—Narrated by Clarenzo Descovinio
They say the city never sleeps beneath Descovinio light.
They're right. It doesn't.
It screams.
From my chamber window in the Obelisk Spire—the tallest tower on the continent—I could see the veins of neon veins slicing through the skyline, tracing electric arteries over black chrome. Descovinia Prime. Our family's crown jewel. Capital of the united world.
And yet, not one of them is free.
Red banners danced in the air above the city, projected by massive holo-pylons. Our family crest hovered like a divine symbol—a flaming sword gripped by the jaws of a serpent coiled in a circle, its tail locked between its own fangs.
An eternal reign. An unbroken chain.
That insignia meant hope for some. For others, it meant ash, fire, and chains.
For me? It meant war.
---
It had been three years since I'd set foot inside this palace. The world believed I'd gone to study abroad. Some thought I'd left for healing, maybe even exile.
Let them believe what they want.
In truth, I had vanished into Theraxis Island, a forgotten, ravaged land on the edge of the old war front. There, among rusted ruins and broken monuments, I learned how to fight. How to disappear. How to kill.
I wasn't training to return to the throne.
I was training to destroy it.
---
Inside the throne hall, I walked with the same posture they trained into us since childhood. Chin raised. Gait measured. Hands behind my back, the way my father expected all of us to present ourselves.
The throne was monstrous—obsidian and gold, pulsing with internal veins of energy. It didn't just symbolize power. It amplified it. As my father sat upon it, his presence filled the entire room. Not metaphorically. The throne connected to the neural grid beneath the capital. When Ricthard Descovinio III sat upon that seat, he could watch anyone, anywhere.
Even his own sons.
He sat in absolute silence, fingers laced, eyes half-lidded like a hawk sizing up prey. My mother, Classandra Clove, stood beside him with her usual expression—disappointment layered beneath poise.
"Clarenzo," she said smoothly. "You've returned."
"Mother," I said with a bow, just deep enough to be polite, not sincere.
"And still alive," she added, not without a note of surprise.
Before I could answer, I heard it.
That voice.
"Little brother."
Drago.
Ruthless, golden-eyed, already dressed in combat armor like he'd walked out of a war zone—or was ready to start one. He leaned on his lightsaber staff, the blade dormant but threatening, as always. His grin was sharp. Predatory.
"Did the island harden you, or are you still soft as a noble's son?"
Next to him stood Allisandro, our younger brother by blood, but more like Drago's shadow. He chuckled without heart.
I held my smile. "Still warm enough to care, cold enough to survive. Thanks for asking."
Their expressions didn't change, but I saw the flicker. That irritation. That little reminder that I hadn't broken.
Yet.
---
Then the room warmed—genuinely—when she appeared.
"Enzo!" Isabella's voice rang through the corridor like wind chimes.
I turned just as she crashed into me, nearly knocking the breath out of my chest. Bell's arms wrapped around my middle, clinging tightly.
She had her mother's eyes. Gentle, steel-gray, always searching. Her braid glinted in the light, silver and clean, nothing like the black threads of our bloodline.
She was illegitimate—a child of love, not politics. Which made her dangerous to this family. A threat. A loose thread.
To me?
She was the only thing left worth protecting.
---
I spent the rest of the day playing my part. I smiled. I exchanged pleasantries. I listened to my father's speech about the "New Directive" and the need for more order through surveillance integration.
We stood on a platform made of light, surrounded by dignitaries and elite officers. He raised his hand. People bowed.
But I didn't.
Not really.
I looked like I did. I acted like I did. But inside, my mind was elsewhere—deep in plans and blueprints, contacts and secrets. I had allies now. Messages were being passed in hidden code through the neural web. Zero was already a myth in the underground.
They didn't know it was me.
Yet.
---
That night, in my private chamber, I knelt before the hidden compartment behind my desk. My thumbprint opened the false wall. A drawer slid out with a hiss.
Inside was the mask.
Matte black. Seamless. A smooth, featureless face—terrifying to some, freeing to me.
This was Zero.
The voice of the people.
The dagger in the Descovinio throat.
I slipped it on. The HUD flickered to life. My heart calmed.
> "This house was built on blood and silence. I will end it with fire and truth."
This was my legacy.
But not my future.
Not if I burn it first.