Upon the vast continent of Dynauram, there had once stood seven realms.
Among them, one was but a quiet western kingdom, remote and overlooked by all others—Svemilet. Yet it was Svemilet that rose from the fringe of the world to its very center. Through shrewd reforms and ruthless discipline, its strength swelled like a tide, and the neglected frontier became the forge of empire.
In time, Svemilet crushed the other six realms beneath its banners, binding the continent in blood and fire.
The man who wore the crown of that conquest was Justin the Great, the brightest star in Svemilet's long and bitter history—at least, so the chronicles would have it.
But even Justin's gaze could not pierce the far North, where the land dissolved into black fog and silent hills. There dwelt a race even fiercer than human—the Mazouku—creatures of uncanny strength and swift steeds, who raided the borderlands for grain, steel, and the crafts they could not forge. Their scattered tribes held no kingdom, yet every rider was worth ten men, and their name alone could still the hearts of soldiers.
When Justin had united all that men could claim, he found peace intolerable. He swore to drive his banners into that shrouded wilderness, to bring even the unknown under the sun of Svemilet.
The war that followed was folly dressed as glory. Though the Mazouku were fewer, their resistance was fierce, and the Emperor's pride demanded wave after wave of men and wealth. Fields went untilled, cities hollowed out. The conquered lands were barren, the dead uncounted.
Even that might have been borne—had Justin's hunger stopped there. But power had made him soft. He raised palaces by the dozen, paved the roads with marble, and taxed the realm to its knees. His name, once a banner of triumph, became a curse whispered in the markets.
The nobles of the six fallen kingdoms never forgot their crowns. Daggers found their way to the capital often, though never deep enough.
These were the truths Crim had come to learn in his seventeen years of life.
Allow me to speak plainly of him.
He was not born to this world.
Once, he had been as we are—an ordinary young man of the early twenty-first century, dwelling in some small, unremarkable city. He had his dreams, vast and fragile, and the quiet desperation of youth that believes effort alone can defy fate. But fate had other designs.
He lost his parents, had no inheritance, and worked himself to exhaustion to keep his studies alive. One day, in the blur between fatigue and thought, he stepped into the path of a runaway truck.
Death was swift.
When next he opened his eyes, he was no longer himself—no longer of Earth—but an orphan of Abundarc.
From his new life's first breath, despair weighed upon him. The world was a shadowed echo of the Middle Ages he once read of—mud, hunger, fear, and faith. To dream of change here was to mock the gods themselves. And yet, Crim was nothing if not stubborn. He began anew, clinging to the remnants of knowledge from his former world, earning respect, climbing the low rungs of power until, in time, he was named headman of a village.
But all that he built has turned to dust.
The scholar, the idealist, the youth who once believed in reason and mercy—
now walks the outlaw's path.
And in the rain-drowned wilds of Dynauram, the boy who would not kneel to fate has become a bandit lord.
Evening had come to Fairy Mountain, and the dying sun bled across the sky, staining the clouds in crimson fire.
Crim and his band had marched until their legs were hollow and their throats raw; their clothes hung from them in rags, their boots slick with mud and blood. At last they broke, stumbling into a clearing strewn with rocks and roots, and fell where they stood.
Crim alone forced himself to remain upright. He looked every bit as ruined as the rest, but his eyes still held the hard light of command.
"Listen," he said, his voice hoarse but steady. "Bring out all the food you carry. Hand it to Tituss. We'll count and keep it together. Until we find a place to hide, we eat only what's allowed. Tituss, you guard the rations. No one touches them without my word."
Tituss had grown up beside Crim—same village, same school, born on the same day. A dull boy, slow to anger and slow to think, yet Crim had always treated him as a brother. Perhaps that was why, though the others once looked to Tusk, the great-shouldered man who'd led them before, it was Tituss they now obeyed when Crim's eyes were elsewhere.
Still, hunger breeds silence.
When they turned over their last scraps of bread and meat, none dared speak against him, but the air was thick with despair.
Days passed in flight.
The early summer sun blazed without mercy, and the little food they had withered away to crumbs. They found no haven—only stone and thorn and the whisper of carrion birds that circled above. Their clothes rotted from their backs; their hair clung in mats, their faces burned and hollow.
By the fifth day they could go no farther. The men sank into the shadow of a narrow vale, collapsing like spent beasts. Some lay flat upon the earth, too weak to move a finger.
Crim sat apart, a stalk of wild grass between his teeth, his eyes dull and far away. With what strength remained, he nudged Tituss with his boot.
"Tituss," he rasped, "how much food's left?"
Tituss fumbled through his pack. Inside lay only a scatter of hard crumbs. When he opened it, every head turned, their eyes dark and glinting.
Crim swallowed against the ache in his throat and forced himself to speak.
"Take a few men," he said. "Go find berries. Roots. Anything green."
Tituss made a face like a beaten dog. "This damned place—I've never even heard of it. I can't tell what's poison and what ain't. And I'm spent, Crim. My hands are numb, my legs too—"
Crim's foot lashed out, catching him in the side. The boy yelped and sprang upright, half in pain, half in reflex.
"Don't sleep," Crim barked, his voice cutting through the still air. "None of you sleep! Close your eyes now, and you may never open them again. Tituss—listen to me. If we wait till dark, we won't have strength to crawl. I'd rather die of poison than of hunger. Now move!"
Tituss had no choice but to lead the few who volunteered to hunt for food. They wandered through the barren hills, their eyes hollow with hunger.
Tusk pushed aside a tangle of thorns and glanced back, motioning to the man trailing behind him.
"We came in from that way," he said. "I marked the path. I won't lose it."
They walked a little farther before the other man stopped, uncertain.
Tusk turned, wary. "What is it now?"
The man hesitated, voice low. "Crim's been good to us. Maybe betraying him isn't right."
At that, Tusk's face flushed crimson—not from shame, but from anger.
"Too late for doubts," he hissed. "You think Crim will forgive you when he finds you've been hiding food? We're both dead men if anyone learns of it."
The man lowered his head, silent for a long while. At last he sighed, drew a small bag of bread from his coat, and pressed it into Tusk's hands.
"Brother, I can't go on. Take it. But promise me this—don't turn the others in."
Tusk bowed his head, pretending sorrow. The man gave him a rough pat on the shoulder and turned to leave.
He never took a second step.
Tusk lunged, driving a sharpened branch deep into his back. The man gasped once, choking on his own blood.
"Did you think I'd let you walk away?" Tusk snarled into his ear. "If Crim learns I ran, he'll hunt me to the ends of the earth. You'd die anyway—better it be here."
When the body stilled, Tusk wiped the blood from his hands onto the dead man's coat, tore open the bag, and began to eat. The bread was damp and tasted of iron, but he still ate with relish.
He was still chewing when they found him. They bound his hands and dragged him before Crim.
Crim's face was hard as stone. "Why did you kill him, Tusk?"
The killer was calm now, his earlier fury gone. "He was running," he said. "He meant to go to the official."
"Liar!" Tituss spat, throwing the small sack to the ground. "You killed him for this!"
Tusk didn't flinch. "He was hoarding it. He said he'd share it if I joined him. He's dead now. What good's bread to a corpse? I was hungry."
Crim said nothing. He only stared—long, silent, measuring.
Tusk met his gaze without a tremor, breathing hard like a cornered bull.
At last Crim spoke, softly. "I believe you."
He untied Tusk's bonds. The others said nothing.
Crim did not truly believe, not in his heart. But they had no proof, and no food, and a man like Tusk—once respected, although he was a real criminal—was too dangerous to kill without cause. One more death might break what little order remained.
And also, least of all did Crim wish for blood.
He was a man of the new age, a stranger in this cruel land, and somewhere deep within him still lingered the remnants of another world — a world where killing was not the answer.
That night they ate the wild fruit Tituss had brought. It was bitter, but it did not poison them.
The rain fell harder as darkness settled, and no one spoke the dead man's name again.