The afternoon sun had climbed high, casting warm light through the chamber windows. Around 11 in the morning, Kain sat alone, staring at the small pile of belongings he'd gathered—a change of clothes, the diary, the map pressed against his chest, a few coins he'd found in a drawer.
This is it, he thought. This is everything I have in this world.
He looked around the luxurious room—the tapestries, the silk sheets, the golden fixtures—and felt nothing. It was a gilded cage, and he was the prisoner waiting for execution.
There's nothing I can do, he realized. No magic I can learn. No allies I can trust. No system to save me.
In the stories he'd overheard at the café, the heroes always had something—a special power, a loyal companion, a system that granted abilities. But his system was useless. Designed for death, not survival. Every time he called it, every time he hoped for something useful, it gave him nothing.
Maybe that's the point, he thought bitterly. Maybe some stories don't have happy endings.
He called the system one last time, more out of desperation than hope.
The blue screen flickered into existence.
Kain stared at it, thinking hard. This system is like modern AI. It has information somewhere. It must.
"What is Aldric's magic?" he asked. "What power does this body have?"
The screen flickered.
UNKNOWN, it replied. PLAYER HAS NOT YET DISCOVERED THIS ABILITY.
Kain's fist slammed into the holographic display. His hand passed through it uselessly, but the gesture felt necessary.
"This fucking system!" he shouted at the empty room. "It doesn't have anything! Not a single useful thing!"
The screen flickered and disappeared, as if offended by his outburst.
Kain slumped into a chair by the window, his anger draining away as quickly as it had come. He stared up at the sky—blue and beautiful, indifferent to his suffering.
There is nothing I can do now, he thought. Let the world decide where I go.
He closed his eyes and let his mind drift back to the café, to the conversations he'd overheard, to the fragments of game lore that had seeped into his consciousness like water through cracked stone.
The hero of Soul Maria, he remembered. In the upcoming months, there will be a great battle. The hero will die, but his sacrifice will buy time for other empires to grow. New heroes will rise from his ashes.
He grabbed the diary and began writing furiously, recording every memory, every detail, every scrap of information that might matter.
The hero's team was unstoppable, he wrote. Until they met the Seven Sin Generals. The Seven Deadly Sins of the Gods. They led an invasion that killed nine thousand soldiers and paladins. They killed the hero's team. Because of them, the demons won. The game became unbeatable.
He set down the quill and stared at his words.
It doesn't matter, he thought. Either way, I'll be dead. I'm not fighting in this war. I'm not becoming a hero. I'm just trying to survive.
His plan was simple: escape. Disappear. Let everyone think he'd died in the war or run away like cowards did in movies. Find somewhere safe and live out whatever life he had left.
But first, he had to get out of this room.
He stood and walked to the chamber door. The moment it cracked open, a guard's arm blocked his path.
"Your Highness," the guard said, his face expressionless, "we have strict orders. You are not to leave. For your own safety. You've just woken from a coma."
Kain looked past him at the corridor. More guards than before. More eyes watching.
Cassian, he thought. He's already decided to kill me. There's no way he'll let me out of this palace.
He retreated back into the room, frustration burning in his chest.
Isolated. Trapped. Waiting to die.
But then he remembered: he could eat. Whatever else they took from him, they couldn't take that.
He called for a maid.
The door opened and a young woman entered—different from Mary. This one had sharper features, darker hair, eyes that seemed to take in everything without appearing to look. She moved with the practiced grace of someone trained to be invisible.
"Your Highness," she said, bowing. "How may I serve you?"
Kain didn't recognize her. Mary was nowhere to be seen.
"Food," he said. "The best you have. Whatever the emperor's chef makes. Bring it all."
The maid's eyebrow twitched slightly—amusement? curiosity?—but she bowed again.
"Of course, Your Highness."
She left, and Kain waited.
When she returned, she carried a tray bearing a single dish covered by a silver dome. She set it on the table beside him and removed the cover with a flourish.
Steak.
But not like any steak Kain had ever seen. It was thick, perfectly seared, glistening with butter and herbs. The smell alone made his mouth water.
He cut a piece. Put it in his mouth.
And wept.
How can this be real? he thought as the flavor exploded across his tongue. I thought they exaggerated when they said steak was heavenly. I thought it was just words. But this... this is...
He ate. And ate. And ate.
Twelve steaks. Twelve perfect, magnificent steaks, each one better than the last. The maid brought more without being asked, watching him with an expression he couldn't quite read.
When he finally collapsed back in his chair, stuffed to bursting, he noticed her watching him.
Something flickered in the corner of his vision.
The system. Activating on its own for the first time.
JULIYA, the screen read. POWER: 2-STAR MAGE. STATUS: FALLEN NOBLE. HIDDEN TALENT: DECEIVING OTHERS. MOTIVE: REVENGE ON PRINCE ALDRIC.
Kain's blood ran cold.
He stared at the maid—Juliya—with new eyes. Two-star mage. Fallen noble. Here for revenge.
I was right, he thought. Mary wasn't the only one. They've been watching me this whole time.
Juliya smiled at him—a pleasant, servile smile that didn't reach her eyes.
"Is the food to your liking, Your Highness?"
Kain forced himself to smile back.
"Perfect," he said. "Absolutely perfect."
His mind raced. A mage in his room, pretending to be a maid, here for revenge against Aldric. Against him.
Cassian's spy? Someone else's? Or just someone with her own score to settle?
He didn't know. But for the first time, the system had given him something useful.
Now he just had to figure out what to do with it.
MEANWHILE....IN ROYAL DEFENSE CHAMBER
The Royal Defense Chamber was a room built for war.
Massive oak tables dominated the center, their surfaces covered with maps, reports, and strategic documents. Tapestries depicting ancient battles hung from the walls, their threads faded with age but the victories they celebrated still fresh in the kingdom's memory. Candles burned in iron sconces, casting dancing shadows across the faces of the men gathered around the central table.
Men—and a few women—who held the kingdom's safety in their hands.
Generals with scars and hard eyes. Tacticians with ink-stained fingers and sharp minds. Spymasters who saw everything and said little. They stood around the great map table, their attention fixed on the southern border where wooden markers showed the concentration of demon forces.
And at the head of the table, watching them all with quiet amusement, sat Prince Cassian.
He wasn't the highest-ranking person in the room—technically, the Lord Commander outranked him. But everyone present knew who truly held power here. The First Prince had external influence—battlefield glory, the love of soldiers, the respect of enemy commanders. But Cassian? Cassian had something far more dangerous.
He had the king's ear. He had secrets on every noble in the room. And he had a mind that treated politics like a chess board, moving pieces not to win, but for the pure enjoyment of the game.
The generals spoke around him, their voices tense with worry.
"The demon army is massing at the southern gate," one said, pointing at the markers. "Our scouts report at least three legions. Maybe more."
"Three legions?" Another general shook his head. "That's twenty thousand demons, minimum. Our southern garrison has maybe five thousand. Even with the wall—"
"The wall won't hold against three legions. Not if they bring siege beasts."
"Then we need reinforcements. Pull troops from the eastern front, from the northern passes—"
"And leave those positions undefended? The demons aren't stupid. If we weaken other fronts, they'll attack there too."
A heavy-set general with a graying beard slammed his fist on the table. "Why the southern gate? Why there? It's not strategic. It's not valuable. They could attack the capital, the trade routes, the farmlands—but they choose a minor border post?"
"Maybe they're not as smart as we think," another offered. "Mindless beasts. They probably threw darts at a map and sent their army wherever the dart landed."
Laughter rippled through the room, but it was nervous, forced.
"Mindless beasts?" The bearded general's voice was sharp. "Have you forgotten the Demon Queen? She alone has killed more heroes than any army. She ended the strongest hero in history—cut him down like wheat before a scythe. There's nothing mindless about her."
Silence fell.
The mention of the Demon Queen did that to people. She was a legend, a nightmare, a shadow that hung over every war council in every human kingdom. No one who had faced her had lived to describe the experience.
"Then we attack first," a younger general said boldly. "Stop waiting behind walls. Take the fight to them. With Soul Maria's help, we could—"
"Soul Maria won't help us." The words came from a woman in gray robes—a representative from the intelligence bureau. "They've made that clear. Our slave markets and our treatment of captured demons offend their religious sensibilities."
"Damn holy kingdom," someone muttered. "Always judging, never helping."
Cassian listened to it all in silence.
He sat at the head of the table, his golden hair catching the candlelight, his expression serene. To the generals, he looked like a prince considering their words, weighing options, preparing to offer wisdom.
In truth, he was barely listening.
His mind was elsewhere—on a dead boy in a borrowed body, on a prophecy that had given him exactly what he needed, on the beautiful simplicity of his plan.
The demon army masses at the southern gate, he thought. Perfect. Absolutely perfect.
He'd been planning to send Kain to his death anyway. A convenient accident during a border skirmish—a guard pushed at the wrong moment, a "tragic" fall from the wall, blame placed on demon monsters. Clean. Simple. Untraceable.
But this? This was better.
A full-scale demon assault. Thousands of witnesses. A young prince, barely recovered from a coma, volunteering to defend his kingdom's border. And then, in the chaos of battle...
Accidents happen in war, Cassian thought, smiling inwardly. So tragic. So convenient.
The generals noticed his smile. They exchanged uneasy glances. Prince Cassian smiling during a war council was like a cat smiling at a mouse—it meant something had been decided, and whatever it was, they probably wouldn't like it.
"Your Highness," the bearded general ventured carefully, "you seem... pleased. Have you thought of something? A way to stop the invasion?"
Cassian's smile widened.
"Stopped?" He laughed softly. "No, General. I don't intend to stop anything."
The room went quiet.
"But... Your Highness," another general stammered, "if we don't stop them, they'll breach the southern gate. They'll pour into the kingdom. Thousands will die."
Cassian waved a hand dismissively. "Thousands die every year. That's what peasants do. The question isn't how to stop them—it's how to use them."
He stood, moving to the map table. His elegant finger traced the southern border, the demon markers, the weak points in the defense.
"I've already planned for this," he said quietly. "I've been planning for a long time."
The generals leaned forward, hope flickering in their eyes. Cassian was known for his schemes, his strategies, his ability to turn disaster into advantage. If anyone could save them, it was him.
"What is your plan, Your Highness?" the intelligence woman asked. "We're eager to hear it."
Cassian looked up, his golden eyes gleaming.
"I've decided," he said, "to send my younger brother to the southern border."
Silence.
Complete, absolute silence.
Then chaos.
"You're sending the Fifth Prince?" someone sputtered. "The one who just woke from a coma? He can barely walk!"
"He's never held a sword in his life! He'll be slaughtered!"
"Your Highness, with respect, that's not a plan—that's a death sentence!"
Cassian's smile never wavered.
"Exactly," he said.
The room fell silent again, but this silence was different. It was the silence of men who had just realized they were in the presence of something they didn't understand—and didn't want to.
Cassian returned to his seat, folding his hands on the table.
"My brother has expressed a desire to serve his kingdom," he said smoothly. "To prove his worth. To die with honor rather than live as a burden." He looked around the table, meeting each general's eyes in turn. "Who am I to deny him that?"
No one spoke.
"The southern gate needs defenders," Cassian continued. "My brother will go there with a small contingent—enough to look like reinforcements, not enough to actually matter. He'll stand on the wall, wave a sword, maybe even kill a demon or two. And when the assault comes..."
He shrugged elegantly.
"Well. War is tragic."
The generals stared at him. Some looked horrified. Others looked impressed. Most looked terrified—not of the demons, but of the golden-haired prince who could discuss his brother's death with the same enthusiasm most men reserved for fine wine.
"You're... you're using him as bait," the bearded general said slowly. "As a sacrifice."
Cassian's smile was radiant.
"I'm using everything, General. The demons. The army. My brother. Even you." He leaned back. "That's what rulers do. They use what they have to get what they want."
He stood, signaling that the meeting was over.
"Prepare the orders. My brother leaves for the southern gate at dawn."
He walked toward the door, then paused.
"Oh, and Generals?" He looked back over his shoulder. "Pray that he dies well. A heroic death will do wonders for morale."
The door closed behind him.
In the silence he left behind, the generals looked at each other with expressions that ranged from unease to outright fear.
"That man," one whispered, "is more dangerous than any demon."
No one disagreed.