Chapter 1

Flames shot up from all corners of the Imperial Palace.

Maids and servants fled screaming, and the clash of swords echoed from every direction.

Clutching my sword, I ran for the Audience Chamber, where the Golden Throne resided.

Please, I begged, just be alive.

“Your Majesty!”

Reaching the Audience Chamber, I leaned against the wall, gasping for breath.

I had fought dozens of skirmishes with those rebels calling themselves the Revolutionary Army on my way here, and my body was in shambles.

“You’re late. Have you also come for my head?”

White hair like molten platinum and deep yellow eyes like inlaid gold.

A woman who looked down on others, her back straight and legs crossed, as if flaunting her slender frame and towering height.

A monarch with the air of an arrogant, self-assured dragon.

The Empire’s youngest Sword Master and a Great Mage acknowledged by the Master of the Ivory Tower.

The one who, at sixteen, started a rebellion, slaughtered her own kin, and seized the throne.

A war hero who crushed nine rebellions and led the Empire to victory in five great wars over forty years.

A tyrant reviled for levying taxes that amounted to plunder.

The Emperor of the Empire that ruled the continent.

And my twin sister.

Jeirilis Soletaraon Soletaras.

She looked down at me from the Golden Throne on the dais.

“How can you say such a thing?”

“Then why didn’t you run?”

I hesitated for a moment before answering.

“I have nowhere to go.”

“Nowhere to go?”

“Do you think the rebels would accept me, after I’ve enjoyed every possible luxury by Your Majesty’s side?”

“What about the allied kingdoms, the Noble Alliance, or the Merchant Union?”

“They’re all the same. I am Your Majesty’s closest confidant. Number one on the kill list, they say.”

“Who decided you were my closest confidant? I do not keep such things.”

She said, her expression unreadable, making it impossible to tell if she was joking.

I couldn’t answer and fell silent for a moment.

“Then why haven’t you fled, Your Majesty?”

The words I shouldn’t have said slipped out.

“How rude.”

As soon as I heard the Emperor’s words, I flinched, my eyes darting around nervously.

I knew all too well that blood always flowed after those words were spoken.

“However, the executioner I appointed fled long ago, so I cannot punish you. I shall make a special exception and let it pass.”

She let out a faint laugh.

“This way!”

“Gather at the Audience Chamber!”

“We’re breaking in together.”

“Stay sharp, everyone! It’s the Emperor!”

“One wrong move and we’re all dead.”

The voices of the rebel mob, the self-proclaimed Revolutionary Army, echoed from outside.

“You asked why I did not flee?”

she said, picking up the sword that rested beside her throne.

At the same time, the wide main doors of the Audience Chamber and the eight side doors burst open.

“Charge!”

With a roar, hundreds of men poured in.

Every one of them radiated a murderous aura, as if they had clawed their way out of hell.

They’ve managed to gather some skilled fighters.

I thought, gripping my sword.

Tension made the hair on my body stand on end.

But the woman on the highest seat in the Audience Chamber smiled like a tiger facing a pack of dogs.

“Why would I abandon my own home?”

She rose from her seat and drew her sword.

Her golden eyes and the translucent blade turned a dark, violent purple.

An aura that far surpassed any mortal’s flowed from her slender body.

The man at the head of the rebel vanguard took a step back.

He was a man who had entered with his face flushed crimson with hatred and rage.

In an instant, his face turned deathly pale.

“Don’t be afraid! She’s only one person!”

Just then, a dozen more men entered through the wide main doors.

The man in the lead had the same golden eyes as me, and they flashed as he stared at the Emperor.

“It’s been a long time, Jeirilis.”

“Address me formally.”

“Of course. Your Majesty. The time has come for you to step down. Please leave the crown and seal and rise from your seat peacefully.”

The man who had rushed in shoulder-to-shoulder with commoners was my half-brother, a traitor, the Rebel Prince known as the Hero of the People.

Justinianus Soletaraon Soletaras.

“Very well. I have made my decision.”

Jeirilis smiled like a white devil.

“Your comrades will all become food for my wyverns. And you will remain by my side for the rest of your life.”

The Rebel Prince smiled, his expression resolute.

The Emperor shook her head and descended from the throne.

“Let’s see if you can still smile with your legs cut off and a leash around your neck.”

A dark purple aura overflowed from her body, casting a deep shadow over her face.

The next moment, a battle of one against thousands began.

The moment the fight started, I raised my sword and charged toward the Rebel Prince.

Anyone below the rank of Sword Expert would be useless in this fight anyway, so I had to cut off the head of the snake.

Honestly, it wasn’t that I couldn’t understand him at all.

I, too, had seen all sorts of things, good and bad, by Jeirilis’s side.

But I could not permit treason.

“You go no further.”

I wreathed my sword in a Mana Blade and struck down.

It was a blow that could have split a great cliff in two.

But the Rebel Prince, his black hair flying, slipped past my flank.

He moved at a speed my eyes could barely follow.

The next moment, his sword blazed with blue light.

Unlike the Mana Blade I had created, it had no flicker, no crack.

It wasn’t a Mana Blade. It was an Aura Blade.

Impossible.

That bastard reached the level of Sword Master.

“Step aside, you scoundrel. You shame of our bloodline.”

The Rebel Prince parried my sword.

With a clang, sparks flashed before my eyes.

*

“Ah.”

When I came to, my head was throbbing.

I had been sent flying by a single blow and was embedded in the wall.

The shouting was still going on; it felt like only a few seconds had passed.

“Hah.”

I staggered to my feet, brushed off the stone dust, and popped my dislocated arm back into its socket.

Before me, a battle between demigods was unfolding with thunderous booms.

They moved at a speed most people couldn’t even perceive.

Among the rebels who had charged her, some now stood with vacant expressions, their swords hanging limp.

“We were trying to fight… that?”

The ominous, dark purple sword and the brilliant blue sword clashed, sending sparks flying.

“It’s time to pay the price for your tyranny!”

The Rebel Prince kicked off the ground, cracking and gouging the marble and crystal floor of the Audience Chamber.

He drove Jeirilis back against a thick pillar, his sword leading the way.

Jeirilis slammed hard against it, her body trembling.

But a relaxed smile still played on her lips.

“You dare speak to me of a price?”

The next moment, her movements became as fluid as water.

The heel of her shoe, infused with mana, struck precisely between the joint and muscle below the Rebel Prince’s knee.

The pain must have been considerable, as Justinianus’s balance faltered for an instant.

At the same time, she pivoted on her left foot, spinning in a wide circle and swinging her sword.

Had she been a single breath faster, the blow would have sliced the Rebel Prince in two.

This will be suppressed without much trouble.

Thinking this, I cut down two rebels who were charging me.

There had been nine rebellions that were practically civil wars. Minor uprisings were an annual event.

It’s impressive that they managed to gather this many troops now.

But the Emperor had once defeated three Sword Masters at the same time.

I can handle the soldiers’ tricks.

The Rebel Prince Justinianus will die here.

I let out a sigh of relief.

At that moment, I felt an ominous energy from the southern sky.

It was an aura that made one shudder just by being near it, like an execution ground littered with rotting corpses.

“You… you.”

Jeirilis must have felt it too, because her face hardened.

For the first time, the smile vanished from her lips.

“What have you done?!”

Her voice was so urgent it was hard to believe it came from someone so arrogant and composed.

Clutching his bleeding stomach, the Rebel Prince staggered back and laughed.

“Yes. I realized I couldn’t speak of a price with this level of skill.”

Jeirilis clenched her teeth and ran out of the Audience Chamber.

I followed her out.

The rebel soldiers just watched us with empty eyes, as if they already knew everything.

A humid wind, like the one before a storm, blew through our platinum hair.

“Your Majesty.”

I called to her, my voice trembling.

“Yes.”

Her voice trembled too.

Flames and black smoke were rising from all over the splendid capital of the thousand-year Empire.

Black clouds and fog rolled in like a tidal wave, swallowing even the flames.

Between the clouds and fog, monsters that were neither living nor dead could be glimpsed.

“You opened the boundary.”

“I did.”

“You summoned the Old Ones.”

“That’s right.”

the Rebel Prince, who had followed us out, answered in a monotone.

I asked, my teeth chattering with rage and horror.

“Weren’t you the Hero of the People?”

The Rebel Prince ruffled his black hair and said,

“I was. But after I realized I couldn’t win no matter what I did, none of that mattered anymore.”

From between the black clouds, a Corpse Dragon descended.

Though only bones and scaled hide remained, it was still massive enough to cast a shadow over the entire Imperial Palace.

Blue flames flickered in its massive maw, large enough to swallow a whale in one bite.

As if to resist, Jeirilis clenched her teeth and gathered her mana.

At that moment, the Rebel Prince charged.

His movements were beyond what I, a mere Sword Expert, could handle.

Jeirilis hastily counterattacked.

Her left arm and the Rebel Prince’s head tumbled down the stairs.

The slicing sound came a beat later.

“……!”

She spat a curse unbecoming of her and gathered her mana again.

A translucent Aura Shield enveloped her body in a sphere.

But even she couldn’t cast a technique that required two hands with only one.

The Aura Shield flickered and dissipated.

I formed a Mana Blade on my sword and stood before her.

“Your Majesty. Step back.”

I guess this is it. This will be my grave.

She looked at me as if I were insane.

“What do you think you can do against that Corpse Dragon’s flames? This is an imperial order. Leave me and flee. A tyrant’s end must be a lonely one.”

“Jeirilis.”

“!”

I called her name.

It was the first time I had said it in forty years.

“I just wanted to do this, just once.”

“You……!”

“I’m your older brother, after all.”

It’s too late to run and survive now anyway.

I clenched my trembling teeth and aimed my sword at the Corpse Dragon.

“Brother.”

Then, a voice full of awkwardness came from behind me.

“I just wanted to say it, just once.”

You, the Emperor, and I, the scoundrel.

Our faces were still those of teenagers, but the names we called each other and the places we stood had changed so much.

The Corpse Dragon breathed blue fire.

It was a ferocious flame that my Mana Blade, not even an Aura Blade, couldn’t withstand for an instant.

In a flash, my vision turned white-hot.

I felt no pain.

The sword in my hand still felt distinct.

A distant flashback unfolded before me like a series of paintings.

My childhood, when I knew nothing, running across the palace lawns.

You, leaving for somewhere, holding someone’s hand.

Your name, which I heard like a legend in the stories of adults.

You, sitting on the Golden Throne, clutching a blood-stained sword.

You, who ruled with cruel purges and sadistic tyranny, as if you’d become a different person.

Me, who could neither leave your side nor truly stay.

I wandered for a long time.

I ruined myself with alcohol, women, and gambling.

I became a worthless, prodigal royal, harmless to those in power, and survived countless purges.

I barely regained my senses and started to pull myself together.

I was too old to properly master swordsmanship and become a Sword Master, or to properly learn magic and become a Great Mage.

I shouldn’t have lived like that.

I should have lived like a royal, not a scoundrel.

Then maybe I could have stopped these flames today.

My whole body felt like iron on an anvil, growing hotter and hotter.

If I were given another chance.

I would make everything right.

I would protect you and this Empire.

I could say it with certainty. It was the most intense desire I had ever felt in my life.

At that moment, I felt all the mana remaining in my heart drain away in an instant.

It felt like the blood was flowing backward through my entire body.

Is my mana scattering?

Then this is really it. I’m dying.

With the sensation of everything shattering into pieces, I lost consciousness.

*

“……Lord.”

A faint voice called a familiar name.

“Lord Bell?”

Bell. It was the nickname I was called as a child.

“Lord Ballen. Please wake up.”

Is this flashback still not over?

It’s longer than I thought.

“Your Highness, Grand Duke Valencianus Soletaraon Soletaras. Please wake up!”

I heard the sound of curtains being drawn and a window opening. Dazzling sunlight and a cool breeze poured over me.

This is too vivid for a flashback.

But it’s not bad.

Thinking that, I opened my eyes.

A bed draped with red curtains and a magnificent chandelier came into view.

“You’re awake now? You must have been tired yesterday. You usually wake up before I call for you.”

A maid with sparkling emerald-green eyes and wavy brown hair tied back neatly spoke to me.

She looked so much like someone I knew that I almost screamed.

“That’s impossible.”

“Pardon?”

“You’re dead.”

“What are you talking about all of a sudden?”

“Rudy is already dead.”

After you die, do you just keep reliving memories from your life?

If so, this is a miserable afterlife.

“What are you saying? Did you have a nightmare? Why would I be dead? I’m right here beside you, Your Highness.”

“Impossible. How can you be alive? What year is it?”

So this isn’t a flashback or the afterlife?

Does that mean I’m alive too?

If I survived, how in the world did I survive those flames?

Those were the flames of a Corpse Dragon that even Jeirilis couldn’t have stopped.

“It is the spring of the year 1073 in the Imperial Calendar. The first year since Her Majesty Jeirilis’s coronation.”

“Then I’m seventeen right now?”

“Yes. Of course.”

Rudy gave me a look as if to ask why I was asking something so obvious.

I scrambled out of bed and stood in front of the mirror.

In the mirror, a boy with white hair and golden eyes, still with a hint of youthfulness in his face, stared back with a shocked expression.