The village square roared with reverence. A tide of people surged forward, parting only for the hooves of the horses that carried the royal convoy. Banners flapped in the wind—red and gold, bearing the insignia of the Majapahit Empire.
Jaka and Laksita stood near the edge of the path, blending into the crowd. He squinted through the dust and sunlight, already uneasy.
He recognized the banner first.
Majapahit's royal crest.
Then the murmurs followed:
"Dyah Netarja has arrived... Princess Iswari!"
His heart sank.
Princess Iswari, or known across Java Island as Dyah Netarja. First daughter of Queen Tribhuwana Wijayatunggadewi. Sister of Hayam Wuruk. Second in line to the throne.
And this—this was the trigger. The first flag. The one that would eventually lead to the burning of the village.
"No… it's too early I think," Jaka muttered under his breath.
He'd lost track of the calendar since entering this world. No HUD, no quest log, no system timeline like a developer's build. The usual safeguards were gone.
He tried to remain calm. But then, he heard the name.
"Ra Kuti!"
The villagers whispered with admiration. Some even bowed deeper as a tall figure rode into view beside the princess. His armor shimmered faintly with intricate inlays of Javanese script. His eyes were calm—too calm. Like the kind of calm that once burned a capital to the ground.
Jaka's mouth went dry.
Ra Kuti. That name should not exist here. Not now. Not in this era.
Ra Kuti was a figure of the past. A tragic echo of Majapahit's dark chapter. One of the Dharmaputra—seven elite warriors formed by the First Sri Maharaja, Raden Wijaya. Chosen for their loyalty, skill, and unmatched power.
They had been legends. Heroes once.
But history soured.
Ra Kuti and the rest Dharmaputra rebelled against the Second Sri Maharaja, Jayanegara—believing him unfit to rule. Power-hungry. Weak. Obsessive. Especially when the young king sought to marry his own half-sisters, Dyah Gitarja and Dyah Wiyat, for their beauty.
Ra Kuti's rebellion occured. The people suffered. The Waisya and Sudra caste—peasants, workers, and smiths like Jaka's family—bore the brunt of the chaos.
And Gajah Mada rose.
He was a young warrior back then—commander of the Bhayangkara, Majapahit's elite guard. He crushed the rebellion, slew the Dharmaputra, and in silence, plotted the poisoning of Jayanegara to protect Dyah Gitarja and preserve the true legacy of the First Sri Maharaja, founder of the Majapahit Kingdom.
That was history. That was canon.
Ra Kuti died during the reign of the Second Monarch. No event, no questline, no alternate path had ever placed him in Princess Iswari's time.
Was this strange for Jaka? History said yes—but not for him.
To him, it all aligned perfectly. A flawless match of what he visioned in the past life.
But his idea—His idea to twist history, to resurrect the Dharmaputra in the era of the Third Monarch—was scrapped. Rejected by the development team in favor of historical accuracy.
There was no design, no code, no script—yet here stood Ra Kuti, alive, breathing, undeniably real, and the truth of it left Jaka thunderstruck and terrified.
The system and the world was evolving.
This wasn't just a game running his old build. It wasn't static. It was changing, rewriting itself, pulling from Jaka's rejected ideas—ones that never made it past the whiteboard.
"If the system is pulling from my scrapped thoughts… what else did it bring to life?"
Then his eyes turned to the princess—Dyah Netarja. Dressed in crimson batik and golden sashes, her posture perfect, her presence radiant even from afar.
His heart caught.
She was younger.
Too young.
"She's ten…"
He had designed Dyah Netarja as a thirteen-year-old prodigy. Someone just on the edge of wielding real political power. Still raw in combat and diplomacy, but already a tactician.
Yet here she was.
"Three years early."
And she looked exactly as he had drafted her child-version concept art—something he'd designed just for backstory flavor, never for gameplay implementation. A younger Netarja with sharp, observant eyes and an uncanny ability to read people like books.
He had built her with Intellect and Charisma as her core stats—skilled in Tactics, Debate, and Psychological Warfare. Small combat proficiency and raw brilliance waiting to bloom.
A player's worst nightmare—or best political ally.
"This shouldn't be happening."
She was never meant to appear this early—never meant to be under Ra Kuti's protection.
Jaka clenched his fists, his thoughts spiraling. This wasn't just one anomaly. This was a convergence. A fusion of ideas never meant to cross.
He felt sick.
It wasn't just the timeline diverging—it was memory made manifest.
And worse—
I'm no longer the system's designer. I'm just a variable. A leftover. A discarded function in a new patch.
The convoy came to a slow stop in the village square. Horses snorted and pawed the ground. A noble silence followed as villagers dropped to their knees.
Then, Ra Kuti dismounted with dignified grace and addressed the people in a voice that echoed clean and deep.
"People of Kalentang Village," he said, "Her Highness, Dyah Netarja, has chosen to stay in your village for a duration of three months."
Gasps rippled through the crowd. Murmurs rose like steam.
Three months?
No royal ever stayed that long in a Waisya and Sudra-class village. Not without purpose. Not without reason.
But Ra Kuti offered none.
"She asks for no tributes," he continued. "Only your respect, and your peace. Her presence here is under divine guidance. The reason need not be spoken."
Jaka's blood froze.
That wasn't just a line. That sounded like a direct echo from one of the cut plotlines—the divine visitation arc. The one that was never greenlit, where Dyah Netarja was fated to glimpse "the broken weaver"—a metaphor for an outsider whose presence alters time.
Him.
Laksita beside Jaka, was still dazzled by the royal procession.
"That's Princess Dyah Netarja," she whispered, eyes wide. "She's so graceful… like a goddess walking among mortals."
"Yeah," Jaka said absently, brain still running simulation after simulation in panic. "And the guy beside her? He looks strong. Who is he?"
Jaka forced a smile. "Just a… war hero."
And a ghost. And a code-breaking paradox. And possibly the death of everything I ever wrote.
Then, something shifted.
As Ra Kuti and Dyah Netarja passed slowly through the crowd, the young princess's eyes scanned the villagers.
And then—they locked on him.
Jaka froze.
It wasn't a mere glance. It wasn't a passing sweep.
She saw him.
Not just noticed him—but recognized something about him. Her gaze sharpened, narrowed, analyzing him with eerie maturity far beyond her age. She tilted her head slightly. Then her lips parted, just the faintest bit.
It wasn't fear or awe, but curiosity—wonder, recognition—that tightened Jaka's chest, for she saw him not as a peasant, traveler, or noble, but as something divine, and he knew he couldn't stay—not now.
He stepped back from the crowd, pulling Laksita with him gently.
"Let's go," he said.
"But the ceremony—"
"I need to think."
Behind him, the villagers remained frozen in reverence, faces glowing with joy and praise. But Jaka felt only dread.
They began walking, slipping away from the square, from the gaze of a princess who should not be there and a warrior who should be dead.
And even as they moved down the village path, he could feel her gaze—still on him. Not malevolent. Not suspicious.
Just… certain.
Like she had just seen the first crack in the world's order.
The wind carried incense and praise, but Jaka could already smell the smoke beneath it—the kind that comes before burning. He looked up at the sky—so bright.
"This is the beginning of something vast," he thought grimly. "And I'm no longer its creator."