MC'S POV
The day I was dragged before my father, the manor halls smelled of rain and polished marble—a scent I used to associate with safety. That day, it smelled like judgment.
The guards shoved me through the obsidian doorway of the great atrium. Thunder rolled outside, flashes of lightning clawing at the stained-glass ceiling. Every sound reverberated too clearly. Every breath cut through the air like a plea that wouldn't survive.
My cuffs scraped the floor with that dull metallic rhythm I've come to hate. In the corner of my eye, I saw portraits of ancestors gazing down on me—men and women wrapped in silken authority, stars glowing faintly in their painted chests. None had ever been starless like me. None would have accepted this disgrace.
This is how the legacy of House Valen ends, I thought, at the hands of its weakest heir.
The Trial Without Justice
Father sat on the throne dais, posture flawless, a perfect sculpture carved from discipline and disappointment. Beside him, Seraphine glittered like sunlight trapped in crystal, hair cascading in thin golden waves, her eyes untouched by guilt.
And Elowen… stood between them like the knife that was both their weapon and my undoing.
Her dress was torn at the shoulder in just the right place to make it believable. Her trembling hands looked sincere, as did the tears streaking her cheeks. Her voice broke when she said the words that sealed my fate: "He tried to force himself on me."
I remember the depth of my silence. It was deeper than shock—it was recognition.
A part of me already knew this was rehearsed long before the act. Not by her, but by Seraphine.
I looked at my sister then. Her emerald eyes didn't flinch. She held that look—a delicate balance between guilt and triumph. It wasn't hate. It was something colder. Pity, perhaps.
"She only defends you because of her guilt," Seraphine said softly. "You always wanted what was hers. Even now, isn't that true?"
Every person in the hall nodded before I even spoke. Nobles and servants alike, faces pale in candlelight, murmuring the same unspoken verdict: the cursed boy had finally revealed his nature.
The Silence of Blood
"Is it true?" my father asked. His voice didn't rise; it never needed to. Command lived in every syllable.
"No," I managed, but the word felt smaller than the space it occupied.
He didn't answer. He only looked to Seraphine. His gaze softened—a rare, fragile warmth I never received.
"She would not lie," he concluded.
The trial ended before it began. I was escorted through whispers, through the creeping suspicion that no one ever believed me to begin with. To them, the act fit the narrative perfectly: the untalented brother consumed by envy, seeking power through sin.
The real pain wasn't my banishment—it was remembering that once, as children, Seraphine used to cling to my hand while crossing the frozen courtyards, saying she'd protect me when the world became cruel.
I wonder if she remembers that promise. Or if power erased it.
The Duke
Father—Duke Valen—always believed in hierarchy over emotion. To him, the world moved by the measure of worth, and worth birthed from mana. His hair was iron-gray; his eyes burned like tempered mercury. When he walked, silence followed—the silence of a man whose word bent reality.
Yet, beneath all that control, I now realize something more fragile existed: fear. Fear of imperfection. Fear that one flaw, one starless child, could stain a dynasty.
He never yelled at me. He merely ignored me, which was worse. Yelling acknowledged presence; silence revoked it.
When he turned away that day, dismissing my pleading as air, I knew then that love had boundaries, and I had crossed them long ago.
Elowen
Elowen's name still aches. She was once my heaven of small comforts—a girl who brought sweetness into a life filled with failure. We grew together under the garden's archways, chasing moths, laughing in shadows cast by her hair.
I think she loved me, once. At least enough to smile like warmth returning after rain.
But proximity to the cursed was costly. In time, her affection waned, replaced by something polite. Her apologies became shorter, her laughter rehearsed. I mistook fading light for morning.
And then I learned that guilt performs better than truth when the stage demands tragedy.
When she testified, I saw panic rather than malice. Seraphine's presence loomed behind her, an aura of persuasion impossible to resist. Maybe Elowen truly believed she was protecting herself. Maybe she wanted to believe Seraphine's certainty more than my innocence.
After all, who could stand beside a boy who couldn't even control a spark?
Why the Servants Hated Me
Servants remember everything nobles forget. They noticed the way spells faltered near me, how candles dimmed when I entered, how gardens withered quicker the longer I sat beneath their shade. They feared my starless curse would bring the house ruin—and fear evolves easily into hatred.
Once, a kitchen boy crossed himself when I touched his shoulder. Another time, a maid quit after claiming my presence made her reflection vanish from mirrors. I used to laugh about it. Now, I'm not sure they were wrong.
If I destroy a room merely by existing, perhaps they feared correctly.
The Dungeon's Descent
The night of my exile, rain hammered against iron gates as soldiers led me down into the labyrinth. The torches hissed like serpents. Water dripped from the ceiling in lazy patterns.
Seraphine watched from the balcony above, her expression unreadable. The flicker of lightning caught her hair—it shone gold against the storm, untouchable. For a moment, I hoped she'd look sorry. She didn't.
Elowen wasn't there. That hurt worse than chains. Maybe she couldn't bear to see what her silence had done. Or maybe she had already forgotten.
The guards left me with nothing but a blade, a torch, and the broken weight of the family crest around my neck. They said it was "mercy." I called it preparation for death.
Doubts of the Unknown Entity
Later, when the walls stopped dripping and my heart began to echo slower, I dared press the Time Button again. Gold light throbbed, alive—too alive. I thought of the voice that had bestowed it on me those few months before everything collapsed.
"You will live twice. The second time, wisely," it had said. I remember how the air tasted then—ozone mixed with sandalwood and fire.
I had accepted without question. What fool refuses a second chance? I thought it was divine intervention. But what kind of god drags mortals from one world to another just to feed their misery?
Sometimes, when the silence deepens, I swear I hear laughter—a soundless ripple through the air, as if that same entity listens, amused by my downfall.
Could it have foreseen this?
Could it have orchestrated everything—my family, my sister's perfection, even the betrayal that broke me?
And worst of all: why do I still feel it watching through the Button, as though waiting for me to break again?
The dungeon's air tastes like salt and metal. The torch burns lower with every breath. Above me, nobility sleeps, and below, monsters wait. I was cast into the dark to perish—but perhaps this dark is where I belong.
As I drag my finger across the glowing surface of the Artifact, its light flickers, almost like an eye blinking awake.
I whisper to the unseen god who gave me this curse, "If this is my second life… tell me what lesson you want me to learn. Because right now, all I've learned is pain."
Silence replies.
Always silence.