The safe room wasn't safe anymore.
We could hear the fighting getting closer, magic blasts shaking loose centuries-old dust from the ceiling. Shion materialized from her scouting run, her usually composed face tight with worry.
"The main passages are compromised," she reported. "Uncle Nasaki's forces are using tracking magic – they're following the royal bloodline's magical signature."
I cursed under my breath. Of course they were. In my previous life, I'd learned that any security system could be turned against its users. Here, our family's distinctive magical aura, usually a source of pride, had become a glowing target.
"The Emperor and Empress?" Sora asked, though her tone suggested she already knew the answer.
Shion's silence said everything.
"We need to help them!" I started toward the door, but Rick's strong hand caught my shoulder.
"Your Highness," his voice was gentle but firm, "your father gave us explicit orders. If the castle fell, we were to ensure your survival above all else."
"To hell with orders!" I tried channeling magic into my palm, but Shuna quickly disrupted my spell matrix. Show-off. "They're my parents!"
"And you're the last hope of the Holy Eastland," Beni countered, adjusting her bow string. "Sometimes living is harder than dying, my prince."
Before I could argue further, a familiar scream echoed through the castle halls. Mother. My blood turned to ice.
This time, no one could stop me. I slammed open the safe room's door and ran, my guards cursing as they followed. The castle corridors were a battlefield – bodies of loyal servants and guards littered the floor, walls scorched black with magical residue.
We emerged onto a balcony overlooking the main courtyard, and that's when I saw them.
Father and Mother, bound in anti-magic chains, forced to kneel before Uncle Nasaki and his Southern Empire allies. The courtyard was filled with soldiers – some ours, some foreign, all watching the spectacle with varying degrees of satisfaction or horror.
"The great Emperor William," Uncle Nasaki's voice dripped with mockery, "champion of peace and prosperity. Look where your weak policies have led us. The people want strength, brother. They want glory."
"The people," Father's voice rang out clear despite his bonds, "want to live without fear. Something you've never understood, Nasaki."
"Bold words from a dead man." Uncle Nasaki raised his hand, dark magic swirling around his fingers. "Any last wisdom for your son, wherever that brat is hiding?"
Mother suddenly looked up, her eyes somehow finding mine on the balcony. Don't, I mouthed, seeing her expression shift. Please don't.
But Mother had always been stubborn. "Welheim!" she shouted, drawing every eye in the courtyard. "Live! Live and remember who you are!"
"There you are, nephew!" Uncle Nasaki's face split into a cruel grin as he spotted me. "Come watch your inheritance burn!"
"Your Highness, move!" Sora tackled me back just as a blast of dark magic obliterated the balcony where I'd been standing. Through the falling debris, I saw Uncle Nasaki gesture to his mages.
"No..." The word came out as a broken whisper as magical flames erupted around my parents. Not normal fire – these flames were black and purple, designed to burn slowly, to make death an art form.
Father's eyes met mine one last time. Despite the pain, he smiled. Then the flames rose higher, and their screams began.
"We have to go," Shion's voice seemed to come from very far away. "Now, Your Highness!"
My guards practically carried me as we fled. Behind us, Uncle Nasaki's laughter mixed with my parents' dying screams in a symphony that would echo in my nightmares forever.
We ran through secret passages, up towers, and across rooftops. My guards had clearly planned this escape route, though I was barely conscious of our movement. My mind kept replaying those final moments – Mother's last words, Father's smile, the flames...
"There they are!"
Enemy soldiers appeared ahead of us. Beni's arrows found three throats before they could raise the alarm. Rick and Sora moved in perfect sync, their swords dancing in the morning light as they cleared our path. Shuna's magic deflected incoming spells while Shion seemed to be everywhere at once, her shadow-walking abilities turning her into death's own dancer.
"Almost there," Rick grunted as we reached the castle's outer wall. "The escape route is—"
An explosion rocked the wall, sending us stumbling. Through the smoke, I saw Uncle Nasaki rising on a platform of dark energy, flanked by his most powerful mages.
"Did you really think I'd let the last legitimate heir escape?" he called out. "Come now, Welheim. Die with dignity, like your parents."
Something snapped inside me. The grief, the rage, the helplessness – it all crystallized into a cold, hard purpose. I felt magic surge through my body, more power than I'd ever channeled before.
"Your Highness, don't!" Shuna recognized the spell I was preparing. "That much magic will kill you!"
"Better dead than captured," I snarled, raising my hands.
But Sora had other plans. With a swift movement, she struck the back of my neck with her sword hilt. As consciousness faded, I felt myself being lifted.
"Forgive us, Your Highness," Shion's voice drifted through the encroaching darkness. "But your mother told you to live."
The last thing I saw was Rick throwing something at Uncle Nasaki's platform – a magical bomb that erupted into a blinding flash. Then darkness took me, and the burning castle of my childhood faded away.
I'd always thought my first death had been meaningless – just another overworked programmer burning out. But watching my second family burn, hearing their screams fade into the roar of magical flames, I realized something:
Death is never meaningless. It's what you do with the pain of survival that gives it purpose.
And I had just found mine.