1 Awakened

When a migraine struck, he could barely let out any sound from his parched throat. Helpless in his cage of pain, the boy with hair purest and whiter than snow squirmed under the covers—hoping he could escape from this pain that increased every time he breathed. Another pain throbbed so violently around his skull the boy wondered if there's a knife that cracked his head open.

The pain was so extreme he felt immediately nauseated and vomited to the side of the bed.

"C-Crown Prince! Crown Prince Ailen has awakened!"

When Ailen opened his eyes so suddenly, all he could see was blackness. Panic momentarily seeped through his bones, heart hammering inside his chest as he groggily looked around. It took him five minutes to adjust to the low lighting conditions. Ailen realized that he's in a luxurious bedroom that was unquestionably not his.

The room was spacious. Victorian-esque furniture and decorations adorned the room from top to bottom, corner to corner. There's an opened door far away from the bed he's laying on; a hubbub of distant chattering was heard— two people rushed into the room. Their faces were blurry, but it's clear that they're wearing maid attires.

Ailen started to see dark spots in his vision, and the little boy tried blinking several times to refocus himself.

But his attempts were fruitless.

Another sharp pain hit his head, and the boy finally able to let a groan escaped his chapped lips.

"Dear Gods— He's awake,"

"We must inform His Majesty immediately,"

"His Majesty would not care less about his son, Meredith. The Emperor stopped giving us any specific order to take care of the Crown Prince three years ago,"

"Then what should we do?! We can't just— ignore this! The Crown Prince is awake, Irma! He's awake! He's breathing, and he opened his eyes for the first time in years, and he's the rightful heir of the throne,"

"Shh! Keep your voice down,"

They stopped whisper-yelling when Ailen started to cough. Their stifled voices caused the white-haired boy to furrowed his eyebrows. One of the maids gently wiped some of the spew on his chin, while the other busy cleaning up the ones on the floor.

"Y-Your Highness, can you hear me?"

Ailen didn't reply. A carousel of thoughts messing up with his mind, the boy couldn't comprehend what was going on at the moment. This is not his body. This is not his life, and this is not the cramped little studio that he hated.

Where's his cellphone? where's his drunk friends who would barged in his room dragging him to have another round of drinks? where's his overpiling bills and college tuition that haunted him down?

Questions started to flooding in, his anxiety grew tenfold, but there's nothing that could calm him down. But the carousel stopped abruptly when the room began to spin, forbidding him to think any further.

His consciousness ebbed, pulling him into a cold swirling mess of abyss.