Rebirth Of The Fallen Heir

Chapter 2: The Rebirth

Austin violently sat up, his hands flying to his throat.

No blood. No plastic tube. No suffocating pain.

Just a rush of crisp morning air flooding his lungs.

His heart was hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird, but it was beating.

It was whole. It was incredibly young.

He did not smell the sterile, metallic scent of the medical pavilion or the decaying lilies.

Instead, the sharp aroma of fresh morning ozone and cheap, familiar pine cleaner filled his nose.

Austin scrambled out of bed, his legs moving with a fluid, effortless strength he had not felt in decades.

He threw himself toward the small bathroom mirror, gripping the edges of the porcelain sink.

Austin froze.

A twenty-two-year-old Austin Vance stared back.

His face was entirely unlined by two decades of exhausting corporate warfare and emotional suppression.

His broad shoulders were perfectly straight, untorn by the high-velocity impact that had once left him a quadriplegic.

His eyes, though young, held the deep, chillingly fierce gaze of a man who had already been to the deepest pits of hell.

Austin slowly raised his hand and touched his own face.

Then... a realization struck him.

He... had regressed!

He had truly gone back twenty years!

The timeline had split, throwing his mature soul back to the precise year before Vivienne would trap him with her first fraudulent pregnancy.

They were not married yet.

He had not signed away a single corporate right, nor had he handed over the keys to the Vance family treasury.

Most importantly, a sudden realization hit his mind like a physical blow, and a hot tear rolled down his cheek.

*They are still alive.*

At this point in time, his proud father and loving mother had not yet passed away from heartbreak and stress.

His gentle younger sister, Olivia, was still alive, currently studying at the Capital Academy, completely unaware of the tragic accident that would take her life in a few short years.

He did not taste despair this time; he tasted pure salvation.

I can save them, Austin thought, his knuckles turning white against the sink.

This time, I will be their shield.

Suddenly, a roaring, catastrophic heat erupted from his lower abdomen.

Austin closed his eyes, mapping his internal meridians with his mind.

A brilliant, blinding light was pulsing within his dantian.

His Aetherial Core was humming.

In his past life, he had willingly shattered this core to save Vivienne's worthless mother from an underground loan shark syndicate, reducing himself to a mundane businessman.

He had sacrificed his future, his strength.

But now, his power was back!

The temporal shock of his regression had completely restored it, infusing his youthful meridians with the dense, terrifyingly refined Sovereign-level Resonance of his forty-year-old self.

He possessed twenty years of flawless future knowledge.

He knew which tech stocks would skyrocket, which ancient Aetherial artifacts would appear undiscovered in the back alleys, and exactly how the elite high-society factions would rise and fall.

He knew every trap, and he knew exactly whose throats he needed to crush.

This time, nobody could control his fate.

A cold, lethal smile spread across his face.

At that moment—

"Austin! Are you deaf?! I've been knocking for two whole minutes! Get out here and open the door!"

The sharp, entitled screech shattered the silence of the apartment.

Austin slowly turned his head toward the front door, the warmth instantly draining from his expression, replaced by a mask of freezing calm.

The lock clicked roughly as Vivienne Sterling kicked the front door open herself, using the spare key he had blindly given her.

She marched into the living room, tossing her cheap designer purse onto his clean sofa as if she owned the very air he breathed.

Her remarkably beautiful face was twisted into her usual, predictable pout.

Austin said nothing, his expression calm and cold.

But Vivienne misunderstood his silence.

She thought he was feeling guilty for making her wait.

She was completely confident that this spineless peasant would immediately bow his head and apologize to keep her happy as usual.

She never imagined, the man standing before her was no longer the Austin who begged for her love.

In reality, Austin was staring at a literal corpse in his mind, calculating the exact timeline required to strip the entire Sterling clan of their status and throw her into the dirt like absolute trash.

"Why didn't you answer me?" Vivienne snapped, crossing her arms and glaring at him as he stepped out of the bathroom.

"Harrison just returned from his overseas tour in the Western Continent tonight, and my childhood friends are throwing a massive welcome home gathering at the Imperial Lounge. I told you to have my emerald dress dry-cleaned and pick up the reservation tab.”

“Well? Where is it?"

Austin stood perfectly still, looking at the woman he had once destroyed his life for.

In his past life, he would have scrambled to appease her, apologizing profusely for his delay.

But this time...

He simply walked past her, his footsteps heavy and indifferent, and sat comfortably on the sofa.

He reached into the fridge, pulled out a cold drink, and did not even look her way.

"The dry-cleaning is where you left it," Austin said, his tone smooth, level, and entirely devoid of emotion. "And as for the reservation f*e, pay for it yourself. I am not spending a single cent on your friends."

Vivienne froze, her jaw dropping in absolute disbelief as she stared at the suddenly unrecognizable man before her.