Rebirth of the Weakest

2: The Trash Cat and the Deal

Ken gasped awake, grasping for a breath that would not come. He had just died. He was almost certain of that.

Then his eyes opened onto nothing at all.

He floated inside a black, endless space scattered with drifting nebulae, stars burning silently in every direction. No ground beneath him. No sky above. Just void, and the faint hum of something ancient watching.

"Where am I," Ken muttered, turning in place. "Is this the afterlife they talk about?"

The moment the words left his mouth, a voice rolled out of the darkness like distant thunder, heavy enough to press against his chest.

"Kenneth Grandoff."

Ken flinched. "Who is there? How do you know my name?"

A figure began to take shape ahead of him, colossal and wrapped in a robe that seemed to be woven from feathers and starlight itself. When it finally spoke, the words landed with the weight of law.

"I am the God of All Realities. Ruler of Destinies. I oversee all that is. I am the Reality God, Zhu Nan."

Ken's soul trembled under the pressure radiating off the being, an invisible weight settling over every inch of him. His knees nearly buckled.

"A god," he whispered. "So I really am dead."

"Kenneth Grandoff," Zhu Nan said, ignoring the interruption. "I can offer you a second life, free of the curse buried in your soul. I have watched a thousand worlds rise and fall, and yours has crossed my path. Answer my questions, and I will grant what you seek."

Ken did not hesitate. What did he have left to lose.

"As it pleases you," he said.

"In life," the god began, "what is worth fighting for while you still draw breath? Wealth comes and goes. Power fades. Even gods cannot fully grasp what holds a mortal heart together."

Ken thought it over, turning the question in his mind like a coin. The rich had wealth. The strong had power. What did neither of them have.

"The one thing they lack," he said slowly, "is humanity. To them, the world is only a tool to use."

"So your answer is," Zhu Nan pressed.

Ken looked up. "Emotion."

The god was silent for a moment, then answered with something almost like disappointment.

"Close, but not quite there. What they lack is human love. There is no unity among the gods, no warmth between us. To beings like myself, a mortal life is smaller than a grain of sand. We only chase power and dominion over the heavens."

Ken felt something crack open in his chest, old and tired. "Then why does any of this matter," he said, his voice thinning. "Even if you send me back, it will only be the same misfortune all over again. I already lost everything once." A tear slid down his cheek before he noticed it was there. "Maybe dying really was the only freedom I was ever going to get."

For a heartbeat, the void felt almost gentle.

"The death of one life is only the start of another," Zhu Nan said. "You carried the seven amulets of creation, and that is what brought your soul to me. I will grant you a wish to return. So tell me, young Ken, what do you truly desire."

Ken said nothing at first. He thought of rain on his face, a little girl's frightened eyes, a truck he never had the chance to outrun.

"I want power," he finally said. "With power, I can change my fate."

"Every world holds its own balance," Zhu Nan explained. "Choose wealth, and everyone around you will be wealthy too. Choose power, and the world you enter will be filled with the powerful. Everything finds its equal. So tell me, little Ken, what difference would that make."

"I do not care," Ken said, jaw tight. "Even with a small amount of power, hard work can still carry a man to the top."

"You carry the curse of karma," the god said, not unkindly. "In this life you are fated to remain insignificant, no matter which door you walk through. Choose with care." A pause, heavy with meaning. "There are three realities before you. The first, a world of wealth, where you are born a beggar among the rich. The second, a world of intellect, where you are born a fool who must claw his way toward wisdom while others race ahead. The third, a world of power, where you are born as nothing among beings who could crush stars between their fingers. Choose well, Ken. You are not dead yet. You stand only in the space between."

Ken weighed each path in silence.

*Wealth, and I would spend my whole life being laughed at by people who never worked a day for what they have. Intellect, and I would grow old still studying while younger minds passed me by. Power, and I would probably get flattened before I ever stood a chance.*

Then something steadier settled in his chest, something that almost felt like stubbornness.

*If I can claw out even a little power, I can protect everything I have ever lost. I can climb from nothing back into something. That is a chance worth taking.*

"I choose the world of power," Ken said, standing a little straighter now. "I will earn my strength through hard work. I will not lean on wealth. I will not lean on cleverness. Just effort, and time, and refusing to quit."

"Still too naïve for what awaits you," Zhu Nan said, though something in his tone almost sounded amused. "Even so, it shall be granted."

Light swallowed everything.

The last words Ken caught, fading like an echo down a long hallway, were strange enough to stay with him.

*Never forget the puzzle. Only through it will you find enlightenment.*

...

Ken woke to a dull, pounding headache and a ceiling he did not recognize.

A woman sat beside the bed, her face pale with worry, and something about her eyes made his chest ache in a way he could not explain.

"Mom," he said before he even decided to.

She practically threw herself onto him, arms wrapping tight around his shoulders.

"You are finally awake," she said, voice cracking. "I was so worried, Le Ken."

The name settled into him like a key turning a lock, and a flood of memories rushed in behind it.

He was Le Ken now. Born into the Grand Le Clan, son of Lady Le Li, a woman the clan elders had spent years quietly humiliating for raising a so-called bastard child outside clan bloodlines. The old patriarch had once willed leadership of the clan to her, but the promise crumbled the moment she gave birth to Ken without a father anyone could name. They had survived on scraps of dignity ever since, propped up by the one elder still willing to help them.

This world ran on martial beast spirits. Strength decided everything, and Ken had apparently spent the last stretch of time in a coma after getting beaten half to death by the clan's second elder's son.

Lady Le Li studied his face, still gripping his hand. "Are you truly alright, my son?"

Before Ken could answer, the door swung open, and a broad-shouldered man walked in with the kind of posture that assumed the room already belonged to him. The second elder, Wei Zhan.

"Sign the deed, Le Li," he said, tossing a folded paper onto the bed without ceremony. "You no longer hold any right to the will. Do it now, or your trash of a son gets more than a beating next time. I can have him banished from the clan just as easily."

Lady Le Li rose to her feet, shielding Ken with her body. "Do not push your luck, second elder. I show you respect because we share blood, nothing more. My father willed this seal to me, and you were never named patriarch. I will not hand it over."

"I am the second brother of the former patriarch," Wei Zhan snapped. "The only one in this clan with real experience. Why should a woman raising a trash-blooded son hold that seal over someone like Le Jin?" He crossed his arms, then let his voice soften into something oilier. "Though I could make an exception. Marry me, and we rule the clan together."

Ken felt something hot flare up under his ribs before he even realized he was speaking.

"What was that, second elder?" he said, a slow grin spreading across his face. "Your own son is trash too, and still hungry for the good meat. Funny thing about dogs, though. They only ever get the bones."

Wei Zhan's face darkened. "You sit at level two beast refiner with a laughable cat spirit everyone mocks as trash. My son Wei Lin reached level ten before he even turned your age, and he carries a tortoise spirit worth actual respect. Do not compare yourself to him."

The words landed exactly where they were meant to, and something in Ken snapped tight with pride and anger both. Before he could think better of it, he grabbed the contract off the bed and signed it in his own blood.

"Within one year," Ken said, "I will be admitted into a sect. I will become a beast master."

Wei Zhan actually laughed. "A trash-tier boy at seventeen, promising beast master rank in a year? Even three years would be generous." He tilted his head, considering. "Fine. Three years. If you fail, I take the patriarch seal for myself instead of leaving it with that soft-hearted outcast, Le Jin."

Ken did not blink. "Then it is a deal, second elder. And until that day comes, you will not lay a hand on my mother again."

"Le Ken, please," his mother whispered, gripping his sleeve. "You do not understand what kind of man he really is."

"Do not worry, mother," Ken said, and meant it. "Hard work makes anything possible. The Grand Le Clan is still the strongest among its rivals. It will not fall apart over squabbles like this."

Wei Zhan let out a long, satisfied sigh on his way out the door.

"Pack your bags, child," he called back over his shoulder. "In three years, I will run you out of this clan exactly like the mutt you compared yourself to."

The door shut behind him.

Ken sat there a moment, chest still tight, and almost laughed at the absurdity of it. Died once already, and somehow landed himself in another mess just as ridiculous as the last one.

*Trash cat spirit. No wealth. No clever tricks up my sleeve. Just stubbornness and time.*

He looked down at his shaking hands, the same ones that had once let go of a briefcase in the rain.

*Kenneth Grandoff is gone. But Le Ken is still here. And this time, I intend to prove that trash can still learn how to bite back.*