“…Am I no longer needed, Your Highness?”
Elian’s voice was trembling. But Calix couldn’t answer that question. No — he wasn’t allowed to. Whatever he said now would only sound like an excuse. Leaving the domain before the Emperor arrived was the only way to protect Elian. When Calix averted his gaze, Elian turned away on the spot.
Bang―!
The door slammed shut, and the sound of Elian’s footsteps faded into the distance. Calix stared blankly at the closed door, then slowly clenched his fist.
…I’ll be back soon.
Calix bit down hard on his lip and turned away. Once he resolved this and returned, he would tell Elian everything about himself. It was a past he had never confided to anyone — but he believed Elian would listen.
***
The dawn air was cold. Just before departure, Calix looked up from his horse at the second floor of the lord’s manor. The tightly drawn curtains shifted slightly — and then the silhouette of someone snapping their head away was visible.
He’s very angry.
A corner of his chest ached. It was a heavy, stinging sensation different from the pain of Mana running rampant. But he couldn’t afford to linger. Calix pulled the reins and gave the order to his knights.
“Move out.”
The sound of hoofbeats shattered the stillness of dawn.
The road to the Grand Duke’s castle was harsh. In the old days, the distance would have taken weeks, buried under snow. But it was different now. A black road cutting across the snowfield — the asphalt road he and Elian had built together stretched on endlessly.
Clop, clop!
The thoroughbreds sprinted at full speed across the smooth, snow-melted road. No jolting, no slipping — a speed unlike anything felt before.
Even this road was made by you.
A bitter smile settled at the corner of Calix’s lips.
It wasn’t a road I made to leave you behind.
And yet, regrettably, this very road was carrying him further from Elian faster than anything else could.
After two days and nights of riding without rest, the heart of the North revealed itself — the Grand Ducal Castle, Drachenberg.
A massive black dragon coiled atop sheer cliffs. Walls built from black iron-stone rose as if to pierce the sky. Everything around it was blanketed in snow, yet the walls themselves were so smooth that not even snow could settle on them. It resembled less a place where people lived and more a fortress built to contain a great and terrible beast.
…It’s cold.
Calix furrowed his brow without realizing it. He found himself thinking of the lord’s manor in the Valeria Domain, where he had stayed until just days ago. Old, but with white plastered walls and warm chimney smoke curling upward, amber light spilling from every window — that cozy little place.
Unlike there, Drachenberg was a bleak, colorless ice prison. A fortress that existed for survival alone, with not a trace of warmth to be found. Right — this was his place. This frozen edge of the North, where warmth was never permitted.
“Your Highness! You’ve arrived!”
The garrison commander and the guards came rushing out and bowed their heads. Calix dismounted and walked into the castle. The familiar chill pricked at his skin. The fact that this place — with no Ondol, no warm air — was truly his home felt, for the first time, strangely foreign.
“The guests.”
“They’ve already arrived and are waiting in the audience chamber.”
Without a moment’s delay, Calix straightened his cloak and headed for the audience chamber.
Creeeeak―.
The heavy doors swung open. Calix walked inside without even brushing the snow from his cloak. In the vast audience chamber, high above, a single throne sat alone.
And seated upon it was the man known as the master of the Empire — Mikhail Sol Helios.
“….”
His half-brother. The only one who had inherited the imperial family name. Helios meant the light it carried, and no name could have suited Mikhail more — he was beautiful. Tall like Calix, yet with skin so pale it looked as though sunlight might melt it, a long and slender neckline, brilliant golden hair, and golden eyes to match.
But that beauty was somehow unsettling. It was because of those empty pupils — staring into empty space, motionless as a pinned butterfly.
“…I present myself before Your Majesty.”
Calix offered a dry greeting. At that moment, from the shadows behind Mikhail, a pale hand slowly reached out. It gently cupped Mikhail’s jaw, and — as if turning the head of a doll — directed his gaze toward Calix.
“You should greet him, Your Majesty. Your little brother has come.”
A languid, viscous voice. The shadow fell away, and a man revealed himself. A decadent beauty that made it difficult to place any gender. Long ash-gray hair tied carelessly back, and on the nape of the neck visible beneath a loose robe, strange purple magical circuit tattoos coiled like a serpent.
It was Eden, the Tower Master.
“…Ah.”
The moment Eden’s touch reached him, life slowly began to return to Mikhail’s eyes.
“Welcome, Calix. My beloved little brother.”
Mikhail’s lips parted. His voice was smooth, yet there was something deeply off about it — like an actor reciting memorized lines.
“The castle without you is no fun. It felt hollow, like breaking into an empty house with no owner.”
They had already arrived in comfort, having passed through a dimensional travel gate connected to the imperial palace.
“….”
“Why aren’t you answering? Your brother came all this way.”
Mikhail smiled — a smirk. And at the same instant, Eden standing behind him curved his lips at the exact same angle. It was a deeply unsettling synchronization, like watching a reflection in a mirror. Calix swallowed his instinctive revulsion and fixed his gaze on Eden.
“Remove that hand, Eden. That is the body of His Majesty the Emperor.”
“Haha, ‘His Majesty’s body.'”
Eden burst out laughing as if mocking the very phrase. Rather than stepping back, he rested his chin on Mikhail’s shoulder and toyed with his earlobe.
“Don’t be so stiff, Grand Duke. Do you know who made this beautiful Emperor? Who stitched together a body rotting to ruin with magic, gave it color, and made it speak its lines.”
Eden’s purple eyes gleamed. It was not the gaze of a subject looking at his lord. It was the look of a sculptor admiring his finest work — possessiveness and arrogance intertwined.
“I am merely exercising the rights of a creator.”
“…That madness again.”
“Madness? Is it a sin for an author to cherish their character?”
The words Eden had murmured — author and character.
What they meant, Calix couldn’t say. But every time he heard those words, an inexplicable revulsion rose within him. His instincts were warning him. Never try to dig into what those strange words mean.
Eden descended the stairs slowly. With every step he took, the Mana in the air twisted in a strange and unnatural way. He came to a stop right in front of Calix’s face.
“By the way, our Grand Duke is looking quite rough.”
Eden reached out to trail his hand across Calix’s cheek. Before it could make contact, Calix knocked it away sharply — Eden drew his hand back with an exaggerated show of pain.
“My, my — still as defiant as ever. Well, I did set it that way.”
Eden looked Calix up and down. It was the kind of gaze used to inspect and review a setting that had only ever existed as text.
“The cold North, a cursed body, a solitary black lion loved by no one….”
Eden clicked his tongue.
“A perfect ‘tragic second male lead’ arc. Feels like the balance has been slipping a bit lately.”
“What kind of nonsense are you spouting?”
“I heard the rumors. Something happened in the Valeria Domain, didn’t it?”
Eden’s expression froze cold in an instant.
“That dreadful cold of yours has diminished. The venom has gone from your eyes, too. And most of all….”
Eden jabbed a finger into Calix’s chest.
“Your heart is far too stable. By now you should be writhing in agony and crawling at my feet.”
A modern person who had transmigrated into this world — the author, Eden.
Eden’s eyes narrowed with interest. A memory from his past life flickered through. The former lover who had coldly cast him aside and left. The face of that betrayer was the very mold from which Calix had been made.
I made you for a reason.
Only to torment. My toy, created so I could feel exhilaration watching you become thoroughly isolated, crying out, and breaking apart.
And yet someone had dared to touch my work. Someone had repaired the toy I had broken.
“I don’t know which little rat is trying to rewrite my story — “
Eden snapped his fingers.
“But shouldn’t things go according to the original?”
“Kgh…!”
Calix’s pupils contracted. Deep within his heart, the source of the curse that had lodged itself there since childhood screamed and twisted in agony. The cold that Elian’s warmth had barely managed to suppress tore through his veins and erupted like an explosion.
“Hgh — ugh!”
Calix dropped to his knees on the floor. The hand clutching his chest had gone white. A metallic taste of blood filled his mouth. Beyond simple pain, an irresistible command was seizing his body — as though someone were wringing out his very soul.
“Yes — that expression!”
Eden grabbed Calix by the hair where he had collapsed on the ground and forced his head up. Gazing at Calix’s face twisted in agony, Eden smiled with something like rapture.
“You are most beautiful when you are suffering, Your Highness. Don’t try to be happy. That’s character collapse.”
On the throne, Mikhail continued to watch the scene with unfocused eyes, wearing the smile that Eden had seemingly programmed into him.
“Does it hurt, little brother? You should have listened to your hyung.”
It was hell. A place ruled by a puppet wearing the name of a brother, and a mad sorcerer who fancied himself a god. Calix gritted his teeth as his consciousness began to blur.
Elian….
He ached desperately for those warm hands. But at the same time, he was grateful. That Elian was not here. That he hadn’t dragged that untainted person into this wretched filth.
But Calix didn’t know. That the seemingly oblivious rural lord had a personality that absolutely could not bear to watch his treasure be broken. That right now, eyes blazing, he was racing toward him — to come fix what had been damaged.
