Our hands clasped as we glided across the glossy fine-grain wood to the rise and fall of melody flowing from the orchestra.

  A crowd was watching us, but I was mainly conscious of two pairs of eyes on me: the Queen’s amber drilling into my back, and Anthony’s gold piercing into my own.

  Has he always been so intense?

  “I remember when I first met you, you were sad back then too. You hid it behind anger, but I still saw it.”

  His hand guided mine through well-practiced steps. Like me, these dance movements had been drilled in him. Mama would call out the numbers to me as I moved, my arms hovering over an imaginary partner.

  We joined the stream of other pairs setting off to the music.

  “Maybe it’s just your imagination. You were really young back then.”

  He stepped into me, draped me over his arm, and pulled me back.

  “You were even younger. It should’ve been impossible for you to remember. But you’re always impossible.”

  I stared into those gilded eyes.

  Royalty… they were never good for me.

  My Beau Duc was royal. He abandoned me in the end.

  And the Dauphin… I was used and discarded.

  “This isn’t a game, Anthony. Not for me.” Our hands pushed as we weaved around each other. The rest of the dancers had ceded the floor to just the two of us. “Your mother won’t approve. She’s practically boring a hole through me with that gaze.”

  Anthony laughed, sweeping me into an impromptu pivot. I had to catch myself on my toes to keep from stumbling. “You’re so much like her. Such melancholy, hidden behind outrage and sharp words.”

  "Flowery words. Is that the focus of the Academy now?" I pulled him along into a more standard movement so that he couldn’t pop more surprises on me. “But if you want someone like your mother, why not just go after her?”

  He smiled. “You are you, Jo. Power, fragility, and resilience. It’s all clearly written on your face. There is no mask. Even that wound accentuates it.”

  He pulled me in against himself—another made-up step, and this time I did stumble. “I know they intend to hurt you in that dungeon. I begged to go so that I could stop it,” he whispered into my ear.

  “Don’t,” I pleaded. “You don’t understand what you’re getting yourself into. You’re going to get hurt.”

  I shot a glance over my shoulder and locked gazes with the Queen. She was cold and unreadable.

  Would she be willing to sacrifice her own son? If she’s a reincarnator, would she even consider him her own?

  A lingering final note sang from a flute and Anthony released my hand to thunderous applause. He smiled mischievously at me as he pulled up my fingers to kiss them.

  “So you are worried about me,” he said, exuding his usual confidence.

  —

  After Anthony, I had to accept dances from both Ben and Tomas. The two of them insisted, and I had no grounds to refuse them once I danced with Anthony. Besides, they were both good kids.

  Ben was eager to show me the moves that he had learned in the Academy, and he decided to improvise by mixing them up with the dances we did together at the town festivals. That drew a few oohs and aahs from the crowd, making me wonder who exactly he was trying to impress. It was not out of the realm of possibilities that he’d found a crush at school.

  Tomas had been practicing as well, and was enthusiastically leading me across the dance floor. Unfortunately, he was a bit short to actually pull me along, but I trailed after him, supporting the illusion. We garnered another ovation after we were done.

  I slipped through the crowd afterwards and found an exit to a garden. The noise of the ballroom faded into a dull thrum behind the silk curtains that I stepped through.

  I took a deep breath and looked up to the night sky. The full moon was high above, lighting a pale path through the hedged walls.

  Two shadows stretched out over the light spilling from the curtains and cut away the glow. It was the Twin Stars. They stood impassive, blocking the way back.

  Long Aotian stood on the gravel path, with the moonlight draped over his flowing long sleeve robe and reflecting off his onyx eyes.

  "I thought we were going to see each other next in the dungeon," I mused as he approached, my voice as cool as the night air.

  He didn't smile. "I searched. Ancient texts. Meditation. I looked for a way to save you." He shook his head slowly. "Found nothing."

  Sweetness and salt swirled over his soul. He truly did despair for me, but that lust was rather unsettling.

  "All this work, just so you could meet a 'model' in real life?" I teased him with a light laugh.

  He stepped closer, his gaze intense, his face grim. "Up close, my Soul Sight sees the real you. I see Hot Fire. Cold Ash. I see beauty. I see tears. I see tragedy, many folds." He pulled his hand over his combed back hair. "To leave you to die... is wrong."

  The sudden weight of his words struck me, sending me off kilter. “How long have you been reincarnated?"

  “Three years. I count days.”

  "You're just a baby then,” I scoffed. “The Queen has been here much longer. You shouldn't trust her. She has been playing this game long enough to have children. You’re just a pawn to her.”

  “Trying to divide and conquer I see.” A lone, regal figure strolled up the hedge lined path toward us. Sarsee smiled at the two of us, her face and jewels glowing under the full moon. “We are each other's pawns. Right now, we share a common goal, and hence we work together.”

  I stiffened. [Virtuous] tugged at my insides. Justice demanded I put an end to her. This woman, who pulled the strings behind the scene. She was the hand behind my mother’s death, I was sure of it. She pushed the Consort toward the attack on our house. She tried to kill Elise.

  But I needed information more than revenge.

  I needed leverage.

  My gaze shifted back to Long. A smile was on my lips. “So is she a ‘model’ as well?”

  Long tilted his head with a start, looking confused. “No, Sarsee, normal. I saw dark hair and big glasses, like girl who play dating game.”

  This guy! I glanced over at Sarsee, feeling exasperated for her, but her face was like carved stone, placid with no emotion.

  She would reveal nothing.

  “So what is this common goal?” I asked. "Just to get back home? You've been here for quite some time. You’re the Queen. This kingdom is yours now. Why would you even want to go back?"

  Sarsee narrowed her amber eyes at me. "My real parents... they had already lost one child. They were broken. I cannot let them bear the loss of another."

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  My breath hitched.

  Lost one child.

  My father, my mother, the one from so long ago, what must they have gone through? The screams. The wails. The missing person flyers. Waiting by the phone. Guilt clawed at my insides.

  "How… how do you know you'd even go back to the same time?" My cracking voice struggled to form the words.

  "It's a hunch," Sarsee answered. "We both came here from the exact same time in the real world. So we hope to go back to the same time as well. Some reincarnation light novels work like that."

  It made sense that time moved differently between worlds. I doubt six hundred years had passed and the same game remained popular.

  On the other hand, weren’t those lifetimes of mine loops?

  What date did I come over?

  I grasped for a time on the clock, a date in the calendar. Anything. But hundreds of years had worn all those memories to dust. None of the bits and pieces I manage to hold on to had a date or time. I was irrevocably lost.

  "Perhaps it's better that I'm the one left behind," I mumbled to myself.

  I glanced over at Long. "And you?"

  "Must return. I am family pillar. Only one working. Mom sick. Dad taking care of her. If I am not there, the sky falls on them."

  An unexpected answer. Another one sharp with pain and desperation. “So you had to survive."

  "Yes. Need to win against my transmigrator friend in my route. No choice. Game allow only one."

  Light laughter racked my body. “So now, the two of you want me to just keel over, and send you home to save your families?”

  Sarsee’s jawline hardened. “I’m sorry, but it’s our only option.” She moved in closer, softening her voice. “Long told me that deep down, you’re a good person. Do you understand that if you live then this world is doomed?”

  I narrowed my eyes at Long. "He never told me explicitly. But what happens if I live?"

  They exchanged glances. Finally, Sarsee answered. "In the game, if the Villainess lives. The Demon Sword will eventually gain free will and complete its gestation. Then it will unleash enough destructive power to fully break the world."

  I desire only the end.

  This I suspected. This I knew. That void in the depths of me, it desired only one thing. And with each rank up, I’ve been stepping ever closer to it. And free will? My tiara had already given me that.

  “Not even the demons desire that.” Sarsee poured salt onto my already open wound.

  I lashed out. "Why did you have to kill my mother?!"

  Sarsee didn't flinch. She exchanged a glance with Long, then nodded. "It is better if you tell it."

  "In game," Long said, "Demon Sword Mother goes mad. Tainted by giving birth to sword. She tries to kill household. The Duke... he is forced to put her down."

  "That is why Cecilia hated the Duke," Sarsee said softly. "And why she became the Villainess."

  I swayed on my feet. The image of Father, his cold distance, his refusal to look at me, suddenly took on a new light. How much more would he have suffered, how much longer would he have closed himself off from me, if he actually had killed my mother.

  "Priscilla was my friend," Sarsee continued. Her voice was flat, her face still hard and bare of emotion. But I could taste the sweetness of despair rising over the flavors swirling over her soul. "Leopold as well. Real friends who talked, laughed and cried together. I could not let that happen to him. I could not let him be the one to kill the woman he loved."

  My stomach churned. I lashed out even more, shouting at her. “So you’re blaming him?! That you’ve to kill her to spare him? I’m sure you benefited as well!”

  “I do not deny that.” She faced me stiffly. “I was supposed to be your mother, you know. I was the Villainess of the prequel, who should have married Leopold and then given birth to the Demon Sword. But I needed to get back. So I did all I could to avoid that route. My hands are steeped in blood.”

  But she didn’t have to take the throne. She didn’t have to take over my mother’s route. She could’ve just run away. No, the spice and bitterness that swirled over her soul dictated otherwise.

  She was too prideful to let go, too angry not to be vindictive, that was clear from Aaron’s diary.

  She didn’t have to kill him.

  She wasn’t good, in the least.

  "So, you would sacrifice your own son?" I tried to undercut her.

  "Anthony?" She raised an eyebrow, running a finger along her jaw. "Why would he be sacrificed?"

  "He promised to save me in the dungeon."

  A look of bewilderment passed between the two transmigrators.

  "You think we mean to kill you there?" Long asked. "We can't. The Heroine is needed, and she not appeared."

  "We need you to clear it of corruption," Sarsee explained. "The game never had anything like this corruption. But you seemed to be able to clear it."

  "We think it is because timeline is broken." Long shot Sarsee an accusatory glance. "That is why you are transmigrated early. You are the anomaly. So, you are the solution."

  "And Anthony..." Sarsee’s voice dropped. The confusion vanished, replaced by a terrifying, icy intensity. "He is my son. My flesh and blood. I gave birth to him. And when I leave, this world will be his. I'll make sure of it."

  She stepped forward and jabbed a manicured finger hard into my chest.

  "I can't stop him from following you. But you will keep him safe in there."

  I shuddered.

  No.

  It wasn't the threat. It was the way she said it.

  I looked at her. Really looked at her. The glint of her eyes. The imperious tilt of her chin. That absolute certainty in her voice. It was intimately familiar.

  It brought me back to the school yard where she told me we’d get back at the bully later.

  It brought me back to our family living room where she convinced me to play the electric keyboard on her behalf.

  “Dark hair and big glasses.” Long had said.

  Ally?!

  It’s a coincidence. There’s surely so many others that fit that description.

  But it feels like her.

  No… No… Please no. I don’t want to be the one that made them suffer!

  I can’t take the guilt over torturing another set of parents.

  “Hey! Get up! Don’t…” Long grabbed me as I fell, my knees scraping against the gravel, my dress pooling around me.

  He looked over to Sarsee and she shook her head.

  "So," I said in a daze. The moon, the hedges, and even their faces grew dark. "Won't you tell me this plan that involves me killing myself?"

  "Can't," Long said.

  "The Demons would know," Sarsee clarified.

  They didn’t know I have the [Tiara of Solace]. But it gives me free will, so it was better they did not know.

  "So that's why you went after Elise."

  Sarsee held her silence.

  "She was researching a way to channel a large amount of energy to a dimensional portal, for you."

  "You didn't want the demons to find out through me?" I laughed, sharp and jagged. “And so you try to kill her, using the demons. Always so damn clever…”

  The words came out hot and bitter. It almost had to be her, always looking for a way to cheat, always breaking off the corners of the Rubik’s cube.

  The dots slowly began to connect.

  "Elise had mentioned the spell requiring a lot of energy. And that’s where I come in, isn’t it? The heroine has a way to crack me open. And you would use the energy within to charge this spell and open a way back home.”

  Another realization hit me, making me deliriously giddy.

  “Oh, and having me go into the dungeon would fatten me up with the power you need… and level up Anthony so that he’s ready to take his world after this. Plans within plans?”

  I stared directly into Sarsee’s eyes and she didn’t deny it.

  Ally!

  I wanted to shout her name to see if it really was her.

  But what then?

  What could she do with this broken brother, who could barely remember her and the parents he left behind. What was more, she would have to let go of me again, to kill me, if she wanted to go back to them.

  Knowing would only bring more pain. More sweetness for her soul.

  I’m a danger to all that I love. I bring pain and despair.

  Ash lined my mouth. My fingers brushed the open cut on my cheek—the gift, the curse, of holding on.

  Click…

  I slowly rose to my feet. “Perhaps… neither of you had played the game enough.”

  “No! I played many hours. All routes. No sleep. I know game.” Long’s hand slashed emphatically through the air. “No other way.”

  But has he played one route, over and over again until the buttons and direction pad were worn down?

  Had he played enough where the game had become an extension of him, and he no longer had to even think of his fingers.

  Had he truly become part of the game?

  “Maybe, you have not played enough to find the pattern.”

  All those lifetimes, of trying to hold on, trying to find the truth.

  Maybe as my soul was being ground to dust, something harder was forming underneath, being hammered into folds.

  Maybe, that was why the sword would only appear after I had endured so much.

  Sarsee and my gazes locked again.

  A flicker of recognition, or at the very least a flicker of doubt appeared in the amber of her eyes.

  Oh, sister of mine. Here I am. The player, the sword, the perpetual martyr.

  "So how much time do I have left?"