"My prince! My prince, wake up!"
Kael was dreaming of neon lights and losing hands—of poker tables stacked with chips, the stench of liquor and sweat hanging thick in the air, and a sickening blur of desperation. He remembered losing badly.
Then there were hands dragging him into a van, the cold steel of a gun barrel pressed to his temple, the stink of moldy concrete in that warehouse. Screams in the dark. Debt collectors who wanted fingers.
He could still hear distant screams and he thought for one terrifying moment, he was still in that damned warehouse with a gun pointed at his head.
"Prince Kael, the wall is breached!"
Kael's eyes opened to a man in rusted armor shaking him like a ragdoll.
"Who the hell is Kael?" he croaked.
The man went rigid. Kael stared, baffled by the absurdity of the soldier's appearance. He was wearing what looked like armor pulled from a low-budget historical film. It had mismatched plates and dents everywhere, as if heavily used.
He chuckled. "What the hell are you wearing?"
Shouting erupted again from his left. They both jerked toward the sound but all he could see were men in costume and smoke swirling thick through the air.
"You need to go, now!" the man in armor barked, gripping Kael's shoulder. "We'll cover you, but you need to run!"
"Wait, wait... what's happening? Are we in a set?"
"Just MOVE, Prince Kael!"
Kael stumbled upright with a startled grunt, armor clinking as the soldier shoved him forward. He groaned under the weight of it, confused and overwhelmed by armor he didn't remember putting on. His eyes went to a sword jammed into the ground beside him with suspicious red liquid that looked like fresh blood on the hilt.
"What the actual—"
The earth trembled as something snarled somewhere.
Kael scrambled upright. His right arm jerked, unsure and off-balance.
FOOF.
Four glowing cards burst into the air and hovered in a perfect arc. Their edges shimmered like molten gold, and the symbols carved into their faces pulsed faintly, almost like they were breathing. They didn't flutter or fall. They just hung there, defying gravity like it no longer mattered.
Kael froze.
Cards?
"Are you guys seeing this?" he asked.
Behind him, something growled.
"PRINCE KAEL!" another soldier screamed from atop a stone wall. "IT'S COMING! GET AWAY FROM HIM!"
Kael screamed when he turned around and saw the thing's grotesque shape. Its jaws split sideways like a cracked mask. It had too many teeth, no real face, and eyes that burned with something red.
The first soldier rushed forward to meet the thing head-on, his blade shaking in his hands.
"RUN, MY PRINCE!"
"Me?!" Kael shouted.
The beast lunged. The soldier met it mid-air with a desperate swing.
Kael didn't wait for an answer and just ran.
Where the hell am I?
The courtyard erupted into chaos as the soldiers fought against things he'd never seen. Monsters.
He sprinted across the muddy courtyard, slipping past corpses and barrels, tripping over a dented helmet. His mind held nothing coherent, just a white-hot streak of instinct and raw panic.
A second monster, this one with blades for arms, crashed through a wooden gate ahead.
"NOPE," Kael barked, spinning on his heel.
He slipped and slammed his hand into one of the floating cards.
The Ace.
[Card Activated: BLOODLINE BOOST - PASSIVE]
(Agility + Strength Enhanced.)
The card ignited gold and slammed into his chest.
Then he felt a sudden change in his body. He was faster. Lighter. He vaulted over a barrel with unnatural grace, his boots landing light.
The wolf-beast lunged towards him again. Kael slammed into a wall, rolled, and stood in one smooth motion. He expected that to hurt but it barely did. He glanced at the floating cards again.
Did the card do something?
He crouched behind an overturned cart, panting.
"Okay," he muttered. "I am dreaming and this is the shittiest one, yet."
The Ace card had grayed out. Now only three cards remained.
A distant howl cut through the air. Kael gritted his teeth. It would be dangerous to stay in one area.
He moved.
His heart thundered, not from fear but from something deeper, a primal surge like instinct fused with adrenaline. His body surged with unnatural energy. The mud didn't stick. The wind bent around him. The chaos blurred.
He zipped between monsters and men fighting them, ducking blades, flipping over crates. "Too real. Way too real. But hey, could be worse."
A sudden tail slammed into his ribs.
Everything broke.
The world went sideways. He crashed through the cart he'd just crouched behind.
He coughed blood. "Okay. This is a fucking nightmare."
Pain radiated through his entire frame, blooming from his side and chest with such intensity it drowned out the rest of the world, anchoring him firmly in the reality that this was no dream.
"This fucking feels too real," he shouted, irritated, coughing.
He froze when the nearest monster looked at him.
A soldier had already thrown himself into the path of the beast. The monster met him with unrelenting force, claws tearing through armor like paper. The man's scream was short, cut off by the sickening crunch of ribs collapsing.
Kael didn't even know the guy's name, but someone had just died for him. And if this isn't a dream, he just saw someone die.
He slapped the second card floating as the monster ran towards him.
[Card 2 Activated: Counter Reflex - PASSIVE]
His body moved before he could think. Rolled sideways. A claw slammed into mud. His hand grabbed a broken spear, and without aim or skill, he drove it backward into the beast's gut.
It shrieked.
Kael fell flat again, gasping, his breath ragged. He blinked rapidly, staring at his hands that weren't his.
A soldier finished the creature with a sword. Kael blinked up at the sky.
"This is either the best dream of my life," he muttered, "or I'm stuck in some twisted isekai battle royale."
The Ace and 2 hovered, now gray.
Only 3 and 4 remained glowing brightly.
Kael forced himself upright as he heard another growling.
"If this next card doesn't give me a tank or a teleport, I swear it better at least punch something for me."
He slapped Card Three.
[Card 3 Activated: Awareness Pulse]
A glowing ring appeared beside the card, spinning like a loading icon on a screen—fast, smooth, and mechanical. Numbers ticked upward inside it, one by one, accelerating from 1 to 64 before the ring pulsed and vanished.
[Probability: 64% – SUCCESS]
Kael stared at the empty space where it had hovered. "Okay... what the hell was that?"
A golden pulse spread from his chest.
He saw everything. One monster behind a crate. One already mid-air, blade descending.
Time bent.
He rolled. Grabbed a fallen shield. Raised it.
CLANG!
He groaned at the impact. The barbed tail was inches from his face.
The beast roared and slammed its massive claws toward him like a wrecking ball aimed at bone.
Kael slapped Card Four without thinking.
[Card 4 Activated: Reverse Snap]
[Probability: 80% – SUCCESS]
The beast lunged again, but the force of its attack rebounded as if reality had snapped backward; its own claw tore across its chest in a perfect mirror image of its intent.
It collapsed at his feet.
He stared. "Hah... fuck, I uno-reversed it."
All four cards now hovered gray and still.
Something sharp punched through his back with brutal force. Kael gasped, his entire body jolting as his vision whited out for a heartbeat.
He looked down in disbelief. The steel head of an arrow jutted out through the front of his shoulder, the metal gleaming wetly as blood soaked the metal and ran down his arm in thick rivulets.
"What the hell..." he hissed, staggering sideways and fell on his knees.
Another card shimmered into existence beneath the arc, its red glow darker and heavier than the rest. It bore a mark unlike the numbered cards — a flower crest twisted into a sharp crown. The Jack of Flowers.
[Status: UNLOCKED]
[Condition Met: Near-Death Trigger]
Kael staggered, breath shallow, vision swimming at the edges. He was close to blacking out, and the battlefield spun in blurred flashes. Somewhere nearby, a soldier clashed blades with a hulking beast, barely holding ground. Steel rang out again and again, but the man was losing.
Kael could see it clearly, the monster would tear him apart next.
Then Kael's eyes fell on the new card.
A message blinked faintly beside the card:
[Face Card Detected – 50% Probability. Flip Coin to Attempt Summon.]
[Flip failed: Summon unavailable. Cooldown enforced. Deck locked for 5 minutes.]
His fingers hovered over the Lucky Coin, now resting just beneath the glowing deck like a seal. The moment he tapped it, the coin flipped skyward. It spun slow, deliberate, loaded with consequence.
Heads.
The Jack burned red.
A flame tore reality apart.
From it stepped a skeletal knight, massive and grim, rusted blade dragging behind him. Fire blazed where its eyes should be.
The battlefield froze. Even the monsters stopped moving.
Kael, half-conscious, bleeding and disoriented, watched as the armored man faced the monster. The weight of his crushed chest gave out and he pitched forward, hitting the ground face-first with a heavy thud.
"If this is a dream, let me wake up." he whispered, almost laughing, almost crying, "God, any time now."