The kingdom of Xvalon was the last flickering flame at the far edge of the Eastern Lands—a tired land ruled by tradition, shadowed by war, and starved by silence. Once rich in magic, now it bled slowly beneath rising taxes, broken harvests, and a king too easily swayed by poisoned words.
King Zemon Xvanheart, a widower with snow in his beard and sorrow behind his eyes, had tried to restore the greatness his father had nearly burned to ash. But that hope had dimmed the day a cloaked sorcerer arrived at court—his name never spoken aloud, his face always veiled in shadow. With a silver tongue and a book of spells, he became the king's most trusted adviser. It was whispered that he'd cast a charm over Zemon's heart… and worse, over his mind.
Under his counsel, taxes rose. The poor starved. The middle class grew bitter. And the only light left in the realm was Princess Zexviliar Xvanheart—a girl born of moonlight, with snow-blonde hair, emerald eyes like sunlit fields, and a voice soft enough to still a storm. She was the soul of Xvalon. And the people loved her as much as her father feared losing her.
On the day of the Sun Festival, golden banners danced on the wind, incense thickened the air, and the square brimmed with restless hunger and aching reverence. The king and his daughter stood atop the marble balcony overlooking the celebration, offering blessings to their people. But not all in the crowd came to receive blessings.
Some came with blades.
And the other—blessed not by blood or name, but by fate.
Edwin Clyne had never tasted palace food or worn silk. He had the cracked hands of a beast herder, born to the mana-farms in the east marshes—where magic ran through animals, not men, and children learned to kill before they learned to count. He stood among the crowd barefoot, dirt-smeared, barely eight years old, when he saw the assassin move.
No one else saw it.
Not the guards.
Not the nobles.
Not even the king's personal detail.
But Edwin did.
And he understood immediately.
The blade glinted—a thin, black dagger, curved like a serpent's fang. Poison shimmered at its tip. Drawn swift and silent from beneath a merchant's robe.
The assassin's eyes locked onto the king.
A single breath before death.
And then the boy screamed.
"MOVE!"
The dagger flew— straight for the kings heart. But it never struck.
It struck Edwin.
The boy had leapt between them.
Blood splashed across the marble. Screams echoed. Guards tackled the would-be killer. And as the crowd erupted into chaos, a small boy collapsed in the king's arms, blood soaking his torn tunic and eyes wide with pain—but yet, alive.
Barely.
He woke days later in the royal infirmary, bandaged and pale, with the scent of lavender and steel in the air. Beside him sat the princess, her hand in his, whispering prayers to a gods the kingdom had long stopped believing in.
But he did. In those same gods.
And when the king entered—eyes narrowed, but lips tight with awe—he asked the boy just one thing:
"What do you want, child? Gold? Land? A title?"
Edwin's voice cracked through parched lips, in pain as he spoke.
"I want to serve. I want to protect the crown. I want to be a knight."
The king studied him, this small, bleeding boy from a beast-farm—so bold, so sure. For a heartbeat, the sorcerer, standing behind the king, narrowed his eyes and clenched his jaw.
And for the first time in years, the king smiled without the power sorcery.
"Then do well to rise strong, Edwin Clyne. For your oath begins today."
What no one saw was the way the sorcerer turned away then, his fingers curling behind his robe. The spell on the king had shivered when the boy spoke. Just slightly.
And in that shiver, the sorcerer felt it— something ancient, pure, and dangerous.
Fate at play.
Hope.
That traitorous force.
The enemy of dominion. The undoing of spells.
And hope, to him, was the enemy of control.