In the land of Velmire, the crown did not always belong to the noble.
Once, it belonged to a thief.
His name was Corven Blackhand, a man raised in the gutters of the capital, where gold was worshipped and laws bent for the rich. He stole not out of necessity, but out of fury—fury at the nobles who dined on silver while orphans starved in alleys. He climbed the underworld like a ladder, rung by bloodstained rung, until even lords feared his name.
Corven was a master of masks. To the people, he was a shadow. To the nobility, a rumor. But to the dying king—bedridden and desperate for an heir—he became a savior. Disguised as a noble exile, Corven cured the court's corruption with swift executions and forged alliances through fear and coin. When the king died, he left behind no true-born heir... only whispers, and a will.
Corven became king with ink, not sword.
His rule was sharp and cold. He replaced knights with assassins, councils with spies. He knew every crime because he had committed worse. He brokered peace with blackmail, won wars with treachery, and filled the royal vaults with gold soaked in blood.
But here's the twist: the people adored him.
Under Corven's iron reign, the streets were cleaner, the poor fed, and justice—twisted though it was—served swiftly. Crime fell, though he himself was crime incarnate.
They called him the King of Shadows, and none dared defy him.
In the end, Corven stood atop a kingdom he had stolen, not born into. And when the nobles whispered of revolt, they found their throats slit before dawn. Not by soldiers. By the people.
Because to them, a criminal king who protected them was better than a noble one who never saw them at all.