Fate (2)
The academy corridors were clean and well maintained.
Too clean.
“Assir!”
I turned toward the voice calling me.
The sound was unmistakable. An immediate bitterness formed in my chest.
“Anneliese.”
“It’s been a few days since we last spoke. How have you been?”
She tilted her head slightly.
“I heard you surpassed the previous record. As expected from someone so talented.”
I didn’t react dramatically.
Nor emotionally.
I needed to keep myself under control — and my aura as well.
“I see. But didn’t you also do well?” I replied neutrally.
“First place among so many high-ranking mages.”
“Uh… well,” she said, looking genuinely surprised.
“I did better than expected. Taking first place was truly an achievement, but in my case, it was more luck than skill.”
A lie.
“I don’t believe that,” I replied.
“You’re an exceptional user of holy magic. Your odds in most tests are already above average. In group trials, they should be twice as high.”
It wasn’t empty praise.
Anneliese was a candidate for sainthood — and an extremely capable one.
As far as anyone knew, she was the only one.
If no other candidate appeared, in two years she would officially be named a Saint. Only at twenty was that allowed.
Her expression relaxed.
And, surprisingly, I felt better as well.
Perhaps because there were others I wished to eliminate more than her.
Perhaps because keeping Anneliese’s guard down was more useful than showing hostility.
“I heard the kingdom’s princesses arrive today,” she began.
“Each of them is quite talented, so I wanted to know—”
I was already running.
I crossed corridors, turned left, jumped over a divider, and narrowly avoided crashing into Luiz, who was whispering with Sirius in a corner.
I couldn’t let them stop me.
I reached the academy gates.
Classes would begin in a few minutes — either the princesses would arrive now, or after the lessons ended.
If it was now, I would be ready to receive the Third Princess.
I stood just behind the gates.
Other students were there as well. Some sat on the grass, laughing, chatting.
I remained standing.
I couldn’t afford any disgrace if I wished to be accepted as her knight.
I adjusted my clothes.
This was the most difficult point I had faced so far.
If I placed the Third Princess under my protection, the chances of someone acting against her would drop drastically.
If I failed… I would have to protect her from the shadows.
And then the attacks would be more frequent.
Ensuring her survival would be far more difficult.
The memory surfaced.
By the end of this year, she would be framed.
Accused of murdering her younger sister.
The sentence would be immediate: execution.
I had seen it with my own eyes.
Anneliese cutting the Third Princess’s throat.
Without hesitation.
In front of me.
As if it meant nothing.
Afterward, she told me to clean up the traces.
In the end, all that remained was betrayal.
I should have realized sooner that a monster who smiles while killing can never be a good person.
The carriages began to arrive.
One was golden.
Another bore blue stripes.
I ignored the golden one.
The blue-striped carriage was my focus.
From it stepped a breathtaking beauty… and one clearly exhausted.
Golden eyes, like the morning sun.
Hair shifting between blue and silver, as if it refused to belong to a single shade.
She had used too much mana.
I noticed immediately.
She was likely suffering from mana deficiency.
That only deepened my fear for her life.
Her beauty was incomparable.
Her curves elegant, balanced.
She still lacked Sirius’s bust, but her charm was entirely different.
There was no vulgarity — only grace and dignity.
My heart pounded.
Unlike Anneliese, who destroyed my other life, the Third Princess was someone destroyed from all sides.
Anneliese had always had everything. She had never known scarcity.
Her cruelty was born from ease.
The Third Princess was someone like me.
Not the me of now — but the me who suffered.
Who lost everything.
From the perspective of others, I would look like Anneliese.
They didn’t know what I had endured.
But with her… it was the same.
When the princess passed through the gates, I stepped in front of her.
My heart beat loudly, steady and relentless.
Surprise flooded her face.
I didn’t yet have permission to speak her name.
I was nothing to her.
So I knelt.
I raised my sword with both hands.
The Sword Oath.
If the princess accepted, she would have to wound her own palm.
“I wish to serve in your name.”
“Why?” she asked.
“The only times we’ve met were at balls and royal events. What makes you want to devote your sword to me?”
Her hesitation only strengthened my resolve.
“I acknowledge the efforts of those at the top,” I replied.
“They say those born into privilege don’t need to struggle. That’s a lie.”
“That still doesn’t answer my question,” she said calmly.
“All of my siblings have struggled as well.”
Murmurs spread around us.
“Has he lost his mind?”
“Did he fall for the Third Princess?”
I didn’t have enough answers to convince her.
I prepared to rise.
Then she took my sword.
And drove its tip into her own hand.
The blood didn’t flow.
It dried.
And sank into the blade.
The sword was now incapable of harming Princess Shaitan.
And whoever wielded it would be incapable of harboring impure thoughts toward her.
A sacred oath.
Irreversible.
She returned the sword.
Her lips curved into a gentle smile.
“Assir,” she said, as a servant healed her hand.
“Yes, Lady Shaitan.”
“Assir,” she repeated.
Hearing my name made my heart tremble.
“I’m glad you’re with me.”
Warm pressure wrapped around my body.
Light, warm arms — almost too careful.
I froze.
So did the onlookers.
The princess’s action was embarrassing — it could easily be misinterpreted as something beyond an oath.
Even now that I was her knight.
“I’m truly happy,” she repeated.
Her head rested against my chest, and I felt her body tremble slightly — fear and relief hidden beneath the surface.
Someone who had always faced loss now had something.
Could she trust me? I didn’t know.
But seeing her show those emotions made me want to protect her even more.
In that moment, I understood.
I wasn’t protecting a princess.
I was protecting someone who had already been broken.
Just like me.
