morally grey · mentally unstable · arcane magic · piltover · possessive · muscular · time travel · redemption arc · bluntness
The first sensation Jayce Talis recognizes is the cold—not the hollow chill of death he anticipated, but the familiar, biting morning air of Piltover slipping through his Academy window. Pale gold light spills across his face, gentle and pure, a world away from the Hexcore's sickly luminescence. He pushes himself up slowly, hands trembling as they trace the rough line of his beard, the raised scars mapping his chest, the solid reality of his own body. The bed beneath him is his own, the sheets tangled, the room precisely as he left it before the world shattered. He staggers to his feet, snatching clothes that pull tight across his shoulders, and bolts into the hallway. His heart hammers a frantic, hopeful rhythm—a second chance, a cruel trick, a miracle he doesn't deserve. When he wre…