Death, Devotion, Dissonance

Evin was changing. In fact, Leanne wasn't sure if she could call him that now. In her eyes, the boy had turned into something else entirely. Gone were the boy's doubts and worries, gone was his sweet, innocent curiosity, gone was his pained hesitation when striking another student, and of course, gone were the times he would pause unnaturally to talk with himself.

Leanne could tell herself that the boy was just growing up faster than others, but the last point sealed her conviction on the matter. When Evin first became a mage, he would often pause and whisper to himself. After a while, he stopped outright talking to himself, but he still paused abnormally. Seeing it, Leanne could only guess that he was talking to the entity inside him through some other means.

But after Evin came back from the north, he had never paused like that again. The boy was changed. In his stead, someone completely different had appeared. The new Evin was more confident, strong-minded, and way too familiar with the ways of the world.

Leanne didn't know what happened in the north, and she had no intention to do so.

Despite the guilt she felt towards Evin, she felt glad. She had always feared the entity inside Evin, but now that he was out in the wild again, she could tell she wasn't in its bad books. The entity wasn't some mad artifact of a forgotten age, hell-bent on burning the world to the ground.

Did that make Evin an otherworlder, then? Leanne did not care. As long as she was left alone.

"There's no way he's someone from another world," Leanne said once again. "Now that I've done as you asked, please let me go. I never intended to be any part of this… struggle and of course, I'll stay far away from it in the future as well."

After saying her piece, Leanne stilled her breath. Perhaps she went a bit too far. Even though the king was weakened to this extent, the man still had his pride. It wouldn't be weird for him to suddenly lash out at her.

'No… I need to be firm on this point. The longer I stay here, the more danger I'll be exposed to.'

The king in question was frowning behind his desk. Leanne showed him her most confident look, not allowing him to doubt her conviction.

"Have you realized what Alt Leland's worst fear is?" the king suddenly spoke.

Leanne was put off-guard by the question.

"No? What's that got to do with this?"

"Quite a lot. To be honest."

"And? What is it?"

"He fears an assassin."

"What? An assassin? … I mean everyone who stands atop such wealth and authority would fear an assassin, I suppose?"

"I worded that poorly," the king sighed. "What he fears is the prophecy of an assassin. You've learned about Lady Twelve Jokes, right?"

"I have. The Aspect of Time."

While working under Nola, Leanne heard some info about the Twelve Aspects that protected the world in the dark.

"Yes. Some even call her the Empress's will," the king nodded. "Did you know that for a price, she can prophesize your death for you?"

Leanne tilted her head. "Aren't they supposed to not interfere with the mortal's matters?"

"A prophecy of one's death does not count because there's no way for any mortal to change their own destiny. It would only be a burden they'd have to live with."

"Alright… and I'm guessing Duke Leland had his own death prophesized?"

"Yes," king Seth nodded. "And I've only heard of this before my father died. Before the Duke of the East started having thoughts of usurpation and betrayal. He described the scene for me. A shadowy figure would casually approach him and stab him in the chest in the middle of a conference. No one in the room even tried to stop the figure.

"No complicated assassination plot, no overwhelming force, no imperial decree from the Empress… a simple stab in Leland's chest. Sounds almost impossible, isn't it?"

"…"

"But did you know what else he said to me back then?" the king smiled. "That I was among the council at the time. With me, the most important men in the kingdom's government. The only mystery was the shadowy figure.

"When I first heard it, I thought it was a joke. After all, I was the least likely to inherit the throne back then. My brothers and sisters were more fitting to rule over the kingdom. Even the bastards from my father's concubines were more talented than I. Me? Perhaps I would've been sold to some other country as a prince, or perhaps I was to be used as a hostage for the South."

But despite all odds, prince Seth inherited the throne. Not prince Kalak, who was a High-mage rivaling the current Mage King; not prince Ephrene, whose intelligence was said to rival the Aspects; not princess Shallash, who was beloved by every citizen in the kingdom… but Seth, the only non-mage among king Roland's children, the Forgotten Heir.

"No," Leanne shook her head. "You can't tell me you're struggling like this because of your enemy's delusion."

"A man has to believe in something," the king smiled wryly. "The day I became king, I believed the duke's prophecy. Someday, he will die. We just have to wait for it."

Leanne was outraged. The king was jumping off a cliff, because he dreamed the night before he was going to survive. And he was inviting Leanne to jump off with him.

"No," she spoke again. "I'm terribly sorry to say this, but my situation's not so doomed as yours. I'm still clean. You can't keep me tied up like this."

She probably shouldn't have said all these things. But she still spoke.

"And just because you survived to see Leland die, it doesn't mean the same will happen to me. I'm only a pawn in this grand chess game between you two, my life worth nothing. It wouldn't be funny for me to die believing in a prophecy you very well, could've made up on the spot."

"The prophecy is real," the king interrupted her. "You know it. Leland has promised luxurious rewards for anyone who discovers someone who's attempting to kill him. If you can provide proof of the planned assassination, you can become richer than 90% of the kingdom's mages in one night.

"Not only that, if someone does succeed in killing him, anyone who catches or kills his murderer can legally receive 10% of his whole fortune. That includes everything, by the way. His real estate, his businesses, his authority. Everything."

Leanne of course, heard rumors about those luxurious rewards when she got herself tangled in this mess. She thought it was weird that the duke was so concerned with his safety, but she only brushed it off as a weird quirk. She was fearful of powerful people, so why couldn't the duke be fearful of an abrupt end to his life?

"The duke's lifestyle revolves around that prophecy," king Seth said with conviction. "Victory is ours.. We just need to be patient."