Oskar had absolutely no idea that his big brother had just signed his death warrant.
He had no idea Wilhelm had once already killed the original boy who owned this body with a careless shove down marble stairs — the sound of skull on stone, the spreading pool of blood.
He had no idea that Wilhelm had prayed the boy would stay dead so no one would ever know what he'd done in a moment of impulsive cruelty.
He had no idea that, hours later, when Tanya had run through the palace screaming in joy that "Prince Oskar lives!", Wilhelm's carefully buried panic had flooded back… and pushed him toward a second attempt.
In the dead of that night, when the palace was quiet and the doctors had gone, Wilhelm had slipped back into Oskar's darkened room with a knife up his sleeve, intent on finishing the job.
> "Time to die, Oskar," he had whispered.
And stopped.
Because the face that looked back at him was wrong.
Dazed.
Confused.
Empty of recognition.
The boy in the bed had stared up at him as if Wilhelm were a stranger.
And then, instead of pleading or crying or accusing, this "Oskar" had smiled and surprisingly cheerfully spoken in clumsy, earnest German:
> "My man… nice day."
Wilhelm had frozen.
The fury drained out of his expression.
His lips twitched in something like relief and contempt.
To Wilhelm, that babbling proved the boy was brain-damaged and no longer a threat.
Killing him now would be riskier than letting this broken version stumble through life as a joke.
And he had left without drawing the knife.
Oskar, of course, remembered that night quite differently.
To Zhan Ge, the Chinese man now wearing a German prince's skin, that night had been a blur of pain and terror.
He had woken up in a strange teenage boy's body apparently in the year 1903 looking way too young, too pale and feeling so psycho weak and just overall clearly in an unfamiliar body in an unfamiliar bed draped in expensive fabrics. His head throbbed. His limbs felt like wet noodles. His ears were filled with the sound of a maid sobbing and there had been bandages and still blood flowing down his face from a slightly open wound.
When she, Tanya had seen him awakening she had seemed so happy and happy but speaking in German so he had looked at her, panicked, and said the only German greeting he'd managed to wedge in his brain in that moment from his memories of Duolingo and war movies of world war two Germans yelling something as they fired their weapons, and from it all two words had come to him that probably were in fact originally from some online meme instead of anything proper, "My man…"
Tanya had fled the room crying harder, and he had assumed, reasonably, that he had done something wrong.
German, in his exhausted, concussed head, sounded like scrambled audio.
Everything the doctor and the servants said might as well have been white noise that he could only reply to in his broken German with short yes or no answers, but mostly just nods as he had no idea what anyone was saying.
He feared that, If everyone realised "Oskar" had been taken over by some confused Chinese guy who barely spoke their language, he'd be thrown out.
And then he would die for real — cold and hungry somewhere in a foreign street.
So he tried to act like a good prince.
Tried to nod at the right times.
Tried to repeat things he had heard before.
He had just begun to piece together where he was and who he was supposed to be when the door creaked open again.
A tall figure stepped into the dark room — narrow, upright, expensively dressed. A silhouette more than a man.
Oskar didn't even know it was his big brother Wilhelm. He just saw "some important person" and instinctively squeezed his eyes shut, pretending to sleep to avoid questions he couldn't answer.
But the figure moved closer.
Stood over him.
Stared down in silence.
Then whispered something in German — tense, urgent, full of emotion.
Oskar caught only one thing:
> His new name. "Oskar."
He felt he had two choices:
Say nothing, look rude and suspicious
Or say the only German greeting he'd memorised
So he took a gamble, looked up, smiled politely, and said with full confidence:
> "My man… nice day."
At midnight.
In the pitch black.
To the Crown Prince of Germany.
Wilhelm had gone from rigid rage to almost baffled amusement. The fury vanished from his face, replaced by a contemptuous kind of relief and faint mockery. He even looked… reassured.
To Oskar, that meant only one thing:
> "Oh! So 'my man, nice day' must be the correct polite greeting at night in German!"
And from that night on, he used it.
With guards.
With maids.
Sometimes even with startled ministers. Some seemed to like it as they smiled, some were quick to greet him back while looking confused. Oskar found it funny mostly and thought it was the right thing to say. Sadly back then nobody had either not dared correct him because he was a prince after all or then they had tried but he hadn't understood.
If he chose to speak like a confused drunk student, that was his business.
So the phrase stuck to him, even when he finally realised how wrong it was.
Amd it was all because Wilhelm had once reacted with what Oskar mistook as approval—
instead of what it really was: relief that his "useless" brother had survived as something he thought he could safely ignore or even find amusement in like a clown.
Oskar did not know that.
He did not know any of it.
To him in the present day and time, those first days of his new life were just a knot of embarrassing, confusing memories he preferred not to think about too much.
In his heart, Oskar still believed that Wilhelm, especially now that he was a father, would eventually change.
He imagined a future where:
Their children played together in palace gardens
Their families sat together at dinners, laughing over minor dramas
The two of them, as brothers, might one day find mutual respect
To Oskar, the Hohenzollerns were no longer famous names from history books.
They were his family.
He loved them, stubbornly, despite all their flaws.
Yes, Karl had once warned him, quite seriously:
> "One day someone might try to kill you, Your Highness."
Oskar had laughed it off like a golden retriever in a giant body.
He genuinely believed he was untouchable because in the history he remembered, no German prince died young.
The Hohenzollerns were historically safe until the very end of the empire.
He knew he'd changed a lot, but in his mind those changes were:
"cool improvements"
"nice upgrades"
"little detours"
Nothing world-shattering yet.
Germany still seemed headed for WWI more or less on schedule.
The real test, he thought, would come there — if he could prevent or reshape the Great War.
Until then, why would anyone want to assassinate him?
He was only trying to help everyone.
And lately, Oskar thought things between him and Wilhelm were actually improving.
When Cecilie had given birth in early July to a healthy baby boy, Oskar had been genuinely happy. Proud, even. He'd held the tiny wriggling prince in his arms and offered name ideas with the unselfconscious enthusiasm of an older cousin.
> "What about Kai? It means 'victory' in Chinese.
It's a good omen, no?"
> "Or Uriel — like the angel of wisdom and light!"
The reactions had been… mixed.
The Empress had smiled thinly.
The Kaiser had tried not to laugh out loud.
Some older aunts had nearly dropped their teacups.
Wilhelm's expression, however, had turned stiff and cold.
By the evening, he had formally announced the baby's name:
> Wilhelm.
Just like himself.
Just like their father.
Just like half the portraits in the corridor.
When Oskar had joked — carefully — about whether they planned to number the baby "Wilhelm the Third," no one laughed.
Still, it was a joyous day.
Oskar felt like a real uncle.
He told himself this meant things were healing.
That Wilhelm, now a father, would surely grow more responsible, less anxious, and eventually see that Oskar wasn't his enemy.
> "We're brothers," he thought. "In the end, we'll figure it out."
Meanwhile, as Oskar happily clung to his illusions, reality turned darker.
He didn't take sidelong glances seriously.
He didn't notice how each new success carved another line into Crown Prince Wilhelm's face.
He didn't see how some older nobles watched him with accusing eyes, measuring, weighing, resenting.
The Crown Prince saw a rival.
The generals saw a saviour.
The people saw a hero.
The Kaiser saw a second rising sun.
And Oskar saw only… family.
So he shrugged off tension, smiled like always, and went where life pulled him next.
On 15 October 1906, that meant Essen.
He stood in a side room of the church at Villa Hügel, adjusting the collar of an overly stiff formal suit, trying not to sweat through the fabric.
The Krupp clan and half of Germany's industrial aristocracy had filled the pews. The vaulted ceiling glittered with chandeliers and coloured light from stained glass. Cameras with flash powder were being fussed over at the back. The organ tested chords.
On paper, everything was perfect.
Prince Oskar as Best Man — by Bertha's insistence.
Gustav von Bohlen und Halbach as the groom.
Bertha Krupp as the radiant bride.
The Krupp family wanted the Fifth Prince visible, friendly, supportive. He was now one of their most important partners — steel from their works fed his shipyards, his designs fed their profits, and his very presence lent prestige to any event. Having him as Best Man was like parking an expensive car where everyone could see it.
In practice, Oskar felt like he was being slowly sawed in half.
The church was packed: nobles, officers, foreign attachés, ambitious merchants who had clawed high enough to be invited. The choir sang. The pastor spoke. The smell of incense mingled with perfume and polished wood.
And there came Bertha.
Walking down the aisle in a fitted white dress that showed the strength she'd built in the gym and saddle, she looked every inch the confident heiress — less a shy girl, more a woman who knew she was formidable.
To everyone else, she was the image of a bride in love.
Oskar knew better.
Yes, she smiled brightly at Gustav.
Yes, she said "I do" in a clear, steady voice.
Yes, she kissed him when the pastor said the words.
But every time her eyes lifted, they didn't rest on her new husband for long.
Her gaze slid past Gustav and landed — always for a heartbeat too long — on the tall figure just behind him.
On Oskar.
The Best Man.
He stared at the floor, then the ceiling, then the stained glass. Anywhere but her eyes.
Once, against his better judgment, he glanced up just as Gustav leaned in for the ceremonial kiss.
Bertha's eyes were on him.
She gave him a tiny, wicked little smile that tied his stomach into knots.
Thank God there are no 4K cameras yet, he thought. In another age, the memes alone would get us both killed.
But no one seemed to notice. The ceremony went "well."
Rings, vows, blessing, applause. Rice and confetti. Photographers barking instructions. Guests lining up to congratulate the couple.
Gustav looked genuinely, innocently happy.
Under Bertha's perfect dress and controlled blush, though, a secret was already growing.
Almost a month old now, if what she'd told Oskar was accurate.
She had even brought a small prepared blood bag with her, tucked discreetly among her things, ready to "accidentally" stain the bedsheets on the wedding night just enough to satisfy older relatives watching for proof of untouched purity.
Oskar hated the idea.
It felt cruel to Gustav — a decent man who had done nothing wrong — and monstrous to Oskar's own sense of fairness.
Then he would remember the history in his head:
Eight children.
One frail heir.
The Krupp line tottering under the weight of its own bad luck.
If just the first heir changed — if the child who would inherit the firm carried his absurdly robust genetics — the dynasty's fate might be very different.
Gustav would still have seven children of his own.
The business would flourish.
Bertha would be happier.
Germany would be stronger.
That was how Oskar tried to justify it.
He still felt like a bastard.
But in his mind, this was one more grim, necessary sin in service of something larger than himself.
As the final hymn swelled and Bertha and Gustav walked arm-in-arm down the aisle, showered with rice and blessings, Oskar clapped and smiled with everyone else.
Never suspecting that, outside the world of flowers and vows, a very different kind of ceremony was being prepared in his name.
Far to the north, near the Baltic coast, Grand Duke Frederick Franz III of Mecklenburg-Schwerin sat alone in his study, Crown Prince Wilhelm's letter lying open on his desk.
He had read it once, then tried not to look at it for days.
Every attempt to ignore it failed.
The paper seemed to glow from the corner of the room, dragging his eyes back again and again.
The message was not explicit. It didn't need to be.
It was not the first letter of that sort.
Always the same theme, couched in anxious, deferential phrases:
"This fifth prince is dangerous for Germany's stability."
"He undermines moral order."
"Someone should consider… more permanent solutions."
By birth, Frederick Franz III was a middling sovereign in the German world — a Grand Duke, not a Kaiser.
By marriage, he had risen higher than many old houses dared hope:
His daughter, Cecilie, was Crown Princess of Germany.
If Wilhelm became Kaiser, Cecilie would be Empress.
Their sons and daughters would shape the Empire's future.
Mecklenburg-Schwerin would bask in imperial light.
That had been the plan.
Then Oskar appeared.
And all he did, objectively, was good.
He raised wages and improved conditions for workers.
He invested in housing, safety, public health.
He poured private wealth into naval development and now into the Army.
He wrote books that made people healthier.
He invented products that enriched the country.
But the very scale of his "goodness" disturbed the old order.
Industrialists grumbled because his labour laws and social projects cut into their free hand to exploit.
Religious conservatives, especially among the older elites, were scandalised by:
his open cohabitation with two women,
his refusal (so far) to marry either,
his daring fashion designs — shorter skirts, tighter fits, stockings that made older men accuse him of "corrupting womanly modesty."
And then there was his ethnic policy.
In Oskar's mind, it was simple:
"I look after my people first.
Germans must stay in Germany.
They must feel it is worth staying and building a future here."
So he had quietly put in place:
laws and policies that especially advantaged ethnic Germans,
hiring practices in his companies that favoured:
those who spoke German fluently,
those of "German blood,"
those of the state church or compatible Protestant background.
In his heart, he saw this not as hatred — but as "taking care of his own team."
But for those who saw themselves as:
Polish,
Danish,
Jewish,
French-speaking Alsatians,
or anything other than "pure German"—
…it looked very different.
They saw:
"The People's Prince" who used the word "people" to mean "not you."
Yes, they could lie about their identity.
Yes, there were other employers.
But no one else paid like the Oskar Industrial Group, or offered such security and benefits.
Everyone wanted to work for him.
Most weren't willing to abandon their language, religion, or heritage to do so.
And slowly, quietly, resentment grew.
Some blamed the system.
Some blamed Prussia.
Most blamed Oskar.
Frederick Franz III understood all of this.
He also understood that he could refuse Wilhelm's desire — tell him it was madness, sacrilege, a crime against blood and God and Empire.
If he did:
and Wilhelm became Emperor — his house would be shut out.
and Oskar somehow became Emperor — they would have gained nothing either.
His little Grand Duchy would slide back into irrelevance in both scenarios.
So, for the sake of his family's position, he convinced himself:
"I must show Wilhelm I am loyal.
At least once.
Let him see I am still on his side."
And Oskar — as fearsome as he appeared — was still just one man.
Royal or not, men died.
Popular men died.
Brilliant men died.
And Oskar, ironically, made it easy:
He went everywhere with minimal personal security, trusting in his image and his Eternal Guard's focus on protecting his women and children.
Frederick Franz stared at the letter a long while.
Then he reached for fresh paper.
He did not write back "yes" or "no."
Instead, he wrote names.
Relatives in Denmark with old links to radical student circles and smugglers.
Contacts in eastern Prussia who knew bitter, jobless Polish veterans angry at being shut out of the new order.
Old "friends" in Hamburg and Danzig with ties to the shadowy side of Baltic commerce.
In a Germany that had swallowed many small nations, there was no shortage of people who dreamed of breaking pieces off the Empire. All they needed was money, weapons, and a target.
Oskar had become a perfect one.
Frederick did not send a single neat contract to a single neat assassin.
He dispersed the work:
one group instructed to recruit men eager to "strike against the oppressor-prince who favours only his own,"
another told to find hot-headed "patriots" who could be pointed at a palace and promised funding for their cause,
another paid simply to arrange weapons, lodging, and escape routes.
Layers upon layers of deniability.
"If it is done quietly," he murmured to his empty office, "no one will know. The boy is careless. Popular men make many enemies. They will blame anarchists. Or Poles. Or the French. Or whoever it is convenient to blame."
He sealed each letter with different wax, addressed through different channels, and dispatched them on their way.
The decision was made.
Threads had been cast into the dark.
And somewhere far to the south, in a church filled with music and flowers, Prince Oskar clapped for Bertha and Gustav and smiled for the crowd—
utterly unaware that,
beyond the walls of Villa Hügel,
his first true army of enemies
had just begun to gather.