Fifteen years old. Dying. End-stage leukemia.
There wasn't anything poetic about it.
Cael Ledwick lay in a hospital bed that smelled like bleach and sadness. The lights above him flickered sometimes, and the machines beside his bed beeped like they were trying to remind people he was still alive. Barely.
His skin was pale, almost see-through. IV tubes wrapped around his arms like limp vines, pumping him full of stuff that wasn't doing anything anymore. Breathing felt like a full-time job.
The only thing keeping him sane was the book on his nightstand—"Legends of Aetheron." A fantasy story full of magic, epic battles, and heroes with glowing swords. He'd read it front to back more times than he could count. It was his way out—at least in his head.
"I always wanted magic in my life," he thought, flipping another page with shaky fingers. "Just… not like this."
Outside his room, his family stood behind a glass window, watching like he was already gone. Nurses whispered like he couldn't hear them. Everyone had already given up—he could feel it.
They'd stopped trying two days ago.
Sure, the machines were still on, and the meds were still dripping, but the fight was over. The looks on their faces said it all.
His hand slipped off the book. It hit the floor with a soft thud.
"Please," he thought. "If there's anything out there—anything real—let me wake up where magic's real."
His vision blurred—not from crying, but because his body was shutting down. The last thing he saw was the golden lettering on that book cover before everything went black.
⸻
No tunnel of light. No angels. No warmth.
Just darkness.
But it wasn't empty. It pulsed, like something alive. Starlight flickered in the distance. A hum, deep and slow, throbbed all around him like a heartbeat.
Then, from somewhere way out in the dark:
"Request received."
A scream echoed—not a scream of pain, but one of arrival. New life.
⸻
Consciousness hit like a wave.
He was somewhere warm, muffled, and wet. Everything was red and hazy. His limbs were tiny and useless. But his mind? Sharp. Awake.
"Wait… what is this?"
He couldn't move or speak, but he knew one thing for sure—he wasn't dead.
He was being born.
Memories of the hospital, the pain, the book—they all came flooding back. But so did something else. Something deeper. A warmth that wrapped around his soul, whispering of mana, magic, and something ancient inside him.
⸻
Light exploded. He was pushed into the world, lungs taking in their first breath.
The air was cold and real.
But no one panicked. No one screamed.
"She's gone," a midwife whispered gently, holding the newborn in her arms. "But the boy… he's strong."
His tiny face scrunched, then relaxed. He stopped crying.
⸻
Far across this strange new world, something ancient stirred.
But right here, right now, there was only one thing that mattered.
He wasn't Cael Ledwick anymore.
He was someone new.
Ashborn.
⸻
To be continued...