REINCARNATION OF THE WAR LORD

They say silence is a sign of obedience. In my case, it’s the only weapon I have left. “David! Stop dragging your feet, you useless mutt.” The shrill voice of Mistress Renia cracked across the marble hall like a whip. Her heels clicked on polished floors, echoing down the corridor lined with towering portraits of noble prodigies, all of them are under eighteen and were already shaping the future of the empire. And me? I was the boy who scrubbed their floors, yeah. “Yes, Mistress Renia,” I muttered, bowing my head as I lifted the silver tray higher, the weight biting into my palms. She didn’t even bother to glance back, Her violet cloak swished with every step, perfumed and perfect, like the rest of the brats who trained here. The Arcanum Academy was a place where the children of the great houses studied to master the fusion of sorcery and science. A place where mana was currency, and lineage was law. And where someone like me, a slave of course with no mana and no last name was less than the dirt on their boots. “Faster,” she snapped. “If Professor Kael’s tea isn’t steaming when I deliver it, I’ll have you whipped again.” "Oh, what a tragedy that would be," I thought as I quickened my pace. "Maybe next time I’ll crawl on my knees and lick the floor clean too, just to show my undying loyalty". I didn’t say it, of course, people like me don’t get away with sarcasm not actually out loud, not here or ever. The corridors hummed with soft blue light from the arcane conduits embedded in the walls. Students passed me in tailored uniforms, their hands glowing faintly with mana as they practiced levitation spells or argued about research projects. None of them spared me a glance. Why would they? I was invisible. The academy’s ghost. The errand boy they barely remembered existed until they needed something. “Hey, slave!” a voice barked from behind, I turned just in time to see a flash of silver. A boot collided with the tray I was holding sending the steaming tea and porcelain crashing to the ground. The liquid splattered across the polished marble, pooling at my feet. “Oh no,” I said softly, looking down at the mess. “How clumsy of me.” There laughter exploded around me. Three of them, they were boys my age, draped in fine academy cloaks, they just stood there watching, their mana auras flickering faintly like halos. The leader, Jareth Valen, smirked as he twirled a practice wand between his fingers, he is enjoying this I see. “Did the little servant trip over his own shadow again?” he mocked. “Maybe the weight of all that his uselessness dragged him down,” another snickered. I knelt silently and began cleaning up the shards with a rag. My fingers burned where the tea had scalded them, but I didn’t flinch or I’d felt worse. “Careful,” Jareth drawled. “Wouldn’t want to cut those delicate peasant hands. Oh wait you don’t need them, do you? Not like they’ll ever cast a spell.” There was more laughter and It rolled off me like rain, It always did. "If you only knew,". I thought, picking up another shard of the broken glasses. "If you knew who I used to be, you’d be kneeling right now. You’d be begging for mercy." But they didn’t, i mean nobody did they only read it as past history. I finished mopping the floor and bowed my head. “I apologize, young master. It won’t happen again.” “It better not,” Jareth sneered. “Or I’ll have you reassigned to the furnaces. See how long those weak hands last shoveling coal.” The three of them sauntered off, still laughing, still utterly certain of their place in the world. I stayed kneeling a moment longer, staring at my reflection in the tea-stained floor. i was seventeen, Lean and very much forgettable. That’s what they saw, just another faceless servant boy who’d amount to nothing. Good, That was exactly what I wanted them to see. By the time I reached the observatory wing, the day’s errands had multiplied. Mistress Renia sent me to polish the mana conduits. Professor Kael needed his laboratory cleaned before the symposium. The kitchens demanded I deliver lunch trays to the alchemical apprentices. Each task came with a fresh round of insults and a reminder of my place, which I already know of. “You missed a spot, dog.” “Don’t breathe near the artifacts, you’ll contaminate them.” “Be grateful we let you live here at all.” I smiled and nodded through all of it, I didn’t argue, I didn’t protest, I just remembered. I remembered the screams of armies as I broke their lines. I remembered the heat of battle when I tore the wings off dragons. I remembered the moment I sealed Oblivion itself, giving my soul to stop a god. And now, here I was back to earth, A nameless servant polishing someone else’s boots. “David!” Mistress Renia’s voice cut through my thoughts. “What are you doing standing there? Take this list to the armory now!” I took the scroll from her outstretched hand and bowed. “At once, Mistress.” “Useless,” she muttered, turning away. The armory was on the far side of the academy, past the dueling courtyards and training halls. I kept my head down as I crossed the grounds, but that didn’t stop the whispers. “Look, it’s the slave boy.” “Still breathing? Guess they need someone to clean the toilets.” “Do you think he even knows what mana feels like?” Every word was a thorn, Not because they hurt me but because once, I would’ve silenced them all with a glance. Now, I was forced to endure it. But endurance is a weapon too, One they’d never understand. The armory was empty when I arrived, save for the soft hum of containment fields and the cold glint of steel. I gently handed the list to the quartermaster, he is an older man with mechanical implants grafted to his arms and waited silently as he prepared the requested items. “You again,” he grunted. “You work harder than any of those pampered brats.” “I don’t have much of a choice,” I said with a faint smile. He snorted. “Maybe not, but you’ve got something they don’t, my boy.” “What’s that?” I am asked him with a grin. “Patience, my boy.” He slid the crate toward me. “And patience wins wars.” I didn’t respond, But the corner of my mouth twitched, he was old but smart not like his older than me though. By the time dusk fell, my body ached from running errands. My hands were raw, my knees bruised, my stomach empty. Most servants were allowed a meal by now but I wasn’t. Mistress Renia said I hadn’t earned it. I walked to the back courtyard to dump the day’s refuse as usual just a few alchemical waste, scraps of broken equipment, discarded mana stones. The stars were just starting to pierce the twilight sky, faint against the glowing lattice of the academy’s barrier field. “Still alive, David?” The voice was mocking but not cruel. I turned to see Lyra, she was one of the apprentices leaning against the wall, arms crossed. Unlike the others, she occasionally spoke to me like a person. “Barely,” I said. “But hey, another day without being thrown off a balcony That’s progress.” She smirked. “You should really learn to talk back, it m ight make them stop picking on you.” “Oh, I do talk back,” I said. “Just… not out loud.” “Whatever helps you sleep.” She pushed off the wall and started back inside. “Don’t stay out too long. The drones will lock down the courtyard soon.” “Wouldn’t want to be trapped in this cute paradise,” I muttered under my breath. When she was gone, I sank onto a bench and stared at the night sky. Above me, the barrier shimmered, it was a masterpiece of arcane engineering. It reminded me of the wards I once forged to shield entire continents. I raised my hand up, It trembled weak, thin, ordinary. it had no sparks of power dancing at my fingertips. No single surge of mana answered my call. But deep beneath the surface, past the flesh and blood and false weakness, something ancient stirred my memory. A storm. A memory. A promise. "Not yet," I told it. "Not today, But soon." They thought I was broken, they thought the legend had died. But legends don’t die, They wait. And when I rise again, this world will kneel at my feet again.