There was but one reason why Vincent Adad, who had only ever seen the humid climate of the western plains, willingly went to face the brutal climate of the north. Even when the cold struck every inch of his body like splinters of glass, and blizzards made him unable to feel his face, he trudged onto the heavy snow. He did not stop, not even when his hands got blue, and his lungs barely inhaled air, until he had reached the base of the Twinspeak and seen the grand castle with his own eyes.

Yes, this was where it all started.

He could still see the Twinspeak castle burning in flames as if it had just happened yesterday. But whether or not it was an illusion, seeing it in the same state as it was eight years ago, made his heart burn instead. The North was as treacherous as he remembered it, and the people as foreign as when he saw them flee upon seeing the sight of a flaming castle...He couldn’t wait to set it in flames again.

As he came out of a narrow crack on the steep mountain behind Twinspeak, Vincent Adad had but one thing in his mind. He looked around him, hoping he had caught no one’s eye, even though the chances of that were slim. He was high enough from the grounds and far enough from the castle, and snow did not stop falling on the Twinspeak valley that he could barely see.

“Who was that?,” he kept asking himself.

Infiltrating the library was no big feat for him. He had done it multiple times in the past, used it as a means to gather information about the enemy, and expand his own knowledge. But part of the reason he escaped notice was that the library, at night, was mostly isolated. Sure, he had waited a year to infiltrate the library since his arrival in the north before, but now it had barely been three months. Still how uncommon it was for someone to not get affected by a sleeping spell... he thought. There was never such a person who visited the library in such inauspicious hours in the past.

Did they see him? Probably not. But they must have noticed him.

Vincent Adad felt tense. He dusted off his shoulders and ragged cloak, and jumped off the steep mountain. Such a feat would have been very easy for him had he not been a sixteen year old boy, but now he lost balance, scraped his knees and tripped. He could not even see as clearly as he could in the night - his eyes had not fully awakened. At this time, were he to get caught, even a mere knight would do him in. And to think he had once killed the Lord of the North, Victor Aurwood, in the very secret path that he came out from. He chuckled. Life sure was funny. The former King and Emperor of Gladios was now a weak sixteen year old foreign boy in the North.

“Where were you?,” an old man asked him the moment he stepped into a cottage downhill.

“Looking for firewood.,” he answered after a small pause, as he handed over a bundle of twigs and branches that he had prepared beforehand. His voice had already started to deepen, and his height had gotten just as tall as this old man who was sitting beside the fire and cooking stew.

“At this time?”

Look who was talking. What was he doing making stew at midnight?

“ It was cold…”

“Looks like you still haven’t gotten used to the North, huh? ,” the old man looked at him and grinned. Two of his teeth in the front had fallen off, and wrinkles had taken over his face.

Yes, everything was exactly the same as it was eight years ago. He and Adiel had been saved by this man when they fell out of exhaustion at the base of the Twinspeak. It was a face he had not seen in years. The face of a fool who took in refugees who had nowhere to go, he thought. Little did he know that Reina Aurwood would ban him from entering the palace the moment she knew.

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“Are you feeding refugees out of the palace reserves?,” she would frown at him from her high carriage, even though these “reserves” were just leftovers that would be thrown away anyway.

“Despicable, ” she would say, “ And I wonder where all the money of the castle goes!”

That bitch was hilarious. He couldn’t wait to kill her again.

“Here! I got some potatoes from the castle today!,” the old man would grin as he handed him a bowl of stew that stank of rotten potatoes and barley. He had had much better food before- this did not even compare to the dishes he had when he was the Emperor, but he drank it anyway for he was hungry and there was nothing else. Perhaps it was the long day or just the cold, but even that filthy stew melted in his mouth and made him warm.

In his past, this old man had died of illness not long after Reina Aurwood had fired him. This time, Vincent thought, he would make sure they never met. It was a quiet night. The fifth lunar day in mid-winter, but there was no trace of the moon in the Northern sky. He had been counting this day in his head ever since he arrived at Twinspeak three months ago. The old man would say it sooner or later.

“The boy has not returned since the afternoon…,” he sighed.

“ Adiel ? He must be taking shelter in the woods” he said just like he did in the past.

“The Northern woods are dangerous, boy...”

Of course, he knew. They trafficked people, dealt with illegal magic items, and let all kinds of people in and out of Twinspeak from there. And Tammie would be one of them. Oh, how he wished he had come back to the time before he had started the Journey to the North! And then he could have brought Tammy with him.

But he and Adiel had left her, they had thought at least, in safety in the west. But the stubborn girl had actually ended up following them instead. Tonight Adiel would accidentally stumble upon the traffickers. And then three days later, he would be found buried in snow, protecting Tammie with all his might.

The snow did not stop falling outside, and winds blew wildly. The time had come. In his past life, she had died young, and now his heart longed to see her, keep her and nourish her till his end.

That’s right. This was a second chance. Right now, time was his friend. He knew everything that was going to happen. All the events that would make him, break him and put him to the test. He did not have to go through all of that again. There was no need to wait.

“I will go look for her tomorrow.,” he briskly replied to the old man.

“Her?”

“I meant Adiel…” His tongue slipped.

There was no need to worry about him. He was the man who would be right hand man of the future Emperor of Gladios, after all. They had grown up together in the ravaged streets of their little western nation. And he had also accompanied him to the North. They both had the same mission and same goals. If he had survived in the past, he would survive again.

The only thing he had to was not let Reina Aurwood, who would be out in her carriage to go to her beloved Spring Resort, stumble upon Adiel or the old man. To do that, he just had to be there early. It was convenient because he wouldn’t want to let Tammy suffer a moment longer either. That way the old man would still be able to smuggle leftovers from the palace, and she would eat well even though it was just filthy stew and be very happy.

Regading Reina Aurwood though, he would take care of her later. The Aurwoods were but a stepping stone in his journey to becoming the Emperor. Even though he had already conquered Gladios once, seeing it in the same state as it was eight years ago only rekindled his insatiable thirst.

Just because he had come back to the past didn’t mean that he had forgotten it. He would make sure they regretted it – the Twin Dragons of Astalda, and every family that bent their knees to them. No matter how many times he had to do it, he would bring them to their knees, and make their heads roll one by one…And the North was where he would start.