Daniel

By the time Daniel made it back to the Li estate, the sun was already up, and he felt like he’d been hit by a truck.

Scratch that—he felt like he’d been hit by three trucks, one after the other, and then dragged behind a ceremonial chariot just for good measure.

His body ached. His mind buzzed. And somewhere in the static hum behind his eyes, Ethan muttered dryly: “Congratulations. You made history. Possibly for the worst reason possible.”

Daniel didn’t respond.

Mostly because he was focused on not collapsing.

He had just survived a night of whispered threats, formal hearings, a political slap disguised as diplomacy, a dizzying encounter with a past-life Princess, and the dawning realization that he had signed up to duel a trained noble who had probably been sparring since he learned how to walk, with vastly higher stakes than he’d initially intended.

He wasn’t expecting a welcome committee.

So when the side doors of the courtyard burst open, and Nathan Li leaned against the frame with the kind of grin usually reserved for battlefield victories or successful pranks, Daniel very nearly turned and walked the other way.

“You realize,” Nathan said, “you just punched the Crown Princess’s fiancé. At the Gala. In front of the Empress. And now the Princess herself has personally guaranteed the duel.”

Daniel groaned. “And you’re opening with that?”

“Opening? Brother-in-law, I’ve been waiting. That was the most satisfying thing I’ve seen since Lucas made a magistrate cry using tax math.”

Daniel blinked. “Why are you acting surprised? You were right there when it happened.”

“Planning to deck him myself,” Nathan replied with zero shame. “But you beat me to it. Good form, by the way.”

Behind him, Gavin descended the stairs, arms crossed, exuding older-brother disapproval that somehow still came off as amused.

“You know that was a breach of protocol,” he said flatly.

Daniel rubbed the back of his neck. “I didn’t know it at the time.”

“If you did, would that have changed your reaction?” Gavin said, his voice amused.

Daniel shrugged. "Probably not."

Lucas appeared from the east wing, already dressed for council, a scroll in one hand, his expression unreadable.

“Impulsive. Undiplomatic. Possibly the best thing I've seen all year.”

Daniel exhaled slowly. “So… I’m not being shunned by you guys?”

“No,” Lucas said, not looking up. “You’re being showcased. Congratulations.”

Nathan clapped him hard on the back.

“ You’re the opening fight of the Imperial Tournament’s first bracket. Against a prince-in-waiting with a fanbase.”

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Daniel didn’t respond right away.

Then Lucas added—quiet, precise, and far too serious for the moment:

“You don’t just need to show up, Ethan. You need to win.”

Daniel looked up.

Lucas met his gaze.

“Everyone saw what you did. Some will cheer. Some will wait for you to fail. But no one’s going to forget. If you lose now… it won’t be a mistake. It’ll be a message.”

Daniel swallowed once.

The others had joked.

Lucas hadn’t.

And that, more than anything else, made it real.

By the time Daniel reached his chambers, he was walking on pure willpower.

Every step felt heavier than the last. His robe was stiff with ceremonial starch, his hair still smelled faintly of gilded incense, and his shoulder burned where Nathan had clapped him a little too enthusiastically.

He didn’t bother lighting the mana-lamps. The room was dim, quiet—clean in the way only a place unused truly was.

He stripped off his coat and let it fall onto the rack. Kicked off his boots and felt the cool tile through his socks. Then he sat—heavily—on the edge of the bed. The mattress gave beneath him with a low creak, sending a jolt up his spine that made him wince.

His right hand flexed, involuntarily. The one that changed everything.

One moment of frustration. A single break in his usual restraint. And somehow, it had become a symbol. A declaration. Not just that he existed—but that he was no longer going to remain quietly at the edge of someone else’s story.

Now he was in it.

And they were all watching.

“Lucas is right,” he murmured into the quiet. “I don’t just need to survive. I need to win. Publicly. Cleanly.”

“Then it’s time to build,” Ethan replied, calm and clear from within.

Daniel stood.

His body screamed at him to rest. But something inside had locked into place—cold, sharp, immovable.

He crossed the room to the low cabinet near the rear worktable and opened it with a flick of his wrist.

Inside: the fragments of the Framework he hadn’t finished.

He pulled them out one by one with the care of someone handling live steel. The stabilizer crystal, pale and flickering. The pulse-thread relays, half-tuned and humming faintly with latent resonance. The mana logic rods, etched with glyphs that still bled faint blue from yesterday’s aborted test.

He laid them out across the lacquered surface in a perfect line.

Not like tools.

Like weapons.

“I can finish the interface in five days… if I reallocate everything.”

“Make it three,” Ethan said. “We won’t get a second chance.”

Daniel didn’t argue.

He just nodded.

The system would give him the edge. But not alone.

He looked across the chamber toward the far wall, where his blade rested on its rack.

Too clean.

Too light.

It didn’t feel like a sword yet.

Not in the way it needed to.

He walked over, lifted it from its cradle, and let it rest in his palm.

It was beautifully forged—balanced, elegant—but still just a blade.

What he needed… was force. Refinement. Real technique.

Not clever forms or polite dueling stances. He needed the kind of mastery that made power flinch.

The next morning, before breakfast, before the sun had burned off the last of the high mist, Daniel found Master Tian in the lower courtyard—seated in meditation, one hand resting on the hilt of an old sword too battered to be ceremonial.

Daniel bowed once.

“I don’t want drills,” he said. “I want discipline.”

Tian opened one eye. And nodded.

By midday, Daniel had found Master Jien, too—Lucas’s former blade tutor, who looked at him like a tool someone had left out in the rain and now expected to be useful.

“You’re too slow,” Jien said, even before Daniel bowed. “Too precise. That’s not a compliment.”

“I know,” Daniel replied. “That’s why I’m here.”

He trained twice a day. Every day until the duel.

Nathan, of course, inserted himself within five minutes of hearing about the sessions.

“First one to drop their blade buys dinner,” he said cheerfully, already cracking his knuckles. “And by dinner, I mean spiritual reconstruction therapy.”

Daniel rolled his eyes.

But he smiled, just a little.

Because this wasn’t about Sophie. It wasn’t even about Dathan anymore.

It was about earning his place. Not through bloodline, Not through borrowed power. But through effort.

So that the next time he stood in a room full of nobles—surrounded by skeptics and watchers and women with gold-threaded veils—he would not be seen as a placeholder.

He would be seen as a threat.

He’d punched an arrogant ass. That type of behavior is the privilege of the strong. Fine. If being able to punch an asshole was the privilege of the strong, then he would do the simple and obvious thing.

He would prove that he was strong.

They wanted a fight. They wanted a showcase. So be it.

He would be ready and would give them one hell of a show.