The Straea Clan.
Not much was known about it to the outside world.
It had been mentioned before, but despite the grandiosity of their existence, the Straea Clan somehow managed to keep their internal structure hidden from the masses.
They weren't exclusive in this.
Void Palace was also quite mysterious to others. Their disjointed dimensional monstrosity of a palace made it difficult for anyone to get anywhere they weren't supposed to be.
On top of that, with how close-knit the people of the palace were, it was difficult to gain information from within.
However, since the palace was active in the world and openly showed its strength here and there, people were somewhat aware of its structure.
For instance, the 12 Swords were known in both name and appearance.
The Straea Clan also had their equivalent of the 12 Swords, but nobody knew who they were.
They were headed by Malefice Straea and served Malevalon directly. They'd never appeared in the outside world before, at least, not in ways that other people could see them. But that didn't mean they'd never appeared at all.
The Straea Clan was actually quite simple.
It was an authoritarian clan even internally. Malevalon held all the power, so there was really no need for a complicated structure.
But that didn't mean there was none. After all, Malevalon himself wasn't going to do all the work necessary to run a clan.
Malefice was in charge of these types of matters, and the ones who worked under him were the closest thing Straea had to leaders outside Malevalon.
Other than them, everyone was equal.
The geniuses were lauded as all geniuses were, but even they didn't have much status.
It was confusing.
Why would a genius bother to stay in the Straea Clan with the kind of treatment they received?
They were used and abused. They were treated like trash, demeaned and taught to become dogs rather than individuals.
This treatment started from childhood.
Because, again, the Straea Clan didn't need young geniuses.
It needed pawns who could carry out orders.
Geniuses would be systematically groomed so they would be mindless in all matters that didn't relate to the clan.
This education had never failed. There had never been a case of internal rebellion even once in the clan's history.
There had never been a case of a young genius obtaining their own free will.
There had never been such a case…until now.
Somewhere in the Straea Clan's hidden manor, the place where young talents were groomed, a boy was thrown against a wall.
Thud!
His body slid down and fell to the ground. His legs were too weak to bring him back to his feet, and his body was covered in gashes and bruises from the beating he'd taken.
However, the look in his eyes never changed.
Ptui!
He spit on the floor next to him, glaring at his attackers.
"Is that all?"
The group of three boys didn't respond. After staring at him indifferently, the one at their head clicked his tongue.
"Tch. Let's go. We can break him tomorrow."
The boys left without much of a fuss.
After all, they weren't actually bullying the boy or anything like that.
It was just the task they were given by the instructor.
In fact, the boy who was getting beat had the same task, just for another person who wasn't currently present.
The talents of the hidden manor were frequently turned against each other like this. They were made to find ways to destroy their fellows, whether mentally or physically.
To do so physically was easy. Everyone in the hidden manor was more than capable of that.
But the mental aspect…
Well, with the type of training they'd been through, no amount of physical torture could make their minds break.
The three boys who attacked had tried just for the sake of trying, to see if that assumption was true.
Since the boy had been beaten within an inch of his life and still kept his spirit, he obviously wouldn't break if they did more, so it was pointless to keep trying.
It was normal. To be beaten, to be betrayed, to be killed. Here, any of these things were just daily occurrences.
Food was scarce. To gain enough sustenance to fully maintain one's physical condition, one had to make an unspeakable number of accomplishments.
The talents were were forced to do anything they could to survive.
And at the same time, they were forced to kill themselves so they could survive.
After all, if the instructors realized that they were having unique thoughts…
…their fates didn't need to be described, did it?
That was a problem for this boy.
The boy who unfortunately donned the name of Straea.
'Fuck.'
He couldn't say anything out loud.
He stood up, brushed himself off, and ripped off the clothes on his back to bandage his wounds.
By the time he was done, he wasn't wearing anything more than a rag. He walked through the halls in that state, but nobody looked at him strangely.
'It's normal, after all.'
There was no medical center here. If one succumbed to one's injuries, it was nobody else's fault.
'I hate this fucking place.'
It was quite strange, wasn't it?
Somehow, he'd managed to maintain a sense of free will despite being raised in a place like this.
He'd never seen the outside world before. He had no idea what society looked like.
Still, he managed to form the mind of someone who'd been living independently in the world for their entire life.
Nobody knew that he'd done so.
He was smart enough to hide it. If there was one thing that he'd gained here, it was survival instinct.
'I have to find a way out.'
It was the same thought he'd been entertaining since he was 6 years old.
Escape.
Now, he was closing in on eighteen. His strength had been raised to an unreasonable degree by the hellish training he'd undergone, but it wasn't nearly enough for him to get out of this place.
'But I'll do it one day.'
He'd been plotting for twelve years.
On how he'd escape, and what he'd do when he escaped.
And at the top of that list…
'I'm going to destroy this bullshit ass clan.'
Since birth, he'd been told about the greatness of the Straea Clan.
Since birth, they'd been trying to indoctrinate him.
But all that did was breed his hatred.
The Straea Clan's methods were good. Disregarding the morality of it all, they did indeed succeed in producing the mindless soldiers they wanted.
However, in this sole case where the method was flawed, the method itself created a monster that only wished for the Straea Clan's demise.
His name was Ezekiel Straea.
And while he seemed like an insignificant character that wouldn't have any say in the matters of the outside world…
He'd soon find that his fate was connected to forces far beyond his control.
Forces that would help him attain the goal that seemed impossible to him.
Forces that would show him what it meant to truly be a monster.
But that was a story for another time.
For now, Ezekiel was no more than an ant, trapped in a cage that he could never escape.
