
Just clinking mugs.
The fire crackling.
Then Haldir drained half his tankard in one go and slammed it down.
"I didn't aim for him," he said suddenly. "I aimed for the demon. The arrow curved. Wind shifted. I swear it."
Kufa stared into his mug. "I know. Doesn't change anything."
Raymond rubbed his face. "We were trying to protect people. That's what heroes do."
Beatrice snorted softly. "Heroes don't kill farmers by accident."
Silence again.
Elara had followed them after all.
She stood in the doorway for a moment, unnoticed, watching the four of them sit like mourners at a wake.
Then she walked over and slid into the booth beside Beatrice without a word.
Kufa glanced at her. "Thought you weren't coming."
"I wasn't," she said quietly. "But I couldn't stop thinking about it."
No one asked her to explain.
They all knew.
Haldir raised his mug again, voice rough. "To the man we didn't save. And to the son who told us to leave."
They clinked mugs a hollow sound.
Elara stared at the foam in her untouched drink.
"That voice…" she whispered. "I've heard something like it before. A long time ago. In someone who had already lost everything.
Raymond looked at her sharply. "You knew him?"
"No," she said. "Not him. But… someone like him."
She didn't elaborate.
She didn't need to.
The fire popped.
The bard played a slow, mournful tune.
And in the dim light of The Wandering Flame, five people who called themselves heroes sat in silence each carrying the weight of one arrow that had flown too far.
The burial was simple.
A small plot behind the farm, under the old oak that had shaded them all for years. No priest. No grand rites. Just Vael and his mother, two shovels, and the quiet sound of earth falling on wood.
They stood there long after the last clod was patted down.
His mother clutched the small wooden marker Vael had carved his father's name, rough but steady. She didn't cry anymore. The tears had dried somewhere between the riverbank and home. Now she just looked… smaller.
Vael stared at the fresh mound, hands still stained with soil.
No matter how hard I tried to avoid it, he thought, the life of Vael keeps dragging me down the same path.
Revenge.
In his previous life the one where he had worn the name like a curse it had started with something like this. A wound too deep to heal. A spark of anger that grew into shadow and flame.
Maybe it had been a different incident back then.
Maybe a sister lost, or a village burned, or a betrayal sharper than steel.
He didn't know.
The memories were hazy now, worn thin by time and two other lives.
But the shape felt familiar.
Pain → rage → power → ruin.
He clenched his fists until the dirt under his nails bit into skin.
Not this time.
Not in this life.
I'll change it. No matter what.
His mother touched his arm light, trembling.
"Vael… come inside. It's getting cold."
He nodded, but his eyes lingered on the grave a moment longer.
Days passed in a gray haze.
The farm didn't stop needing care just because one heart had.
Cows still needed milking.
Fields still needed tending.
His mother still rose before dawn to knead dough, though her hands shook more now.
Vael took on more.
He couldn't sit still.
If he stopped moving, the thoughts came louder.
One afternoon he told her he was going hunting.
"I'll stay out overnight," he said. "Deer or wild boar. Something we can sell at market. We need the coin."
She looked at him really looked and for a second he thought she saw through everything: the infinite power, the three lifetimes, the guilt.
But she only nodded.
"Be careful. Come back before the second night."
He packed light: a tent, a bow he rarely used, a knife, a small sack of bread and dried meat.
He walked deep into the forest until the trees grew thick and the river sang louder than the wind.
He set up camp near the water's edge close enough to fish if the hunting failed.
He built a small fire, fed it dry twigs, watched the flames catch.
Then the sky split open.
Rain came hard and sudden, drumming on leaves, soaking through his cloak in minutes.
The fire hissed and died.
The firewood carefully gathered turned dark and useless.
Vael sat under the half-pitched tent, staring at the dead embers.
Then a thought.
Small.
Almost silly.
What if I just… removed the water?
He stared at the sodden logs.
Infinite skills.
Infinite control.
He raised a hand, palm open, and focused.
Not on fire.
Not on force.
On water.
He felt it every droplet clinging to the wood, seeping into the fibers.
He pulled.
The rain around the logs shimmered, then lifted tiny silver threads rising into the air like smoke in reverse.
The wood lightened, steamed faintly, and dried before his eyes.
Vael blinked.
Then he laughed short, surprised, almost boyish.
Eureka.
He felt ridiculous.
Like some mad scientist in one of his old Earth novels, goggles askew, hair wild.
Genius. Absolute genius.
The laughter faded, but the spark didn't.
He looked at the river.
If I can pull water from wood… what else can I pull?
He stood, rain dripping from his hair, and walked to the bank.
He raised both hands this time one feeling for life, the other for water.
He sensed them immediately: fish, prawns, crabs, lobsters every creature swimming, breathing, carrying liquid in their bodies.
He focused on the water inside them.
And pulled.
The surface erupted.
Silver bodies leaped, arced through the air, and landed on the bank in a writhing, glittering heap.
Prawns skittered.
Crabs snapped claws.
Fish flopped, gills gasping.
Vael stared, mouth open.
He stepped back, half-laughing, half-awed.
He hadn't even tried hard.
It was effortless.
Like breathing.
He knelt, sorting quickly big ones into the sack, small ones gently back into the river.
No need to be greedy.
He sat on the wet stones, rain still falling, sack heavy beside him.
For the first time in three lifetimes, he felt something close to excitement not for power, not for revenge, but for possibility.
Maybe I don't have to lose everything again.
Maybe I can protect what's left.
The rain eased to a drizzle.
Vael looked up at the sky, water running down his face.
Not this time.
He smiled small, tired, but real.
Tomorrow he would sell the catch.
Tomorrow the farm would keep turning.
And maybe just maybe he could finally outrun the path fate kept trying to force him down.
To be continued.