"To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering."

***

The grandfather clock in the hallway chimed four times. Each hollow note bounced through the empty corridors of the Leone estate while I sat alone in my chambers, staring at the thing that was about to ruin my night.

The Rune of Diminishment sat on my desk like a paperweight from hell.

Tomorrow morning was the Royal Awakening Ceremony. The grand spectacle where the kingdom’s noble youth would have their classes revealed, their stats displayed, their worth quantified in front of the entire aristocracy. Every single person in attendance would be watching. Analyzing. Judging.

And me? I’d be standing there as Kaelen Leone: the pathetic third son, the family embarrassment, the boy who couldn’t manifest proper mana if his life depended on it.

Which, technically, it did.

Tomorrow I stop being background noise. Tomorrow I become an active player in the same game that killed the original Kaelen before I ever showed up.

Fun times.

The rune’s dark stone surface seemed to drink the candlelight instead of reflecting it. The carved spirals appeared to shift and writhe when I wasn’t looking directly at them. An optical trick that made my eyes water if I stared too long.

According to PlotHoleFinder69’s extensively detailed forum post from my previous life (gods, that felt weird to think about), this artifact could mask its bearer’s true capabilities from the System’s supposedly all-seeing gaze. It would show the world exactly what I wanted them to see.

But magic in this world always demanded payment. There was always a price.

I’d spent the last three days researching the rune in the Leone family archives. The eastern wing of the library. The section nobody visited because the books were old and the language was terrible.

Ancient mages apparently loved writing in flowery, overly metaphorical nonsense. Probably made them feel smart to write "the serpent consumes its tail in the garden of flesh" instead of just saying "cut yourself in a circle."

But beneath the pretentious garbage, the pattern was clear. Diminishment required a deliberate sacrifice of flesh. Carved into the bearer’s body by their own hand. Sealed with their own blood. The wound had to be self-inflicted. The pain had to be willingly accepted.

No shortcuts. No substitutions.

The irony was perfect. To hide my true strength, I first had to wound myself. To appear weak to the world, I had to prove I was strong enough to bear pain without crying out. I had to become my own torturer.

I reached for the silver letter opener lying beside the rune.

A "gift" from Lucius on my sixteenth birthday. The handle was elegantly engraved with the Leone family crest. A roaring lion. I could still remember the smug satisfaction on his face as he presented it with fake brotherly affection, playing the magnanimous older sibling in front of Father.

He gave this to me with such contempt. Probably imagined I’d use it to open threatening letters from creditors. Or maybe to dramatically end my own existence in a fit of despair.

He never could have imagined I’d use his thoughtful gift to carve myself into something he couldn’t recognize.

I unbuttoned my shirt and stood before the full-length mirror in the corner of my chamber. Made myself meet my own gaze.

The reflection showed Kaelen Leone’s pale, lean torso. Unmarked except for a handful of faded childhood scars. One on the shoulder from where he’d "fallen" down the stairs after angering Father. Another across the ribs from where Lucius got "overly enthusiastic" during training.

Soon there would be something else joining them. Something I chose.

The rune’s required pattern was complex. A tightly wound spiral within a larger spiral, punctuated with small notches and subtle curves that had to be rendered with near-perfect accuracy to function. I’d practiced the design dozens of times over the past three days. Charcoal on parchment. Memorized each stroke’s angle and depth. Burned the pattern into muscle memory.

Now came the real test.

I pressed the letter opener’s sharpened tip against my bare chest. Just above my heart. Exactly where the texts specified the pattern must begin.

This is insane. I’m about to mutilate myself based on information I read in an internet forum post from a world that shouldn’t exist anymore. This is the definition of madness.

But what’s the alternative? Walk into that academy tomorrow completely defenseless? Let the System catalog everything I can do? That’s not risky. That’s a death sentence.

At least this way, I have a chance.

The first cut was shallow. The pain was immediate.

It wasn’t a burn. It was cold. Clean. A line of intense wrongness drawn across my skin, a message my nerves screamed directly into my brain.

I gritted my teeth hard enough to make my jaw ache. Forced myself to press deeper. Followed the spiral’s outward curve.

Blood welled up immediately. Bright red. Shockingly red. It ran in thin rivulets down my stomach and stained the waistband of my trousers.

Keep going. Don’t stop.

The texts were specific. It had to be deep enough to scar permanently. Deep enough to mark me as changed. Surface wounds wouldn’t carry the magic.

It had to hurt. It had to cost something real.

Each subsequent stroke required active effort to maintain control over the blade and my shaking hands. The spiral grew steadily under my knife. By the time I reached the inner curves, cold sweat beaded on my forehead and dripped down to sting my eyes. My breathing had gone shallow and rapid. The room tilted slightly.

Almost done. Just a little more.

The original Kaelen survived worse.

Close enough.

The final stroke connected the pattern’s ending point to its beginning. Completed the circuit.

For one long, terrible moment, nothing happened.

I stood there bleeding and shaking, wondering if I’d just mutilated myself for nothing. If PlotHoleFinder69 had been wrong. If the whole thing was some elaborate troll post and I’d just carved up my chest for literally no reason.

Then the lines began to glow.

A faint silver light that seemed to come from deep within my flesh rather than from the surface. It pulsed twice in a slow rhythm that matched my racing heartbeat. Then it gradually faded, leaving behind a raised, silvery scar that looked years old despite being carved minutes ago.

The transformation from fresh wound to ancient mark happened so fast it made my head spin.

I touched the scar with trembling, blood-slicked fingers. Expected a fresh wave of pain.

Instead, I found only a strange warm, tingling sensation that spread outward from the mark like ripples in a pond. Not unpleasant. Just profoundly other.

The Rune of Diminishment on my desk had gone completely dark. Its carved surface now looked like ordinary stone. Its power had been transferred into my flesh. Bound to me permanently.

It worked. It actually worked.