The Gravemont Curse

Matthew's POV

I stepped out of the Bugatti, the soft evening breeze rippling across the surface of the pool behind me. Before me, the mansion stood bathed in golden sunlight, its glass panels glittering like a treasure hoard.

Home at last.

From the front steps, Mr. Kale, my ever-dutiful butler, approached in a pristine royal blue tuxedo. He gave a slight bow when he reached me.

"Welcome home, Young Master," he greeted with his usual composure.

I didn't reply. Instead, I strode toward the automatic front doors, my hands in my pockets, while he silently followed behind.

"My sisters?" I asked, raising a brow.

Mr. Kale chuckled. "The little ones are quite upset with you. They gave me strict orders to make sure they don't see you—otherwise, they'll beat me up."

The edges of my lips curled upward. "So, it's war, huh?"

I stepped inside, greeted instantly by the cool embrace of air-conditioning and the dazzling glow of the chandeliers. White, luxurious cushions were artfully arranged around a thick glass center table, and the Electrochromic walls pulsed between different hues, bathing the living room in an otherworldly glow.

In the chaos that was my life, this house was my only sanity.

"Welcome home, Young Master Zayden," Elysia's smooth, AI-generated voice boomed from the hidden speakers.

Oh, dear Elysia, how I have missed you.

"Hello to you too, my friend," I replied, heading toward the plush cushions a few steps away.

But before I could even move forward—

THUMP. THUMP. THUMP.

The unmistakable sound of stomping feet thundered down the mahogany staircase.

Oh no. This is bad.

The first thing I saw was Iris, armed to the teeth with pillows, her narrowed eyes locked onto me like a predator eyeing its prey.

Zara followed right behind her, carrying even more pillows—how did they even manage to hold that many?

A headache was already forming. These two were only fourteen, but apart from Ada, I had never seen anyone so feisty.

Zara and Iris, my two extremely troublesome twin sisters. For someone as naturally indifferent as I was, they somehow had the uncanny ability to crack me open with little effort. At this point, I had accepted it as their innate talent.

"The jerk has returned!" Zara declared, tossing a pillow in her hands like she was testing its weight. "Get out, or this will hurt!"

I barely had time to react before Iris launched a pillow straight at my face.

I caught it mid-air, my grip firm, my expression unreadable. "Guys, why don't we talk about this?"

"I'll target his face. You go for his butt," Iris instructed Zara, already reaching for another pillow.

"Turn around, loser," Zara demanded. "I can't see your ass."

Okay, that's enough. Time to negotiate.

"I got you guys some Caviar Pizza from Russia," I announced, hoping the bribe would work.

"Hit him before he bribes us!" Iris shouted.

And then—chaos.

A mountain of pillows came crashing down on me. One after the other, they rained upon me like an ambush attack. I didn't even realize I had stumbled backward out of the house.

Mr. Kale wasn't any better off. He had also been evicted by my evil little sisters. So much for his "strict orders" to keep me out of sight.

As the doors clicked shut, I looked up to see Zara grinning down at me. She stuck her tongue out before dramatically flipping her hair and waltzing back inside.

I exhaled sharply, rubbing my temples.

I was supposed to be the one in charge as the big brother. Instead, I got little sisters who punish me.

This was embarrassing.

Good thing Ada wasn't here. If she were, she'd definitely take their side, and Ada plus my sisters equaled disaster.

Just as I was about to collect myself, my phone rang. I glanced at the screen—Iris Calling.

I sighed. This is not going to be good for my health.

"Iris. Zara," I greeted cautiously. "I brought a peace offering. The pizza can't wait too long, you know."

I heard muffled whispers over the phone. Good. I had their attention.

"Big brother," Iris cooed sweetly.

I froze.

That was a trap. Whenever Iris got all sweet and innocent, the next thing that came out of her mouth was pure evil.

And I was right.

"Even though you've been a jerk," she continued, "we're willing to forgive you. However, this barely covers our emotional damage. If you want a full pardon, you need to show us more sincerity."

I pinched the bridge of my nose. "What do you two want?"

"We want a puppy," Zara's voice rang through the phone. "It gets boring at home when you're away, so the dog can replace you."

I nearly dropped the phone.

Replace me?!

The fact that they had already decided I was replaceable by a dog made my blood boil in ways I didn't understand. I wasn't even sure why I was getting jealous, but I was.

"Absolutely not," I snapped. "You two don't even know how to take care of a dog. I have to remind you to clean your rooms all the time!"

"We weren't planning to take care of it," Iris shot back smoothly. "We both realized that we have, um… lazy issues. So we've decided it would be best to get a groomer while we shower the puppy with all the love and affection it deserves."

My grip tightened on the phone.

Hold up.

They were planning to pamper a dog with the love and affection they didn't even show me?!

I stood there, outside my own house, kicked out by my own sisters, listening to them plot against me like I was some irrelevant side character in my own story.

I exhaled sharply, a bitter smile forming on my lips.

I'm sorry, little ones, but you've got the wrong big brother for this.

You wanted a puppy?

Well.

Good luck trying to win against your very, very obsessive older brother.

"No. This topic is closed," I said, my tone leaving zero room for negotiation.

"Please!" they both pleaded in unison.

"No," I repeated, more firmly this time.

The more they begged for a dog, the less I wanted to get one—just out of sheer spite.

"Jerk," Zara yelled through the phone.

"Go sleep by the pool because that's where you'll be spending the night," Iris shot back.

I sighed, rubbing my forehead. Why does my head feel sore today? "Fine. I'll get you a dog—on one condition."

Silence stretched on the other end. Then Zara hesitantly asked, "What condition?"

"If you both clean your rooms for an entire month, I'll get you a dog."

"A week," Iris countered immediately.

"A month," I insisted.

"Two weeks," Zara haggled.

"Four weeks."

"That's still a month, you idiot!" Iris screamed.

"Oh? I didn't notice." I smirked. "Fine, then. Three weeks and six days."

"JERK!" They both yelled at the same time.

I chuckled. "The Caviar pizza's getting cold, by the way."

"Promise you'll get us a puppy if we keep the deal?" Zara pressed.

"Of course," I replied, fully confident in their overwhelming laziness.

"You better," Iris huffed before abruptly hanging up.

At the same moment, the door clicked open.

Iris stood in the doorway, arms folded, scanning me from head to toe with a disapproving frown.

"The pizza?" she asked.

I tossed the car keys to Mr. Kale. "Get it from the car."

He nodded and walked off, just as Zara sauntered into view. The two of them stood side by side, staring at me, their gazes sharp and assessing.

"It's good you're okay," Zara muttered, turning her face to the side like she didn't care. "I thought Antarctica was gonna freeze you into an ice popsicle."

Warmth spread through my chest. Even though they masked it with indifference, I could see the worry in their eyes, the way they subtly checked me for any signs of injury. I had my reasons for leaving without telling them, but that didn't make it right. Guilt prickled at my skin.

"I'm sorry," I admitted, though the words tasted unfamiliar on my tongue.

"Who cares about that?" Iris said, shifting uncomfortably. "Pizza's here. We gotta go, Biggy." She grabbed the box from Mr. Kale, Zara right on her heels, their excitement already erasing the tension.

I sighed, rubbing my temples. So much for pouring out my emotions.

Turning to Mr. Kale, I muttered, "We're going underground."

He bowed in silent acknowledgment.

I strode into the living room and mumbled under my breath, knowing full well the AI would catch it.

"Open the Cipher Nexus."

"Initiating entry mode," Elysia's mechanical voice responded.

With a soft whirr, the ground beneath me shifted, revealing a hidden staircase descending into darkness. Without hesitation, I stepped down, Mr. Kale following behind.

At the foot of the stairs lay my world—a fortress of advanced technology, walls lined with glowing screens and servers humming with raw power. Countries called places like this top secret. To me, it was home.

This was where I became a god.

To most hackers, the name Dreamy Eyes was a symbol of defiance, a legend whispered in dark corners of the internet. I did what no one else dared to do.

But what made me truly terrifying… was that I always got away with it.

I hacked into global systems, breached government networks, and cracked classified codes—all for fun.

There was a saying: Call your system impenetrable, and Dreamy Eyes will take a look.

They weren't wrong.

I sank into my chair, and instantly, every screen in the room flickered to life.

A few minutes ago, Obinna had called, giving me an overview of the situation. The moment I realized a shady organization was pulling the strings behind a larger network, my fingers practically itched with anticipation.

Networks were meant to be broken.

My hands flew over the keyboard, and within seconds, I was deep inside Nigeria's government databases. Child's play. The firewalls crumbled like wet paper before I even had to get serious.

Decoding, encrypting, rerouting—until I found it. A suspicious file.

I clicked.

Instantly, an advanced defense mechanism kicked in, trying to bounce me out. Cute. But I was faster. My fingers blurred across the keys, rewriting the code in real-time, tearing through the system like a hot knife through butter.

The file opened.

My eyes scanned the contents—then widened.

The words on the screen made my breath hitch.

What the hell is this?

Land acquisition rights? The country was sold?

Was this madness or just another day in Nigeria's elite corruption circus?

I didn't waste time asking myself how this was possible. In Nigeria, anything was possible with the right amount of stolen money and moral bankruptcy. What mattered more was who had the audacity to pull this off.

Because as far as I was concerned, Nigeria wasn't just some playground for billionaires with God complexes. It was Storm territory—and this? This was a direct challenge.

Whoever had the guts to do this was either insanely bold or unbelievably stupid.

I skimmed through the endless pages of legal jargon, my patience thinning. This type of paperwork had a special talent for making my eyes glaze over, but I needed a name. Someone had signed off on this deal, and whoever it was had just earned themselves a personal invitation to hell.

Then I saw it.

Evelyn Wood.

A woman.

That was unexpected. Not unheard of, but unexpected.

I ran a quick search, bypassing the usual security walls like they were made of wet paper. In seconds, I had her entire life laid bare in front of me.

Single mother.

Multi-millionaire.

Businesswoman.

Fashion model.

I scoffed.

A millionaire buying an entire country? Please. Not even the richest man alive could pull that off without collapsing into bankruptcy or committing treason. Evelyn Wood wasn't the real player—she was a pawn.

Which meant the real masterminds were still out there.

I dug deeper, infiltrating her social media, business transactions, and personal messages. Nothing immediately screamed criminal overlord, but I knew better. People didn't leave incriminating evidence in plain sight.

Most of her connections were harmless—family, colleagues, thousands of customers drooling over her luxury fashion brand.

Useless.

Even for someone like me, filtering through millions of messages would take weeks. And I didn't have weeks.

Still, it was a lead. And that was more than I had yesterday.

Evelyn Wood was officially on our hit list.

And when we got to her? We would rip every ounce of information from her mind.

I leaned back, exhaling slowly. My fingers flexed over the keyboard, aching from the relentless speed.

"Kale," I called.

The old man stood at attention, always composed, always unreadable.

"Are my parents still alive?"

It was a ritual by now. Every time Kale and I stood in the same room, the question surfaced. And every time, the answer was the same.

"Very much so, Young Master."

I nodded, my face unreadable. "Good."

But it wasn't good. It wasn't good at all.

Because six years ago, those same people I was supposed to call parents left me and my two younger sisters standing in the pouring rain.

I remembered the way the downpour had soaked through my clothes, how my sisters clung to me, shivering, confused, waiting for an explanation I didn't have.

And I remembered his voice. My father.

"Zayden, you are a Gravemont. So I will give you a life quest. Use your computers and find us, and then we will come home."

A life quest.

My eyes burned, but I refused to let it show.

For years, I had searched. Hacking, tracking, decoding—pushing myself past every limit to find the mother and father my sisters lost.

And yet, they remained ghosts. Like they had been erased from existence.

No trace. No breadcrumbs. Nothing.

Every passing day was a reminder of my failure. A reminder that I wasn't good enough.

Not for them.

Not for a Gravemont.

I still had memories—memories of warmth, of love, of laughter. But they felt like lies now. Because what kind of parents abandoned their children and called it a quest?

That question haunted me.

It gnawed at me in the dead of night.

And worst of all, it made me wonder if I was the problem.

Maybe I wasn't enough. Maybe I was the reason they left.

But time had done its job.

The pain dulled. The emotions faded.

With time, I became numb.

To them.

To the past.

To everything.

Because emotions?

Emotions were just weapons waiting to be used against you.

And I had been hurt enough.

So I continued my search. Not for me, but for my sisters. So that they could have closure. So that they could be happy.

As for me?

If I ever found those two again, I only had two words for them.

Words that had festered inside me for years, rotting, seething, waiting.

"Fuck you."