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━━━ ⋅•⋅⊰∙∘☽༓☾∘∙⊱⋅•⋅ ━━━
A cool light filled the familiar hallway—a light that immediately let me know where I now was.
My home.
Laughing filled the sunlit room I made my way towards—the sound loving and echoing around me.
My heart blossomed at the sound; knowing who it came from. I wanted to run, to join my sister in her bedroom at our estate. To talk and laugh and comfort her.
But my walking was so slow—so achingly slow as the sound of laughter became quieter and quieter with each step I took towards Kumiko's joyful voice.
It was like moving through mud—my feet dragging millions of pounds behind me in attempt to make it to my sister. To bask in her happiness.
The edges around me darkened. The sound that had been vibrating around me grew so quiet that it began to be replaced by a wicked sort of ringing. A screeching noise that covered up the sound, configuring into a violent, blood curdling scream.
I tried to run, to demand my legs to move. But the sloth-like movements only increased, the hallway darkening before I could even get close to my sisters room.
The scenery changed then—the scream of my sister warping into another sound. My own scream.
The dark void lessened, as if my eyes were adjusting to the new scenery.
Without a second blink, I knew where I was.
Especially as the pain shot through my back, the arch my body was forced into at the hit of the cane against my bare skin. It took half a second for me to recognize the space—the emotions of fear and pain and determination coursing through me.
My old training room.
My flesh was struck again. Whipped.
And there—at the head of the room where she had always sat whilst I had been training—sat my mother. Queen of the Underworld.
And I was chained, kneeled before her as my brother slammed into my scarred flesh. Over and over again.
I tried not to scream. To have the dignity to reel in the pain that shot through me with every strike.
