Page 37 of Knox

Lyrian leaned in curiously. "What recordings?"

"Tell him, Adrian." Knox shot Adrian an expectant look.

"Uh…" Adrian licked his lips. "Your story is a novel in this world. You’re considered fictional characters." Was that a tactless thing to say?

Lyrian and Zev didn’t seem offended. Intrigued, if anything.

"Listen to that," Zev said. "I knew I’d be remembered, but not that I’d be remembered even in another world."

"You’ve got quite a lot of fans," Evelyn pointed out. "Adrian is always talking about your story with his friends on the internet."

"Oh, I know I’ve got fans." Lyrian grinned brightly. "But to be interdimensionally famous…! You must show me this story—and what is this internet?"

"It’s a computer thing," Evelyn said as if this explained everything. "It can be very convenient. I’ve found so many recipes on there. Like that Thai coconut chicken noodle soup Adrian loves. I should make that some time this week."

Lyrian nodded along as if this was all very interesting and absolutely understandable. "You must," he encouraged her. "It sounds delightful."

Adrian’s appetite had vanished, however.

He couldn’t imagine showing the internet to Knox and the others. What if they found the fanfiction? The raunchy fanart? The memes? The blog posts in which Adrian dissected their lives?

With a sinking feeling, Adrian remembered the blog post Knox had read earlier.

At this point, he should just delete them all before they could cause more harm.

As if he could ever make himself do that…

"Excuse me," Adrian said, pushing his chair back from the table.

Knox looked up, concern flickering in his eyes. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, just need a moment," Adrian replied, forcing a smile.

He walked into his room and took in the disarray. Evelyn had cleaned up the glass shards, but the weight of the mess surrounding him pressed down on his shoulders. The carpet was entirely ruined, clothes were strewn about, and small objects lay scattered across the floor. He moved carefully around the damage from the storm.

Focusing on something familiar, he powered on his laptop and opened the webnovel. The screen lit up with the latest chapter ofMonsters of Veridia. His mind wandered back to Knox’s words about the author possibly being a magic user.

Could that be?

A notification popped up on the edge of his screen. An email from his brother. Adrian deleted it without even fully reading the title. Something about how sorry he was, no doubt.

Bullshit.

Adrian didn’t have time for this.

Quietly seething, he opened a chat window to ask his friends what they thought about Knox’s theory regarding the author ofMonsters of Veridia, but both were marked as offline. He sighed, closing the chat window and opening a new tab.

He typed in keywords related to the bridge incident and hit search. Headlines blared across the screen. Many articles were what he had expected: discussions about whether videos of what happened on the bridge were AI-generated, a media stunt, or some Russian / Chinese ploy to sow chaos. But there were also many headlines like these:

"Shadow King Saves Civilians from Bridge Collapse!"

"Villain turned hero? The incredible story of the Shadow King!"

"Witnesses Describe Unbelievable Scene of Magic and Mayhem!"

These articles were painting Caelen as a savior, not understanding the danger he posed.

The doorbell rang suddenly, and then again, jolting Adrian back to reality.