*Beep... Beep... Beep...*
The rhythmic beeping of the heart monitor filled the sterile hospital room, followed by a violent, rasping cough that seemed to tear through the silence like broken glass.
*Cough... cough...*
A seventeen-year-old boy lay motionless on the narrow hospital bed, his frail body connected to a web of tubes and wires that snaked across his pale skin like mechanical veins. His sunken cheeks and hollow eyes spoke of a soul that had already made peace with death, yet something burned bright in those fading orbs—triumph.
"Yes! Finally... I managed to finish it," he wheezed, his voice barely above a whisper. "The webnovel 'Chronicles of an Empire'—all ten thousand chapters."
Despite his deteriorating condition, pure joy radiated from his gaunt features. His cracked lips curved into a smile that seemed to illuminate the dim room, as if he had just conquered the world rather than merely turned the final page of a book.
"It might seem crazy," he gasped between labored breaths, "but this pitiful existence of mine endured every single chapter of that masterpiece."
*Cough... cough...*
Crimson droplets splattered across the white sheets as blood escaped his lips. His mind drifted like smoke, lost in the vivid world he had just left behind. "I wish... I wish I could have been born as one of the sons of the Eisenklinge family. They were so proficient with mana that illness could never touch them."
His teeth sank into his lower lip, drawing more blood as frustration coursed through his dying body. He had been born with wealth—his family's fortune could buy hospitals, but it couldn't purchase him a single healthy day. Money was powerless against the disease that had claimed his childhood, his adolescence, and now his future.
"The Eisenklinge legacy," he whispered reverently, his eyes distant. "They could command every element as if the very forces of nature bowed to their will. Masters of combat, wielders of many weapon... they were even called 'warmongers'."
Another violent coughing fit wracked his skeletal frame, and this time, a substantial pool of blood painted the pristine hospital linens crimson. Sweat beaded on his fevered brow despite the room's chill. "This is it... I can feel my strength leaving me. But at least I achieved my dream—I finished the story."
His voice grew softer, more distant, as if he were already slipping between worlds. "If there truly is a cycle of rebirth, if souls get second chances... I don't ever want to be this pathetic again. I want to be strong—strong like an Eisenklinge."
The words hung in the air like a prayer, a desperate wish cast into the void. The light began to fade from his eyes as his hand, once clutching the tablet that held his beloved story, fell limp against the bed rail. His final breath escaped like a whisper, carrying with it seventeen years of dreams unfulfilled and battles lost to an enemy he could never defeat.
Silence claimed the room.
---
## **Meanwhile, in another realm...**
Screams pierced the air of an opulent bedchamber, each cry echoing off marble walls adorned with tapestries bearing the fearsome crest of the Eisenklinge family.
"Push, Lady Beatrix! Push!" urged the head maid, her experienced hands steady despite the chaos. Sweat glistened on her weathered brow as she guided the laboring woman. "I can see the crown of the head!"
Lady Beatrix, her golden hair matted with perspiration, gripped the silk sheets until her knuckles turned white. Her emerald eyes blazed with determination as she summoned every ounce of strength remaining in her exhausted body. The pain was excruciating, but she endured—for this child would be special, she could feel it in her very soul.
With a final, earth-shattering scream that seemed to shake the very foundations of the castle, she gave one last tremendous push.
Then—a cry. High, piercing, and undeniably alive.
"My lady, you've done it!" The maid's voice cracked with emotion as she carefully lifted the squirming infant. "A son! And he's the very image of Lord Alaric!"
The baby's cries filled the chamber with new life as the maid gently cleaned him before placing him in a cradle. Beatrix, despite her exhaustion, reached out with trembling fingers to caress her son's impossibly soft cheek.
"You truly do look like him," she whispered, her voice thick with love and exhaustion. "Welcome to our world, Ares."
The attending maid couldn't suppress her smile at the tender scene before her. She turned to another servant who had abandoned her cleaning duties entirely, standing transfixed with tears of joy streaming down her face.
"Junia!" she hissed in a sharp whisper, careful not to disturb the now-sleeping infant. "Stop gawking and send word to Lord Alaric immediately! Tell him Lady Beatrix has delivered a son!"
Junia started like a child caught stealing sweets, her face flushing crimson. She scurried from the room, her footsteps echoing down the marble corridors as she sought out a guard to deliver the momentous news.
The guard she found couldn't suppress his grin as he received the message. He strode purposefully through the sprawling castle complex, past towering spires and through courtyards where fountains sang with crystal-clear water. His destination loomed ahead—the central keep.
At the massive entrance, two guards in gleaming armor stood at attention, their weapons crossed in a barrier of steel.
"I bring news for Lord Alaric," the messenger announced, his voice steady despite the magnitude of his message. "Lady Beatrix has just given birth to a son."
The guards' stern expressions cracked into genuine smiles. One of them disappeared through the doors while his companion remained at his post, the news already spreading through their ranks like wildfire.
Inside the keep, the chosen guard navigated corridors lined with portraits of Eisenklinge ancestors—warriors whose painted eyes seemed to follow his movement with approval. He reached the throne room's antechamber, where two more guards stood sentinel before doors that could have housed giants.
After whispering his message, he departed, leaving the final guard to deliver the news. Unlike his predecessors, this man's face remained an emotionless mask of professional duty. With practiced precision, he pushed open the colossal doors, revealing the heart of Eisenklinge power.
The throne room stretched before him like a cathedral of authority. Obsidian pillars supported a vaulted ceiling, while torches cast dancing shadows across walls.
Upon the great throne sat Lord Alaric Eisenklinge himself—His midnight hair fell to his shoulders like a dark waterfall and his obsidian eyes held depths that promised either salvation or destruction, depending on his mood.
Beside him, on a throne of lesser stature but no less elegant, sat his wife Lady Cassia. Her platinum blonde hair caught the torchlight like spun gold, and her piercing sapphire eyes held the calculating intelligence of nobility born and bred. Her figure, even seated, spoke of a woman who commanded attention in any room she entered.
Before the lord stood two figures that made the very air seem heavier. Both men bore the distinctive black hair and dark eyes of the Eisenklinge bloodline, but while one showed his face openly, the other wore a mask that covered the upper half of his features, leaving only his mouth and jaw visible.
The guard felt an invisible weight pressing down on him as Lord Alaric's gaze shifted in his direction. Those obsidian eyes demanded answers before questions were even asked.
Dropping to one knee in a deep bow, the guard's voice rang out with practiced reverence: "Glory to Lord Alaric!"
The lord's expression remained unchanged, carved from stone and just as unyielding. Lady Cassia beside him wore a look of barely concealed impatience, her fingers drumming silently against her throne's armrest as if she had a thousand more important places to be.
"Speak." The single word carried the weight of absolute authority.
"My lord," the guard began, his voice steady despite the crushing presence before him, "I have just received word that Lady Beatrix has successfully given birth to a son."
For the first time since the guard had entered, Lord Alaric's composed mask cracked. His dark eyebrows rose slightly in surprise, and the faintest trace of a smile ghosted across his stern features. One of his many concubines had finally delivered, and something warm flickered in those cold depths—an emotion he rarely allowed others to witness.
Lady Cassia's reaction was immediate and far less subtle. Her jaw clenched as she watched her husband's face transform, recognizing the tenderness that appeared whenever Beatrix was mentioned. Her perfectly manicured nails dug into her palms until she drew blood, her knuckles white with the effort of maintaining her composure.
"The sixteenth!" she declared, her voice sharp as a blade cutting through the moment. "Take him to the Young Masters' nursery immediately!"
The words had barely left her lips when Alaric's head snapped toward her, his eyes blazing with the fury of a volcano about to erupt.
"Cassia!" His voice boomed through the vast chamber like thunder, causing his wife to recoil as if physically struck. Even the two masked figures before the throne shifted uncomfortably.
"You do not make decisions for me," he continued, each word dropping like a stone into still water. The temperature in the room seemed to plummet as his gaze held hers in an iron grip.
Lady Cassia's grip tightened until her nails pierced skin, droplets of blood staining her pale palms crimson. Her breathing became shallow, but she dared not speak again.
Turning back to the guard, Lord Alaric's voice regained its measured control: "Beatrix's son will remain with her for one full month before joining the others in the nursery."
The guard bowed deeper, understanding his dismissal. As he departed to deliver this new message, Lady Cassia's composure finally cracked completely.
"My husband!" she burst out, her carefully maintained facade crumbling like ancient parchment. "He is the sixteenth son, and illegitimate besides—the child of a mere concubine! Such privileges are reserved for the true-born children of the Eisenklinge family!"
But Lord Alaric had already turned his attention elsewhere, dismissing her outburst as he would swat away an annoying insect. His focus shifted to the two kneeling figures before his throne.
"Kael." The unmasked man raised his head, awaiting his master's command with the patience of a trained hound.
"You will return to the Direwyn family territory. They continue to keep slaves despite the Emperor's decree, and His Imperial Majesty has requested that the Eisenklinge family... handle the situation accordingly."
Kael's bow was deep and immediate. "Yes, Lord Alaric."
Like smoke given form, he melted into the shadows that clung to the throne room's corners, his presence simply ceasing to exist as if he had never been there at all.
"Bram." The masked figure straightened at his name, every line of his body speaking of deadly readiness.
"Return to the Lorvain mines. Ensure that our marshals are not embezzling the family's wealth. If you find evidence of theft..." He left the sentence unfinished, but the implication hung in the air like a blade waiting to fall.
The masked man's response mirrored his predecessor's: a deep bow, a quiet "Yes, Lord Alaric," and then dissolution into darkness as complete as his companion's.
With his business concluded, Lord Alaric rose from his throne with fluid grace. His thoughts had already turned to his newborn son—Beatrix's child, born of the woman he loved but could never publicly claim as his true bride due to the political necessities that bound him to Cassia.
As he strode from the throne room, his footsteps echoing with purpose, Lady Cassia remained seated in her diminished throne. Slowly, she opened her clenched fists to reveal the crescent-shaped wounds her nails had carved into her palms. Blood dripped steadily onto her silk gown, each drop a testament to her mounting fury.
She could not—would not—accept how her husband's heart softened whenever Beatrix was mentioned. Rising from her throne with predatory grace, she swept from the room, her mind already weaving the threads of a plan that would ensure her position remained supreme.
The game for Lord Alaric's affections had just begun anew, and Lady Cassia had no intention of losing to a mere concubine.