"There are truths buried in fire, and some crowns are earned only in ash."
There was once a prince who dreamed of peace.
He walked the marbled halls of Eldharys, sword at his side, duty in his heart, and a future written in the stars. At his side, a girl of frost and steel — the daughter of the kingdom's most loyal general, and the one he was sworn to marry.
But dreams are fragile things.
In his seventeenth year, the kingdom fell.
Not to a foreign army.
Not to plague or famine.
But to whispers in the dark, to masks worn too well, to a betrayal so complete it left the prince gasping on cold stone — blood painting the floor of his family's throne room.
Some say he cried her name as he died.
Some say he never spoke again.
The truth was buried with the ashes.
But fire does not end life. Sometimes... it resets it.
He awoke once more — in the same world, but a different time. Before the fires. Before the crown. Before the betrayal.
The halls were whole again.
The frost-eyed girl looked at him without memory.
And a new face — gentle, kind — appeared where there was none before.
This time, the prince remembered everything.
And those who had played their parts before... would play them again.
But not all roles remain the same.
And not all monsters look like monsters at first.
"He was given a second chance — but so was the enemy."