The room was silent. Only the occasional creak of wood under Naoya's soft footsteps and the faint whisper of wind seeping through the cracks in the shoji could be heard. This wasn't a child's room, nor a learning space. It was a luxurious cell, draped in power and pressure.
Naoya—once a middle-aged office worker in a modern, magic-free country—stood in front of the full-length mirror, his reflection distorted by the dim evening light slanting in from the inner garden. His blond hair was loose, falling to the nape of his neck, and his youthful face glowed with a false serenity.
"I'm feeling it again..." he whispered, holding his hand out in front of him, his fingers tensed like claws. "That force... that electricity boiling beneath the skin..."
He closed his eyes. The flow of cursed energy ignited like a river of lava beneath his flesh. Since he began training more rigorously, his progress had skyrocketed. The celestial projection techniques, which should have taken years, were responding as if his body remembered them before his mind.
"It's not enough," he growled through gritted teeth, feeling the heat rising through his veins. "I can go further."
He spun on his heel and launched a barrage of punches into the air, combining speed, control, and visualization. Each movement was clean, calculated… and brutal. The technique slid through the air like a precise sequence of divided time. As if the entire world could be manipulated with his fingers.
But then it happened.
A voice. Not external. Not physical. A voice inside him.
"You're not using it right. Not as you should. You are more than this, Naoya." A laugh crept into his mind. "Why hold back? Why fear what you can become?"
Naoya opened his eyes, but it wasn't fear he felt. It was excitement.
He slowly approached the mirror. His reflection was staring back at him, but something... something about that image wasn't right.
"You feel it too, right?" he said to the reflection, his voice lower, sharper. "This... hunger. This clarity."
He ran his fingers over the glass, as if he could touch that version of himself that had no moral limitations, no fear of the clan's judgment.
"That's the version that will survive," the voice whispered once more, identical to his own, but more... poisonous.
[Servant's perspective: Ichiro, 52]
Young Naoya had been locked in his room for hours. Since he turned fourteen, something had changed in him. Before, he still displayed a hint of curiosity, a teenage restlessness. Now, all he showed was silence... and that look.
Ichiro walked down the tatami mat hallway, his steps light and his head down. He carried a wooden tray with hot soup, rice, and tea. He hesitated before knocking on the door.
"Young Naoya... your dinner."
Nothing. Silence.
"Young Naoya, if you please..."
He gently slid the panel open, and what he saw chilled his blood for a moment.
Naoya was standing in front of the mirror, barefoot, shirtless, covered in sweat. His gaze... wasn't that of a child. Not even that of a teenager. It was that of a predator.
"Did I interrupt?" Ichiro stammered.
Naoya turned his head slowly, without blinking. He regarded him as if he were dust on the floor.
"I told you not to come in without me knocking."
"S-sorry, I thought maybe... you were busy, and the food..."
"Food?" "Do you think food matters when you're on the verge of world domination?" The smile that followed wasn't childish. It was almost... monstrous. "You're so weak you don't understand. No one in this house understands."
Ichiro immediately lowered his gaze.
"Forgive me, young Naoya. I'm only a servant."
"Exactly," the young man said. "You're only a servant. Remember your place."
Ichiro nodded, set down the tray, and left, but as he walked down the hall, he thought something he never dared say out loud:
That boy... he's not the same as he was a year ago. Something in his eyes has changed. As if... someone else was watching him from the inside.
[Naoya – Back in the room]
Silence returned.
"Idiots. All of them. They crawl for scraps of power, but none are willing to claim it with tainted hands. I am."
In front of the mirror, he spoke to himself.
"Naoya Zen'in... the real one. Not the child, not the nobleman. Not someone's son. The heir to absolute power."
He closed his eyes. He activated his technique once more.
And this time... it hurt.
Not physically. It hurt his soul. As if something dark had been released inside him and, for an instant, bit him from the inside out.
"Ah... hahaha..." He laughed softly, opening his eyes. "Yes. That's it."
He was alone.
But for the first time, he felt invincible.
And dangerously comfortable with it.