Chapter 1 - The Reject of House Valemyr
"Some are born to rule. Others to crawl. And you, Ashen... you're not even fit to crawl." — Duke Veyron Valemyr
Dawn never rose for Ashen.
The sun shone for nobles, for the blessed, for heirs.
For him, there was only the clammy darkness of a cellar, infested with rats, mold, and humiliation.
He woke with a jolt. Not because of a dream—he hadn't had those in a long time. It was a kick in the ribs that tore him from sleep.
— Get up, filth.
The voice was deep and bitter. A servant's. Not even a noble. Just a lackey the duke allowed to beat his own son.
Ashen sat up with difficulty. A tooth fell from his mouth. He picked it up in silence, like an automaton. He had learned not to scream. Not to cry. Every tear summoned another blow.
— The dining hall is filthy, you cockroach. Want the guests to throw up when they see you again?
Ashen didn't answer. His legs were weak. He hadn't eaten in two days. But it didn't matter. No one cared whether he survived.
Through the corridors of House Valemyr, the boy walked in silence, barefoot on the cold stone floors. Eyes followed him—full of scorn, hatred, and sometimes worse: amused disgust.
Kael, his half-brother, appeared at a corner. He had just finished sword training, shirtless, glistening with sweat, wearing his usual predatory grin.
— Well, well. Look what the rats dragged in.
— ...
Ashen tried to slip by without a word, but Kael blocked his path.
— Not greeting your brother, bastard?
— ...
Kael grabbed the back of his neck and slammed him against the wall.
— Say "Lord Kael," or I'll rip out your tongue.
— M-my... Lord Kael... Ashen mumbled, blood in his mouth.
— There. That's better. Here. Catch this.
He tossed a bucket of latrine waste at his feet. The filthy water splashed his face.
— Clean that with your tongue. The floor's cleaner than you.
And he walked away laughing.
Ashen fell to his knees. He trembled. He no longer knew what hurt more: the violence... or the indifference.
Later, in the kitchens, Ashen tried to beg for a scrap of bread. He hadn't eaten in three days.
— Please... just a little... even moldy crust...
The cook, a massive woman with a grease-stained apron, struck him with a hot ladle.
— You think you're entitled to food prepared for real Valemyrs?! she shouted. Go eat your own filth, you runt!
Ashen recoiled, clutching his burned cheek.
— You really want to eat? sneered a kitchen apprentice.
He pulled out a gnawed bone, caked with mud.
— Here. For you. Like a good dog.
They laughed. All of them. Even those who pretended not to look.
Ashen took the bone. He couldn't afford to refuse.
That evening, he was summoned to the grand hall. Duke Veyron Valemyr sat upon his black throne. A rigid, cold silhouette. Eyes of steel. No father could have been more distant.
— Come forth, birth mistake.
Ashen knelt. He didn't dare raise his head.
— I've pondered for a long time. Should I send you to the temple as a cellar rat? Or sell you to the salt mines?
Silence fell, heavy as stone.
— But I've found something better. You'll undergo the Blood Trial, alongside my true children. That way... when the stone rejects your existence, the whole kingdom will know you're a reject. And you'll be discarded like the garbage you are.
A dry laugh echoed in the hall. Ashen shivered. Around him, Kael, Lira, even Elaira—all wore predatory grins.
— But why wait? said Kael, drawing a dagger. We could already see how much blood he can lose without dying.
— Enough, Veyron said. I want him alive for the ritual. After that...
He didn't finish his sentence. He didn't need to.
Ashen was dragged back to his "room": a cage in the stables, shared with a sick dog. He collapsed, face in the soiled straw.
His thoughts were ruins.
But deep in the abyss, a cold fire was born. Not love. Not hope.
Hatred.
"If they want a monster..."
"...then I'll give them one."
"He who is not even worthy of the whip is already lost. But he who is whipped to entertain the court... is worse than lost." — Noble Proverb of High-Val
The morning rose over the Valemyr estate in golden light, soft and peaceful.
But such beauty applied only to the living.
Not to those dragged like animals.
Not to mistakes exhibited like trophies.
Ashen was naked, kneeling in the courtyard, arms tied behind his back.
The marble stones burned his knees. Chains bound his wrists. The iron cut into his flesh. But he said nothing.
He stared straight ahead—not out of defiance, but out of instinct. Survival.
Don't meet their gaze.
Don't invite a remark.
Don't trigger another round of blows.
But it had already been decided.
— Are you sure he's still breathing? asked Lira, his half-sister, smiling.
— I can check, replied Kael, tapping Ashen's side with the tip of his boot.
Duke Veyron and Duchess Elaira stood above on the balconies, dressed in dark, opulent clothing.
A dozen noble guests took their places in stone bleachers, installed specially for the occasion.
— My friends, the duke announced calmly, today, you shall see what becomes of a cursed child who failed to die in the cradle.
Laughter rippled through the crowd.
— I present to you... our beast of shame.
Kael picked up a leather whip and cracked it in the air.
— Do you know why you're here, mistake?
Ashen barely spoke.
— To entertain, he whispered.
Kael leaned close and burst out laughing.
— Exactly! At least you've remembered your purpose.
Then he struck.
The whip lashed around Ashen's thin torso, tearing open the skin. A red line split across his ribs.
— A scream, maybe? asked Kael. No? Still playing the stoic?
— You think you deserve the dignity of suffering in silence? cut in Elaira, as cold as death. Even your pain is mediocre.
She descended the balcony steps with two handmaids. In her hands, a silver goblet.
— Ashen, she said as she neared, look at me.
He raised his eyes slowly. They were empty.
— You have dishonored my name. You have no beauty, no strength, no mind. You're not even useful as a slave. So tell me... why do you insist on breathing?
Silence.
— You don't know? Neither do I.
She threw the goblet's contents into his face.
It was acidic wine, mixed with coal ash. Ashen screamed. The liquid burned his skin.
— That's your only communion today, she said. Fire. Salt. And shame.
The nobles applauded.
At noon, Ashen was dragged to the throne room's center.
He wore a burning iron mask, forged in mockery of his own face—a hideous caricature, crafted by Kael himself.
— Ladies and gentlemen, Kael announced, here is our beast, our Ashen Dog. Let him crawl for us!
They forced him to move on all fours, the mask bolted to his face.
Each movement cut him—internal spikes scraped his skin.
— Play dead! yelled a noble.
Ashen collapsed.
— Be a dragon! screamed another.
He opened his mouth to roar, but Kael shoved a glove of mud inside.
— Too slow, Kael said. Dragons aren't silent.
He grabbed Ashen by the hair.
— Want to run away? Want to die?
Ashen, panting, spat dirt.
— No... I just want it to stop.
— You think you decide anything?
He drove his knee into Ashen's ribs. A crack. Two ribs broken.
Ashen collapsed. Silent tears ran down his chin.
But no one saw them.
That evening, the guests dined.
Ashen was chained beneath the great table, like a hunting dog. His arms were shackled. He hadn't eaten in days. He salivated as the scent of roasted meat passed above his head.
— Want a bone, beast? asked a young noble with a grin.
— Yes...
The boy tossed a bone to the far side of the room.
— Crawl for it. With your mouth. Hands stay tied.
Ashen obeyed. He crawled, chains scraping the floor. He hit a chair leg, fell, got back up, and reached the bone.
He gripped it with his teeth.
— Good, good, Elaira mocked. At least you've learned obedience.
Veyron stood.
— This spectacle is at an end. Tomorrow... the Blood Trial begins. And then, dear Ashen... the world will know what you truly are.
And what you are not.
Ashen said nothing. He stared at the floor. A mess of blood, mud, wine, and shame.
But inside him, a black fire burned.
Not a spark of hope.
But a certainty.
"I will remember you all."
"Every smile, every blow, every word."
"And when I return..."
"...you will crawl lower than I ever did."
"The man who is offered is no longer a man. He is a silence that still breathes."
- Court Canticle for Sacrificed Souls
The air stank of iron, incense, and fear.
The inner courtyard of the Valemyr estate was full.
Nobles, monks, soldiers, and the members of House Valemyr stood in a circle around a black altar inlaid with red stones.
The ground was painted with ancient symbols, drawn in the blood of animals sacrificed at dawn.
At the center, Ashen knelt, shirtless, in chains.
His arms were stretched out in a cross, bound by rough ropes that tore at his shoulders and wrists.
He had been bathed, perfumed... like a lamb before slaughter.
His empty eyes stared at the horizon.
His heart still beat, but nothing tied him to this flesh anymore.
Around him, four masked priests chanted the verses of the Blood Ritual:
"Let he who has no name, no land, no family, begiven to the sacred fire..."
"...Let his existence beerased, and his body offered to royal will."
Duke Veyron Valemyr, his father, stepped forward.
He wore a black cloak stitched with red thread and a ceremonial smile.
- People of blood and honor, he declared solemnly, today I, Veyron of House Valemyr, present to His Majesty Maelrath an offering...
He turned to Ashen.
- ...This thing. This mistake. This reject.
- We raised him, fed him, tolerated him. But today, we wash our hands of him.
- He shall become "The Fool," toy of the Court. He shall bear our name no longer.
Duchess Elaira, his mother, approached, holding a scroll sealed in black wax.
- This is the Act of Renunciation, she said coldly. Signed by every member of House Valemyr.
We renounce Ashen and confirm his transfer as royal property.
She read each line aloud.
Each word landed like a slap.
Ashen felt each syllable slicing through him, turning him to living ash.
Then came Kael, his half-brother.
- You know, Ashen, he whispered by his ear, I was the one who came up with your new name.
Ashen didn't respond. His teeth clenched.
His eyes stared into the void, but inside, a silent scream swelled.
- You thought we loved you, didn't you? That if you endured the pain, we'd accept you?
You're nothing. And you're going to die laughing.
Lira, his half-sister, stepped forward next.
- Want to know why I never helped you? she asked with a cruel smile.
Because your suffering pleased me. It made me feel powerful.
She spat at his feet.
A cold, contemptuous spit.
The crowd laughed.
Then, like a living shadow, King Maelrath entered.
Draped in purple, his face veiled in black silk, he walked slowly, like a blade gliding toward a throat.
He circled Ashen, studying him.
- He's not a man, he said at last. Perfect.
He touched Ashen's cheek with his gloved fingers.
- I accept him. He shall be the Fool. He shall wear the mask, sleep on the floor.
And if he ever fails to amuse me... I'll kill him live, before the Court.
A snap of his fingers.
They brought forth a cage.
Black iron, etched with runes of erasure.
They forced Ashen inside. He did not resist. He looked to the sky.
The door closed. Sealed. Welded with molten lead.
The cage shuddered.
It left the Valemyr estate, pulled by two black horses.
Ashen was alone. The world around him blurred.
He felt every jolt as a punch to the chest.
He closed his eyes.
And he thought.
They stole my name. And I let it go.
They took my voice. And I did not scream.
But they forgot one thing...
When you tear out a man's heart, sometimes... it grows back-twisted.
I am their offering. Their shame. Their living trash.
But in this cage, I change.
Blood still drips from my wrists. Each drop is a laugh they will one day hear.
They think they've broken me. But all they've done is dig deeper.
You wanted a fool?
You'll get a nightmare.
Yes, I'll laugh.
But not for your amusement.
I'll laugh as your palaces burn.
I'll laugh when your children scream.
I'll laugh with the crows.
I am the end of your forgetting.
The whisper in your walls.
The laughter you'll hear in the dark.
And when you beg me to stop-
I'll laugh louder.
A laugh rose-weak, strangled.
- Ah... ha... haha...
Then stronger.
- AHAHAHA... AHAHAHAHAH!
The guards riding beside the carriage turned, pale.
Ashen laughed. Laughed like a madman.
- I AM THE FOOL! he screamed in the cage. I AM FREE! FREE! AHAAH!
He slammed his head against the bars. Again. And again.
- NO MORE PAIN! ONLY LAUGHTER! LAUGHTER! LAUGHTER!
His eyes were wild. Shattered mirrors of a ruined soul.
- I will love you all... to death.
The cage rolled forward.
The Fool laughed.
The last echo of my laughter still rang in the cage, like a venomous serpent hissing through the bars.
I laughed, still, endlessly.
I laughed because it was all I had left.
A broken, piercing laughter, sharpened by madness and pain—my scream of survival in this theater of shadows, where I was nothing but a toy.
King Maelrath, wrapped in purple, watched me with dark, hungry eyes.
The entire court waited, breathless, hanging on my every twitch.
— Fool, the king murmured, soft and dangerous, make me laugh. Until my guts burn and my guards collapse.
I didn't need to be told twice. I was already on stage, whipped forward by the madness that consumed me.
— Why does the moon cry, Majesty? I shouted, staggering, wild-eyed.
— Because she can never touch the sun—just as I will never touch peace!
Loud laughter. Coarse voices. Cruel howls through the thick air.
I saw their gazes—vipers—drinking in my suffering, my madness.
— More! roared Duke Veyron, his eyes gleaming with hatred.
— Make him laugh 'til he screams! ordered Lira, her contemptful grin stretching wide.
Day after day, I was the show, the torn puppet still giggling.
I tottered on the fragile thread of reason, performing my number until my throat burned with blood.
Each joke was a blade.
Each laugh, a dagger.
My teeth clenched. My lungs shrieked.
But still, I laughed.
One day, Kael approached with his usual cruel smirk.
— You really think laughter hides what you are? he sneered.
I spat in his face, breath ragged.
— I am the fire beneath the ash. The fool who dances on his torturers' graves.
He chuckled.
— You'll never be more than a broken puppet.
Laughter is a sweet poison that keeps me alive.
But beneath this mask of madness, I burn.
I am no longer a man—but a scream.
A scream no one hears.
I am a shattered reflection of a cruel world.
Each laugh is a tear.
And still, I laugh.
Because if I stop...
They win.
And me?
I'm not dead yet.
But the end of the play came.
One day, in the heart of the court, as I delivered some grotesque joke, I saw the king frozen.
His face darkened. His eyes no longer glimmered.
— Fool, he said coldly, you no longer amuse me.
Silence fell like a guillotine.
They dragged me from the cage, my body broken, my mind flickering.
They dragged me into a cold room, damp, with walls of black stone.
They chained me to the wall.
My wrists. My ankles.
Muscles stretched. Skin raw.
Galdric, the executioner, entered. His smile was a blade.
— The king wants to see how far the Fool can go, he whispered.
The torture began.
Cold needles pierced my fingers, sank into my palms.
Each stab was a hammer blow.
Each drop of blood, a voiceless scream.
Then came fire.
A burning torch licked my open wounds.
My flesh twisted, melted beneath the flame.
I screamed.
The chains bit into me.
I screamed until my voice broke.
And still, they didn't stop.
The blows came like a symphony.
Wooden clubs. Screeching whips. Iron claws. Flaming pincers.
Each moment drew me closer to the abyss.
Pain is a cruel master.
It tears me.
It pulls me from life.
But in that pit, I still stand.
My screams are the last breath of the man I once was.
I am a shadow.
A wounded flame.
The Fool cries—but the Fool endures.
Hours stretched into centuries.
Time lost meaning.
I fell into a dark void.
I awoke in an even crueler nightmare.
Thin, cold wires were attached to my limbs.
I felt every tug, every controlled movement, every stolen gesture.
I had become the perfect marionette.
The king entered, cloaked in funereal purple.
— Behold, Your Majesty, the Fool dances at your command, a guard announced with a wicked grin.
My head was heavy. My limbs stiff.
But in my madness, a spark lit within me.
They pulled me.
Made me move.
Forced grotesque gestures from my frame.
I recited jokes. Shouted curses. Laughed on command.
But none of it was me.
My body was no longer mine.
Stripped of will.
Slave to mechanical madness.
But my mind burned.
Beneath the strings. Beneath the cage.
A flame still flickered.
The court laughed.
Adored this macabre show.
My broken voice tried to reclaim itself—but it was only an echo.
Then, one day—
Silence.
The king no longer laughed.
His icy gaze struck me like lightning.
He rose slowly—like a verdict carved from stone.
— It's time to end this.
I felt the blade fall.
The Fool died.
But the fire never went out.
In madness... I had found truth.
Life is a cage.
And death...
The only freedom.
I sank into the dark.
"Thereis no more pain. No more flesh. Only the memory of torment and theecho of laughter."
His last breath left his burned lips.
His body hung disjointed, suspended by snapped strings like a puppet from a closed theater.
But Ashen...
Ashen wasn't dead.
Or rather: he was dead... but still thinking.
Am I still something? Am I a memory? A fever?
A fever that thinks, breaks, stretches into eternity?
They killed me.
The king. My family. The court. The laughter.
The cage. The wires in my muscles.
The blood.
My own laughter.
Is this what it means to be mad?
A void stretched out before me.
Black. Dense. Without horizon.
And yet, at the center—a table.
Round. Of gray stone. Cold. Eternal.
Motionless within a shifting nothingness.
Around it, forty-four chairs. All occupied.
Masked, deformed faces.
Some cried while laughing. Others laughed while screaming.
Some sat broken, like shattered dolls.
Forty-four...
The number of madness.
Forty-four fragments of a soul shattered when the mind can no longer be whole.
Was this my new home?
Ashen stood. Naked. Transparent. Or perhaps clothed in suffering.
His reflection did not exist.
There was no light.
And yet, he saw everything.
One chair was empty.
Across from the highest throne, where a figure stood with arms crossed, watching.
— Sit, it said.
The voice had no age. No gender.
It echoed like a thought forgotten upon waking.
Ashen stepped forward.
— Why am I here? he whispered.
— Because you crossed the unthinkable.
Because you laughed through agony.
Because you were the Fool... to the end.
He sat.
And thus began a silent monologue, heard only by him.
Or perhaps by the world, misunderstood.
"There is no single truth, only forty-four shards of the same broken mirror."
When consciousness returned to Ashen, he felt neither pain, nor chains, nor flesh. Only a pale light bathing an immense, circular, perfect room.
Before him stretched a large round table, made of a material he did not know. It seemed to be a mixture of obsidian, bone, and memories. Around this table stood 44 chairs, all occupied. He was seated in chair number 44. The last one. The only one looking dilapidated. Painted in chipped red, it creaked with every movement.
The other seats were all different — some massive and ornate, others bare stone, or made of glass, shadow, flames, chains, dead flowers, or black ink.
The 43 people around him... were himself.
Or rather, reflections of another Ashen. Alternative versions. Doubles from parallel worlds, all bearing different faces but the same soul.
One had burning eyes and cracked armor. Another wore the robe of an archmage. A third wore an iron mask, a fourth laughed endlessly while scratching his skin.
The one in chair number 1 spoke. His voice was calm, deep, worn by time.
— You are finally here. The last to awaken. The forty-fourth.
— The Fool, murmured another. The one who laughed until death.
Ashen said nothing. He watched them, fascinated and afraid.
— You are... me?
— No. We are what you could be. What you already are, in other threads of fate. You will recognize us all, sooner or later.
One by one, each stood to introduce themselves, their voices blending with the ethereal strangeness of the room.
The Judge – Incarnation of pure, cold, inflexible justice. Ashen became a magistrate in an empire of absolute laws.
The Martyr – Tortured for his beliefs, he saved a rebellion at the cost of his flesh.
The Traitor – The one who betrayed everyone he loved to survive.
The Hero – Savior of a kingdom, adored but empty inside.
The Tyrant – Having become king by blood, he reigns in fear and silence.
The Pilgrim – Eternal traveler, seeking endless redemption.
The Butcher – Drowned in the blood of his enemies, he forgot why he killed.
The Sage – Eternal old man, guardian of lost knowledge.
The Dead – Ashen who committed suicide as a child, still haunting the void's corridors.
The Poet – Cursed to speak only in verse, driving listeners mad.
The Child – The one who never grew, frozen in fear of his earliest years.
The Mask – Constantly changing personality, never truly himself.
The Forgotten – Ashen who lost his name, his past, his identity.
The Knight – Faithful to oaths he no longer understands.
The Scribe – Writes the history of others, but never his own.
The Apostle – Devotee of a god who may not exist.
The Monster – Man-beast fusion, rejected by all, including himself.
The Vagabond – Without ties, without purpose. A free and empty specter.
The Laughing Fool – The one who laughs at everything, including his own agony.
The Witness – Eternal spectator of others' dramas, powerless.
The Architect – Creator of worlds, but incapable of building his own.
The Hunter – Obsessive, chasing a truth he does not want to hear.
The Twin – Ashen who stole his brother's life in another world.
The Shard – Fragment of a broken soul, wandering from mind to mind.
The Mute – One who can no longer speak, having been silenced.
The Rebel – The one who destroyed everything to no longer feel dominated.
The Warlord – Former soldier, become an instrument of carnage.
The Alchemist – Seeker of truth, driven mad by realizing it does not exist.
The Coward – The one who flees everything, even his own thoughts.
The Dreamer – Lost in an inner world so rich he forgot reality.
The Puppeteer – Manipulates others to forget he is controlled.
The Screaming Mute – Who only speaks through the cries of his wounds.
The Mirror – Always reflects others, but never truly exists.
The Flayed – The one stripped of everything, even identity.
The Hanged – Suspended between life and death, unable to choose.
The Crumpled – A wrinkled soul, used and discarded.
The Sleeper – The one who has slept for a thousand years to no longer suffer.
The Drowned – Overwhelmed by memories of a sea he never saw.
The Empty Laughter – The one who laughs without reason, because he forgot everything.
The Broken – The one who did not resist, but kept living.
The Infinite – The one who lives every life, again and again, without end.
The Hourglass – Who sees time pass, unable to stop it.
The Judged – The one who must answer to his own reflections.
The Fool – You. The one who has endured everything, lost everything... but laughed despite it all.
Ashen remained silent.
— You are me... and I am you...
A murmur ran through the room.
— Yes. But you have only been a fragment. Now, you can choose.
— Choose what?
— To reincarnate. To begin again. But differently. You have lived through hell. Now, one of us can lend you his path.
— And if I refuse?
— Then you will remain here, eternally, watching who you could have been.
Ashen placed his hands on the table. He looked at them, one by one.
His gaze returned to seat number 1. Then to 43, the Judged. Finally to his own seat, number 44. The Fool.
— Can I... keep my madness? he asked, his eyes shining.
The Mask replied:
— You can tame it. Or transform it. Every life is a page. Every chair, a pen.
A solemn silence.
Then a white light burst from the center of the table. And the Voice spoke, like thunder in the hearts of souls:
"Ashen, broken, twisted, sacrificed... Choose your mask. And begin again."
— Validated choice. Time transfer activated. Fragmentation of the present. Compression of the past. Transmutation of the soul...
Ashen clenched her teeth.
— Wait, he whispered. Just a second...
But it was too late.
The others were reaching out to him. They were smiling. Some were crying. Others were laughing.
A crash. A red light, then white, then black.
His body was dismembered by the vacuum.
His soul?
Dissolved, then resealed.
Recast. Spit out. Redefined.
He felt his own name be torn in him. He screamed. He was no longer Ashen. He was no longer anything. He was nothing more than raw will.
Then... he opened his eyes.
The cold was biting his fingers.
The ground was hard. The air wet.
Footsteps. Wheels. The cries of merchants.
He recognized the sounds even before seeing the walls. He knew that smell of coal and burnt bread. This hubbub of a city never asleep.
Ashen slowly straightened up, his limbs stiff.
Around him, Edelstadt.
The capital. His city. The one where he had grown up, lived... and been broken.
But it wasn't the same time. He felt it. The cobblestones were clearer, the signs different, and the walls... younger. Less eaten.
They sent me to the past.
He got up, staggering. No one paid attention to him. He was just another beggar in the alley.
He clenched his fists.
So... everything starts again.