-Break-
Φ I still remember the day a hero saved me. My mom and dad brought me on a trip in the carriage. It was a rainy day, aremely cold outside, but I was happy being with my parents. However, it didn’t st as bandits attacked our carriage. They came out of nowhere and killed all the guards dad had hired. They took us out of the carriage, separated me from my parents, and were about to kill them in front of me as I cried nonstop.
But someone appeared out of nowhere and cut down all the bandits in seds, saving my parents and me from a horrible fate. He patched our wounds up, and then started walking away. Before he could get far, my dad called out to him and said, “Please wait. Let us repay you for your kindness.”
But the man with white hair said in response, “Heroic big brothers like me don’t do things expeg to be paid back, I did it because I believed it was the right thing to do, so that I will be on my way,” and with that, the ma without a trace.
The words he said that heroes do good things for the sake of doing them shook my core. I old anyone, but on that day, I promised myself that I would be a righteous person like that man who saved me.
So, after we returned home from that trip, I studied extremely hard, so I could one day i our family business. I wao bee a respectable person like my parents, and I wanted enough power to help people like that hero. Studying all the time shocked everyone around me since I have never beeo researything for any reason. But with my newfouermination, I couldn’t stop, especially when my younger brother Lio was born.
As I looked into his face after he was born, I realised how a hero inspired me, so I had to be a hero for him, this pushed me to work and study even more. As time passed, I grew up to bee a strong, brilliant man. The event that happened on that faithful day when I was so young has shaped so muy life, but the event on that day also shaped my parent’s life but not in the same fashion.
As I grew older, I became more involved in my parent’s business. At first, my family has been artisan weavers feions and has tless eternal spiders. Still, my grandfather’s geion expanded our business by using all the money we had geed, to beerts that dealt with lots of goods. Still, it was tough for my grandfather to diversify our business.
But my father didn’t struggle as hard as my grandfather. He turned our pany into the biggest in the try, and made us go worldwide in multiple industries. Our business’s growth rate was ridiculous, and my father made that happen. I looked up to him so much, and as our business grew ever rger and rger, I started to help out without him knowing.
As I was helping around, I noticed some odd things. Somethings were recorded wrong, and some stock was missing. We had lots of people on our payroll whom I couldn’t trace precisely what their job was. Not knowing what was happening, I iigated it without rest, and I eventually came to the answer of what was happening. I theo front the culprit of everything.
“Father, may I please have a moment of your time?”
“I am attending to some dots, but talk to me as I work. e and sit down.”
As I go and sit down in front of my father, I say, “Hey, dad have you here what happeo Godeney.”
“Yes, what happeo him was unfortunate. He was a close friend of mine. I would never have thought he had a crippling addi to utopias venom. He even bankrupted his business just to feed his addi.
I was thinking of spending some support to his family, and we are uaffed due to our ret expansion, so we could probably take in all his staff members who lost their jobs.”
“Utopias venom is a horrible drug cirg through this city and others. I know some of my friends whom it has even reached.”
“It truly is a pity when people start drugs. It is tough to quit. This might be unfair, but It makes me very happy knowing you're not foolish enough to try such things.”
“Utopias venom, e destiny, astral key, all drugs that have been cirg all the city we have business in.”
Looking up from his work, my father says, “Cole, what is it y to say to me.”
Getting up from my seat, I say to my dad, “I have been iigating this pany, and I found out what you have been partaking in off the books: drug traffig, human traffig, on dealing, paying off nobles and politis, and the worst thing I found was what you were doing to the eternal spiders.
Few spiders produce the highest quality silk, which goes for millions, so to get more of that, you have been using drugs to force a spider to make it. But that shortens their life spans and damages their reproductive ans making so that less and less be born.”
“What of it, Cole? I don’t see how this is any of my business.”
“Of course, it is your business, dad. Your as are destroying this nation and lives across this world, we own sixty per t of the spider in this nation, and most of its ine es from the spiders. If we damage them, it will affect this try feions beyond our life span. It will affect even your dets.”
“No, it won't, Cole. We have diversified our business so much that even if all the spiders were to go extinorroould still be able to enjoy our fortable lifestyle. Our family has broken free from the s that bind us to this try, and if we are smart, it would be like this feions to e.”
“What about the people outside of our family and their lives? The things you have done, drugs and human traffig, using your influeo get your way in this try, they be called nothing more than evil?”
“These things will exist whether or not I have a hand in them, so it’s better for me to be the one in trol, and thanks to what you call evil, I was able to fulfil my duty as a father, which is to protect my family above all else, I don’t care about anyone else who exists now or their dets, they are of no to me.”
As my father said this, I punched him in his face as I got on top and started beating him. While I do this, I hear a voice shout, “STOP THIS COLE.”
“Mother.”
As she runs over and pulls me off my father, she says to my father, “Are you ok.”
“Met away from him. That monster isn’t the man you married.”
“Cole found out about all the other business Elizabeth.”
“So, he knows Richard.”
“Mom, you know about all this too, and you’re ok with it?”
“We po tell you when you were a bit older. I am sorry you had to find out this way.”
“Why are you so passive about this? Do you know how much evil your as have caused?”
My mother walks closer to me and says, “Cole, your need for justid your kindness are things I love about you from the bottom of my heart, but when it es down to it all, people only care about their families and their happiness, anyone who tries to care for everyone in life equally won’t be able to protect what they love the most wheime es, so we will step on anyone necessary to protect you and lio, nothing will ge our minds.”
Hearing such cold words from my loving mother was too much to bear, so I ran out of that room as fast as possible. I wouldn’t talk to anyone for days, until my personal butler Ed came to speak to me. He has been with me since I was born and was the person I trusted the most, so as he came to chee, I told him all that was b me, and in response, I asked him.
“What should I do?”
“Young master, I think you should keep this all a secret and live on with it.”
“So, Ed, you also agree with my parents.”
“No I don’t, but your parents run a busihat keeps millions of families afloat. It would all e crashing down if you were to expose the truth about your family.”
“Cole, do you not think me capable of taking over the pany if my parents were to be imprisoned.”
“Young master, you don’t truly uand how horrible the grown-up world is. Hundreds of vultures will use the opportunity to destroy this pany if they sense any form of weakness, so I believe in this situation, the right thing to do would be to keep quiet.”
“Yht Ed.”
After my versation with Ed, I left my room and tinued with my life like usual, but it wasn’t the same, the food I ate felt stale, I had lost all my motivation, It was like my time had stopped, and it tinued until my brother came home with bruises.
“What happened, lio.”
“I got into a fight.”
Hitting him on the head, I say, “Why would you do that, moron.”
As he starts g while holding his head, he says, “I saw some kids pig on a girl, and I had to stop them because, as you always say, it was the right thing to do.”
Seeing my brother’s g face, I hug him and tell him, “You’re a real hero Lio.”
“Thanks, brother.”
The day I went to report everything my parents had been doing, and the lo 24 hours of my life began. I thought I would have the skill to keep the business going, but I was unprepared for the sequences. Employees quit, pany stock went missing, and families we wronged kept ing to our doorstep with all uards leaving. Our only option was to pay people to appease them.
I tried to ask family and friends for help, but they all added fuel to the fire against my family. They made tless news articles that painted not only my parents but my family as evil. They made us all out to be demons, which caused more and more people to despise us.
Then at the end of the day, I heard my parents were executed. tless people who wit couldn’t help but e to me and tell me their st words. My mother wept profusely for her children, while the st thing my father said was, “Please stop. My boys are in danger. I beg of you.” They all ughed as they told me my high and mighty parents’ st words.
As Ed left us as well, I had nothi except Lio and the remnants of our pany, and as we returo our house as I tried to figure out something to do, but then my brother told me there was a kno the door. As I went to see who it was, I found three men. The man in front said, “My god I have never seen a big mansion without a single servant in sight.”
“What do you people want with us?”
“Oh, nothing like that. We have just e to cim what you owe us, but let’s talk in another room.” After he says this, the man walks into another room, thhly familiar with the yout of our house. Who is this guy? I have never seen him before, but I o deal with this quickly.
“Lio, I will just be one sed, so go to your room, ok.” As Lio goes away, I follow the men into the room.
-Break-
“ you please say that number again?” I ask the man in front.
“About three hundred million lupas is how much your family owes us. I have the tract here. As you see, it was signed using your parent’s spirit energy, so this is no fabrication.”
“Why would my parents owe you so much?”
“Do you think they could have aplished all this expansion with their money alohey took a rge loan from us, which was no problem iy sihey would have paid it back within three years at the rate they were going, but you see, they just so happeo be executed, and their business Is haeming money, so we o collect what you owe us now.”
“I am sorry, I don’t have that much right now.”
“Well, I khat, but you have a way to pay off about seventy-five per t of it.”
“How would I be able to do that?”
“Sell me all your assets right now, your house, your properties, all your stock.”
“I ’t do that.”
“Oh yes, you , every day your business value drops, people have lost all trust in you, and everyone who wants to protect their reputation won’t e anywhere near you. There is currently no hope for your busio recoup from this loss, and by tomorrow as the news spreads to more nations, your assets won’t even be enough to pay off forty per t of the loan, that’s how much shit you are in, so you either sell me them now or have a useless pany ahree hundred million lupuas i.”
“You guys are from no official bank that I know of. If you were, I would have seen the debt while I checked the books, but I didn’t. tracts don’t hold for illegal activities. I don’t have to pay you guys back a t.”
“But you see, that would make my boss quite angry. He hates to lose money for any reason, so he will recoup that loss somehow, with how hectic things have been in this try I doubt many will miss the boys of the devils who almost brought ruin to the nd. I have also heard that all the employees in your pany have beeing attacked. I am sure people would be delighted if they also went missing.
We make all of your bodies work until we get back every t. I am sure there are a bunch of people who would love to buy you as revenge; I know some wealthy people who like to purchase the children of fallen houses.
So, to put this simple, you will be giving us back this moher with the lives of you and your former employees or with everyone you own, pie, but knowing you’re a hero of justice, I am pretty sure of the option you will pick.”
Walking up to me and squeezing my arm, the man says, “So that you know if you try to do anything like fleeing to the holy nation of Gevurah, all are passion will fade, and your lives will be forfeit, you uand.”
“Crystal clear.”
As we tih our business, I sign every single asset of our pany over to this man, aells me. “Good, now you have to make up some way to get the remainiy-five million to us in the en years.”
“But isn’t that too much for the period you set?”
He thes close to my fad says, “Our boss is being quite generous to you for all the easy money your parents have brought him. He would usually take your lives and use that as his method of retrieving the cash, so don’t push your luck.”
As he started walking away from me, all I could do was sit there in a all the people who betrayed and stabbed us in the back, especially those in front of me who had robbed us of hope.
“Instead of g your fist in anger against me, you should be angry at the person who snitched on your parents and got your family into this situation. Oh yeah, that was you wasn’t it. Bye.”
I exposed evil, what I did was nothing but justice, so tell me, why is this happening to me? I don’t uand. What I did what was right.
The day, men came to cim all we owned early in the m, kig us out of the house. As I brought my brother outside, he asked me.
“Cole, why is this happening? What is going on.”
As I hug him, I say to him, “Lio, the few years will be ruff, but I know we’re going to get through them. Please trust me.”
As he tries to hold back his tears, Lio says, “I trust you, brother.”
This is the price to pay for being just. This is a trial I must face because I know there is happiness at the end of it all. After all, being a righteous person ever be wrong.
