Prompt: Lidusis POV from the demon king's death to the present.

The king is dead, they declared. Gone. Disappeared. Never to be seen again. Rubymonter had been insistent on it, had arranged the funeral and the grand parade, and the memorial. According to her, it was best that the past remain underground with their previous king.

And yet, they buried an empty coffin.

Lispen was only a guard, a king's guard, but only a guard nonetheless. He was forced to observe the farce of a ceremony with the neutrality and aloofness he showed everything else. The king's favorite pet, the one he called friend, Diorook, could not be coerced into participating in the whole affair and instead had chosen to exile himself away in the darkness.

Lispen knew that he could not, for he had a duty to perform.

The king had not loved him especially, had not named Lispen friend as he did with Diorook. But when Lispen watched him, for once he did not feel so very cold inside, like the world was made of ice. Lispen knew he could watch the king's back for the rest of eternity and be content.

When the coffin was lowered, he knew that it meant nothing. And yet, he felt colder than ever before.

Lispen may not have had any noble lineage of which to speak of, but he was smart. Smarter than most of the noble demons combined, smarter than Rubymonter, who thought she was so clever. Now that she had rid herself of the king, she prepared herself to receive the demon king's power, to finally erase the last shred of his presence and swallow it whole.

Before she could, Lispen stole it away.

Humans were such fragile, broken things. He tried hundreds of them. None of them lived, unable to bear weight of incredible power. Lispen began to think none of them could carry it.

And then he found a baby. Lidusis. A newborn, left unattended. They should have known better. The child was cursed now, even though he was meant to live for a while yet.

Six years later, Lispen felt it. From the depths of the abyss where no demon could reach, the king had awoken. Lispen knew the wait was almost over

He looks so young, was the first thought that came to his mind. Lispen forgot himself for a moment, took out his sword, placed it on the king's shoulder.

"Hold," Lispen said. The king looked at him, but his eyes, they were too human. Lispen became aware that the wait was not done yet. He reassumed his facade.

"Do you realize… just exactly whose carriage you just stepped on?"