King Arthur coughed.
It was a dry, rasping sound that rattled his chest, flecked with blood that slid down the corner of his lips.
He couldn't even bring his hand up to wipe the blood that had blackened.
His arms, once strong enough to cleave armies and steady enough to wield the Crown's sword, now lay limp at his sides like rotted branches that refused to sway in the wind.
A soft napkin brushed against his mouth.
He blinked, shifting his gaze upward with the effort of a mountain being moved.
The face that met him was not that of a knight, general, or noble retainer, but of a girl.
A maid.
Doria.
She had been his shadow these last months, tending to him when his body betrayed him, when his throne became more coffin than seat.
Even when he had ordered every soul to leave his chamber, she had refused.
The strongest man in the world — undone not by blade or war, but by poison.
A slow-acting venom that had gnawed at him for years, burrowed into his veins.
Even the System that had made him a king could not root it out.
A cruel jest of fate: that a world-conquering king should die like this, wheezing in the company of a single maid.
But she had eased those days, hadn't she?
With her quiet laughter, with the game she had brought him — [Return of the Swordmaster's Bastard Son]
Arthur had scoffed at first.
A king had no time for games.
His crown was conquest, his pieces were kingdoms, his board was the world.
But she had insisted, and when his hands could still move, he had allowed her to guide him through it.
And damn him, it had been… fun.
The first time in years he had let go of kingly pride and simply been a man.
The characters had been vivid, the story sharp, the heroines — he chuckled inwardly were immensely cute.
And he had finished it, lying in bed while his body wasted away.
Finished it and seen how it ended.
Now he was here, half-alive, half-dead, with Doria at his side.
'You don't need to do this,'he thought as another cough wracked his chest.
His lips did not move.
His throat refused him.
She couldn't hear his thoughts so she didn't respond.
A blue screen flickered at his bedside, a cold, familiar comfort.
[Host is dying…]
His System.
The invisible hand that had raised him from obscurity, that had carved his throne from nothing.
Without it, Arthur would never have been king.
"My king." Doria's voice trembled, sweet as honey poured over broken glass.
She dabbed his lips again, she was twenty years old unlike him who was already in his thirties, her features sharp with an intensity that unsettled him.
"I've really enjoyed the time we had lately."
'I enjoyed it too,' Arthur thought, though the words remained caged in his chest.
Her eyes softened.
Then hardened. "I don't like seeing you in pain, my love."
Arthur's heart skipped.
He had never given her that word.
Not aloud.
Not in any court.
"Seeing you unable to move… it breaks me. So—" Her hand slipped into her apron, pulling free a small kitchen knife mottled with rust. "I shall end your suffering myself. Then… take my own life."
Arthur's eyes widened.
'What madness—'
He tried to rise, to shout, to lift even a finger, but his body mocked him.
Paralysis gripped him as tightly as death's hand.
Doria stepped closer, tears trembling at the edges of her lashes.
But her mouth curved in a smile that was far too steady.
"In our next lives," she whispered, "I will find you. You will only ever belong to me, my king."
The blade pressed against his chest.
His heart, once tempered iron, thumped weakly.
He couldn't feel the steel.
Only the pressure, like a hand pressing him deeper into the grave.
"I love you," she said as the blade sank into his flesh.
Her tears finally fell, dripping warm against his skin. "I love you so much it hurts…"
And in his fading sight, she turned the blade inward, driving it into her own heart without hesitation.
Her body slumped against his, her blood mingling with his in the final intimacy of death.
[Host has died]
[Ding…]
[The King's Crown is reacting]
A golden glow spilled outward, wrapping around them both.
His last sight was not of Doria's still body, but of light swallowing the dark.
Then silence.
Arthur, King of the World, closed his eyes.
…
He opened them again.
The sky stretched above him — blue, cloud-flecked, radiant.
The warmth of the sun pressed down on his face.
There was no ceiling, no throne room, no chamber of poison and blood.
Arthur blinked, slowly rising to his elbows.
His body moved.
He felt very alive.
His hands flexed without pain and there was no pain in his chest..
"This…" His voice caught him off guard.
Gone was the deep, commanding timbre of a king.
In its place was a younger voice, sharp but untested. "Is this… Heaven?"
He sat up fully, staring at his reflection in a puddle nearby.
Black hair fell in messy strands. His eyes were younger, sharper, far removed from the thirty-five-year-old body he had left behind.
"Or am I somewhere else?"
A familiar chime answered.
[Congratulations]
[Your Reincarnation has been successful]
Arthur's lips parted.
"Old friend," he murmured.
The System was the System.
Loyal even to the grave.
"Where are we?"
[You are currently in your favorite game, residing in the body of Damian Lysandre.]
For a moment, silence.
Then Arthur laughed.
It rolled out of him, wild, incredulous, a sound that shook with disbelief and delight.
The sound of a king told the world that even death had not claimed him.
"So fate has been kind after all," he whispered, smirking at the sky.
He was in the game that had made him feel light despite his position as a King… It felt amazing.