– Frey Starlight's POV –
So much noise.
So many faces.
Dragged straight out of that gloomy, quiet hole and thrown into this blinding light and obnoxious noise.
My head felt utterly empty.
Were they holding a trial for me now?
To decide whether I should live or die?
No… why even bother?
Just kill me already.
But no, things were never that easy.
Why the hell did that old man Iris defend me?
What was all this bullshit they were spewing about "my value" determining my life?
Value?
What fucking value?
The value of your lives I was about to annihilate that day?
"I would like to hear the defendant's stance on everything that has happened so far... and what he has to say."
Maekar Valerion spotlighted me completely.
They wanted my testimony.
They wanted to hear what I thought of this circus around me.
Hadn't I made myself clear enough?
Wasn't it obvious to these damned fools what I wanted?
Did I really have to scream it at them?
Fine then.
-Cough-
I coughed lightly, gathering what little voice I had left.
All those eyes were pinned on me as I raised my head and stared straight at the Emperor and everyone present.
"First of all, let me just say one thing."
I took a deep breath... and then spat it all out.
"You're all a bunch of bastard sons of whores and bitches who don't even understand the simplest fucking thing... Ah, my apologies"
I caught sight of Ada among the crowd.
"Everyone here's a bastard... except my sister Ada."
Wait... I wasn't the real Frey, so technically her mother wasn't my mother...
"Ah, whatever, who cares! I'm a bastard too, and you, Maekar Valerion, are the biggest son of a bitch here! King of bastards, Grandfather of whores!"
The collective shock was almost visible in the courtroom ..
but I wasn't finished vomiting up the rage boiling inside me.
"The world would be a much better place if we got rid of every last one of you sons of bitches! So how about we all just die together? Since we're all bastards anyway! Go on ...kill me!
Because if you don't... I'll fuck every last one of your whore mothers myself, and then kill all of you!"
Saving me?
Who the hell said I wanted to live in the first place?
"Kill me! I'm not sorry for what I did! Do I look like someone who regrets it?
If I regret anything, it's that I didn't wipe you all off the face of the earth that day!"
"Kill me! Kill me! Kill me! Kill me! Kill me!!!"
My screams of madness filled the courtroom.
Confusion, fear, horror ...
all etched across their faces.
They didn't know what to make of it.
They didn't know whether to call it courage… or pure, naked insanity.
While I continued to scream for my death ..
A sudden impact cracked against the back of my skull, silencing me instantly, sending a harsh tremor through my head.
The one who hit me… was the last person I expected.
Phoenix Sunlight.
The so-called brightest talent of the previous generation.
Phoenix gripped my head tightly and offered a calm apology:
"Forgive him. Frey Starlight is clearly not in a sound mental state right now."
With a devastating punch, he made me spit blood onto the pristine floor.
"Allow me to discipline him for his words."
Punch!
Smash!
Kick!
I was beaten so brutally that the courtroom was almost painted with my blood.
Phoenix, now covered in my blood, turned calmly to the onlookers ..
Most of whom had no idea how the hell to react to the madness unfolding.
Phoenix Sunlight remained eerily composed as he continued to hammer me down.
"We supreme talents tend to understand each other very, very well."
He shattered the chains restraining me and grabbed me by the hair.
"Your Majesty, esteemed guests... allow me to be selfish for a moment."
The brightest talent among them all,
Phoenix Sunlight, stepped forward with his proposal.
"Everyone fears what Frey Starlight might become in the future... but let me ask you ... Does this look like someone who could threaten anyone ever again?"
Displaying my bloodied face to everyone, Phoenix continued:
"I could kill him with a single blow, break him without even lifting an arm.
So how about this?"
His eyes burned fiercely.
"Leave him to me. I will personally take charge of Frey Starlight, forging him into a sword this empire can wield in the wars to come ...
a sword to rival his father... Abraham Starlight."
The pressure surrounding Phoenix Sunlight ... the Sunlight Family's brightest jewel ...grew heavier.
"And rest assured," he added coldly,
"if he fails... I'll kill him myself. And I'm more than capable of it."
Everyone watched Phoenix standing there, holding me up effortlessly with one hand, delivering his insane offer.
Maekar Valerion's expression didn't change in the slightest ...
Not even after the way I had publicly insulted him.
He simply nodded.
"Are you confident you can handle him?"
Phoenix responded without hesitation.
"On my honor, as a proud warrior of House Sunlight."
"Then it is decided."
Maekar's hand slammed onto the table, his voice final:
"Frey Starlight shall be imprisoned within Alcatraz—the Prison of Time—for three months.
After that, he will return to the temple under Phoenix Sunlight's direct supervision.
I grant you full authority."
The courtroom was stunned.
Whether it was Phoenix's stance,
the mention of Alcatraz,
or the fact that Frey Starlight would actually survive ...
Everything had shifted.
Maekar had made his decision.
From the very beginning, he had never intended to kill me.
How could he?
When another Abraham Starlight had appeared right before his eyes?
Just as the father had fought in the War of Light,
so too would the son fight in the war to come.
Maekar had seen too much of history...
And history was about to repeat itself.
In a surreal twist, the trial finally came to an end.
---
...
...
...
The trial was over.
Everything was done.
At one point, things had been teetering dangerously toward disaster.
You could see it in the expressions of Frey Starlight's allies ..
how Ada Starlight and Iris Sunlight nearly collapsed from sheer panic, when that mad young man nearly destroyed everything.
If not for Phoenix Sunlight's desperate intervention, it would have been a catastrophe.
Frey was saved.
Saved from all those who wanted him dead.
But who...
Who would save him from the greatest danger of all?
Who would save him from himself?
After the trial, Frey Starlight was temporarily returned to the Starlight estate,
awaiting transfer to Alcatraz.
Alcatraz ...
the worst prison in the northern empire.
A place cursed with powerful magic that warped perception of time,
making days feel like endless years,
while prisoners were subjected to daily inhuman torture.
Three months inside that hellhole felt like an eternity.
Ada Starlight was devastated when her brother's sentence was announced.
But to Frey... it meant nothing.
What could three months of torture possibly change for someone like him?
It all seemed laughably insignificant.
Frey Starlight refused to interact with anyone.
No matter who tried to reach him,
he gave no response.
He was nothing more than an empty vessel
staggering silently before their eyes.
Phoenix had saved him today.
He had vowed to rehabilitate him.
But what could he fill Frey with...
when there was nothing left inside?
Even death had been stripped from him by Balerion's cursed restraint.
Now,
Frey was just a hollow young man,
sitting there alone.
On the same stadium bed...
where everything had once begun.
He lay back,
staring blankly at the ceiling ..
The same ceiling he had seen
when he first awakened in this hell.
Two years had passed since that day.
Two years in hell.
And now, he had returned to square one.
But this time... with no goal, no hope.
He sat there, alone.
In that moment, far away from where he was ..
Author's Tools
Level 2 ›››› Progress: 100%
The personal laptop vanished into thin air, disappearing completely.
At the same time, a small dot appeared in the air before Frey's empty eyes.
A glowing blue dot.
The young man slowly stood up, staring at the light.
Those dead eyes ... eyes that wished for nothing but death.
Slowly, Frey reached out and touched the point with a single finger,
and a strange interface unfolded before him.
It was the Status Window he had seen so many times in his previous life...
that classic, cliché system window that appeared so often in stories.
The laptop was gone, leaving behind only this interface.
There, written in bold letters ..
Author's Tools – Level 2
- Additional features and capabilities have been unlocked! Please review them.
Frey's expression didn't change in the slightest as he stared at the new functions.
They all seemed meaningless to him now.
"Got rid of the cursed laptop just to get this..."
The Engineer was stubborn.
Unbelievably stubborn.
Frey Starlight was about to close the interface forever,
never intending to open it again.
But something caught his eye ..
A section at the bottom of the screen flashing faintly...
as if it was calling to him.
"Look at me."
There, a single line was recorded:
Recorded Message – Abraham Starlight
Frey frowned.
He couldn't even comprehend what he was reading, wondering if he had misunderstood the words.
Abraham Starlight,
the mysterious man, had left behind a message inside the system.
At this point, Frey no longer understood anything.
He simply clicked on it, wanting to know what that man ..
the one he knew nothing about ... had left for him.
The moment he pressed it, a magical sound echoed across the room.
A voice.
A voice that stirred Frey's dead heart,
forcing his eyes wide open.
"Hello, my son."
Just two words ..
but Frey jolted violently,
his lips trembling.
"It's been a long, long time...
You don't know how much I missed you,
how badly I wanted to see you again."
The voice of Abraham Starlight...
a man Frey was never supposed to have any connection to.
The voice was strong, warm, gentle, and heartbreakingly kind.
The very thing he had longed to hear his entire life.
That voice...
it was a voice he had heard countless times ..
"If you're hearing this now, it means you've already come a long way.
You've endured suffering I can't even imagine..."
He paused.
Frey muttered under his breath, his whole body trembling:
"Don't... don't use that voice..."
He shook violently.
"Don't torture me any more than this..."
Because that voice ..
that voice belonged to ..
"Before I tell you everything...
I need to confess something, my son...
You have no idea how shocked I was when I opened my eyes in this world..."
No.
"You have no idea how stunned I was...
to find myself inside the very novel you used to tell me about...
My son."
Frey collapsed to the ground the moment he heard those words.
"It felt like a gift from you,
as if you had given me a second chance to live.
I searched for you everywhere, believing with all my heart that I would find you.
I fought, carried a sword I had never wielded before..."
Kneeling on the ground,
Frey Starlight listened to his father's voice,
tears exploding from his dead eyes.
It felt like his chest was being ripped apart.
His heart shattered again and again.
"I'm sorry, my son...
I know how much you've suffered,
but please... allow me to tell you my story.
Haha... I really was a terrible father, wasn't I?"
"NO!!!"
Frey choked on his tears and screamed:
"You were the best father I ever had!
Better than I ever deserved!"
He screamed from the depths of his soul,
but it was useless ..
the recording could not hear him.
It could only move forward.
"I know you've suffered more than anyone,
I know you're broken into pieces...
But look at how far you've come.
My son, you have no idea how proud I am of you..."
The words shook Frey's very soul.
"You deserve it, son...
You deserve to know the truth.
So let me show you."
Without warning,
a blinding light engulfed Frey Starlight.
A light that transported him elsewhere.
"Let me show you...
where it all began."
The light swallowed him whole ..
carrying him away...
Into Abraham Starlight's memories.
Into the beginning of everything.