I woke up face down on cold stone. My head ached intensely, and I could feel my heartbeat pulsing in my teeth. I tried to grab my staff, but I couldn't move my arms. Metal bit into my wrists, engraved with dull blue runes that pulsed. I yanked harder, and the cuffs dug grooves into my skin. My shoulders burned, but nothing gave. The magic had left me, and I could feel its absence like a phantom limb. Every time I tried to pull the cuffs toward me, they pulsed against my wrists and the magic unraveled.
[Status Effect: Arcane Suppression—All spell casting disabled]
My chest tightened. I jerked my arms upward again and again, each time with increasing franticness. I couldn't catch my breath. The walls seemed to be closing in, or maybe that was just panic. My vision was starting to get fuzzy. I looked around the room to figure out where I was. It was dim, with just one high window casting a sliver of moonlight. A chair was in the corner. There, perched in that seat with her legs folded and her chin resting on one hand, was Queen Victoria, clearly amused by my panic.
"Good evening, Ayla." She uncrossed her legs and stood, smoothing the fabric of her dress. I stared at her. All of a sudden, my mind, which had been operating in overdrive, short-circuited.
"What are you doing here?" I rattled my cuffs against the floor. "Where am I? Why am I in handcuffs?"
"I owe you an apology." She crossed the room toward me, heels clicking on the stone. "My guards were instructed to bring you here with discretion. Their interpretation involved rather more force than I intended." She studied what I assumed was a nasty bump forming on my skull. "I'll be having words with them."
"You had me kidnapped? Are you nuts?”
"You have a habit of vanishing during our conversations. I'm starting to take it personally.” She smiled coyly, and her green eyes crinkled at the corners... but I felt nothing.
Before I regained my memories, Victoria was the sun: the center of my universe. Let me be clear: she was pretty, but in a “girl-next-door” sort of way. Not really my type. She was such a boring character. She was a quest giver, and that’s all she’d ever been. All her interactions boiled down to “go kill things and come back.” She had maybe six conversation trees in total. Playing a male character unlocked a romance subplot, but it was widely considered the worst path with repetitive dialogue and terrible gifts. Her characterization largely revolved around "dead husband" and "the chosen one will save us."
Funnily enough, the demon queen had her own corner of the internet. Half the fan art online was Morrígan was R34, and somebody had actually built a romance mod for her that got fifty thousand downloads before the devs sent a cease and desist. I'd been a moderator of a Discord server called "Morrígan's Wives.” Why chase the vanilla queen when the final boss had big tits and a terrible personality? This tracked with every relationship I'd ever been in. I had a type, and that type was "will probably yell at me."
Victoria watched me. Shit, I'd been staring into space for too long.
"Sorry." I sat up and put on my best eager adventurer face. "Head injury. Everything's a little fuzzy. But actually, I'm really glad you found me." The lie rolled out smoothly. "After our talk, I was so fired up I went straight back to the tower and couldn't sit still. Figured, why wait around when I could get a head start on taking that demon queen down?"
Victoria raised an eyebrow. "Is that why you leaped from a window?"
"Enthusiasm." I shrugged. "I'm passionate."
She smiled politely, but her eyes didn't match. She wasn't buying it. I needed to keep stacking before the whole thing went to hell.
"I've been doing a lot of research too. Library, every day, digging through tower lore and guardian histories and tactical breakdowns. You can check the logs. The archivist hates me, she'll remember."
That landed better. She sat down again, crossing her ankles.
"I admire your dedication." Her hands were neatly folded in her lap. "Tell me, Ayla... what is it you hope to gain from defeating the demon queen?"
A test. She already had an answer she expected, and she was waiting to see if mine matched. I knew this conversation from the game; the player had to pick from three dialogue options: glory and fame, protect the kingdom, or win Victoria’s hand. The right choice was option 2. It raised your reputation and unlocked better equipment for the final boss fight.
“Peace,” I said. “For the kingdom. She killed the king and people are suffering.”
“It wouldn’t have anything to do with the crown, would it?” Her voice was playful. “Perhaps the prospect of ruling beside me?”
"I mean, I'm not a dude, so that's off the table." I said it half as a joke. In the game, female characters got locked out of Victoria's route entirely and shunted onto Sir Laoch instead, a brooding knight with a tragic backstory. He was boring as hell. I’d skipped every one of his cutscenes.
“It’s unconventional,” she admitted. “But it’s been done before. Other kingdoms have had ruling queens who chose female consorts. It wouldn’t be the most radical thing I’ve proposed to my council.”
My entire body rejected the idea before my mind had a chance to agree. It came from the same place as when Lily mentioned moving in together and I changed the subject. Or when she left a jewelry store tab open on her computer and I pretended not to see it. Whatever was broken in me was still broken, and a new world hadn't come with replacement parts.
"That’s... really generous...but that's not really me. Crowns and thrones and... yeah. Not my lane."
Victoria's eyebrows arched. For a moment, silence stretched between us. She seemed shocked, but she quickly recovered. “Then what would you ask for?”
“Oh!” I straightened up, making my chains rattle. “Could you pay off my guild debt? Because I am drowning in fees.”
“Your guild debt?”
“Trust me, it’s significant.”
“You’re turning down a crown to settle a tab?”
“It’s a really, really big tab.”
She stared at me for a moment, then laughed. "Consider it done." She shook her head and waved toward the guard by the door. “Remove the manacles.”
The guard stepped forward, placing his thumb against something on the cuffs. The metal split open and fell away. My arms shot up, feeling weightless after the heavy restraints. I rubbed my wrists where the skin had gone red. My mana surged back. I took a deep breath, and it filled my chest, making my fingers tingle.
[Status Effect: Arcane Suppression—REMOVED]
"I'll be providing full support going forward." Victoria stood, encircling me. "I’ll clear your guild debt, and I’ll provide resources for your assault on the tower. My best soldiers, provisions for a full expedition, equipment from the royal armory—”
“Could I get access to the royal library? The restricted archives, if possible?"
She stopped mid-step. "The royal library? What for?”
“For research!” I was nodding so enthusiastically that I had to stop myself. "The public library is missing the foundational texts, things like tower bindings, guardian lore, and original Covenant records. The crown has to have the deep archives."
She studied me again and I could feel her turning it over. Swords and soldiers she understood, but ancient lore about magical contracts was a harder sell.
"There are records in there that could give me an edge," I continued. “Intelligence on the demon queen’s binding, historical accounts of past guardians, anything about how floor bosses function. It’s important to know your enemy."
She watched me with furrowed eyebrows before nodding. “All right. You will get unrestricted access. I'll have a research chamber prepared and a dedicated aide if you need one." She smoothed her dress and approached the door, but stopped. "But Ayla, this has gone on long enough. The demon queen has sat in that tower unchallenged while my people suffer, and their patience is not infinite. You have one month. If the demon queen is not dead in thirty days, I send the army."
"One month," I stupidly repeated.
"Thirty days." She smiled, but her eyes remained empty. "I trust that will be enough."