infinity transmigrate

The sword hummed.

Not out loud. Not for anyone else.

Only Kael could feel it.

It didn't vibrate, didn't glow, didn't whisper like some cliché fantasy relic.

No.

It was remembering.

And that was the worst part.

_____________________________________________________________________________

"Kael."

Riven's voice cut through the silence like a quiet warning.

"I know," Kael replied. "It's doing it again."

The sword lay across his knees, still and dark, like it was waiting for permission.

They camped in an old rail station. Dusty benches, flickering lights, and enough rat skeletons made for strange decorations. Finn was asleep

against a broken vending machine. Silas snored with his face buried in a half-burnt map. Riven hadn't touched her food.

They were all exhausted. After everything they'd been through, how could they not be?

Kael sat apart, near the far wall, staring at the blade.

He hadn't touched it since the last fight. Didn't need to. Didn't want to.

But now?

The damn thing was reaching for him.

"You should let it happen," Riven said, watching him glance nervously at the sword.

Kael blinked. "What?"

"The memory," she said, crouching across from him. "You keep fighting it. Let it in."

"I'm fine."

"You're twitching."

"I twitch when I'm fine."

She raised an eyebrow.

Kael exhaled. "Have you ever felt like something inside you is just... watching? Waiting for you to screw up?"

"Welcome to self-awareness," she smirked.

"Great. So this is normal."

"No. But you make it look normal."

Her gaze dropped to the black obsidian blade. The way it sat in Kael's lap made her uneasy, too.

"So what are you going to do now?" she asked.

Kael flinched.

He knew the answer. He just didn't want to say it. Didn't want to see himself again. Not them. Not the versions with the smiles that weren't smiles.

But he had to. If he wanted to understand who he was—and what this sword was doing to him—he had to look.

He inhaled sharply.

"I have to look inside it."

He stared down. The blade still hummed. Still waited.

Riven gave him a quiet nod.

"Huuu…" he breathed out. His fingers brushed the hilt.

His vision blurred.

Then, everything broke.

He stood.

The sword was gone.

His hands were empty. But he felt no pain.

No nightmare selves grinning back.

This time, it was different.

Memories floated around him—memories he didn't recognize. Forgotten pages turning too fast. Flashes of lives. Battles. People.

Then the world around him shifted—

And he stood in the center of a battlefield.

Ash choked the sky. Mountains burned. Screams tore the wind apart.

A man stood in the chaos.

Kael stared.

It was him.

But older. Stronger. A full-grown Kael in dark armor, long hair whipping in the wind. Blood covered his arms. The same blue eyes. The same sword.

But in those eyes—

Nothing human.

"This is the cost," the other Kael said.

Kael blinked. "The cost of what?"

"Of meaning something."

Then the scene shattered again.

He stood in a garden.

Still. Too still.

Beautiful—but silent. Not a single sound. Not even birds.

A voice came from behind him.

A woman's voice.

"If you take the blade again, you don't come back the same."

He didn't need to see her face.

He knew that voice.

Laniriel.

"Wait—" he started.

But the scene shifted again.

Another battlefield.

This time... no doppelgänger.

Just a man lying on the ground.

A sword through his chest.

Kael stepped closer—

"Ugh—!"

Pain exploded in his chest.

He looked down.

His own sword had pierced him.

The copper taste flooded his mouth.

He fell to his knees, lungs drowning in blood.

"GAHH—"

The blade pushed deeper.

He looked up and froze.

The one holding the sword—

Was him.

Exactly him.

Cold. Silent. No expression.

A darker Kael.

"W-Who..." he choked out.

"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?!"

No answer.

The blade pushed in one final time.

The last thing he heard before everything went black was his own voice whispering:

"You sinner. You were better left behind."

_____________________________________________________________________________

GASP!

Kael woke up, soaked in sweat, gasping like he'd just escaped drowning.

Riven caught his shoulder. "Hey! Easy."

"I—" he choked out, "I saw... everything."

"Yeah?" she asked gently. "Did you like it?"

He laughed. It came out broken. More sob than sound.

"No."

Silas stirred. "Someone dying?"

"Nope," Riven called back. "Just Kael being dramatic."

Silas grunted and rolled over.

Kael didn't move.

He just stared at the sword lying in his lap.

So quiet now.

Like it hadn't just killed him in a dream.

He gripped the hilt and lifted it.

It wasn't heavy anymore.

He looked at the blade.

"This is my story," he muttered. "And even I don't understand it."

_____________________________________________________________________________

Later, when the fire had burned down to embers, Kael stood alone at the edge of the platform.

The railway tracks stretched into a tunnel swallowed by black.

No train. No sounds. No people.

Just darkness.

He stepped closer, the sword wrapped in a cloth borrowed from Silas and slung across his back.

One step. Then another.

He stopped.

He glanced around.

"I guess I'm the only one here," he muttered.

He knelt. Unwrapped the sword. Held it in both hands.

Closed his eyes.

"I remember you."

The blade responded with a hum.

Warmth pulsed through his palms.

A quiet acknowledgement.

He took a breath—

And swung the blade downward.

Riven joined him later, leaning against the wall nearby, arms crossed.

She watched him in silence.

He kept swinging the sword. Over and over. Practicing.

Until finally, he collapsed onto the ground, chest heaving.

She walked over. Her shadow loomed behind him.

"You're different."

"Again?" Kael asked, half-smiling.

"More like... a completely different person."

Kael nodded. "It's all connected somehow."

He looked at the sword lying in front of him.

"The sword. The Gate. And her."

"Laniriel?"

"Yeah."

Riven leaned on the railing beside him.

"She mattered to you."

"I think I broke her."

"…"

"I think you're good at making promises that hurt," she said quietly.

Kael winced. "You're not wrong."

"But," she added, "you're worse at letting go."

That made him smile.

"Yeah," he said. "That sounds more like me."

They stood there for a while.

Two people who didn't know how to stop surviving.

_____________________________________________________________________________

Morning came too fast.

They packed their supplies, ate cold rations, and argued over directions.

The usual.

Kael now carried the sword on his back, not to show off.

It just felt right.

They reached the edge of Sector 9 before noon. Past the barrier. Past the point, most scavengers turned back.

Finn looked around, wide-eyed.

"This place gives me the creeps."

Silas muttered, "Yeah. Feels wrong."

And it did.

The deeper they walked, the heavier the air got. Like the world itself didn't want them here.

But Kael didn't slow down.

He walked ahead, and the others followed—first Riven, then the rest.

Until Finn finally asked, "Hey, Kael?"

"Yeah?"

"That sword… it doesn't, like… talk to you, does it?"

Kael smirked. "Not in a way you'd like."

"Oh," Finn said, pale. "So it does talk."

Silas snorted. "Figures. Everything about you screams 'possessed.'"

Kael didn't deny it.

He just nodded.

"It remembers who I was. That's enough."

And then he stepped forward.

Across the threshold.

Into Sector 9.

Into whatever the world had waiting for him next.

_____________________________________________________________________________

The sword stayed quiet.

But Kael knew.

It was listening.

And somewhere deep inside it…So was he.