Chapter 1 –
A heavy stillness wrapped around Melvik as he stirred awake, his senses sluggish. His head throbbed with a dull ache as though something had ripped him from one reality and flung him headfirst into another. Slowly, his eyes adjusted to a dim glow, the air thick with a foreign scent—something like sandalwood and fresh rain.
Above him, a ceiling of intricately carved stone rose in arches so high it seemed to defy gravity. Soft light filtered through vast windows draped in cascading fabrics, their designs so ornate they seemed fit for royalty. The patterns whispered of distant lands—dragons entwined with roses, swords dripping fire, and suns caught in endless eclipse.
He tried to sit up. Nothing happened.
His body, as heavy as iron, refused to move. A surge of alarm bolted through him. He strained again, muscles twitching uselessly. What was—?
He froze.
His arms—too short, too small—twitched at his sides like stubby twigs. His heart lurched. He blinked, his breathing sharp.
What the hell happened to my hands?
They were tiny, delicate things, absurdly smooth. No calluses, no scars—nothing to suggest they had ever gripped a controller or turned the pages of a book. His mind raced, replaying fragments of memory: late-night bug testing at the gaming hub, neon signs reflecting on rain-slicked streets, a roaring engine, a flash of blinding light—
Truck. I was hit by a truck.
Am I dead?
He clenched his fists—or tried to. The pathetic flutter of small fingers confirmed it: this was no dream.
Panic rippled through his chest. He fought the weight pinning him down, thrashing as much as his feeble limbs allowed. The world tilted, and in his frenzied struggle, a wooden rail loomed into view, wrapping around him like prison bars.
A cradle.
I'm in a cradle?!
As dread slithered up his spine, a creak shattered the silence.
The door opened.
They entered—a procession of women, all dressed in black dresses with crisp white aprons. Their flowing skirts swept the stone floor as they moved, their steps as graceful as shadows. Each bore beauty so immaculate it felt surreal—rosy cheeks, eyes like polished gems, hair twisted into buns with precise elegance.
One stepped forward. Her headpiece, a lattice of silver embroidery, marked her as the head maid. Her eyes—sharp and calculating—swept over him with warmth that felt practiced, not tender.
"ШбнеФ оку," she greeted with a soft smile. Her voice carried a melodic rhythm, the words sliding past his understanding like water over stone. "Ывдщ жхзь преф."
Melvik stared. What language is that?
More women gathered around the cradle. Their hands moved in synchronized grace—fluffing pillows, adjusting linens, their touches light and deliberate. A small basin of fragrant water appeared, steam curling lazily from its surface. One maid dabbed a soft cloth and pressed it against his face, the warmth both soothing and suffocating.
He twitched in protest, but the weight of his body remained inescapable.
"Яфы имай бднк," one maid whispered with a delighted smile, her eyes softening as she gazed down at him.
"₽£д ияец фн," another giggled, her cheeks blooming with mischief.
Their words, though incomprehensible, carried tones he recognized all too well—admiration, fondness, excitement.
Melvik's mind raced. They think I'm adorable.
The head maid's voice dropped into a reverent hush. "Яфы июпвй фахл мовур оалсяыл бжвкр вво щпчал," she murmured. Something about sorcerers. Magic.
He strained to catch fragments of their conversation, piecing together meaning through context alone.
Magic swordsman… duchess… high aptitude.
Wait. Magic?
"Яфйю ьмм мяфкрхж юэжжосп хфй эзнг чяыце жрощек."
A solemn air settled over the room. The maids exchanged glances, their mirth fading into quiet reverence before they finally withdrew, the last flutter of their skirts vanishing through the door.
Silence returned.
Melvik lay there, heart hammering, eyes fixed on the intricately carved ceiling as he tried to breathe through the crushing weight of realization.
Reincarnation.
It was the only explanation that fit. His mind clawed through memories of fantasy novels and isekai tropes—truck accidents, rebirths, swords, and sorcery. He had mocked the absurdity of it all once, joked about how ridiculous it would be if he were dropped into such a story.
Now here he was.
What kind of cruel cosmic joke is this?
He swallowed hard, tilting his gaze to the towering window beside him. Beyond its thick panes, the world stretched wide and mysterious. A dense forest sprawled below, its treetops swaying like waves beneath a pale, cloud-draped sky. In the distance, mountains rose like jagged teeth, their peaks crowned in mist.
A shiver crept along his spine.
Where am I?
More importantly—who am I?
The maids had called him Halios. A name heavy with unfamiliar weight. His gaze drifted back to his cradle, the silk blankets embroidered with sigils and dragons curled around flames.
A grand house, no—something bigger. Nobility. Maybe royalty.
His pulse quickened.
Somewhere in the depths of his soul, something stirred. A whisper, faint and fleeting. His name in this world felt right, though foreign on his tongue.
But fear gnawed at the edges of his mind, a relentless reminder of how fragile his existence had become. His past was gone—his home, his studies, the familiar hum of technology. All of it burned away in the flash of headlights and the roar of an engine.
And now?
He clenched his tiny fists, frustration pooling in his chest.
Now, I'm a baby.
CHAPTER 1: A NEW REALITY
Melvik's fingers danced over the keyboard, the soft click-clack of keys blending into the symphony of electronic beats coursing through his headphones. The dim glow of the monitor bathed his face in pale blue light. In this place—this hallowed refuge of pixels and possibility—the world made sense. Algorithms were logical. Characters followed scripts. Even chaos could be reduced to code.
Here, he was a conqueror. Out there?
Out there was a cacophony of people and emotions he could never quite decode.
He adjusted the oversized headphones, drowning out the hum of voices beyond his station. His job as a Game Bug Tester at the Gaming Hub wasn't glamorous, but it was perfect. Alone with software glitches and virtual landscapes, he found a peace he couldn't grasp in the bustling city outside. Each bug he hunted and destroyed felt like a small victory—a battle fought and won in the only war he truly understood.
He had always been more comfortable with machines than people.
Technology was orderly, predictable. People weren't. They laughed when they were supposed to cry, hid truths behind half-smiles, and spoke in riddles called emotions. Even as a university student studying technological science, Melvik had kept his distance. His mind, sharp and restless, soared through the intricacies of artificial intelligence and data structures—but human interaction? That was a labyrinth without a map.
It wasn't just intelligence that set him apart. His love for music, books, and games consumed him. He devoured knowledge with a hunger that burned relentlessly. Fiction or nonfiction, fantasy or philosophy—he read indiscriminately, filling the void with stories that didn't ask for conversation in return.
He didn't mind the isolation. Solitude had been his oldest companion.
In the heart of the neon city, surrounded by the chatter of strangers, he felt invisible—and he liked it that way. He was nineteen, freshly released from the orphanage that had been his cage and his shelter. The world offered freedom, and the Gaming Hub welcomed him with open arms.
---
The night air was cool when he finally stepped outside. Melvik tightened his headphones, the pulsing rhythm of basslines and electric melodies wrapping around him like armor. He moved through the darkened streets, where neon signs flickered promises of food and fortune. Steam rose from subway grates. Cars sped past, headlights streaking like comets through a hazy urban sky.
The music swelled—louder, deeper—until the city blurred into background noise.
He didn't hear the horn.
A blaring blast, sharp enough to split worlds, came too late.
Melvik turned, heart lurching. A wall of headlights rushed toward him, white-hot and blinding.
His last thought:
Is this how it ends?
Impact.
A violent crush of force and momentum.
His body shattered. His mind fragmented. And then—
Stillness.
---
He floated in a void of memory and sensation, somewhere between existence and oblivion. Shapes and sounds danced at the edges of his awareness—disjointed fragments of neon lights, computer screens, and the cold, sterile hum of the city.
The rhythm of the music faded.
Warmth.
He felt it before he saw anything—a radiant heat that wrapped around him like sunlight on a summer's morning. Slowly, his senses sharpened. The acrid smell of exhaust and pavement was gone. In its place was something else. Sandalwood. Fresh rain. Fragrant blossoms.
His eyes fluttered open.
The world had transformed.
---
A room of impossible grandeur unfolded before him.
Vaulted stone ceilings loomed high above, carved with spiraling patterns that glowed faintly like embers caught in twilight. Walls of polished marble stretched outward, lined with towering windows framed in curtains of iridescent silk. The air felt alive—rich with scents of incense and magic, humming with energy just beyond comprehension.
Melvik—or was he still Melvik?—lay cradled in a bed unlike any he had ever known. It was a masterpiece of wood and wrought iron, shaped like a gilded cage, its bars etched with flames and dragons that seemed to twist and breathe in the flicker of candlelight.
This isn't real. It can't be real.
He blinked, disoriented. His hands twitched against the silk sheets. His mind raced to piece together fragments of logic, searching for familiarity.
Nothing.
There was no keyboard. No monitor. No hum of circuits to ground him in reality.
He pushed against the weight of his limbs, but they felt foreign—heavy and uncooperative. His gaze dropped, and his breath caught in his throat.
Hands.
Small. Smooth. Tiny, childlike hands—no larger than a bird's wing, no roughness or scars.
A shudder rippled through him. His pulse quickened, the frantic thrum of a caged heart. He raised the fragile limbs closer, as though inspecting a puppet's strings.
What happened to me?
His thoughts churned, unraveling faster than he could contain them.
Reincarnation. Isekai. Fantasy worlds.
No. No, that's just fiction. It doesn't happen.
Except… it had.
---
He turned his head toward the window. Outside, a vast forest of emerald green stretched endlessly. Mist drifted through the trees like ghostly tendrils, and beyond them, mountains jagged as teeth rose into the sky. A breeze whispered through the glass, carrying with it the promise of magic and peril.
---
A new world. A new name.
Halios.
They had called him Halios.
Melvik took a deep breath, his mind racing, his heart a storm of dread and curiosity.
---
He wasn't in the world he had known.
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He was in a realm of dragons and danger, knights and sorcery—a place torn from the pages of fantasy and thrust upon his soul. And his story had just begun. Wouldn't you follow our protagonist, on his journey into worlds unknown
**Across Realities**