The victory over Lord Preston felt like ash in my mouth. Isabella's hollow eyes haunted me. My Corruption stat, now at 91, was a constant, grim reminder of the path I was walking. I was so focused on watching for doom flags from the prince and the heroine, I'd forgotten that the most dangerous threats often come from places you don't expect.
I was in the royal armory, running an errand for my fencing master. The air smelled of metal, oil, and old wood. It was a practical, honest place, and I felt like a stain on its simplicity. I was looking for a specific weight of practice sword when a voice, sharp and clear as a blade on a whetstone, cut through the quiet.
"I wouldn't have pegged you for the type to do his own fetching, Herrmann."
I turned. Standing in the doorway, silhouetted by the light from the hall, was Knight-Captain Lyra. She was tall and lean, her red hair cut short and practical. Her armor was polished but showed the fine scratches and dents of real use, unlike the parade-ground perfection of Sir Roderick's. Her eyes, a cool, assessing gray, were fixed on me with open contempt.
In the game, Lyra was a minor character. The stern, no-nonsense captain of the city watch, fiercely loyal to the crown. She had no role in the otome romance. Her only interaction with Klaus was a single line if the player wandered into the wrong part of the city: "Move along, little lord. The streets are no place for you."
Now, she was very real, and she very clearly hated me.
"Knight-Captain," I said, giving a slight nod. I kept my voice neutral.
She didn't return the gesture. She walked into the armory, her movements efficient and graceful. She stopped a few feet away, close enough that I could see the faint scar that bisected her left eyebrow.
"I heard about your little stunt with Lord Preston," she said, her voice low. "A lucky break for your family. Funny how that happens."
My blood ran cold. She was connecting dots I didn't know were visible. I said nothing, holding her gaze. My interface flickered to life, the text shaky.
Knight-Captain Lyra: Favor: -50. Corruption: 10. Obsession: 35.
Negative fifty Favor. It was the lowest I'd ever seen. Her Corruption was incredibly low, a testament to her rigid honor. Her Obsession was 35, likely focused on justice or order. She was a pure, uncomplicated enemy. Or so I thought.
As I stared, trying to find a weakness, a new line of text stuttered beneath her stats. It was faint, pulsing with a soft, guilty light, unlike anything I'd seen before.
[Secret Shame: Active.]
A secret shame? What could this paragon of virtue have to be ashamed of?
"Is there something you want, Captain?" I asked, buying time. "Or did you just come here to stare?"
"I look at filth like you so I remember what I'm sworn to clean from this city," she shot back, not missing a beat. Her hatred was a physical force. "You nobles play your games in your silken rooms. You lie, you cheat, you break people for sport. But out there, in the real world, your games have consequences. People get hurt."
She was talking about Isabella. She had to be. She saw the aftermath of my manipulation, even if she didn't know I was the cause. Her Obsession with order was clashing violently with the messy, unjust reality I represented.
I needed to know what that secret was. If I was going to survive her contempt, I needed leverage. I focused on the [Secret Shame] stat, pushing with my mind, trying to pry it open.
A sharp, stabbing pain lanced through my skull, far worse than any headache I'd gotten before. The interface glitched violently, lines of static scrambling the text. For a moment, I saw a jumble of images and feelings that weren't my own.
A cold, rainy night. A dark alley in the slums. The feeling of terrible, gut-wrenching fear. The face of a young, starving girl, her eyes wide with terror. And a choice. A terrible, split-second choice.
The vision vanished as quickly as it came, leaving me dizzy and nauseous. The [Secret Shame] stat was still there, but now a single, cryptic word was visible beside it.
[Survivor's Guilt.]
That was it. That was her weakness. It wasn't a crime or a betrayal. It was a failure. A moment in her past where she couldn't save someone.
Lyra was still staring at me, her jaw tight. "You have nothing to say for yourself? No clever words? That's a first."
I took a slow breath, steadying myself. I couldn't reveal what I knew. But I could use it. I could change the angle of our conversation.
"You're right," I said, my voice quiet.
Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. "What?"
"You're right," I repeated. "People do get hurt in our games. It's… regrettable."
She scoffed. "Regrettable? Is that what you call it?"
"What would you call it, Captain?" I asked, genuinely curious. "When you have to make a choice, and no matter what you choose, someone gets hurt? When you have to live with the consequence of a decision made in a single, terrible moment?"
I was no longer talking about Isabella or Lord Preston. I was talking about her. About the guilt she carried.
The change in her was immediate and subtle. The outright hatred in her eyes flickered, replaced by a flicker of confusion and… unease. I had struck a nerve. A deep, hidden one.
"You know nothing about choices," she said, but her voice had lost some of its steel.
"Don't I?" I took a small step forward. I wasn't threatening her. I was… sharing the space of her shame. "We all have our ghosts, Captain. Our moments we wish we could undo. The faces that haunt us in the quiet hours of the night. You carry yours on the outside, in your armor and your duty. I carry mine on the inside. We're not so different."
It was a lie, and a manipulation, but it was woven with a thread of truth. I did have ghosts. Null's ghosts. And Klaus's.
Lyra took a half-step back, her hand unconsciously drifting to the hilt of her sword. She wasn't afraid of me physically. She was afraid of the mirror I was holding up to her soul.
"You are a snake, Herrmann," she whispered, her voice thick with disgust. But the disgust was now mixed with something else—a dawning, horrified recognition.
My interface flickered.
Knight-Captain Lyra: Favor: -50 -> -45. Corruption: 10 -> 12. Obsession: 35 -> 38.
Her Favor had gone up. She didn't like me any better, but she no longer saw me as simple, predictable filth. I was something more complex, and therefore, more dangerous. Her Corruption and Obsession had both ticked up slightly. I had disturbed her perfect world.
"Stay out of my way," she said, her voice low and dangerous. She turned and strode out of the armory, her boots echoing on the stone floor.
I stood alone, my heart pounding. The encounter was over. I had survived. I had even gained a sliver of… something. Not respect. Not understanding. A wary, hateful acknowledgment.
I looked down at the practice sword in my hand. I had gone looking for a weapon made of steel, but I had found a much more powerful one instead. Knowledge. The knowledge of a good person's secret shame.
And as I stood there, my interface delivered its final, chilling judgment.
[New Leverage Acquired: Knight-Captain Lyra's Survivor's Guilt]
[Corruption: 91 -> 93]
The cost was always the same. To protect myself from one enemy, I had to become a little more like the monster they already believed me to be. I was digging my way out of a grave, and with every handful of dirt I threw aside, I was burying the person I might have been a little deeper.