Jozef adjusted the folds of Mingchi’s festival robes with the same care he’d used since Mingchi was a boy. The orange and red silk caught the light from the study windows and shimmered with each small movement.

  Five minutes had already passed since the lanterns of Pik ignited for the work-cycle. Neither man spoke. There was nothing more to say, as soon it would be the hour the East would remember.

  Since Mingchi’s interview, the one in which he had openly condemned the Emperor and his Zhaisheng project, the reaction across East Kowloon had split into disbelief, cautious renewed hope, and, among a few, a fierce surge of Eastern nationalism. Lords from the Western Reaches and Central Kowloon had called him a coward, a child cracking under pressure, a leader dragging his people towards greater ruin. Tonight, Mingchi intended to make them swallow every word.

  ‘You’re ready, my Lord,’ Jozef murmured as he stepped back.

  Mingchi nodded and approached the balcony doors. They slid open with a soft hiss. A sea of faces awaited him across every level of every balcony circling the groundscraper’s surrounding void. Lanterns flickered. Media drones hovered. Yet there was no jeering, no applause. Only a steady, expectant silence. He noticed how thin they all looked. And unlike his coronation, the crowd barely had energy. No one jostled for space on windowsills or AC units. No music. No chanting. Only the distant hum of ventilation and the low murmur of voices drifting up and down the hollowed circular space.

  ‘Are the LED boards showing me clearly?’ Mingchi asked.

  ‘Yes, my lord. Every billboard on the groundscraper has you live,’ Jozef replied from the shadows beside the doorway.

  Mingchi laid his hand on Jozef’s shoulder as he stepped forward, the door sliding shut behind him. He glanced left and right. His Kuishi guards lined both sides of the balcony, their eyes fixed on the crowd below. He checked their uniforms, relieved to see no rifles on display. After the shooting at the protest, he’d ordered that all visible Kuishi carry only a single handgun tucked discreetly beneath their jackets.

  Mingchi gripped the railing, inhaled, and began.

  ‘I will not lie to you, my people,’ his voice projected over speakers. ‘These past few cycles, I have been afraid. Afraid that I have failed you. Afraid that I have already become Gaochi’s son, the very thing I spent my life trying not to be. It took me until very recently to realise that this kind of fear has no place in the East we must build if we are to survive this famine.’

  A murmur moved through the masses.

  ‘Before anything else, look around you. Look at Pik. Look at what we have become. We all know how we ended up here.’

  The people stared intently.

  ‘When I was a child, the maids in this estate used to read me Dongist stories from the Book of Memory. It is the only book in the trilogy where Prophet Dong speaks at length about East Kowloon. He marked our region with strength and dignity, foretelling a day when the East would unite as a single state called Chin Xiao De. And when that day comes, Songzu Dong said, it would herald a sign of Kowloon’s redemption, when God lifts us back to the surface. What privilege that our very own prophet said this about us!’

  Mingchi let the words hang for a moment.

  ‘Yet almost eight hundred annui-cycles have passed, and have we moved any closer to that vision? Has anyone ever once pretended that East Kowloon was destined for such a beautiful prophecy? After the rebellions ended, we were punished like a rabid mutt. Where Puyin hesitated to discipline the Southern Lords, scared of them breaking the newly-established truce, he showed no hesitation at all in punishing us. Because he knows we’d do nothing.’

  A few heads nodded.

  ‘We have carried the burden of an old reputation. A reputation of weakness. A belief that anyone can wound us and our only response will be to paint a canvas and sing a song showing how much it hurt. When Puyin promised every district a new era of greatness, the second Zhaisheng, he chose East Kowloon as the financial fuel for Kowloon’s golden age. Because once again, if the Emperor asked us to jump, he knew we’d simply ask, “How far?”’

  His voice rose.

  ‘So tell me, my brothers and sisters, exactly how far? The South knew from the start how far they’d go before snapping. Ho Man Ting has already acted in classic Southern fashion, expelling anyone who isn’t them. But us? Our ancient libraries have lain scorched for centuries, our artistic lifeblood drained, our faith twisted beyond recognition. Why aren’t we upset? Where’s our rage?! Where the hell are the Yaozhis, the aid they swore to provide to every subject of the Unification Pact in times of need? Does the pact only benefit District Yu? That is not a pact. That is subjugation!’

  The crowd stiffened; the tension cracked like static as Mingchi’s shouts echoed up and down.

  ‘I stayed quiet when they called me weak. I stayed quiet when the Emperor called me dongfa’shu for only asking for relief. We’ve all weathered these insults quietly. But we will not stay quiet any longer. We will not be the Easterner they expect us to be, soft and placid. As of tonight, I have ordered every Zhaisheng construction site in Telos dismantled. Brick by brick. Rod by rod. Those money pits of imperial greed will become the foundation of a vast agricultural centre, one that feeds every household in Pik. And every law that confines food processing to Kam Shan will be ignored.’

  Roars exploded through the balconies. Fists shot into the air.

  Mingchi pressed on, carried by the force now building beneath him.

  ‘The Emperor believes he can recreate Emperor Hongwu’s great Zhaisheng, the one only made possible because Dong himself stood at Hongwu’s side. He attempts to manufacture divine aid, but I will show him what a real golden age looks like. Today, Pik dies and is reborn. We will no longer be called Pik, but the name Dong anointed for us: the first sovereign state of Chin Xiao De, beholden to no authority but the Light itself!’

  His voice carried across the balconies.

  ‘At the heart of this revival, I extend a sincere invitation to every artist in Kowloon. Painters, architects, dancers, singers, actors, poets, novelists. From this moment on, Chin Xiao De will become an oasis for all artists. I pledge to provide you with everything you require. Homes. Nourishment. Schools and studios. Every resource needed to realise your craft. Together, we will revive the lifeblood of our culture, the spirit of Eastern society.’

  By now the atmosphere among the crowd had transformed entirely. What had begun as a sea of cautious, attentive faces surged into a tide of celebration. Fists rose in defiance. Shouts of support rippled through every level of the groundscraper.

  Mingchi raised a hand and silence fell like a curtain.

  ‘Brothers and sisters, many across Kowloon are pushing for freedom from the dynasty. If nothing else, it shows how relevant our own struggle has become. Yet some of these movements use methods that endanger everyone, not only their enemies. As you know, Ho Man Ting’s leaders have shaken hands with the Yang. I understand why it appears our motivations should align, that such a partnership feels natural. But if you believe the Yaozhis are the only ones who want us weak and defeated, you are mistaken.’

  Mingchi stood with his chest out.

  ‘We all remember the tragedy that befell Yau last annui-cycle. Remember how the Luen siblings refused to bow to the Yang’s demands. In response, the Yang obliterated several of their groundscrapers, snuffing out tens of thousands of lives in seconds. Since then, a single nightmare has haunted me. What happens when the day comes that they issue demands to me? And what happens if I answer as the Luen siblings did? Will they punish me the same?’

  He gripped the railing, knuckles tightening.

  ‘My father may have been a coward who bent his knees to forces larger than him, but I am not the same. Because recently, this nightmare became reality. On the day of my coronation, the Yang secretly demanded my allegiance. I’m sure you all remember, the Kuishi who interrupted me during my address. I now tell you that he was no Kuishi at all, but a Yang agent, delivering their demand in a letter. No dignified Lord would allow such a threat to hover over him!’

  He gestured to his left. A Kuishi guard signalled to another around the bend, and two more guards emerged, dragging a bound prisoner in a grey jumpsuit, a black hood over his head. When they brought the prisoner beside him, Mingchi placed a hand on the hood, holding the man upright before the crowd.

  ‘Beside me stands that very Yang infiltrator, the man disguised as one of my guards. Had I angered the Yangs, it would have been this assassin who slays me! Know that these people are no different from the Kingmakers! They are as much a threat to our liberation!’

  Gasps swept across the balconies.

  ‘Now this Yang will meet the same fate that so many innocent Easterners faced during my coronation. As I cast Gajan from this height, as he falls towards the unforgiving ground of Kowloon, let it be known: we sever our bonds with the Yaozhi Dynasty. Today, the first sovereign territory of Chin Xiao De rises from the ashes.’

  A tremendous roar thundered through the square, echoing against the walls of the groundscrapers. Mingchi seized the prisoner by the hood and the back of his jumpsuit, hauling his torso over the railing. Fifty-five storeys above the ground, the man hung limp and resigned, offering no resistance.

  Mingchi’s voice rose without amplification, raw and burning.

  ‘People of Chin Xiao De! Witness a stronger East!’

  With this declaration, Mingchi propelled Gajan over the railing. In the split second of his freefall, his voice pierced the silence, a lone cry as he plummeted towards the unforgiving concrete below.

  The broadcast ended with a white flash, dissolving into the dark glass of the entertainment console. Baoyan’s own silhouette stared back at him, hands clasped over his head.

  As the roar of Pik fell away, the silence took over.

  His dorm had become unrecognisable. Unwashed bowls were stacked high across his usually tidy console table. Clothes lay strewn across the beanbags. The study desk was buried beneath notebooks, ration wrappers, and torn sheets from his history book. The bed sat half-made, half-abandoned, blankets twisted from restless nights.

  He had been like this since he’d rushed back from the stairwell, since the violent confrontation with the Southerners against Legate Tan. Since he had struck Captain Shen while masked. The fear had clamped down on him the moment he shut his door. He hadn’t attended any of his classes for the cycle. He barely ate or drank. He felt anxious and adrift.

  On the dimmed entertainment screen, Mingchi’s speech replayed faintly in his mind.

  A strong East. Promise of redemption. Promise of justice.

  Mingchi had shown every person of Pik, no, Chin Xiao De, that reclaiming their dignity was possible.

  But here in the tower, all anyone spoke of now was regicide. Baoyan swallowed hard.

  Will it be Warlord Xinjian, after Ho Man Ting’s border shut down, or Lord Mingchi, after his provocative interview with Jeni and now this bold speech declaring independence? Light, even saying it like that makes it feel obvious it’ll be Lord Mingchi.

  His chest tightened.

  I can’t let it be my Lord.

  Suddenly, the sound of hurried footsteps swept past his door.

  Baoyan went rigid. He held his breath, muscles locked, waiting for the knock that would end everything.

  Nothing.

  The footsteps faded. Slowly, he rose and crept toward the door, sliding it open just enough to peek out. Two Centurions were sprinting down the hall, turning the corner without a glance back.

  Not the Captain. Thank the Light.

  He shut the door quickly.

  Baoyan crossed the room and snatched up his holocommunicator from the messy desk. His fingers trembled as he unlocked it.

  “Ushi 3 missed calls.”

  Baoyan pressed the device face-down immediately.

  He could not answer. Not now. Not with what he was considering.

  I can’t risk any communication between us. If they trace this back… the Southerners will pay for what I may do.

  He sank into the chair, burying his face in his hands.

  What the fuck do I do? His thoughts were spinning out of control. What the fuck do I do? Light, Prophet Dong – someone. Guide me. Tell me how to protect my people. If the regicide is against Mingchi, I already know how this ends. The Kingmakers will never let his vision survive.

  Mingchi’s voice echoed in his ears, clear as if the man stood beside him:

  ‘Why aren’t we upset?’

  ‘Where’s our rage?!’

  ‘We will not stay quiet any longer. We will not be the Easterner they expect us to be, soft and placid!’

  Baoyan gripped a fistful of his short hair, pulling hard against his scalp.

  I don’t know what to do!

  ‘Tonight, Pik becomes the first sovereign territory of Chin Xiao De—’ The hope Mingchi had given him, that fragile light inside him that threatened to grow brighter, it felt like torment.

  He squeezed his eyes shut.

  He pictured Mingchi dead, Pik returning to its hopeless famine.

  He pictured Shen dragging him out of his dorm in cuffs, accusing him of acting against the dynasty.

  I’ve crossed too many lines already. It won’t just be expulsion. If I stay here, something far worse will happen to me.

  His thoughts curled, twisted, and then sharpened.

  Mingchi has to live. No matter the cost. If he dies, Chin Xiao De dies with him. If the Kings really plan to make him the regicide target, someone has to stop Puyin before the order comes down.

  His gaze drifted to the cluttered table.

  On the far left, next to pushed-aside piles of rubbish, sat a shallow tray filled with black ink. Baoyan stood, moved toward it, and reached into the dark liquid. His fingers pinched something submerged in it.

  He held a dark mask in his hands. The mask the Southerners had given him, but now a jet-black. Ink dripped from its edges, staining his fingertips. The sharp scent filled his nose.

  This isn’t something I can ask them to help with. I can’t drag anyone into this.

  ‘I am sorry, Captain,’ he whispered, barely audible. ‘I know you tried.’

  His throat tightened.

  ‘I cannot let them take my Lord. I cannot let them crush Chin Xiao De. And… Thank you, Ushi. For showing me what must be done.’

  Mingchi stepped back into the estate’s private study, the balcony doors sliding shut behind him. For a moment he simply stood there, chest rising and falling, the roar of the crowd still humming through his veins. Through the high windows came flashes of colour: lanterns waving, people dancing in the buildings opposite, reporters scrambling for better vantage points, drones circling the balcony like hungry rodents.

  ‘My Lord!’ Jozef rushed in and embraced him. ‘You have done it. You have given your people hope again.’

  ‘I trusted they would see reason, Jozef. What concerns me now is how the Lords and Ladies of the other Eastern districts are reacting. I sent each of them a private message declaring my intentions, just before last night’s interview. Do you know if any have responded?’

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  ‘Two Lords contacted you after the interview with Jeni, and four more have sent word following today’s speech.’

  ‘Excellent. Chin Xiao De demands solidarity among all Easterners,’ Mingchi said as he crossed the room and sat at his desk. ‘Bring me some cha, Jozef.’

  When Jozef left, Mingchi turned on his computer and opened his inbox. As Jozef had said, six unread messages awaited him from Districts Paku Ling, Mok Tse, Hung Hau, Tai Po, Jo Dan Bali, and Samka Tsuen. Some read:

  Lord Batu Pi of Paku Ling: Lord Mingchi, your vision is admirable, but my district is hanging by a thread. If Paku Ling is seen supporting Pik, the Emperor will cut our food shipments overnight. We will support you in spirit, but no public endorsement will be issued.

  Lady Shou Mei of Hung Hau: With respect, Lord Mingchi, Hung Hau has survived by avoiding unnecessary provocation. Your declaration will provoke the dynasty into regicide, and the consequences will spill far beyond Pik. We must keep our heads low until this storm passes. I advise you do the same.

  Lord Nabayu of Jo Dan Bali: I urge caution, young Mingchi. The East has buried too many dreamers who believed rebellion would save us. Jo Dan Bali will not repeat their mistakes. We cannot afford to stand with you. Do as your father did, we need strong relations with the dynasty to survive.

  Lady Ruen Kasa of Samka Tsuen: Lord Mingchi, your message resonates deeply, but the timing could not be worse. Samka Tsuen is struggling to keep order, and we cannot afford to be associated with secessionist rhetoric. Please understand our silence is for survival, not betrayal. In time our answer may change, but for now, it is this.

  The replies were all pathetic, each line a polished refusal wrapped in courtesy.

  Mingchi’s jaw tightened. He refreshed the inbox again, hoping for another message, one that wasn’t the same cowardice.

  Nothing.

  A surge of anger flared through him. He shot up and swept his arm across the desk, sending everything on it skidding across the room. Pens and notepads clattered against the far wall. At that moment Jozef entered with a saucer and teacup.

  ‘My Lord!’ He hurried forward, placing the tea on the desk before dropping to gather the scattered items. ‘What has happened?’

  ‘Spineless!’ Mingchi shouted. ‘Each one of them waiting for someone else to take the first risk!

  ‘My Lord…’ Jozef murmured softly, but Mingchi pressed on.

  ‘How naive I was to dream of a united East, a Chin Xiao De, when our very foundations are this fractured. We stand here as a lone bastion against adversity while our so-called Eastern brethren watch in silence. Their apathy is louder than any cry our starving people have made. Look at the South, Jozef. Why can’t we be more like them? They embody unity. Warlord Xinjian breaks from Puyin, and immediately the Southern warlords close ranks to shield him. They understand brotherhood, the unbreakable bond of standing together in peril.’

  He turned away, ashamed of his own people.

  ‘Yet here we Easterners stand, abandoned by our own. Our pleas for solidarity lost in winds of self-interest. What happened to our loyalties? I lament not only for our difficult path ahead, but for the shattered spirit of the East as a whole. It’s pitiful. These Lords have not forsaken Chin Xiao De, they have forsaken themselves! Do they not realise that soon they too will beg for release from the Yaozhis? And what then? What should I do, Jozef? Remember those Easterners who turned their backs on us, so that we may turn our backs on them in their hour of need?’

  ‘My Lord, they are worried about the same thing you should be worrying about now. The response from Yu. They fear a regicide, and that is natural. That is precisely why the Kingmakers exist. Whatever happens next, you must be ready for it. If you can show them surviving the Kingmakers is possible, perhaps their tune will change.’

  ‘Do you think I am any less afraid of a regicide than they are? I have no secret weapon against them!’ Mingchi snapped. ‘I know very well what my defiance means. I’ve already commanded my Kuishi to lock down all known King rail ports and be on high alert for Kingmakers.’

  In the dark annals of Eastern rule, regicides, the covert assassinations of Lords, had always been brutally efficient. It was the Emperor’s most silent and most devastating weapon. Even during Mingchi’s exchange with Warlord Xinjian, it seemed that man’s every thought had circled back to the same fear: the inevitability of a regicide.

  Jozef let himself breathe out audibly, placing a hand on Mingchi’s shoulder. ‘Your speech was incredible, my Lord. I keep replaying your words in my mind. It resonated with every Easterner. I have never seen public opinion shift so quickly. But… there was something I wanted to discuss. A part of your speech about your father that I do not think was entirely accurate.’

  ‘What was that?’ Mingchi asked, raising a brow. Jozef straightened.

  ‘You said your father showed up every day to rule Pik, no matter the threats against him. I understand the point you were making, but there was one time he did falter. One time he hid, much as you did. This was before you were born.’

  Mingchi tilted his head. ‘Explain, Jozef. I thought that man hid from nothing.’

  ‘Only a few days after Lord Gaochi’s coronation, he finally had his long-time rival of your family imprisoned. Your father had grown to resent this man personally. The rival came from a powerful line of Eastern nobles, so when Gaochi ordered his arrest, it enraged not only his family in Pik, but distant relatives in neighbouring districts as well. Still, Gaochi was Lord of Pik and did not fear making enemies. He told himself there were limits he would not cross; the sentence was meant as humiliation, nothing more: one year in a cell. Then tragedy struck. One night, the man was found dead, killed by his own cellmate. Everyone assumed your father had arranged it, that he had used the prison walls to finish off the man he hated most.’

  ‘Sounds like Gaochi,’ Mingchi said.

  ‘But the man you were born to isn’t the Gaochi I’m speaking about here. At this point in his life, he was still trying to rule as fairly as he could. The dead man’s family – powerful Eastern nobles – blamed your father exactly as you just did. Threats began pouring in, letters left in his inbox promising revenge. And for the first time, Lord Gaochi grew frightened. Then, one morning, he received a final warning: a letter sealed with blood-soaked wax. Not in his mailbox. Under his pillow.’

  Jozef paused before continuing.

  ‘Lord Gaochi spiralled. He locked himself in his bedroom, kept a guard on the balcony at all hours, had every meal tasted before it reached him, and even dismissed and rehired entire branches of the Kuishi out of fear. But soon he decided he would rather face death than live in fear. He stepped out of isolation and ordered the execution of every relative his rival had in Pik, certain they were behind the threats, and issued an arrest-on-sight decree for any who returned. That single decision shaped how he dealt with danger for the rest of his rule. And that was the man you were born to. The man who later began… forcing himself on the maids.’

  Mingchi took the words in silently. His father’s brutality did not shock him, but the image of Lord Gaochi cowering in his own bedroom did. It was a version of the man he had never imagined. He pictured the bedroom again – the room Jozef said Gaochi once barricaded himself inside, the room Mingchi had spent most of his childhood avoiding. The room Gaochi had later ruled from in his bitter old age… and the room in which he finally died.

  ‘Your father was many things, my Lord. Harsh, proud, unyielding. But even he reached a moment when fear overtook him. And when it did, he returned to his room. Not out of cowardice, but to change himself.’

  Mingchi looked up, wary. ‘And what are you suggesting, Jozef?’

  Jozef hesitated, gaze dropping. ‘Only that regicide is more than blades and explosives. You must remember there is no shield more imperceptible than the one our Lord Jesus raises over us. The Kingmakers strike where a leader is weakest, but the Almighty can protect even the most fragile petal from hellfire. Your Dongism may not frame it this way, but… I believe it with all my heart.’

  Silence settled between them.

  ‘In Christianity,’ Jozef said softly, ‘the bond between a father and son carries a weight many people underestimate. From what I’ve seen in my long years, the greatest danger isn’t only in wronging your father – it’s in letting him die with that hurt still between you. Time and again I have watched men turn away from their ageing fathers, refusing to face their responsibilities. And when those fathers passed, misfortune always seemed to find the sons who had abandoned them. Remember, our Holy Father gave His only son for mankind. Abraham was prepared to sacrifice his child out of obedience. And in both stories, the sons remained steadfast in love, their hearts unbroken toward their fathers. It’s a narrative truth people often overlook.’

  He lifted his eyes to Mingchi, pleading without daring to fully plead.

  ‘Before the Kingmakers decide your fate, allow God the chance to guard you. Your father’s room has remained sealed since that day. Perhaps… Perhaps the key to Chin Xiao De lies in facing him again. In forgiveness.’

  The implication hung unspoken between them, delicate and dangerous.

  Jozef bowed his head. ‘If you return to that room, my Lord, the Light may yet stand between you and what is coming.’

  Mingchi looked away, his face tightening. ‘Leave me, Jozef. I need some time to think.’

  The estate butler bowed and withdrew, the soft click of the door leaving the study in stillness.

  For a while Mingchi simply stood there, staring at the balcony’s distant glow through his windows. His breath felt thin in his chest. Return to that room? Gaochi’s room? The very thought clawed at something deep and coiled inside him.

  He paced once, twice, fingers dragging along the edge of the desk.

  Why did his feet feel so heavy? Why did that room, shut for years, still possess the power to gut him so completely? It was only a space. Four walls. A bed. A memory.

  But it was not just a memory, was it?

  His hands trembled slightly. He tried to push the thought away, to bury it beneath politics, strategy, fears of building Chin Xiao De. Yet every step he took in his study seemed to circle back toward Gaochi’s name, his voice, his memory.

  Go back. Face the Light. Seek forgiveness. It’s why you’ve only known suffering since Gaochi left.

  But forgiveness for what? He needs to beg forgiveness from me! He needs to beg for forgiveness from every person in Pik!

  He sank onto the chair, rubbing his temples. Why could Jozef not understand? He’d served that man all his life! In fact, poor Jozef was abused more than anyone else by my father! Why is he blind to reality?

  Go back. Ask forgiveness. Let the Light guard you. Let it protect Chin Xiao De.

  Mingchi let out a slow, shaking breath. Father, he thought, though the word tasted like blood in his mouth. How much resentment did my father carry with him into the Light?

  Slowly, painfully, Mingchi lifted his eyes to the door of his study, considering walking that path. The path to the old wing he’d sealed the cycle after Gaochi died.

  I locked that room to bury what happened, to keep anyone from discovering the truth of what happened. But perhaps it was not others I meant to hide it from. Perhaps it was me. But will it change anything when the Kingmakers come? Will the Light truly favour me if I confront him?

  Mingchi rose slowly and stepped out of his study. Instead of turning left towards the rest of his quarters, he walked right, the path to a place he long avoided. He ventured into the forgotten wing of the estate, a portion of his home he vowed to never revisit.

  The dim, musty corridors stretched before him, his footsteps echoed against the wood. Dust hung in the air, illuminated by faint rays of light filtering through the slits of curtained windows. White-draped furniture stood like ghosts, Mingchi tried remembering what they looked like before Jozef covered it all. The air was thick with neglect, memories he tried burying, each creaking floorboard an echo of him anxiously walking up and down these hallways as a child.

  As he moved deeper into the old royal wing, the weight of the past grew heavier. Old portraits of his father, their faces obscured by layers of dust, watched him with silent judgement, their eyes following his every move. They saw what I did, he thought. They know what happened that night.

  In this part of the estate, time seemed to stand still, frozen in an era that Mingchi had fought hard to leave behind. Yet, here he was, confronting it once more.

  Finally, he reached the door to his father’s bedroom. It stood there as a gateway to the past, a barrier to a room filled with painful memories. Mingchi paused, gathering the courage to cross the threshold, to confront the ghosts of his past that had haunted him for so long. With a steadying breath, he unlocked the door and pushed it open, bracing himself for whatever waited inside.

  Nearly an entire annui-cycle had passed since he last stepped into this room.

  Nothing had changed.

  The air struck him first, stale and unmoving. As he walked in, his eyes drifted over the framed photographs lining the walls, their glass surfaces dulled by dust. Opposite the bed stood the massive entertainment console where Gaochi had watched the Eastern Zuche tourneys, shouting at the screens between coughing fits.

  The room was still dressed in dark maroon, brown, and burnt orange – colours that once felt warm but now only amplified the old, suffocating dread. For Mingchi, this room had never been a sanctuary. It had been a chamber of fear, the place where his father’s temper was the sharpest, where Mingchi’s every breath felt like a possible misstep.

  He approached the bed at the centre of the room, its sheets perfectly smooth, untouched since the night Gaochi died. As Mingchi stepped closer, the atmosphere shifted – colder, heavier, as if the very photons of Light dimmed where his father had taken his final breaths.

  He reached out and brushed the white bedsheet with trembling fingers. Then, slowly, he knelt beside it, eyes closing as he pictured Gaochi once more: frail, tyrannical, sickly, and still terrifying. Lying exactly here.

  Exactly where Mingchi had left him.

  ‘Father,’ he said quietly. ‘You should see Pik tonight. You should see what I have done, what you could never have hoped to do.’

  He clasped his hands so tightly the webbing between his fingers stretched and burned and his silver ring pressed against his bones.

  ‘They chanted my name. Our people, our starving people, finally believe in something again. They believe in me, Father. Something you spent your entire life trying to force, I earned in a single night!’ His voice rose, gaining heat.

  ‘I did what you never could. I confronted the Emperor. I confronted the Yang. I stood before the East and offered them a future instead of excuses. I didn’t hide behind parties and excess. I didn’t allow indecency to guide me. I let the Light guide me. I let Prophet Dong guide me.’

  The words began to sharpen.

  ‘You bankrupted us when we needed your strength after the district rebellions. You silenced anyone who offered advice. You were a coward, slinking away from every difficult choice and calling it tough leadership.’

  He leaned closer to the bed.

  ‘And because of you, because of every stupid decision you made while you lived, we had no choice but to break from the dynasty. Chin Xiao De isn’t my personal ambition. It was a necessity for my people’s survival! A necessity you created, you damned monster.’

  His breath shook; the anger trembled his closed hands.

  ‘If you’d ruled with even a fraction of the courage Pik deserved, I wouldn’t be here, terrified of Kingmakers coming to cut me down. If they kill me, it will be on your hands. Jozef, that poor man you spent your youth thrashing with your fists, he asked me to come here and… Ask for your forgiveness. Beg you. For killing you. Can you believe that, you old bastard dog, Gaochi?’ He laughed bitterly, breath hitching. ‘Bless Jozef’s heart, but there is not a single soul in Pik who would ever ask forgiveness from you while justice still exists as a God-given truth.’

  ‘Tell me the truth. Have you cursed me for killing you? Are you giving me regicide for patricide?’ His voice wavered. The anger that had carried him this far began to crack. ‘Or is the Light truly punishing me?’

  Mingchi looked up at the ceiling.

  ‘Do you remember,’ he whispered, voice cracking, ‘the last time you shouted at me from this bed, Father?’

  The dim light flickered.

  Somewhere deep in Mingchi’s mind, something unlatched.

  Gaochi was the very embodiment of tyranny, a notorious figure among the Eastern lords known for ruling with an iron fist. For the benefit of his district? No, to make sure no one complained about the parties that only seemed to get bigger. Mingchi watched his father enforce a zero-tolerance policy on dissent, jailing critics and adversaries with theatrical brutality, cultivating a climate of fear that kept Pik silent. Gaochi, a loyal crony of Puyin, feared nothing more than losing his grip on power – especially to the one equaliser even tyrants must face: death.

  As age and illness began to hollow him out, another fear took root in him: he had no legitimate heir. That desperation curdled into resentment, and he turned his gaze toward the bastard child he had once ignored; Mingchi, the son of a maid, raised quietly in her private quarters at the edge of the estate.

  When Gaochi finally summoned him and declared him heir, the shift was violent. Mingchi was torn from the only gentle part of his childhood and thrust into Gaochi’s world, where every lesson blurred the line between ruling Pik and salvaging a dying man’s legacy. What began as tutelage quickly became an outlet for Gaochi’s bitterness, his looming mortality poured into a bastard son he expected to become a legitimate successor by sheer force of will. Meanwhile, the woman who had raised Mingchi tenderly for the first six years of his life, his maid-mother, slipped quietly out of his world. By the time he was twelve, the last trace of her was a fleeting glimpse of her scrubbing the estate floors, no longer permitted to speak to him. After that, he never saw her again.

  As Gaochi’s sickbed gradually became his new throne, he grew painfully aware of what he saw as Mingchi’s inadequacy to inherit Pik. He dragged the boy to every meeting, every audience, every display of authority, hoping exposure would force him into the mould of a ruler. Instead, each passing cycle only made the contrast starker: the father ruled through fear and excess; the son shrank from both. And whenever it became clear just how different Mingchi was, Gaochi would beat him, convinced he could strike that difference out of him.

  When the famine worsened under Puyin’s ‘exciting’ new Zhaisheng, Gaochi did nothing to resist it. In truth, he welcomed it, seduced by the Emperor’s assurances of prosperity once the project was complete.

  In the decision that ushered the great Zhaisheng into Pik, Gaochi approved project after project funded by Puyin, each one propped up by harsher taxes on an already starving populace. One construction became two, then three, and with every new foundation laid, the famine deepened. When Mingchi finally snapped and interrupted a meeting between Gaochi and the Emperor to object, the Lord of Pik felt overwhelmingly humiliated. He had underestimated the man his son was becoming – someone who thought critically about Eastern politics rather than obeying blindly.

  Later, in this very bedroom, Gaochi summoned Mingchi to berate him for the interruption. What began as his son defending himself quickly escalated into an argument. The Lord’s agitation hardened into threats, and then into open fury against his disobedient heir.

  The confrontation broke when Gaochi, enraged beyond reason, heaved himself from his sickbed and lurched towards Mingchi, hurling insults so vicious he even spat out mention of the maid he’d raped. Objects flew across the room – medicine bottles, glassware, whatever he could reach – as his tyrannical rage came out once more. But Mingchi, fuelled by years of pent-up resentment, shoved his father back onto the bed. In a moment of reckless defiance, he snatched the small container of pills from the bedside table, tore it open, and forced its entire contents into his father’s mouth. The container and pills choked Gaochi’s airways, foaming his mouth as it strangled his windpipes from the inside – but he wasn’t dying fast enough. Mingchi smothered his nose with his arms and dropped his bodyweight behind the container as he pushed it deeper inside his father’s mouth, watching his teeth shatter and his tongue slice through the container’s sharp edge. Gaochi’s nose streamed with mucus, and his eyes, contorted up in agony, welled up with tears. At last, Gaochi’s frail frenzy slowed, and Mingchi slowly raised himself from his father’s limp body, the container still half down his throat.

  The door opened, revealing Jozef, rooted to the spot in sheer terror. The seasoned butler’s gaze darted to Mingchi, who was slowly retreating, his eyes locked on the lifeless form of his father, mouth gaping open with the container jutting straight out.

  Jozef sprang into action, his voice filled with shock and disbelief.

  ‘WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!’ he cried out, rushing to Gaochi’s side. He lifted the medical cylinder from Gaochi’s mouth, blood and saliva stringing from its edges. Jozef’s eyes widened in horror as he took in Gaochi’s ghastly pale expression, the pills still lodged and stacked visibly up his throat.

  With a look of unspeakable horror carved into his face, Jozef slowly turned to face Mingchi. His eyes locked onto the man he once knew as a calm and collected child, now a cold-blooded killer.

  Mingchi’s face was frozen in disbelief and shock as he looked at Jozef.

  ‘WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!’ Jozef bellowed, lunging at Mingchi with a closed fist, striking him across the cheek and sending him staggering back against the wall. Seizing Mingchi by the collar, Jozef unleashed a barrage of blows across his head. Mingchi crumpled to the floor, huddled against the corner with his arms raised in a futile attempt to cover his head, as Jozef continued his frenzied assault. Mingchi, overwhelmed by what he had done, offered no resistance.

  After his outburst of violence, Jozef crumbled, tears of disbelief streaming down his face. He staggered towards Gaochi, collapsing beside the bed with his arms draped over his chest, his body racked with sobs. Mingchi, meanwhile, pressed his back against the wall, sliding upwards with difficulty. He rubbed his bruised cheek, dazed and disoriented, as the sounds of Jozef’s grief filled the room.

  Gradually, Jozef composed himself, though his tears continued to flow. He picked up the blood-stained medicinal cylinder from the floor, his hands shaking uncontrollably.

  Carefully, Jozef bent over Gaochi, delicately removing the pills still lodged in his throat, placing them back into the cylinder. He then retrieved the lid from the floor, lifting Gaochi’s lifeless arm and placing the cylinder in his hand. Still sobbing, and with a final, gentle movement, he positioned the lid loosely on the container and let Gaochi’s arm fall to the side of the bed. The container remained in his grasp, the lid tumbling to the floor along with a few stray pills.

  Jozef did nothing else but stand and cry for a moment and then leave, refusing to look back at Mingchi again.