Help! I'm the Plot Device: Just Here to Save the Heroes

The Fine Print Killed Me

The Betrayal

Ten years ago, the valley of the Shadow Cats still thrived under the silver glow of the moon. Children chased each other across rooftops, elders wove illusions for amusement, and guards patrolled with calm confidence.

That night, the Crown Prince of Zhao, only fifteen, crossed their gates. He was not an intruder - he was a guest. He had once been saved by the Shadow Cat Prince Li Jie, ambushed by wild demons at the border. From then on, a bond formed. The young prince had laughed freely with him, practiced sword forms at his side, and promised friendship.

So when he asked for entry into the valley - "to see the place my savior calls home" - no one thought to refuse.

Yet under moonlight, trust turned to blood. The mortal armies descended with fire and steel, guided by the very friend they had welcomed. Homes collapsed in flames, shrieks tore through the night, and the proud clan was reduced to ash.

And in the heart of it stood the Crown Prince, blade bright with heavenly blessing.

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"So this is Heaven's chosen?" Jerry muttered as he read, brow furrowing. "Leading his friend's family to slaughter? What a saint."

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Only one survived. The young Shadow Cat Prince, dragged by loyal guards to the river's edge. In desperation, he leapt into the rushing waters, vanishing into the darkness.

He would never again be the same.

The Adopted Son

By dawn, the massacre was complete. The empire rejoiced. Songs were written of the Crown Prince's glory. The Black-Gold Seal of the Shadow Cats was presented to the mortal emperor as tribute.

But elsewhere, fate wove another thread.

At the foot of the mountain, a grieving noble couple knelt at a riverbank shrine. Lord Yan He and his wife, Madam Song Wei, had just buried their only son -Yan An- a boy of thirteen who had succumbed to illness. They had been married for fifteen years without another child, yet Lord Yan never took another wife.

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"Such a gentleman," Jerry commented softly. "Keeping faith with his wife even without an heir. You don't see that often."

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As incense smoke rose, they heard splashing by the river. A boy lay unconscious on the rocks, pale and bloodied. His golden eyes marked him as otherworldly.

When asked his name, he could not answer.
When asked his past, he shook his head.

In grief, Lord Yan and Madam Wei named him after their dead son. The world never learned that the boy they buried was gone; to all, it seemed their child had survived.

And so the Shadow Cat Prince was reborn - not as himself, but as Yan An, the noble heir of House Yan.

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The Bride

Years passed. The boy grew into a man, hidden beneath silk robes and human customs, his claws buried under the mask of nobility.

Then came news of the Crown Prince's wedding.

His bride-to-be was Lady Liang Fei, daughter of a powerful minister. A beauty praised as the "jade moon of the empire." But to Yan An's astonishment, she was also the fiancée of the real Yan heir - the boy who had died. They had never met, but letters and poems had been exchanged, mistaken by Liang Fei as his.

Now, her letters reached him instead. And in one, written with trembling brushstrokes, she confessed:

"I do not wish to marry the Crown Prince. My heart belongs elsewhere... to the one who once wrote me words of spring."