I woke with a start, gasping and choking on air as if I'd been drowning. There was no water — only the dry, cold bite of the air. I was lying awkwardly in the same spot where those three girls had been with us before we… vanished. Us?
Regina! I snapped my head around. She was there.
The three other girls lay on the patchy, dew-damp grass, twitching faintly as they stirred. Alpha — hair black as midnight — was already awake, staring at the sun as it reached toward its zenith, her gaze sharpened by an unreadable intensity.
"What happened?" Omega, the snow-haired girl, asked no one in particular as she rose and smoothed her gown.
Regina awoke moments later, scanning the clearing with the same troubled look Alpha wore.
"I feel like I'm forgetting something," Mésos said, having risen without me noticing. "And from the looks of it, you'll be no help in reminding me." She glanced around. "Some time has passed since we were last here. It's colder."
"You girls care to shed some light on the issue?" I asked, my gaze settling on Omega, her bone-white hair blazing in the sunlight.
We started toward where the palace should be. Alpha, Mésos, and Omega followed — one casual, one bored, one faintly eager.
"Those girls might be trouble if we walk in there with them," Regina murmured, eyes on the distant silhouette. She turned to me.
"Why are we even bringing them?"
"I… don't know," I said, a wave of confusion washing over me. "It just feels… natural."
Regina shifted her attention to Alpha. "Do you think the tattoo on her hands — and the way you all do not resist following her — is tied to our memory gap?"
Alpha, the self-proclaimed eldest, nodded once. "Likely."
"What tattoo?" I asked.
Mésos appeared at my side without a sound and lifted my left wrist. A strange mark spiraled across my skin, ink-dark and unfamiliar.
"What is that…?" The thought hit me like a spark. "System?"
I tried to summon a piece — nothing.
"Interesting," Regina murmured, running her thumb over another spot on my body. The mark felt warm. "Your ability is still there, that much is clear from the tattoo's reaction. So why can't you summon?"
A crunch of footsteps behind us cut her off.
"Well, what a lucky find," a gruff voice boomed. Omega gave a muffled cry — a man had his hand clamped over her mouth, a dagger at her throat.
The speaker strode forward, armored in battered steel and hefting a great axe. More emerged from the trees, blades glinting. Regina drew her sword — it dissolved into rust in her hands.
"Adorable… and foolish," one of them sneered. His words were twisted by a dialect I hadn't heard before. I'd understood this world's language since my reincarnation — but this felt different.
"A language shift," Regina said, eyes locked on the axeman. "That means something."
What's going on? Who are these men? Why can't I remember? Where's the Prince? The forest?
Mésos simply looked bored. Omega, meanwhile, was more annoyed at the dirt on her gown than at the man. Alpha, in stark contrast, simply smiled.
Maybe we should accept this gentleman's invitation, a stray thought whispered.
My mind snapped back. Invitation? More like slavery. Or worse. Sex slaves. Not on my second life.
I counted. There were more of them than I'd realized. This brute wasn't just muscle.
From the lack of reaction from the other girls, it seemed they'd already accepted the idea of going with these men. We were unarmed, outnumbered, and—at least for now—out of options. I was the first to drop to my knees in a slow, deliberate show of resignation. The others followed without protest.
The man with the great axe smirked and signaled one of his underlings. Ten men in cheaper brown armor stepped forward, cuffs and ropes in hand. A few kept short swords drawn, just in case we got brave.
We were herded into a waiting carriage. Inside, I found we weren't the only captives—a cat-eared girl sat in one corner, tail twitching with agitation, she was dressed in leather armor and was chained like the rest of us, she looked exhausted and the most beat up.
Across from her, an elf with sharp, angled features and eyes full of hate glared at our captors, his ears twitching slightly
I stared. In all the books I'd read back in Regina's mansion, there hadn't been a single mention of beastkin or elves existing in this world. Yet here they were, flesh and blood, looking just as shocked to see us.
Alpha smirked like she'd just discovered her new favorite toy.
Mésos leaned back, eyes closed, as if this was a mildly inconvenient nap.
Omega's glare still burned toward the man who'd grabbed her before.
The carriage jolted forward. Through the slats, I caught sight of our destination: the ruins of what had once been a magnificent castle.
Crumbling towers clawed at the sky, their stone bones patched with scavenged metal plates and jagged beams. Smoke drifted from its makeshift chimneys, carrying the bitter scent of oil and something charred.
It was no longer a palace—it was a fortress, its grandeur gutted and replaced with rusting bones and scavenged steel. And now, whether we liked it or not, we were being delivered straight into its heart.