Ten years.
A full decade trapped within a chrysalis of yielding bone and useless, trembling muscle. That was the revised timeline Seiyuu had deduced from the whispers of his parents in the days following Scribe Vance's departure. The Awakening—the violent tearing of the mana channels—would occur on his tenth name day.
A decade was an eternity in the realm of corporate warfare. In his past life, Seiyuu had conquered industries in half that time. Now, he was expected to spend it mastering bowel control while his enemies tightened the noose around his inheritance.
In this infuriating reality, Seiyuu Ashitoge did not rage against the board he was dealt; he played the pieces he was given.
On a morning so bitterly cold that the moisture on the nursery window had crystallized into jagged, milky ferns, Lord Aldous came for him.
"My lord, please," Elara pleaded, her voice thin and ragged as she wrapped Seiyuu in a third layer of scratchy, unbleached wool. "He is barely a moon old. The wind off the crags could freeze the breath in his lungs."
Aldous stood by the hearth, clad in a heavy cloak of faded badger fur over his scuffed leather gambeson. The fanatical light that Scribe Vance had ignited in his eyes had hardened into a grim, unyielding fixation.
"The wind is the breath of Aethelgard, Elara," Aldous said, his tone brooking no argument. "The boy has a dense soul.If he is to be the blade that cuts House Castellan down, he must know what it is he fights for. He must see the rot they have inflicted upon us."
I am a month old, you imbecile, Seiyuu thought with clinical detachment as Elara reluctantly handed him over. I am supposed to lack the understanding of ABCs, let alone understand the geopolitical nuances of a blood feud.
Nevertheless, as Aldous nestled the bundled infant securely against the rough leather of his chest, Seiyuu forced a wet, meaningless gurgle past his lips. He let his head loll against his father's collarbone, playing the part of the infantile heir heir.
Aldous carried him out of the nursery, the heavy iron-bound door groaning on its hinges. The corridors of Walderose Keep were caverns of echoing stone, lit only by the weak, slate-grey light filtering through narrow arrow-slits. It smelled of damp earth, old grease, and the unmistakable, sour tang of slow decay.
Their first stop was the Great Hall, a cavernous space that must have once hosted roaring feasts. Now, it was a hollow tomb. The grand hearths were cold, swept clean of ash. The long oaken tables had been stripped away—sold for firewood or coin, Seiyuu surmised. High above, the banners of House Walderose—a silver stag leaping over a blood-red river—hung in tatters, chewed by moths and damp.
"Look, Seiyuu," Aldous murmured, his voice echoing too loudly in the vast emptiness. He shifted his grip, ensuring the infant's face was turned toward the dais at the far end of the hall. "That was the seat of your grandfather, Lord Beron the Stout. When he held court, this hall was thick with the scent of roasted venison and spiced wine. A hundred men-at-arms pledged their swords upon these flagstones. We commanded the Ironfall Valley, and the Arch-Dukes of Veridia knew our name."
Aldous's chest heaved with a bitter sigh. "And now? We eat thin oat gruel, and our name is a whisper to frighten children."
Nostalgia is a poison that blinds men to the present, Seiyuu evaluated coldly. Your grandfather's wealth is irrelevant. It is unrecoverable sunk cost. You dwell on the ghost of an empire instead of preserving the ashes you currently possess.
Aldous carried him onward, descending a spiral stair of worn granite into the armory.
The air here was freezing, biting through Seiyuu's wool wrappings, but he strictly suppressed the urge to shiver. The armory was a depressing catalog of depleted assets. Racks that should have held hundreds of pikes held a mere two dozen, the iron heads blooming with rust. A few suits of chainmail hung from wooden stands, looking more like discarded snakeskin.
"Castellan's sanctions," Aldous growled, tracing a gloved hand over a rusted breastplate. "They blockaded our iron shipments three years ago. They bribed the King's magistrates to look the other way while their mercenaries harried our supply lines. They fight like merchants, not lords. They choke us in the dark so they do not have to look us in the eye when we die."
Aldous lifted Seiyuu slightly, bringing the infant's face close to the rusting steel. "Smell it, boy. Smell the rust. It is the smell of theft. They have stolen your birthright, piece by piece. They want you to inherit a graveyard."
Seiyuu maintained a blank, unfocused stare. He understood perfectly what House Castellan was doing. It was a flawless starvation strategy. Bleed the subsidiary dry, devalue their assets, and acquire the remaining property for pennies on the dollar. It was exactly what Seiyuu had done to the Kanzaki Group in his previous life. He couldn't help but feel a twinge of professional respect for this Lord Castellan. The man is a pragmatist.
His father, however, was a sentimentalist. A pathetic, whining middle-manager complaining to a baby about market forces he lacked the competence to navigate.
"Goo," Seiyuu offered, blowing a tiny bubble of saliva to placate the man.
Aldous mistook the sound for engagement. A tragic, tearful smile cracked his weathered face. "Yes. You understand, don't you? Your soul knows the injustice."
They left the keep and stepped out into the courtyard. The wind hit them like a physical blow. It howled down from the jagged, snow-capped peaks of the Howling Crags that loomed to the north, carrying the scent of pine needles and an unnatural, freezing decay—the Dread-Frost Scribe Vance had spoken of.
The courtyard was a mire of frozen mud. A half-dozen men huddled around a smoky brazier near the gatehouse. They were a motley, depressing sight: graybeards too old to hold a spear steady, and green boys too young to grow a beard. They wore mismatched boiled leather and carried weapons that belonged in the rusted armory.
This is the security force? Seiyuu thought, his infant heart maintaining a steady, slow rhythm despite the horrifying revelation. A single coordinated breach would slaughter them in minutes. We are not just bankrupt; we are defenseless.
"Lord Aldous," one of the older guards called out, offering a sloppy salute that made Seiyuu want to fire him on the spot. "A bitter morning for the little lord to be out."
"The little lord must learn of our pathethic state, Captain Thorne," Aldous replied stiffly, marching past them toward the southern battlements.
They climbed the stone steps to the top of the curtain wall. Below them, the Ironfall Valley sprawled outward. It was undeniably beautiful, a jagged, treacherous landscape of deep gorges and dense, evergreen forests. But Aldous did not point to the beauty. He pointed to a high ridge to the southeast.
Even with his underdeveloped infant eyesight, Seiyuu could see the foreign colors. High on the ridge, commanding the only passable road out of the valley, sat a wooden palisade. Banners snapped in the wind, though they were too far away to make out the sigil.
"Castellan's toll-fort," Aldous spat, the word dripping with venom. "They built it on our land, ignoring the ancient treaties. They claim it is to protect the valley from bandits. A lie. It is a chokehold. Nothing goes out, and nothing comes in without their tax. Our timber rots in the yards. Our silver stays in the earth because we cannot feed the miners to dig it."
Aldous leaned against the freezing stone parapet, holding Seiyuu over the edge. The drop was a hundred feet straight down into a rocky ravine. Elara would have fainted at the sight, but Seiyuu merely stared down at the jagged rocks, utterly unfazed. He knew Aldous wouldn't drop him. He was the man's only remaining asset.
"Look at it, Seiyuu," Aldous whispered fiercely, his breath pluming in the freezing air, his face inches from his son's. "Look at the thieves who wait for us to die. The Scribe said you have the soul of a High Mage. He said you have the density to hold the Aether."
Aldous's voice dropped to a ragged, manic hiss. "I will keep you alive. I will endure this humiliation, this starvation, for ten years. I will beg Castellan for scraps if I must, just to ensure you reach your Awakening. But when the power comes to you..."
Tears, hot and desperate, spilled over Aldous's frost-chapped cheeks, dropping onto Seiyuu's swaddling clothes.
"You must hate them, Seiyuu. You must let the hatred gorge you. You must take the fire that the gods will give you and burn House Castellan to ash. You must avenge your grandfather. You must avenge me."
It was a pathetic, disgusting display.
A lord weeping on his own walls, begging a month-old infant to execute the vengeance he was too weak to enact himself. Aldous was abdicating his responsibility, passing the heavy, bloody burden of survival onto the shoulders of a child.
In the corporate world, a CEO who cried in front of his shareholders and blamed his rivals for his own failure was ousted before the market closed. Aldous Walderose was a failure of a man.
Seiyuu looked into his father's weeping eyes. He saw the desperation, the clinging hope, and the profound, underlying cowardice.
Hate is a weapon for the emotionally incontinent, Father, Seiyuu analyzed, perfectly still in the man's grip. I will not hate House Castellan. Hatred blinds you to utility. Hatred makes you predictable.
He looked past his father's shoulder, toward the distant banners of the enemy fort.
I will not burn them to avenge your bruised pride. I will dismantle them because their lands border mine, their copper veins belong in my ledger, and their existence is an obstacle to my monopoly of this valley.
Ten years. It was a grueling timeline. He would have to endure a decade of this man's weeping, of Elara's cloying anxiety, of thin gruel and freezing winters. He would have to play the role of the dutiful son, absorbing their pathetic hopes while secretly architecting his own ruthless ascent.
He needed to map the political landscape of Veridia. He needed to understand the mechanics of this 'Aether' before the Awakening forced it upon his biology. He needed to find leverage in a house that possessed none.
Aldous was still staring at him, waiting for some impossible sign of comprehension from the infant.
Seiyuu obliged. Relaxing the muscles in his face, widening his eyes in a simulation of innocent wonder. He let out a soft, delighted coo, reaching a tiny, trembling hand out of the thick wool wrappings to bat playfully at the salt-stained tears on his father's cheek.
Aldous choked out a sob, pulling the baby tight against his chest, burying his face in the wool. "My son. My perfect son."
Yes, Seiyuu thought, his cheek pressed against the rusting leather of his father's armor. Cling to me. Protect the vessel. Endure the winter for me, Father.
And when I am grown, I will show you and this dying world the essence of my existence.