"No One Understood Why the Monster Was Crying... Until the Dragon Crest Began to Glow"
No One Understood Why the Monster Suddenly Knelt and Wept Before a Condemned Prisoner... Until the Dragon Mark on the Boy's Neck Began to Glow in the Middle of the Arena
The Arena of Vardos was the cruelest place in the Empire.
Mercy did not exist there.
Only blood.
Screams.
And death transformed into entertainment for nobles drunk on power.
Every weekend, tens of thousands filled the colossal stone arena to watch prisoners thrown into combat against ancient beasts.
Almost no one survived.
But today was different.
Because the King himself had come to watch.
Black imperial banners whipped violently against the arena walls.
War drums thundered across the capital.
And in the center of the blood-soaked sand—
a young boy knelt in chains.
His clothes were torn.
His hands were covered in cuts and dried blood.
A dark slave brand burned across his neck.
No one knew his real name.
The guards only said he had been captured in the western slums after killing a nobleman.
Yet even while kneeling before his execution—
the boy's eyes remained unnervingly calm.
No pleading.
No fear.
The King leaned back upon his throne and laughed.
"This one has spirit."
He raised his goblet of wine.
Then gave a single order.
"Release the Beast King."
The entire arena fell silent.
Several nobles turned pale.
Others rose from their seats in alarm.
Because the Beast King was no ordinary monster.
It had slaughtered more than three hundred gladiators in only three years.
No one had ever survived facing it.
BOOM.
The massive iron gates slowly opened.
Chains rattled like thunder.
Then—
a gigantic claw stepped out of the darkness.
The arena trembled.
Its roar exploded through the stadium, forcing thousands to cover their ears.
The Beast King had arrived.
More than ten meters tall.
Its body was covered in black bone armor harder than steel.
Its crimson eyes burned like hellfire.
Steam hissed from its jaws whenever its drool struck the stone floor.
It was the Empire's nightmare made flesh.
The crowd erupted into madness.
"TEAR HIM APART!"
"KILL THE PRISONER!"
The monster lowered its colossal body.
Then charged directly toward the chained boy.
BOOM.
The ground cracked beneath its weight.
The nobles laughed wildly, waiting to see blood splatter across the sand.
But the moment the Beast King reached him—
everything changed.
The monster stopped.
Its enormous red eyes locked onto the prisoner's neck.
Slowly...
it lowered its head closer.
As if smelling something ancient in the air.
Blood.
A scent so familiar that its entire body suddenly began to tremble.
A low growl escaped its throat.
But this time—
it did not sound hungry.
It sounded... broken.
Then—
BOOM.
The Beast King suddenly collapsed onto its knees.
The entire arena froze.
Absolute silence.
Some people thought they were hallucinating.
The monster that had crushed hundreds of warriors with its bare claws...
was kneeling before a chained prisoner.
Not only kneeling.
Its giant crimson eyes—
were filled with tears.
A retired general seated above the arena suddenly turned deathly pale.
His wine cup slipped from his hand and shattered on the floor.
"No..."
He staggered backward in horror.
"That mark..."
"It still exists...?"
The King immediately turned toward him.
"What are you talking about?"
But the old general could not answer.
He simply stared at the arena as though witnessing an ancient nightmare returning to life.
Because twenty years earlier—
before the royal family had been massacred—
there had been another person who bore the same symbol.
The Dragon Crest.
A mark said to appear only upon rulers capable of commanding all ancient monsters.
And in the suffocating silence of the arena—
the torn cloth around the prisoner's neck slipped aside.
A golden dragon emblem began to glow across his skin.
Light spread through every chain binding his body.
The ground shook violently.
The Beast King lowered its head until it touched the sand.
Its massive body trembled as though it had finally found its true master after thousands of years.
Then the monster released a deep, sorrowful sound.
Almost like weeping.
A sound no one had ever heard from it before.
And finally...
the young prisoner lifted his head.
The Dragon Crest blazed against the darkness.
The golden light illuminated the entire arena.
Then he spoke softly.
"I thought..."
"...all of your kind had been slaughtered long ago."
The Beast King's tears flowed freely.
The old general collapsed into his seat.
The King's face drained of color.
And throughout the arena, tens of thousands of spectators sat frozen in silence.
For the first time in centuries—
the Dragon Heir had returned.
And the Empire suddenly realized that the prisoner they had condemned to die...
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might be the rightful ruler they had spent twenty years trying to erase.
The entire Empire fell silent.
