Dappled sunlight filtered through the dense canopy of leaves high above. Birds chirped and tweeted as they flitted from branch to branch.
The bubbling of a brook could be heard in the distance, although it couldn't be seen.
It was a calm day in the middle of spring.
A carriage trundled down a bare dirt road through the forest. No horses drew the carriage, and it seemed to propel itself through some form of invisible power.
The carriage was fully enclosed, and the windows couldn't be seen through from the outside.
The exterior was painted black, with faded and cracked silver trims and regalia.
"Hhhh—Arrgh!" August's eyes shot open and found himself staring out from within this carriage.
He spent several seconds staring out the one-way windows and trying to steady his drumming heart.
Taking in the sight of an undisturbed and peaceful forest. Only the trundling of the carriage broke the peace.
He started, leaping high enough to hit his head on the roof of the carriage.
"Fuck!" Cursing, he sat back down.
His hands ran across his body. He no longer felt any pain, and his wounds were gone. Not from healing, but as if they had never happened.
He was no longer covered in dust and grime from the collapsed fortress. Blood no longer caked his face, arms, and hands.
He froze.
His uniform was black.
'Did it actually work?' Examining his uniform thoroughly, he thought.
He was wearing a black and silver officer's uniform, with the regalia fitting of a Bastion.
This was the uniform of a Bastion of the Anfang Empire.
Officially, their colors were black and gold, but the Empire considered the color gold a symbol of the royal family. As such, the military wore silver as a sign of subservience to the Emperor and the Archdukes.
'Nothing like the rich showing class differences.' He scoffed.
The carriage showed signs of belonging to the Empire as well.
And August had a duffel bag of belongings that did little to dispel the illusion that he had gone back in time.
If this was fake, then Kadria was a master illusionist. August swallowed and leaned back against the worn seats.
Almost a minute passed as he let his thoughts wander. He had failed.
His fortress had fallen. Everybody he had loved had died. Everything he had accomplished had been for nothing.
His hands instinctively clenched into a fist.
Had he truly been given a second chance? A chance to prevent everything from going wrong?
He sat bolt upright. Would he have the chance to find them all again?
Jafeila, Vala, Narime, and the others? More than anything else, they were the driving force in his life these days.
If he had gone back to the time of the Anfang Empire, they'd be much younger. So would he, in fact.
He'd been a teenager when the Empire had been invaded by its neighbors and all out war had broken out across Doumahr.
A teenager apprenticing as a Bastion, thrust into a war that nobody really understood.
Something shiny from within his bag caught his attention. His bag, he remembered.
Things didn't feel right, but he needed to remember that this was now his life.
He must have a past in the Anfang Empire, and a family here. How else could he be a Bastion in the Empire?
Reaching down into the bag, August found a small hand mirror.
Small jewels decorated the outside of the mirror. On the back was an inscription.
A family motto, signed with what he somehow knew was his mother's name.
The mirror was a gift from his mother, he realized. No, a way to remember her. He wasn't vain. It was simply a way to remember lost family.
Somebody moved in the mirror. August looked closer and realized it was himself. But that was impossible.
After all, it looked far too much like August did before he had come back. Shouldn't he be much younger?
'No way in hell.' August blinked. He carefully analyzed his features and checked his hands. Despite his assumption, he looked almost identical to his old self.
When Kadria had sent him back, he had somehow thought that meant he would become young again.
'She said nothing about that.'
He was still in his mid twenties, but sent back in time. After putting the mirror back in the bag, August took the time to think.
Actually think.
Since arriving in this time, he had been making assumptions and jumping at everything.
He needed to stop for a few minutes and assess everything he knew. And everything he didn't know.
He had a rough idea of where he was, but not when he was. Exactly how many years in the past had Kadria sent him back? If the Anfang Empire was still intact, that meant that all out war hadn't broken out.
He could still remember when the world had been relatively peaceful. Nations still bickered.
Wars were still fought. But the network of Bastions kept the demons in check, and there were no massive invasions by demonic hordes.
No Messengers capable of defeating several trigem Champions effortlessly.
In fact, trigem Champions were so rare that they were considered legends, known by name across the entire world.
All of that changed when the Empire started a war with its northern neighbor, the religious Order of Trafaumh, known by most as Trafaumh.
While the Empire's armies were busy in the north, another nation had invaded from the east.
The Empire began to collapse, its Bastions falling, and the resulting loss of protection allowed hordes of demons to escape into the world.
The Empire's capital of Aleich fell, and a Messenger tore apart most of its lands.
It took years to vanquish the Messenger, by which point more Bastions had fallen, and more demonic hordes had taken root.
War had become normalized, and the collapse of the world began.
Falmir had been the last nation standing by the time Kadria attacked August's fortress in the Far Reaches.
Every other country had fallen to the Messengers, and their lands left to rot in the hands of the demons.
Kadria had been right to say that August didn't truly want to save that future. But back in the past, before the Empire had fallen? There was so much opportunity here.
All of August's friends and lovers were still alive. And he had a chance to avoid some of his past mistakes.
August's biggest problem was that he didn't know exactly when or where he had been sent back to.
He was a Bastion, so he could claim a binding stone and use that to gain more power and Champions.
But if he was in the wrong place, then he couldn't stop everything from going wrong.
He didn't know where this carriage was taking him, either. Was there even a binding stone nearby? Although he had remembered his mother in this timeline, he found it difficult to remember other things.
There was no sign of Kadria. She had said she would see him on this side, so where was she? Somehow, he knew that he had unleashed a true monster into the past.
Perhaps he should have let himself die and trapped her in the future. If she needed a talented Bastion in order to travel back in time, then did he do the wrong thing to allow her to travel back with him?
He shook the thoughts off. 'This is my chance to fix things'. He would deal with Kadria when he found her.