Limit Released
"Darling."
"Hm?"
"If I die, how are you going to live?"
I thought for a moment before I answered.
"Hard to say. I really don't know."
My wife caught my hand and held it tight, a sigh slipping out of her.
"Without me, there really would be nothing left for you to lose."
"……."
"And the most frightening person in the world is the one with nothing left to lose. There's always been a monster inside you that no one can control. I'm the shackle on it, and it terrifies me—what that monster would do to the world if the shackle ever came loose."
The worry in her eyes. That was the last conversation I ever had with my wife.
She left this world, and the only shackle binding me came undone with her. On a certain night after that, I got into a fight, and when my head struck the floor, my previous life came to an end.
"Hhk—!"
My eyes flew open.
What filled my vision was neither cold concrete nor some filthy back alley reeking of liquor.
"Your Highness, are you awake?"
The maids who had been keeping watch beside the bed drew near and carefully offered me a towel. I took it without a word and wiped the cold sweat from my brow. In the mirror beyond, a cool face looked back at me—black hair, black eyes.
Sixth Prince of the Grand Terra Empire. Gun von Grand Terra.
That was who I was now.
My gaze was as still as a lake, but my mind was not. The monster my wife had spoken of—the one that could not be controlled—had opened its eyes completely. The moral brakes that once held me down did not exist in this other world.
Clack—!
"Our little youngest is already up?"
Lost in thought, I barely registered the door banging open. The man who filled it was a giant of nearly two meters, flaunting a head of dazzling platinum-blond hair. The First Prince, Leonhardt.
"Brother, do be careful. The Sixth Prince must be nervous about today, in his own way."
Behind him, another man pushed his glasses up and smiled like a snake. Slicked-back hair. The Second Prince, Kyle.
"Nervous? More like the day he finally learns his place."
"Haha. A bit harsh, don't you think?"
Trailing their little exchange, the Fifth Princess, Victoria, swept in wearing a dress drowned in frills, covering her nose with a feather fan.
"Ugh. That vulgar stench. Does he think that just because he breathes, he's royalty like the rest of us?"
"Victoria. A stench? Isn't that rather generous praise?"
"Hohoho! Well, even trash has a smell."
Children of the Empress Consort. The First Faction, all three of them. Their mockery was naked, and I didn't so much as change my expression. I simply went on dressing, unruffled.
"That's enough."
A cool voice cut through the room as my older sisters entered—daughters of the Second Empress. The Third Princess, Chloe, in a sensual silk dress, and the Fourth Princess, Aria, leather trousers on her legs and twin swords at her hips.
Chloe tossed her wavy reddish-brown hair back and spoke, cold as frost.
"What are all of you doing here instead of going to the audience chamber?"
"Hmph. If you're ready, then hurry up and get out. Show up late and I'll kill you."
Aria tacked it on, rough as ever.
Cold and fierce to look at, the pair of them. I knew better. Behind closed doors, those two sisters poured a blind, doting affection all over me.
"If you're ready, let us be off. The nobles are all assembled."
With the First Prince's parting sneer, the family left the room ahead of me. Seen off by the maids, I walked the long corridor toward the audience chamber.
Today. My coming-of-age. Twenty years old.
In this world, every sentient being resonated with the mana in the air and awakened a single unique ability. There were no mages reciting complicated incantations. Only inborn power became authority. A thorough meritocracy.
Judged Abilityless, and you spend the rest of your life despised—lower than livestock.
I walked, and I watched the red moon beyond the window. Those who awakened poured their power into empty ore and made disposable goods called mana crystals. Those crystals were the axle on which the world's economy and its weapons turned. Add the Blessings the twelve goddesses of heaven handed down on a whim, and that power broke past common sense into something transcendent.
"His Imperial Majesty arrives!"
The cry cut my thoughts short. I opened the doors of the vast audience chamber, and ranks of nobles stood waiting. Above them, on the dais, a giant of a man sat the throne, beastlike golden eyes alight. Emperor Theodore.
"Begin."
A short command from the Emperor.
At the center of the chamber lay the Tablet of Revelation, the instrument that measured a unique ability. A rectangular mana stone about the size of a book, it scanned one's mana and displayed the ability's name and its rank—its color.
Hundreds of eyes fixed on me. I walked forward slowly and set both hands upon the tablet.
Vmmm—.
In an instant the tablet turned clear as glass and began to let the light pass straight through it. And in my vision alone, letters flickered past beside a geometric pattern of pink.
Imprint
EX-RANK / TRANSPARENT
Imprint?
An authority of domination. The power to engrave a rule into another person's skin. But the letters died in a heartbeat, and the cleared tablet showed neither color nor name in the empty air. It simply sat there, silent as a lump of stone.
"Puhahaha! Will you look at that!"
The First Prince clutched his stomach and howled with laughter.
"Not a glimmer of light, not a single letter—a perfect rock! He's Abilityless!"
The hall drowned in murmurs and jeers. Nobles who had no way of knowing the legendary rank called Transparent saw nothing in me but an empty shell.
"That's not right. Just now, there was clearly some kind of light……."
I opened my mouth, quiet, and shut it again at once. Contempt came flying at me like knives.
They won't believe me anyway. Argue, and I'll only make it worse.
"An Abilityless in the imperial blood! A hideous disgrace!"
The Emperor on the throne thundered his rebuke. He looked every inch the raging tyrant. In truth, it was a father's love in disguise—a performance meant to keep the assassins off me.
And so the coming-of-age ceremony ended in ridicule, and I was shut away in a remote corner of the palace grounds. But when I opened the door of the old Detached Palace they had led me to—
"It is an honor to meet you, Your Highness."
I had expected a pit of dust. In the middle of the room, a woman in a black-and-white maid uniform—the skirt slit high at the side—offered a precise, immaculate bow. Silver hair tied neatly back. Ice-blue eyes with no feeling in them at all.
"From this day, I am assigned as your personal maid and guard. Ceria von Arkwright."
Assassination daggers and mana crystals hidden beneath the apron, and a speed that was frankly absurd. An overpowered maid, through and through. This was the moment my quiet, deviant life—free of every shackle—truly began.
The Detached Palace was cozier than I had expected. A long way from imperial splendor, but for living quietly, it was perfect.
"Darjeeling, Your Highness."
Ceria set the teacup down with a practiced hand. Dozens of daggers were surely hidden inside that deeply slit uniform, and still her movements were nothing short of elegant.
"The tea smells wonderful. Thank you, Ceria."
I lifted the cup and smiled, soft. Endlessly gentle, endlessly devoted—toward my own people. That had been my nature since my previous life.
"You flatter me. His Imperial Majesty commanded me to attend you. It is only proper."
A voice like a sheet of ice, not one feeling in it. I put on the face of a mild prince and asked.
"I'm sorry to make you rough it in a shabby place like this. Are there rules I ought to watch from now on?"
"There are a few matters I must advise you of."
She began to brief me, flat as any secretary.
"First. You are permitted to leave the Detached Palace, but you must be accompanied by me. Your safety is my highest charge."
"Understood. That's reassuring."
"Second. Before long, a mountain of documents will arrive, each bearing the portrait of a noble young lady."
I set the cup down and tilted my head.
"Portraits? You mean candidates to be my fiancée?"
"Yes. You are to choose a lady who pleases you, invite her to the Detached Palace, and take tea. It is the first official engagement of Your Highness, now that you have come of age."
A hollow laugh escaped me.
"Hold on, Ceria. Everyone saw me draw nothing at all from the Tablet of Revelation. They know I'm Abilityless. I was driven out as a disgrace to the imperial house. Is there really a young lady anywhere who wants to be engaged to me?"
Ceria didn't so much as blink. She drove the fact straight in.
"No. On the contrary, far more of them will come swarming."
"Why?"
"There are three reasons."
Back perfectly straight, she raised one finger at a time.
"First. Through a flawed prince, one may attach oneself to the vast power of the imperial house with the least difficulty."
"…"
"Second. Even if Your Highness failed to awaken an ability, what runs in your body is unmistakably imperial blood. Any child born hereafter would, as a matter of course, hold the right of succession."
"Aha. So they mean to use me as a stud."
My self-mocking joke didn't move her face at all.
"Third. They have judged that if Your Highness is to survive this treacherous empire, you will have no choice but to depend entirely upon a young lady of another house—one who possesses a formidable unique ability."
A reality that cut to the bone. Those nobles meant to seat an Abilityless prince as a puppet husband and take the power of the imperial house into their own hands.
"I see. Everyone's arithmetic is thorough."
"Which is why you must not lower your guard, Your Highness. The young ladies called to tea will do whatever they can to twist you around their fingers."
"Don't worry, Ceria."
I drained what remained of the black tea at my leisure and smiled.
"Who ends up holding whom is something you only learn by living through it."
At that easy answer, Ceria's eyes wavered—only a fraction. As if she were asking herself whether this man was truly the Abilityless prince the whole world pointed at. Then the blank, impassive mask returned, and she bowed her head.
"…I shall bear it in mind. You must be weary. Allow me to show you to the bedchamber where you will stay."
The bedroom she led me to was neatly kept as well.
"Rest comfortably, Your Highness. Should anything occur, call my name."
"Just your name?"
"Yes. Whenever, and wherever. If Your Highness calls, I will be at your side at once."
A steadfast guard's farewell, and the bedroom door closed.
Left alone, I threw myself onto the plush bed and stared at the ceiling, turning over what had happened in the audience chamber. The tablet turning clear. Those pink letters, flickering through my vision and no one else's.
I definitely read Imprint.
An ability had manifested in me. That much was certain. But the nobles had seen a transparent lump of stone give off no light at all, and they would never believe a word I said. Worse, I had no one on hand against whom I could test a power that engraved rules into another person's skin.
"Haa. What a shame."
A laboratory with no test subject. I let out a short sigh and closed my eyes. It had been a long, exhausting day.
Before I knew it, deep dark had settled beyond the window. Night. Perhaps I had napped too long. A strange presence snapped my eyes open.
Shff—.
What?
A room so dark that not even moonlight reached it. At the foot of the bed, something wrong was wavering—a black shadow. I focused, and made her out: a woman wrapped head to toe in black, a cold dagger raised toward my heart.
"Hhk…!"
She realized I was awake and lunged like an animal.
"Ceria!"
On instinct I snatched the pillow beside me and threw it up like a shield.
Thud—!
The point punched through the feather pillow and stopped a hair from my nose. Cold sweat broke in that instant, and every filthy curse I owned exploded through my head.
Ah, fuck! What the hell is this crazy bitch!
The bedroom door, shut fast, tore away as if it had exploded.
BANG—!!
"Kurgh…!"
A speed the eye could not follow. Ceria blew out in a burst of extreme acceleration and was behind the assassin in less than a second.
Crack!
A sickening rupture, and both of the assassin's arms snapped at grotesque angles. The dagger clattered across the floor. Still in her black-and-white maid uniform, Ceria stomped the woman's nape and pinned her flat to the ground.
"…Your Highness. Are you unharmed?"
Ceria's flat voice, not a breath out of place. I shoved the ruined pillow aside, sat up on the bed, and slowly applauded. Clap. Clap. Clap.
"Truly impressive. Thank you for saving me, Ceria."
My praise only made her grind her foot harder into the assassin's neck.
"I am deeply ashamed. A rat slipped in, and I failed to deal with it in time. I apologize. There is an unused confinement cell in the basement of the Detached Palace."
"A confinement cell?"
"Yes. I will lock her in there and torture her until she vomits up which house sent this vermin, and who stands behind it."
I listened to that bloodthirsty report, and my eyes went to the assassin sprawled on the floor. Even through the pain of broken arms, the gaze lifted toward me was as savage as a beast with venom in its teeth.
Let's see.
An opponent who could no longer resist. Perfectly subdued. A thought flashed through my mind.
I was disappointed this afternoon. No test subject.
The perfect specimen on which to drive my Imprint home had just crawled into my bedroom on her own two feet.
"Ceria."
"Yes, Your Highness."
"I'm coming with you. Down to the basement cell."
At that, Ceria's brow drew in, just slightly.
"You must not. There will be a horrific amount of blood. There is no need for Your Highness to take such filth into your eyes."
Blind protection. I climbed slowly down from the bed and seized a rough handful of the assassin's hair.
"Ghk…!"
A pained groan spilled out of her. I pretended to know nothing at all, looked at Ceria, and smiled in a voice I made gentle on purpose.
"It's fine. I've got the most frightening person in the world standing solidly right here beside me, don't I?"