Her stepmother let out a low, cynical hum but remained silent, returning to her food with a dissatisfied pout.Roxana couldn't bear the suffocating weight of the table for another minute. After picking aimlessly at her rice for a short while, she quietly pushed her chair back, left the dining room, and retreated into the safety of her private bedroom, locking the door firmly behind her.The room was dark, save for the soft, pale silver light of the Oakhaven moon filtering through the sheer window curtains.Roxana walked over to her vanity mirror, her movements slow and heavy with exhaustion. She sat down on the small cushioned stool and lifted her left arm, her fingers gently tracing a faint, fading red mark circling the delicate skin of her wrist.It was the physical imprint left from her frantic, desperate struggle with Lorenzo during that stormy afternoon—a mark that still hadn't completely cleared from her skin.As her thumb brushed the tender skin, her mind involuntarily drifted

The study descended into a grotesque, uncensored circus of human desperation.In the middle of the room, the two men—father and son—turned on each other with the snapping, foaming ferocity of starved dogs cornered over a single, rotting bone.Decades of family unity, polite high-society smiles and expensive tailored suits, stripped away in a single second, leaving only the ugly, naked truth of their survival instincts.Lorenzo didn’t say a word.He didn't move to intervene, nor did he raise his weapon again. Instead, he slowly closed his eyes, leaning back against the plush, dark leather of the expensive sofa.He stretched his long legs out, resting his head back in a state of absolute, tranquil relaxation. He was in no hurry to pass judgment. To him, there was a quiet, poetic justice in watching the very monsters who had terrorized Oakhaven tear each other’s throats out.On the floor, the father and son locked eyes, their breathing ragged and shallow. They needed to get out of this r

But as the dust settled in the doorway, the figure standing in the light didn't move.It wasn't an army of armored guards. It was a single, slender young man dressed in a simple shirt, his eyes watching the chaos on the floor with a calm, silent indifference. It was Leo—the youngest son of the Sterling house, the one they had spent a lifetime treating like absolute dirt.Barry’s face contorted with a fresh wave of disgust as he looked up from the floor, spitting a mouthful of blood onto the rug. "You? What the hell are you doing here, you useless piece of trash? Get out of the way! Call the guards to clear this room, or I'll make sure you never walk again!"SMACK!A brutal, ringing slap echoed through the study.The old man had lunged forward, his heavy hand striking Barry across the face with such force that the younger man’s head snapped sideways, a fresh trickle of blood leaking from his lip."Shut up! Shut your filthy mouth!" the old man wept, completely ignoring his oldest son as

Slowly, Lorenzo opened his dark, bottomless eyes. He didn't look at the trembling patriarch or the bleeding Barry. His sharp gaze fixed entirely on the back of Leo’s bowed head. He sat forward slightly, resting his elbows on his knees as he looked down at the young man."When I had my eyes closed just now," Lorenzo said softly, his deep, smooth baritone cutting through the silence of the room like a cold blade. "Didn't you think about picking up that gun and killing me?"The air in the room seemed to freeze.Leo didn't lift his head. Instead, he slammed his forehead against the floorboards once more, a loud, heavy thud echoing through the quiet study."I would never dare, Master!" Leo swore, his voice fierce, raw, and completely devoid of fear. "I will always remember who gave me the strength to stand in this room today. Everything I have—every breath I take, every coordinate of my survival—is a gift from your hand. Without you, I would still be a starving dog eating scraps in the har

He disconnected the call and looked straight at Leo. "We are sending them straight to the deep jade mine in the northern wastes—the broken shell your father used to hide his black market funds. They will spend the rest of their lives doing hard labor in the deep dark. They will sleep on the wet stone, and they will only receive their daily ration of food and water after their hands have physically dug a strict quota of ten kilograms of raw ore from the rock face. If they fail the quota by even a single gram, they starve for twenty-four hours."Barry let out a low, strangled cry of pure horror, his fingers clawing at his own face as the reality of a lifetime of manual labor in the dark frozen north settled into his brain. The old patriarch fainted entirely, his silver head slumping sideways onto the rug."I am posting a full squad of my personal, deep-sector guards at the perimeter of the mine," Lorenzo added, his voice dropping into a final, lethal frequency. "They will be monitored e