The damp cold of the outer rim tunnels seeped into Luigi’s new, fragile bones as he crouched behind a stack of rusted iron crates. His side throbbed with a rhythmic, burning heat where the crude stitches held his stolen flesh together. Every breath felt like inhaling ground glass, the air thick with the scent of wet soot and the copper tang of distant blood. He watched from the shadows of the slave pit as the guards paraded through the corridors, their neural-binding lanterns casting long, distorted shadows that danced like demons against the damp stone walls. Luigi adjusted his grip on a jagged shard of crystal he had scavenged, his knuckles white with tension.
"Move it, you vermin! The morning shift doesn't wait for your weeping," a guard bellowed, the sound of a heavy boot striking a huddling slave echoing through the hollow chamber.
Luigi narrowed his eyes, his mind a storm of cold calculation and burning memory. He was no longer the prince who slept on silk, but the predator hiding in the filth. As he leaned back against the rough wall, a discarded piece of a communication scroll caught his eye, partially buried in the mud near his feet. It bore the unmistakable crest of the House of Vesper, the family of his former fiancée.
"What is a royal decree doing in a place where only the forgotten rot," Luigi muttered to himself, his fingers trembling as he reached for the damp parchment.
He smoothed the crumpled paper against his knee, the faint glow of a distant lantern allowing him to read the elegant, flowing script. His heart, the heart of the boy Boru, began to race with a frantic, uneven beat. It was a letter of confirmation, dated three days before his execution. The elegant handwriting belonged to Isellia, the woman he had intended to marry, the woman he had trusted with the secrets of his soul.
"The prince has been successfully isolated," the letter read, the words searing themselves into Luigi’s retina. "The false documents regarding the Aether Core theft have been planted in his study. Proceed with the arrest during the eclipse. Once he is removed, the Obsidian Council will have no choice but to name Michael as the sole heir. Ensure Mario handles the interrogation; he enjoys the sound of breaking bones."
Luigi felt a sudden, violent surge of bile rise in his throat. He crumpled the parchment in his fist until his fingernails drew blood from his palm. The betrayal was not merely a political maneuver by his father or a jealous whim of his brother. It was a meticulously crafted slaughter orchestrated by the woman who had kissed him only hours before his arrest.
"Isellia," Luigi whispered, the name tasting like poison on his tongue. "You didn't just want me dead. You wanted me dismantled."
"Did I hear someone talking back in the dark," a voice rumbled, the heavy clatter of armor drawing closer to Luigi’s hiding spot.
A guard with a scarred face and a sneer of permanent contempt rounded the corner, his lantern swinging rhythmically. He stopped just a few paces from the crates, his eyes squinting into the gloom. Luigi pulled himself tighter into the crevice, his breath held until his lungs ached.
"Come out, little rat," the guard said, a cruel chuckle vibrating in his chest. "I know you're there. I can smell the rot on your skin."
"I am not a rat," Luigi thought, his fingers tightening around the jagged crystal shard. "I am the ghost you forgot to bury."
Luigi slowly stood up, stepping out of the deepest shadows just enough to be visible. He kept his head low, his shoulders hunched in the practiced posture of a broken slave. He needed the man to come closer. He needed the distance to be short enough that the guard’s neural-binding magic wouldn't have time to paralyze him.
"Oh, it's just another one of Boru's kind," the guard laughed, leaning his spear against the wall as he reached for his belt. "You slaves never learn when to stay in your holes, do you?"
"I was looking for a place to rest, master," Luigi said, his voice a pathetic, high-pitched whimper that made his own stomach turn. "The pain in my side, it is too much."
"The pain will be the least of your worries if I decide to use you for target practice," the guard replied, stepping into Luigi’s personal space. "Look at me when I speak to you, boy."
The guard reached out, his thick fingers grabbing a handful of Luigi’s matted hair and yanking his head back. For a split second, the man froze. He looked into Luigi’s eyes—the heterochromatic gaze that did not belong to a common slave. In that moment of hesitation, the guard saw not a trembling boy, but a staring abyss of royal fury.
"What is wrong with your eyes," the guard stammered, his hand reflexively moving toward the hilt of his sword. "You aren't—"
"I am your ending," Luigi hissed.
Before the guard could draw his weapon or activate his neural-binding ring, Luigi lunged. He drove the jagged crystal shard upward with every ounce of strength in Boru’s meager frame. The sharp point buried itself into the soft tissue beneath the guard’s chin, tearing through the windpipe and piercing upward into the roof of the mouth. The man’s eyes bulged, a frantic, gurgling sound escaping his throat as he tried to scream.
Luigi did not let go. He twisted the crystal with a brutal, sickening grind, feeling the hot spray of blood coat his hands and face. He leaned his weight into the guard, forcing the man back against the stone wall. The metallic smell of fresh blood filled Luigi’s senses, a scent far more intoxicating than the rot of the pit.
"Does it hurt, soldier," Luigi whispered into the guard’s ear as the man’s life began to flicker out. "Does the air feel thin when your throat is full of your own blood?"
The guard’s hands clawed feebly at Luigi’s arms, his boots drumming a frantic, dying rhythm against the floor. Luigi watched with cold, clinical fascination as the light left the man’s eyes. He felt no remorse, only a profound sense of clarity. The first debt had been collected, but the ledger was still miles long.
"This is for the girl you fed to the hounds," Luigi muttered, giving the crystal one final, merciless shove before letting the body slump to the ground.
The guard’s corpse hit the mud with a dull thud, the lantern rolling away and casting a long, flickering trail of light down the corridor. Luigi stood over the body, his chest heaving as the adrenaline began to fade, replaced by the sharp, stinging protest of his reopened stitches. He looked down at his blood-stained hands, then at the guard’s belt.
"I need more than a piece of glass if I am to survive the night," Luigi said, his voice steadying.
He knelt beside the dead man, his movements quick and efficient. He unbuckled the guard’s weapon belt, securing a short iron sword and a small pouch of coins to his own waist. He then took the neural-binding lantern, blowing out the flame to keep himself shrouded in darkness. As he searched the guard’s pockets, he found a small, iron key marked with the seal of the inner slave quarters.
"Isellia, Michael, Father," Luigi listed the names, each one a vow of slaughter. "You gave me the body of a slave, but you left me the mind of a king. You should have checked the pulse of the head you severed."
He looked toward the end of the tunnel, where the faint sounds of the morning bell began to toll. The slave pit was awakening, a city of the miserable preparing for another day of servitude. But Luigi would not be serving anyone. He would be the shadow that moved through the halls, the ghost that haunted the dreams of those who thought they were safe on their thrones.
"One guard is not enough," Luigi whispered, a dark, jagged smile touching his lips. "I want the whole kingdom to bleed just as I did."
He turned and slipped back into the labyrinth of the tunnels, his footsteps silent against the damp stone. The ghost of the slave pit had begun his hunt, and the towers of Veridian-Xylos were no longer high enough to hide from the vengeance of a man who had already tasted death. He disappeared into the gloom, leaving nothing behind but a cooling corpse and a crumpled piece of parchment that held the truth of a queen's betrayal.
Aksara