Early next morning, Matilda barged into her and Anna’s dorm suite.

“Annabelle, get out here! Right now,” she shouted as soon as she’d closed the door. “Didn’t I tell you not to do anything extreme yesterday?”

Even though she acted angry, deep down Matilda worried about her friend. More importantly, she had several pieces of news she had to tell Anna.

Anna walked out of her bedroom like a beaten dog, her eyes still puffy from crying.

“I’m sorry Matilda,” she said. “I should’ve listened to you.”

“That’s not important now. Are you well, did Wolf hurt you?” Matilda asked worriedly, as she inspected her miserable friend.

“I’m fine. He would never lay a finger on me,” Anna said with a hollow smile. She had realized the fact too late. “Why?”

“Don’t you know what happened yesterday?” Matilda asked in shock.

In her mind, if Wolf had come over, he should’ve mentioned what he’d done in the dueling arena.

“No, what happened?” Anna asked.

Matilda explained what happened yesterday in the arena. She didn’t know what caused Wolf to act the way he did, but she could guess. In Matilda’s mind, Anna had Mandy brutally beaten, but hopefully the woman was alive.

Regardless of the root cause, the fact was that Wolf beat up two dozen students and professors, torturing five of them in front of a crowd.

When Matilda came to the part with the spear she started stuttering, and her face turned crimson.

“He hurt them real bad with a spear.” She finally said, unable to utter the words needed to describe what truly happened.

“After that the Headmaster’s secretary appeared and stopped Wolf from killing them. Lord Alexandria promoted Wolf to the Seventh Order on the spot, before escorting him to the Headmaster’s office for a conversation.” Matilda wrapped up the report.

Listening to Matilda’s narrative, Anna went into a daze.

The events Matilda just described sounded too fantastical. She and Matilda knew Wolf’s strength. They saw him kill monsters and bandits with inhuman proficiency, but Anna never would’ve dreamed he could beat up a band of Mages, an Eighth Order Mage included, without breaking a sweat.

“Papa even mentioned that Sir Duke will probably invite Wolf to join his faction. He praised me for forging a friendship with him.” Matilda added, but Anna hardly heard her. She was still stunned by this development.

Anna couldn’t believe what her best friend just told her. She wasn’t the only one. This story spread through the city like a wildfire, but the vast majority of people refused to believe it at first.

While Anna was stupefied, a hurried knock came from the door.

“Young Miss Annabelle! It’s Walter! Please open up, I have urgent news from the estate.” The Didot family’s majordomo spoke hurriedly, his voice laden with despair.

“What is it, Walter?” Anna asked as she let him in. The way the man spoke gave her a bad feeling.

As soon as he entered the room, the man went down to his knees, touching his forehead to the floor.

“Lord Baron wants you to go back home right now. Please, please, Young Miss, don't make things difficult for me. My family is still at the estate,” he begged from the bottom of his heart.

“No.” Anna refused flatly.

The last person Anna wanted to see right now was Edwin.

Walter broke down into tears and after listening to his sobbing pleads, Anna finally relented and agreed to follow him.

Anna and Walter left the room, leaving Matilda behind. The young Marchioness smiled bitterly, thinking about the unsightly scene. Anna had no choice but to follow, and yet she tormented the old servant just because her mood was foul.

***

A couple of hours later, Anna walked into her father’s tea parlor, back at the Didot estate.

Edwin sat in a comfortable armchair, his expression calm. Behind the armchair stood Margaret, she was far from calm. She fidgeted with her hands, close to breaking her fingers.

As soon as she saw Anna, her eyes widened, wordlessly asking what was going on.

“Ah, Bella dear, you’re finally home.” Edwin calmly put down the cup on the club table. “I believe you know why I summoned you?”

Hearing that calm voice filled with hidden threat, Anna wanted to shout, to scream, to fight back. But in the end, she nodded obediently. She feared Edwin the Hook.

Edwin also nodded.

“Your mother, however, is typically clueless,” he continued calmly. “Do you wish to tell her, or should I?”

Anna opened and closed her mouth, then dropped her head and stared at the carpet.

“Our dear daughter had your favorite uncle neutered,” Edwin explained, knowing Anna would remain silent.

“Uncle Brad?” Margaret asked dumbly.

Her maternal uncle doted on her ever since she was a baby. After the Didots died in a series of unresolved incidents, the Geezas shunned Margaret, save for her maternal uncle Brad.

And now, because of her daughter, the doting uncle Brad got hurt?

“Is… Is that true?” Margaret asked no one in particular as she laid her hands on the chair’s headrest.

“Margaret, calm down. He’s still alive. It’s just that he’s a eunuch for the time being,” Edwin continued as he slowly got up and patted his wife’s hand.

Margaret jerked her hand back from the gentle touch, acting as if an adder had bitten her.

“What happened?” Margaret tried to calm down while hiding her hands behind her back.

Unlike what Margaret feared, Edwin turned around, completely ignoring her questions and even her existence.

“Tell me, Annabelle, my dear daughter, did you and that fine young man of yours break up?” Edwin the Hook asked, facing Anna.

That calm look and that cold, piercing gaze made Anna shudder. Her father was more terrifying when he acted calm than when he was shouting. Especially in a situation like this.

“We… No. We had a fight,” Anna whispered, shaking her head in fear.

Edwin’s smile widened, and he nodded.

“Good. Fights are good. Young people are passionate, and they passionately resolve their little lover’s quarrels. You resolved it, right?” He maintained the warm smile, but his pupils narrowed as he uttered that last sentence.

“Father—” Anna started, but Edwin raised his hand and didn’t allow her to finish what she had to say.

“If you haven't resolved your problems, tell me, what problems are you facing? Maybe Father can offer some helpful advice?” Edwin offered, that warm smile never leaving his face.

Anna, however, felt as if she fell into an icy lake. Her skin crawled as she realized her father already knew everything long before she got those envelopes. And now, with things blowing up as much as they did, this turned into a scandal of the decade.

“He visits brothels…” Anna squeezed through her teeth.

Her voice no longer oozed with fear and despair, and Edwin even caught a defiant note, but he allowed it. Crushing rising defiance in children is a father’s duty. As long as you viewed your children as pawns, that is.

“Haha, how lively.” The crimelord laughed sincerely. “There, there, my little Bella. It is perfectly understandable for such a fine young man to visit houses of pleasure. I advised you on how to avoid this some time ago, but apparently you didn’t listen.”

All you have to do is spread your legs and nature will take its course. Those words echoed in Anna’s mind, causing her head to spin as something disgusting tried to rise from the pit of her stomach.

Edwin didn’t seem to notice his daughter’s discomfort. He maintained a genuine, pleasant smile as he continued speaking.

“I understand you don’t approve of my humble wisdom. Now you have to face the consequences, but it doesn’t matter. If you’re really worried about what your man is doing, maybe you should offer to accompany him to his favorite establishments. Who knows, you might learn something, or get some ideas—”

“Edwin! What about her noble dignity?” Margaret screamed in indignation.

*Pa!*

Edwin pivoted around, slapping Margaret with all his might. The poor woman crumpled down on the floor immediately, shielding her head with her arms in an eerily well-practiced manner.

“You stupid two-copper whore! You wouldn’t recognize noble dignity if it dick-slapped your face,” he roared furiously, raising his voice for the first time today. “Who cares about her dignity? Who cares about your dignity?”

“Mother,” Anna shouted, and in response Edwin brutally kicked Margaret in the stomach.

“Look what you made me do,” he shouted, immediately making Anna freeze and shut up.

“Now, about following him to bordellos—” Edwin began, but rage once again erupted from the depths of Anna’s soul.

“You want me to follow him around into whorehouses?” Anna finally snapped and started screaming. “And what about his mistress? Am I supposed to hold a candle for them and take notes?”

Anna didn’t know what, but she expected something, but Edwin had no reaction. In fact, he smiled and nodded after a couple of moments of silence.

“That doesn’t sound like a bad idea and you seem to be heading in the right direction. However father believes that there is something more immediate and meaningful you can do, which is… To spread your gods damned legs!” Edwin roared before smashing his foot into Margaret’s solar plexus.

Anna moved to help her, but Edwin was faster and had more combat experience than his young daughter. He grabbed Margaret by the neck and squeezed.

“If you take one more step, I swear I’ll break her neck,” he said with terrifying calmness as Margaret made pathetic choking sounds while turning purple.

Anna stopped, helplessly watching Margaret weakly claw at the hand holding her in a vise-like grip. Both women cried, but they were powerless to do anything.

“If you don’t want him going around, dicking other women, then you fuck him until he can’t do it,” Edwin continued his lesson flatly, completely ignoring the two women’s misery. “It’s not hard. You just have to spread your gods damned legs!”

The next moment he took a deep breath and calmed down, while also easing the grip on Margaret’s neck, letting her skin recover some semblance of normal color from the unnatural purple shade.

“You think it’s a humiliation?” he asked. “You stupid little bitch. Mage Academy’s Headmaster invited him for a private conversation. My sources say the Duke plans to send his people to invite him to the palace today. He’s not even fifteen years old, and he’s already an Eighth Order Mage,” Edwin shouted, his eyes finally shining with madness and obsession.

“Do you even know what that means, you retarded little bitch? If the man wants to fuck you, you spread your fucking legs. If he goes around fucking other women, you tell him ‘Well fucked honey’! Do you understand my words?” Edwin had completely snapped, but after breathing in and out thrice he calmed down.

Meanwhile, Anna fell down to her knees. While Margaret could only powerlessly stare at the horror before her, her daughter was falling apart.

What did I do to deserve this nightmare? Which god did I offend? Margaret thought, but couldn’t come up with an answer.

“Don’t go around making enemies for the family,” Edwin said calmly, while shaking Margaret in his hand. “Do you want to ruin my life’s effort and your little brother’s future? Did you know that when Wolf challenged those retards he said that he was going to crush their houses as well? Just that random statement is now influencing the political current of this duchy. I know you’re a woman, and I know women don’t have the brains for politics. So, father will put this in simple terms. Spread them.”

He said the final two words slowly, as if speaking to a mentally disabled person. Anna’s chest tightened and her sobs grew louder, but Edwin paid her no mind.

“He is a rising star of the duchy and he can have anything he wants, yet he chose you. And you, what do you count for my dear daughter? Your potential as a Mage is capped at Sixth Order. If I hadn’t drowned you in elixirs to make sure you can stay in class with that kid, you would’ve still been a Third Order Mage. But even with all the resources in the world invested in you, you might, just barely, crawl your way up to the Seventh Order in fifty or sixty years. While I do agree that this would make you somewhat influential in our County, it’s nowhere as near as what you get for being that man’s woman,” Edwin continued explaining slowly, mercilessly crushing Anna’s dreams and spirit.

“So, in conclusion, you will do whatever he asks of you. If he goes out to have fun and invites you to join, you will join him. If he tells you to fuck a whore with him, or alone, you do it. If he asks you to spread your legs, then you will spread them. Even if he asks you to fuck his horse, you will do it with a smile. It would be for the best if you can get yourself pregnant at least once, but it’s unlikely at this point. Maybe once he becomes a True-Namer… Yes, give it your best effort then.” Edwin wrapped up calmly with a genuinely friendly smile as he dropped Margaret on the floor and sat down.

He took a sip of his tea, then shifted his gaze to Anna, who was falling apart on the floor.

“Get officially engaged by the end of the week,” he said flatly. “I don’t care how you do it. If you can't, I'll make it so that what you did to that little bimbo is heaven compared with what will happen with this bitch.”

He stomped on Margaret to make his point, then took another sip of his tea.

“Why aren’t you two scramming?” he asked flatly, and the beat-up Margaret hurriedly got up to help Anna out of the room.

Once alone, Edwin smiled slightly, then sighed.

Violence, money, family, they are all just tools to climb to a position of authority. I work so hard, but that little brat is completely useless. He’ll squander everything as soon as I croak. Should I leave the house to Bella? She’s more competent…

***

This was the first time Anna witnessed this side of her father. Before, she knew about the abuse from the way Margaret looked at Edwin, from the bruises, and from her mother’s limp walk from time to time.

But seeing her father act so savagely, hearing him say such vile things straight to her face, it broke something inside of Anna.

When she needed love, support and council she was brutally betrayed and humiliated by her father. He was willing to sell her off, and even pimp her for what? For a bit of power and influence he may or may not squeeze out of her relationship with Wolf?

For the good of the family? Did their family even exist, wasn't it an illusion? And even if it existed, could it be that all of her worth as a human being and a daughter could be summed up as a gift and fuck-toy for a sufficiently influential man?

Anna refused to believe this. She was a flesh and blood manling. She had her own mind. She had her own emotions. Suddenly, she recalled how she ran away from home years ago. Back then, she and Edwin had a conversation that was in certain aspects similar to this one, but considerably less vulgar and violent.

Her father told her that her talent was mediocre, and that she would be sent to Mage Academy to find a good husband and make important friends. Ever since she was a child, her fate was to be married off for the greater glory of the family. Ironically, it was that very conversation which led Anna to her eventual meeting with Wolf. And now that sweet boy grew into the root cause of Anna’s humiliation and the terrible scene her father put her through.

Anna looked at the tacky mansion, which screamed ‘I have money’. She looked at her despairing mother, who hobbled next to her. Finally, she took a look inside herself. She was a flesh and blood being. She had her own mind. She had her own emotions. The dominant emotion right now was no longer anger, but hatred.

Anna hated her father. She hated the house Didot. She made up her mind. She’d do everything she could to bring the house Didot to ruin, and end this vile bloodline which filled her with disgust and despair.