“No! It’s not me! Why are you suddenly tormenting me!!”
When I shouted so fiercely my throat felt like it would tear, the photos before my eyes changed expressions as if mocking me. Terrified by the grotesque and horrifying situation, I shut my mouth tight.
At that moment, my consciousness instantly floated to the surface.
“Master!”
“Uh… uhh.”
When I opened my eyes, what I saw was Belly’s face, pale blue with fear. I was lying in bed, dripping with cold sweat. Perhaps from the aftermath of the nightmare, I was completely tense and my whole body was stiff and aching.
“A dream, it was a dream…”
“You’re awake, Master. Master…”
Belly hugged me while shedding tears profusely. His fear and relief were evident in that touch. But right now, my whole body ached as if I had muscle pain, so Belly’s touch was nothing but agonizing.
“It hurts! Belly-ya, it hurts!”
“Ah, sorry, I’m sorry.”
But even while saying that, Belly didn’t let me go. Though he loosened his grip a bit, he held me as if imprisoning me in his arms. His anxiety poured out from his whole body. It seemed I had suffered from nightmares for quite a long time.
“I’m fine…”
“I called for you, Master, I kept calling…”
His sobbing voice was pitiful. Hearing that voice, my mind became stable instead.
It was strange. It wasn’t normal that Belly’s sadness gave me a sense of reality. Guilt arose from deep in my heart. Moreover, that guilt wasn’t something freshly bloomed, but something very old.
“I’m sorry…”
I muttered to Belly without even knowing what I was apologizing for. I was annoyed at myself for being so strange and incomprehensible. However, no matter how much I tried to understand, since I didn’t know the cause, the annoyance couldn’t be resolved.
* * *
The massive mansion made of white marble had high ceilings and many windows. The beautiful mansion was clearly aged in appearance, but rather than being eerie, it looked like a work of art.
Though the windows were so numerous they would be difficult to manage, the slaves wiped them cleaner than their own bodies, making them transparent without a single speck. The sunlight entering through the large glass windows brightly illuminated the mansion without a hint of darkness. But the stronger the light, the deeper the shadows become.
As soon as I captured that scene in my eyes, I could tell I was dreaming. It wasn’t simply because I recognized this as my family home.
“…Ugh, urgh…”
Due to the fear and terror engraved deep in my bones, a groan of suffering automatically reflexively burst out. Even though I knew all of this was a dream. The picture-perfect beautiful old mansion was no different to me than the gaping maw of a beast.
Still, if it were only this, it would be bearable. I curled up my body and hoped to wake from this hellish nightmare.
“Hey, Vittorio.”
“Hiii!”
But the nightmare brought something worse. When I was startled by the voice calling me and turned around, there was a monster. The massive black body was like a melted lump of clay. It was a horrible appearance as if it had risen from a puddle in hell.
That thing that didn’t look human had only a normal voice. It was even a voice I knew. A gentle, masculine voice smooth enough to easily win people’s favor. But to me, it was like the voice of a wicked demon.
“Hy… Hy, Hyung. Hyung.”
“Haha, look at this bastard. Stuttering stupidly again.”
*Thud. Thud.* Every time the massive arm unpleasantly hit my head, my body swayed greatly. But even at that action, far from getting angry, I was only grinning foolishly.
It was because I knew well. The violent acts he would inflict on me if I resisted even a little. It was a fact I had learned directly and painfully with my whole body.
“Wh, wh, wh, what.”
Even though this was a dream, I couldn’t do anything. That man tormenting me was probably living arrogantly in the beautiful Valli mansion in Ripinum Kingdom right now.
This was all an illusion. But I couldn’t easily shake off that illusion. No matter how hard I tried to escape, I was powerless in this nightmare.
‘Ah, that stuttering kid? I’ve decided to send him to Connubium to be useful at least now. Haha, when he comes back, he won’t dare say he wants to go to the military academy. How about it? Will you take this kid after graduation?’
Rather than comforting their younger brother who would leave for a distant foreign land the next day, the family held a grand party as if celebrating.
I wasn’t newly hurt by such a family. Hurt was something that occurred only when there were expectations, and I had been disappointed too many times. But the fact that those voices enjoying themselves merrily didn’t disappear even from my dreams like a brand… must mean I foolishly had a glimmer of expectation.
“Wh, wh, wh, wh, what would you say, you stupid brother.”
The voice imitating me in a base tone was colored with dark malice mixed with violent pleasure. The black body squirmed more stickily as if reacting to the malice. I could even feel heat that seemed like it would burn my hands black just by touching.
I still can’t understand such a hyung. My older brother, Giovanni Valli, was born grasping power. The Valli family was the family that held the greatest power in Ripinum Kingdom, and Giovanni was the eldest son of that family.
I was 8 years younger than hyung. Though 8 years might seem short, it’s a vast time. He, who became an adult faster than me, firmly established his position. It was a solid position that couldn’t be dared challenged, so he could have chosen to show me mercy.
He could have sent me to study abroad at another school, and since I was a relative, it would have been fine to raise me as his right hand. I could have lived up to expectations no matter what they were. However, hyung chose to torment me terribly.
In hyung’s hands, I grew up not as Vittorio Valli, but as a stupid stutterer.
“Wh, wh, what…”
“How ill-mannered. Are you speaking informally to your hyung?”
No matter how much it was in a dream, I had no intention of resisting him or speaking informally. However, my frozen tongue couldn’t properly say what I wanted to say. He clearly knew my situation well and was finding fault.
*Smack!*
He didn’t miss the opportunity and struck my head hard. Even though it was in a dream and I shouldn’t feel pain, the pain was vivid. As if an electric current was flowing, I convulsed finely as if electrocuted.
“…!”
Before screaming, I bit my tongue inside my mouth, so the scream didn’t flow out. When I opened my eyes to slits and looked up, I could see him licking his lips slowly with satisfaction. The sight of the giant tongue dripping purple fluid licking the black face was grotesque and terrifying.
“This hyung will have to re-educate you on manners.”
“Fi, fin, fine…!”
Etiquette education. Seized by great fear, I tried to jump up like a roly-poly doll from where I was and speak. However, my tongue became stiffer and I ultimately couldn’t get any words out. All I could do was kneel beseechingly and bury my head on the ground.
Hyung giggled as if he was quite pleased with the sight of his younger brother, who was much younger than him, submitting.
“Bring it!”
Though the door was oiled and shouldn’t make a sound, it seemed to my ears that I heard a creaking sound. My heart pounded and hammered, and my breathing became rapid and I wheezed. My face reflected on the floor was deathly pale, paler than the mansion’s marble. It was as if I were a dead person.
The maid dragged the tray very quietly. On the dark brown tray made of solid wood was a large glass bowl covered with an iron lid. I guessed what was contained in that bowl, so I became even more terrified.
“Now, come here and sit!”
At hyung’s overbearing words, I walked at the speed of an inchworm crawling. It was the best speed I could manage. However, hyung found that frustratingly maddening and approached irritably, roughly dragging me to the dining table.
The background that had been a reception room had already changed to a spacious dining room. It was a sudden change possible because it was a dream, not reality.
I felt a sense of incongruity, but I… was a pitiful and weak person who couldn’t resist even in my own dream. Though my trembling appearance might look pitiful, the maid only set tableware and food in front of me.
Hyung laughed lowly as if pleased and slowly opened the lid. The bodily fluids overflowing from his body gave off a disgusting smell like rotten fish.
“Now, eat. This is food that this hyung personally gives you.”
“…!”
“It’s a gift from your elder, so surely you won’t not eat it? If so, I can’t even imagine what punishment I’ll give for lack of education.”
It was what I expected. I knew well what would appear in my nightmare, what the most painful and horrible memory in my life was. Tentacles wriggling inside the food bowl squirmed and popped out. A living blue octopus was writhing in the bowl.
Etiquette education. That was a refined expression for the act of hyung tormenting me.
I couldn’t even open my mouth and glared at the octopus with wide eyes.
“Oh my. It’s no use glaring. Now, open your mouth. Hurry.”
“Hy… Hyung-nim!”
My body suddenly regressed to the past. I became my 10-year-old body, 6 years younger.
Though my height wasn’t that tall originally either, 10-year-old me was so small it couldn’t compare. It was because hyung had taken away everything that had been given to me. Whether objects or food, nothing remained in my hands in the end. Not even rags remained.
He always seemed like a person suffering from hunger and thirst. He was that greedy. If I had stayed in that house, someday even my life would have been taken by those hands.
“I, I don’t want to!”
Since it wasn’t yet a time when I stuttered severely, the words came out naturally. Though it was my own voice, it felt utterly unfamiliar. It was because I had already become accustomed to my pathetically stuttering self.
