The first rays of dawn crept across my windowsill like hesitant fingers, painting the stone walls in shades of amber and rose. I slumped against my door, every muscle in my body screaming in protest. The [Rune of Diminishment] sat heavy in my pocket, its warmth seeping through the fabric like a promise of salvation.
I did it. I actually did it.
The thought bubbled up through my exhaustion, bringing with it a wild, intoxicating rush of triumph. I'd broken into the archive wing, evaded guards, squeezed through a window that should have been impossible to navigate, and emerged with the one artifact that could save my miserable existence. The forum post had been real. PlotHoleFinder69's throwaway comment about an overlooked plot device had just become my lifeline.
I stumbled toward my bed, legs shaking from the adrenaline crash. The soft mattress beckoned like paradise after the night's ordeal. My hands trembled as I pulled the rune from my pocket, examining it one more time in the growing light. The dark stone felt alive in my palm, its carved symbols seeming to shift and dance when I wasn't looking directly at them.
A rune that conceals the bearer's true capabilities from the System's omniscient eye. Perfect for someone who needs to hide their real nature.
The irony wasn't lost on me. I was using a tool meant for deception to survive in a world built on deception. The original Kaelen had been a lie—a pathetic mask covering genuine pain and neglect. Now I was a different kind of lie, wearing that same mask to hide something else entirely.
I wrapped the rune in a spare handkerchief and tucked it into the false bottom of my jewelry box, beneath a tangle of worthless copper rings and tarnished chains. The hiding place felt secure enough for now. Tomorrow, I'd figure out how to properly activate the artifact's power.
Tomorrow. When I can finally start changing my fate.
My body hit the mattress like a sack of grain, and I let out a groan that came from somewhere deep in my bones. The silk sheets felt like clouds after the rough stone and splintered wood of the archive wing. I closed my eyes, ready to surrender to the exhaustion that had been building for hours.
My body craved oblivion, but my mind refused to power down.
There was an anomaly. A loose data point I'd failed to catalogue. It flashed at the periphery of my thoughts—an unfiled report, a narrative thread left dangling. I tried to force it into focus, but it skittered away, a ghost in the machine of my memory.
What am I forgetting?
I rolled onto my side, staring at the wall where dawn's light painted shifting patterns through the window glass. The novel had been over three hundred chapters long, packed with subplot after subplot. The main storyline followed Leo's rise to power, but dozens of smaller stories wove through the narrative like threads in a tapestry.
Minor characters. Side plots. Tragic endings that served as emotional beats between the larger action sequences.
The memory crystallized like ice forming on a window.
Lyra.
The name crashed through my fatigue with the force of a battering ram. The body I was in acted before I could think, surging upright in a single, violent motion that sent the room spinning. Lyra Ashford, one of the kitchen maids. Eighteen years old, black hair always tied back in a bun, hands perpetually stained with flour and grease. She'd appeared in maybe six scenes total, background decoration for the academic setting.
Until she became the center of a tragedy that had made half the forum cry.
Oh no. Oh no no no.
I scrambled out of bed, rushing to my desk where I kept the calendar. My fingers traced the dates, counting forward from the confrontation with Leo. Three days had passed since then. The family dinner had been last night. Which meant today was...
The fifteenth of Harvest Month.
The day Lyra would be framed for theft. The day Lord Blackwood's missing heirloom would be discovered in her quarters, planted there by his corrupt steward who needed a scapegoat for his own embezzlement. The day she'd be dragged before a tribunal of nobles who cared more about maintaining order than seeking truth.
The day she'd be executed.
My hands shook as I gripped the edge of the desk. The novel had described her death in heartbreaking detail—not because she was important to the main plot, but because her execution served as a catalyst for Leo's growing disillusionment with noble society. She died to make the protagonist feel bad. A disposable tragedy to add depth to the golden boy's character development.
She's going to die today. Unless...
The thought trailed off into impossibility. What could I do? I was Kaelen Leone, third son of a declining house, known coward and general embarrassment to my family name. I had no political power, no allies, no resources beyond what I'd just stolen from my own family's archives.
But I had knowledge. I knew what was going to happen, when it would happen, and who was really responsible.
The steward. Marcus Grundy. He's been skimming from Lord Blackwood's accounts for months, and today he's going to pin the theft of Lady Blackwood's emerald necklace on a innocent girl to cover his tracks.
I paced across my room, mind racing through possibilities. The theft would be discovered this morning when Lady Blackwood noticed the missing necklace. Grundy would suggest searching the servants' quarters, starting with the newest and most vulnerable. The necklace would be found under Lyra's mattress, placed there sometime during the night shift change.
The same shift change I used to break into the archives. While I was playing treasure hunter, an innocent girl was being set up to die.
I'd been so focused on saving myself that I'd forgotten about the other victims of this cruel narrative. Lyra was just the first. Over the course of the novel, dozens of minor characters would suffer and die to service the main plot. Servants, merchants, soldiers, students—all of them ground up in the gears of Leo's heroic journey.
You saved yourself, Extra. But are you going to do anything about it?
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