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  Grandpa Zeno cast a brief, impassive glance at Irumi before silently picking up his chopsticks and taking the first bite of meat. Following the patriarch's silent cue, the rest of the family commenced their meal. Irumi transferred a piece of chicken to his plate, eating with mechanical efficiency.

  Unbeknownst to the rest of the table, Irumi was currently immersed in a hyper-perceptive state. He raised his eyes slightly, focusing on his mother, Kikyo, seated directly across from him. Thick, violet smoke continuously billowed from her silhouette. The vapor moved with an eerie sentience, coiling and writhing around her form.

  Jealousy. Irumi diagnosed the emotion hidden within the purple haze.

  Recently, he had begun visualizing these colored auras leaking from the people around him. It allowed him to map their psychological shifts and meticulously deduce their inner thoughts. This sensory anomaly seemed innate, a latent trait present since birth. As he grew, it had evolved from a vague empathic sensitivity into a tangible, visual spectrum of human emotion.

  He used to call it Emotion Perception. Now, he had a more accurate designation for the phenomena: The Seven Deadly Sins.

  Is she envious that my bond with Grandpa Zeno is stronger than my connection to her? Irumi observed Kikyo in silence. At twenty years old, she still retained the refined, subdued elegance of a traditional aristocrat, a stark contrast to the screeching, hyper-neurotic matriarch she was destined to become. Yet, watching the violet malice fester around her, Irumi perfectly understood the psychological rot that would eventually drive her to madness.

  "Irumi. Illumi."

  Silva's deep, resonant voice cut through the quiet. He looked at his two sons, his expression stony. "Your training officially begins in three days. Are you prepared?"

  At twenty-four, Father had only recently inherited the mantle of Family Head, but his authority was already absolute.

  "Yes," Illumi murmured, giving a hollow, mechanical nod.

  Irumi offered a single, curt nod in silent affirmation.

  "Understood. Tsubone will oversee your conditioning," Silva concluded.

  Among a family of five, that brief exchange constituted the entirety of their dinner conversation. The rest of the meal was consumed in suffocating silence. Grandpa Zeno remained entirely mute. At forty-five, the former patriarch was still in his absolute physical prime. Unlike the deceptively withered old man he would later become, this era's Zeno matched Silva in height, his frame packed with dense, terrifyingly honed muscle.

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  What a clinically sterile family, Irumi thought. As Silva, Zeno, and Kikyo wordlessly departed the dining hall, Irumi vaulted off his chair and navigated the labyrinthine corridors back to his quarters, Illumi trailing like a ghost behind him.

  Day Four. 7:00 AM.

  Following a rigidly portioned breakfast, Tsubone escorted the twins deep into the estate's grounds. The Zoldycks had carved a massive, 1,600-square-meter training facility directly into the dense forest, primarily used for breaking in new butler recruits. Naturally, once an assassin possessed sufficient combat prowess, they were expected to use the lethal, beast-infested primeval forests of Kukuroo Mountain as their true proving ground.

  "Master Irumi. Master Illumi," Tsubone greeted. She stood before them with a deceptively warm smile, while Gotoh flanked her, maintaining his rigid, emotionless posture. "Today, we will begin with fundamental physical conditioning and stamina building."

  She approached a nearby wooden table and retrieved two sets of tailored, black child-sized jackets and wristbands, holding them out to the twins. "Put these on."

  Heavy. The moment Irumi accepted the garment from Tsubone's hands, his arms violently jerked downward. The sheer, concentrated density of the weighted fabric pitched his small body forward, nearly dragging him face-first into the dirt.

  THUD.

  A heavy impact echoed beside him. Irumi snapped his head to the side. Illumi was planted face-down in the dirt, completely pinned by the weight of his own jacket. The toddler slowly turned his head, his hollow eyes blinking in mild, uncomprehending confusion.

  "Why... did I fall?" Illumi murmured from the dirt, his blank eyes blinking in mild confusion.

  "Ho ho ho..." Tsubone chuckled. She cast a brief, genuinely surprised glance at Irumi—who had managed to stay on his feet—before looking down at the prone toddler.

  "Master Illumi, these are specialized weighted garments designed to forge your physical strength and endurance," she explained, her tone pleasant but brokering no argument. "From this moment forward, you are forbidden from removing them under any circumstances, save for bathing and sleeping."

  Moving with agonizing slowness, Illumi pushed himself up. He managed to secure the heavy black jacket and strapped the dense bands around his ankles. He looked over at Irumi, who had already finished equipping his own set and was silently waiting for Tsubone's next command.

  "The jacket is precisely ten kilograms. Each ankle weight is two and a half kilograms," Tsubone stated, outlining the brutal math. Fifteen kilograms total—more than the body weight of a typical three-year-old. "Once your bodies acclimate to this baseline, the load will be incrementally increased."

  She gestured toward the active training grounds where the butler trainees were running drills. "Go join the recruits. We will move on to the next phase of your curriculum only when you can match their pace."

  Irumi surveyed the chaotic yard. Recruits were sprinting laps, firing live ammunition at targets, and drilling lethal close-quarters combat techniques. How tedious, he thought, his half-lidded eyes taking in the scene.

  He attempted to take a single step forward. The sensation was immediate and suffocating—it felt as though his shoes had been filled with lead and submerged in a thick swamp. Every single muscle fiber screamed under the sudden gravitational oppression.

  This weight is no joke. Gritting his teeth, Irumi forced his leg forward. Normal walking was nearly impossible, let alone keeping pace with adult trainees. His small foot hit the dirt, kicking up a tiny puff of dust. Side by side, the twins began their agonizing, snail-like march across the yard.

  Irumi glanced at his brother. Despite the crushing strain, Illumi's face remained a hollow mask, making it seem as though he were entirely unaffected. But a downward glance revealed the truth: Illumi's calves and thighs were violently trembling. He was already pushed to his absolute physical limit.

  It was, after all, only day one.

  By sunset, the session finally concluded. They hadn't run a single lap or thrown a single punch; they had spent the entire day merely trying to walk under the gravitational load. Yet, both boys were drenched in cold sweat, their lungs burning as they gasped for air.

  At dinner that evening, the sheer physical exhaustion triggered severe nausea. The mere smell of food made Irumi want to vomit, but logic dictated survival. He forced the nutrient-dense meal down his throat, suppressing his gag reflex with sheer willpower.

  This was just the baseline. The nightmare had barely begun.

  Two Years Later.

  Two silhouettes, one large and one small, blurred through the dense canopy of Kukuroo Mountain.

  Irumi's small, agile frame darted through the thick underbrush, moving with a predator's grace. High above him, Tsubone vaulted from branch to branch in relentless pursuit.

  Fwip!

  The sharp whistling of displaced air warned him a fraction of a second before impact. Irumi violently threw himself to the left. A thick, sharply pointed tree branch embedded itself deep into the earth exactly where his skull had been a moment prior, quivering from the sheer kinetic force.

  She's actually trying to kill me, Irumi thought grimly, eyeing the makeshift javelin buried in the dirt.

  "Master Irumi's reflexes are growing remarkably sharp," Tsubone noted. She dropped from the canopy, landing soundlessly three meters away. A deceptively warm smile stretched across her face as she watched the five-year-old scramble back to his feet.

  "However..."

  Before the syllable even left her lips, Tsubone vanished. She reappeared directly inside his guard, driving a devastating punch squarely into his midsection.

  "You are far too relaxed!" she barked.

  BAM! The sickening sound of knuckles meeting flesh echoed through the clearing. The raw, concussive force folded Irumi in half like a piece of paper, launching his small body backward through the air.