You Died and He Came Back

Crown Prince Darian trampled your handkerchief and told you to get out of his sight. Then an arrow took your life in front of him, and he regressed to fix it.

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Story facts

Turns played: 3
Cast: 1
Languages: English, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, and French
Rating: Teen

About this story

You are the eldest daughter of the Ersia family, politically engaged to Crown Prince Darian von Hart for six years, and he has never once let himself feel anything for you beyond contempt. At the hunting grounds, you offer him a hand-embroidered handkerchief for safe return, and he crushes it in his fist before letting it fall under his horse's hooves, telling you to get out of his sight.

Then everything changes. An arrow finds you, blood soaks through your white dress, and Darian, the man who just humiliated you in front of the entire court, falls to his knees in the dirt screaming your family name like something in him has broken. This is the moment he has regressed back to, given a second chance he never asked for and does not fully understand yet. Whether he gets to earn anything different from you this time depends entirely on what you do with a second chance of your own.

Who you play

You are the Ersia family's eldest daughter, politically engaged to Crown Prince Darian, a man who has spent six years making his contempt for you obvious to the entire court. The story opens at the exact moment everything goes wrong for him, the moment he regresses back from. How much of your own history with him you remember, how guarded you stay, and whether you give this version of him anything at all is entirely up to you.

The cast

Darian von Hart

the crown prince who regressed after your death

Darian is twenty-four, the empire's sole heir to the throne, raised with the entire nation's attention and never once caught losing his composure in public.

More about Darian von Hart

What to expect

The opening scene is the humiliation itself, trampled handkerchief and all, before the regression that follows it.
Darian has spent six years openly despising you, so this is enemies-to-lovers with real, established hostility behind it.
He gets a second chance he did not ask for, and how much he actually deserves it is something only you decide.

Introduction

Narrator: His entire vision flashed red. Thick, dark crimson liquid gushes between your lips, soaking her pure white dress and spattering the dusty earth below. To Darian, the sight was unbearably unreal. No—it was so brutally vivid that it almost seemed fake.

Narrator: With a dull thud, her body crumples like a puppet with its strings cut, and that fleeting instant plays out before his eyes as slowly as an eternity.

Narrator: You tumbled to the ground. Like the handkerchief he had thrown into the mud only moments before, she too was dashed pitifully against the earth.

Narrator: Watching her white dress become a ruined mess of dirt and blood in an instant, Darian forgot even how to breathe.

Narrator: This can't be real.

Narrator: Terror surged in like the tide.

Narrator: This was never what he had wanted. He had only wanted her out of his sight, not broken into this helpless, bloodied thing.

Narrator: That dreadful blood was draining her life away. Your eyes wandered aimlessly through the air, then lost focus and slowly began to close. At the sight, Darian heard something inside him snap.

Darian von Hart: Ersia!!

Narrator: An animal scream tore from Darian's throat.

Narrator: Instinctively, he dropped to his knees. He paid no heed to the muddy water soaking his hunting trousers.

Narrator: He roughly hauled her fallen torso up and gathered her into his arms. Her limp body was horrifyingly heavy, and hot blood kept welling from her chest where the arrow was embedded, drenching his hands. Soon the crimson spread as though it would swallow his gloves, his clothes, and Darian himself.

Narrator: The lashes beneath her closed eyelids did not so much as stir. Only days ago, that face had been alive with smiles, tears, and noisy chatter directed at him; now it was turning pale and cold as a wax doll before his eyes.

Narrator: Fear seized him. He had dismissed her as a stain on his life and wished to erase her, yet now, perversely, he trembled at the thought that she might be erased forever.

Darian von Hart: Open your eyes. Who gave you permission to close them?

Narrator: Darian cupped her cheek with a hand slick with blood. It left ugly smears across her white face, but all he could see were her tightly closed eyelids.

Narrator: He gritted his teeth and shook her. His voice trembled uncontrollably with mingled fury and terror.

Darian von Hart: Can't you hear me? Open your eyes... now!... Ersia!!

Try one of these first lines

I keep my chin level and my voice cold. "Careful, Your Highness. Contempt looks a great deal like fear from where I stand."
I study his face for the crack I'm sure is there. "You've never once looked at me like that before. What changed, exactly?"

Questions about this story

What is You Died and He Came Back about?

You are the eldest daughter of the Ersia family, politically engaged to Crown Prince Darian von Hart for six years, and he has never once let himself feel anything for you beyond contempt.