This chapter is brought to you by Moon by Jin from BTS.

Edited by: bafflinghaze

---

"Young Master Nazareth, a letter from the Dartmouth Family has arrived for you," a maidservant announced the moment she walked into Neo's office.

"Young Master Nazareth, you have a letter from the Moores Family," another servant declared, following the maid inside.

Neo stopped writing and looked up. He saw both servants holding a letter in their hands. After deducing their content, he turned back to his work. "Get rid of them."

"Certainly," both answered simultaneously and gave a small bow. They left immediately to do just that.

Once the door was shut, Neo sighed.

Two out of three of the nobles he previously held connections with were still harassing him after he sent out letters regarding his intentions to break off contact. Both the Dartmouth and Moores were persistent, but he'd heard nothing from the third.

Hopefully, they would all eventually accept his request and leave him alone.

"Young Master," Rainier greeted as he walked inside.

He held a tea tray in his hands and cocked his head when he saw him. "Is something the matter?"

Neo made a scornful noise and shook his head, "There's always something these days," he groused, eyeing the tea tray. "And you always seem to bring the right drinks every time."

The servant set the tray down with a wry smile. "I am glad to serve," he replied, pouring him a cup of tea and handing it to him.

Neo raised an eyebrow as he was handed the cup, "Are you?"

"The paycheck is good."

He scoffed. A few seconds went by while he took a sip of the tea and refreshed himself.

The two of them didn't say anything until Neo set the cup down. "Can I see?"

Rainier paused in his movements, the hand reaching for the teapot frozen in midair.

After a moment where both of them just... stared at each other, his hand reached behind his head and undid his blindfold.

Cornflower eyes adjusted to the light before meeting vermillion.

Neo slowly reached out to trace the marks covering Rainier's eyes. They stood stark black against the man's skin, the scars of a blade extruding in some areas.

A feeling of frustration bubbled in his chest.

"I'm taking too long," he muttered.

The servant blinked at him with a mix of confusion in his eyes. "It's been barely two months."

Neo scowled. "But it shouldn't take more than a few weeks for me."

Rainier had no response to that.

Neo pursed his lips and dropped his hand, looking away.

After a while, the servant spoke, "... You act as if I will die. Will I?"

Neo was stricken by the question and immediately denied this, "No—"

Rainier cut him off, "Then it's fine."

He wrinkled his brows, not understanding. "It's not fine. How can it be fine—"

"Young Master," Rainier showed a small, but uneasy smile, "I've waited this long. There's nothing wrong with waiting longer."

Silence passed through them.

Neo suddenly felt blood rushing against his ears, followed by a ringing sound. His hand clenched.

"... Aren't you angry?"

Rainier raised his lips charmingly, his eyes looking like a calm current awaiting a turbulent storm, "I'm furious. But what can I do about it?"

He was right.

In a small voice, Neo asked, "Don't you want me dead?"

The servant snorted derisively, "Not if you're the one holding the key to the antidote."

He poured him another cup.

Neo accepted it.

"I'll get rid of it by summer."

"I look forward to it, Young Master."

---

Sometimes, when Tybalt closed his eyes, he could see an infinite number of possibilities in his life. Every choice he'd made, every lesson he'd been taught, every moment he'd breathed and experienced and lived, he could see how vast the future was and the opportunities it held in the face of choices.

He'd watched the world as it was, flipping a coin in his head, wondering if the possibility was favorable, whether or not the outcome was feasible in his favor.

His eldest brother once told him he had a head for business, and Tybalt merely laughed.

Business was a game of chance. Tybalt didn't like chances, but he loved choices, and in loving it, he managed to fool everyone around him into believing he was a risk-taker.

If only he hadn't learned to love what he did. His life would have been much simpler.

The Phelan Family hadn't always been so negligent and cruel to their bastard children.

Father had his affairs, but he had them with perfectly consenting fellow adults and was always generous to them.

Stepmother didn't care for his affairs and went on her expeditions. She sometimes brought back gifts for them.

His eldest brother was an exemplary role model and cared for them in his own way.

Titus was Titus, but even he held a soft spot for the little ones when most of them were still 'little ones.'

Unfortunately, change was just as inevitable as chance, and there were no choices in change.

One day, Father became an awful man. Stepmother suddenly started to ignore them. Their eldest brother left for the capital and decided it was better to stay there. And Titus... Titus was no longer family.

Flip a coin.

Heads or tails?

The coin flipped.

He catches it.

Tail.

Tybalt cemented the choices for himself, and for his other younger siblings, when he first saw the signs. If change was true, then they could only rely on him.

That's why, when the neglect started, they stopped loving their family.

Some may shun them for this decision, but no one would understand how difficult it was to choose tails.

Being a bastard to a family known for having a multitude of bastards wasn't the reason for their choice.

They were survivors, regardless of the luxuries offered to them by the Baron and Baroness. Though they had been liked, they knew to never give themselves fully to the follies of a noble's affections. There were too many of them, wasn't that enough proof for why they chose to stop loving their family?

Bastards like them would always find a way out, it was in their nature to do so. When it came time for them to be forgotten, they accepted this fact and turned their backs.

Why would they shed tears for something equivalent to a temporary illusion? None of them cried upon picking tails. They didn't regret their choices.

Now, Tybalt liked to pretend he hadn't rigged the game.

His mind could calculate every single pathway from the root of each choice and find the tip of a branch within the flip of a coin. No one would believe him, obviously, so he'd gotten pretty good at flipping coins in his favor.

He knew, he saw, and he imprinted every single sensation and thought into his memories.

But he won't tell anyone that.

There was no point in telling anyone about that.

Tybalt was preparing himself to go out when he was stopped by his siblings.

"Where are you going, Tybby?" A little girl rounded the corner after spotting him. With her wide lavender eyes staring into his own, she toddled after him, her strawberry blonde curls springing into the air.

"Julie," Tybalt greeted her with an overwhelming fondness in his gaze.

She was his youngest sibling, Juliet. Four, small, and weighing a little more than a large cat, she was incredibly adorable.

Tybalt smiled and picked her up.

As soon as he did, the rest of his siblings appeared.

Paris, Escalus, Balthasar, and Abram.

Rissy, Esca, Balty, and Abe, preferably.

Thirteen, twelve, ten, and nine respectively.

All brothers.

Their father started getting busy after he learned how to walk.

"Are you leaving for work?" Paris asked with a small frown on his face.

"Can we come?" Escalus demanded a second later.

Balthasar and Abram were silent, but the two of them obstructed him from moving by clinging to his legs.

Tybalt sighed. He ruffled their heads and kissed Juliet's temple.

"I'll be back by dinner. Take care of Julie and make sure Father doesn't die."

The four boys frowned but didn't try to argue. Tybalt placed Juliet into Paris' arms and smiled, "You're in charge," he told him.

Paris continued frowning but he didn't argue. He had always been the most sensible one.

---

It was a spontaneous decision but Neo was never one to make good choices.

On the day he was set to visit St. Achilles, Neo decided to also venture into the Red Light District, the place of his childhood, his upbringing. A source of trauma, in all honesty.

Half of it was a slum for the poor and destitute, while the other half was a rich and splendorous street capitalizing on sex and entertainment.

Not to say the brothel his mother worked at was terrible. There had been good people who were close to his mother. They helped him as much as they could, and for those reasons, Neo couldn't be more grateful.

Nazareth never came back to the Lotus Garden. The moment he left, it was like he sprouted a pair of wings and flew off. Despite all the aunties and uncles, he willed himself to forget them, knowing they would be a source of weakness to his future objectives.

It was all a bit of a train wreck after his mother's death.

On the night of her passing, he had run out of the brothel through the back and was met with a fork road.

Perhaps fate had given him a choice. Two roads, two destinies, two alternatives. Nazareth had seen something shine brightly on the left, so he ran in that direction, praying he had chosen a good path to go down.

When he was beckoned closer by the shine, he realized it was a silver coin on the ground.

In his moment of grief, he had let down his guard and picked it up with interest, only to be immediately attacked by the other street rats crawling around.

This was not the first time Nazareth found himself in a violent brawl. He had half-lived in the slums and had fought for resources on nights he wasn't able to sneak into the brothel to see his mother.

In retrospect, nothing was new about the incident—

—Besides being the turning point of his morality.

His mother was dead and all he saw was the brutality of mankind and the heartlessness of the desperate. Greed and desolation drove them all to fight for a single coin.

Nazareth had lost the coin eventually when someone took a bite of his hand and forced him to let go.

He was hurled from the fight and got nearly trampled on by more street urchins wanting to join in on the excitement, so he ran further down the left alley, refusing to look back as he told himself it was the last time he would ever trust the kindness of men and the mercy of the gods.

With his mother gone, he could only rely on himself to survive, even if it meant turning just as evil and filthy as the rest of them.

Neo sometimes wondered what would have happened if he decided to choose the right path. It was too late to regret it now, but he was curious about what might have happened.

---

The carriage stopped at the mouth of an alleyway.

Young Master Nazareth brought out a cloak from under his carriage seat and donned it with the confidence of someone who was used to traveling through shady-looking streets.

He glanced at Rainier. "You're going to need one, too."

Rainier reached under his own seat and drew out a cloak as well. He put it on with the same confidence as his Young Master.

The two of them stared at each other wordlessly.

They stepped out of the carriage and simultaneously pulled their hoods over their heads, both of them obscuring their faces at the same time.

Rainier followed the Young Master as he moved deeper into the alley.

They were soon faced with a dead end.

The Young Master looked around and began tapping on the stones. Before Rainier could ask him what he was doing, a magic circle appeared beneath them and the next thing he knew, they were no longer in the alleyway.

When he blinked again, Rainier found himself standing in the middle of a dead street.

"Come on," the Young Master encouraged.

And then they were walking.

As it turned out, they weren't the only shady-looking people in the area. In the corners of the street, Rainier saw figures—children—running around. They wore rags and were covered in dirt as they scoured the ruins of the dilapidated buildings.

There were other hooded individuals to the shadows, trying to look as small as possible to avoid being noticed.

"Don't look," the Young Master instructed.

Rainier noticed how he barely batted an eye to the decrepit state of the street.

A man suddenly appeared from behind some boxes. He looked heavily emaciated as he stumbled toward them with a crazed look in his eyes. Before he could even reach them, however, the man tripped and fell.

And didn't get back up.

Rainier grew concerned by the sight of this. He began to make his way toward the person, but the Young Master quickly placed a hand on his arm, stopping him in his tracks.

"They're dead," he said in a low voice, pulling Rainier closer to him.

Rainier widened his eyes. He turned to the body and, upon closer observations, sensed that there was no breathing.

What the hell?!

The Young Master started to drag him away, "Let's go. We're causing a scene."

They're causing a scene?! What about the guy who just died in the middle of the street?!

He was reasonably shaken by this event.

As if reading his mind, the Young Master shifted his gaze toward the road and explained, "Meningitis. It's a brain infection. People here don't have time to practice good hygiene."

Rainier wordlessly nodded, feeling like he was out of his depth.

They kept moving.

The more they walked, he noticed, the nicer the buildings were becoming. It wasn't until they reached a beautiful structure with a half-moon gate did he realized where they were.

The red lanterns surrounding the area began to glow with a welcoming light as the sun made its descent.

"This is the back way. I don't recommend coming through the front if you still want a reputation," his Young Master told him offhandedly, before reaching out to pull a rope half-hidden behind a pillar.

A moment later, the door swung open.

Rainier was instantly hit with the smell of wood and jasmine.

A lavishly dressed, auburn-haired woman appeared in front of them with a seductive smile on her lips, holding a long pipe between her fingers.

"Welcome to the Lotus Garden—oh." She paused, and then eyed them up and down with interest, blowing out a ring of smoke from her mouth before zeroing in on the Young Master.

"Aren't you a little young, dear?" She asked with a smirk on her face.

Yes.

Yes, he was.

Rainier gave the Young Master a look through his sheer blindfold.

But rather than answering the inquiry, the Young Master chuckled, an odd sound to Rainier's ears as it was rare to hear him laugh.

His charge drew back his hood and faced the woman, "It's Nazareth, Auntie,"

All of a sudden, there was a shift in the woman's demeanor.

The aura of an enchantress cracked, revealing something else beneath the white powder and rouge.

With eyes widened in disbelief, the pipe in her hand slipped out of her grasp without her notice.

"Naza?" She asked with caution.

The Young Master nodded once in assent.

She gasped, and her eyes quickly began to turn red.

"Little Naza?" She demanded, stepping closer. "Tiny little Nazareth Webbers?"

The Young Master cracked a smile, "I go by Odum, now."

The way she delicately wrinkled her brows had Rainier thinking she might cry.

"Oh, look at you!" She flung herself forward and drew the Young Master into a tight embrace, "You've grown so big! We thought... we thought you were dead! There was no news about you at all after Alouysia's... well..." She trailed off tearfully, before quickly changing the subject. "I'm so sorry about what happened, dear. The old Madam had told us you were gone for good. We all assumed... Oh, never mind that for now. Come in, come in. Everyone, look who's come to visit!"

From the corner of his eyes, Rainier saw the way the Young Master's eyes darkened. There's a story, but he wasn't sure if the other was willing to share it.

"What happened after I was gone, Auntie?"

The woman pursed her lips tightly but eventually gave up keeping her silence, "The Madam passed away a few years after you left. There was a shift in policies and I was suddenly selected to take over. Things have changed a lot since you were gone, dear. Everything is a lot safer for the staff and we've been getting high ratings in our performances rather than our assets."

"I see." The Young Master sucked in a breath. His shoulders, which were previously tensed, eased at the woman's words, "I'm glad."

The woman looked at him in pity, before taking his hand into her own, "We could have saved her with all the money she was raking in. She fell out of favor with the Madam, but she did it for you. She knew her days were limited, but she never regretted having you. We missed you just as much as we missed her."

The Young Master's eyes trembled. He then allowed himself another chuckle and shook his head, "Mummy would have swatted me black and blue if she knew what I did. You and the others would've also handed her a tray of slippers to do the swatting."

The woman raised an eyebrow. "We might. It will have to depend on how badly you've messed up, my dear."

"Very."

"Then don't say a word. You might not be leaving with functioning legs if I and the others were to find out. Your mother might not be here, but we are very willing in using her methods to discipline her wayward child."

"Auntie..."

Rainier looked back and forth between his Young Master and the auburn-haired woman.

He noticed the way the woman spoke, her tones light and airy with each word. It was soothing and drew one's attention with a charming grip. Where had he heard this type of accent before?

He got his answer when the Young Master began to gradually lose his aristocratic elocution.

Huh.

So this was his Young Master's natural accent. He hadn't expected that.

He'd only heard it a few times, mostly when the other was delirious from pain. The incident with the Slave Emblem and the trials for the antidote came to the forefront of his mind.

"—Rainier,"

Rainier felt a jolt through his spine when the other spoke his name. The way he pronounced it suddenly sounded odd against his ears.

He straightened his back and composed himself, before turning to the other, "Yes, Young Master?"

Before the other could answer, the woman stepped forward and gave him a tight hug.

"Young man, thank you for taking care of my nephew all these years," she spoke with clear warmth in her voice.

"A-ah," Rainier wasn't sure how to respond to that.

She took a step back and placed her hand over her chest before bowing deeply to him. Rainier immediately grew flustered by the action.

"There is no need—"

"You may call me Madam Constanze. I am the head of this establishment."

Rainier blinked, "The pleasure is all mine, Madam—"

All of a sudden, several well-dressed figures wrapped in silk and brocade appeared out of nowhere and began to flock around the Young Master. The familiarity with which they spoke to him was as if they'd only seen him a week ago.

"Naza is here?"

"He's here? Where? Where?"

"Naza, come here! Do you still remember Auntie Number Twelve?"

"What about Uncle Number Three?"

"Oh, you are tall. We will make you look lovely, child."

"Is he still a size small?"

"I kept some fabric in the back! The old Madam didn't confiscate everything!"

"The age restriction has also been moved to twenty, love. You are still a fetus."

"I have rouge! And flower pins!"

Within the chaos, Rainier could make out his Young Master's voice:

"Wait—please—"

His Young Master was clearly startled by their reactions.

A few seconds later, all of them disappeared up the steps of the brothel, taking Rainier's charge with them.

Madam Constanze sighed, a look of exasperation making its way onto her face, "You won't be seeing him for a while," she told him and then headed for the front entrance. "Seems like there will be no customers today." She flipped the OPEN sign over and blew out the lantern lights at the front of the brothel. "There will be a feast."

She smirked at him. "Young man, why don't I show you how to make some of his childhood snacks?"

Rainier shook his head, "I'm afraid—"

"I can share some embarrassing stories with you,"

The offer was enticing, but Rainier had responsibilities to his Young Master.

"No—"

"We used to dress him up all the time. I still have pictures."

Rainier did a one-eighty and smiled charmingly. "I am grateful for your generosity, Ma'am. Please, lead the way."

Damn, these people were too charismatic.

---

They ended up staying for dinner.

Rainier watched as more and more food made its way into the grand dining hall. The round table at the center of the room could seat over fifty people, if not more.

Interestingly enough, he didn't see a single chair. Were they supposed to eat while standing?

Across the room, there was a raised platform with a variety of instruments and silks. Several of the ladies, and even men, sat in front of their favorite instruments and began to tune them.

The harmonious scene was an odd one, seeing as it was in a brothel.

Madam Constanze stood on the platform and watched the organized chaos in the room, "Add a plate. Ophelia's nephew will be joining us."

A man dressed in loose blue robes and half-heartedly plucking a harp snickered and shared glances with some of the other brothel workers sitting on the platform. "I heard he's handsome."

"Yes, a very handsome and sweet dear. Perhaps he and Naza will get along, they are about the same age," a woman holding a fiddle added.

Another man standing with a flute raised his eyebrows suggestively. "Anything is better as long as he is nothing like his father. The baron pays well but everything about him could be improved. Along with his techniques."

As one, the group of musicians cringed.

Rainier listened to their conversation with a somewhat growing discomfort.

He absentmindedly helped a few of the brothel workers arrange the table to ease his thoughts.

"Oh, there he is! Naza, dear, those robes look amazing on you!"

Rainier heard a few wolf whistles and turned to the source of the disturbance. He saw a group of people emerge from the staircase, looking rather proud of themselves. They surrounded someone in a tight circle.

"Madam." The lady in the front smiled brightly, "I hope you are pleased."

The women parted like the Cardinal Sea.

Rainier froze.

The youth standing in the center was dressed in russet-colored robes lined with delicate embroidery and overlaid with a cream shawl made with rich brocade. They had pinned his hair into a half-bun, affixed with wooden hair sticks and dangling pins.

"Oh, wow..."

Rainier suddenly heard a voice from beside him.

He turned and met lavender eyes.

"Uh, hey," a sly little smile formed on the boy's face as he greeted him, "Naza's servant, right?" He asked, and then tapped the spot between his eyes, "I can tell with the, you know..."

Yes, Rainier did know. He was also fully aware of who this boy was.

Tybalt Phelan, his Young Master's friend, and Master Aurelion's spy.

"Sir Phelan," Rainier responded shortly.

---

They brought him to his mother's old room.

"The previous Madam decided to keep it as it was. Some of the patrons were sad to see her go, so they sealed it in her memories," he was told.

Nothing had changed.

Golden drapes and tapestries hung on all four walls, while the ceiling held a chandelier covered in night pearls. The familiar scent of his mother's signature incense lingered faintly in the air.

There was a large bed in the center, with pillows stuffed with goose feathers and pelts of fur. Neo had no recollection of ever once sleeping on that bed, or sharing it with his mother. He was not in debt to the brothel, so, therefore, was not allowed its numerous extravagances.

The numerous aunts and uncles opened his mother's old closet and reached in, smiling with a gleam in their eyes.

Neo took a step back.

Half an hour later, he stood in front of a mirror.

"I look ridiculous,"

"You look like your Mummy. This was her favorite piece." One of his aunties replied, placing a pair of sticks into his hair.

Neo sighed.

"Dear, don't tell me you're too old to let your aunts and uncles dress you up?"

"I'm too old."

The woman clicked her tongue, "You can go back to being your masculine self after dinner. Just humor us for now, alright?"

"Hah," Neo lamented his luck. He stared at himself in the mirror and traced the elegant embroidery on his sleeves. He pursed his lips.

"Make me beautiful." There was barely any enthusiasm in his words, but his aunts and uncles cheered.

Eventually, they dragged him to the dining hall to display their hard work.

Neo gritted his teeth and tried not to smudge the rouge they painted onto his lips. He didn't think this shade of red was his color.

After being forced to turn this way and that—and after taking multiple pictures—he was finally free from the evil clutches of his mother's friends.

He made his way through the dining hall in search of Rainier.

"Naza!" Neo heard a familiar voice call his name.

He turned. "Tybalt?"

And standing beside Tybalt was Rainier.

"What are you doing here?"

Tybalt smiled. "My aunt works here. What about you?"

Neo hesitated. Tybalt was related to someone in the Lotus Garden? He hadn't had a single clue about this in their first time.

"This is where I grew up," he answered truthfully.

"Oh..." The lavender-eyed boy looked like he had stepped on a mine.

Neo gave him a weak smile, "It's a lot nicer now. Who's your aunt?"

"Ophelia. She's my mother's older sister. Has some pretty amazing connections." The last part was uttered with a worshipful tone.

"I don't remember an Ophelia," Neo responded, a small frown making its way onto his face.

"That, my dear, is because she started a few years after you left," Aunt Constanze made her way into the conversation with the ease of a bird. "Now," she smiled, "I'm sure you boys are tired of standing around. What do you say we start the feast?"

Clapping her hands once, twice, music began to play.

His Aunt smirked proudly, "Get your plates, dear. The ladies and gents at my establishment are ravenous."

As soon as she said this, it seemed like a switch had gone off.

Other than the men and women playing music on the platform, the rest of the brothel workers started to tear into their meals with extreme violence. The start of a battle royale has begun.

His Aunt winked at him, "I hope you remember how we feast in this house."

At her words, Neo felt like a part of himself had come alive.

He turned to Tybalt and Rainier, who was staring dumbfoundedly at the scene of the once-elegant-looking men and women battling one another for a drumstick.

"Rainier, you get the plates. Tybalt will grab the food."

"Wait, Young Master—"

"Naza, you can't be joking—"

Neo ran into the fight and assaulted the first vulnerable-looking target.

---

If anyone had told him he was going to have to battle over sixty brothel workers at a dining table to get his dinner today, Tybalt would have laughed and questioned why he would ever do that.

Yeah, he ended up battling those brothel workers and now he was eating the food he managed to win after Naza pulled his illegal street fighting abilities out of nowhere and chose violence.

They somehow made it out with barely any blood on them.

The three of them took shelter near the platform, watching the fight go on. Plates were flying, people were flying, yet, the table was safe. It explained why it was made of stone.

Naza had won them a large plate of food, enough for all three of them.

"Is that... normal?" Naza's servant asked.

Tybalt watched as his Aunt was nearly backhanded by a male worker dressed in tight-fitting robes. He certainly had an advantage, seeing as his Aunt's dress was showing to be a hazard.

He was proven wrong moments later when she slapped the man with her sleeves and stole his plate.

From beside him, Naza hummed, "Everyone here usually comes from the slums. The brothel implemented this feasting rule so they could let out some energy. It used to be even more violent than this, we were allowed weapons." There was a nostalgic look on his face as he explained, "My mother would send me off with a butter knife."

Okay.

"How old were you?"

"Hmm, maybe four or five?"

Tybalt tried to imagine Juliet holding a butter knife.

Yeah, no.

Maybe with supervision, but certainly not for a brawl.

These were the rare moments where Tybalt thanked the gods for being born in his family's manor. Naza and him were both bastards, but he didn't think he would have the same survival rate as Naza if he had been tossed into the slums.

Naza was pretty resilient.

It actually explained a lot of things.

Suddenly, Naza stood up. "Rainier, I'm going in for seconds."

"Young Master!"

Tybalt watched as Naza's servant chased after him.

Naza took out the sticks in his hair and charged in, "Are hairpins okay?"

No one answered him, but a majority of the workers began to take out the pins in their hair.

They all donned beautiful smiles on their faces as they aimed the pointed ends at their fellow co-workers.

Tybalt saw the crazed look in Naza's eyes as he joined the fray, taking on more opponents than he had previously.

All for a plate of food.

For the first time in his life, Tybalt realized what it meant to be wild feral.

He didn't think it would look so pretty.

---

Dinner ended with a majority of its participants deeply satisfied.

Tybalt and Rainier seemed a bit off, perhaps a little exhausted from the feast.

Neo knew it was a lot to take in. He had a lot more injuries compared to the brothel workers, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle. Aunt Constanze had scolded him for growing rusty, which had him and Tybalt sharing a meaningful look.

To her, it was ten years.

For him, it's been more than fifty.

Neo stayed for another hour to change out of his mother's robes and wipe the rouge from his lips.

When he was done, Aunt Constanze pulled him aside.

Looking around to make sure they were alone, she took something out of her sleeves. "Here," she grasped his hand and turned it over, placing a golden hairpin on his open palm.

It was a worn-looking thing, well-loved and treasured. Small dandelions were engraved to the thick dull ends.

Neo peered at it in confusion, "This is..."

His Auntie smiled. "It belonged to your mother. I stole it away before the old Madam could take it. It is now yours."

She closed his fingers around the pin.

Neo bit his lips, his eyes turning slightly red. He met his Aunt's gaze and mustered a small smile.

"Thank you."

The two of them hugged.

"Now, dear, don't be a stranger. Your aunties and uncles will still be here. Come visit when you have the time."

Neo left through the back door with Rainier and Tybalt.

The three of them bid the brothel workers a good night and began making their trek out of the Red Light District.

They were soon met with a fork road.

"Which way do we go?" Tybalt asked.

Neo knew both paths would take them to an exit. He and Rainier had used the left to get here. However, he replied, "You choose." He just wanted to see.

Tybalt blinked. He looked between the two paths, back and forth, back and forth, before pointing to the right.

"Right is right."

Neo's gaze immediately shifted to the left. There are no silver coins lying around.

He looked to the right. No coins, either. His hands tightened into a fist.

The experience should still be the same, so why...?

A feeling of dread settled in his chest.

"Young Master?"

Broken out of his daze, he saw Rainier and Tybalt staring at him curiously.

"It's nothing."

He pretended he didn't notice the concerned looks on their faces and stepped forward.

"Let's go."

---

Step 22: Take a moment to think about your childhood traumas and bring your servant to the brothel. Have fun. No, not in that way. You might even meet a friend there.

---

The author has something to say:

Cardinal Sea is the Red Sea from Moses.

Tybalt's family is a whole play ( ' ▽ ' )ﾉ.

Thank you, that-one_lazy-child and Nujnuj_Nitagac for the lovely fanarts! You can find their masterpieces, either on the discord or the fanart page. All links will be on my profile.