I had been here for three weeks.
Or, well, three weeks of existing here. Understanding what happened was another story. Turns out, I had somehow been reincarnated into Artelia, the world I created back when I was on Earth. And, oh, the fun part—I'd been born in Yv'Graal. Yes, that Yv'Graal. The absolute worst continent of the twelve. The one where the land seems to curse at you, breathe on you, and then demand you worship it. A place where tragedy is just part of the scenery, and the gods? They're nothing but scarred royals in fancy clothes.
The geography here is a nightmare. Seriously. You could walk for months and never see the same sky twice. Black bone mountains jut out of the clouds in the north while salt-covered deserts stretch endlessly south. The rivers run red with iron—or, more likely, the blood of past wars. Cities rise like tumors from the remains of long-forgotten battlefields, and the forests? They groan with faces carved into their bark. Geography here isn't just brutal. It remembers.
And Yv'Graal is huge. It's the second-largest continent, but honestly? It feels smaller. Most people don't wander. Not because it's too far, but because they're terrified of what might see them. The land itself is cursed. Things that die here… don't always stay dead. It's haunted. But not in the way you're thinking. This is a place where the spirits are real, and they're not the friendly kind.
It's a mishmash of races, though the term "race" hardly seems to matter here. You've got the Felsworn—pale warriors from blood-soaked soil. Then there are the Hollowkin—people with hollow eyes, touched by famine of the soul. Some call them demons. Others call them family. There are the Beastfolk clans roaming the Deadspine Wastes, cursed to never bear children unless they bathe in a king's blood. And then there's my group—the Thrice-Burned. We're the ones whose souls have died and fought their way back. A rare thing. And a cursed one.
The gods here? Oh, they're not divine. They earned their power through cruelty or betrayal or sacrifice. The Crimson Choir, the Hollow Crown, the Lady Beneath the Gallows. These are the ones we worship, fear, and bargain with. They don't give blessings. They trade favors. And the religions? They're as broken as the people. Everyone's praying to something different, not out of devotion, but because they're desperate. It works. Sometimes. If you can pay the price.
And horrors? Oh, don't even get me started. Things that wear the faces of your loved ones. Trees that whisper your darkest secrets. Fog that makes you relive your worst mistake, over and over again. There's a term for monsters born from sorrow here. Grieveborn. And believe me, Yv'Graal is full of them.
What makes us special? Pain, I guess. In other places, tragedy is something that happens. Here, it's just part of the season. We learn to survive it. Some people call it strength. I call it what it really is—necessary cruelty. Nobody romanticizes survival in Yv'Graal. You survive because you have to.
Even the whole social structure is built on pain. The more you've suffered, the higher you rise. Nobility isn't inherited. It's branded. We call them the Marked—those who have endured enough trauma to be chosen by fate. It's not a crown you're born into. It's a scar you survive. Aristocrats wear their pain like badges of honor. Every noble family has a House Mark—a symbol tied to the first trauma their ancestor lived through. Some of them are proud of it. Some of them are still bleeding. Like my family. Whitehall? Nobles here too. Fun.
The political system is… fragile. Eight major houses constantly fighting for control. The Throneless Pact keeps them from going too far, but it's barely holding together. No king has sat on the throne in 300 years. The last one tried to become a god and destroyed the capital in the process. Now, the Eight rule by a council, barely keeping things intact through threats and underground wars.
Each house controls a Painhold. Yes, a Painhold. It's a city built on suffering. The strongest Painhold is Vaelmoor, ruled by House Orvarn, who worships silence and bleeds their enemies dry through proxy wars. My Painhold? Grinshold. Where people carve their sins into their own skin like some kind of confessional. It's a place where the weak die, and the strong? They wish they could.
And magic? We don't call it magic. We call it Branding. Power doesn't come from books or incantations. It comes from scars. Emotional, physical, or both. Magic here is born from moments of deep trauma. A mother's scream as she watches her child burn. A betrayal on the night before a wedding. A vow made over a mass grave. These moments become Brandmarks. Tattoos of memory and emotion. They're activated like spells.
But there's a cost. Power leaks out, and the Pricebound—the people who've used too much too quickly—start losing parts of themselves. Sight. Voice. Name. Some of them become monsters. Others? Tools. The strongest mages are barely human anymore. But they keep winning, so no one says anything.
So yeah—Yv'Graal is a land of blood, pain, and lost hopes. But it's mine now.
And I've come back, ready for all of it.
Let the continent bleed again.
---
Now, here I am, supposed to be fed. But Selain—the household milkmaid who wore exhaustion like some ridiculous accessory—had nodded off mid-feeding. Head slumped. Mouth slightly open. Elbow resting on the crib like she was some kind of tavern drunk, not supposed to be holding my literal life in her hands.
The bottle had slipped from her grasp, the tip dangling uselessly against my cheek, lukewarm milk dribbling into my ear like some kind of medieval torture method.
I glared at her. As much as a baby could glare, anyway.
Which, by the way, is a lot. Especially when you've been reborn with the memories of a grown woman and a general disposition that's a little too judgmental for a baby.
"Of course, sleep on the job," I muttered to myself, sucking on nothing because the bottle had drooped as badly as her spine. "What if some giant Phoenix monster swoops in and grabs me? Will you still be snoring then, Selain? Is your sciatica that bad?"
I wasn't being dramatic, by the way.
This is Yv'Graal. The Wound Eternal. The land where even the flowers bleed when you pick them.
You'd think that after living in this hellhole, people would take a little more care of their precious reincarnated babies. But no, no. It's too much to ask for someone to, I don't know, defend the baby while the sun's up?
Yv'Graal wasn't some charming countryside continent with friendly animals and benevolent spirits.
No, it's a twisted mess of screams and blood and iron rivers that never seem to stop flowing. The land itself is sick, haunted by a history so twisted that it's practically alive. Mountains that look like claws. Volcanoes that hum dirges. I think some of them scream at night. But it could just be the nobles.
As for races? You name it, we got it. Human-ish, elf-ish, demon-adjacent. The purebloods still have cursed bone marrow or some ancient doom mark. Everyone's ancestors made a deal with something. Beast. God. Emotion. It's why we all glow in the dark or cry ichor. But don't even get me started on the winged caste. Feathers don't make you holy. Sometimes it just means your mom made a bad deal with some sky parasite.
Religion here? It's a mess. We used to have real gods, then they fell, and now we pray to fallen angels with filed teeth who demand blood sacrifices. Churches here are mausoleums. Prophets? They scream instead of preach.
And magic? Magic isn't really magic here. It's more like trauma-based brandmarks—every painful moment etched into your soul becomes a spell. The more you suffer, the more power you have. And everyone here is trying to avoid too much happiness, lest it strip them of their edge.
Society? A straight-up pyramid scheme of pain.
The top is occupied by the Black Mantle Aristocracy. They look like a monarchy but act like a cult. Every noble family has a cursed relic and a few family-wide disorders. They call it "divine inheritance." I call it bad decisions and way too much inbreeding.
Below them, we have the Priest-barons. Sacrificial economists who fund wars and funerals with equal fervor.
Then there's the middle tier—a meritocracy built on trauma. If you survive enough shit, you climb the ladder. If you lose everything and don't cry about it, you get a cursed sword and a seat at the feast.
And then, there's everyone else. The fodder. The ones who die quietly, unless screaming counts as living.
Back to my crib. My first trauma starter pack.
I was about to cry from sheer boredom—the kind of boredom that makes you question the entire meaning of existence—when suddenly, the sun dimmed.
Not metaphorically. Literally.
A shadow blocked the light pouring through the window.
I turned. As much as my stupid infant neck would let me. And there it was.
A Phoenix.
Not some dignified, "rebirth in flames" kind of Phoenix.
No. This was a Yv'Graal Phoenix.
Its feathers looked like splintered bone. Its eyes were molten gold. Its beak could probably skewer a dream. Its wings? They blocked out the sky.
And then it pressed its burning face against the window.
I screamed.
Not a cute little baby cry. No, this was a full-on existential scream.
I screamed again.
And besides me, Selain muttered about cheese stew and snorted.
Are you kidding me?
I was about to get flambéed, and my maid was lost in her fantasy of carbs.
I kicked. I thrashed. I flailed like a ghost child from a Victorian nightmare.
The Phoenix clicked its beak.
The window cracked.
And I swear, I saw my short, pathetic life flash before my eyes.
"WAKE UP, SELAIN!" I tried to scream, but it came out as a string of incoherent vowels.
Still, nothing. Just snoring.
If I survive this, I'm unionizing the maids.
If I don't?
Well, at least I'll die on brand.