Depraved Noble: Forced To Live The Debaucherous Life Of An Evil Noble!

Chapter 830: Indirect Fratricide

Darius looked from the dagger to the jar to his brother’s terrified face. He hesitated.

The very thought made his stomach clench, his testicles crawl up into his body.

"But...But I...I..I...But—"

Cassius’s smile vanished. He frowned, looking genuinely hurt.

"But what, Darius? But what? You should be dead right now alongside your brother. I’m being merciful. I’m giving you a chance."

Lucius nodded emphatically.

"And yet here you are, hesitating." Cassius’s frown deepened "Don’t you want to save your brother? Don’t you love him?"

He turned to Timothy. "Look, Timothy. Your brother doesn’t love you. He never did. He won’t lift a finger to save you."

He looked back at Darrius and sighed dramatically.

"Well, if you won’t do it, I’ll just hang him right now. No more games. No more chances."

Lucius brought out a noose, its hemp fibers glistening with what looked like dried blood.

"NO! I’LL DO IT!"

Darius screamed, the words tearing his throat.

"I’LL PULL THEM OUT! I’LL DO IT TO SAVE MY BROTHER!"

Cassius clapped his hands together, the sound sharp in the quiet.

"Bravo, Darius! Bravo! Truly, some brotherly love! You see, Timothy?"

He said cheerfully to the boy. "You’re lucky. Even after all you’ve done, you might survive because of your brother’s love."

Timothy’s eyes filled with a desperate, pleading adoration.

’Do it. Do it quickly! Save me!’

Darius looked at his brother, trying to project reassurance.

He was the older brother. The protector. He could do this.

Slowly, trembling so violently he could barely control his movements, he picked up the dagger.

The hilt felt foreign, heavy. He turned it brought the point toward his right eye.

The tip hovered a millimeter from his pupil. He could see his own reflection in the steel—wide, terrified purple eyes.

One push. That’s all it would take.

So, he pushed.

Schlurk...

But the moment the cold metal touched the sensitive surface of his eye, a bolt of pain shot through his entire nervous system.

"AAAAAAAAAGH—! IT HURTS—! IT HURTS—! IT HURTS SO MUCH—!"

He recoiled as if struck by lightning, hurling the dagger away. It clattered across the stone path.

Lucius let out an indignant cry—"MY DAGGER!"—and scurried after it like a offended cat, picking it up and polishing it meticulously before shooting Darius a look of pure disdain.

Darius was on the ground, rolling, clutching his face, screaming like a branded animal.

"IT HURTS! OH GOD, IT HURTS! WHY DOES IT HURT SO MUCH?"

It made a pathetic kind of sense.

Darius Valheim had never known physical pain.

Fevers were treated by teams of healers in silk-draped rooms.

A sprained ankle from horseback riding resulted in the execution of the riding master.

A paper cut would have caused a national incident.

This was a trauma beyond his comprehension.

Cassius watched, his expression shifting from anticipation to profound boredom.

"What is this, Darius?" He asked, his voice dripping with disappointment.

"With all that bravado, I thought we were about to witness something glorious. A man sacrificing his sight for love. I was prepared to be moved."

"But this?" He gestured at the sobbing, writhing form on the ground. "This is pathetic."

He nudged Timothy with his foot.

"Look at him, Timothy. Your brave older brother. Moaning over a scratch."

Then he looked back at Darius, his expression turning cold.

"You know, the race of one of my loved ones have suffered far worse at Valheim hands."

"Your family hunted vampires, didn’t they? Pulled out their eyes while they were still alive? Recorded their screams for entertainment?"

"This is what you did to them. Now you can’t even do it to yourself?"

Darius continued to sob.

"I-I can’t! I can’t! It hurts too much!" He crawled toward Cassius on his knees. "Please, let him go! I beg you! I’ll give you anything else!"

"Money! Lands! Just not my eyes!"

Cassius placed his foot on Darius’s head, pushing his face into the dirt as he encouraged him.

"You can do it, Darius. I believe in you. I believe in the love you have for your brother."

He nodded to Lucius, who stepped forward and ripped the gag from Timothy’s mouth.

The boy sucked in a huge, ragged breath, then immediately began to scream.

"YOU CAN DO IT, BROTHER! YOU CAN! YOU’RE THE BRAVEST MAN I KNOW!"

"PLEASE! PLEASE HELP ME! I DON’T WANT TO DIE! I DON’T WANT TO DIE LIKE THE OTHERS!"

His voice was high, shrill, filled with the pure, unadulterated terror of a child facing annihilation.

"YOU’RE THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN HELP ME! I BEG YOU!"

Darius slowly lifted his head from under Cassius’s boot. His right eye was red, weeping, but intact.

He looked at his brother, at the desperate, begging face, and something in him broke.

Not with resolve, but with surrender.

"I’m sorry, Timothy." He whispered, his voice raw. "I’m so sorry. I can’t. It just hurts too much."

"Please...forgive me."

In that moment, Timothy’s face changed. The hope, the desperate belief, drained away, replaced by a cold, utter understanding.

His brother, the idol, the protector, was a fraud.

A weak, spoiled coward who was nothing without the family name.

Timothy’s tears stopped. He just stared, hollow.

Cassius sighed, a sound of finality. "Well then. If you’re not going to uphold your end, there’s no need to keep Timothy alive, is there?"

Before Darius could process the words, Cassius had the noose around Timothy’s neck and hoisted him in the air.

"KWEHK—! HEEEK ARGHH—!"

Timothy began to choke, his small hands clawing at the rope, his feet kicking uselessly.

"TIMOTHY, NOOOO!"

Darrius lunged, not at Cassius, but at his brother, grabbing his legs, trying to pull him down, to take the weight off his neck.

But Cassius was already pulling the rope on the other side, hoisting the boy into the air.

All he could do was grab onto his brother’s leg and pull as hard as he could.

"Stop it! Stop it! I beg you! Leave him alone! He’s just a child! HE’S JUST A CHILD!"

Darius’s voice was a broken, pleading wail.

He had heard this tone before—from fathers begging for their daughters’ lives, from husbands pleading for their wives.

He had always found it disgusting, a sign of weakness. Now it was his voice. His desperation.

But Cassius didn’t stop. He pulled harder.

Timothy’s choking sounds grew wet, desperate. His face was almost black.

Seeing this, Darius pulled with all his strength, throwing his entire weight downward.

"TIMOTHY!" He screamed, a final, primal effort.

Cassius, watching with an insidious glint in his eyes, gave one final, powerful tug on the rope.

SHRRRIIICK!

The sound was wet, fibrous, a horrible tearing and snapping.

Darius, still pulling down with all his might, stumbled backward as the weight disappeared.

For one glorious, delusional second, he thought he’d done it. He’d saved him! The rope had snapped! He’d been strong enough!

He was crying with relief, turning, opening his mouth to call his brother’s name.

THUMP!

Something heavy landed behind him. Not the thud of a body. Something denser. Smaller.

Darius froze. Slowly, mechanically, he turned his head.

There, on the stone path lay Timothy’s head.

The noose was still tight around the neck stump.

The eyes were open, the purple irises staring blankly at the sky.

The rope hadn’t snapped. The force—Cassius pulling up, Darius pulling down—had been too much.

It had sliced clean through Timothy’s neck, severing head from body.

A few feet away, his body twitched, the legs still moving as if trying to run. Blood pumped from the severed neck in diminishing spurts.

"...Timothy?"

Seeing this horrific sight, Darius’s soul left him.

Every last spark of vitality, every shred of will to live, drained away. His face went ashen.

Tears flowed, but they were automatic, like rain from an empty sky.

Cassius walked over, looking down at the scene with what might have been pity.

"What a shame." He murmured. "I gave you a chance. You didn’t take it. Look what it led to."

Darius didn’t respond. There was nothing left to say

Cassius seemed to realize the game was over. The fun had drained away, leaving only the grim reality of what they had done.

"Let’s finish this." He said, his voice losing its playful edge. "I’m tired of looking at this pathetic sight."

He held out his hand to Lucius, who placed the dagger in it without a word.

Cassius crouched beside Timothy’s body.

Without ceremony, he plunged the dagger into the boy’s abdomen and pulled.

Pachuk!

The blade sliced through flesh and muscle, opening the cavity. He reached in, his hand disappearing up to the wrist, and pulled out the intestines.

Slorgh!

They came in a glistening, pink-gray coil, steaming slightly in the cool morning air.

Darius watched, numb. He didn’t react. He was beyond reaction.

Cassius worked methodically, untangling the intestines, pulling them out to their full length.

Then he took a small vial from his spatial ring, a strengthening potion, the kind used to reinforce cloth or leather.

He poured it over the length of the intestines, rubbing it in with his hands. The fragile tissue grew tougher, more pliable, like rope.

When he was satisfied, he carried the end of the intestinal rope to Darius. Darius didn’t move as Cassius wrapped it around his neck, the wet, warm flesh sliding against his skin.

Cassius made a noose, the knot tight and professional.

Then he threw the other end over the same branch Timothy had almost been hung from—and pulled.

"Arghhhh—!"

Darius was hoisted into the air. First his heels left the ground, then his toes.

He rose inch by inch, the intestinal noose tightening around his neck.

He didn’t struggle. He didn’t scream. His body made gagging sounds automatically, but his mind was elsewhere.

Lucius watched, then frowned. "Young master, you forgot his eye."

Cassius, still pulling, shook his head. "No, Lucius. I want him to see. In his last moments, I want him to see what he caused. I want him to look at his family until the darkness takes him."

Lucius smiled, a genuine, admiring smile. "How poetic."

Darius rose higher, until he was level with his family.

His mother’s empty sockets seemed to stare at him. His father’s bloated face. His grandmother’s withered body.

All around him, the Valheims hung in silent judgment.

And they spoke to him, not with voices, but with memory:

’It’s all your fault. It’s all your fault. It’s all your fault!

His vision began to darken at the edges. The world narrowed to a tunnel, at the end of which was his family’s accusing gazes.

He choked. His body twitched. His legs kicked once, twice.

Then—stillness.

The last Valheim hung among his kin, strangled by his brother’s own guts.