Chapter Text
The stench of smoke and damp rot clung to the back alleys of the Kingdom of Spades. The streets were cracked and uneven, the gutters overflowing with filth, and the air hung heavy with the desperate murmurs of those who called this place home.
It was a kingdom teetering on the edge—war-worn, fractured, starving. And Akane Aoi was just another soul trying to survive in it.
He moved quickly through the narrow streets, his hood drawn low over his face. A storm had passed earlier, and the cobblestones were slick beneath his boots, puddles reflecting the dim lantern glow of broken windows and battered doorways. He kept his hands tucked in his cloak, though the sword at his hip was a familiar weight.
A knight. That’s what they called him.
But knights were supposed to be noble. Honorable. Servants of justice.
A proper knight stood with pride, armor gleaming in the sun, sworn to serve with unwavering loyalty. But the knights of the Kingdom of Spades were nothing more than shadows, lurking in the dark under King Hanako's rule. They were spies. Assassins. A necessary evil in the eyes of their king.
And what was he?
A stray dog in armor that no longer shone, Hanako’s pawn in a war he had no choice but to fight.
He slowed as he reached the door of a crumbling building—more shack than home. He hesitated, glancing over his shoulder before slipping inside.
The scent of stale bread and damp wood greeted him. Inside, the walls were warped with age, the ceiling stained from leaks, but in the farthest corner, Mirai sat curled in a blanket.
She looked up at the sound of his boots, her green eyes sharp even in the dim candlelight. “You’re late, Akane-kun...”
Akane pulled off his cloak with a sigh. “I got held up.”
Mirai frowned but said nothing, her eyes appearing only slightly open with worry as she looked at him, watching as he reached into the folds of his belt and pulled out a small sack. He tossed it onto the wooden table, and the clink of coins rang through the tiny room.
Mirai scrambled over peering inside. “Did’ya steal this?”
Akane scoffed, although there was no anger in it. “I work for it.”
That wasn’t entirely a lie.
Mirai’s frown deepened. “Work,” she echoed, voice quiet. “You mean fight!”
Akane didn’t answer. He turned away, undoing the straps of his armor. It was worn down from years of use, the once-polished metal dull and scratched, but it had kept him alive. Kept her alive.
“I got assigned a mission,” he said finally. His voice came out flat. Hollow.
Mirai tilted her head, little hands leaving the sack and falling to the floor where she sat.
Akane ran a hand through his messy hair, exhaling sharply. “It’s a big one,” he admitted. “Enough gold to get us out of here.”
That part was a lie. There was no getting out. Not really. Not when King Hanako’s hand rested so heavily over everything they did.
Mirai set her hands in her lap. “What is it?”
Akane hesitated. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Uh-huh it does!”
He turned, meeting her gaze. Even now, she looked at him with trust. Belief. Like he was still the same person who used to carry her on his shoulders and chase her through the fields when they were young.
But that boy was gone.
He turned away.
It’s an assassination.
I have to kill a man.
The Prince of Diamonds.
He couldn’t speak such words aloud, especially not to her innocent ears. His stomach churned. He could still feel the first time he had ever drawn blood—his first real battle. That horrible stickiness on his hands, the metallic scent that never seemed to wash away.
Killing a person was different.
But he didn’t have a choice.
If he refused, Hanako would cast him aside like garbage. And Mirai…
He clenched his jaw. No. He wouldn’t let her suffer. Not for his weakness.
So he swallowed it down, just like he always did.
“I’ll be back soon,” he said, voice steady, a lie so smooth it felt like breathing.
He forced a smile, ruffled her hair, and pretended she didn’t see right through him.
─────⋅☾⊱♰⊰☽⋅─────
The Kingdom of Diamonds gleamed even beneath the darkened sky. Its castle rose in the distance, spires white as bone, standing untouched by war. The fields around it were lush, untouched by famine, untouched by the rot and ruin that choked the streets of Spades. It was a beautiful sight—one he wasn’t sure he’d leave alive.
The leather grip of his sword burned in his palm as he rode with the others through the dead-silent night. He rode at the back of the group, six knights in total, all draped in dark armor to blend into the night. Their mission was clear: take out the guards at the castle gates. Slip inside. End the prince’s life before dawn.
The idea sat heavy in his gut, rotting. The idea of killing a man—of watching the life drain from his eyes—was something he couldn't quite stomach.
And the closer they got, the heavier his chest felt.
It would be quick, they had said. The prince was barely older than a boy—young, inexperienced and not yet coronated—easy prey. He’d fall like the rest.
Akane didn’t believe that.
If prince Teru Minamoto was weak, the Kingdom of Diamonds would have fallen long ago.
His fingers twitched. He felt sick.
“You’re too quiet, Aoi.”
One of the knights rode up beside him, smirking beneath his dark hood. “Getting cold feet?”
Akane didn’t look away from the path ahead. “Just focused.”
“Hah. Right.” The knight’s eyes glinted, arrogance thick as he quickly swung his head to remove the hair from his face. “Just don’t screw it up for the rest of us. I’m supposed to get 5 pounds of gold out of this.”
Akane wanted to snap back, to say he wouldn’t screw it up, but the words died before they could leave his mouth.
Because something was wrong.
The castle gates were too quiet.
There were no guards in sight. No usual patrols. Just empty space where men should have been.
A sharp twang broke the silence—an arrow slicing through the dark. It hit one of the knights, knocking him from his horse with a strangled cry.
Then the alarms sounded.
The castle lit up. Soldiers poured out from the shadows.
“Shit—!” The knight beside Akane turned, yanking at his reins. “It’s a trap! We were just the—”
A distraction.
The real attack was already happening elsewhere.
Akane barely had time to register that thought before everything descended into chaos.
They were outnumbered. The knights around him had already begun fleeing, turning their horses, leaving him behind.
“Wait—!” He tried to follow, spurring his horse forward, but suddenly he felt as if he had been shoved, losing balance as the world began to tilt.
Things moved in slow motion as Akane caught sight of something embedded in his side, in a spot where armor was simply his chainmail.
An arrow.
For a split second, there was nothing. No pain. Just the cold shock of it—like being doused in ice water, Akane’s body failing to register the wound before the agony set in.
And then he was falling.
His fingers slipped from the reins. His body hit the ground hard, the impact rattling through his bones. His lungs seized, and for a terrifying moment, he couldn’t breathe—couldn’t move. Then he gasped, his fingers clawing at the dirt, but the weight of his armor made it impossible to move quickly.
In the second he fell from the saddle, his horse galloped away, kicking up dirt as it disappeared into the night.
Above him, the sky stretched wide and endless, thick with dark clouds and the glow of faraway firelight. Somewhere in the distance, swords clashed, men screamed, the battle raged on. But Akane was no longer part of it.
He gritted his teeth, trying to push himself up, but pain flared so intensely that his vision whited out and his arms buckled beneath him.
No. No, no, no—
He pressed a hand to his side, blood leaking hot between his fingers. He couldn’t die here. Not like this. Blood pulsed from his ribs in a slow, sickening rhythm, spreading through his chest with each breath. His fingers clawed at the dirt, grasping for something, anything to ground himself. But all he found was cold earth, wet with blood—his own, and others'.
Above him, hooves thundered across the battlefield. The knights he had ridden with were fleeing, their figures disappearing into the shadows, vanishing beyond the distant shouts of war.
They had left him to die.
His breath shuddered. His fingers trembled where they pressed against his wound. The arrow was still there, buried deep between his ribs, and every shallow inhale felt like a blade twisting further inside him.
He should have expected this. He was never one of them—never trusted, never valued. Hanako’s knights were not loyal to each other. They served the strongest. And Akane…
Akane had always been expendable.
And now, he was going to die because of it, as the weight of his own body threatened to pull him down, into the cold, into the dark.
But Mirai’s face was there behind his eyes, burned into his retinas the moment he even thought of closing them.
She was too young to remember what life was like before their parents were gone. Before the war made their lives so small, before Akane had to fight just to keep food in her hands.
But he remembered the warmth of their mother’s voice, humming a melody from a song Mirai barely knew. He remembered sitting by the fire with their father, too small to even hold a wooden sword properly, listening with wide-eyed wonder as he was told stories of knights—real knights—who were noble and strong, who didn’t fight for greed or survival, but because they believed in something greater.
"A knight is meant to protect," his father had told him once.
Then why was he here?
Why had he become this?
A soldier without a cause. A man with blood on his hands, but not enough power to stop the war that took everything from them.
He squeezed his eyes shut.
Mirai needed him. She was waiting for him.
He couldn’t die here.
A fresh surge of panic forced him to move. Slowly—gods, too slowly—his fingers curled weakly into the dirt once more. He needed to get away—out of the open, away from the fighting, somewhere safe. If he stayed here, he’d be trampled under the hooves of warhorses or cut down in the chaos.
Or worse, finished off.
Every shift of his weight sent white-hot pain searing through his chest, but he gritted his teeth and dragged himself forward. His legs felt numb, his arms shaking beneath him. He could feel the warmth of his own blood trailing behind him, staining the ground.
His vision blurred in and out, his limbs shaking, his breath coming in short, sharp gasps.
The sounds of battle grew distant, like echoes from another world. His body felt heavy, the exhaustion weighing him down like a chain.
Everything hurt, but the fear was worse. It crawled under his skin, into his bones. There was no doubt it was cold breath of death.
Because this was it, wasn’t it? This was how people died.
Alone. Forgotten. Left to bleed out in the dirt while the world kept moving. A fit of coughing overtook him, making the pain exponentially worse as blood spewed from his mouth in boughts. His body gave a weak lurch forward before collapsing fully onto the mud.
The battlefield had turned into a blur of motion and color—flashes of silver armor, dark figures darting through the smoke, the distant flicker of torches. The ringing in his ears drowned out the sound of battle, leaving only a heavy, suffocating silence. It was as if all at once, Akane had been submerged and he was hopelessly drowning.
His body was stone; too heavy to lift, too broken to fix.
This was it.
This was—
Light, bright and blinding, cut through the darkness. A presence, warm and unwavering, loomed above him.
Akane tried to move away, but all he could manage was to weakly cross his arms over his body to shield his face. His mind swam—was he already dead? Had the gods sent an angel for him?
Backlit by the glow of battle with golden hair catching the light like strands of sunlight, this presence had eyes that were sharp, cutting even through the blur of Akane’s fading vision.
Too beautiful to be real.
But then Akane’s eyes adjusted—just barely—and the colors registered.
The man—which Akane could deduce now was what he was—above him wasn’t wearing white. His cloak was blue. A rich, deep blue, embroidered in silver.
The colors of the enemy.
But not only that, Akane could recognize the difference in garments between a normal knight and one of nobility. This wasn’t simply a soldier, this was the prince. Akane’s breath hitched, a weak, broken sound that barely escaped his lips.
His body screamed at him to move, to fight, to run, but he couldn’t. He could only stare, his vision pulsing in and out of darkness, his mind barely grasping the weight of what was happening.
For a long moment, there was only silence.
The battle still raged beyond them, but here, in this moment, it was just the two of them.
The prince didn’t speak. Not at first. His sharp blue eyes scanned Akane, taking in his broken form, the wound at his side, the blood staining the ground beneath him.
Then, through the haze, a voice. Low. Steady. Words garbled and just out of reach. Akane couldn’t understand them, but there was something firm, commanding in the way they were spoken.
Then a hand gripped Akane’s arm, firm but not rough. He barely had time to process it before he felt himself being lifted.
A sharp, burning pain ripped through his side as his body was pulled from the ground, and a strangled sound tore from his throat. His vision blackened completely for a moment, nausea twisting in his gut.
A shift in movement was suddenly disorienting, the world tilting as he was lifted onto a higher place—seemingly the saddle of a horse? His body slumped forward, head resting against something warm, something solid. He could barely breathe past the pain, past the suffocating weight of his own exhaustion.
Then, a second shift.
Someone joined him.
A presence settled behind him, strong arms wrapping around his waist, securing him in place.
The warmth of another body pressed against his back, steady and unmoving. The scent of steel, leather and smoke filled Akane’s senses, grounding him in the moment.
He wanted to protest. Wanted to fight back, to push away, to remind himself that this was the enemy.
But his body betrayed him.
His head tilted back slightly, resting against the shoulder of the man behind him. His eyes fluttered closed, breath shallow, body numb.
The last thing he felt before slipping into unconsciousness was the steady rhythm of the horse beneath them and the unshakable presence at his back.