The men froze. For a heartbeat, none of them understood what they were seeing.
The young master—who had never once raised his voice, had just shoved one of them hard enough to send him stumbling into the dirt.
The warrior on the ground stared up in disbelief.
Then his face flushed red—not with pain, but with humiliation.
If he let this stand, the other two would laugh. They would remember. They would tell the story when they returned to the village.
An kid who hadnt even gotten his tattoos yet knocked him down like a common dog.
Where would he put his face after that? He scrambled to his feet and lunged so Ishar tackling him back to the ground.
Ishar did not move. Not because he didn't want to but rather because he couldn't.
It had been a long time since he had a body.
This body was unfamiliar in every way to his original body: taller, younger, thinner.
His balance was wrong. His sense of weight was wrong. Even standing felt… delayed.
The warrior's fist connected with his face.
Pain exploded. For a moment, Ishar simply registered it.
When he had been a remnant soul, pain had not existed. Hunger, fatigue, pain—those had all faded into abstractions.
Now they returned all at once, vivid and immediate. It was almost novel.
His head snapped to the side. Another blow followed, then another.
The man struck him again and again, breathing hard, putting his whole weight behind each hit.
Ishar did not react. He did not cry out. He did not raise his arms.
His expression remained empty, distant, as though the body being struck belonged to someone else.
That unsettled the man far more than resistance would have. But angered him more.He hit harder.
Eventually, one of the other warriors stepped in and grabbed him by the shoulders, dragging him back.
"That's enough," he muttered. "You'll kill him."
The man cursed but let himself be pulled away.
They could beat the boy. They could humiliate him. They could order him around however they pleased.
But killing him was another matter entirely.
That would be a challenge to the village head himself. Only he decided which of his children lived or died.
Ishar collapsed to one knee, then slowly pushed himself upright.
His face was swollen, discolored, already bruising into something unrecognizable.
Blood trickled from his nose and split lip, warm against his skin.
The three men stood over him, breathing hard, watching. Ishar looked up. Then he spoke.
The voice that came out was not his own. It was higher, thinner—young, unfinished.
The voice of a fifteen-year-old whose body had not yet entered maturity.
"From henceforth," he said evenly, "you will address me as Young Master. Or Ishar."
The men blinked.
"I do not care what my previous name was," he continued. "That is how I shall be known."
With that, Ishar turned away from them.
He stood up, brushed dirt from his clothes with stiff, unfamiliar hands, and walked toward his small pile of belongings.
The sky was already lightening. Dawn had come while they weren't looking. They would be leaving soon.
Behind him, silence stretched.
Finally, the warrior who had pulled the other back scratched his head and let out a short laugh.
"I think," he said, "you guys finally broke the kid."
Borik did not laugh.
He stared at Ishar's back for a long moment before speaking.
"Until we reach the village," he said slowly, "no one interacts with him...Just in case."
He had been a warrior for a while and he rarely felt fear. But when he stared at the young masters eyes.
It was like he would be consumed. The eyes went the same. They were too inhumane.
Many cultures in Ishar's previous world believed that a person's eyes could serve as a gateway to their soul.
That's why when you wanted to convince someone over something you'd tell them to look into your eyes.
The other two warriors nodded at the same time. They weren't as experienced as Borik but even the felt the situation was too weird.
They watched the boy gather his things straight-backed, methodical, unhurried and none of them could quite explain why the morning suddenly felt colder than usual.
***
The gates of the Olan tribe loomed before them, manned by two seasoned warriors who immediately saluted Borik as the party passed.
Once inside, the group made their way to the stables, where over 16 horses stood, muscles coiled beneath sleek coats.
Horses were a rare commodity in this world; a mounted warrior could dominate any group of foot soldiers.
The Weyian tribe, for example, did not even possess a single horse and traveled entirely on foot.
These twenty horses belonged collectively to the tribe. Only the village chief held a personal mount, and warriors could ride only with the chief's explicit permission.
Once the horses were settled, the four men, Borik, the two warriors, and Ishar proceeded on foot to the village chief's house.
The chief's compound was enormous: a two-story stone hut at the center, with smaller stone huts branching out from its perimeter.
The compound was enclosed by a high fence, designed so the chief could move easily between his own house and those of his women.
Children slept with their mothers until they turned sixteen.
Boys had to prove their strength to earn a hut of their own; weak sons were sent away.
Daughters, upon reaching sixteen, were either married off or retained as domestic help if deemed unfit for matrimony.
The group halted at the entrance to the chief's hut.
A stern guard stepped forward. "State your purpose," he demanded.
Borik smiled, attempting his usual bravado. "We are here to see the chief concerning a—"
He was cut off. Ishar stepped forward, his young frame deceptively calm, and spoke with quiet authority.
"Tell my father I am here to see him." The words seemed to ripple through the air.
The guards froze, horror etched into their faces. Borik and the two attendants nearly burst into tears.
Had they known what this boy was capable of, they would have killed him in the wild blamed it on an animal and taken their chances with the chief.
Borik's heart sank; he had hoped to ask for the hand of one of the princesses once this mission was completed.
Now, that hope seemed dangerously fragile.
Ishar appeared oblivious to the tension around him.
"Didn't you hear me?" Ishar asked, voice slightly annoyed. Then he raised it higher.
"Hey, Father! Your son is here to see you! Tell the guards to buzz off!"
The reaction was instantaneous. Borik and the other two fell to their knees, tears streaking their faces, trembling as they muttered apologies.
"Please forgive the young master."one said
"The journey was truly tedious." The other replied.
"He is not feeling well; have mercy on him."
They begged not out of genuine concern, but because their fate was tied to the Ishar.
Since they were the ones that brought him here.
If Ishar were punished, so would they be. If he were spared, their lives would continue.
A booming voice cut through the tense air. "Who dares make such noise at my doorstep?!"
The massive door swung open. A man stepped out—seven feet tall, with a large round stomach and a shining bald head.
His face was framed by a thick, black beard, and his upper body and hands were adorned with intricate tattoos.
He wore a heavy wrapper of black fur around his frame. Ishar's eyes widened in curiosity.
These tattoos were different from the decorative marks on the rest of the tribe, they radiated power, raw and undeniable.
Ishar couldn't help but wonder if he cursed this village chief and he lived how would he be since he is already powered from the tattoos.
Would the effect stack or one would just become ineffective.
All present immediately fell to their knees, a collective gasp of awe and fear rippling through the courtyard.
The man's gaze swept over them, settling finally on the boy who seemed to have been shouting.