Calvide... Even with both fists clenched firmly in the sheets he couldn’t seem to keep his trembling fingers still. As much as he tried to tell himself it was impossible – absurd, preposterous – like his shaking fingers, he couldn’t suppress the part of him whispering that it already knew what was going on. The room was spinning again, everything tilting ever so slightly as he found himself at a loss. The crest on the wall, the tall bookshelves, the long, dark hair that now framed his face. He knew that denial would do little but preserve his comfort a moment longer, but even then... Surely, surely it was impossible.

Parting his bitten lips, he grit out a quiet, rasping reply. "My name is... Cyrus Odelia Calvide?"

The healer hummed softly, making no outward sign of surprise, and their following words made Cyrus's heart sink.

"Good. It is by the graces' benevolence that you have retained your senses thus far; had the studies damaged your mind to a point where you no longer recalled your own self, there would be no saving you."

Lacey released a cry of relief, pressing the heels of her hands to her eyes and scrubbing at her tears with her sleeves. The healer took a few moments to gather their thoughts and leaned forwards to pick up their medicine bag, moving it from the mattress to their feet.

"I will be frank with you, my Lord: how much do you remember?"

Cyrus's lack of reply spoke for itself, it seemed, for the healer continued after the moment stretched into an uncomfortable silence.

"The date, your location, anything at all?"

"We are in... my family's estate?"

The healer sat up straighter at his response. "That is certainly the case. Where are you now?"

"The Count’s- my bedroom, in the southern wing."

"Indeed. And outside the estate? What do you recall about that?"

"The ninth district of Whitecliff. In... the kingdom of Vilon."

The relief in the healer's posture was palpable, so much so that they mustn't have noticed how wooden Cyrus's voice had become, his eyes unfocused as he stared unblinking at his bedsheets.

"You are beyond fortunate, Lord Calvide," the healer declared after a breath. "Considering the scarcity of healers experienced in treating illusory backlash, extensive memory loss would have made your prospects incredibly poor."

"... What?"

A low, chiding sound emerged from behind the healer's mask at the query, their head turning briefly towards Lacey before returning to Cyrus's face.

"Whatever your reasoning was for studying the illusory arts, you will have to inquire with your servants. All I am able to tell you is that it is dangerous – not as a weapon, but in the damage it inflicts on the practitioner," the healer explained, tutting in quiet disapproval. "Popular belief holds that it is a school of magic so useless that it's only valued by madmen; in reality, the cause and effect is inverted. The magic drives them mad.

"That you remember where you are, who you are, even how to speak... it is a testament to your mental resilience, if nothing else. How much memory you have lost or whether your lost memories will return to you, I cannot say, but as it stands you at least have a foundation on which to build new ones." With that statement the healer rose to retrieve the heavy tome from the desk, bundling it up in the arm not holding their bag.

"Rest now, my Lord Calvide, and try to relax. I will send the Count your way once he has stored this book somewhere safe; he can assist you in determining how much you have forgotten. Should you experience any additional trauma, please come and find me without delay."

Cyrus's gaze followed them across the room, dazed and glassy eyed. His hands rested limply on his lap. When the healer reached the door, however, they were intercepted before they could grab the handle.

"Wait! Is that it? Y-you aren't going to leave, are you, what – what if his Lordship has forgotten something important, like – what if he can't read anymore, o-or eat? Isn't there more you can do?" Lacey babbled nervously.

The healer stopped at the edge of the door, forcing Lacey to halt as well; one arm hung slack at her side as she stared at the motionless, blank features on the healer's mask.

"If his Lordship has forgotten how to eat, I'm sure his many servants will be capable of attending to him," they stated dryly, the vaguest hint of amusement colouring their voice. "Beyond healing his injuries, there is little I can do for him but consult my peers and the Scholars. With luck we may find record of similar cases, and better ascertain Lord Calvide's prospects."

Lacey finally shifted herself aside, only to glare daggers at the healer's back as they departed the room, closing the door softly behind them. She waited until the firm click of the latch sounded, then returned to her prostrate form at the foot of Cyrus's bed with her hands clutched in front of her chest like in prayer.

"Lord Calvide, I-I know I'm just a maid, but..." she began hesitantly, glancing up to meet his gaze across the bed. Whether she was seeking reassurance from his gaze or a reprimand, Cyrus didn’t know, but something in his dazed expression brought distress to her face and she flung herself forward into an even deeper bow.

"I promise I'll do everything I can to support his Lordship's recovery, n-no matter what! You... you won't become a madman, the Count will find experts to help you, I know he will! So..! Please, don't lose hope!"

With that final sentence, her confidence seemed to buckle – the very next moment the distraught young maid had fled his bedside, the heavy wooden door swinging on its hinges in her wake. It seemed, Cyrus thought absently, a bit of an overreaction.

In fairness, Cyrus's vacant gaze was far from inspiring. He stared straight ahead, long black hair sticking up at odd angles, shoulders slumped forward and the remains of a nosebleed smudged across his face. The cogs of his mind that usually worked so efficiently had all but stalled to a grinding halt.

Without any pain forcing him to squint, his surroundings were no longer a vaguely decadent blur. The bed he was resting on was absurdly wide, so much so that five adult men could comfortably lay shoulder to shoulder across it. Its posts were a dark, glossy lacquer adorned with silver orchids and reached almost all the way to the ceiling. The rest of the furniture in the room was much the same; bookshelves, desk, a coffee table and chaise lounge – those that weren’t delicately crafted lacquerwork were still dark ebony and polished to a shine, the sliver of daylight that peeked out from the curtains reflecting off their surfaces.

Even the room's wallpaper was intricately patterned, floral motifs embellished in filigree on a background of rich plum, a mirror of the embroidered sheets he rested on. Speaking of mirrors, a glint of silver on the wall to his left caught his eye, and Cyrus rose unthinkingly from the bed to reach for it.

The frame dug into his palm as he took the mirror from the wall, the decorative vines and birds wrought in silver detailed and so worryingly real against his skin. As was the pale face that greeted him in his reflection. Dark, angular eyes, a subtly aquiline nose, a sharp but delicate jawline. Long black hair with a widow's peak. The silver points of the frame bit into his hands hard enough to draw blood – it wasn’t his face.

Cyrus Odelia Calvide, corrupt noble and Next to Eden's second-act boss, stared despairingly back at him from the surface of the mirror wearing a rumpled nightgown and a terrible case of bedhead.

A more courageous man would have thrown the mirror to the ground in distress. Cyrus couldn’t deny being tempted, but the detailed silver work shone at him as if flaunting its expense (were those rubies in the birds' eyes?) and he haltingly dropped it onto the mattress instead, following suit when his knees buckled.

Feeling his headache building anew, Cyrus wondered if he couldn’t convince himself that this was an elaborate dreamscape after all; that maybe his heart had given out in the middle of blocking Planewalker_777 for the thirty-eighth time and this dying dream was his karmic recompense. The twinge of pain in his palms cheerfully interrupted his half-hearted attempts to delude himself.

It could be worse, he consoled himself, closing his eyes with a sigh. He could have opened his eyes this morning as a nameless villager, herding boars around a peat bog and hoping they didn't spit fire at him. At least if he died for impersonating Count Cyrus his last moments would be spent bleeding out on plush carpet instead of with a faceful of foul-smelling dirt.

The thing about Cyrus Calvide, Video Game Villain was, put bluntly, that he was kind of a fucking dick. He wasn't the big bad, but he was the most detestable enemy in the game by a long shot. This fact was evident as early as the tutorial.

There you were, running errands and training against low-level enemies in the Hero's peaceful hometown while villagers talked worriedly about recently increasing taxes. Instead of buying equipment from the local smith you had to go off on a sidequest to hunt down a decent sword, all because any excess ore had been requisitioned by the territory's far-off master and the remainder was needed for farming tools.

Stripped of so many resources, when the first trickling wave of the demon invasion washed over the humble village only the Hero was able to properly fight back. The townspeople never stood a chance. It could reasonably be said that while the Demon King's forces pulled the trigger on the village of Goldacre, Count Cyrus had been the one who pushed them into the line of fire first.

Too bad the mismanagement of a territory was the least of his crimes.

The Count had seen the demonic incursion coming long before anyone else, and while most of the ruling class rested easy in their confidence that the divines would protect them, he had already begun sending mercenaries down out-of-the-way supply routes to stockpile materials and magical artifacts. When the invasion finally started in earnest and the rest of the nobles realised the gravity of the situation, Count Cyrus was positioned to profit. Using his newfound political influence as the man financing Vilon's defense, the Count promised great rewards to any adventurers who could deal significant blows against the enemy forces, the Hero's party being one of those teams.

So far a player could argue that these were the actions of a greedy and clever man, not a grand villain. This argument quickly dissolved with the discovery that almost all the skilled adventurers who had reportedly died in the line of fire had, in fact, been murdered by the Count himself.

The Count had a unique skill, you see. By drinking blood from a person's heart he could acquire their skills for himself.

Why work for power when you could reap what others had grown instead? Every mission the Count had sent adventurers on had only been an excuse to cultivate their abilities further, fattening pigs before the slaughter. Under his cruel gaze the invasion was an opportunity for profit and the Hero and his party nothing more than livestock. Taking advantage of the chaos caused by the demons, the Count had done nothing but sit back and exploit the suffering of others for his own gain.

Murder, fraud, war profiteering, patricide, fratricide; topping that off with an extremely annoying boss fight, even the players charmed by the Count's pretty face were left with a sour taste in their mouth. Even the Demon King had apologists in the game forums and fans who gushed over how badass he was – Count Cyrus had no sincere admirers. You either loved to hate him or just plain hated him.

But where in the timeline was he? Cyrus wasn't the count yet, thank god, so who was? Count Calvide the patriarch? Count Calvide the brother?

Two hours, however vivid, was not long enough for Cyrus to give up hope that this was all still a dream; but as long as there existed even a minuscule chance of this being his new reality there was no sense in treating the situation flippantly. It was his own life on the line, after all, and how likely he was to keep it depended on how many indiscretions Cyrus Odelia Calvide had already committed.

God, the divines, whoever he was supposed to pray to – please let Count Calvide the patriarch still be alive. Cyrus bit back a curse as his comb snagged on yet another tangle of hair.

Voices drifted up the hallway, low with concern, freezing him in place. The walls were too sturdily made; he couldn’t make out the words no matter how he pricked up his ears.

The door flung open and knocked into the doorstop with a thunk, sending a jolt through Cyrus that had him yanking on the tangle in his hair. He stared, wide-eyed and tense, as an absolute brick wall of a man made an abrupt entrance, a harried maid following behind him with a tea tray.

The man strode purposefully into the room, unhindered by the basic courtesy of knocking or the sight of Cyrus in his nightgown. He paid no mind to the maid arranging tea on a low table, instead making a beeline for where Cyrus was perched on the edge of the mattress like a deer in headlights. The man came to a stop directly in front of him, the toes of his boots practically knocking against his own bare ones as he placed both hands on his hips and stared down at Cyrus with arched eyebrows.

A tailored frock coat and neatly coiffed hair contrasted almost comically with the man's broad shoulders and barrel-like chest. Where Cyrus was lithe, almost elegant, this newcomer gave off the impression of a wild black bear dressed up for a tea party. But despite their differences there was a familiar quirk to the man's lips, the angles of his nose and brow a match to those he saw earlier in the mirror, and the man himself couldn’t be far beyond his mid-twenties.

Both of them were motionless in their mutual scrutiny, save for Cyrus's hand twitching around the comb stuck in his hair. Just as Cyrus realised he'd been frozen awkwardly in place from the moment the door swung open, the man sighed, posture going slack. He brought a broad hand up to scratch at the back of his head.

"Damn, that healer really wasn't putting one over on me, huh? You look like I'm going to attack you or something," he said, utterly bemused. "You're usually so smart, how'd you mess up so badly you'd forget your own brother?"

Darius Calvide pouted at him from above like an absurdly large dog, completely unaware of the way he’d just kicked Cyrus further into the pit of despair.

"... I haven't forgotten everything," Cyrus hedged, knowing it would be out of character for Cyrus Calvide of all people to take that lying down. Being scrutinised for someone else's mistakes was already growing tiring. "Does that make you the Count?"

"Of course," Darius replied, thumbing at a brooch on his chest. He looked entirely too proud of it. "Don't tell me you scrambled your brain so much you can't even recognise the King's mark anymore?"

Oh, the grin on the man's face wasn’t pride after all; it was the unmistakably gleeful expression of an older brother reveling in schadenfreude. Finally dispensing of his stiff upper lip, Cyrus groaned and buried his face in his hands.