Chapter Text
The feeling of reincarnation is odd, he thinks, like floating through life with a cheat sheet in hand. Already knowing how to stand, how to breathe, how to survive. Instincts coded into him as if they had always been there. Like how a barely formed baby kangaroo can cling to survival without instruction.
He wakes up stringent, floating, being carried and rocked gently. Before he can stop himself, if he can consciously stop himself, a cry leaves his lips. It startles him more than anyone else, and he can hear an exasperated exhale escape from whoever is carrying him.
"Neji, I'm not good at this at all..." someone starts, their voice low and uncertain, but they are cut off by a sharp intake of breath.
“Experience will refine you, and you're doing fine” a second voice cuts in, coming from his right. It is firm, but edged with just enough warmth to soften the critique. “There is always a beginning to every skill, Falena.”
His eyes remain closed, and not by choice. They feel too wrong, too raw. His limbs are weak and unresponsive, almost like he had no control over them. The weight of a hand cradling his own neck presses heavily against him, and is the most persistent sensation he can feel.
The first voice starts again but hesitates, then sighs, the sound heavy with doubt. “Fine isn’t good enough. He deserves better than this. I should—”
“Should what?” the second voice cuts in, sharper this time. “You’re here. You’re trying. That’s enough.”
He tries to shift in the quiet between their words, adjusting to the new sensations of warmth and the faint vibrations of their voices. He can’t see them, his world still dark and unfocused, alien and unknown.
“See?” the second voice murmurs. “He’s fine.” But even as they speak, he can feel an edge of doubt from the tone of their voices, there's a question left unspoken.
“Has Father visited him yet?” The voice above him asks, finally cutting the silence that uncomfortably settled earlier.
"No." The sterner voices replies before edging on hesitation and a slight pause, "Only her Grace has seen him."
Blurred memories surfaced. He remembered briefly waking before this, in another time, another place. A tunnel vision filled with blinding light and the agonized screams of a woman pierced his mind. It was chaos, both raw and unrelenting. He cried then, his own screams joining hers, high and sharp, reverberating in his ringing ears.
His body, weak, twisted, and convulsed, was overwhelmed by the sensations all too vivid, too loud, and too much. There was the weight of hands carrying him, solid yet trembling, their grip both grounding and alien. He screamed again, louder this time, until finally, exhaustion claimed him like a merciful wave to a low shore.
And then, silence.
When he woke again, it was to this place. To a world quieter, and warmer but still alien. At least he doesn't remember the echoes of the woman's screams too vividly anymore.
Another deep and audible inhale and exhale catches his attention, he really doesn't know what to do in this stringy body.
“It’s been almost a week. Where is he?” The question comes through gritted teeth, frustration simmering at the edges. The weight of the hand cradling his neck feels tight all of the sudden.
The rocking has stopped, and his body is still in the man's arms. He shakes slightly and musters whatever willpower his weak form has and grabs hold of the clothes of the man above him.
He isn’t sure why he did it. To comfort the man? Or to get him into rocking him in a gentle sway again?
The other man pauses, hesitant. His voice is quieter now, his previous tone softening into something else entirely. “He... will see to your brother at the appropriate time, Falena.”
Falena scoffs, the sound cutting through the room. The warmth in his voice now replaced a hint of bitterness. “He better,” he bites out. “My brother deserves to be recognized for his birthright.”
The man cradling him adjusts his grip, holding him a little closer.
“My brother,” Falena repeats, his voice softer this time but no less determined. “Leona Kingscholar.”
Now he was left in a bed. A crib? Laying in the darkness and down, feeling small and weak. The world felt too big right now, too overwhelming, and the body he was in, if it was even a body, didn't help making sense of it all. His limbs twitched, clumsy, and like jelly.
The air felt thick, heavy around him. His small chest rose and fell in shallow breaths, the coolness of the room striking against the warmth of his skin. It was quiet. Too quiet. His eyes stayed shut, unwilling to open even if he wanted to. Confusion seemed to lurk in everywhere in his mind. Where was he? What is he doing here.
Footsteps. Slow. Steady. The sound drew nearer, then paused, and he felt a presence close by. Someone was here, and that feeling was enough to make his body tense more. But then, the warmth came.
The fabric shifted beneath him as strong arms gathered him up. He was cradled, his body held close to another. It wasn’t frantic, no rush, but the comfort of a steady presence.
Their hands were firm but gentle as they cradled him against their chest, the motion smooth, almost practiced. There was no hurry, no frantic action, just the steady, rhythmic breathing of the person who carried him, and the soft warmth that enveloped his fragile body.
His body was weak, so small and fragile. The sensation of being so helpless, so dependent, wrapped around him like a shroud. He could feel the slight shift of fabric (smooth, soft against his skin) as the person moved, adjusting their hold. There was nothing but the rhythm of breaths, steady and deep, that filled his world. His own breaths followed suit, shallow and unsure, still unaccustomed to the air that filled his lungs.
His limbs twitched again, barely registering the change in position. His throat constricted, and before he could stop himself, a soft cry slipped past his lips, weak and desperate. It felt alien. Wrong.
As though his body was asking for something, but he didn’t know what.
The arms holding him didn’t falter. The fabric of their clothing shifted once again as a hand gently probed at his mouth.
There was a quiet pressure, an attempt to coax him to open, to feed him, but Leona’s lips stayed tightly shut. His body didn’t respond. The dry sensation in his throat only seemed to intensify, but still, his mouth wouldn’t open.
The pressure of the hand persisted, soft but firm, trying again to coax him. But it was no use. Leona’s body remained unyielding, unfamiliar with the need. The moment stretched, suspended in the air like an unanswered question, until finally, the hand withdrew.
A soft, quiet sigh.
His body stiffened up, this was someone from earlier, it was the man named... Neji?
He didn’t speak, but he carefully placed Leona down to the crib again, the warmth of his body slipping away as he laid Leona down once again. His movements were careful, deliberate. Even without saying anything, Neji knew exactly what Leona needed, or at least, what he didn’t need at that moment.
Leona couldn’t see him, but he could hear Neji shifting away and standing up from the bed. He hear him move further and further away, his footsteps thumped lightly on a wooden floor until the soft click of a door shutting marked the end of it.
The darkened room fell silent once again. The cold wind hitting him on the face making him scrunch up in the face in closed anticipation. The quiet stillness of his body seemed to mock him, and the confusion and fear of what was happening pressed down on him, making the small cry he wanted to give rise up in his throat. But it didn’t come. Not yet.
Ever since that first moment with his brother, he had always clearly remembered his name.
Leona Kingscholar.
The "scholar" at the end rolled off his tongue well, once he got over the incoherent babbling he used to do.
A scholar. That’s what someone who is born in the Kingscholar family should strive to be, according to Neji, the ever stoic figure who had now become a constant fixture in his life.
Most of his memories as a baby came in fragments. Fleeting images seen through lidded eyes catching glimpses of light and shadow, the feeling of soft blankets, and the sway of being carried in his tiny world. He remembered being rocked gently in the arms of the maids, Selena, Firaya, and Cedyu and hearing the steady cadence of Neji’s lectures, though he couldn’t understand a word of them at the time.
More often than not, at the time, he was simply asleep. At first, it frustrated him. He wanted to stay awake, to observe and learn, but his body had other plans. He would've wanted to learn about this unfamiliar place in his first years of life, but again, his body was uncooperative. By the time he was four years old, though, his world had sharpened, and his life was already settled on a pattern.
His days were divided between the ever so observant Neji, the maids who cared for him dutifully, and his brother, Falena.
Falena was different.
From the very start, Leona had decided his older brother was good. Falena’s bright smile could light up a room, his laughter infectious even to the most stoic of servants. He was kind in a way that was genuine, and he cared deeply. Maybe a little oblivious at times, but it was perhaps a part of his brother's charm. As much as Leona liked him and understood his responsibilities, he couldn’t help but feel a sharp sting of disappointment every time Falena left him behind for his “princely duties” and left him with Neji or the servants.
They weren’t bad company, per se, but they were formal, detached. No jokes, no stories, no laughter. Especially Neji, he doesn't remember a single time the man laughed just for the sake of laughing. Everyday was a constant repeat of routines and lessons. Falena was the only one who brought some light into his little world, but that light was fleeting, like sunlight slipping through cracks in the curtains.
And so, Falena’s absence would make Leona bitter in a way. In the way that would leave a hollow space that no servant could fill.
Then there were his parents. Or rather, their absence.
Leona had stopped thinking about his father for a long time now. The man’s presence was unremarkable, more an idea than a reality in Leona’s world. He hasn't seen the man since his third birthday, and Leona would've been convinced that he forgot it altogether this year if it weren't for Falena bringing a gift from their father. Honestly Leona thinks that the man prefers Falena, his heir. Why would he bother showing up for his second child when the first is already enough? As for his mother, she was even more distant. Appearing only twice in his earliest memories, both times so brief that he’d fallen asleep before he could even register her fully.
She was like just a name spoken in the passing, both by his brother and the servants.
It didn’t bother him that much as he thought it would. The only thing that really stuck with him was the nagging sense of neglect that he would occasionally feel, but he'd remind himself that he had Neji, Falena and many others so what weight would it add if just two people are being remarkably absent in his life? He was barely two years old when he made the realization, but even then, he sometimes felt the prick of hurt at the notion of being forgotten.
But like he said, he didn't dwell on it too much. After all, he was still a baby, and babies needed sleep, a lot of it. He hated it. The sheer amount of time his body demanded for rest annoyed him to no end. It reminded him of cats, and maybe that wasn’t too far off the mark because...
Was he even human anymore?
Leona wasn’t sure. A sense of confusion would also come to him when he thought about it. On top of his head sat two furry lion ears, twitching reflexively when he brought his small, grubby hands to touch them. They were sensitive, and embarrassingly so. Brushing them with his fingers made him wince sometimes. Occasionally, by pure instinct he would try to wear glasses like how Neji does, but the lack of human ears would inconvenience him at every attempt. He eventually had to ask his brother to buy him glasses made for someone of their species. And as if the ears weren’t weird enough, he also had a tail.
A tail.
It moved almost on its own, sometimes betraying his emotions before he even understood them himself.
Excited? It wagged. Annoyed? It flicked.
The lack of control frustrated him, but at least he’d learned to do simple things with it, like wrapping it around someone’s leg or grabbing something when it was within reach, but those required more focus, and he was usually too lazy to be precise.
Leona sighed. He was a beastman now. A strange mix of human and lion. It was surreal. Strange, if he could describe it with only one word. And, frankly, the last thing he’d expected in his second life was to be a furry.
Because yes, this was his second life.
Vague memories of his past life appeared at times and lingered, blurry and disjointed. He couldn’t remember his name or face, but snippets of his old habits surfaced occasionally. He remembered the glow of a computer screen in a dark room, the hum of a fan, and the soft clicks of a keyboard under his fingers. Maybe he’d been a gamer? Probably a shut-in too, judging by the way those memories felt.
Honestly, looking back on it now, Leona cringed. What had been so interesting about that screen that he’d spent most of his first life glued to it? Why had he invested all his time and energy into something so... dull?
He couldn’t change the past, but he could reflect on it, even if it made him want to bury his face in his hands.
This time, though, things would be different. They had to be different. Leona wasn’t going to waste this life like the last one. He was going to live, really live, and not just exist.
Even if he still didn’t quite know how.