Reborn as the Empire's Blind Prince

2. Garrett

Lucian's eyes remained closed as he examined the glowing figure approaching him.

It was a man, dressed in the heavy, interlocking armor of the Everstar guards.

Even without physical sight, the False Sight rendered the intricate plating as sharp, white translucent lines.

A broadsword hung heavy at his hip. Lucian recognized him instantly from the inherited memories.

Garrett.

Whenever a new heir was born to the Everstar family, they were assigned a personal guardian.

They were tasked to be protectors, advisors, and silent shadows until the young master awakened.

They resided together in the Starlight Castle, a sanctuary where entry without the Emperor's explicit orders was a crime punishable by immediate execution.

That fact alone made the assassination attempt even more disturbing. If Lucian, Garrett and a few royal assistants were the only ones permitted in the castle grounds, how did that ring end up in the grass?

"Young master—you're standing!" Garrett gasped. His iron-shod boots thudded across the packed dirt as he rushed forward.

His voice was thick with an agitation that bordered on panic.

Lucian didn't speak. He kept his eyes shut, using his False Sight to observe the energy emitting from the older man.

Ming Ho hadn't known much about this world, but the old Lucian's memories provided the basics he needed to know.

The world was fueled by essence. Essence was pumped from the heart through the veins, a raw energy that could only be fully unleashed after the Awakening Ordeal, granting the Awakened their abilities.

'His energy feels like a dying candle trying to stay lit,' Lucian noted. He watched the frayed, flickering white lines that emitted from Garrett's body.

From the memories, Lucian knew Garrett was once a fearsome warrior on the frontlines, a man who served the Emperor directly and bathed in the blood of the Empire's enemies.

But he had been discarded years ago. Stripped of his rank and demoted to babysitting the blind, useless prince.

'How pitiful.'

Lucian pushed his False Sight harder. He tried to see how far his False Sight could go. He pushed past Garrett's surface energy, wanting to see the essential veins underneath the armor, but a sharp, blinding sting spiked behind his eyes.

'Tch. It's not strong enough.'

His False Sight required mental stamina. The stamina needed to see normally was very low, but pushing deeper drained him fast.

Garrett finally reached him, his massive, calloused hands hovering anxiously over Lucian's narrow shoulders, afraid to touch him.

"Were you trying to practice walking again? Where is your wheelchair?"

Lucian hesitated. He waited for Garrett to notice the blood on the ground. He waited for the shout, the alarm, but when the older man said nothing, Lucian tilted his head down.

'It's gone,' he realized, his breath catching.

The heavy, pulsing red stain on the grass had completely vanished. He checked his robes, running his thumbs over the silk. Dry and spotless.

'How did that happen?'

Ding!

A sudden, intuitive pulse washed over his mind. It was a floating text box.

[False Sight: Blood Trace Cleared from Sight]

[False Sight has two main functions:]

[1] It allows the User to see, perceive and read people and the surroundings at long distance, essence or no essence.

[2] It can clear traces of fresh essence-carrying cells of Lucian out of sight, for example blood, within 5 minutes of exposure.]

Lucian read the text carefully and it made sense to him. The ability didn't just allow him to read essence across distances. It actively manipulated it.

It had detected his fresh blood as a displaced trace of his own essence. Deeming it a vulnerability, the ability had instinctively scrubbed the trace from the environment to protect him.

'That explains why my blood was the only thing with color in my vision,' Lucian thought, the pieces clicking together with terrifying precision. 'It cleared it out as an anomaly. A camouflage reflex.'

He lifted his chin, feeling Garrett's expectant, worried gaze burning into him.

'I can't just tell him I can see. I'll have to play the part of the broken blind prince.'

"I... I can't find my wheelchair," Lucian finally muttered. He let his shoulders slump, letting a trace of practiced vulnerability slip into his voice.

"Don't worry about that, I'll find it," Garrett said, his tone softening instantly from warrior to caretaker. "It's time for breakfast anyway."

He scanned the area. "Ah, there it is."

Garrett walked over, the overlapping plates of his armor clinking softly.

He pulled the crashed wheelchair from the thicket of a nearby rose bush. "How did it end up all the way over here?" he asked, rolling the heavy wooden chair back over the grass.

"It's a long story," Lucian said, forcing a weak, dismissive smile.

Garrett smiled back, though it didn't reach his tired eyes.

He gently helped Lucian pivot and sit down. Despite the relentless cruelty of the palace, Garrett had always been different.

He was more of a father to Lucian than the Emperor ever was. He was the one who taught him how to walk, how to read the tactile bumps of braille, how to survive the suffocating silence of his isolation.

Garrett gripped the worn leather handles, and the chair began to roll.

The wheels ground against the gravel path. A heavy silence settled between them.

As they moved, Lucian's mind immediately drifted back to the metal ring resting deep in his pocket.

"Garrett," he asked casually, aiming for the tone of a bored child. "Are any of the emperor's son currently present in the castle?"

The wheelchair slowed for a fraction of a second before Garrett found his rhythm again.

"Yes, Master Lucy," Garrett answered, his voice dropping an octave. "The Fourth and Fifth Princes arrived this morning. The Third Prince is expected by evening. It's going to be a full house this week for your birthday... and the Ordeal."

'The Third, Fourth, and Fifth,' Lucian thought, his fingers quietly clenching the armrests of his chair.

'It's looking too easy. There has to be more to it. Someone or... something I'm not seeing.'

His heart raced. The old Lucian had never read books; they were only read to him by tutors who sighed with impatience.

Ming Ho, however, knew of demons and monsters from the fiction of his past life. He understood tropes. He understood power scaling in this type of world. But still he needed to know what type of world he was in, and it was frightening to wonder.

'What sort of mess did I just wake up in?' he panicked, the reality of the Valerian Empire pressing down on him.

He forced a slow, measured breath into his lungs.

'Pull it together, Ming Ho. You survived the grind of your old life. You can survive this. There's nothing to be afraid of.'

Garrett pushed him out of the garden and onto the main thoroughfare.

Through the False Sight, the Starlight Castle loomed ahead. It was a massive, spiraling fortress of stark white stone laced with thick, pulsing tints of pure gold.

They passed a patrol of the Castle Guards. Through his closed eyes, Lucian saw their essence.

Unlike Garrett's flickering essence these men possessed cores that burned violent and highly disciplined.

None of them bowed as the wheelchair rolled past. None of them even shifted their gaze. To them, there was nobody there.

As they finally reached the large doors of his private wing, a girl, no older than Lucian, stood in her maid's uniform.

Lucian saw her glowing silhouette, her head bowed toward the floor.

'Isabel.' Lucian remembered.

While Garrett was his personal guardian, Isabel was his personal maid. She was one of the few who was nice and loyal to him, despite his blindness.

"Good morning, Master," Isabel greeted, her voice soft and welcoming.