Suddenly, while adrift in the void of inexistence, Sokram felt something.

Different yet tangible.

He could sense his body, albeit smaller, getting pushed out of a confined space.

Moments later, freedom arrived.

The tightness vanished, and the primal need to breathe overwhelmed him.

Then, a sharp slapping sound reached his ears, followed by a sting on his behind.

His body responded reflexively, and an uncontrollable urge took over: The need to cry aloud.

“It’s a boy, Hilda. A healthy little boy,” came a familiar yet distant voice.

Sokram's mind stirred. 'Aunt Moira?' He thought, overjoyed.

The spell had worked.

Even at the cost of enduring an eternity in the void, it had succeeded!

He found himself handed to a beautiful woman, one he recognized instantly.

Her long, wavy, raven hair framed a flawless face with piercing blue eyes and a voluptuous body that radiated both elegance and strength.

This woman was Hilda, his mother.

Nearby, beside Moira, two other women caught his eye.

Two of them were near-perfect replicas of Hilda, though subtle differences in their features distinguished them.

One carried an air of wisdom that spoke of age, while the other exuded the vitality of her early twenties and golden hair.

They were his grandmother, Brunhild, and his elder sister, Astrid.

Brunhild sighed, her gaze lingering on Sokram's tiny form. "He looks nothing like Adulwulf. If his skin weren't so dark, we might pass him off as one of his sons." Her expression soon softened, and she smiled. “Well, at least he resembles his great-grandfather.”

“He is Adulwulf’s son, Mother,” Hilda replied firmly. “The blood test will confirm it. I have not betrayed my loyalty to him. He was there. He saw everything. And the oath proved my words truthful.”

Hearing his mother’s voice filled Sokram with emotion. He had underestimated how much he missed that melodious sound.

“Well, let’s hope you’re right,” Brunhild's words sounded skeptical. “Otherwise, there’s going to be a storm coming.”

Sokram understood their conversation well. He knew the unusual circumstances of his birth were bound to stir trouble.

His birth was no ordinary event.

Sokram was a chimera child, the result of a forbidden Soul Magic and Biomancy ritual, one that had cost the life of his father, Garuth, the Black Dragon.

Garuth sacrificed his soul to forge the body Sokram now inhabited, a body that carried the bloodlines of five primordial races.

Every one of the twenty-four primordial races' bloodlines was considered a treasure for the immense gifts they bestowed. Thus, having five of them in one body was a dream beyond reach for most.

The awakening of such potent bloodlines had made Sokram envied or targeted by countless powers as he threaded the Path of Evolution toward the Star Palace.

However, his unnatural conception had already brought turmoil to his family from the start.

Sokram had two mothers and two fathers.

While Garuth, the Black Dragon, had perished in the ritual, his second father, Adulwulf, a human descended from the High Humans, refused to accept him.

The primordial High Humans, the original progenitors of humankind, had been extinct on their planet for thousands of years, though their bloodline still lived; it was a rare gift.

Yet through this ritual, Sokram had inherited this bloodline and would soon fully awaken its many gifts.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The ritual had merged the fetus in Hilda’s womb with another carried by his second mother.

His second mother was a rare type of elf, a hybrid of Sun and Moon Elves known as a Gray Elf.

Gray Elves were renowned for their silvery-gray hair and eyes like the dragons. Even more significant was her identity as the crown princess of the Central Continent’s Elven Empire.

These memories resurfaced until Sokram was startled back to the present by the abrupt opening of a door.

‘Heh, Nana Margiory,’ Sokram thought, catching sight of the entrant. ‘Still as beautiful as I remember. And, as always, with Uncle Mikeal and Uncle Klaus following her like loyal shadows.’

He almost let out a laugh, but his tiny body failed to follow his amusement.

Margiory, a vision of elegance, stepped inside.

Her wavy white hair cascaded down her back, and her deep blue eyes sparkled with vitality. Though petite at 1.7 meters, her voluptuous figure and commanding presence made her one of the most celebrated beauties of the Northern Continent.

Even at nearly seventy, her youthful appearance defied her age, much through magical procedures and her alchemical rarities, but also because of her cultivation.

Yet, seeing her brought Sokram no solace.

He knew all the events that would follow, and his inability to alter them weighed heavily on him.

Adulwulf would soon accuse Hilda of infidelity, an accusation born of ignorance and envy.

The ritual had been beyond her control, and no physical act had occurred. Even when the blood test proved Sokram shared Adulwulf’s lineage, Sokram's dark golden-brown skin, ashen-white hair, and silvery eyes: Traits linked to the dragon race.

Traits that would fuel Adulwulf’s refusal to accept him and would shatter their family.

Mikhail, his older brother, would side with Adulwulf, while Astrid would accompany him and Hilda back to their hometown.

The weight of what was to come pressed heavily on Sokram's tiny chest. He could already see the cracks forming in his family, the accusations and denials that would tear them apart. Unable to bear his inability to change it, he retreated inward, seeking solace in the familiar confines of his Soul Realm.

He believed that though his infant body was frail and uncoordinated, his soul remained intact, but he was wrong.

Fully submerged in his consciousness, he felt the familiar pull of his soul realm.

Once, a place of solitude, a sanctuary where only he and the entities he allowed could enter.

Inside, all his knowledge, recorded in the form of books, the knowledge of his previous timeline, now knowledge only he possessed.

But as he stepped inside, what he found was a contrasting reality to his expectations.

The immense price he had paid for the spell to return to the past had taken a heavier toll than he thought.

What had once been an infinite library filled with the accumulated knowledge of billions of years was now reduced to a modest room with only a few shelves.

The contents appeared to be just basic knowledge, stripped of the details that had formed the foundation of his unparalleled power.

That power had once made him the undefeated pinnacle of the Realm of Kings.

Even so, Sokram saw an opportunity.

With the core knowledge still intact and most of his memories preserved, he could rebuild his foundation.

Not just rebuild it, he would make it stronger.

His reason for returning was not to increase his power. His mission was to ensure that his loved ones would survive the trials ahead.

This time, they would stand beside him in the Realm of Kings.

While the family drama played out around him, Sokram began relearning everything he needed to achieve his goals.

The simplicity of an infant’s life allowed Sokram's subconscious to handle his bodily needs, sparing his conscious mind for greater tasks.

He also feared that remaining too aware might attract attention, attention he was not yet ready to face.

Far away, at the heart of the galaxy, where the fabric of space and time warped under the immense gravity of a supermassive black hole, and in its center stood a palace that defied mortal comprehension.

It was a structure that seemed woven from the very essence of starlight, its walls shimmering with an otherworldly luminescence that pulsed faintly, as if alive.

The palace’s vast halls stretched endlessly.

Its ceilings seemed to dissolve into the starry visage of the galaxy, and their breadth so immense they could have housed entire civilizations.

Yet, despite its grandeur, only a select few beings, each possessing power beyond imagination, had ever been granted the privilege of setting foot within its corridors.

To witness its ethereal beauty was to glimpse a realm beyond Transcendence, yet, despite its grandeur, the palace was nothing but a fragment of a door.

This wonder of Magi was the Star Palace, a place that housed the guardian of the galaxy, Nhiria.

In the centermost hall, where a majestic throne sat before an enigmatic and ancient closed door, Nhiria glanced amusedly at a small planet in the far corner of her galaxy.

“Lady Nhiria, don’t you think that child is peculiar?” asked Eliora, a Sun Elf seated to Nhiria’s right. Eliora’s athletic figure, sun-kissed skin, and cascading red hair reflected the splendor of her kind. She was the First Exalted Paragon. “I’ve only ever detected these mental wavelengths in adults.”

“Yes, I noticed it too, Eliora,” replied Nhiria, seated on her galactic throne. “But I’m certain that soul is new. We witnessed Garuth’s soul being consumed by the void when he completed the ritual. One of the fetuses’ souls was lost as well. What remains is undoubtedly a newborn soul.” She gestured toward the far-off infant.

“Could it be that the child is already fully conscious?” asked Azulla, a Moon Elf with raven-black hair, pale skin, and dark purple eyes. Her alluring battle-hardened physique and regal aura marked her as the Queen of the Nether. Standing to Nhiria’s left, her expression was one of intrigue. “If so, wouldn’t that make him a genius unlike anyone we’ve ever seen?”

“It’s possible,” Nhiria acknowledged. “Or it could be a trait of the unique new race this ritual has created. Either way, we must observe him closely. Perhaps... perhaps he is the champion I’ve been waiting for.”

Her gaze turned distant, piercing through the vastness of existence, even beyond the dimensional walls, toward the gates of the Realm of Kings.

Sealed since the inception of the Multi-Dimensional Plane, those gates represented the ultimate threshold and the ultimate goal of Sokram and Nhiria's destiny.