"Your Grace," he said. "The Emperor has summoned you."
Wait. Your… what?
I must be hallucinating. I knew I'd played too long, but I didn't think it'd get this bad.
I shot up in panic and looked around. Stone floors, soldiers. Definitely not my bedroom. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and opened them again — nothing changed.
"Did I buy a VR set in my sleep or something?" I muttered. But wait— I sat down too fast and realized I wasn't even on my bed.
I reached up, trying to pull off the headset that clearly wasn't there. It didn't come off because… yeah, there was no headset. Just air.
When I looked up again, the people around me were staring — wide-eyed, frozen. Same as me.
'I must be dreaming, right?!' I told myself. 'Maybe I passed out. Maybe I died, explosion, glitch, sleep deprivation. Pick one.'
Then a thought hit me like a truck. 'Did I just get… reincarnated?'
No way. No. Absolutely not. That's ridiculous.
"Hey, you," I said, pointing at the guy still kneeling in front of me. "What did you just call me?"
He flinched. "I called you 'Your Grace,' Your Grace."He tried to hide the fear in his voice, but the shaking kind of ruined it.
"And who are you?" I asked. Everyone else gasped like I'd just insulted their ancestors. Even the man in front of me started trembling harder.
'What is wrong with them?' I thought.
I looked down — silver rings on my fingers. Heavy gloves. A black coat lined with silver. My breath came out in visible puffs. And then… the sword.
The same one from the game.
That's when it hit me. Maybe this really was transmigration.
"I am your loyal knight, Your Grace," the man said. "My name is John."
I sighed. "Ha… this can't be real, right?"
But when I looked closer at the sword — northern-forged, engraved with the sigil I'd clicked a hundred times — my stomach dropped.
No. No way.
I turned toward the frost-covered walls, where mirrors shimmered faintly.
And staring back at me was a man.Tall. Pale. Eyes like frozen steel. A jawline that could probably cut diamonds.
Terrifying, if I didn't already know who he was.
The illusion. The magical disguise the Duke of the North used to hide his real face.
And underneath that illusion?
Was me.
I didn't become the hero. I didn't become the romantic lead. I became the Duke of the North.
The villain. The man who dies in the main story.
And apparently, I'm the only one who knows that.