I Just Wanted a Peaceful Life… So Why Do Heroes Worship Me?

It began with stillness.

Not silence—stillness.

Even the wind stopped moving through the trees near the sanctuary's edge. Birds quieted. The stream near the eastern path slowed, its surface rippling with tension that no one could name.

Rei noticed it first.

Not as a threat. Not as an attack.

But as presence.

Like a pair of eyes watching from just beyond the wards. Focused. Patient. Professional.

Not here to guess.

Here to confirm.

Rei was in the greenhouse when it happened—rearranging herb trays, trimming the roots of a particularly stubborn starvine that had started growing against the flow of the spiritual field. Zephyr sat outside the entrance, his ears tilted back and fur charged with quiet static.

Ellyn found him first. "The outer barrier pulsed. Just once."

Rei didn't turn. "Direction?"

"East. Old pine slope."

He nodded. "A scout."

"Another dreamer?"

"No. Not this time."

Outside, Fluff had already stationed himself on the roof.

Lynna met Rei near the orchard with a confused frown. "Why do you look like you're about to prune something dangerous?"

"Because I am."

They moved toward the edge of the sanctuary without another word.

Ferren was banned from following. Kreg distracted him with bread and a deliberate challenge to build a "flour-based warning system."

Zephyr kept pace behind Rei, unusually alert. No growls. No snarls.

Just silent awareness.

By the time they reached the tree line, the stillness had thickened into something solid. Unnatural. Controlled.

Rei stopped just shy of the sanctuary's outermost rune circle.

"Come out," he said softly. "I don't care for dramatics."

A shape shifted from the trees.

Not quite a person—not quite a shadow.

And then the figure stepped forward, the illusion falling away.

Cloaked in gray silk, with bindings at the wrists and ankles, their face covered in bone-stitched veilcloth. No weapons visible. No voice.

But they bowed.

Not out of respect.

Out of duty.

Lynna's eyes narrowed. "Who is that?"

"An old problem," Rei said.

The figure raised one hand and slowly pulled out a scroll.

It unfurled with perfect, practiced grace.

Black ink shimmered with forbidden spells, sacred geometry, and one name written in red across the top.

Rei.

Not a mistake.

Not an alias.

Not a guess.

They knew.

Lynna's breath caught. "That's… your real name?"

Rei's voice didn't change. "No. That's the name I left behind."

The figure waited. The scroll shimmered again, pulsing.

A challenge.

A request.

A warning.

Rei stepped forward, bare feet brushing pine needles.

"No," he said.

The scroll disintegrated.

The figure flickered.

Attacked.

Fast. Clean. Like wind through tall grass.

But Rei was faster.

He didn't block.

He redirected.

A single step. A turn of the wrist.

And the figure slammed into the ground hard enough to rattle birds out of the trees.

Zephyr didn't move.

Lynna didn't breathe.

The cloaked figure blinked—shocked—and reached again.

Rei touched two fingers to the ground.

And the forest bent.

Not shattered.

Bent.

Branches curved.

Roots lifted.

Stone cracked in a perfect circle around his feet.

He didn't yell. He didn't chant.

He simply looked up.

"Tell them," he said quietly. "I'm not coming back."

The figure shivered.

Vanished.

Gone without a trace.

Lynna turned to Rei slowly. "...What was that?"

Rei looked down at his hands. "An old apprentice."

She blinked. "That was your apprentice?"

"A loyal one. They only follow orders."

Lynna stared at the crushed soil, the bent trees, the imprint left behind where a trained killer had landed.

And she whispered, "Remind me never to make you angry."

Rei turned.

And for the first time in days, he smiled.

"I don't get angry," he said. "That's the problem."

—

Back in the sanctuary, Ferren was halfway through explaining why yeast had "predictive potential" when Zephyr returned alone and sat at the hearth.

Ellyn didn't ask.

She didn't need to.

Rei came in an hour later, quietly resumed his tea-making routine, and said nothing.

But everyone moved just a little differently around him that night.

Because they had seen the silence move.

And realized it had teeth.