Lonely Eagle, the hero and overlord of a race, a figure who had defined an era, had finally found peace after a lifetime of battle. He felt his consciousness grow blurry and wink out. He was cramped, but in a snug, good kind of way. He blissfully floated in a dark, warm place. In this place of peace, his mind and consciousness faded into nothingness. The only thing left in the world was the feeling of comfort and safety. Then… everything went to hell.

The warm liquid he’d floated in started rapidly draining away. His dark, safe world quivered. For a man who had certain victory stolen from him, and who had unjustly died, to experience being born several hours later on the same day probably took one of the top spots for the shittiest day of the century.

Earthmother! What the hell was that, Lonely Eagle thought.

Gods!

My head feels like it’s about to burst!

Ugh! No-no-no!

*Pft, pft!*

Get out of my mouth!

Did I…? Did I just… come out of a woman?

Dear gods!

Was I really reborn?

That… that felt worse than dying. That... that was the most horrible thing I remember ever experiencing in my millennia-long life. No wonder you forget everything about it.

These and many similar thoughts plagued Lonely Eagle’s mind as he tried to speak. The man didn’t really have anything worth saying. He wanted to shout, to curse, to express his general dissatisfaction with the world and the person in charge of its management. Even if one believed in reincarnation, his memories and mind were supposed to be wiped clean. Now Lonely Eagle fully understood why, and he completely agreed with the concept.

The man gave it his all to curse the local underworld administrator, but try as he might, the only thing that came out of his mouth were incoherent cries and gurgling noises. The once mighty figure, now a newborn baby, felt a huge, splitting headache that only got worse and worse by the second.

The feeling that his head was about to explode, and that his eyes would pop out, wasn’t all that far from reality. Lonely Eagle’s new body was about to break down under the strain. There really existed a reason why all of your memories were wiped clean when they were born. A newborn couldn’t handle the stress.

After a moment, Lonely Eagle realized the danger he was in.

This body can’t handle my memories yet, nor the strength of my soul, he thought. If I want to live, I’ll have to seal everything and leave just a sliver of my true self somewhere, ready to take over.

As he came to this realization, Lonely Eagle acted without delay. Keeping the core of his mind and personality as intact as possible, he willed the halls of his Mind Palace to crumble and their columns to shatter into fragments. Stray thoughts, experiences, random memories, anything non-vital was discarded, but it still wasn’t enough! He could already feel blood running out of his ears, eyes, and nose. The vitality of his tiny body was draining at a horrifying rate.

Gah! This body is so damn weak! Gods-damn piece of trash! Just buy me a minute! Anyone!

“S-s-sky, t-t-the baby is crying tears of blood! It’s even worse than we feared!” the panic-stricken father stuttered.

He looked at the woman who had just gone through a difficult labor, his eyes filled with terror. He believed that he was doing a great job trying to sound calm, but the big man utterly failed to hide the franticness from his voice.

“Use a healing potion, you dimwit! Do it now, before his body falls apart! It would be wasted on either of us anyway,” Sky ordered coldly. She spoke as if she was addressing a servant, not a husband.

The labor had taken a lot out of her. Her face was deathly white, her body drenched in sweat. Her black hair was as wet as if she’d been caught in a sudden downpour. Yet, despite her condition, Sky struggled to sit up and take a look at the last child she would ever give birth to.

So unsatisfactory, she thought. What was I expecting, anyway… giving birth to a mongrel child? Sky frowned as she looked at the grimy newborn. The child had obviously managed to betray her expectations not even a minute after it was born.

No, Sky thought. The child can’t be blamed. I was expecting the impossible to happen. Me, a proud daughter of the Wolf, stooping so low that I have to pray for miracles. To mate with a human… How pathetic... How laughable…

While Sky was filled with self-reproach, Archibald baptized the child with a high grade healing potion. Thanks to the potion’s effect, the baby’s condition improved and stabilized, for now.

“So, his name is Wolf?” Archibald asked. “Are you sure about this? Won’t it cause trouble?” He did his best not to grumble while cleaning the little fellow.

He disapproved of the boy’s name, partly on account of the Wolf clan having been his nemesis for the better part of two centuries, partly because it sounded too elven.

Hearing Archibald’s words, Sky’s frown deepened.

“Naming him Wolf should cause him less trouble than slapping your family name on him. This child is a joint venture, remember that!” the woman said icily. "Since you are so adamant on your family name, I can choose a name as I see fit. You can consider that baby a partnership between Wolf and Hillman if that makes it any easier for you."

Sky’s eye twitched. If she had given birth to such a defective child back when she was at her peak, she probably would have thrown it out the window herself.

Archibald shot her a strange look. Despite the way Sky treated him, he still held a hint of warmth in his eyes when he looked at her. Unlike Sky, Archibald had never had any children before.

“Do you still think of this child as nothing more than a tool and joint venture? The way you acted just now…” Archibald started saying, but trailed off under that cold, stern gaze.

“Give him to me,” Sky barked sharply in a no nonsense tone of voice.

It was plain to see that she was used to having her orders obeyed, and Sky considered her words to be on par with a decree from the heavens. But Archibald hesitated. He was afraid Sky would strangle the baby. A moment later, he relented under her cold gaze and handed over little Wolf.

The woman silently held her crying baby. She inspected him for several moments, seemingly deep in thought.

“This child cost me two years of my remaining lifespan,” Sky grumbled. “My very short lifespan. Do not dare to play dumb and forget about our deal, Lord of Thunder. This is not a product of love, but a living tool. You swore an oath to deliver my letter to this child. I shall commit everything I have to say to paper before I die. There is no way this… pup will be capable of understanding what I have to say before my time is up. Oh, and do not even think about not teaching him how to read and write once I return to Earthmother’s embrace. You have already vowed on Earthmother to teach him the basics, even if you do not tutor him in magic.”

Sky grudgingly revealed her tit, letting the baby eat. As soon as she started undoing her shirt, the big man turned around, giving her privacy.

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep my word. How much time do you have left?” Archibald asked. He ignored her ramblings, but only to an extent. It was obvious that while their relationship wasn’t all that harmonious, he still worried about this elven woman.

“More than a year, I think,” Sky said indifferently. “Three, if my luck is good, or if we find something good to support my soul. But even if we do find something, Wolf will be the one to get it. Is that clear? How about you? When do you expect to kick the bucket?"

Unlike Archibald’s troubled look, Sky stared back at him with a flat expression. It was the look a messenger might give to a horse near death, trying to figure out whether the animal would last until he reached his destination.

“I’m doing much better than you. A decade, maybe two. Enough to see him become a man, I hope,” the dying horse replied weakly.

“Look at us,” Sky said with a sigh. “Two decrepit old cripples making an instrument of revenge. How can you start acting sentimental all of a sudden? You emotional imbecile...” Sky’s deathly pale face had a queer look to it. She didn’t bother trying to hide her dejection, and the self-loathing she felt from the entire humiliating situation she found herself in.

“This is my child. My only child. I’ve never had time to form a family. Unlike you…” The big man stopped himself from continuing after realizing he’d just said something he shouldn’t have.

Sky gritted her teeth when she heard what the dumbass human just said.

“He is my only child now too. Not just that, he should be the last of my clan. I keep thinking that I have made a mistake. I do not care about the two years of my life I’ve lost. I have lived long enough, especially if I have to keep living in squalor like this. But what can this mangy little pup do? Live out his days in misery as my last living descendant? Impregnate some human bitch and extend my proud bloodline by further watering it down? Disgusting.”

Sky’s mouth twitched at the thought of how humiliating her life had become. Her descendants would become human! But only if this disabled baby boy even lived long enough to have descendants. Maybe it would be better for her lineage to end with this child.

“Do you realize who this child’s enemy is?” Sky asked. “He will be up against Him, and that person is first under heaven. Do you have any idea what his odds are? A child of mixed blood is most likely to be average. Even with your knowledge and guidance, how much power will he be able to gather before you drop dead? Not to mention that he was probably born with a crippled soul because of you, and even more so because of me. Aaah! This is such a mess! I cannot believe you managed to talk me into going through with this!”

While the two grownups were talking, little Wolf had already fallen asleep.

***

In the world of his mind and soul, Wolf sat on a throne. The seat was atop a dais, and it was made of a substance that greatly resembled ivory. Baby Wolf didn’t look anything like the proud elven warrior he’d been a couple hours ago. Even in his mind, Wolf was nothing more than a newborn.

He looked around this strange hall he found himself in. Aside from one aesthetically pleasing white pillar fashioned from pristine bone, or stone, everything else was blurred and shrouded in a thick layer of fog.

“So this is my Mind Palace…” Wolf’s Mental Aspect said in a half-dazed manner. “Wait, what’s a Mind Palace?” The word seemed present in Wolf’s mind, but he didn’t know how it got there. It had always existed, along with the realization that all creatures, including him, had a Mental Aspect and a Mind Palace.

The Mental Aspect frowned as he surveyed the fog filled room. Finally, his gaze lingered on the sole visible column.

“That is the first column of my Mind Hall,” he said.

Baby Wolf was confused. While he was more than a mere newborn, he was no longer the master that he had once been. Lonely Eagle had purged almost everything that defined him, everything that strained the baby’s soul. Shards of his former knowledge, memories and personality were scattered around the Mind Palace. Some of these fragments were permanently lost, refined into pure Soul Force, while most of them were just strewn about without any semblance of order.

Lonely Eagle had been in a hurry to preserve his ego. There hadn’t been much time, or opportunity, to be meticulous about the way he’d placed the vital pieces of information. Still, he’d been able to control himself well enough to leave the essential parts of his personality somewhere in this first Mind Hall. That way, he could take control of the body as soon as it was able to withstand him.

Until this possession occurred, what was left behind was no different from the fresh soul of a baby sprinkled with as much neutral cognitive ability as this tiny body and soul could possibly support without suffering from rejection. What was left was basically an embryo of Lonely Eagle’s rebirth.

The little boy had no stains of prejudice, nor any other contaminants left behind by his former life. The only thing remaining were the random tidbits of useful information, such as the knowledge that this was a Mind Hall. It was an integral part of the Mind Palace, which was the most real and most imaginary place in the world.

However, Wolf was missing the meaning of words such as integral, real, and imaginary. But at least he knew what Mind Hall and Mind Palace were, that was the place where he was right now. He also knew what the world was. That was the place where his body was sleeping at this moment. For Wolf, that world was a blurry area roughly half a meter around him, which was the present limit of his perception.

Ignoring the problems of the imaginary world and the real world, Wolf’s Mental Aspect looked around the Mind Hall. After a moment, he realized that there was absolutely nothing to do in this cramped cage surrounded by mist.

He wanted to do something to entertain himself, but there really was nothing he could do. There was only him, the throne, the ten steps that formed the stairs and that one column. His Mental Aspect sighed out of a habit that he didn’t even know he had. He was still staring fixedly at the white column, and as he did, he felt an irresistible tug.

Following some unknown, primal instinct, Wolf wished for a carving tool to appear in his tiny hand. As soon as Wolf had the thought, an item, similar to a diminutive chisel, manifested itself.

“Neat!” he exclaimed. “Well, if I can’t get out of here for a while, I might as well do something fun.”

Every surface in the room, save for the throne, had an aesthetically pleasing, organic look. It was as if someone had taken the bones of giant deities and woven them together into a wonderfully balanced whole.

And yet, the boy disliked this. He wanted to add his own scribbles around the room, not just stare at art that was before him. The natural design was already a masterpiece without a flat surface to be found anywhere in the room.

Unfortunately, mortals were greatly attracted to order and openness, rather than the vast, deific air of the chamber's current appearance.

Following his own artistic direction, Wolf started smoothing out the rough edges and bumps on the floor. That task took several months to complete. Then Wolf focused on the column. He was surprisingly proficient at carving, even though he was unaware that this was not the most common skill for a newborn.

Wolf simply acted on instinct, which he neither perceived nor understood. Like any confused mortal, he was trying to tidy up and create structure where one wasn’t needed.

From time to time, the boy was interrupted in his labor. This happened when his parents woke him up to feed and clean him. He enjoyed his sweet meals, which came with a sense of warmth and protection from his mother.

The reality of the situation was that his mother’s feelings weren’t all that warm. After giving birth all she felt was that she had made a dumb mistake, that she was an utter fool who had traded half her remaining lifespan for a little shit factory.

Five months passed at this steady pace. At first Wolf did his best to communicate with his parents, to let them know what he wanted, which culminated with him saying his first words before he was half a year old. He also did his best to learn how to move on his own. Being unable to do or communicate what he wanted when he wanted annoyed him to no end.

Sky grew shocked at how her baby acted. Wolf was her seventh son, and all her other children had been pure-bloods. After noticing the little fellow’s efforts and progress, Sky had to admit that this mix-blood, which she’d expected to be inferior to her pure-blood children, was actually superior by far. At least if the reports from the wet nurses that raised her previous children could be believed.

Wolf started trying to crawl about a month after he was born. He took some three months to get the hang of it. Then, as soon as he learned how to crawl, he was trying to walk, leaning on whatever object he found near him.

But that wasn’t the oddest thing. The eeriest thing about the baby was that, almost from the day he was born, it seemed like little Wolf could understand what she and Archibald said. Her child never cried without a reason. And even when he cried during those first couple of months, Wolf sounded more like a tiny man screaming in frustration than a baby bawling.

Despite the cold act Sky put on the surface, she slowly started developing feelings of pride for the child. She hoped against hope that this baby might be special. Hoped that, against all odds, this fragile little thing might one day avenge her untimely and absolutely meaningless death.

Archibald's lessons:

People of the Ten Races of Man, or manlings as they are more commonly called include Dwarfs, Earthlings, Elves, Goblins, Grayfolk, Halflings, Humans, Lizardfolk, Orcs and Windfolk. Even though these ten races have a huge population and control enormous territory it’s still tiny compared to the world we live in.

The Ten Empires of Man are surrounded by the Beasts-Lands, and we don’t know whether there’s anything beyond the territory ruled by the Monster Beasts.