098 YES, BIG BROTHER
"Stop it! Don't hurt me! My big brother will stop you!" a boy's voice echoed from within the alley.
"Ethen, you have a big brother?" another voice mocked. "Even my weakest guy wouldn't want you as his brother! Hahaha!"
Several boys surrounded Ethen—bullies armed with baseball bats and makeshift weapons.
"Please… don't kill me," Ethen whimpered as the bats came down.
Suddenly, a violent gust tore through the alley. The bullies were hurled against the walls as if struck by an invisible freight train. Bones cracked, limbs twisted.
Ethen blinked through his tears.
Standing a few meters away was a tall boy—no more than a year or two older than him. With a single punch into the air, Damen Dark unleashed another kinetic vortex, rippling the air with raw destructive force.
"Damen… Big Brother is that really you?"
He walked toward Ethen and offered his hand.
"Do you need a big brother's help?"
Ethen hesitated, then nodded. "Yes." He took Damen's hand.
"Will you be my big brother?" he asked. Damen nodded in agreement, "Of course."
The bullies, now trembling on the ground, stared at him with terror in their eyes.
"Forgive us! Don't kill us!" they begged.
"Forgive you? Never!" Ethen shouted, anger breaking through his fear.
Damen understood. "That's the spirit."
He clenched his fist, and the air itself imploded. The shockwave crushed what remained of the bullies' battered bodies. If they survived, they would spend months in the hospital.
Then he turned back to Ethen.
"You were the one who unlocked the Aur Box for me?"
"Yes," Ethen said quietly. "That was me."
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[Five months ago]
It was Ethen Lace's first day at Melrose Middle School No. 9. He had been transferred from another school after a violent bullying incident—so bad that the police were involved.
Hoping for a new start, Ethen told himself that this time things would be different.
It was also the season of final exams for the seniors. The announcement board displayed the top scorer for the year: Damen Dark.
"Have you heard? Damen Dark is our school's top student!"
"Who would've guessed? He used to get beaten up almost every day."
"Yeah, I heard he's an orphan. His foster family makes him work in the mines after school."
Ethen overheard the gossip as he sat alone in the cafeteria. This Damen Dark sounded just like him—bullied, mistreated, yet somehow, he'd risen to the top.
The thought sparked something inside Ethen. "Maybe I can start over too. Maybe there's still hope."
But that fragile hope shattered when a shadow fell over his lunch tray.
A boy kicked the table, knocking his half-eaten meal to the ground.
"What are you doing?" Ethen asked, startled.
He recognized the boy immediately—it was Ray Gon, the cousin of the same bully who had tormented him in his old school.
"I know you," Ray sneered. "You're that crybaby who went on TV, accusing good people of bullying. You don't deserve to eat free food here."
He spat on Ethen's face. Laughter erupted around them. Other boys joined in—spitting, hurling bits of vegetables, chanting insults at him.
He endured.
Ethen's eyes burned as tears fell. "It's happening again… why does it never end?"
Ray kicked him hard in the chest.
The next blow sent Ethen crashing to the ground—but before Ray could stomp on him again, a teacher appeared and dragged them both away.
Hours later, Ethen lay in the infirmary. His knee throbbed with pain. The doctor whispered something about a fracture that might never heal properly.
No one came to check on him. The school didn't even reprimand Ray.
"This world is filled with darkness," Ethen murmured to himself.
As he turned his head, his gaze landed on a poster on the wall. It showed Damen Dark smiling proudly as the principal handed him a certificate.
That confident smile burned into Ethen's mind.
"I want to be like him when I grow up…" he whispered weakly.
"Big Brother."
At that moment something inside Ethen snapped.
His vision swam.
His world tilted and reordered itself.
When he opened his eyes, the school looked different — no longer just brick and paint, but a living lattice of symbols and light.
He saw the computer in the corner as if through X-ray: lines of code, threads of connection, the school's servers were laid bare.
The code made sense to him — not as gibberish but as a language he could read. He thought a single command, and the characters rearranged like obedient soldiers. The room around him blurred and his mind slipped into the machine.
In minutes he had access to everything on the school network. He skimmed records, schedules, security feeds — then found what he wanted most: videos of Damen Dark on the school's cloud server.
He watched them on loop.
There was one clip he loved above all: Damen, furious and fearless, recording his bullies and shouting, "Try anything funny on me — this becomes evidence. You will never graduate middle school."
The way Damen's eyes burned in that video lodged in Ethen like a promise.
"One day Big Brother will save me."
-----
Damen carried Ethen to the nearest hospital himself. Hours later, after the doctors finished treatment, Ethen overheard one speaking quietly to Damen outside the room.
"His injuries are deep," the doctor said. "Even if he recovers, he may never walk again."
When Damen entered the ward, Ethen was lying motionless under the white sheets, the dull rhythm of the heart monitor echoing in the sterile room.
"You're tough," Damen said softly, pulling up a chair beside him. "This won't kill you."
Ethen managed a weak smile. "I know my body. There are too many injuries… I'll never be normal again."
Without a word, Damen took a small vial from his pocket and drew the liquid into a syringe. He inserted it into Ethen's IV line.
Ethen asked, "What is that?"
"Medicine," Damen replied. "Something to make you stronger."
It was a Strength Enhancer — an expensive bio-serum he had bought from the hospital's restricted supplies.
"But… that medicine costs a fortune," Ethen said, startled.
"There's no but," Damen said firmly. "You must become strong. Only with a strong body can you make full use of your awakened power."
He paused, then added with a faint smile, "Besides, thanks to you, I now have more money than I could earn in a hundred lifetimes."
Ethen blinked, confused but touched.
His lips curled into a trembling smile.
"Get yourself better, we have things to do. With a little brother like you, we would overturn this city together", Damen pledged to him.
"Yes, Big Brother," he whispered.
Then it became a blur.
Suddenly a voice called out to Ethen, "Wake up…wake up now. Big Brother is here."
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