Chapter 2 – Cassius Desdemona
Light.
"Gasp!!!"
The young man sprawled on the luxurious bed jerked upward with unnecessary intensity — the bed creaked — sending the purple bedsheet sliding to the floor.
His eyes darted restlessly around the room, confusion growing stronger with every passing second.
"Now, what in the hell is going on?" Noah cursed instinctively, his mind struggling to catch up with itself.
Then his last registered memory flooded back, making him flinch at the sight of blue fire swallowing his entire body in his mind's eye.
'I… I died?' He arrived at that conclusion with his body swaying as if suddenly dizzy, head aching, his heart thundering so hard against his chest that his ribs felt ready to cave.
His breathing turned shallow and ragged, forcing him to gulp air loudly through his mouth just to stay conscious.
Steadily, Noah climbed down from the bed and sat on the floor shrouded by a soft purple carpet, his back against the bed frame.
Those few actions — combined with the pain in his chest, every sensation coming through his body, and the light flowing through the half-open windows above the large desk to his right — told him clearly enough.
This was not a dream. This was real.
But then…
'Where am I? Who am I?'
He recognised the feel of a body well enough. And this one felt wrong. It felt like he was an intruder inside something that was anything but his.
Those suspicions were confirmed when Noah suddenly blanked out, an entire set of foreign memories erupting inside his head from nowhere.
Memories he had never lived. Yet he felt a deep sense of connection to every person who appeared inside them.
A connection, a feeling, he knew all too well.
His unhealthy love for a group of crazy people.
Realisation finally dawned on him as he lost consciousness.
…
"Argh."
Noah hissed through gritted teeth as he came back around, one hand clamped tight around his head.
Yet the first thing he did was pull himself up and run straight to the bathroom with the certainty of someone who had lived there his whole life.
Once inside, he went directly to the mirror and faced a face both unfamiliar and familiar all at once.
The face of Cassius Desdemona. The youngest of the Desdemona Family.
"It wasn't a dream." He whispered, touching his face with trembling, awed hands, his lips quivering like a man caught out in the cold.
The face looked eighteen with short, immaculate white hair framing the head, white lashes, and deep crimson eyes that churned like pooled blood on a glowering sun.
Noah had been unfairly handsome in his last life. But this was something else entirely.
That wasn't what concerned him right now, though.
His expression was strange, his lips caught between a wide smile of happiness and one of deep sorrow.
Happy because he had been reincarnated, something he had never truly believed possible, and into his favourite family of all things.
Sad because of what he had left behind on Earth. Noah had been an orphan, yes. But he had been loved immensely for his character and his looks. He had great friends who always showed up for him, and gorgeous girlfriends.
He had never once felt alone.
Now all of that belonged to a different world. And so suddenly that a jarring feeling crept up his throat and wouldn't leave.
But the situation was clear enough.
Gingerly, he studied his reflection, trying to anchor himself to the face staring back.
'I have died.' He said inwardly, holding his own gaze. 'I have died as Noah.'
The faster he accepted that, the faster he could focus on what was in front of him.
Because he knew exactly how this family ended.
He had played the game 333 times. And all 333 times, this family died in the late stages of the First Game.
He had no time to grieve his past if he wanted to keep his present.
At that, Noah looked around the bathroom — eyes sweeping past toilet, shower — and found a bathtub decorated in purple, precious gems set into its edges.
He walked toward it slowly and spent two minutes figuring out how to turn it on. Once done, without even removing his clothes — a purple pyjama set — he stepped inside as it filled with cold water.
He shuddered, breath steaming from his mouth.
He threw his head back, raised both hands dripping with water, and passed them slowly and repeatedly over his face.
Splashing sounds echoed through the enclosed bathroom, followed by the heavy breathing of someone fighting off cold.
After a few minutes in that state, the confusion and uncertainty slowly drained from his eyes.
'Noah is dead. I have to accept it.' He said, eyes closed, hands still on his face. 'I am Cassius Desdemona now. The youngest son of the Desdemona.'
'And this is an opportunity.' He forced a small smile. 'This is the chance to finally save this family. Isn't that all I ever wanted?'
To save this family. The family he had never truly had.
Was that possible now?
"But first…" He whispered, climbing out of the bathtub in a hurry, something important snapping back into his mind.
The beginning of his new family's downfall. The thing that set it all in motion.
And it was tied to him in some way. To Cassius Desdemona himself.
"I need to stop my own death." He breathed. "And to do that I need to stop my parents from blackmailing the—!"
"Young Master."
The words caught in his throat as he stepped through the bathroom doorway and found a woman in maid's clothes standing in the middle of his purple-decorated room.
Tall, with black hair braided into one thick knot swinging over her left shoulder. She stood with her hands pressed together in front of her, positioned beside the door, looking at him.
Her green eyes knotted immediately into a tight frown at the sight of his soaked clothes, but she seemed to have more pressing matters than to scold him.
Not that she could, anyway.
She lowered her head respectfully. "I apologise for the intrusion, Young Master, but you have been summoned."
Cassius's chest tightened. "By who?"
He kept his voice steady. Barely.
"The family heads. Your older sister, Lady Morgan, will be in attendance as well."
His heart dropped.
'Yes. I am fucked.'
—End of Chapter 2—