The morning sun broke through the moss-covered windows of the Salt manor, casting thin gold bars across the stone floor.
Philip Salt—once Kent, now trapped in the legacy trial under a false identity—moved with a sense of growing awareness. With each passing hour, he peeled back another layer of the life this body once lived: timid, used, stepped over like a worn doormat.
But that would no longer be the case.
Servants moved more briskly now. Fear replaced their mockery. The same guards who once smirked behind his back now saluted with trembling respect. A few bruises, broken canes, and flying boots the day before had served as sharp reminders that Philip Salt had changed.
Now, in the early light, Kent sat at the small ancestral library hidden behind the third courtyard, poring over old Salt clan records. He had bribed an old, half-blind record keeper to give him access. What he found sent small storms of calculation racing through his mind.
