"What are you doing on the property of the Augustride Family?"
There was an overbearing voice coming from the sides.
At that moment, all those kids turned their heads to the side.
And Diana saw the person who was talking.
She was very familiar with this boy.
His black hair, coupled with his red eyes shining like a demon, knew that face very well.
He was her stepbrother, her other sibling from another mother.
However, to this day, they have never talked each other for a long time, or they have never talked about anything.
Basically, she didn't know much about this her older brother.
The only thing she knew was that, for some reason, her mother and her sister didn't like this boy, and they were always telling her that she should stay away from him.
And being the good girl she is, she listened to what her mother said, and she didn't approach him nor initiate any conversation with him.
But at this moment, he was the only person she was familiar with, and it felt like this red-eyed boy was the only one who could help her among those people she knew.
"Didn't they teach you how to talk? Or, can your brains simply not understand what I am saying?"
He said, this time with a more overbearing tone.
She didn't know why but at that moment, this boy looked like he was the owner of this place.
Hearing him talking, the nobles who were harassing her shook with bewilderment and responded with a ferocious voice.
"HA! Who do you think you are? How dare you call me Brandon of the Perez family, lowlife?"
The boy at the front suddenly raised his voice and responded pretty ferociously to the red-eyed boy looking down on him.
"I am Callius Augustride. The first son of the Augustride Dukedom. I called you low-life because even a pig would behave like a civilized person if educated properly, but it seems this is not the case for you."
The red-eyed boy said with an overbearing while introducing himself as the son of the dukedom.
"Hahaha! There is no way a twerp like you would be the son of Duke Austin. Look, you don't even have white hair. How can you claim yourself as the son of the Augustride Family? Do you think we are stupid? What do you guys think?"
That guy said while smiling ear to ear.
"Yes, I have never heard of someone like him belonging to Augustride Family. He is clearly lying, HAHA! If you want to play the hero, just do it with your strength. Why are you lying?"
"Hahaha, look how mad he is right now. Huh?"
/CRACK/
Suddenly the guy who was talking got punched in the face and fell to the floor.
"It seems you are really stupid. To not recognize the insignia of the Augustride Family on my clothes and on the clothes of the girl you were bullying. As expected, even a pig is smarter than you."
"Burgh-"
With another clear movement, suddenly, the girl near the boy got punched in her stomach, and without even uttering a voice, she fell down to the floor.
The only thing Diana could see at that moment was her brother attacking those kids suddenly.
In an instant, two out of three kids got attacked and fell down to the floor without even responding.
The only one who was still standing was the guy who introduced himself as Brandon Perez.
"Huh? What are you doing, you bastard? How dare you attack my friends like that?"
With a loud shout, he threw a punch at Callius, only for him to dodge at the last second.
"Brandon Perez, the third son of the Perez Barony. Your family is a vassal of ours and known for their talented spear-using. As an heir of a baron family, you are pretty arrogant. I wonder, who is the person holding your leash? From the looks of it, you are not that talented in close comb-"
/PUNCH/ /SWISH/
"SHUT UP! WHAT DO YOU KNOW?"
While shouting like that, Brandon threw another punch at Callius, and just like the last one, he dodged that at the last second.
"Huff, Huff, huff."
However, from the looks of it, it seemed like Callius got tired pretty fast. Diana knew he didn't have a good body constitution, but she never thought he could move this fast and precise.
"WHAT DO YOU KNOW, HUH? NO ONE ACKNOWLEDGES ME; NO ONE CARES ABOUT ME!"
While shouting like that, Brandon started charging at Callius while throwing punches, one after another.
/SWISH/ /SWISH/ /THUD/
Callius kept dodging and dodging until he found an opening. The moment he saw the balance of Brandon staggering, he immediately attacked Brandon's leg, making him lose his balance, only to fall down to the floor, just like the other kids.
"Huh?" /SMASH/
When Brandon fell down to the floor, Callius put his foot on Brandon's head and started pressing it.
"Low-lives like you should just bow their heads and listen when I am talking. Know your place as livestock; how dare you lay a hand on the bloodline of our Augustride Family. How dare you put your filthy hands on my sister? Do you know how disgusting I feel right now? It feels like I saw an artist's painting of a lifetime getting dirtied by mud. It feels like the perfect thing I envisioned is broken. Did you touch her with this lowly hand? Was it your right one or the left one? Or did you touch her with both your hands?"
Saying that, Callius raised his foot and suddenly smashed it on Brandon's left hand.
/SMASH/ /CRACK/
"AAAAAH! MY HAND!"
"Or was that the right one?"
/SMASH/ /CRACK/
"AAAAAAH!"
"Now, it seems your head is finally back to normal. Next time, it won't be just your hands; I will cut every finger of yours and feed them to your mother. Be careful how you behave. Don't ever forget the things that happened to you today, and live your life like I was always watching. Because I never forget and never forgive."
/THUD/
He said and kicked the guy in the face for the last time, and turned his attention to Diana.
Looking at his blood-red eyes, shining in the night, she couldn't utter a word and froze like a statue.
"You are a person of Augustride Dukedom. Raise your head, and face everything by yourself. You are not a doll that would need to be protected, and you are the daughter of Duke August. Next time, don't behave like some sort of statue but stand your ground. This is how we, Augustride's, should live."
He said and left just like that.
Seeing the commotion and hearing the screams of those kids, guards came to the place where everything happened.
After that, it was pretty much a normal investigation, and soon it found that those kids were poisoned with a drug that would make them hypnotized as well as reveal their inner desires.
However, with this event, the reputation of Callius got worse, and rumors started spreading among the nobles.
How he liked torturing people, or he was a violent boy looking for a fight everywhere. It was even said that he was harassing girls in his free time. There were rumors like that started circulating in the inner cycle of nobles as well as the outer cycle.
However, none of them mattered to Diana.
The things she witnessed that day, the things Callius said to her, she understood what she was lacking and decided to change how she behaved.
Later she saw, Callius was being scolded and scorned by her mother, Adelyn, and tried to interfere with that.
However, he refused while saying, "I don't need anyone's help nor their sympathy. I, alone, will deal with the consequences of my actions." And just like that, he got punished for his actions.
Although Diana knew Callius was not in the wrong and tried to tell the truth to everyone, no one believed her, and her mother seized this opportunity to deal with Callius at that time.
But she understood one thing for sure. That, how powerless she was, and how her brother she didn't know about, stood his ground against those people.
His arrogant attitude, his overbearing words, his graceful and elegant way of fighting, everything was imprinted on Diana's mind.
After this event, Diana swore that she would be useful to his brother and that she would always support her.
No matter what happened, she swore that she would be on his brother's side and that she would always stick with him.
And this event also made her understand how adults changed the way of truth according to their wishes and how they manipulated her so far.
This world was never the pure place she had always envisioned.
No, this world was cruel. Her mother and her sister were always saying she should stay away from Callius, but when she needed them, where were they?
Her sister was enjoying all the attention she was getting from people and her 'loved' one, while her mother was busy with her ambitions.
They didn't even believe her words of truth.
This event made her open her eyes and created a rift between her and her family.
This was the story of the young girl who later became the villainess of the story and who was the only person on my side.
However, just like me, she too is not right in the head…