Bloodbound Tyrant: The System Made Me Unstoppable-Chapter 31: The Tyrant’s Paradox

Lucien Mason sat on the throne of obsidian, fingers drumming against the armrest. The throne room was dark, lit only by scarlet torches that cast flickering shadows across the crimson veins embedded in the walls. Ever since the massacre of the Silverfang nobles, his name had spread like wildfire across the Eastern Dominion. King-slayers, tyrant, demon... they whispered it all, but one truth echoed above all else—

Lucien was unstoppable.

A new title burned on his system interface.

> Title Unlocked: Tyrant of Bloodfire

Your aura instills dread in enemies and loyalty in followers. All charisma-related actions are tripled in effectiveness when in combat.

He leaned back, eyes glowing a shade deeper than red. Ever since awakening the dormant bloodline—the Forbidden Emperor’s Line—his body had changed. Taller, leaner, faster. His eyes could now see the spiritual flow in living beings. The veins of fate themselves revealed their patterns to him like a tapestry of destiny.

But peace was a lie.

The palace doors burst open with such force that the reinforced hinges cracked. Ancient protective wards flared briefly before dying, as if whatever approached had simply dismissed them.

"Milord," gasped Kallan, his second-in-command, dragging a bloodied knight behind him. The knight’s armor was melted in places, and his eyes held the thousand-yard stare of a man who had witnessed horrors beyond comprehension. "A messenger from the Midnight Crown. They request your presence."

Lucien stood, cloak whipping behind him like liquid shadow. The very air around him seemed to thicken with malevolent energy.

"Midnight Crown? I thought they vanished after the Purge."

"They returned," Kallan said grimly, his voice barely concealing terror. "And they brought... this."

He handed Lucien a scroll bound with chains made of shadowflame. The metal links writhed like living serpents, and the parchment itself seemed to absorb light. As Lucien opened it, a single drop of his blood sizzled on the parchment, activating the message. The words appeared in fire across the page, each letter burning with an intensity that made the air shimmer.

> "Lucien Mason. Heir to the Forbidden Line.

The Eclipse approaches.

Come to the Bloodroot Crypt. Alone.

Or your empire burns. 𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢

The time of revelation has come.

What you believe yourself to be is merely the shadow of truth."

A signature in ancient script sealed the message, written in what appeared to be liquid starlight.

—Lady Selkira, Warden of the Eclipse.

Lucien’s jaw tightened. That name—it hadn’t been spoken in a hundred years. Lady Selkira was a myth, a tale used to frighten corrupted lords into loyalty. But Lucien had read the forbidden archives in the depths of the Crimson Vault. She was real.

And she was the one who held the Eclipse Key.

The artifact that could either seal the Forbidden Line forever or unleash its full potential across the world. With it, Lucien could transcend mere tyranny and become something approaching godhood. Without it, he would always be limited by the bloodline’s natural restrictions.

He crushed the scroll in his hand, fire erupting around his fingers in spirals of crimson and gold.

"I’ll go," he muttered.

"Alone?" Kallan asked, stunned. "Milord, this could be—"

"A trap?" Lucien turned, his eyes now blazing with enough intensity to cast shadows on the walls. "Of course it’s a trap. But if Selkira truly has the Eclipse Key... I need it. The Eastern Dominion is mine, but the other kingdoms still resist. The Midnight Crown’s return isn’t coincidence—something is stirring in the world beyond our borders."

Kallan bowed deeply. "Then take the Blood Guard. At least fifty men—"

"No." Lucien’s voice carried the weight of absolute authority. "This is about the bloodline. About what I am. Some things must be faced alone."

---

Bloodroot Crypt – Midnight

Lucien descended the steps alone, a torch in one hand, Voidsteel blade sheathed at his side. The crypt’s stone walls pulsed with ancient blood magic, each pulse synchronized with his heartbeat. The deeper he went, the more the walls seemed to breathe around him. Runes carved into the stone glowed faintly, telling the story of the Forbidden Line’s origin—a tale of power stolen from dying gods and the price paid for immortality.

Each step echoed like a heartbeat in a silent grave. The air grew thicker, saturated with magical energy so dense it was almost tangible. Lucien’s enhanced senses picked up traces of ancient rituals, centuries of accumulated power, and something else—something that made his bloodline sing with recognition.

He reached a hall of statues—ancient tyrants frozen in time, each one a former wielder of the Forbidden Line. Their faces were carved with expressions of eternal anguish, and their eyes seemed to track his movement. At the base of each statue, inscriptions told their stories. The Crimson Emperor, who had bathed continents in blood. The Void Empress, who had consumed entire dimensions. The Nightmare King, who had turned reality itself into a weapon.

All of them had possessed the Eclipse Key.

All of them had eventually been destroyed by it.

Then, from the shadows between the statues, she stepped out.

She wore a gown of black silk threaded with living shadow that moved independently of any breeze. Her skin glowed pale like moonlight, lips crimson as spilled wine. Her hair cascaded in waves of midnight, and her eyes—bright violet with pupils shaped like hourglasses—locked onto Lucien with an intensity that made his soul feel exposed.

"Lucien Mason," she whispered, her voice carrying harmonics that resonated in dimensions beyond sound. "You wear the blood well."

"You’re Selkira."

She smiled faintly, stepping closer. With each step, the temperature dropped noticeably, and frost began forming on the ancient stones.

"I was once. Now I am the Gatekeeper. The one who decides who is worthy of the truth." She paused, studying him with eyes that had witnessed the rise and fall of empires. "And you... are the final lock."

He narrowed his eyes, hand instinctively moving to his sword hilt. "You summoned me for a prophecy?"

"No. I summoned you... to awaken the truth." She reached out and touched his chest. Her fingers passed through his armor as if it were mist, and he felt ice spread through his veins. "There’s a piece of you sealed deep inside—put there when you were born. A fragment of something... older. More complete."

The ground shook.

The walls split with sounds like breaking bones.

From behind her, a sealed door burst open. What lay beyond wasn’t a room, but a mirror—a glowing pool that shimmered like starlight on blood. The surface rippled with images: battles he’d never fought, kingdoms he’d never conquered, faces he’d never seen but somehow recognized.

Selkira whispered, "Look inside. And remember what you truly are."

Lucien stepped forward and gazed into the mirror. The reflection that stared back at him was wrong in ways that defied explanation. It moved a fraction of a second before he did, smiled when he frowned, and radiated a presence that made his own considerable power feel like a flickering candle.

And what he saw shattered everything.

Inside the reflection, he saw himself—but not as he was now. His reflection wore black armor inscribed with runes that hurt to look at directly, and a golden crown that seemed to bend light around itself. But it was the smile that truly terrified him—twisted with godlike cruelty and infinite amusement.

The reflection winked.

Then it spoke.

"Welcome back, Lucien. Took you long enough to find me."

"What the—"

The reflection stepped through the mirror, flesh forming from light and shadow. A perfect replica. No... more than that.

A version of him from the future. Or another world. Or perhaps the original from which he was merely a copy.

> New System Notification

[WARNING] Paradox Entity Detected: Lucien Prime.

You are no longer the only Lucien.

Prepare for synchronization conflict.

[ALERT] Timeline integrity compromised.

[ALERT] Reality anchor points failing.

[ALERT] Causality loop detected.

Selkira stepped back, a dark grin spreading across her face. "He’s the original. The true heir to the Forbidden Line. You? You were just the failsafe. The lesser seed. The tyrant they needed until he could return."

Lucien’s heart pounded, his system interface flooding with warnings and contradictory data. His sword flew into his hand, the Voidsteel blade singing as it cut through the air.

"So you’re saying I’m not real?"

"No," Lucien Prime said, drawing a blade of cosmic fire that made the air itself burn. "You’re real. You’re just not me. And unfortunately..." He raised the burning sword, its light casting impossible shadows that moved independently of any source. "Only one of us can exist in this reality."

Lucien snarled, his aura igniting. Flames erupted around him, but they paled in comparison to the inferno surrounding his doppelganger.

"Then you chose the wrong reality to invade."

"Did I?" Lucien Prime laughed, the sound like breaking glass and screaming steel. "Look around, little shadow. Look at what you’ve built."

The mirror behind him flared, and suddenly the crypt was filled with visions. Lucien saw his empire—but not as he remembered it. Cities burned not from conquest but from rebellion. His subjects didn’t fear him; they despised him. The nobles he’d slaughtered were martyrs now, their deaths sparking uprisings across the continent.

"You’re a tyrant playing at being an emperor," Lucien Prime continued. "I am an emperor who transcended tyranny. I consumed gods, reshaped reality, made the very concept of resistance impossible. Your little kingdom is a pale shadow of what I accomplished."

"Accomplished?" Lucien spat. "You mean destroyed. I can see it in your eyes—the madness. The emptiness. You won everything and lost yourself."

"I became something greater than self."

"You became a monster."

"We became a monster the moment we awakened the bloodline. The only difference is I embraced it fully."

The two tyrants faced each other—one born of chaos, the other of fate. The air between them crackled with energy that made the ancient stones begin to crack.

But before either could strike, Selkira raised her hand.

"Wait," she said, and both Luciens froze. "There’s something else you need to know. About why this is happening. About what you both really are."

She gestured to the walls around them, and the runes began to glow brighter, telling a story neither had seen before.

"The Forbidden Line isn’t a bloodline," she said. "It’s a prison. A way to contain something that should never have existed. You’re not descendants of ancient emperors—you’re fragments of a single consciousness that was shattered across infinite realities to prevent it from reassembling."

Lucien felt his world tilt. "What?"

"The Eclipse Key isn’t meant to unlock your full potential. It’s meant to merge you back together. To restore the original entity that was so powerful, so utterly destructive, that reality itself conspired to break it apart."

Lucien Prime’s expression changed from confident to horrified. "You’re lying."

"Am I? Then why do you both feel incomplete? Why do you dream of conquests you never made, of powers you never wielded? Why does seeing each other feel like looking at a missing piece of your soul?"

The truth hit them both like a physical blow. They were parts of something larger, something that had been deliberately fragmented to protect existence itself.

"And now," Selkira continued, her form beginning to shift and change, revealing something ancient and terrible beneath her beautiful facade, "the Eclipse approaches. The cosmic alignment that will force all the fragments back together whether you want it or not. The only question is whether you’ll merge willingly and retain some measure of your individuality, or fight and lose everything that makes you who you are."

The mirror behind them cracked, and through the fissures, more figures began to emerge. Other Luciens from other realities. Some were knights, some were merchants, some were beggars. But all of them carried the same eyes, the same presence, the same incomplete longing.

"How many?" Lucien whispered.

"Thousands," Selkira replied. "Scattered across every possible timeline, every potential reality. And they’re all converging here. Now."

> System Alert

[CRITICAL] Temporal convergence detected.

[CRITICAL] Multiple timeline collapse imminent.

[CRITICAL] Choose: Assimilation or Annihilation.

[WARNING] Failure to choose will result in complete ego death.

Lucien looked at his Prime counterpart, then at the gathering army of alternate selves. In the distance, he could hear the sound of reality itself beginning to unravel.

"What happens if we refuse?" he asked.

Selkira smiled, and for the first time, her expression held something like pity.

"Then you get to find out what it’s like to be erased from existence while still being conscious of the process. The original entity will reform regardless, but it will be mindless, driven only by the need to reclaim what was taken from it. It will not stop until every reality is consumed."

"And if we agree?"

"Then you become what you were always meant to be. But you’ll have to live with the knowledge of what that means for everyone else."

The first of the alternate Luciens stepped through the mirror, his eyes reflecting the same terrible choice. Then another. And another.

The Eclipse was beginning.

And somewhere in the darkness beyond the crypt, something vast and hungry stirred, drawn by the scent of its scattered pieces finally coming home.

"Choose quickly," Selkira whispered. "The convergence has already begun. And once it starts, there’s no going back."

The fate of not just one reality, but all realities, hung in the balance.

And Lucien realized that becoming a tyrant had been the easy part.