The world was glowing.
It wasn't magic, not the kind with runes or flames. It was the last light of a long day, sunset sliding low over the ridge, catching every golden blade of grass, every dandelion puff drifting on the breeze. The trees at the forest's edge stood black and bold against the sky, their leaves flickering green, gold, orange, rustling in warm gusts.
Wade lay flat on the hill behind their cottage, arms crossed under his head, eyes on the heavens.
Lira sat to his right, humming tunelessly as she threaded wildflowers into a messy braid. Riven lay stretched across a worn wool blanket nearby, tossing a pebble up and down with one hand, chewing on a stalk of grass like it was a sword he didn't feel like drawing.
Below them, the village murmured with life. Distant laughter. A door creaking open. Mira's voice calling from their kitchen window, asking if they wanted berry pie or honey with the evening bread.
Riven had shouted "Yes!" before she finished the question.
Wade didn't answer, not right away.
He was too busy listening.
To the crickets tuning up their nightly orchestra. To the soft hiss of leaves dancing in the wind. To the firepit crackling where Theren was boiling water for tea down the hill.
To the stillness between sounds.
He didn't want to miss it.
Because moments like these, simple, perfect, fragile things—never really lasted.
But this one had lasted years.
His life had once ended with metal, blood, and silence.
Now it was filled with warm blankets, scratchy scarves, shared meals, and rough hugs. With Mira's gentle lullabies, with Riven's off key singing as he sharpened sticks and pretended to be a general, with Lira's whispering wind trails and her way of always handing Wade something just before he needed it.
He hadn't earned this, hadn't asked for it either.
But he had dreamed of it.
And now, without even realizing it…
He was living in it.
"Hey," Riven called, breaking the quiet. He was still on his back, still flipping the pebble in his hand, but his voice had a lazy curiosity in it.
Wade blinked. "What?"
"If you ever did get magic," Riven said, "what kind would you want?"
Wade hesitated. He'd thought about it, of course he had, a hundred times, in a hundred different ways.
"Lightning," he said, before he could overthink it.
Riven snorted. "Figures. All flash and noise. No subtlety."
"I'd control shadows," Lira said with a grin, twisting her flower crown tighter. "You know, move between them. Whisper secrets. Watch from the dark. I'd be elegant and mysterious."
"You're already a weirdo," Riven said.
"And you're a smoke bomb with legs."
"You say that like it's a bad thing."
They bickered. They always bickered.
Wade smiled and closed his eyes.
Later, when the sky was deep blue and full of stars, Mira came up the hill with a basket.
She didn't say anything. Just sat beside them, pulling out fresh bread still warm from the oven, slices of goat cheese wrapped in wax paper, and a jar of thick black honey.
Theren followed with a kettle slung over one shoulder, whistling something ancient and low.
They all sat together, eating with their fingers, sharing tea from mismatched mugs. No one spoke for a long time.
They didn't need to.
Wade watched the way Theren leaned into Mira's shoulder. The way Riven kept poking Lira's ribs when she reached for food, just to annoy her. The way Mira hummed between sips like she was memorizing the moment.
And he realized—
This was what it meant to exist.
Not just to breathe.
Not just to survive.
To matter to someone. To be part of a story—even if it wasn't one that ended with kings or empires or quests.
Later, when the fire had burned low and Mira was brushing crumbs from Wade's shirt, she kissed the top of his head and said softly, "You're quiet tonight."
He nodded.
"Good quiet or sad quiet?"
He thought about it.
Then he looked up at her with clear eyes, and said, "The kind of quiet that feels full."
She smiled like she knew exactly what he meant.
That night, Wade lay in bed between Riven's snores and Lira's soft breathing.
The wolf carving Theren had made sat beneath his pillow. Chalk lines of a half drawn sigil were still faintly visible on his hands, his fingers were sore from practice, his knees bruised from climbing trees, his shoulders ached from hauling water.
And he was more content than he'd ever been in two lifetimes.
He pulled the blanket up to his chin.
He didn't have magic.
He didn't have a spark.
But tonight, lying there in the dark, warm, full and loved—
He had something better.
He had a life.
After the others had gone inside, Wade stayed on the hill.
The fire had gone out, reduced to a nest of warm coals, and the last of the bread had been wrapped in cloth and carried home. The grass was damp with night dew, and fireflies hovered low, blinking in soft pulses like breathing stars.
He lay back, hands folded behind his head, and stared at the sky.
Velgrath's constellations were different from Earth's. There was no Orion here, no Big Dipper or North Star. Instead, the stars formed patterns he hadn't known how to read at first. Now he did. Lira had taught him,
that crooked triangle near the horizon? That was the Archer. The jagged W above it was the Cracked Crown. And just above that, the swirling cluster—like spilled sugar on velvet, that was the Spiral Forge, named for the first blacksmith god.
He didn't know why, but he found comfort in knowing these names. In the quiet certainty that they would be there tomorrow. That they belonged.
He closed his eyes, breathing in the night.
On Earth, nights had felt like pits. Cold, empty things that had to be endured. There had always been a silence to them that pressed too hard, reminded him that no one was thinking about him, that he could disappear and the world would keep turning.
Here, silence was different.
It was soft.
Held.
Here, silence wasn't the absence of people.
It was the presence of peace.
He touched his chest, just above where the System window would one day bloom.
There was nothing there now. No power. No status screen. No floating numbers.
But maybe he didn't need one just yet.
Because right now, he wasn't trying to be important, or strong or special.
He was just living.
And if he never got magic, if the System never came, if the world never knew his name… that would be okay.
Because in this one, fragile moment under the stars—
He knew who he was.
And for the first time in two lifetimes, that was enough.
Wade opened his eyes and whispered to no one
"Thank you."
He didn't know who he was speaking to. Fate? The world? Whatever twisted force had pulled him from Earth and dropped him into this cottage in the woods?
Maybe it didn't matter.
He meant it.
Thank you.
For this hill.
For that bread.
For her laugh.
For their bickering.
For the love that asked nothing of him but to exist.
He stood slowly, turned toward the soft amber light glowing in their kitchen window
And walked home.