The sky looked drawn.
That was the first thing Khael Corzedar thought as he stared upward, eyes squinting at a blue so perfect it couldn't possibly be real. Not like this. Not with clouds shaped like brushstrokes, drifting lazily across a sky colored like an anime background—soft gradients, no pixelation, no smog, no sunspots. Just… surreal beauty.
He was lying in a field of knee-high grass. A breeze tickled his arms.
No buildings. No phones. No sky noise. Just silence.
"What… where…"
He pushed himself up on trembling elbows, only to suddenly—
WHACK!
"AGHH—!!"
A fist struck him in the face, snapping his head to the side. He tumbled backward into the grass with a yelp.
"Gotcha!" a boy's voice said, followed by laughter.
Khael groaned. "What the hell—?!"
From the corner of his now-watering eye, he saw two figures just ahead.
One was a boy with spiky black hair, laughing mischievously as he rubbed his knuckles. The other a girl, scowling with crossed arms. Her silver-white hair shimmered in the light, the soft pink in her braid catching the sun like rose silk.
She was beautiful. Unreal. Like a watercolor dream.
Silver-white hair… lavender eyes… Echo runes glowing faintly on her hands…
Lira Valenne.
Her name burst into his brain like a memory he didn't know he had.
"That wasn't funny, Kaen!" she said, cheeks puffed in frustration.
Kaen.
Khael froze. His heart skipped a beat.
Kaen… Kaen Suro…
All Affinity. Shade Echo Mark. The cursed protagonist ofKaen Eclipse.
"No way… No freaking way…"
Khael clutched his forehead. Flashes poured into his mind like a torrent: volumes stacked on his shelf, late-night rereads, theorizing plot twists online—
He stared at the spiky-haired boy again. The same red-orange ember tips. The same reckless grin.
"This is Kaen Eclipse," he muttered. "I'm inside the manga world."
He stumbled back a few steps, heart pounding.
This isn't the first chapter… It's not Chapter 1 yet…
Wait. Chapter 1 started on the 21st day of Academy Arrival. They said it clearly in the panel.
He looked around. Trees in bloom. Training grounds in the far distance. Students lounging in uniforms.
That means… today is the 19th day.
I'm here… a day before the story begins.
And yet, he wasn't some random NPC. He had a body. A name. Memories… hazy, but present.
The name Khael Corzedar echoed in his ears like it belonged to him and it did.
He could remember walking halls in this academy, awkward conversations, failing to manifest an Affinity… It was fuzzy, like someone else's dream stitched into his mind.
But it was his now.
He wasn't just Shigeo Smith anymore. That boy, who once lay in bed reading this very manga, had died.
And now he was Khael.
He'd grown up reading Kaen Eclipse, a shonen masterpiece about a cursed boy rising from nothing. He'd reread it. Lived in its pages. He even cried when it ended. So many characters died. So many twists. Kaen Suro, the protagonist, had gone from outcast to hero to legend.
But the world was cruel. It always had been.
And now… he was here. Somehow.