The sun hung at its highest point, a pale white disk above the silent territory. At noon, the land was usually alive with noise. Vendors called from the streets. Children ran between stalls. Knights trained in the yards with the rhythmic clash of steel. These sounds had become part of the world Andreas grew up in, familiar to the point that he no longer noticed them.
Yet today, all of it was gone.
A heavy, unnatural quiet covered the entire domain. Even the wind seemed unwilling to disturb the stillness. Earlier that morning, the previous Overlord had been found dead. Part of the central castle had collapsed from an explosion that shook the fortress to its foundations. For a moment the knights thought they were under attack.
They rushed to the scene, expecting an enemy force or traces of a battle.
Instead they found the previous Overlord lying on the stone floor, motionless. No wound marked his body. No spell residue lingered in the air. The cause of death remained a mystery. And now, hours later, Andreas stood in the cold room where the corpse rested.
He stood before the body of the previous Overlord, the man he was meant to succeed. The others had left him alone without giving a reason. Perhaps they thought he needed time to grieve. He did not. But he also did not argue.
The corpse rested on a stone slab. The room smelled faintly of smoke and dust from the collapse. Andreas stared at the lifeless face. He examined it not as a son looking at a parent, but as a successor studying a predecessor.
He tried to think of their relationship, though there was not much to recall. The previous Overlord had never acted cruelly toward him. He had trained Andreas in spearmanship on rare occasions. He had assigned excellent instructors for combat and magic. He ensured Andreas received an education suited to a future ruler. But he spent little time with him beyond that.
Once, he had heard from old servants that the previous Overlord had loved his wife deeply. For a short period, Andreas had wondered whether the man resented him for the circumstances of her death. But that had not been the case. There was no hatred in his eyes. No lingering resentment. If anything, there was a distant kind of support. Distant but real.
Other Overlords treated their heirs very differently. Some had multiple children and allowed succession disputes to tear their households apart. Some smothered their heirs with protection, leaving them naive and unprepared. Many were good parents by moral standards, but terrible rulers. Others excelled at governance but failed their families.
By comparison, the previous Overlord had been a capable ruler and a strict educator. Yet perhaps that was the problem. Andreas suspected the man had never seen him as a child. Not as a son. Not as someone to cherish. Instead he had been treated as an inevitable outcome, a successor being shaped for a role.
A tool.
Andreas felt no anger toward that idea, only a vague discomfort he pushed aside. He refused to dwell on it. The dead could no longer answer questions, so there was no reason to ask them.
He turned away from the body and walked out of the room. The air in the hallway felt lighter, though not by much. Standing beside the door was Arden, the butler, waiting quietly.
Arden bowed his head slightly.
"Are you finished, young master? If you wish, you may take more time with the previous Overlord."
"It is not needed,"Andreas replied.
"The territory needs a new Overlord. There will be no succession disputes since I have no siblings, but the other Overlords may take this chance to prey on us. I have a great deal of work to do."
Arden looked at him. Though his expression remained proper and composed, a trace of concern flickered behind his eyes. He knew Andreas and the previous Overlord had not shared a close relationship, yet the boy before him had not shed a single tear. He had emerged from his final moments with the corpse looking completely unchanged.
Without comment, Arden followed him through the corridors, leading him to the main office.
Once inside, Andreas moved directly to the stacks of documents. Thanks to the previous Overlord's competence, the territory suffered no immediate crises. The administration was stable. Supplies were accounted for. Knight rotations were organized. The only
responsibilities that fell upon Andreas now were to arrange the funeral and attend the upcoming Northern Border Overlord meeting in the previous Overlord's stead.
He set aside several documents and straightened his posture.
"Butler," Andreas said,
"begin preparations for the funeral. It will be held here, inside the castle."
"Of course, young master,"
Arden replied with calm refinement.
"I shall see to every detail personally."
Andreas thought for a moment before continuing.
"Also summon all our vassals and every great demon in the territory to the meeting hall."
"As you command," Arden said. He turned to leave.
"And one more thing," Andreas added.
"Call the magicians to my room later. There is something I wish to discuss with them."
Arden bowed. "It will be done."
While the funeral preparations began within the castle walls, Andreas walked into the meeting hall where all high-ranking demons and vassals were already gathered. Thirty individuals filled the room. Twenty-five of them were great demons who held various important positions in the household. The air buzzed with whispers that died instantly when Andreas appeared.
He walked to the central table and sat.
"I am ascending to the position of Overlord," he said.
A few murmurs rose, but they were too quiet to distinguish. Then a particular voice rose clearly above the rest. It belonged to the financial manager of the territory, a man who had held his post for over a century.
"Young master," he said, "you remain a child. While you continue your education and develop your abilities in combat, the territory should be governed by us, your family's vassals."
Andreas looked at him calmly. The man was not wrong. The finance manager had served Vakuroum for more than a century and had never once misallocated a single coin. He was competent, precise, and entirely trustworthy from an administrative standpoint. Any other heir might have relied on him without hesitation.
History, however, contained too many precedents for Andreas to ignore. When an Overlord died before his heir matured, vassals often took control of the territory until the successor was ready. Many of these vassals were capable administrators. Some had genuinely honorable intentions.
But Andreas also remembered how such arrangements usually ended. In most cases, the heir became nothing but a ceremonial figurehead, a puppet wearing a crown. The real power remained in the hands of those who claimed to act in his interest.
He rested his hand on the table. "Who here agrees with that opinion?"
More murmurs rose. Again they were unclear.
"To make it simple," Andreas said, "anyone who agrees, raise your hand."
Of the thirty people in the hall, eighteen raised their hands.
Andreas looked at them for a single quiet second.
"Do it," he said.
In the same instant, the hands of all eighteen vassals detonated into fragments. Blood splattered across polished stone. Screams ripped through the chamber as several demons collapsed, clutching the stumps where their hands had been. Others writhed on the floor, their groans mixing with the sharp smell of burnt flesh. Those who had not raised their hands froze where they sat, horror stiffening their bodies as they stared at Andreas in absolute silence.
Andreas stood from his chair. "If you were easy to replace," he said, "it would not have been your hands that were blown apart. It would have been your heads."
He looked across the trembling crowd. "Understand this. From now on, I am the Overlord. Any opposition to that fact, no matter how small, will be treated as treason."
Without waiting for replies, he walked out of the meeting hall.
Truthfully, he had not done this out of suspicion. He did not believe the vassals loyal to the previous Overlord were plotting against him. He simply did not wish to waste time. If he wanted a firm rule, he would craft it from the first day. And this way, there would be fewer foolish challenges in the future.
Later, Andreas sat alone in the office that was now his. Through the window he could see the courtyard of the fortress. A funeral procession had gathered there. Demons of all ranks stood in respectful silence. The coffin was carried toward the cemetery where every previous Overlord of the territory had been buried.
Arden stood at the front of the assembly, giving a speech. That role was traditionally the successor's duty, but Andreas had declined. He
said he had more important work to do.
Yet now he sat with nothing to do at all.
He watched as the coffin was lowered into the ground. He watched as the earth was placed over it. He watched as the people bowed their heads and mourned.
And he thought, in a quiet corner of his mind:
When I die, I will probably be buried there as well.
He closed the curtains.