I only finally felt like a man on that fateful day.

Not when I lost my virginity during that strange but blissful encounter…

Not when I earned my first gold coin…

…And not when I found out that there was more to my ancestry…that I descended from a long line of kings.

No.

I only felt like a true man when lightning finally decided to hit me in the face.

During those forgotten days in which I felt more lost than anything else, I found myself praying for any kind of miracle that would rekindle my will to continue living in a world that never wanted me in the first place.

As an orphan left on the doorstep of an orphanage before I was even capable of thinking, a life of misery was all I ever knew.

But now that I feel death looming on the horizon for me, I must admit that this second life of mine was lived with the first life as a reference.

A life of misery could shape you into your best self in no time. You already know how low of a life you could have so the sky's the limit if you tried to change your fate.

Sadly, my first life didn't last more than two decades.

At nineteen years of age, a thick bolt of lightning, thicker than a horse carriage washed over me and there weren't even ashes left as a testament to my short existence.

The next thing I knew, I was born into a royal family as the next in line to the throne.

Keeping the memories of my first life was a gift that I would've exchanged for a blank slate if you asked me. I would've preferred living my new life without my scarred mind. I knew too much misery.

Despite living my first days as a newborn prince, I found myself plagued with the constant nagging of my mind trying to make sense of everything.

What could explain reincarnation?

What could explain that strange text of floating purple letters in my mind?

No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't forget that text despite not knowing what it meant, because sadly, in the first life like this one, I was illiterate.

The majesty and ancient feeling that purple text exuded though…left me wanting to know more.

Perhaps it was that colossal lightning that hit me that was the explanation of everything.

As painless as my first death had been, I had no regrets. Perhaps this was God's way of making it up to me.

I was born a little bit earlier than my twin brother, making me the de facto crown prince.

I was barely born and a huge responsibility was hurled onto me like that.

I never complained, though I later found an excuse to relinquish my title to my ungrateful brother who took it for granted…but that's a story for another day.

During my first days, I listened a lot and cried less than my normal twin brother which raised quite a lot of eyebrows and questions.

In my defense, I was only trying to learn a foreign language. I was driven mad by not knowing where I was and what was being spoken that my brain worked on overdrive trying to learn all it could early on.

It was during that time of learning that I found out that I was far from being normal.

Somehow my thinking was fast. Too fast.

My ears could pick up sounds a hundred meters away.

By now, without even mentioning my eyes and nose, you already understand where I am going with this.

I suspected it was magical because it only took me less than a month to learn the language.

Only magic could explain such a thing.

Was this world magical?

Were there dragons, goblins, and elves like in those songs I heard in my first life?

No one seemed to be as peculiar as me though.

I knew because if I concentrated my vision hard enough and looked at my limbs, I could see little purple hairlike tendrils of energy akin to lightning coming in and out of my body.

As for the rest of the humans around me, nothing.

I was starting to think that I was the only magical being around when the day of my third anniversary, I finally met my father, the king, for the first time.

He exuded a silvery energy at least six inches around his body.

It seemed that only a select few had access to magic…whatever it was.

"Hello, Jack. Such intelligent eyes. It seems it is not for nothing that you're the crown prince. Heh." The King said as he held me.

It seemed the rumors about my peculiarities had reached his ear.

The way I conducted myself was unlike any other baby.

If I needed something I made hand signs. I couldn't shock them with my eloquent speech just yet. Heck, even I was a little shocked by how fast I learned things.

My father, King John Kuzah, had been campaigning for the most part of the last three years. The campaign had started shortly after he learned that my mother, Melissa, was pregnant.

He had made an incredible effort by being there for our third anniversary and it could be seen by how excited he was.

Not only had he conquered and annexed two whole kingdoms during those three years, but he had also even earned the title of Duke by joining the neighboring Sarantin Empire and becoming its subordinate.

As far as I can remember, those days were synonymous with glory and riches for our Glaze Kingdom because my father's prowess with the sword was unmatched and he himself was a one-man army…so no one dared to think of any foul play against our kingdom while he was alive.

At the time, all my father's enemies thought that the elusive Paladin gene would end with my father. They were biding their time and training their successors for the eventual war that would divide the fat cake that was the Glaze Kingdom.

…But the Paladin gene.

A birthright that was even rarer than the Mage gene.

Both genes confer immense power to the destined individual, the former being stronger than the latter because instead of casting mere spells it was the body in its entirety that was being exponentially strengthened.

Imagine our family's enemies when they later learned that Duke John had a hybrid of both mage and paladin genes as a son.