Anaxa had just finished one of his alchemy experiments. It had failed yet again, but he told himself there was something to learn from every mistake. That was the mantra he clung to. Stepping outside, he let the sunlight warm his face. He raised a hand to shield his eyes from the brightness, squinting as his vision adjusted.

Then he saw someone approaching.

A figure in the distance, walking steadily toward him, carrying a child.

As they came closer, recognition flickered in Anaxa’s eyes. It was you. Well-known across Okhema, and someone he’d worked with more than once. You stopped in front of him, the child clinging to you tightly. Anaxa stared. The child couldn’t have been older than five. Small arms wrapped around your leg, a hand clutching a worn, self-made plushie, shaped like a dromas. A specific one.

His sister had made that plush toy for him when he was a child.

But his sister was gone now. She had been for years.

Anaxa’s breath caught as his gaze moved from the plushie to the child’s face. Wide eyes. That familiar hair. The resemblance was undeniable.

The child looked exactly like him. Exactly like he had, at that age. Only without the eyepatch.

Panic flickered in his expression. He took a step back, heart racing, the implications slamming into him like a wave. There was no mistaking it. No other child could look like that. No one else could possibly have that face.

But how..?