On my first day back with my wealthy family, Caelum, the young man who had taken my place, stood off to the side with his shoulders hunched, looking timid. He looked nothing like the privileged young heir he was supposed to be.

He hid whenever he saw anyone. When he could not hide, his eyes would turn red, almost as though he was about to cry, especially whenever he ran into my mom, Linda.

Linda threw herself into my arms and sobbed. "Your brother has never been close to me, not since he was little. No matter how hard I tried, he never let me love him. Thank goodness you're back."

My three sisters weren't fond of him either. "He's been a troublemaker since childhood, and now, we find out he's not even related to us by blood. No wonder we could never bring ourselves to treat him as family."

Caelum's face went pale, and I instinctively held his hand. The next moment, we both heard a vicious woman's voice.

[Here comes another brat. Watch how I deal with eyesores like you!]

After my sisters left, my mom finally got up. "It just so happens that the kitchen ordered some foie gras, and it came in today. Since you grew up in the countryside, you must never have eaten anything this fancy, right? I'll prepare some for you to try."

She smiled and stroked my face with her well-kept, smooth hand before turning toward the kitchen.

As a wealthy wife who had lived in comfort for years, she looked barely over forty despite being in her fifties and still had a girlish charm. It was obvious that she had lived a very happy life.

When I first saw her, I was genuinely happy. If not for the voice I had just heard, I never would have connected those vicious words to her.

I looked at Caelum. "Did you hear that?"

His face was pale, and he looked like he wanted to say something to me, but hesitated. He cast a fearful glance toward the kitchen before murmuring, "I... You should go take a look in the kitchen..."

Before Caelum could finish his sentence, a sharp crashing sound came from the kitchen, followed by a startled cry.

We ran over and saw that Linda had knocked over a pot. The chicken consommé the kitchen prepared had scalded her arm red, and blisters soon appeared.

My third sister, Mia, who had gone back to her room to play games, rushed downstairs and shoved us aside, then grabbed Linda's hand in distress. She immediately roared at the house staff. "Did we hire you to sit around? Why is my mom personally cooking?!"

Caelum shrank behind me.

"It's not their fault. Silas had never eaten something like foie gras before and wanted to try it. I'm the useless one for not being able to handle something this simple."

Linda looked at me with tears in her eyes. "You won't blame me, right?"

Mia immediately glared at me in fury. "If you wanted to eat it, you could've made it yourself! You're already acting like the heir the first day you're back?!"

She looked at my rough hands with a disdainful look and said, "Mom spends a fortune a year just taking care of her hands. You grew up in the countryside, right? What hardship haven't you gotten used to? Yet you still made her cook for you herself?"

But I had never said I wanted to eat it at all. If Linda had not mentioned it, I would never have known that there was even foie gras at home.

Mia did not even ask before blaming everything on me.

I instinctively argued, "I didn't."

As soon as I spoke, I realized I had made a mistake. Beside me, Caelum nervously tugged on my hand.

Sure enough, Mia became even angrier. "You didn't?! If not for you, why would she have gotten hurt so badly? We normally won't even let her do the smallest of chores, but you ordered her to cook for you the moment you came back? Just who do you think you are?!"

She even raised her hand, but Mom patted her back and calmed things down. "It's fine. Your younger brother has only just come home today. Don't scare him."

However, there was nothing but smugness in her heart.

[No one can outrank me in this house.]

[If I'd known he would be found one day, I would've strangled him at birth instead of merely abandoning him... No, if I'd known he was a boy, I would've gotten rid of him before he was even born.]

My eyes narrowed.

She was still cursing in her heart.

[This is George's fault, too. He was so scared I would be upset, he brought me back a fake one!]

[It took years to turn that one into a failure, and now he's brought the real one back.]

I could not stay there any longer. I apologized to her, then hurriedly pulled Caelum back to my room.

I could not help but ask him. "Have you lived like this all these years?"

Caelum nodded quietly.

A memory suddenly surfaced from the day the Gomez family found me. Linda had held me tightly, tears streaming down her face as she cried herself hoarse. "If your father hadn't brought your brother back to keep me going, I don't think I would've lived long enough to see you again. You have to treat your brother well from now on. He'll never look down on you."

At the time, I had thought Caelum could not have sincerely hoped for me to return. He was the youngest in the family and the only son at the time. Aside from my dad, George Gomez, no one knew he was not their biological child, so he must have grown up surrounded by love. But now that the family's biological son had been found, his status had become awkward.

When I arrived home last night, I had not even seen him.

Linda had brought me to look for him, but he hid and refused to meet me.

Linda said, "It's not his fault. Your father and I suddenly brought you back, so he must be feeling rather upset right now. He isn't deliberately giving you attitude."

If I had not seen how thin and timid Caelum was today, I really would have believed her and thought Caelum disliked me.

I had not expected Linda to favor daughters over sons like this.

I sighed softly and reached out to pull him over, but he quickly dodged away. I took his hand and pulled up his sleeve before he could refuse. Only then did I discover that both his arms were covered in bruises.

"She hits you, too?" I asked in shock.

Caelum shook his head. "Not long after I was old enough to remember things, whenever Mom and I were alone together, she would always have accidents. When George and my sisters rushed over to comfort her, they would also worry about me since I was there.

"Later, after it happened too many times, they thought I was deliberately hurting Mom. As soon as they arrived, they would push me aside and gather around her. Hannah practices kickboxing, so she's very strong. Every time she pushed me, making me fall or crash into something, they would yell at me for pretending to be weak to win their sympathy."

I pursed my lips and fetched the first aid kit. While applying ointment to his bruises, I discovered that his arms weren't the only places that had been hurt. His waist and back were also covered in bruises.

We could not stay in the Gomez family.

No wonder my mentor said I would go back soon.

I was only halfway through applying the ointment when someone suddenly started pounding on the door. Caelum panicked and hurriedly reached for his clothes. Before he could put them on properly, the person outside kicked the door open.

"Caelum! What did you do to hurt her so badly this time?!" I looked up to see Hannah, my second-oldest sister, glaring at us with fury written all over her face. She had barged straight into her own brother's room without a second thought. If Caelum had been even a moment slower just now, she would have seen everything.

I was a little angry. "Hannah, Caelum is an adult, too! Don't you know you should respect other people's privacy?!"

Hannah's eyes darted away nervously.

Linda immediately rushed over to mediate. "Oh, I'm really alright. Stop involving your two brothers in this."

It would have been better if she had not come. The moment she did, Hannah looked at the ice packs on her arm, and her anger flared.

Hannah shoved us aside as she snapped, "If you two hadn't been so picky and insisted on eating the foie gras Mom cooked herself, would any of this have happened?!"

Caelum ran over to help me, and each of us grabbed one of her hands.

[Hit them! Hit them hard!]

[I want this little bastard to know who's truly the most loved in this family!]

That voice was just too familiar.

Hannah froze, confusion written all over her face. Then, she turned to look at our mom with a complicated expression.

My mom looked anxious, as if she was worried that we would start fighting. But in her heart, she was gloating and waiting for Hannah to beat us up.

After a while, Hannah let go. "Mom, something came up at the company. Olivia is still waiting for me. I need to grab the documents and head out."

Mia yelled at her in anger. "Why are you so worried about company matters?! You should teach those two a lesson first!"

Watching Hannah leave in a hurry, Mia could only give us a vicious glare. She then warned us, "If you dare hurt her again, I'll make you pay!"

She then snorted coldly and left as well.

Our mom's expression became somewhat odd as she said, "Silas, Caelum, I'm so sorry about this. It's all my fault. I'll go talk to them right now."

After everyone left, Caelum and I held each other's hands and could not help smiling at each other.

It turned out that as long as our sisters were in physical contact with us, they could hear Mom's inner thoughts as well and see through her facade.

I soon began looking for a chance to leave the Gomez family as quickly as possible.

Caelum shook his head. "It's not possible."

He had tried to escape several times before, but he had been caught and brought back every time. With just a few words from Linda, the others would even blame him for having too much of a temper. They scolded him for running away from home over a minor reprimand.

"If you cause trouble out there, we'll be the one who has to clean up your mess!" They had said.

Caelum continued, "Without me, Mom would have no one to target. Every time something happened, Dad and our sisters became even more distressed for her than before. They would lock me up in a windowless room or punish me themselves afterward.

"It's not that I never explained myself, but none of them believed me. After a long time, I no longer had the energy to argue."

I went to Hannah and told her everything, hoping she could help us in some way. But she denied ever hearing Linda's inner thoughts.

"Coward!" I said angrily.

Hannah's expression changed, and she explained, "Silas, we must have imagined it back then. You've only just come home. You don't know her well enough yet. She's not that kind of person."

We had barely spoken a few words before Mia appeared.

She sneered. "Ha! Mom was just downstairs talking about how close the two of you are and asked me to come up and chat with you. I didn't expect to find you up here badmouthing her."

Mia was still in college, and her personality was much more impulsive. Linda had used her as someone to gather information, yet she had no idea.

I did not hesitate either. I immediately pulled Caelum and Hannah into a fight with her.

Mia gritted her teeth and snapped, "You start throwing punches after just a few words? You're such a country bumpkin, you backwater hi-"

The next second, her expression changed sharply as her fist froze in midair.

[Mia is still the easiest to use. She's just a naive and foolish college student, after all.]

[I wonder what they are plotting, but it doesn't look like anything good. I should go check it out myself.]

The moment Linda appeared on the stairs, Mia's expression darkened.

She looked at us. "What happened? Hannah, Mia, you're not allowed to bully your brothers! Let go, all of you. What do you think you're doing?"

Hannah and Mia ignored her. After lowering their heads and apologizing, they hurried off.

Linda's expression froze.

As she watched them leave, her face grew even more grim. She seemed unable to understand why their attitudes had suddenly become so abnormal.

She grew uneasy.

The way she looked at Caelum and me became inquisitive.

Meanwhile, Hannah and Mia began intentionally avoiding contact with Linda.

After all, they had lived together for many years, so it was normal that they could not accept right away that their own mother was so different inside and out. But without their help, and with people watching Caelum and me wherever we went, we could not possibly make it down the mountain on foot, as the family estate was built on top of a mountain.

Fortunately, Hannah and Mia avoided her like the plague, which had never happened before.

Linda's intense unease and sense of losing control drove her to think of driving us out. Just like how she had mercilessly abandoned me behind everyone's back when I was just newly born.

She began targeting me.

She took me to upper-class banquets but deliberately gave me George's old formal suits to wear, making people laugh at me.

When we went to celebrate the birthday of the Queen family's matriarch, she deliberately bought white lilies, which were usually used for funerals, and blamed me for it. The Queen family drove me out on the spot, stripping me of all dignity.

She thought this would destroy my confidence and make me cower in my room every day, just like Caelum. She did not expect me to remain perfectly calm, as if nothing had happened.

She finally could not stand it anymore.

That day, Caelum and I went downstairs.

We saw Linda standing thoughtfully in front of a blue vase taller than herself.

George had asked my mentor for it.

The vase was placed in the southeast corner of the house. It was said to ward off evil and misfortune. After being enchanted by my mentor, it could protect the family, and by extension, the company, for a century.

This was one of the conditions George had agreed to before bringing me back.

Linda only knew that George valued the vase, but she did not know why. There was a glint in her eyes, and she reached out to push the vase.

"No!" I shouted in alarm.

I rushed downstairs in a panic, only to meet with her smile. Then, she fell into the shards, the sharp fragments cutting her arm open and staining the shards red with her blood.

I froze. "It's over..."

If there had been no blood, the vase could probably still be saved. However, once it came into contact with blood, there might even be backlash from the enchantment.

When Linda saw my expression, a smile formed on her lips.

Then, she cried out, "Silas! I love you so much! Why did you scare me and make me fall..."

Mia heard the commotion and ran over. Her face looked grim, but this time, she did not immediately blame me. She only watched Linda quietly.

Seeing that her daughter was not speaking up for her, panic flickered across Linda's face.

Then, she heard the sound of a car returning.

She had planned everything. Today was the day my father, George, and my eldest sister, Olivia, would return from their business trip, and Hannah had gone to pick them up. They had just arrived home.

When the front door opened, she cried even louder.

George looked at the shattered pieces on the floor as if he could already see the terrifying sight of his company collapsing in an instant. His eyes widened with rage, and the veins in his neck bulged as he roared, "What exactly happened here?!"