I was once the King of Kings.
My name—Chris the Eternal—echoed across continents. I conquered half the world through steel and spirit. No rival matched my strength, no empire withstood my wrath. I was blessed with an immortal body, carved by divine war and tempered by centuries of pain. I crushed tyrants, silenced rebels, and brought peace by the sword.
I had one goal: unite the world, then reach for Heaven itself. Only by bringing the realms under a single banner could true order exist. I would burn a thousand cities if it meant one day no child would ever starve again.
And then… I blinked.
My throne was cold. My limbs no longer obeyed. My hands moved without command. My voice, my breath—it wasn't mine anymore.
That was the day Zaire arrived.
He wore my body like a costume. At first, I thought I was dying. But I wasn't. I was still there, deep in the chambers of my own mind. Watching. Powerless.
Zaire laughed the first time I tried to speak through him. A casual chuckle, like a drunk mocking a ghost.
"You're awake in there, huh? That's crazy. You must've had some willpower, King Man."
His voice was a twisted version of mine—youthful, mocking, drenched in arrogance.
"Don't worry. I'll finish your dumb little dream. I'll conquer the world and the heavens too. But this time, we're gonna do it my way. Blood, rape, pillage—hell, everything gives EXP in this world. You didn't know that, did you?"
I didn't understand his words. "EXP"? "Quests"? He kept talking about things as if he were inside some strange game.
"Man, this body's OP. You must've been high-level or something. And this stat growth? Nuts. Anyway, I'm calling this the Demon Lord Route. Let's break the world before we fix it."
I screamed inside my own mind.
Zaire marched with my armies, but he warped them into monsters. He turned generals into executioners. He taxed the people until even the nobles protested. He ignored the culture, burned the temples, and raised banners with slogans like "Survival is Submission."
He took women in the night. Executed children to send messages. Every day, he received invisible "quest rewards" for cruelty.
"Kill a noble? +500 Gold and Rare Loot! Oh, a rebellion crushed? Level up, baby!"
He leveled up by slaughter.
I tried everything to stop him.
I would whisper when he slept. Push back with all my will when he tried to speak.
One night, after he torched an entire village, I managed to paralyze his right hand for a second.
It made him laugh.
"Oooh. Big scary king's getting angry now."
"Face it, you had your turn. You were a boring ruler. This world has systems now. I'm built for this."
Zaire wasn't from my world. He was something else—another soul, pulled here by some cursed algorithm of fate. And he had something I never had: a System. He called it his "Interface," an invisible guide that gave him quests, stats, upgrades. Like he was inside a game.
"I got a perk called 'Villainous Path'. You know what that means? Bonus EXP from fear. Every time someone cries before I kill them, I get stronger."
I could feel the joy in his voice. It was like fire behind my eyes.
There was one journey—one last flicker of hope.
We were traveling through the province of Alinor. Word had come that the villagers there refused to pay the new "Gratitude Tax" he invented.
"Gratitude Tax! Genius, right? They live in my empire. They breathe my air. I should get something for that."
I pushed harder than ever before. I forced my thoughts into the front of his mind. Images of children. Mothers. Pleading faces.
"Not this one," I whispered. "Let them go."
Zaire frowned mid-step. His hand twitched.
"Still fighting, huh? That's kind of impressive."
He ordered his troops to surround the village anyway. I screamed inside. I clawed. I begged.
And for a moment… he paused.
But then, a notification popped up in his vision. I could see it too, faintly, through him.
[Quest Updated: Burn the Resisters. Bonus EXP for collateral deaths.]
He grinned.
"Sorry, King. They're just pixels to me. EXP is EXP."
He ordered the massacre. Children burned in front of their families. Women screamed in silence before being dragged into the flames. And he smiled the entire time.
Something inside me cracked.
I didn't know pain like this before. Not on this scale. Not helplessness. I had fought gods and lived. But now I couldn't lift a single finger.
Then it came.
The flicker. A single thread of silver in the void of my mind.
[System Notification: You have been infected with the Invading System.]
[Error: Host soul not dominant. Secondary consciousness detected.]
[New Feature Unlocked: Body Invasion. Find a host. Escape the prison.]
Hope returned like a blade to my throat. Painful. Beautiful.
For the first time in decades, I had a way out.