The Fractured Morning

When power whispers back, mercy stops answering.

Act I — The Fractured Morning

Sleep should’ve been a mercy.
But for me? Mercy never clocks in on time.

I lay sprawled across my bed, still in ceremonial robes, incense and parade dust clinging to me like guilt.

The ember pulsed in my chest, a rhythm that wasn’t mine — a second heartbeat I never asked for.

Dreams clawed at me: rain, headlights, Ray’s grin, running on a loop. Over and over. A film reel I never wanted but couldn’t switch off.

And then the air shifted.

Not a dream. Not imagination.
Reality bent.

The chamber’s silence turned unnatural.

Moonlight sliced the marble into perfect, cruel geometry.

Shadows stretched longer than they should’ve, writhing like they had their own lungs.

The taste of the air soured metallic, like biting on coins.

Guards outside laughed faintly, trading jokes, completely blind to the storm inside.

And me? My eyes half-opened. My body still felt crushed from last night, but my chest burned hotter.

A black aura unfurled around me, licking across my skin like a shadow-flame.

My vision stuttered—pixels bleeding at the edges of sight—each blink tasting of iron and static.

For a heartbeat, I felt… different.

Not just myself.

Like something new was threading through my veins.

A rhythm not my own.

I sat up, fingers twitching in the dim light, and shadows coiled obediently around my wrist.

My pulse stumbled.

A hairline ache laced my ribs, like glass settling under the skin.

“This isn’t mine…” I whispered under my breath.

The assassins.

Their last moments still echoed.

Whatever they carried—whatever had been them—was now… brushing against me.

Before I could test it—

The doors slammed.

First through the threshold: Hakuya Kurotsuki.

My “servant.” At least, that was his cover.

To anyone else? A loyal attendant, quiet and dutiful.

To me? The watchdog my father chained to my shadow.

His figure was sharp, robes neat, his black hair tied back like discipline itself had combed it.

Hakuya. A name that meant White Night.

Fitting, really. A man sworn to keep me safe in darkness, yet ordered to stay unseen.

He bowed perfectly — too perfectly. Always perfectly.
“Master Haise,” he said, voice even.

I almost laughed.

Because the truth? He thought I didn’t know he tailed me everywhere.

That he was hidden. That I was blind.

Cute.

But I’m the miracle boy. Of course I knew.

Sometimes, when I was bored, I’d even toy with him.

Send a parallax ghost left down the corridor while I slipped right through a shadow.

He’d trail my echo for an hour, reporting back dutifully, while I lounged in the gardens.

Best entertainment Heaven ever offered.

But last night? Even Hakuya hadn’t stopped them.

“They struck before he arrived — lucky for him, or I’d be explaining two funerals today. No one else realized it, but I did.”

The thought weighed heavy, even as I smirked at him now.

Behind him came guards, pale-faced at the wreckage.

Then—my parents.

The chamber silenced under their presence.

The walls were cracked, clawed by fire.

Floors scorched. Ceiling trembling, like it remembered being bent inside out.

My father’s storm-colored eyes swept the scene.

Concern flickered there, buried under steel and command.

My mother’s gaze was sharper — protective, wary, hands white-knuckled in her robe’s folds.

I shrugged, spreading my arms like a bad comedian presenting a stage.

Me (sarcastic):
“Don’t worry. Just an accident. Bed and walls were too fragile for me.”

The guards flinched at my tone.

My mother’s lips pressed thin.

My father’s silence rumbled heavier than thunder.

And Hakuya? He simply bowed lower, hiding what I couldn’t quite read.

Hakuya’s eyes widened for the briefest flick—fear or awe, buried before I could name it.

The black aura dimmed, but the echo stayed — like something watching from under my skin.

Act II — Assassin’s Echo (Inside the Dimension)

Later, when the room finally emptied, I sat alone in the dark.

I snapped my fingers.

The Pocket Dimension yawned open like a living lung, violet-gold veins pulsing, pulling me inside.

The walls breathed.

They pulsed with fractals, replaying last night’s scene in ghostly loops: the assassins lunging, their hesitation, their erasure.

Each motion a scar cut into the Dimension.

But it wasn’t just memory.

Their essence bled into me, their skills shimmering in the air like shards of broken glass.

Phantom Archive: Skill Assimilation Detected

I felt them settle, one by one, as if waiting for me to claim them.

1. Umbral Step — slipping between shadows like crossing a threshold.

2.Phantom Silence — sound folding in on itself, the world hushed.

3. Veil Pierce — eyes that cut through lies.

4. Executioner’s Instinct — the predator’s certainty, knowing where to strike.

5. Shadow Fractals — blades spun from living night.

6. Oblivion Shroud — a cloak that made you vanish from the world itself.

“My chest burned, but not with fear. Excitement.

If Heaven saw what I was now, the Aegis might blink again.

Every flicker of power made me want the next.

The shadows bent to me — me — like they’d been waiting.

Each trick felt like a new page in a book I’d been starving to read.

Gods, it was addicting.

I should’ve stopped. I didn’t want to.”

I lifted my hand.

A breath.

I stepped — and emerged from the opposite wall, shadow trailing.

Not teleportation. Not illusion. Just… absence.

I held my breath.

The sound cut off.

Absolute silence.

Even my heartbeat muffled.

Then I sliced downward.

Shadows bent into a blade, edge humming.

I stared at it.

Then flexed my hand until the power broke.

Me (thinking):
“So… the Dimension devoured them. And because the Dimension is mine… their powers are mine too?”

It wasn’t a victory.

It was a warning.

A secret that would stay buried in me.

“The Dimension adapts to what it consumes — and now, so do I.”

“Somewhere deep in the Dimension, something else breathed back.”

Act III — The Invitation

A knock shattered the silence.

A messenger stood, scroll in hand.

Wax sealed with flame sigils — the 4th Legion: Sentinels of Flame.

An invitation.

But not really.

More like a leash.

The words were honey, but the meaning was iron.

They wanted me at their Academy. “Training.” “Study.” “Observation.”

Father’s voice was thunder without rain:
“It’s time you were tempered. A blade untested breaks.”

Mother’s voice was silk pulled taut:
“He’s too young. But… he can’t stay caged forever.”

The ministers, of course, fawned like vultures in prayer beads:
“Watched. Guided. Safer this way.”

I twirled the scroll between my fingers, grin thin.

Me (mock-cheerful):
“Fantastic. School with extra babysitting. Just what I needed.”

But the ember inside me pulsed — and agreed.

Because I had my own reasons.

“If Heaven wanted to watch me, I’d watch them closer.”

The Academy was a library disguised as a training ground — every tutor a gatekeeper, every lesson a ledger to be read.

Assassins had come once.

They’d come again.

And if the Academy was a stage, then the answers would be in the wings.

Maybe it wasn’t even me they wanted.

Maybe it was Father’s crown.

Either way, I’d find out.

Turning Point

I stared at the cracked mirror, my reflection warped.

The ember flickered behind my eyes.

Me (sarcastic, muttering):
“Yeah, before? I was a broken boy. But not anymore. Now I’m just… under renovation.”

Ray’s grin burned in my memory.

My parents’ faces, drawn but steady.

Hakuya’s silent bow.

The assassins’ hesitation before retreat.

I clenched my fist.

“I’ll become stronger. I’ll find the truth. I’ll protect them all. I’ll be the god they believe in. I won’t break again. I won’t be a loser.”

The words weren’t loud.

But the ember pulsed like it was listening.

“Maybe that was the answer it wanted all along.
Then My pulse echoed out of sync — like my own light was learning a new rhythm.”

The Ripple stirred violently inside me.