Edmund could feel someone calling him.
"My lord, please wake up…"
He looked away, but the sounds he had heard did not disappear. Instead, they grew even louder. Then, he felt someone gently tugging at his sleeve.
"My lord!"
Edmund's eyes snapped open. His familiar surroundings had disappeared, his desk was gone, and the walls covered in sticky notes were nowhere to be seen. Everything had been replaced by a strange landscape. A circular public square, surrounded by small brick houses, with a gallows erected in the center, now dominated his field of vision. He himself was sitting at a table on the other side of the hall. There was no comfortable office swivel chair beneath him, but a cold, hard iron chair. A group of people accompanied him, watching him attentively. Several of them were dressed like medieval lords and ladies from those Western movies, and they were trying to suppress their laughter.
"My lord?" asked the cautious double of Gandalf.
Edmund looked at the old man. Well, the old man was not actually named Gandalf, despite his appearance. His real name was Barov, and he was the finance minister who had served Edmund's father and helped him govern the territory.
The identity of the man everyone was waiting for was Edmund Lusignan, the second son of the Graymont barony, who had inherited the title after a series of misfortunes. The inhabitants of this frontier town lived from mining and hunting, and depended on a few trade routes to obtain food, tools, and materials they could not produce themselves.
In short, it was a desolate place that his father had left in an even worse condition after taking power; thinking about all of this had given Edmund a headache, and it had all happened on the first day he arrived in the city.
Edmund had once again had that dream in which he felt as though he were still living his previous life, with a normal and civilized existence. The change in scenery and the barbaric sight of the city left him momentarily confused, but he then accepted reality, as he had already done several years ago. However, he still remembered the questions he had asked himself at first: was it possible that this was not a dream? Had he really reincarnated into the Middle Ages and become Edmund? Had he gone from being a pathetic mechanical engineer with his nose buried in paperwork to a nobleman overnight?
However, this was not the first time he had awakened with those memories. Edmund was a reincarnated person. Over the years, he had learned to hide his knowledge and slowly understand the rules of this world. Magic existed and was dangerous, but very few people had the talent to use it, so it was often viewed as a curse, and strict rules accompanied those who could use it, which calmed the minds of ordinary people.
But in these lands, anyone who had the "curse" was nothing more than trouble and danger.
This territory, which seemed so barren and backward, was located in the Border Principalities, a name he had never seen in his history books. The place was nothing more than a land filled with baronies and mercenaries constantly fighting to seize power, not to mention that it was the playground of hundreds of monstrous creatures that delighted in human flesh.
He took the written orders Barov was holding, threw them to the ground, and slowly said, "I feel tired. I'll listen to the rest of the report another day."
Edmund knew he could not afford to be reckless with his situation, but he was suffering from an immense headache because of the mess his incompetent father had left on his shoulders.
The nobles accompanying him remained calm at his unexpected declaration, but a tall man in armor stood up and exclaimed:
"My lord, this is no joke! The territory has been plagued by greenskin skirmishes for days, not to mention the terrible famine ravaging the common people." John, that handsome man, was actually his knight commander.
Edmund frowned and said, "The situation won't change even if I hear about every problem today."
His voice was filled with blatant mockery, and it was not only because of the bad memories he had of some of the people around him, but also because he was still debating whether to take responsibility; if he continued listening to the situation, he would only become involved before he had a chance to set it aside and abandon everything related to this place.
Seeing him remain silent, Edmund waved his hand to call his personal guards and left. John hesitated for a moment before descending and catching up with the troops walking alongside the new baron. The other nobles stood and paid their respects to their lord, but Edmund could perceive open contempt in the eyes of the crowd because of the brooch he wore on his chest, the insignia that marked him as a cursed mage.
Back at the fortress, located south of the frontier city, he dismissed the anxious minister Barov, who was standing outside the door to his chambers, finally allowing himself to breathe a sigh of relief now that he was alone.
"You may leave, Barov. We'll continue with the reports tomorrow as soon as I'm free."
"As you command, my lord." His tone seemed to say that he wanted to do it right now, but he backed down.
The minister bowed and walked away down the corridor. Edmund waited until his footsteps disappeared before closing the door.
Edmund could understand the anxiety of the household servants; unlike the nobles, they would lose everything if the barony fell, but they seemed unable to understand that this was a problem that had unexpectedly fallen onto his shoulders.
He had arrived at the barony after a letter had reached him in Middenheim months earlier from his mother; it spoke of how his father's health had worsened and how his elder brother had unexpectedly died while hunting goblins; his mother asked for his company, using his sisters, who would need his company to cope with what had happened.
Edmund remained seated for a few moments, going over memories from years ago, before he had fled the territory because of the pressure the house had placed on him, despite isolating him for being a mage.
He had barely lain down on the bed when he heard hurried footsteps on the other side. Two figures opened the door quickly, but when they saw Edmund in the middle of the room, they seemed to lose all their courage.
The older one was twenty years old. Her face still retained the delicacy of youth, but her eyes showed the exhaustion of someone who had been forced to mature too quickly because of the hardships that had befallen her family. Beside her was her younger sister, a sixteen-year-old girl who barely reached his chest.
For several seconds, neither of them said anything.
Then, the older one seemed to find some courage and ran toward him. "Edmund!"
The girl immediately followed her, and both approached the bed to hug him. His two younger sisters, whom he had been forced to leave when he decided to leave this place many years ago.
Edmund remained motionless for a moment. Although he would not admit it, he was afraid that neither of them would remember him because they had been so young when he left.
His arms wrapped around both sisters, pulling them against his chest as if he feared someone might take them away from him again. The girl hid her face against him, while the older one pressed her lips together to hold back her tears.
For the first time since returning, the weight of responsibility, the precarious state of the territory, and the fearful looks no longer mattered.
"We thought you would never come back," the older sister Annie whispered. She had inherited their mother's golden curls and their father's blue eyes, the beauty of the barony.
"I couldn't stay away forever," Edmund replied without releasing them from his arms. "Someone has to keep an eye on these little troublemakers."
The girl raised her head. "Will you stay with us?" It was Eliza. She looked much more like their father; not only did she have the same blue eyes, but she had also inherited his straight hair, dark as night.
Edmund looked at their faces and remembered the day the two of them had been born and how they had been the source of his happiness for many years in this life.
"Yes." The answer came without hesitation. "I'll stay."
The territory lacked food, the walls needed repairs, and most of the nobles were simply waiting for him to fail so they could liquidate their possessions and escape somewhere else where they could preserve their wealth.
Moreover, rumors about his power had already spread among the inhabitants. Some called him a monster, others a warlock, and many simply avoided getting too close to him. Edmund could not entirely blame them. The ignorance of these barbaric peasants barely allowed them to know that the sun rose in the east and then set in the west.
However, they now expected him to take power, as his cunning mother had played her cards well and manipulated not only the local nobles, but also Edmund, her only son and baron, into returning and taking control.
She was an ambitious woman and the true heir of House Lusignan, the legitimate ruler of Graymont, and, for the sake of her house, she was willing to do anything to ensure its survival. She had even taken advantage of Edmund's love for his two younger sisters and the threat that they would have to marry local barons if Edmund did not take power.
They were the only members of his family he was still willing to fight for. If they abandoned this place, they would be at the mercy of a court full of fools, the nobles, and a mother who cared only about advancing the power of House Lusignan, and although he could take them somewhere else, Edmund knew what world he was in and that in two decades the end of the world would come, ensuring that there would be nowhere that could save them.
He would not allow his sisters to pay the price for the ambitions of barbarians ignorant of the reality that would soon ravage this world.