Chapter 19  : The Cellar and the Potatoes

The progression of the events from Accius’s apology till him and his followers’ departure took less than fifteen minutes.

At the ‘friendly’ advice of the madame, Accius finally gave in. He unwillingly apologized and ordered his followers clear the filth on Dick. At last, they carried Dick away and left the doors of the Lithur manor.

Judging from how hurried and silent their departure was, it was evident how embarrassed they were about the incident. The madame, who was the cause of everything, seemed to be indifferent to their emotions. Instead, she sent them off with jovial smiles.

“Safe travels, and the Lithurs will always welcome your presence here.”

Accius glared at the madame and walked out of the manor without a word.

The Fulners left just like that.

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Benjamin was rejoicing internally. Of course, he held down his expression and did not show his happiness.

This was probably the first time since he teleported to this world someone stood up and saved him when he was hopeless. As a responsible adult, he was aware that he had to be independent, but it still felt great to tide things over without putting in any effort.

Would this mean that he did not have as much of a bad luck as he did before?

Regardless, he would never be willing to be hit by a chamber pot. At least he escaped that now, and that in itself was worthy of a celebration.

However, it did not take him long to realize it was way too early for him to be happy.

“Benjamin, what actually happened last night? Are you the one behind all this?”

After the Fulners left, the madame became silent again, and Claude regained his stature as the man of the house. Suddenly Claude began to speak and question Benjamin in a stern tone.

Benjamin’s heart dropped, and he quickly sent a SOS look towards the madame.

The madame yawned and ignored him.

“….”

Game over.

If she wanted to help, she should have helped him through the whole way! Why would she give up halfway!

What was that!

Clearly, Claude saw through Benjamin’s guilty conscience. Claude emitted an unsatisfied “hmph”. His facial expression morphed into something scary. After a brief glance at the madame, he continued to berate Benjamin.

“Don’t think that this is over. What have I taught you all this while? What happened to your pride as a noble? I’ll ignore the fact that you ran away from home, but you made a mess within the first day you returned! Can’t you let us stop worrying about you?”

Benjamin was listening closely until he heard a particular sentence. He had a question mark in his heart after that.

Running away from home?

What was the situation here? Why did he feel like he missed a chapter and a plot point?

“Hey, what’s with the running away from home? Did Benjamin run away from home?” Benjamin was perplexed, so he asked the System with telepathy.

“Nope,” the System was certain.

“If so, what’s the matter now?” Benjamin continued.

“I have no idea,” said the System.

“You….” Benjamin choked on his words, but this was not the first time he did that. Thus, he recovered swiftly and chided.

“Why do I need you?”

The System’s tone of voice was flat, “Nothing much, which is why you can refrain from finding me in the future. Let’s breakup.”

“….”

There must be a virus in the System.

He regained his sense of reality and had a brainstorm of the chronology of events. He quickly realized that the only possible reason for Claude’s accusation of him “running away from home”.

Could it be that….. no one knew that he was kidnapped, and they assumed he just ran away?

Watson, I found the blind spot!

Shit, no wonder no one in the house came to comfort him after he returned. Didn’t they know that he was teetering at the edge of death? What was wrong with this family? How could they not know that their son was kidnapped? How could they assume he just ran away from home? The church probably contributed to this confusion, as they most likely hid the truth from the Lithurs in order to cover Michelle’s tracks.

No wonder! No wonder he had never gotten a friendly face around the house! No wonder everyone was hostile to him!

No matter what, he did wander around the valley of death just recently. How would they treat him if they knew about this?

Once he thought about this, he started to explain.

“I didn’t run away from home! I was….”

“Shut up! Since when you learnt how to lie, you brat? Huh, do you think I’m stupid?” Claude cut him off mercilessly. His tone revealed that he would not allow any explanations, “You thought of lying to me? ‘Did not run away from home’…. If you didn’t, where were you for the past few days? Don’t tell me you got yourself kidnapped!”

“…”

That was correct, I really was kidnapped!

Benjamin wanted to exclaim, but if he did, he would be beaten to death.

Fuck, another line stealer.

Claude’s anger was way more dramatic than what it was before. His emotions were probably effected by the humiliation of being one-upped by the madame when outsiders were present. As Claude could not throw a fit to the madame, the only unfortunate person to take the toll was Benjamin.

There was no use for Benjamin to clarify anything when his father was this furious.

He could only face the music with his face hung low.

As expected, Lady Luck was only with him for a short period of time. His lifelong partner was Misfortune after all.

Thus, Benjamin determinedly stood in front of everyone and was shouted at by Claude for fifteen minutes. No need to go through what exactly Claude yelled about. When Benjamin was scolded, everyone in the living room was frozen. They did not move nor speak, their head bowed low, and only the servants were nervously cleaning up the filth.

After the bombardment of screams and shouts, Claude finally seemed to slowly calm down. He looked at the quiet Benjamin and said after a brief pause.

“Go to the cellar and think of what you’ve done. You will not be fed until you’ve admitted to your wrongdoings!”

Hence, Benjamin clambered his way down to the cellar and was locked in.

That was the end of the struggle session, everyone in the living room left to their own home and families. At the same time, Claude, with his face pulled in a displeasing manner and his enraged gaze, assigned a maid to confine Benjamin. She then escorted him to the cellar of Lithur manor.

The cellar was not like those in fantasy novels, with secrets of the family hidden deep within, demons summoned with a flip of a book; the cellar of the Lithur family really was just a small, plain cellar.

Approximately eight square metres, the room had layered black bricks as walls. Moss crept up the cracks between the bricks, and the only thing inhabiting the cellar was none other than bags of potatoes.

Right when he entered the cellar, Benjamin stepped on a potato, lost his balance, and fell into an ocean of potatoes.

Just as he was about to seek help for his fall, the door banged as the maid disappeared from the cellar. In a flash, the door was shut tight, with the lock securely in place.

Benjamin gazed emptily at the key hole. It shone some light into the darkness. Moments later, he sighed.

He slowly got up from the pile of potatoes.

“Ah, detention….” He looked around to check the environment.

He patted the dust off himself, and sat at a spot where there was no potatoes around. Using the bag of potatoes behind him as support, he reclined and finally could relax himself.

“Huh…. Although this was a detention, I could finally have the time to rest and take a deep breath,” he mumbled to himself.

Despite being punished, it was way better than getting hit by a chamber pot of filth. It was just detention, and he would not be confined for a year or two, no? He would probably be out after a day or two, and he would not suffer much.

This was not a problem for him, and he could even utilize the time to recuperate.

In hindsight, it had been five days since he teleported into this world. Except for the three-days when he was unconscious, he was constantly in a high-pressure situation in the other two days. He had a battle of wits with Michelle, threw a chamber pot at a sleepwalking Dick Fulner, nearly got killed by an assassin, went to the church to prod for information, survived a struggle session with the Fulners…. Man, he did so much within two days!

Everything felt…. just like a dream.

His life was not peaceful either, it was as chaotic as a designer in a design company. The problems were each more complicated as the last.

He felt as if nothing was left in his body.

At this moment, he even thought that getting detention from Claude in this cellar was the best thing that happened to him since his teleportation.

Although the cellar was small and stuffy, it was not uncomfortable. The dim lighting and the peaceful quiet also calmed his anxious heart, not to mention the slight fragrance of potatoes wafting in the air.

The scent of potatoes…. they were good.

Probably because he was hungry.

When his thoughts came to this point, Benjamin realized an imminent problem. This issue was prominent before, and it displayed its disastrous streak. If Benjamin did not take measures against it, it would then create an unimaginable catastrophe.

This problem was…. he was starving.

Starving, and famished.

He went without food for one day and one night now, and the hunger tore through his esophagus to his intestines, and echoed back from his intestines to his esophagus. This heart-tearing agony was basically telling him that he was ravenous.

Then, he remembered Claude’s words, ” You will not be fed until you’ve admitted to your wrongdoings.” These words reverberated in his ears just like an alarm clock in the crack of dawn. It rang until he was traumatized by it.

You will not be fed…..

Be fed….

Fed….

Food…

He was stunned for a moment, and as if he had a revelation, he sprang up from the floor like an arrow released from a bow. He rushed to the closed metal door, and glued himself to the rusted key hole.

“Let me out! I want to admit it was my fault! You shall not stop me from seeking forgiveness! Open the door so I can confess my wrongdoings! I love admitting my mistakes! Admitting my mistakes make me feel happy!”

His anguished howl echoed in the cellar.

It echoed until Benjamin was so hungry he could not hold on to the door, his voice hoarse and dry until he coughed. The world outside the door never gave any answer. He slid down the door like a lizard, and collapsed onto the floor. He felt vulnerable.

He finally realized how scary of a punishment detention was.

After he sprawled on the floor for some time, his sight shifted towards the potatoes scattered around him. Although they were raw and probably would not taste any good, but…. he could probably still eat it.

“Can potatoes be eaten raw?” he asked the System.

The System answered, “Never tried, you can go ahead though.”

“…”

Benjamin would totally scream abuse at the System if he was not weak due to hunger.

Ah, who would care! He was too hungry to care about trivial things! People always talked about how those in famine would eat tree barks and leather, of course he could eat raw potatoes, right? The mashed potatoes in KFC were quite alike with raw potatoes, and he was still alive after eating them.

He would rather die from food poisoning than starvation.

Dying from starvation would be miserable and would make a good joke to laugh about at lunch. It would be so embarrassing!

However, cause of death by consuming raw poisonous potato would be quite embarrassing too….

Ah, fuck it! What use would it be to worry! He wanted to be the first warrior who ate a raw potato!

Under the urge of hunger, Benjamin grabbed a potato close to his hand, opened his mouth and was prepared to take a bite.

Suddenly, a clatter was heard in the cellar.

Benjamin was startled, but he had already taken a bite off the potato and could no longer hold back. His teeth firmly chomped down on the potato, and immediately a soreness rose from his mouth, and he felt his jaw slackened, as if it nearly dislocated.

Shit, that was so fucking hard! He could not even bite into it!

The sore Benjamin quickly threw the potato away, and he turned to look at the source of the strange noise.

The door of the metal door now was slightly ajar, and a pair of sky blue eyes appeared. The pair of eyes were wide, and they stared straight at Benjamin. Benjamin was very surprised.

Fuck, now what?