Chapter Text
Ⅰ
This is TSC’s first time visiting the ancestral mansion.
To be honest, if he weren’t the youngest in the main branch, his coming-of-age ceremony might not have been so grand. But this declining family could barely scrape together anyone to celebrate his birthday. He couldn’t help muttering inwardly: shallow and tedious.
TCO sat in the driver’s seat, never glancing at what his younger brother in the backseat was thinking. He was too busy chatting with TDL in the passenger seat—naturally, about the coming-of-age ceremony. After all, he’d once felt just what TSC was feeling now, though back then, his rebellious adolescence had led him to make a scene that day, ending in a bitter departure.
TDL, still in the passenger seat, chuckled at him. He’d been there that day, tried to stop TCO but failed. The look on the head of the family’s face back then always brought a faintly mocking, nonchalant smile to TDL’s lips whenever he mentioned it.
TCO sighed helplessly, forcing an awkward yet polite smile. “Let’s not laugh at me, eh?” If he weren’t driving, he might have thrown a playful punch—nothing hard. They’d bickered so long they knew just how to hold back.
TSC watched their playful banter with a cold eye, sometimes truly feeling he ought to be under the car.
Bored, he pulled out his phone to chat with friends, killing time on this tedious holiday.
Red: Took the family parrots out today!
Blue: Won’t they fly away?
Red: Nope, they’re super good!
Red: Where’s Yellow? We said we’d hang out—gotta hit the pet store for supplies.
Yellow: Getting dressed. My laptop’s acting up…
Blue: Oh no, weren’t all our vlogs on your computer?
TSC: Relax, the USB’s with me.
Red: Oh TSC! How’s the old mansion? Having fun?
Blue: Enjoy your coming-of-age! Wait, where’s Green?
Red: He got a part-time gig as a singer at a nearby bar. Probably still asleep.
Yellow: We should hit that bar sometime! Heard their drinks are cheap—
TSC: I’m in once I get back—
Blue: We’ll save you a spot! Yellow, you out yet?
Yellow: Just left. Can see Red now.
The car stopped. TSC tore his gaze from his phone, opened the door, and stepped out. Before him loomed a large white villa, plainly aged. Green ivy crept silently over the white walls, reaching toward the sun, craving growth, craving spread. The solid wood balcony railings were carved with vintage patterns; the delicate ironwork on the fences whispered of past glory. TCO stepped forward, unlocked the gate, pushed it open, and gestured for them to enter.
“ The servants maintaining the main house have the day off,” TCO explained. “Might need a little tidying up inside.” It was only one small reason for the trip.
“TCO, are they trying to use us as free servants?” TDL’s tongue was as sharp as ever, sparing no sarcasm for those old-fashioned, rigid elders. With a job of his own, he’d rather be back working on his software development.
“This run-down place is long past its prime—who are they putting on airs for?” he added.
TSC heartily agreed. Having never grown up here, he had no warm feelings for the mansion.
“Either way, we’re here now.” TCO pushed open the door. The interior was just as he remembered.
“Let’s check things out first.” He walked in, eyeing the wilted bouquet in a vase, wondering what flowers to replace it with.
“I’ll wander the first floor then.” TDL turned toward the dining room, leaving the two brothers—strangers, almost—standing in silence.
“I’ll check the second floor.” TSC nodded toward the stairs. TCO glanced up at the huge crystal chandelier, silently praying it wouldn’t give out right then.
“Sure. And check the wiring in the rooms up there—old as it is.”
He meant it as a kind reminder. When he’d lived here, the corridor lights and bedroom lamps had flickered constantly from aging circuits. He didn’t know if this barely familiar relative might be spooked. But a faint unease lingered—something important, half-forgotten, tickled the back of his mind.
Faint murmurs of forgetting still echoed in his ears from the past. Even returning to this place hadn’t jogged those scattered memories.
“Got it.” TSC didn’t hesitate, heading upstairs.
TSC walked down the second-floor corridor, marveling at a place he’d never seen. The green wallpaper, though faded, carried a faint dampness and the ghost of mildew, yet the mansion remained eerily neat—whoever tended to it kept it well. But the plumbing, clearly, had aged alongside that cursed wiring, leaving its mark.
Silence hung heavy. He checked his phone: nearly six in the evening. Faint bird calls drifted through the windows, where the sun was dipping low. He opened a window. Below lay a garden of roses, moonflowers, and small shrubs, blooming in a flood of golden light. A breeze ruffled his orange hair. Struck by the quiet beauty—something he’d never witnessed—he pulled out his phone to snap a photo for his friends.
Too focused on getting the perfect shot, he nearly dropped his phone when a dark shape flashed across the screen.
TCO said the servants were off today… He frowned. Maybe a small animal? He tried again.
This time, the screen captured what had startled him: a man with disheveled black hair, bearing an 80% resemblance to TCO, watering the flowers with a watering can. A serene smile played on his lips, glowing faintly unreal in the golden light.
TSC lowered his phone, rubbed his eyes, and leaned out the window, peering down. Nothing but blooming flowers met his gaze.
What the hell? He muttered. The faint mildew scent still lingered in his nose. He left the window open to air the place out, then turned to check the aging wiring in each room.
It was tedious work, but TSC plowed through it—until he reached the room at the far west end of the villa. He pulled the doorknob: locked.
Odd, he thought, confused. The corner was dim; this poor light made it unfit for a guest room. He’d messaged TCO earlier, asking if there was a storage room on the second floor. TCO had replied: east wing, second to last room.
So what was this? He wiped the thick dust off the bedside table and noticed a photo frame, face-down in the corner. He flipped it upright. No inscriptions, just a half-portrait of a black-haired man—white eyes, like TCO’s—smiling at the camera. Behind him lay the very sea of flowers he’d seen from the window.
This was his first meeting with the mansion’s nameless ghost.
Unaware, he stood in a decaying corner where over twenty years of loneliness and sorrow still echoed—unremembered, unwept.
In that moment, the gear named “Forgetting” began to turn. Long after a life lived in obscurity, long after death, Vic finally encountered the key that would wind the old box.
Fate mocked him, cruelly, for everything.