As I lay face-down in the cold, wet grass, the harsh reality of my mistake set in. I had completely forgotten that Swift Knights possess the Fleet Movement ability. Before I could even attempt a frantic retreat, two heavy guards tackled me into the dirt.
They pinned my shoulders flat against the earth, pinning me instantly. Within seconds, another dozen Knights swarmed the area, forming a tight, inescapable circle around me. Standing right among them were my father and my half-brother.
Ralph Sky stared down at me. Recognizing the exact shade of crimson hair that matched his own, he knelt down and forced my face up toward him.
Our eyes locked—my vibrant green meeting his piercing blue. A look of sheer shock washed over his seasoned face.
"Loki? Why on Myst are you here in the base?!" he demanded, his voice a mix of anger and disbelief. "Did you do something completely reckless again?"
Aside from our shared hair color, my father and I stood at the exact same height of 5'10". He simply carried a slightly more muscular, battle-tested build. Looking at us side-by-side, no one could deny we were father and son.
At a young 109 years of age, he was currently a 4th Circle Strong Knight of the Air element. For a 4th Circle human, he was practically in his prime. In the world of Myst, the average human lifespan scales dramatically with magical power. The historical standards generally follow a strict ladder:
9th Circle: 10,000+ years
8th Circle: 5,000 years
7th Circle: 2,500 years
6th Circle: 1,500 years
5th Circle: 800 years
4th Circle: 500 years
3rd Circle: 300 years
2nd Circle: 200 years
1st Circle: 150 years
0-Circle (Normal Humans): 60 to 100 years
Naturally, these numbers are just baseline averages for pure humans. Factors like health, environment, and luck can swing those numbers by about twenty percent either way. But while living for centuries sounds like a dream, nature always demands a price. For humans, that price is fertility. The stronger your magical circle, the harder it is to have children.
When my father was younger and only at the 1st or 2nd Circle, he easily fathered five normal children with his other wives. He had seven wives in total, raising one child with each woman. But as his power grew, his fertility plummeted. By the time he had Thorin and me, it was a biological miracle—and because of that, we were far more remarkable than our older siblings. Except for the two of us, all his other wives and children were entirely ordinary, lacking any special talent for aura or magic.
A sharp rustling sound snapped me out of my thoughts. The guards were aggressively patting me down, searching my clothes for weapons or stolen goods. But that absolute jerk, Thorin, knew exactly what he was looking for.
His eyes locked onto the handmade map I carried. Right before my disbelieving eyes, Thorin snatched the paper, stuffed it into his mouth, chewed furiously, and swallowed it whole. Once the evidence was gone, he casually flashed me an "okay" hand sign.
To an outsider, it might have looked like a loyal brother protecting me from a harsh military investigation. But the mischievous, devilish glint in his playful eyes told the real story. The bastard was only covering his own tracks!
"Father, I swear, I only came here to see my fiancée," I stammered, trying to patch together a defense. "Captain Winter... I..."
My words choked in my throat. My father reached into the pile of my confiscated belongings, pulled out a pair of black silk panties, and held them directly in front of my face. His eyebrows arched in a silent, heavy question.
I forced a painfully awkward smile and swallowed hard. The surrounding Knights stared at me in absolute shock.
"Father..." I squeaked. "Would you believe me if I told you Shade gave those to me?"
The only person who seemed to buy it—even a little—was Thorin. He gave me a sly, hidden thumbs-up from behind our father's back. Everyone else just looked at me like I was a degenerate lingerie thief.
Sighing deeply, my father dropped the "evidence" into a canvas bag alongside my other suspicious belongings. He waved a hand to dismiss his subordinates.
"Put my son in the holding cells until we can properly investigate this," he ordered. "Don't hurt him... yet."
With my hands tightly bound behind my back, the pair of Knights marched me away toward my lackluster accommodations for the night.
As they watched me get dragged off, Thorin leaned in and whispered to our father. "Father, I really do believe Loki. I know he isn't a bad guy. You aren't actually going to keep him locked up for this, right?"
"Son, military rules are military rules," Ralph replied heavily. "I will do what I can to help him, but the boy still broke into a secure military base belonging to the Duchess herself. Let's get back to work."
Meanwhile, Duchess Sylvia Sky sat in her grand, sunlit office, reviewing the morning logs of the Northern Sky Duchy.
As a master of Time and Space magic, her internal clock was flawless. She woke up at the exact moment of sunrise every single day. With long, perfectly curled silver hair, brilliant blue eyes that shimmered with a faint, silvery magical light, and the breathtaking curves of a mature woman, Sylvia was the ultimate dream-lover for every man across the Northern Duchy. Frankly, she held the hearts of the nobles in the royal capital and the southern kingdoms as well.
She had recently ascended to the legendary 9th Circle as a Mage at just 209 years old. It was one of the fastest rises to the absolute peak of power in recorded history. With a life expectancy stretching well past ten thousand years, she was destined to rule the northern lands for a very long time.
However, that meant any prospects of producing an heir to take over the Duchy were incredibly far off.
In truth, Sylvia didn't care about an heir. She held zero interest in romance or marriage. In her eyes, there simply wasn't a single man alive capable of stirring her heart.
Crunch.
She took a crisp bite of a sliced red apple, savoring the sweet flavor. For the past few years, her kitchen had been regularly stocked with incredible batches of apples, fresh-baked bread, rich honey, and fine wines. They all came from a newly opened bakery and brewery named Otherworldly Sky Delights. It was apparently managed by a distant branch of her own noble house.
The Sky family line originally descended from the first Mage King, Luke Balder I. He was a legendary Half-Elf Death Mage who had ruled and died roughly 12,000 years ago. He was also the grandfather of the current ruler, King Owen Balder. King Owen had made history as the first male Death Summoner, and only the second human male to ever successfully wield magic. The third known magic-wielding male was an Immortal Cultivator—a Water Mage—who ruled as the Emperor of the Eastern Humans across the distant, barren Eastern Wastelands.
The name of the fourth known magic-bearing male sat directly on the desk in front of her, stamped with an official royal seal.
Prince Vali Balder. 19 years old. 3rd Circle Death Healer.
Crunch.
Sylvia read the formal request demanding her hand in marriage. She bit down viciously on the apple, a cold sneer forming on her beautiful face.
"If that old fool Owen honestly thinks I would marry his son just because the boy can use magic, he is even more idiotic than I thought," she muttered to the empty room. "I would plunge my entire Duchy into an all-out rebellion before I ever let that third prince become my husband."
Knock, knock.
Just as the taste of her morning apple turned bitter, a distinct, rhythmic knocking echoed through the room. She recognized it instantly as her trusted Airship Captain, Shade Winter. (Strangely, the taste of apples always brought back fleeting, fragmented memories of a past life.)
"Come in, the door is unlocked," Sylvia called out.
The heavy door creaked open. Sylvia stood up, turning her back to the desk to look out the massive, north-facing glass window.
Even from this distance, her heightened 9th Circle senses could easily map the jagged, frosty peaks of the Endless Arctic Sky Mountains. It was the very reason her family bore the surname Sky. The mountain range completely dominated the northern hemisphere of Myst. It was truly endless, turning into an impassable, frozen wasteland where all biological life perished after a mere thousand miles. The massive peaks stretched all the way from the Western Abyssal Ocean, cut directly through the ancient Elven lands, and spanned across the hostile Eastern Human territories before finally touching the Eastern Deep Neptune Ocean.
After a long moment of silence, Shade's stoic, unbothered voice broke the quiet room.
"Duchess, I tricked my fiancée into coming to my quarters last night, and accidentally got him arrested. I assumed he would easily sneak away, but the Knights on duty were far more organized than I anticipated."
Every ounce of Sylvia’s political irritation vanished, replaced by sheer bewilderment. She spun around to face the expressionless Airship Captain.
"What?!" Sylvia gasped. "Shade, are you joking? You are engaged? Since when, and to whom?"
Shade spoke with absolute casualness, entirely unbothered by how scandalous the news sounded. The Duchess had always assumed Shade shared her deep-seated distaste for men.
"I have been engaged for ten years now," Shade replied evenly. "We will be married quite soon. He is the seventh child of Knight Ralph Sky."
Sylvia frowned, trying to place the name. "Wait... you are marrying Thorin Sky? The dual-element Air and Electricity Full Knight? The prodigy I am personally sending to the Royal Academy?"
A flash of genuine annoyance crossed Shade’s face at the mere suggestion that Thorin could ever capture her interest. "No. He is Thorin's younger half-brother, Loki Sky. My fiancé is incredibly special to me. He is a 1st Circle Life Vanguard with unawakened Air magic blood."
Thud.
Sylvia jerked back so violently that her hand clipped her ornate desk chair, sending it tipping over onto the floor. Her eyes widened in genuine shock, bordering on panic.
"Why was I never informed that the Sky family was harboring an unrecorded Mage-Knight?!" she demanded, her voice rising. "Why did you keep this from me?!"
Shade, fiercely protective of her lover’s freedom, didn't flinch. "Because I have no intention of sharing my husband with other women. Furthermore, he simply wants to live a quiet, peaceful life running his family business with his mother. They own Otherworldly Sky Delights—the very shop your morning food comes from."
If Loki had been standing in the room to hear Shade fiercely defend his strictly Earth-born, monogamous values, he would have wrapped his arms around her, kissed her senseless, and given her a massive thumbs-up. (Though whether Loki's desire for a single wife would actually play out that way in this world was an entirely different story.)
Duchess Sky’s lip twitched slightly. It was infuriating to realize her top captain had been actively hiding a historic magical anomaly right under her nose, but she quickly forced herself to calm down.
"Shade, take me to the holding cells immediately. I want to see this fiancé of yours in person," Sylvia commanded, smoothing down her regal dress. "I will grant his release. But we will also need to arrange permanent protection for him. If the royal family catches wind of a fourth magic-bearing male before we can secure him, it will be incredibly dangerous. You cannot protect him from the shadows of the capital entirely on your own."
Maintaining her flawless, professional mask, Shade simply gave a curt nod. "Understood."
With that, the two powerful women departed for the military prison.
Years later, looking back on that fateful morning, Shade would deeply regret ever stepping foot into the Duchess's office that day. She would find herself wishing she had simply staged a chaotic jailbreak, stolen a Duchy Airship, and flown her Loki away to a completely deserted island.
Back in the depths of the stone prison, morning light began to bleed through the tiny, barred window positioned high up on the wall, illuminating the cramped cell.
I sat on the cold stone floor, softly singing an old Earth track to pass the time.
"There goes my hero~♪ Watch him as he goes~♪ There goes my hero~♪ He's ordinary~♪ Kudos, my hero~♪"
As the chords of the Foo Fighters song left my lips, a deep, heavy sadness washed over me. My mind drifted back to Amaya Kaida, my blind Japanese girlfriend from my past life. She had been my high school sweetheart, my first love, and the girl I fully intended to marry.
I didn't even fully understand what had happened to her, or how we had both ended up entwined in my bizarre dreams, but my chest ached terribly for her whenever I sang her favorite melody.
Slide.
A couple of quiet tears escaped my eyes and rolled down my cheeks. Lost in my grief, I completely failed to notice the small wooden viewing hatch on my iron cell door slide open.
The moment the Duchess arrived at the cell block with Shade trailing close behind, the guards snapped to attention, saluting sharply before quickly clearing the corridor.
Utilizing her immense 9th Circle sensory perception, Sylvia instantly picked up the sound of a hauntingly beautiful, deeply sorrowful male voice echoing from the cell ahead.
Slide.
She gently pushed open the small viewing grate that allowed guards to inspect the cell, peering through the iron bars to see what lay inside.
"There goes my hero~♪ Watch him as he goes~♪ There goes my hero~♪ He's ordinary~♪ Kudos, my hero~♪"
Thump. Thump. Thump.
The moment Sylvia’s eyes landed on the weeping young man, her heart violently hammered against her ribs.
Her breath hitched, catching completely in her throat. An overwhelming, illogical wave of emotion crashed over her, leaving her with an intense, desperate urge to tear the heavy iron door off its hinges just to pull the crying boy into her arms and comfort him.
When a person experiences true first love, there is no logical explanation for how violently it strikes out of nowhere. Sylvia was an incredibly intelligent, rational woman; she knew instantly that something was profoundly wrong with her emotional state. Her magical senses confirmed there wasn't a single trace of charm or illusion magic radiating from either of them. Yet, down to the absolute depths of her soul, she knew—she wanted to spend the rest of her existence with this man, no matter the cost.
Suddenly, a vivid memory flashed through her mind—a fragment of a strange, recurring dream where a clever, tricky man had rescued her from a dark captivity, leading to an ambiguous, intimate evening together before the vision faded.
Sylvia Sky stared through the grate, realizing with absolute certainty that she had spent her entire life waiting for this boy—this man—to come and save her. Again.
Standing just a step behind her, Shade caught the fading notes of Loki's song. But as she turned her gaze toward the Duchess, her posture instantly stiffened. She recognized the terrifying, predatory, and deeply infatuated look widening in Sylvia's eyes.
It was the exact same look Shade had worn ten years ago, on the day she first laid eyes on Loki Sky.
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