Stone Mage: Revenge of the Villain System

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"Everyone listen up! I need you to make 10 dozens of pie, on the double!" Zeuxis exclaimed to the cooks in the kitchen.

"Zeuxis, what are you up to?" The smaller and weaker Ronin tugged at his brother's sleeve. "You know what Father told you earlier today about not ruining Bella's birthday."

"Oh, get lost, prune! You're a big stick-on-the mud, you know that?" Zeuxis rolled his eyes.

"And are you not also told to be servant today? Go serve up trays and don't stick your tiny black nose on someone else's business!"

And as he said this, Zeuxis shoved him!

Ronin had fallen to bags of flour from being shoved. He immediately became covered with the white powder, coughing as they entered his nose and throat.

He looked at Zeuxis with a deadly glare with those pure black eyes.

Zeuxis just grinned at his current state of being powdered with flour. "Haha, looks like you'll be made into a prune cake too!"

The chefs were stunned by this and wanted to help, but the second eldest Zafeiri who was only aged 13 snapped his finger at them to have them get back to work.

"You useless cooks! Make those pies quickly or I'll turn you all to cakes myself!" He ordered around with that dirty finger of his like he was ordering dogs.

"You can't get away with this, boy." Ronin said in the most intimidating tone he could muster using that childish voice of his. "Someday, your games will be over, and you will have to pay for them."

Zeuxis was actually unsettled with the way Ronin spoke those words, in such pure malice with those dark and sinister eyes.

But he shook it off. "You're just a tiny little prune, a speck of dust compared to me! What can you do? Certainly not this!"

He flicked his wrist and soon came....

Crackles of blue lightning floating in the air. He joined all of this to form the shape of---

A dagger.

Ronin was surprised a little by this, but his shock didn't last long, turning into a sneer.

'I see. So because he cannot be a Hero Mage and can only be a Clairo Mage, he instead used his Mage Focus to mimic a weapon.'

"Go on, stand up and fight me if you want. You look like you really want to, haha!" Zeuxis snickered while holding his fake dagger made of lightning.

He then quickly leaned in to bring it up to Ronin's neck. "Or are you too afraid you'll get turned into a toasted prune? Huh?"

Ronin did not say anything for a while, keeping a neutral expression.

He then said this. "You are a very desperate child, Zeuxis. I hope you have fun trying to gain your father's attention in such a pathetic manner."

"Grrrrr.... I will, then!"

Zeuxis did not hesitate to drive that dagger into Ronin's shoulder!

"Ah!"

Ronin was electrocuted, his tiny body convulsing from this plasmic energy that threatened to tear him apart---

Zuuexus retreated his lightning dagger with a devilish grin before any permanent harm could be done. "Who is more pathetic now?"

He just left the groaning Ronin there and turned to the cooks.

"Now anyone who wants to try some of that can just go too slow on those pies. I don't care about the quality at all, I just need you all to make as many as you can. You have 10 minutes."

Ronin breathed heavily after that attack, unable to move from that electric shock. He gritted his teeth to endure the petrifying pain, and moreover....

The huge blow to his ego that against this kid, he was completely powerless. His Flame right now was too small to manifest into any Mage Focus.

However, the way he was looked down upon and laughed at .... while being electrified seemed to have brought....

Glimpses.

It was very quick, but he saw a classroom.

And it was not Zeuxis laughing at him as he suffered, but several people.

He knew immediately that this must be a glimpse of his past life before becoming a system, but there was nothing more.

He only sneered at this short memory. 'So even before being cursed to be a system, I was still a useless weakling in real life. How very cliche, but I was expecting it anyway.'

He staggered to stand and brush himself up. 'I'm really going to kill this boy someday. And when I do, I will do it as slowly as possible. Let's see if he can still do that stupid laughter of his once I torture the hell out of him.'

He went out of the kitchen while Zeuxis was busy ordering people around, looking for Duke Taevas and Belladonna that went off to get changed.

Cermin was still entertaining the people, and Ronin just walked pass them like a zombie with his long, black hair rising up on all sides like a porcupine.

But as he stared at Cermin, there was a familiar feeling on his chest.

A feeling of... Of thinking that it's all unfair.

That life was not fair. Forever questioning why people can be so easily liked and adored and worshipped by everyone else....

While someone like him who doesn't do anything besides existing has to suffer scorn and hatred.

Ronin's head throb and a searing pain came. Everything he saw were bleeding and mixing into the weird shapes and colors that was not really there.

Figures from a past that does not exist anymore.

And Cermin's shape fits perfectly with a certain figure in the classroom that he had always hated for being loved so much.

So much hatred that he could just tear this person's heart out and eat it----

"Are you alright, brother?"

Ronin noticed that he wasn't able to move much at all because of this dizziness, and had only reached the door leading out of the parlor.

Duke Taevas and Belladonna had already arrived before he can reach them.

"Zeuxis..." His throat was too dry to speak, and the world was still a blur to him. "Zeuxis is..."

Smack!

A pie went straight towards the back of his head. It hit him very hard that it caused him to stumble down upon impact.

The already weak and reeling Ronin was knocked down completely, falling down with a plop!