He crouched on the rooftop of the eastern spire, eyes hidden behind an ink-lacquered half-mask. Below, the masquerade glittered with wine, whispers, and lies—but he saw only threads.
Red threads for treason. Gold threads for ambition. Blue threads for loyalty, often fraying.
And one thread… black as regret, stitched in silver: Jungho's.
The Fool Who Was Not a Fool.
Watcher designation: Reed.
He had served the Fool's Guild for nine years. Scouted warlords, exposed false prophets, even orchestrated a king's public breakdown by slipping his jester a poisoned metaphor.
But Jungho—he was different.
He had returned from somewhere else.
Not summoned. Not trained. Not bred in the Guild's thousand-year game of ridicule and rebellion.
He was a chaos fragment stitched into a stable weave.
And worse—
He was adapting.
Faster than expected.
The younger shadow beside him shifted. Dove, a field agent still too new to understand the value of silence.
"He mocked Baroness Velis in front of the Queen. That's not Guild subtlety. That's a suicide note."
"Is it?" Reed asked, voice barely above the wind.
"Open mockery makes him a target."
Reed tapped a finger against the obsidian railing. "It also makes him undeniable."
Dove scoffed. "He's a performer. Not a player."
"Not yet."
Inside the masquerade, the Queen's laughter echoed again.
Thin. Measured. Deliberate.
The monarch laughed because it was dangerous not to. Because to frown at satire was to admit guilt.
That was the Guild's first lesson.
Reed remembered when he had failed it.
Ten years ago, he had performed a joke about a noble's taste in hats—a harmless jab—only to find his mentor dead the next morning, drowned in a basin of feathers.
From then on, he learned: the sharper the blade, the sweeter the smile must be.
Jungho had that smile.
But unlike others, it wasn't learned.
It was built in.
"Do we recruit him?" Dove asked, quieter now.
Reed said nothing.
In his hand, he turned the second coin. A rare token. Guild-sanctioned offer.
One side showed a broken bell.
The other, a jester's mask split by a sword.
The coin was never given lightly.
To offer it was to initiate a pact: perform for the Guild, or perform against it.
Neither choice was safe.
Reed placed it back in his coat.
"Not yet. Let him bleed a little more."
"He's already marked."
Reed raised a brow.
"Even better."
Beyond the rooftops, the Guild's hidden sanctum awaited in a shattered theater west of the city. Underneath it, in chambers carved from forgotten stone, elders whispered behind mirrored masks.
Some believed Jungho a gift. Others a threat.
Reed had been dispatched to observe and report.
But he had already broken protocol.
He had not reported everything.
Not the blood-marked glyphs on Jungho's sleeves.
Not the cracked mirror he stared into as though waiting for someone else to appear.
Not the way the system itself stuttered around him, as though uncertain what it had awakened.
"You admire him," Dove said.
Reed looked at the younger shadow, unreadable.
"No. I fear him."
"Then why not end it?"
"Because sometimes," Reed said, rising to his feet, "the most dangerous tool is the one you don't control but can still aim."
Below, Jungho had re-entered the ballroom. The Queen raised her glass. The Chancellor whispered to a masked noble.
The real performance had already begun.
And no one—not even the Guild—could predict the encore.
—-
The morning after the Masquerade of the Seasons arrived quietly—too quietly.
There were no raucous aftermaths, no gossip-mongers crowding the halls. Just a heavy stillness, like a silk curtain drawn over a corpse.
Jungho awoke to the scent of iron.
Not blood.
Ink.
Dozens of red petals had been arranged on his chamber floor, meticulously folded from parchment—each stamped with the crest of a different noble house.
Some bore words. Most did not.
But the meaning was clear.
He had declared war with a joke.
[System Notice: Hostile Court Sentiment Increased]
[Court Favor +1 (Residual Masquerade Impact)]
[Jester Evolution Progress: 66%]
He crouched, fingertips brushing the edge of a crimson paper petal.
It was Baroness Velis's symbol.
He smiled grimly and lit the whole bundle with a candle.
They curled into ash like the hollow threats they were.
A knock interrupted the smoke.
"Enter."
The steward bowed low, eyes careful. "A summons, my lord."
"My lord? That's new."
The man hesitated. "From Princess Arin. She has requested your presence for breakfast."
Jungho raised a brow.
Not dinner. Not tea.
Breakfast. The most honest meal of the day.
He donned his patched coat, his expression unreadable.
"Lead on."
The Princess's private gardens were different from the others—less curated, more alive.
Roses spilled over cracked marble urns. Ivy curled up rusted armor arranged like forgotten sentinels. Birds nested in untrimmed hedges.
And at the center, beneath a vine-draped arbor, sat Princess Arin.
She wore no crown. Just a simple violet sash and a plain mask pushed to her brow.
A single plate sat across from her, laden with eggs, fresh bread, and berries.
"For you," she said, before he could speak. "I already ate."
Jungho bowed with exaggerated grace. "How generous. Most only serve me stale laughter."
She didn't smile. But she didn't frown either.
"I wanted to see if the rumors were true," she said.
"That I'm charming? Dashing? A secret assassin in patchwork?"
"That you're dangerous."
He tilted his head. "You invited me to breakfast to confirm I'm a threat?"
She stirred her tea.
"No. I invited you because you made the Queen laugh. And that terrifies the court more than swords ever could."
They sat in companionable tension as he ate.
She watched. He played the part of amused guest, but his eyes never stopped scanning.
No guards.
No servants.
No exits within three steps.
She was smart.
Too smart.
"I read about you," she said at last.
Jungho paused. "In the court records?"
"No," she replied. "In the shadows between them."
Now that got his attention.
She leaned forward, voice low.
"There's no record of your birth. No family. Your first appearance was at the gatehouse, bleeding, with a cracked bell tied to your wrist."
She tapped her cup. "And yet within a week, you were in the Queen's court."
Jungho set down his fork.
"What do you want, Your Highness?"
"To know if you're playing your own game."
He gave her nothing. Just a smile.
"That depends," he said.
"On?"
He stood, dusting crumbs from his sleeves. "On whether you're a pawn pretending to be a queen, or a queen pretending to be a pawn."
She didn't stop him as he turned to leave.
But just before the hedge swallowed him, she said:
"Velis plans to strike during the moon feast. Don't drink the wine."
Jungho paused.
Then turned slightly.
"Poison or betrayal?"
She sipped her tea.
"What's the difference?"
Back in his chamber, the system blinked again.
[New Trait Acquired: Dangerous Wit – Enemies now perceive your words as threats even when neutral.]
[Passive Resistance Unlocked: Charm Immunity - Rank D]
[Jester Evolution Progress: 72%]
But beneath that, in smaller letters:
[An Eye Has Opened]
Jungho frowned.
"What eye?"
No answer.
Just the faint sound of laughter—
But not his own.