Asmodeus System: Stealing My Bully's Mother

The black rented carriage gradually slowed to a halt. Its wooden wheels groaned against the frozen mud, shattering the suffocating silence that cloaked Valen Village under a bleak, gray sky.

The old driver let out a long sigh, exhaled a plume of white steam, and tapped twice on the cabin wall.

The road ahead was completely ruined by muddy potholes. Forcing the carriage through was practically asking for a broken axle, and the sacred boundary of his contract ended right here.

The cabin door was pushed open.

A gust of wind surged inside, completely sweeping away the remaining warmth. The air no longer carried the sharp scent of pine or the metallic stench of border monster blood. It smelled of cracked earth, rotting wood, and the pitiful plumes of kitchen smoke.

The stench of poverty. The scent of a place abandoned by time.

The old coachman accepted his remaining payment and immediately turned his horses around. No farewells. No pleasantries. Within minutes, the black carriage was swallowed by the mist, leaving three figures standing on the edge of the deserted, stony road.

Ethan’s boots stepped into the frozen mud.

The young man stood tall and unyielding. The wind whipped violently at his long-sleeved black shirt and tousled his dark brown hair. His brown eyes swept over the village without a single flicker of emotion, like a king gazing indifferently upon the ruins of his fallen empire.

Miya stepped down right behind him.

The Elven girl pulled her cloak tighter, clutching her medical bag to her chest like a shield. Her pointed ears twitched nervously as she registered the suffocating stillness hanging over the air. Her pale skin turned a shade lighter.

Ethan turned back, carefully lifting a fragile figure from inside the cabin.

Elara was now resting comfortably against her brother’s chest, bundled tightly in heavy woolen blankets. The blind girl was half-conscious, her white-filmed eyelids fluttering softly.

Miya quickly adjusted the edge of Elara’s blanket to keep it from touching the dirty snow, then stepped into position a pace behind Ethan—ready to follow the shadow.

They began to walk.

The village gate ahead was nothing more than two tilted posts encrusted with frozen moss. The nameplate was barely legible, decayed by the elements.

Ethan paused briefly before it.

His eyes stared blankly at the sign. Once, beneath this exact gate, his father had stood to welcome the spring traders. Now, even the wood itself was on the verge of collapsing.

Miya stopped alongside him, waiting in respectful silence without asking questions.

The wind howled. Ethan stepped forward once more.

The view beyond the gate was equally pathetic. Tilted wooden houses leaned against one another just to stay upright. Thatch roofs were full of holes, and stone fences lay in ruins. The fields stretching behind them cracked like dead skin under the torment of winter.

Silence reigned. There was no bustling market square, nor the laughter of children.

Yet, the village was far from empty.

From behind smudged windowpanes and doors cracked open by a hairsbreadth, dozens of eyes peered out. Those hidden glances cast an atmosphere far colder than any blizzard.

Whispers crept like snakes through dry grass, and Miya’s sensitive ears caught every single one. Shock at Lord Valen’s return. Doubt that he was even still alive. And, of course, massive curiosity regarding the bundled blanket held closely in his arms.

On a rickety porch, an old man wearing a faded hat took a single step forward. His lips trembled, preparing a greeting.

However, his courage instantly withered. Ethan merely shot him a split-second glance—a vacant, piercing look so cold that it forced the old man back into the shadows.

In another corner, a middle-aged man halted the swing of his axe.

He stared at Ethan, wanting to ask, to demand, to scream. But what was the point? This Young Master had also left without giving any answers years ago.

He forcibly swallowed his grievances, slammed his axe down into the wooden log, and turned his back on the road.

Even innocence was not spared from the underlying terror.

From behind a broken fence, a child clad in filthy clothes pointed toward Elara. But before a sound could slip from his mouth, his mother yanked his arm roughly. SLAM! The door was shut tight.

This alienation cut sharper than a dagger. Yet, not a single muscle twitched on Ethan’s face. His gait remained steady, his eyes looking straight ahead, utterly refusing to give the people of his past an emotional stage.

Along the roadside, two middle-aged women carrying laundry baskets stepped aside. One of them nearly dropped her load, but quickly bowed her head. They didn’t dare look up for more than a fraction of a second.

Ethan walked right past them.

As they penetrated deeper, the villagers’ gazes shifted.

The presence of a pure Elf was a total anomaly in this forsaken land. Pointed ears, golden hair, a pristine cloak—Miya instantly became a magnet for judgment. Whispers mutated into unfounded theories and conservative fear.

A chill ran down Miya’s spine. Betting her life on a battlefield felt vastly better than being stripped bare by the prejudice of terrified townsfolk.

The petite girl ducked her head, pressing herself as close as possible behind Ethan’s broad back, hiding her pointed ears.

Without needing to look back, Ethan allowed his towering frame to serve as a fortress, absorbing and deflecting every invisible terror directed at his healer.

Near a collapsed stone fence, two young children peeked out from behind a stack of firewood. One of them almost giggled, but his companion quickly slapped a hand over his mouth.

Miya caught the motion. This village was too terrified for even its children to laugh.

Across the cracked, barren fields, Miya’s eyes briefly wandered. Fractured earth, filthy snow, and complete absence of crops.

"This place... it’s like it lost its life," Miya whispered, barely audible.

Ethan offered no response.

Then, they passed an old house leaning precariously by the roadside.

Deeply etched into its rotting wooden wall were three jagged claw marks. The gashes were dry and blackened, tearing through the timber as if the wall were nothing more than paper. The snow couldn’t mask their violence.

Ethan’s stride slowed by a single breath.

Miya paused as well, staring at the claw marks as her heart sank. She knew a mark like that didn’t come from an ordinary wild beast. This was the work of an experienced predator.

"Master Ethan... this is..." she whispered.

Ethan only gave it a brief glance before resuming his pace.

"Monsters," he answered curtly, his voice barely a murmur.

A few villagers noticed them eyeing the gashes. Some hurriedly lowered their heads, while others stared at Ethan with a flash of bitterness—as if silently saying: You’re only noticing it now?

They continued forward.

Two houses down, a middle-aged man was nailing a wooden plank across his own front door.

Sweat dripped down his face despite the freezing temperature. His ears were alert, his eyes darting wildly. Every rustle of the wind sent a wave of tension through his shoulders.

The moment Ethan walked past, the man paused. He turned and stared at Ethan for a brief second. No respect, no disdain.

He simply shook his head faintly, then returned to hammering the plank. Silently assigning blame without needing to utter a single word.

Miya watched the man’s back. "The villagers... are fortifying their own homes?"

As they neared the edge of the village, a strange stench began to sting the air.

It was subtle at first, but rapidly grew dense. Miya held her breath for a moment, her nose picking up the scent of carrion wafting from the direction of the forest.

It wasn’t a normal stench of decay. It was the smell of flesh that had died in the freezing cold, mixed with swamp moss and damp earth.

The girl clutched her stomach. "This... is the smell of a carcass, right?"

Ethan turned his head slightly. "From the forest."

A faint smile appeared on Elara’s lips from beneath the blanket instead. "It smells cold..."

Miya offered a bitter smile. The child didn’t even realize what scent she had just caught.

A hunchbacked old woman sat before her front door. As Ethan passed, she stared at him for a long time—as if verifying that the figure standing before her wasn’t a ghost.

Ethan shot her a brief, hollow look before passing by.

The old woman finally bowed her head, her lips murmuring something that was lost to the wind.

The sloping road guided them to the edge of the settlement. The Valen Family Residence.

The structure was larger and more solid, yet its grandeur had long since perished. Cracking stone walls were tangled in black moss. Its expansive roof was buried beneath heavy snow. The small iron gate out front was practically sunken into mounds of frozen dirt, and the yard was overgrown with wild weeds protruding like iron nails.

In Ethan’s arms, Elara stirred softly.

"Hmm..." Elara murmured weakly. She inhaled deeply, her nose catching the scent of drier air that felt... strangely peaceful, driving away the lingering smell of medicine from her memory.

Ethan didn’t answer. His jaw merely clenched tight, holding back the emotional weight threatening to explode in his chest.

His boots finally came to a complete halt right before the rusted gate.

At that exact second, a silhouette emerged from the side yard.

A young girl, no older than eighteen. Her dark brown hair was tied in a simple ponytail. She wore a faded apron with her sleeves rolled up to her elbows, carrying a wooden basket filled with wet rags.

The girl had her head down, preparing to hang the laundry. But the sound of crunching footsteps forced her to look up.

Time on that snow-covered yard instantly froze.

The girl’s eyes locked onto the tall figure clad in black, then shifted to the tiny girl held tightly in his arms, and finally to the Elf standing by his side.

Her grip weakened. CRASH.

The wooden basket slammed onto the ground. The wet rags spilled, dirtying the pristine snow, but she didn’t care in the slightest.

Her light brown eyes widened in shock. Her lips trembled violently as she gasped for air. Her frozen fingers now tightly pinched the hem of her apron. She took one trembling step forward before her feet rooted themselves into the earth.

A single tear finally broke free, tracing down her frost-flushed cheek.

"Y-Young Master..." the girl’s voice cracked, hoarse from bottled-up yearning and overwhelming emotion. "...you’re finally home."

The fragile sob of the servant, the absolute silence of the Young Master, and the howling northern wind stood as the quiet witnesses to the ruler’s return to his ruined throne.

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