“Stay inside,” Burn said as he opehe carriage door. He gred at Yvaihe boy was about to follow him out, but he defted back to his seat instead.
“Sir Sator, this is nothing. Please return ihe an urged.
Ever since he’d taken up the job of Wilderwood Mansion’s an, he had never entered a man with such a anding presenot even the Marquis who employed him bore the same air that Mante di Sator exuded. Not to mention his wife and son—
Burn walked toward the man who had jumped in front of the carriage, the horses nearly trampling him had the an not been so adept. He looked down at the figure, seemingly uninjured but radiating fusion and pain.
The man suddenly lu him, clutg his ankle.
“Good sir…! Please! Please help—please!”
He was dirty—filthy, really. His skin was smeared with the remnants of hardship, a vas of grime etched upon his frail frame. He was young, but the harshness of life had aged him prematurely, turning his boyish features into a mask of desperation.
At a g ainfully obvious he was a sve, bound not just by s but by the weight of despair that g to him like a sed skin.
His clothes hung off him as though they were borrowed from a more fortunate soul, tattered and threadbare, doing little to shield him from the elements or the world’s judgment.
His hair, matted and u, framed a face that looked as if it had fotten what joy felt like—a remihat innoce often fades in the light of cruel realities.
The way he clutched his ankle spoke volumes; it wasn’t just physical pain, but a plea for aowledgment in a world that had long since chosen to ignore his existenbsp;
“Ah, just what I oday,” Burn thought, “a young rebel appealing for a hero's rescue. How quaint.”
He kicked him away, and the sve’s desperate clut his ankle was gone. Gng at Wilderwood Mansion, he unleashed a twisted sneer; a loose sve impeding his return home was just the delightful invenience he needed.
He hadn’t had the pleasure of meeting this pitiful creature before because he left much earlier from the academy.
“Master Sator,” Finn appeared briskly from the mansion gates, his gait almost frenzied, his guards in tow. “What’s this?”
Burn shrugged. “Just a random sve?” he replied. “What brought you out here?”
Finn’s expression soured slightly. “I heard the Madam colpsed during the entrance ceremony buffet. You took your sweet time returning, and I started to worry something dire had transpired. So, I patiently waited for your arrival, and…” His gaze drifted to the sve, writhing on the ground like a fish out of water.
“My Madam is perfectly fine,” Burn decred.
Finn waved his guards forward to remove the sve, pstered across his face. “Well, that’s a relief—”
“No! W-wait! Please help! Help!” The young sve scrambled past the guards, his plea a frantic echo. “Save me—my… my… someohere’s someone I o save! Please…!”
fused and desperate, he was heless relentless, the kind of unwaveriermination you’d expect from a poorly scripted py with an overly enthusiastic actor.
Burn couldn’t help but smirk. The irony of it all was delicious—a sve impl assistance from someone like him, as if he were some sort of knight in shining armor, rather than just a master in dull, metal heeled shoes.
The day had turned delightfully ridiculous.
“This one is clearly an illegal sve. Look at the state he’s in,” Finn decred, a mix of disdain and pity in his voice. “I’ll handle him from here. You were leaving today, right? o dey anymore.”
Knowing Burn, Finn didn’t want him to cast more bad lu this already unfortunate soul of a sve. After all, Burn had a reputation for turning prisoners of war into sves—a delightful pastime he’d practically mandated for the nobility of the Elysian Kingdom.
Finn couldn’t even begin to imagine what Burn would do to this poor soul for the crime of invenieng his travel pns.
“Just… please… I’m going to die… they’re going to die…!” the young sve pleaded, his bloodied palms scraping against the pavement in desperation. “They forced us… they… they tortured us…! Those people…!”
Finn clicked his tongue, grumbling softly, grimag. “Why do we still endorse this whole svery thing…?”
“Would he die just because he’s a sve?” Burn asked, an eyebrow raised, irritation simmerih the surface.
“Well,” Finn nearly stuttered, “Yes, he would die at this point.”
“No,” Bured. “He won’t die simply because of his status as a sve. He'll die because his owner decided it was a good afternoon for aion.”
Finn narrowed his eyes. “That’s because he’s a sve in the first pce. Isn’t that how people treat sves? That’s why svery is—”
“Svery is good,” Burn shrugged. “Clearly, some people don’t have a right to an opinion or voice. I know you’ve met people like them.”
Finn widened his eyes. Some nobles, criminals, and horrible people’s faces fshed in his mind.
“Anyway, as long as svery is perfectly reguted with precisely maintained rules, nothing like this would happen,” Burn said. “My Empire’s sves had ces to prove themselves useful and free themselves from their lowly status too.”
“Except those who were only suitable for menial work, the unambitious ones, or the turned-i-asshole criminals, everyone had the same ce to prove themselves,” Burn shrugged.
Gahad was a sve, yet he became the stro knight of Soulnaught.
“There are sves walking among us, living decorated and rich lives uheir generous masters, their lives better than most free people, pampered and loved. And when you put it another way, you call anyone a sve,” Burn sighe guards to pull the young sve to his feet.
“Like I am a sve to my wife, and my wife a sve to me,” Burn looked closer at the young sve. Meanwhile, Finn was stunned. Now his view of Burn pletely ged.
Burn had promised Man to expin himself more now. And even though his view was twisted and cruel, there were reasons behind it. He stood firm in his opinion that some people just fit to be sves.
Some people o be made into sves.
Most people were already sves anyway, even though they thought they were free. They were usually sves to money, sves to their own desires, or sves to what they thought were where their happiness y.
If ohought about it, extreme svery like this would still happeheless, hidden uhe shadow of the underground world. So why irely make it legal and keep a keen eye on it? Enforce order.
This truth about humanity—he might be one of the small unity of people who dared to face it and fix it.
Of course, if it were Man, she would try to fix it some other way—since she was also part of this small unity.
After the young sve, Burn frowned. He ordered—
“Bring him inside.”
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