Chapter five : "Understanding the Situation"

Gradually, Nevales awakens, and his body is painfully stricken. It was his lower neck injury that bothered him most, as if it reminded him of what just happened. With his trembling fingers, he sensed that area as if it were restoring to him the image of the tragedy he had experienced, each movement stirring up new pain in his body. When he opened his eyes, his nose was struck by a stench, causing him to quickly cover his nose with his hand. It was so stenchy that his stomach was twisted.

"Where the hell am I? What is that stench?"

Every move he made was accompanied by an aggrieved goddess, and even the slightest acts caused him pain. Nefalice quickly rises up, and instead of appearing as expected to panic, there is a strange mixture of confusion and question on his face. The bond and trust he had with Edward was stronger and deeper than anything else in his life, even stronger than the bond he had with his parents.

"Why did Edward do it?" he muttered in a soft voice with a perplexing question.

Although shocked, he knew he would only get an answer from Edward himself. Therefore, he breathed slowly trying to gather his thoughts, and then began to examine himself and his surroundings, something he learned well from the fighting books and Edward's lessons on magic. Edward often tells him that the magician's condition and surrounding environment greatly influence his power and stability. WHERE HE FOUND HIM WAS A SLIGHTLY DARK ALLEY, BARELY REACHED BY LIGHT, FILLED WITH TRASH THAT WAS EVERYWHERE. The stench that disturbed him from the moment he woke up was still around him, and he did not lift his hand from his nose for a moment. HIS FACE HAD A CONSTANT EXPRESSION OF DISGUSTMENT, AS IF STAYING IN THIS DIRTY PLACE WAS TOO MUCH FOR HIM. Again, with a voice of profound indignation, he complained: "What kind of place is this? Disgusting!" After sniffing him out, he checked himself out. He was wearing a one-piece costume, in a slightly faded color, with large sleeves covering his hands completely.He was surprised to see his blue eyes slipping toward something inside his clothes. There was a paper that was perfectly folded, carefully hidden.Quickly take it out and open it, like he's clinging to any answer. As soon as he saw the handwriting on the paper, he immediately knew it was Edward's handwriting. His curiosity grew and he immediately began reading the letter.With every word he read, the whole world seemed to be collapsing around him. His frozen face turned pale, and his hands slightly shivered while holding the paper. The first part of the letter was enough to destroy everything he knew. Nevales lowered the message a little, his face tucked in with a heavy silence. His eyes were traumatised, but still, there was a slight trace of fear that crept into his features. "Oliver's family was exterminated..." Repeat the phrase inside him, as if it needed time to take root in his mind. His family... The family that held the title of Count, the influential political and military power of the kingdom, a great family that was influenced only by the fourDuke families or the royal family itself, wiped out entirely?Oliver's family was not an ordinary family. She was one of the most powerful noble families in the kingdom, holding the title of count which placed her in a unique position among the nobility classes. The Oliver family was a symbol of strength and stability, and its influence extended to almost all corners of the kingdom.However, there were limits to their influence. Above them were the four Duke families, which controlled the major regions of the kingdom, each representing a political, military, and economic stronghold. These four families—the Vernstons in the south, the Brandels in the north, the Kleins in the east, and the Malverds in the west—formed a layer above the Counts, standing only below the imperial family.

Still, the Olivers were always respected, sometimes even feared, for their power and influence that far surpassed any other Count family. It was rare that any major political decision was made without consulting Count Alfred.

Nevallis clenched the letter tightly in his hands, his mind working at full capacity. "What the hell happened? How could my family be wiped out like this?"

When he finished reading the entire letter, his expression had changed. It was not anger or sadness that dominated him, but a mixture of confusion, mystery, and deep astonishment.

He slowly lowered the letter, his eyes lost, as if searching for an explanation in the empty space in front of him.

Inside, he was trying to understand the situation. "Was it one of the Duke families? Or perhaps... an order from the imperial family?"

Doubts began to haunt him, and questions clashed in his mind. But he knew one thing for sure: no matter the reason, his life had changed forever.

....

Nevallis stood in the dark alley, his heart drowning in a sea of confusing thoughts. He stared at the torn piece of paper in his hand, and the sound of it tearing in the surrounding silence seemed like the last trace of any connection to his past. He sighed deeply, contemplating the words he had just read. He didn't have any real attachment to his family in the first place. He suspected that nothing truly connected him to them, even though he was supposed to be the heir. He didn't have anyone who cared about him there. Even his parents, if you counted the time he had spent with them throughout his life, it wouldn't add up to more than two months. It was as if they were mere names in a family registry, exchanging responsibility for him as just a duty, nothing more.

He recalled the words his father once said to him: "The extermination of noble families is not an uncommon thing. It's how matters are settled in the noble world of the kingdom."

Those words, which once filled him with anger and fear as a child, were now part of the inescapable reality. His father had wanted him to adopt those ideas, to be capable of eradicating any family without hesitation or mercy. That was the nature of the nobility, in his view— their blood was worth no more than their desires and ambitions. The brutality of the world he had been raised in was now glaringly clear in this moment. Nobles, in his eyes, were like predators who wouldn't hesitate to kill each other for power and influence. This was the world he had been forced to live in—a world without mercy or compassion, where there was no place for the weak or the sentimental. His gaze shifted from the torn paper to his hand, where something else had caught his attention in Edward's letter.

It was a ring made from deep black metal, faintly gleaming. The edges of the ring were inscribed with ancient runes written in a forgotten language, a language known only to a few. This was a Void Ring, a rare item that the magic of this era could not replicate. It was one of the rarest artifacts in the world, and many wished to own it, even the Duke families.

In the world of the nobility, a ring of this kind was so rare that Nevallis wouldn't have been surprised if one or all of the Duke families owned one.

He was startled upon seeing the ring. He knew it was something rare, but he never expected to end up owning it. Moving away from his disoriented thoughts, Nevallis closed his fist around the ring and followed Edward's instructions precisely. He injected pure mana into it, as Edward had taught him. Injecting mana into an item wasn't easy, especially with a Void Ring.

He drew the mana from inside himself and carefully poured it into the ring. Despite his extreme exhaustion, he managed to complete the task. But when he pulled something out of the ring, he collapsed to the ground, panting from exhaustion. The process was incredibly draining, and he felt as though all his energy had been drained.

After resting for a moment, Nevallis lifted his head and glanced at the item he had pulled out of the ring.

It was a delicate bracelet made from dark metal, resembling a mix of silver and black onyx. It glowed with soft lines like veins of living light. These lines flickered as if they touched his very heart. In the center of the bracelet, there was a small, shimmering stone with an odd color, as if it changed with the surrounding light.

As Edward told him in the letter, it was a purpose used to change the shape; Edward described it as a bracelet that could change its shape a little like the color of his hair and eyes, but the bracelet needed mana to work.

Luckily Edward injected Mana into the bracelet and sealed it, Nevales guessed that he would not need to worry about the bracelet's mana needs for several months.

He took a deep breath and injected a simple thread of pure mana into the bracelet. After all, the change was not moral, it was physical. If a mirror surprised Nevales, his hair and eyes turned black.

He took another breath, then began to move slowly out of the alley, his steps were quiet and heavy, his eyes glazed black when he finally came out of the dark alley, he felt something strange in the air, as if everything around him had changed as well. He waited a moment to make things clear in his mind, and then he looked around slowly. He was surprised by what he saw.