The Seventh Prince pt.2 Ch.13

-The Seventh Prince POV-

Opening the door I saw Mr. Plackitt standing there with a child next to him. The kid had white hair and wore a blindfold. Clothed in the standard attire of a Shadow Guard member, he was handsome to say the least, even the blind fold not detracting from his facial features. After a second of thought I decided to use [Analyze] on him, he likely wouldn't detect it and even if he did he would do nothing about it. Not the best way to start a relationship but necessary for my plans.

'Analyze'

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Name: Zero Dawn

Prominent Title: Creator of Physics Magic

Class: Related to the Soul

Age: 10

Level: 15

Mana: 2000 units

STR: 20-25

VIT: 20-25

AGI: 20-25

INT: 20-25

WIS: 70-85

WIL: 150-190

MNA: 100

Margin of error: 12%

Danger Level To Host: Black

Chances of Survival: 0.013%

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What....? Who did father call....? This is madness! Despite only being fresh into his second class he's got 200k mana! That's ridiculous, with a 100 mana stat he either has the mana well title or mana well skill at max.... Also a creator of a magic branch.. at 10! Father must have gone mad, I may be a genius but compared to this kid I'm just a researcher. At best I'll make some spells that would help the kingdom, meanwhile if he continues on this path this kid could become a powerful eighth class holder at least! Eight classes, there are only 5 eighth class holders in the whole kingdom, and that's the minimum I'd put him at.

"My prince? You didn't try and alter a mind spell again?" Breaking me from my thought's I saw Mr. Plackitt looking at me with a worried look on his face. Jeez it was only one time!

"Ah yeah I'm fine." Turning to the kid I introduced myself. "Hello there my name is Garret Shade, Seventh prince of the Shade kingdom."

The kid tilted his head slightly before giving a light bow.

"Greetings your highness, my name is Zero Dawn, and I'm a member of the Shadow Tower. It's nice to meet you."

"Nice too meet you as well. So as you likely—"

Interrupting me, a guard entered the room. Walking over to Zero he stuck out a small metal plate engraved with runes.

"Hello there Mr. Dawn, I need you to place some mana into this plate."

Hearing what the guard wanted I tensed slightly, father does indeed work fast. Zero turned to look at the guard before turning back to me with a questioning look on his face. Turning back to the guard I felt a small mana fluctuation and the runes on the pate lit up. The guard thanked Zero before taking his leave.

"Well.. as I was saying I assume you know why your here?" The boy nodded and I continued. "Great, well then what's your class type if you don't mind me asking."

"Support type" A kid of few words huh..

"Interesting, do you know anything about magic?" I need Mr. Plackitt to go, I trust him but it's best if he doesn't hear this conversation.

"Yes."

"Amazing, come with me then! Mr. Plackitt you can go now." Dismissing Mr. Plackitt I dragged Zero into my lab and closed the door. Immediately I activated several enchantments in my lab that acted as anti-detection arrays.

"Ok! So getting to the point, you—-"

Pausing I look at Zero as he raises his hands slightly. In a flash a 12 ringed magic circle

appears around him before expanding out and attaching to the walls of the lab. The walls and enchantments in the lab vibrate slightly before the spell takes hold.

"You may talk freely now Prince Garret." Nodding at his work Zero looks over at me and gestures for me to continue.

Breaking from my shock at watching a ten year old cast twelfth circle magic, and without chanting at that, I continue with what I was going to say.

"You've been brought here to be inducted as a soul guard… at least that's the standard procedure. However I awakened a special skill, this skill takes hold through the system itself and hence is unavoidable."

Looking at him he appeared unfazed, good after all we'd be together for quite some time and him being hard to faze would make this easier.

"It's essentially a slavery contract on steroids, entirely impossible to remove and much more strict. However the worst part is the complete and total exposure of both your mind and system to my mercy. I'd be able to control stat allotment and everything."

At this point the room had grown slightly heavy from the energy he was radiating. All things considered though he was taking it well. I mean if somebody dragged me into a room and told me I was going to be enslaved by them I'd try and kill them on the spot.

"However I find slavery distasteful and so I found a way to make the contract one of equality. Basically we'd both be unable to hurt each other bound by the system."

This was it, the alternative I had found after pouring through mothers notes. An equality contract, all of the signees attacks will be simply ineffective against the other. This is the only method I could see to avoid this, father won't let me choose, and he can't fight back or he'd be named a traitor. Let's hope he just accepts this so we can move on to the next phase of my plan.

-Mc POV-

Fuck! It's so much worse then I thought! A system based slave contract shouldn't even be possible! Thats blatantly unbalanced I demand the devs balance this fucking trash game! Ok, calm down Zero. Think on the bright side, the prince doesn't want it either.

An equality contract the other hand is… acceptable. After all he can't hurt me either, of course he could get soldiers to do it he is a prince but from what I'm seeing he's a nice guy. No, can't think like that everybody could be an actor using skills. Distrust is safety, paranoia keeps you alive, constant vigilance!

"So… an equality contract? Please explain to me how that works? Also is it truly the system or is it an offshoot of our soul?" Calming down I asked the most important question, what did he mean when he said it 'took hold through the system'.

"The contract works based on the system tied to everyone at birth. Very few skills are capable of directly connecting to the system, the most common being information type skills like observe, appraisal and all the others." Wait? They directly connect to the system? I knew they had to pull that information from somewhere but to think it was the system it's self? I assumed it was an Akashic Records situation not pulling from the system. "Some powerful mages in history have developed skills that directly connect to the system in one way or another. These skills become powerful bloodline skills that can be awakened by anyone with the same bloodline combined with certain conditions and great amounts of luck."

That's interesting, but I wonder why that's the requirement? I should look into hemomancy, if bloodlines can be part of system affects then hemomancy is necessary. Unfortunately it's a forbidden magic, it's relatively hard to unlock and your not supposed to use it for anything but healing. I learned at around 6 that while many healing mages use the death attribute, classes focusing on it and many spells of the attribute are very forbidden. The only publicly allowed usage of death magic is through having a healing class. Not that you could learn it anyway, even in the big academies the death affinities formula is kept a close secret. After all unlike class unlocks truly unlocking an attribute allows it to be used all sorts of ways.

Many attributes are considered forbidden with certain practices being exceptions. An example would be corrupter mana, a combination of mind and reversal mana that corrupts the mind of whoever is target, and the user. It then floods from the mind into the mana networks of the target corrupting them and turning them into void wraiths a terrify species of undead heavily controlled due to their power and infectious ability. However it's an invaluable mana type in fighting elemental diseases as it corrupts straight through the element.

Breaking away from my thoughts and back to reality I nod at the prince to continue.

"The contract binds the two systems together and since the system is omnipotent its completely binding. As for souls, as far as anyone can tell the system doesn't reside in any part of the soul we can interact with if it does reside there at all." Continuing with his explanation made me realize something, their system may be omnipotent but what about mine? Mine, in theory shouldn't be able to harm me…

'System would you enforce that contract?'

{Negative, system doesn't have the ability to harm the host, native system affects will be annulled in favor of the hosts system.}

Interesting, what about the mind exposure and stat allotments would you allow that?

{Affirmative, host would have signed the contract. Only the punishment for ignoring orders or killing the contractor would be annulled.}

Shit, there goes that plan then…

"So, an equality contract? And we just act as if we made the binding contract? No offense my prince but wouldn't your father be able to tell if your bloodline skill works or not?" This was my biggest worry, after all wouldn't the king, a powerful 10th class user, be able to tell if his family bloodline is used.

"No, it's a bloodline from my mothers side and even father doesn't know much about it."

After saying that the prince went silent for several seconds while looking a little sad. A prince who openly shows his emotions, how was he chosen for the magic academy? I understand that he seems to be a mage of some sort but he showed his emotions in front of me. Either he can't hide them or he trusts me enough after a few minutes. Regardless of which, politics and all the scheming nobles of this world will chew him up and spit him out.

Just him being sad at the mention of his mother is good information, imagine what I could get if I tried…

"The ritual circle required is already being made, that's what the guard took your mana for. It'll take around two days two get the circle up and working. Before then I hope you can prepare as best you can for the worst case—"

"If you fail in establishing an equality contract I'd rather just die."

Cutting the prince off I told him my true opinion on the matter. Dying, as someone who experienced it, sucks, however it's far better then being a contract bound slave. If he fails in his contract being established several things could happen.

One my personal system would negate the effects, hopefully viewing them as harmful, to the point of making the contract irrelevant. I would then be either executed to cover up the failure or experimented on to find out why it failed. Two, he'd establish the original contract in which case I'd self destruct my soul before he can order me not to. And finally three, it would be the first option but the king doesn't care and I live freely, but that's far to optimistic.

"That's… understandable. However it shouldn't come to that. I've poured over the notes many times and it doesn't seem difficult."

"Well let's just hope your right."

I truly did hope he figures it out, after all it's not exactly common to get second chances. I enjoyed being alive and I'd like to keep it that way. I will check to see if I can access the palace library. If they have the formula for space I might be able to get a plan B up. Although the palace is likely warded to high hell and 2 days is no way long enough for that It would be better then nothing.

God why couldn't it be something simple like basic guard duty. Hell I'd take a nice female noble with questionable tastes just about now. At least that's easier to escape…

Whatever, I have 2 days. Two days in which I have to look for as many escape routes as possible. Maybe a spell that functions on a deadman's switch and I just take the prince hostage? I'll just have to figure something out and hope for the best. God this sucks, I don't want to make the protagonists proclamation of 'controlling my own fate' or 'I shall rebel against heavens will' but not being in control is very infuriating.

God I might actually end up making one of those decrees if I'm not careful… what is this cliche world doing to me.