The dense darkness slowly receded, replaced by a blurred and painful streak of grey behind the eyelids. Consciousness arrived like the crash of a cold wave, dragging Constantine’s soul out of the eternal void he had briefly felt. The first thing to assault him was not a sight, but an excruciating pain. His throat felt as though it had been doused with molten lead. The burning sensation spread from the base of his tongue, down his gullet, until it settled as a fire tearing through his stomach.
Constantine tried to draw a breath, but he met only stifled air smelling of damp and dust. His chest felt incredibly tight, as if a giant stone were crushing every one of his thin ribs. He choked, letting out a hoarse sound that felt foreign to his own ears. It was not the deep growl of an emperor who had won a hundred battles, but the weak whimper of a dying boy.
"Argh... hukk... hukk..."
Constantine’s hand moved tremulously, reaching for his own neck. Yet, as his fingers brushed the skin, he recoiled in shock. The texture he felt was remarkably smooth, but the bones beneath protruded in an unhealthy manner. There were no war scars there. No powerful neck muscles. His hand felt tiny, slender, and utterly devoid of strength.
He forced his eyes wide open. The ceiling he beheld was no longer Valerion marble adorned with paintings of gods, but old wood beginning to rot, with cobwebs in every corner. The candlelight, nearly extinguished in the corner of the room, cast shadows that danced in a deeply unsettling fashion. He tried to move his head to the side, and each small movement made his world spin wildly.
Where... is this? he whispered in his mind, for his voice was too shattered to speak aloud.
Constantine struggled to position himself to sit up. Every inch of muscle in this new body shrieked with extreme weakness. He felt as though all his energy had been drained to its lowest point. With a tremendous effort, he managed to lean his back against a pile of hard, damp-smelling pillows. His eyes then fell upon a small wooden table situated right beside his bed.
Upon the table sat a silver chalice, its surface dull and scratched. Constantine could see a slight residue of a murky, thick liquid at the bottom of the cup. The aroma wafting from it was pungent; an overly dense herbal scent mingled with a bitter, nauseating metallic tang.
Poison, Constantine thought instantly.
Decades of experience as a ruler surrounded by traitors made him intimately familiar with this scent. This was no medicine. It was a lethal concoction designed to paralyse the heart and slowly burn the internal organs without leaving an obvious trace. He realised with profound horror that the prince whose body he now inhabited had been poisoned just moments before his soul entered.
"Bastards..." he hissed hoarsely.
An intense wave of nausea suddenly surged from his stomach to his throat. The acidic fluid mixed with the remnants of the poison pressed to escape. Constantine could hold it no longer. He lurched to the edge of the bed, his small hands clutching the coarse sheets until his knuckles turned white.
"Ugh... bueekk!"
He retched violently. A blackish-green fluid spilled from his mouth onto the filthy floorboards. His body shook uncontrollably as he continued to heave up the remnants of the poison until all that remained was a clear, bitter liquid on his tongue. His breath came in gasps, tears pricking his eyes from the sheer pressure of the vomiting.
"Hah... hah... hah..."
Constantine leaned his heavy head against the bedpost. Cold sweat drenched his brow. Though his body felt like discarded rubbish, his mind began to work with a tyrant’s precision. He began to evaluate the situation. He was in the body of a prince, in a palace that appeared far poorer and more neglected than Valerion. And most importantly, someone in this place had just tried to kill him.
"Prince Astraia?" he murmured, trying to unearth any memories left in this body.
Blurred images began to surface in his mind. The name of the Kingdom of Astraia rang in his ears as an insignificant little territory in the South, a place once not even worth his notice when planning the conquest of the continent. And this body—the third prince, sickly, unloved, and always regarded as a burden to the kingdom.
No wonder this body is so frail, Constantine thought, staring at his pale arms with deep loathing. They didn't even need an army to kill this prince. Just a cup of cheap poison while he slept.
Anger began to simmer in his chest, overriding the agonizing pain. Constantine Soren never let his enemies win, not even when he was dead. If fate gave him a second chance in this wretched body, he would ensure that whoever put that poison in the silver chalice would beg for death at his feet.
He tried to move his legs, intending to stand. However, as his feet touched the cold floor, he realised just how dire the condition of this body was. His leg muscles felt like jelly, unable to support his own weight. He would have tumbled forward had his hand not quickly gripped the edge of the table.
"Damn it. This body is utterly useless," he complained with shallow breaths.
He looked back at the silver chalice on the table. Who had brought it? Who had access to the prince's chambers in the middle of the night? His personal servant? Or perhaps one of his father’s concubines? In a weak court like Astraia, intrigue usually revolved around succession and jealousy among the women of the royal harem. Constantine knew he was in a nest of vipers without a single fang to defend himself.
But these snakes do not know a dragon has occupied this body, he thought with a thin smirk that looked macabre on the youth’s pale face.
Constantine closed his eyes for a moment, trying to steady his breathing. He had to calm his nervous system, which was reeling from the poison's residue. He began to practice the military breathing techniques he once used to clear his mind in the heat of battle. Slowly, his racing heart began to stabilise. The burning in his throat remained, but he began to tune out the pain.
Suddenly, he heard the sound of footsteps outside the chamber door. The steps were incredibly cautious, as if the perpetrator did not wish to wake anyone, or perhaps, wished to ensure the prince was indeed a corpse. Constantine froze. He immediately extinguished the candle beside his bed with a weak but steady hand. The room was plunged into total darkness, save for the faint moonlight filtering through the cracks in the window.
He lay back down, positioning his body to look like someone in a deep sleep—or rather, someone who had just succumbed to poison. He narrowed his eyes, leaving only a tiny slit to observe the door.
The sound of the door bolt sliding was unmistakable in the eerie silence of the night. The door creaked open slowly, a sound that made the hair on his neck stand on end. A slender shadow entered the room. The figure carried a small lantern, its light shielded by a hand, creating a very limited aura of illumination.
Constantine could feel his heart pounding again. This was his first test in this new life. Whoever had entered this room was the key to the conspiracy that had nearly claimed his life. If he were the original prince, he would be a cooling corpse by now. But he was Constantine Soren.
The shadow approached the bedside. A familiar yet faint scent of perfume reached Constantine's senses. The figure stood still for several seconds, staring down at Constantine’s stiff form. Then, the figure reached out a trembling hand toward Constantine’s nose, intending to check if the prince’s breath remained.
"Is it done?" a feminine voice, soft yet laden with anxiety, whispered into the room.
Constantine remained motionless. He held his breath with precise technique, making his chest appear perfectly still. He waited for the right moment. He had to be certain who this person was before launching his counter-attack. In his mind, he had already devised a strategy to deal with this threat. Though his body was weak, his will was the deadliest weapon of all.
The cold night air in the stifling room seemed to freeze. Constantine felt the figure’s cold fingers nearly touch his skin. It was then he realised this game was far more dangerous than he had previously imagined. The Astraia Palace was no mere place of exile; it was a battlefield full of daggers behind backs.
Just you wait, Constantine thought as he began to gather the remaining strength in his arm muscles. Once I confirm who you are, not one of you will see the sun rise in peace.
Constantine Soren had risen, and though he inhabited the body of a dying youth, the tyrant’s soul remained thirsty for the blood of traitors. This stifling chamber would soon be the silent witness to the rebirth of a legend that should have vanished into history. He would take everything, starting from this poison-filled night.
Aksara