Haremlord: Rise of the Banished

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They took his eyes.And now, he sees clearer than ever.

Lan An awoke with a jolt, his body seized by agony, as if every bone had been pulverized into dust. Even twitching a finger felt impossible. Worse still, his skull throbbed with unbearable pressure, flooded by a deluge of foreign memories. The chaos overwhelmed him.

Two hours passed before the splitting headache receded. As clarity returned, Lan An's thoughts aligned and the truth hit him like a thunderclap.

"I… I'm alive? I've really transmigrated?" he whispered, voice hoarse. Cold sweat soaked his brow. If he had the strength, he would've pinched himself to confirm this wasn't a fevered illusion.

He began to sort through the fragments of memory.

In his previous life, he had been an orphan raised in a state shelter until age seven, when an old man adopted him. That man, he later learned, had been a war hero, a battle-hardened legend who never married, never had a child. In his twilight years, he chose Lan An to be his son.

Lan An idolized him. Inspired by the man's valor, he entered the military academy and graduated with top honors, determined to follow the same path of honor and service.

But fate is a cruel beast.

The old hero had made powerful enemies during his career enemies who struck once he retired. That night, black-clad assassins rained death upon their home. Lan An would never forget the gunfire, the flames, the helplessness. His father, old but unyielding, fought to the death beside him. But they were outnumbered. Their quiet home burned to ash.

In his final moments, Lan An saw his father's clouded eyes still filled with warmth, but tinged with regret. Perhaps the old man blamed himself for dragging Lan An into his storm. Lan An had tried to speak tried to say, "I'm proud to be your son." But the flames devoured those final words.

"That… was my only regret," Lan An thought.

Suppressing the grief, he turned his attention to the memories of this new body and what he found made his blood run cold.

A surge of fury erupted. His fists clenched tight, blood seeping from his palms.

With trembling effort, he raised a hand to his face.

Nothing.

His eye sockets were hollow.

He was blind.

Rage, raw and volcanic, surged through him. If he could move, he would've roared at the heavens. But the next truth shattered him even more:

The one who had taken his eyes... was his biological father.

The contrast was soul-crushing. In his past life, a man who wasn't bound by blood had loved and protected him. In this life, the one who gave him life had taken everything away.

This body's name was also Lan An.

The eldest son of Lan Po Lei patriarch of the Lan Clan, an elite Eighth-Tier cultivation force on the Bing Tian Continent.

In this world, power ruled. The weak were trampled without mercy.

The Lan Clan held vast lands, millions of descendants, and a legacy that rivaled the heavens. Their founder was said to have ascended to the Immortal Realm itself.

As the firstborn of such a clan, Lan An should've lived in glory. But destiny spat on him.

He was born without a spiritual root.

In a world of cultivation, this was worse than death. A crippling disgrace. His very existence became the clan's greatest shame.

His mother originally from a minor Fifth-Tier family was shunned and cast aside after giving birth to a "defective" heir. Heartbroken, she died with her eyes unclosed.

The final nail in Lan An's coffin came a year later, when his younger brother, Lan Wu, was born. Unlike him, Lan Wu inherited dual spiritual roots: Ice and Lightning. The clan rejoiced. The Elders named Lan Wu as the next heir.

And Lan An? He became a stain.

Mocked by servants, denied his name, stripped of all dignity.

But the cruelty didn't end there.

At thirteen, Lan Wu suffered a mishap while cultivating an ocular technique and went blind. The clan, desperate to preserve their prodigy, turned to forbidden methods.

Only a blood relative's eyes could be used in a transplant.

So Lan Po Lei chose.

He gouged out his firstborn's eyes with his own hands.

Lan An had begged. Screamed. Bled.

It changed nothing.

He was left blind, broken, and discarded. Used by the clan's youths as a living punching bag. Whenever he neared death, they tossed him scraps of food, just enough to keep him breathing for more torment.

Three years of this hell passed.

At sixteen, during yet another "training session," they went too far.

And that's when Lan An the one from another world arrived.

"Compared to you… my life was a blessing," Lan An whispered, his fingers trembling as they brushed the hollow sockets. "But now that I'm here…"

A fire surged in his chest.

"I won't waste this second chance."

No matter the odds, no matter the pain—he would survive.

He would rise.

"But first… I need to get out of this hell."

Clang!"Activation successful. The Overlord System is now initializing.""Binding to host in: 10… 9… 8… 5… 2…"

The mechanical voice echoed through his mind, cutting through the silence.

Lan An froze.

Then, a trembling grin crept across his face.

The flame… had returned.