Origin Seven Sins

[Amadeusz]

Read on Royal Road

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The body was wrong.

Leon Vaelis opened his eyes to a ceiling of cracked stone and rotting timber, the smell of mildew thick enough to choke on, and the immediate, undeniable certainty that this flesh was not his own. His arms were too thin, the bones jutting against skin that had never seen proper sunlight. His chest rose and fell with the shallow breaths of someone who had been sick for a very long time.

He sat up, and the world tilted sideways for a moment before righting itself. The room was small, a forgotten corner of some abandoned structure, maybe a chapel or a waystation. Dust motes hung in the single shaft of light that pierced the gloom, and the only furniture was the pallet he'd been lying on and a wooden chest with a rusted lock.

The memories came in fragments, like broken glass reassembling itself in his mind. He remembered the war, the one that had ended three thousand years ago, or maybe it had never ended at all. He remembered the taste of sunlight turned to weapon, the weight of a crown that was also a shackle, and the faces of six others who had stood beside him when the gods came down to pass their sentence.

He remembered being the Original Sin of Pride.

Leon pushed himself to his feet, swaying slightly. The body protested with a chorus of aches and pains, muscles atrophied from disuse. He moved to the chest, his hands trembling as they reached for the lid. The lock was broken, had been for some time, and the hinges groaned as he lifted it open.

Inside, wrapped in cloth that might have once been white, was a sword.

The moment his fingers touched the hilt, the world exploded into light.

It wasn't painful, not exactly, but it was overwhelming in a way that made pain seem like a distant cousin. Information flooded his mind, not in words but in pure understanding, as if someone had taken the entire history of this world and poured it directly into his skull. He saw the Holy Knight Orders, their armor gleaming with stolen blessings. He saw the Demon Tribes, their cities carved from living stone and fueled by a hunger that could never be sated. He saw the Celestial Dominion, the angels who called themselves administrators and treated the world like a game board.

And he saw the System.

The interface materialized in front of him, translucent and golden, hovering in the air like a window into another dimension. It was different from the crude status screens he'd heard about in stories, the kind that treated people like characters in a game. This was something older, something that predated the current age by millennia. The text was written in a script he shouldn't have been able to read but understood perfectly.

[AUTHORITY PROTOCOLS INITIALIZED]

[VESSEL SYNCHRONIZATION: 23%]

[SACRED RELIC DETECTED: AURELIUS, THE GOLDEN LION SWORD]

[SIN MARK STATUS: DORMANT]

Leon pulled the sword free from its wrappings, and the blade caught the light in a way that seemed almost alive. It was beautiful, he supposed, in the way that weapons could be beautiful when they were also works of art. The hilt was wrapped in gold wire, and the crossguard was shaped like a lion's head with its mouth open in a silent roar. The blade itself was polished steel, but when he held it at the right angle, he could see faint etchings running along its length, words in the same ancient script as the System.

The interface flickered, and new text appeared.

[ANALYZING CURRENT STATUS]

[NAME: LEON VAELIS]

[LEVEL: 1]

[CLASS: UNASSIGNED]

[ATTRIBUTES:]

[STRENGTH: 8]

[AGILITY: 6]

[ENDURANCE: 5]

[MAGIC: 42]

[SOLAR MAJESTY: 1]

Leon stared at the numbers. The first three were abysmal, the stats of someone who had been bedridden for months, but the magic attribute was high enough to make him pause. And then there was the last one, Solar Majesty, sitting there like a secret the System was only half willing to tell.

He focused on it, willing the interface to explain, and the text shifted.

[SOLAR MAJESTY: A unique attribute tied to the Original Sin of Pride. Represents the user's capacity to wield light as both creation and destruction. Current level allows for basic manifestation.]

[SKILL ACQUIRED: SOLAR FLARE I]

[SOLAR FLARE I: Releases a burst of concentrated light in a targeted direction. Damage scales with Solar Majesty attribute. Cooldown: 30 seconds.]

Leon flexed his fingers around the sword's hilt, and he could feel it now, the power coiled inside him like a sleeping beast. It was faint, barely a whisper compared to what he remembered, but it was there. He raised the blade, pointing it at the far wall, and spoke the skill's name in his mind.

The light that erupted from the sword was blinding, a lance of pure radiance that slammed into the stone with the force of a battering ram. The wall didn't explode, not quite, but it cracked, a spiderweb of fractures spreading out from the point of impact. The smell of ozone filled the air, and Leon's arm tingled with the aftershock of the magic.

He lowered the sword, breathing hard. The body was weak, but the soul was not, and the System was the bridge between the two. He could work with this.

The sound of footsteps outside the door made him turn, his grip tightening on Aurelius. They were heavy, deliberate, the kind of steps that belonged to someone wearing armor. Leon moved to the side of the entrance, pressing his back against the wall, and waited.

The door burst open, and a figure stepped through. The armor was silver, polished to a mirror shine, and the cloak was white with gold trim. A Holy Knight, then, or at least someone wearing their colors. The helmet obscured the face, but the sword in the knight's hand was real enough, and the way it was held suggested someone who knew how to use it.

"By order of the Celestial Dominion, this area has been marked for purification," the knight said, the voice distorted by the helmet. "Any unauthorized individuals are to be detained or eliminated."

Leon stepped out from behind the door, and the knight's head snapped toward him. For a moment, neither of them moved, and then the knight raised the sword.

"You're coming with me," the knight said.

Leon looked at the sword, then at Aurelius in his hand, and he smiled. It was a small smile, the kind that didn't reach his eyes, and it made the knight hesitate.

"I don't think so," Leon said.

The knight lunged, the blade cutting through the air with a whistle, and Leon sidestepped, his body moving on instinct even as his mind struggled to keep up. The sword passed close enough that he could feel the wind of its passage, and he brought Aurelius up in a counter, aiming for the gap between the helmet and the chestplate.

The knight blocked, their blade meeting his with a clang that echoed through the room, and Leon felt the shock of the impact travel up his arm. The body was weak, but the System was compensating, feeding him information faster than he could process it. The knight's next attack was a downward slash, and Leon twisted, letting the blade slide past him, and then he activated Solar Flare again.

The burst of light caught the knight full in the chest, and the armor glowed red-hot for an instant before the knight was thrown backward, crashing into the wall. The sword clattered to the floor, and the knight slumped, smoke rising from the scorched metal.

Leon lowered Aurelius, his breath coming in ragged gasps. The cooldown timer for Solar Flare appeared in the corner of his vision, counting down from thirty seconds, and he filed that information away for later. The knight wasn't dead, not yet, but they weren't getting up anytime soon either.

He moved to the doorway, peering out into the corridor beyond. It was empty, but he could hear more footsteps in the distance, and the faint sound of voices. The Celestial Dominion was here, which meant the System had flagged this location for some reason, and that meant he needed to move.

Leon turned back to the fallen knight, and as he did, he felt something shift in his chest. It was a warmth, spreading outward from his heart, and when he looked down, he saw a faint glow beneath his shirt. He pulled the fabric aside, and there, etched into his skin just above his heart, was a mark.

It was a lion's head, identical to the one on Aurelius's crossguard, and it pulsed with a golden light that seemed to come from somewhere deep inside him. The System interface flickered, and new text appeared.

[SIN MARK ACTIVATED]

[DESIGNATION: PRIDE]

[WARNING: SIN MARK DETECTION WILL ALERT HOSTILE FACTIONS]

Leon stared at the mark, and then at the doorway, where the sound of footsteps was growing louder. He could hear shouting now, orders being barked in a language he didn't recognize but the System translated automatically. They were coming for him, and they were bringing more than one knight this time.

He sheathed Aurelius, the blade sliding into a scabbard that had appeared on his belt without him noticing, and he moved to the window on the far side of the room. It was small, barely large enough for him to squeeze through, but it opened onto a narrow alley that looked like it led away from the main structure.

Leon climbed through, dropping to the ground below, and he started running. The body protested, his legs burning with the effort, but he pushed through the pain. The System was feeding him a map now, a overlay of the surrounding area, and he could see the red dots converging on his location.

He turned a corner, and a wall of fire erupted in front of him.

Leon skidded to a halt, his heart hammering in his chest, and he looked up to see a figure standing on the rooftop above. The flames were coming from twin blades, each one wreathed in fire that crackled and hissed, and the person holding them was grinning down at him with an expression that was equal parts excitement and fury.

"Well, well," the figure said, and the voice was female, young, and absolutely delighted. "Looks like I found one of them after all."

Leon raised his hand to Aurelius's hilt, and the figure's grin widened.

"You're the one with the Sin Mark, aren't you?" she said. "I can smell it on you. Pride, right? That's a good one. I'm Wrath, by the way, but you can call me Aria if you're feeling friendly."

She dropped from the rooftop, landing in front of him with a grace that belied the weight of her armor, and the flames on her blades flared brighter.

"So," Aria said, tilting her head. "Are we going to fight, or are you going to tell me why the Holy Knights are so interested in you?"

Leon opened his mouth to answer, and the sound of armored footsteps filled the alley behind him. He glanced over his shoulder and saw at least a dozen knights pouring into the space, their swords drawn and their helmets gleaming in the firelight.

Aria's grin turned feral.

"Guess we're fighting," she said, and she lunged forward, her blades cutting through the air like twin comets.