"Oh man… what am I gonna do?"
The words slipped out before he could stop them.
Oskar pushed himself up from the lakeshore, knees stiff, boots squelching softly in damp grass. Cold mist curled around his ankles as if trying to keep him there. Behind him, the lake whispered to itself in the blue night; ahead lay the palace gardens—manicured, silent, orderly to the point of insult. A perfect place for a royal son.
A terrible place for a reincarnated Chinese truck driver whose most practical skill involved dodging flying explosives.
He scrubbed a hand over his face, wiped lake water from his too-noble blond hair, and looked up at the third-floor window of the palace. The bedsheet rope still dangled there, pale against the stone.
"…Tomorrow," he muttered. "I'll think of something tomorrow."
Right now he was exhausted, wet, half-frozen, and smelled faintly of fear-flavored lake water.
He started walking back through the gardens.
It was close to midnight, dark enough that his brain kept jerking upward on instinct, eyes flicking to the sky. Somewhere off to the side, a gardener dropped a metal bucket.
The sharp clang echoed.
Oskar's body reacted before his mind did.
He bolted forward five steps, heart hammering, breath hitching—then froze, slapped a hand over his own face, and swore under his breath.
"Damn it. No drones. No artillery. Germany. 1904," he hissed. "Safe. Safe. SAFE."
The palace grounds remained perfectly calm.
Gravel crunched under his boots. Lanterns flickered along the paths. Guards patrolled in the distance, talking quietly, their voices low and unhurried. Even the trees seemed well-behaved, standing in neat lines like they'd been trained.
His thoughts drifted—unwillingly—to the one object in the world that summed up his entire failure so far.
His diary.
It was sitting on his bedside table, stuffed with a year's worth of unhinged reincarnator dreams for a "better world."
Inside were sketches and plans and half-legible diagrams:
battleship designs,
tank concepts,
infantry weapons,
artillery improvements,
gyms, planes, radios, paved roads, industrial zones, airports, hospitals, sanitation systems.
And then the madness pages.
Pandas with rifles.
Penguins in steel helmets.
A Chinese flag on the Moon.
A German flag on Mars.
A battleship with a smiley face painted on the bow.
One page labeled: Future Money Machine.
Another: Sexy Idea, Do Not Show Anyone.
He had ideas.
What he didn't have was the single thing every reformer in German history had needed before anything else:
German.
Not modern German.
Not app German.
Not movie German where people just yelled "SCHNELL!" a lot.
Real German.
He couldn't read:
bureaucratic Gothic script,
naval technical manuals,
business forms,
legal documents,
newspapers,
or the goddamn alphabet when the letters started curving like drunk snakes.
He didn't know how to:
register a business,
open a bank account,
fill out a form,
apply for a permit,
politely ask a clerk for anything,
or read his own family's genealogy chart.
No internet.
No Google.
No "How to Start a Corporation in 1904."
He was a man with a plan who couldn't fill out a kindergarten signup sheet.
His steps slowed.
"I'm running out of time," he whispered to no one. "I need money. I need power. I need allies."
He exhaled, shoulders sagging.
"…I don't know," he muttered. "Maybe I should just make my little man Karl do all of it."
The thought stuck.
He stopped beneath his window and looked up at the rope of knotted bedsheets hanging from the sill. It swayed faintly in the night air, thin and pale against the stone—less an escape route and more an accusation.
"Well," he sighed, "at least this body is good at climbing."
He grabbed the rope.
It strained immediately.
The knotted sheets creaked under his grip, fibers tightening and protesting as he set his boots against the wall and began to haul himself upward. This body was strong—unfairly strong—but it was also heavy. Not bulky. Not clumsy. Dense. The kind of weight that came from long bones, thick muscle, and a frame that had never been meant to sneak.
The rope held.
Barely.
The knots dug into his palms as he climbed, arms and shoulders working with mechanical efficiency. Muscle answered thought without hesitation, lifting him smoothly, relentlessly. It felt wrong—like wearing armor he hadn't earned.
Effortless strength.
No idea what to do with it.
That was the worst part.
Strength didn't solve anything.
It just made it impossible to pretend he was harmless.
By the time he reached the window, his breath fogged faintly in the cold. He hooked an arm over the sill, shifted his weight—
—and pulled.
The frame rattled as his mass swung inside.
He landed—
thud.
Not loud. But heavy. The floorboards flexed and groaned as if deeply offended, the sound traveling through the room in a way that made it clear this was not how princes were meant to enter their chambers.
Oskar straightened.
And froze.
Because he was not alone.
Sitting on his bed—legs crossed neatly, posture immaculate, dressed in a perfectly pressed formal suit—was Karl.
Short. Pale. Blond. So short that even standing on the mattress, his head barely reached Oskar's chest. A man built like a compact block of irritation and competence. His hair was neatly combed. His glasses sat precisely on his nose. His expression was calm.
Too calm.
And in his hands—
Oskar's stomach dropped.
The diary.
The one with the red cross on the cover.
The one marked DO NOT TOUCH, written in angry, underlined German that Oskar wasn't even sure he'd spelled correctly.
Karl turned a page.
Slowly.
Then looked up.
"Ah," Karl said mildly. "Your Highness."
He lifted the diary just enough to make sure Oskar understood exactly what he was holding.
"Back from your midnight… lake excursion."
Oskar lunged.
"HEY—! That's private!"
Karl raised the book higher—about shoulder height.
Which, unfortunately for him, was still well within Oskar's reach.
Oskar simply reached out and plucked the diary from his hands like a parent confiscating scissors from a child.
Karl sniffed.
"Relax," he said coolly. "I only reached page forty-seven. Though I must ask—why are there pandas wearing military helmets? And why is there a drawing labeled 'bikini'? What, precisely, is a bikini?"
Oskar blinked. He hadn't understood most of that—but he recognized the dangerous word.
"Ah, yes," he said, nodding. "Bikini. Very good. Swim clothes. For women. Less cloth. Very… modern. Not your business, bad small man. Bad."
Karl pinched the bridge of his nose.
"You know what's bad, Your Highness?" he snapped.
"You climbing out of your window.
Down three floors.
Bathing naked in the palace lake like a feral animal."
He gestured sharply toward the window.
"And yes, I saw all of it. From your window. As did—most likely—other servants. Because it is not subtle when a Viking-sized prince is splashing around past midnight."
He stopped. Inhaled.
Then asked, tired and precise:
"Do you even understand what I'm saying?"
Oskar considered this carefully.
"…Ah yes, my little man?"
Karl dragged a hand down his face.
No amount of sarcasm could save him from the reality now sitting in front of him:
His prince was built like a saga hero, climbed walls like a lunatic, owned a manifesto disguised as a diary—
—and barely understood the language he was ruling in.
Then suddenly Oskar jabbed the diary at him like a weapon.
"No! Bad small man! You do not read panda plans!"
Karl threw his hands up at once.
"I did not want to read about panda infantry, Your Highness! I came for business. All your ridiculous secrets are safe with me."
Oskar froze on the one word he actually understood.
"…Business?"
Karl nodded, his expression tightening, humor draining away.
"Yes. Political business."
Oskar went pale.
"…I was a good boy today, yes?" he whispered. "I didn't do anything wrong… I think?"
"Not yet," Karl said flatly. "But His Majesty is calling for you."
Oskar stopped breathing.
"Karl…" he whispered. "Why? Why would the Emperor want me?"
Karl shrugged—an economical, practiced movement that said this is above my pay grade, my prince.
"You are well past the age where one can continue doing nothing," he said calmly. "Eventually, even you must be assigned somewhere useful. The subject of education has arisen. Specifically—"
Karl hesitated, visibly bracing himself.
"…the Naval Academy, Your Highness," he said at last. "You'll be going there."
Oskar blinked.
Blank.
Karl sighed and resorted to visuals.
He pointed at a bookshelf crammed with thick, unreadable tomes.
Then at the painting of steamships and ironclads on the wall.
Then mimed sitting stiffly at a desk, writing furiously.
Oskar understood immediately.
He went pale.
"Karl… no. No, no, no," he whispered. "There's no way. I can't—I won't—the language—the exams—I'll die of shame!"
Karl reached out and patted Oskar's leg, the way one might calm a spooked horse.
"Shh. Shh," he said patiently. "Just speak with him, Your Highness. Maybe it's ceremonial. Maybe you're enrolled officially but not actually expected to study. Maybe you just show up on parade days and smile."
"No," Oskar breathed. "I will be disowned."
Karl exhaled through his nose.
"Well. Panicking won't change it. And His Majesty wants you in his study."
He paused.
"And you know how he gets."
Oskar shoved the diary deep into his uniform coat like contraband.
"Karl," he whispered urgently, "walk with me. Please."
Karl rolled his eyes.
"You're not a child anymore," he muttered. "But fine. I'll escort you. I just can't enter with you."
He turned, already heading for the door—then paused and glanced back.
"And Your Highness," Karl added, "your rope. It's still hanging out the window. If your personal maid Tanya sees it, she'll panic. And if that other maid—the one who scrubs the floors at night, Anna, I think—finds it first, she'll need half the guard to get it down."
He sighed softly.
"Please… deal with it."
Oskar didn't catch every word—but he caught rope.
He turned, jogged back to the window, and grabbed the bedsheet line with one hand.
With a single smooth pull, he hauled the entire length inside. The knots slid easily through his grip as if the rope weighed nothing at all. He flung the sheets onto the bed in a loose heap, like laundry tossed aside.
Karl watched.
Only mildly impressed.
After a year of watching his prince turn from a confused boy into something built like a living weapon, feats of raw strength had lost their novelty.
They left the room together.
The palace halls stretched long and echoing before them. Oskar's steps were uneven, breath shallow, shoulders tight. Karl walked at his side with perfect confidence, hands folded neatly behind his back, posture immaculate—the picture of a miniature Prussian officer escorting a giant into battle.
Every few steps, Karl murmured under his breath:
"You'll be fine, Your Highness."
Oskar didn't believe it.
But he believed Karl believed it.
And somehow, that helped.
Just a little.
They stopped before the guarded doors of the Kaiser's study.
Oskar froze.
He looked down at Karl, panic spilling out in a whisper.
"Karl, my man. What if—listen—what if we make big business? You and me. Lottery. Big bills. LOTS of money. And then—no school for me?"
Karl stared up at him.
The guards stared at him.
Karl closed his eyes, took a slow breath, then cleared his throat.
"Ready?"
"No."
"Well," Karl said calmly, "too late."
A guard knocked twice.
From inside, Wilhelm II's voice thundered:
"ENTER!"
Oskar swallowed hard.
He stepped forward.
Karl remained outside, hands clasped behind his back, small and immovable as the doors swung shut.
Softly, so only Oskar could hear it, he whispered:
"…Good luck, Your Highness."
The doors closed.
And history, patient as ever, waited on the other side.