Carmela explained hurriedly, "He did that to himself! He was always playing the victim for sympathy! He just wanted attention!"

The live stream chat exploded, flooded with hateful comments likely driven by bots: "What a toxic snake! Sick manipulation!"

"Looked like a gentleman, but rotten to the core! Served him right getting kicked out!"

Julian smiled smugly and hugged Vivienne from behind right on cue, whispering in her ear, "Darling, it's our big day. Let's turn it off."

"Even though he threatened me, he's been punished. I don't hold it against him anymore."

I scoffed. Punished?

Don't you have a conscience, Julian?

Vivienne ignored his touch, her sharp eyes glued to the screen. "Is that so? I want to see exactly how he hurt himself."

She tapped the second video.

The footage showed me late at night, studying a crucial port bidding contract. I was planning to win it and present it to Vivienne as a dowry.

I didn't have Russo blood, but I'd bled for the Family for years, saving every penny. I planned to risk it all to build my own power base.

As an adopted son, I knew I had to become powerful in my own right to be worthy of her.

Suddenly, Julian pushed the door open, walking in with a guilt-ridden face. "Cassius, Papa stripped you of your Capo title on my first day back. You're not mad, are you?"

Before I could even speak, his expression twisted into a manic, mocking laugh. "You absolute idiot!"

"Can't you see Papa only cares about me? And you're still shamelessly clinging to the Russos?"

"I literally just hid a file and framed you for it. Papa didn't even blink before labeling you a rat. Isn't that hilarious?"

My chest ached, but I didn't want to fight him. I just said coldly, "It's not funny, Julian."

"I don't want what's yours. Stop coming here to tell me these things, and stop playing these pointless games."

My lack of a reaction only fueled his rage.

He violently grabbed me by the collar of my suit, his face contorted with fury. "Cassius! Who the fuck gave you the right to say you don't want what's mine?!"

"Vivienne is mine! She belongs to the true heir of the Russo Family! If you hadn't stolen my life, you never would've been her fiancé!"

"I suggest you call off the engagement right now. Otherwise, next time, it won't be a knife—it'll be a bullet!"

The video cut to black.

The venue was dead silent for several seconds before someone yelled, "What the hell?! Cassius was the one being framed the whole time?!"

"Julian accused Cassius of stealing Family secrets just to strip him of his Capo rank?!"

"So Cassius never threatened him! Julian made it all up!"

"He orchestrated the whole damn thing!"

My adoptive parents looked at Julian, their faces completely drained of color.

Julian stiffened, then grabbed their hands, explaining frantically, "You're misunderstanding! Cassius forced me to say that! He threatened me... he said if I didn't do what he wanted, he would..."

He let his sentence trail off, leaving room for people's twisted imaginations.

Don Carlo looked as if it all made sense now, nodding along. "I never knew Cassius was so calculating! This was a trap he set from the beginning!"

Carmela nodded vigorously. "He definitely recorded this on purpose to frame Julian! Julian is too kind; he's no match for a snake like Cassius!"

"He probably self-destructed because he knew he wasn't fit to be a Valenti son-in-law and couldn't stand Julian becoming one! Pure evil!"

Some guests whispered in agreement: "He really is filthy. I've seen every picture of him from The Abyss. He looked like he was enjoying it, not forced at all."

"Exactly. Giving up a Mafia Princess for that? God knows what goes through his head."

"So that's how it is... No wonder the Russos dumped him! He had it coming!"

Hovering in the air, I couldn't help but shiver, my gaze instinctively finding Vivienne.

Please don't believe them... please.

Surprisingly, Vivienne didn't express their disgust. She let out a soft, bitter laugh and said, "I also want to know what went through his head. Keep watching."

Vivienne clicked on the third video.

In the frame, I was holding up the newly signed port contract, beaming at the camera. "Vivienne! I nailed it! Am I something else, or what?"

"I'm going to use this money to buy you that pink diamond you've been eyeing! I know you've been eyeing it for a while but were too polite to say anything. It's okay, I'm going to be rich soon. I promise, once you marry me, I'll never let you suffer. I'll give you everything you want!"

In the video, my eyes were bright with joy and deep devotion.

Comments flashed across the live stream:

"He looked so in love with her..."

"Is this really the vicious, calculating Cassius everyone talks about? Am I seeing things?"

Vivienne's hands trembled slightly, her gaze complex.

Julian lunged forward to snatch the phone. "Vivienne! Cassius is in the past! I'm the one marrying you today! Turn it off, please!"

When she didn't answer, his face darkened. "There are so many people here. You're humiliating me..."

Carmela chimed in, "Exactly. Cassius took his money and is probably whoring around somewhere having the time of his life. He forgot about you a long time ago. Just stop watching."

My spirit hovered beside Vivienne, and I shook my head desperately. I wanted to scream that I hadn't forgotten her.

But I could only watch. I couldn't do a thing.

To everyone's surprise, Vivienne pushed Julian away and let the video play.

On screen, I was still eagerly planning our future.

The next second, Julian kicked the door open. "Cassius, what are you so happy about?"

He covered his mouth, feigning shock. "Wait, you didn't actually think that contract would put you back on top, did you?"

I froze. "What do you mean?"

Julian pulled out his phone and put it on speaker. "Hey, man, were you actually going to give that port to Cassius?"

From the phone came the sycophantic voice of a minor mob boss. "Of course not, Julian. Everyone knows he's just a fake taking up space. I'd have to be brain-dead to give him the port. I was just messing with him."

"You should've seen him when he signed the papers—bowing, scraping, so damn excited. Hahaha, it was pathetic."

"Zero dignity. He actually thinks he can marry into the Valentis and become a Don. What a joke."

My blood ran ice cold. My face burned.

It all made sense now. The bid was nothing but a trap Julian set up just to watch me get my hopes up and have them crushed.

I pointed at Julian, my voice trembling. "Why... why would you do this?"

Julian crossed his arms, looking down at me. "Why? Just to remind you of your place. People like you are born cheap. You don't deserve anything."

I totally lost it.

Even when my adoptive father took my Capo title, I wasn't this furious, because I knew it didn't belong to me.

But this time, I'd bled for this chance.

I clenched my fists and lunged at Julian in a blind rage.

Right at that moment, my adoptive parents burst in.

Seeing the scene, Carmela immediately shielded Julian. "Cassius, you're bullying him again?!"

Don Carlo glared at me furiously. "You have zero respect for this Family!"

I froze, not even bothering to explain this time.

Because I knew it was useless.

Julian suddenly started crying. "Mamma, Cassius just said... this house isn't big enough for the both of us. Is that true?"

"You!" Carmela shook with rage, slapping me across the face again and again. "I'm sending you away! Right now!"

Julian rolled his eyes and suggested, "I heard there's a place called 'The Abyss'. Everyone who comes out of there is perfectly obedient. Why don't we send Cassius there to learn some manners?"

The Abyss...

I knew of that place. It was a private, underground slaughterhouse and brothel where billionaires and tycoons went to torture people for fun.

"No!" I dropped to one knee, desperately clutching Don Carlo's coat. "Godfather, please! Don't send me there! I swear my loyalty to the Russos forever!"

I suddenly remembered Vivienne and yelled, "I am Vivienne's fiancé! You can't just dispose of me like this!"

His response was a brutal kick to my chest.

Don Carlo sneered. "Once you're tossed into The Abyss and passed around like a toy for men, you think the Valenti family will still want your filthy ass?"

"When that happens, Julian will be the only one fit to marry into the Valentis!"

Even in death, my chest ached with a phantom pain.

The parents I lived with for over twenty years never loved me. Not even for a second.

As the video ended, people in the crowd started questioning: "Didn't they say Cassius was partying abroad? Why was he sent to The Abyss?!"

"Nobody comes back from there in one piece!"

Julian panicked and reached for the phone again. "It's AI! It's deepfake! Cassius faked it all! He went there himself because he's a sick freak!"

Before he could touch the phone, Vivienne's bodyguards slammed him face-first onto the plush red carpet.

My adoptive parents reached for their guns, but multiple red dots from sniper lasers instantly painted their chests.

Vivienne's eyes welled with tears. Her voice choked as she said, "We are going to watch exactly what Cassius went through in The Abyss... every single second of it."

The fourth video cut straight to my first day in The Abyss.

I knelt in the mud, screaming, begging Don Carlo to take me home. "Godfather, please! Don't leave me here!"

"I'll change! I'll do whatever you want!"

But Don Carlo showed zero mercy. He rolled up his window without looking back, leaving me to be dragged away by the guards.

Later, they muzzled me like an animal.

In utter darkness and silence, I was shoved into a freezing iron cage.

Fear swallowed me whole. I curled up in the corner, shivering violently.

I don't know how much time passed before blinding spotlights flooded the darkness.

As my eyes adjusted, I saw masked, crazed billionaires surrounding the cage from all sides.

"What is this place? It's terrifying!"

"Looks like a gladiator arena! Who built this?"

"These people look insane... what are they going to do to Cassius?"

The chat erupted. The audience had never witnessed anything so horrific.

Watching the video again brought all that terror rushing back. Even as a weightless spirit, I couldn't stop shaking.

Soon, I was dragged out of the cage, stripped to the waist, and forced to fight a frenzied beast bare-handed.

I ran for my life, but the beast chased me endlessly, trying to tear my throat out.

Absolute terror unlocked my survival instinct. I fought back like a cornered animal. I didn't know how much blood I lost. By the time the beast finally fell, there wasn't a patch of skin on my body left unscathed.

I won.

But the torment didn't end.

I was injected with a tranquilizer and passed out.

When I woke up, I was chained to an auction block. Bottles of vintage liquor were arranged around me, as if I were a delicate piece of art.

My fingers, my toes—everything was positioned for display.

A fat, greasy politician lifted my chin with a spiked riding crop.

He won the bid. He even demanded to brand his name onto my collarbone.

I was drowning in humiliation, trying to thrash, but my limbs were completely numb from the drugs.

"This lone wolf has a nice bite to him," the politician licked his lips. "A bit wild, though."

"But the ones who dropped him off said he's untouched. Nice and clean. He'll taste amazing once his spirit is broken."

I felt violently sick. The tears wouldn't stop falling.

They looked at me as a toy. As meat.

The degradation was worse than death.

The footage that followed was too graphic. Vivienne stopped the video.

Those filthy photos that later reached Vivienne were taken when they tried to break my mind.

If I fought back, the torture only got worse.

The agony I endured there was a hundred times worse than what anyone saw on screen.

After the video stopped, the chat exploded. "My God! This is The Abyss?! It's literally hell!"

"The Russos are monsters! Even if he's adopted, how could they do this!"

"Poor Cassius! Where is he now? Is he still alive?!"

"Call the FBI right now! Arrest the Russos! Save Cassius!"

Save?

I smiled bitterly. I was already dead. They probably wouldn't even find my body.

Carmela collapsed to the floor in shock. "Impossible! He didn't have his phone!"

She was right. They were supposed to have taken my phone. But a guard whose family I had once helped had secretly returned it. When they dragged me away, the phone was already tucked in my chest pocket, recording everything. I had originally just wanted to record the route out, never imagining what it would capture instead.

Julian was trembling violently. It took him a long time to fake his composure. "Vivienne, Cassius is doing perfectly fine abroad. Someone made this with special effects! Don't believe it!"

I watched his pathetic lies coldly, pure hatred boiling in my soul.

Vivienne slowly looked up. "I'm not saving him."

My heart dropped. Was she really disgusted by me?

Someone in the crowd spoke up for me: "Cassius was with you for five years! How can you be so heartless?!"

"Fake or not, you have to look into it! What if it's real..."

Vivienne's voice was ice. "He's beyond saving."

Wait...

Did she know I was dead?

Impossible. No one ever came looking for me. No one could know.

Carmela immediately seized the opening, pointing at the crowd. "This is Family business! Mind your own damn business!"

"Vivienne already said he's beyond saving! Are you deaf?!"

Before she could finish, Vivienne tapped the next video.

"You're wrong."

"I meant you are beyond saving."