Online Game: Starting With SSS-Ranked Summons-Chapter 588: Memories [2]

All of it destroyed. Broken. Lost.

She walked forward carefully, stepping over rubble and debris as she ventured deeper into the ruins. Aether remained behind with Arthur, instinctively understanding this moment required space.

Charlotte's hand traced along a partially standing wall, her fingers finding familiar marks—height measurements their parents had made when she and Arthur were children, tracking their growth year by year. The marks were still visible despite the damage, faded pencil lines with dates written beside them.

"Arthur was always taller," Charlotte whispered, her voice carrying across the quiet destruction. "I remember being so frustrated about that. Mom said I'd catch up eventually, but I never did."

She moved to what had been the dining room, now open to the sky. The table was gone, either looted or destroyed, but Charlotte stood where it would have been.

"This is where we ate together every Sunday," she continued softly, memories flooding back with painful clarity. "Dad would make his terrible jokes and Mom would laugh even though they weren't funny. You'd roll your eyes and I'd kick you under the table for being grumpy."

Her voice caught slightly. "And then they died. Car accident. Just... gone. One day they were here, and the next..."

Charlotte's hand moved to her chest, gripping her shirt where the "cancer" had been. "You took over. Tried to keep us together. You were just a kid yourself, Arthur, but you tried so hard."

She walked toward what remained of the staircase, half-collapsed but still recognizable. "Uncle Richard showed up days later, saying he would help. You believed him because you were desperate and exhausted from trying to be an adult at sixteen."

Her expression darkened with remembered pain. "Then he kicked us out. Took the house, took everything Mom and Dad left us, and threw us onto the streets like we were garbage. Because he could. Because the system let him."

Charlotte turned to look at Arthur, tears streaming down her face. "We were homeless, Arthur. Sleeping in shelters, scrounging for food, trying to survive while you worked whatever jobs would hire you without proper documentation. I watched you suffer every day trying to keep me safe."

Arthur stood at the edge of the ruins, his own eyes burning with suppressed emotion as memories crashed through his carefully maintained control. He'd tried so hard to bury these feelings, to focus on survival and then power and then protecting Charlotte from her illness.

But standing here, in the ruins of what had been their home, it all came flooding back.

The exhaustion of stealing to survive while trying to care for a younger sister. The humiliation of being turned away from shelters because they were full. The constant fear that he'd fail Charlotte, that she'd suffer because he wasn't strong enough or smart enough to provide.

And then her illness. The final, crushing blow that had nearly broken him completely.

"I'm sorry," Arthur's voice came out rough, strained. "I should have been stronger. Should have fought harder to keep the house. Should have—"

"Stop," Charlotte interrupted, walking back toward him through the debris. "You did everything you could. We were kids, Arthur. Kids with no support, no resources, no power to fight the system. What happened wasn't your fault."

She reached him and pulled him into a tight embrace, both of them standing amid the ruins of their childhood.

"But we're not powerless anymore," Charlotte said fiercely, her voice strengthening despite the tears. "You became the strongest player on Earth. I have infinite mana and can finally help you with the burden you've been carrying by yourself. We're not those scared, helpless kids anymore."

Arthur's arms wrapped around his sister, holding her as emotions he'd suppressed for months finally found release. His shoulders shook slightly, though whether from suppressed sobs or rage at the injustice they'd suffered, even he couldn't say.

"Uncle Richard," Charlotte finally managed, her voice carrying fury beneath the emotion. "Is he...?"

"Probably dead," Arthur said with grim expression. "Detroit was hit hard during the initial invasion. Plenty of people didn't survive. If he did live, though..."

He pulled back to meet Charlotte's eyes, and she saw steel in his expression.

"If he survived, we'll find him eventually. And he'll understand exactly what it means to have crossed the Fate siblings when they actually have power."

Charlotte nodded slowly, that cold part of her mind already filing the name away for the future. Uncle Richard. The man who'd stolen their inheritance and condemned them to homelessness. If he still lived, he'd learn what a terrible mistake that had been.

But for now, standing in the ruins of their past, Arthur and Charlotte simply held each other—mourning what they'd lost, acknowledging the pain they'd survived, and silently promising that no one would ever make them feel that helpless again.

Aether watched from a respectful distance, the void dragon's usual cheerfulness subdued by the weight of the moment. Even his young consciousness understood the significance of this place, these memories, this shared grief.

Finally, Charlotte stepped back, wiping tears from her face with determination. "We should go. There's nothing left here but ghosts and ruins."

Arthur nodded, casting one final look at the destroyed home. "Yeah. We've got better places to be now."

"And better family," Charlotte added, reaching out to gently pat Aether's head as the void dragon approached. "Right, Aether?"

"Master and Master's sister are Aether's favorite family!" the dragon declared, his enthusiasm returning. "Way better than mean uncles who kick people out!"

Despite everything, both siblings smiled at that.

"Come on," Arthur said, helping Charlotte back onto Aether's back. "I want to talk to you about something Important, but before that. We need to be in a better-looking place."

As Aether prepared to teleport them away from Detroit's ruins, Charlotte took one last look at the destroyed house.

"Goodbye, Mom and Dad," she whispered. "We're okay now. We're going to be okay." 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

Then reality folded, and the Fate siblings left their painful past behind, heading toward the future they were building together.

A future where they had power, purpose, and each other.

And that was enough.