The day bled into hues of crimson and deep violet, as if the heavens themselves mourned and celebrated at the same time. It was a Tuesday, late October, and the air in Emerald City carried a sharpness that hinted at the coming winter. Leaves, painted gold and ember-red, whirled in the wind like forgotten dreams.
Fred stood silently at the edge of Silverstone Pier, his dark coat whipping around his lean frame. He was now nineteen, yet the weight he carried aged him beyond his years. His skin was a smooth bronze, kissed by the last traces of summer sun, and his sharp, hazel eyes stared at the restless sea ahead.
The harbor buzzed quietly behind him — fishing boats creaked against their moorings, and gulls swooped low over the waves, their cries echoing like lost spirits. Far beyond the mist, the dark outline of Raven Isle floated like a secret waiting to be uncovered.
Fred adjusted the black gloves on his slender hands, his mind racing with the news he'd received the night before: a new group — The Crimson Order — was stirring in the underground, and they knew about the Black Diamond Card hidden in Fred's possession. A card powerful enough to open vaults, unleash secret inheritances, and command loyalty from organizations too terrifying to be named.
He had come here to think, to breathe, but there was no escaping the tides of destiny.
Behind him, footsteps crunched softly over the cracked stones.
He didn't turn. He didn't need to.
He knew it was Amelia — the woman with the storm in her eyes.
Amelia was twenty, her tall, willowy figure wrapped in a wine-colored trench coat that clung to her curves with elegance. Her skin was a fair porcelain kissed with a faint blush from the cold, her lips a soft rose, her black hair tied messily yet beautifully atop her head. She exuded a cold, distant beauty that could bring kings to their knees and terrify them all the same.
"You should be careful," Amelia said, her voice calm but trembling beneath layers of control. "They're hunting you harder than you think."
Fred smiled without warmth, the wind stealing his breath. "Let them come."
There was something different about him now. Something the world had yet to see. Fred had been humiliated once, mocked, stepped on, ignored. But now... he was no longer the same boy. Beneath the broken facade, a titan was awakening.
Amelia stepped closer, lowering her voice. "The Crimson Order moves through shadows. They won't strike at you directly. They'll go after those you care about."
Fred's jaw tightened.
He remembered them — his classmates who once laughed at him, the teachers who turned a blind eye, the so-called friends who vanished when he fell.
But he also remembered the few who stayed: Elena, the shy girl with dreams bigger than her voice; Max, the boy with jokes hiding his fear; Old Man Harrow, who offered him food when no one else would.
He wouldn't let them suffer because of him.
Above them, the sky darkened further, and a cold drizzle began to fall, dotting the stone pier with tiny black kisses. A storm was brewing, not just in the skies, but in Fred's soul.
Suddenly, a sleek black car slid into view on the street above. A figure in a gray coat leaned casually against it, holding a cigarette. His hair was silver — unnatural for a man in his twenties — and his eyes glowed faintly under the streetlight.
Amelia stiffened. "That's one of them. A Crimson Hunter."
Fred turned fully now, his own presence shifting — no longer a boy looking at the ocean but a storm preparing to devour anything in its path.
"I'm done hiding," Fred said, voice low but burning with quiet fury.
He took a step forward, Amelia moving instinctively to his side.
The night sang with tension, like a violin string stretched to its limit.
The Hunter smirked, tossing the cigarette away. "Fred… the forgotten prince. You finally came out to play."
Fred said nothing.
Instead, he reached into his coat and pulled out a slender black card — gleaming under the rain.
The Hunter's smirk faltered for just a second — but that was enough. In the underground world, only one kind of card could command such fear.
The Black Diamond.
Fred tucked the card back into his coat casually. His message was clear: You are not hunting a boy anymore. You are courting your own destruction.
With Amelia by his side, Fred walked calmly toward the waiting enemy, each step heavier, louder, more final. He had been a pawn once.
Now, he was the player.
And tonight, the first piece on the board would fall.
---
The scene shifted seamlessly into the roaring depths of The Scarlet Lounge, a secret underground club where the Crimson Order's second-tier leaders plotted in the shadows. The club throbbed with neon lights and heavy bass, bodies writhing on the dance floor, oblivious to the storm that was about to tear their world apart.
Fred and Amelia, dripping with rain, entered without fanfare but every eye turned toward them, some with curiosity, some with fear.
The game had begun.
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