KING OF RUIN - Chapter 19: The Price of Mercy

[Warning: Mature Content 18+, Harem, No NTR!]He was only ten years old when his world turned to ash. Hidden behind a door, shivering with helplessness and fear, the boy peered through the keyhole and watched his parents die. He never knew who killed them. He never even saw the faces of those who took everything from him.The terror was too much for a ten-year old boy. His mind shattered, erasing that night from his memory. And then everything was blank, darkness in front of his eyes as he lost consciousness.When his eyes opened again, a man stood before him, a stranger with a gentle smile and eyes filled with something strange… pity? Or something else?“What happened here boy?”“Happened where?”“You don’t remember, do you?”“Remember what…? Where is father? My Mother?”“I guess this is for the best.”“Good boy. Your father was my dearest friend… and now, you are my responsibility. From now on, you will be my son.”“You have no one left, boy… but I can make sure no one ever takes anything from you again.” The man said gently.And then that man forged him into something inhuman. A weapon honed to perfection, a shadow lurking in the underworld. The mere whisper of his name - Draugr, A ghost that never truly dies, sent grown men into cold sweats, their legs trembling beneath them.The boy soon outgrew his master and carved his own legend in blood. But all this while he never stopped searching—for the ones who killed his parents, for the truth, for revenge.And finally, after fifteen years of silence, he was close. The last clue he needed was just within his grasp.It was so close, yet just an inch out of his grasp. He was ambushed, a trap he never saw coming.Wounded, bleeding out, fighting for his life against an army of men and women eyeing to claim his life, he should have died. But fate had something else stored for him.Barely holding onto life, he stumbled into a girl—fragile-looking, yet completely unafraid of the monster before her. She didn’t run. She didn’t scream. Instead, she smiled.She saved him. Took him to a hospital. And as he lay unconscious, she made her plans.But when he woke up… He had lost everything, He remembered nothing.Not just the truth of his parents' murder. Not just the years of searching. Not just the enemies and allies he'd made along the way. Not even his own name.Twenty-five years of his life—wiped clean.Now, in a world that fears his very name, with ghosts of a past he can no longer remember hunting him in the shadows—he must decide: Is he still the Draugr they all fear? Or is he just a man searching for the pieces of himself?And who is the girl who stole his fate and bound it to hers?

Weary reader, it is an honor that you have chosen this book amidst the heavy, dim library.Regrettably, this book is unwell.Your fingers should be able to feel the raised growths on the surface of its cover,Words written in bygone days are like parasites rooted in the pages, hoping for someone to observe their wriggling,To feel, to decipher, to touch the essence of this ailing story.If you insist on borrowing this book, please make sure to regularly check your own physical condition.

The year is 407 AD and Rome is at the precipice. In the West, a usurper by the name of Flavius Claudius Constantinus has declared himself emperor. By doing this, he and his traitor legions have fractured the Western Roman Empire into two. At the same time, the north bleeds! Countless germans swarm across the borders of the Empire and pillage its lands in their ruthless raids. Alaric, King of the Goths, rises to a position of prominence and threatens the ancient capital of the dying Empire with his barbarian hordes. As if things weren't bad enough, rumors from the east state that a mysterious power rises within the fogs of war, threatening to drown the Empire in a river of blood.

As a response to these threats, the indolent emperor Honorius has given orders to his supreme commander Flavius Stilicho to reclaim the province of Gaul from the usurper. However, should he leave the heartland of the Empire undefended, undoubtedly Alaric would invade. Thus, under the threat of barbarians at the gates, Stilicho dispatches a young roman general by the name of Titus Claudius Marcellus to bring an end to the reign of the usurper. Will Rome fall to the tides of barbarians and traitors alike? Or can Marcellus restore a world collapsing around him? Find out in Heir of Aurelian!

During a party one evening in the royal palace, Rachel, the eldest daughter of Duke Ferguson, was reproached by Prince Elliot for sins she didn’t remember committing and their engagement was abandoned. Rachel informed everyone she had not committed the acts they were accusing her of, but she was dragged away out of the party venue and thrown into the palace dungeon.