With each passing day, Rigo’s training grew more brutal.

  Every morning still began with the candle exercise in the dark chamber—but now it was followed by even harsher trials. Rigo was no longer required to endure only physical pain. She was forced to kill every other emotion within her as well: fear, anger, even love. Any emotion that surfaced—no matter how small—was punished immediately.

  A lash of the whip.

  A sharp slap across the face.

  Or being locked in total darkness without food until she finally surrendered to emptiness.

  Day by day, Rigo felt something inside her changing.

  The warmth that once lived within her slowly disappeared, replaced by a suffocating cold—as if the blood in her veins were gradually freezing.

  Her eyes, once wide and filled with curiosity, began to fade. They became little more than empty shells, focused on a single purpose:

  To survive the merciless system of the Gelar Clan.

  Her mother, who once fought desperately to save her daughter from such cruelty, could now do nothing but watch Rigo’s soul crumble from afar.

  At night, when the training ended, she would quietly approach Rigo, who sat silently on the floor of her room. Her back was covered with whip marks that had not yet healed. Carefully, her mother would apply ointment to the wounds, trying to ease even a small part of the pain.

  But what truly broke her heart was Rigo’s behavior.

  The child who once hugged her tightly and begged for bedtime stories now simply sat there, unmoving.

  When her mother fed her dinner, Rigo opened her mouth automatically, like a machine responding to a command. Her gaze was hollow—there was no life left in her eyes.

  Often, her mother would pause, silently studying the girl before her.

  “Rigo… sweetheart, do you still remember the story about the princess who danced beneath the full moon?” she whispered one night, trying to revive a fragment of the warm memories they once shared.

  Her trembling hand gently brushed Rigo’s cheek, hoping for even the smallest reaction.

  But Rigo simply stared straight ahead.

  “I don’t remember,” she replied in a flat, mechanical voice.

  Her mother swallowed the sob rising in her throat, forcing a fragile smile even as tears blurred her vision.

  On another night, she tried to give Rigo a small piece of candy—once her favorite treat.

  She slipped it into Rigo’s hand with hopeful eyes.

  “Here, sweetheart. You remember how sweet it tastes, don’t you? You used to beg for this candy all the time.”

  Rigo stared at the candy for a moment before placing it in her mouth.

  “Sweet,” she said shortly, as if stating a simple fact.

  There was no smile.

  No flicker of nostalgia.

  The candy that once symbolized a child’s simple happiness now meant nothing to her.

  Seeing her daughter like this shattered her mother’s heart more each day.

  She knew Rigo was slowly becoming a machine—exactly what the Gelar Clan desired. The remnants of love that still lived within her felt powerless against the relentless training that erased everything.

  Every night, she cried in silence, holding Rigo’s sleeping body close, even though she knew her daughter could no longer feel the warmth of her embrace.

  Morning brought even harsher training.

  The instructors began introducing crueler exercises. Rigo was forced to run across burning coals, grip the blade of a sword until her palms bled, and stand for hours beneath freezing hail without a single complaint.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  If the slightest hint of pain appeared on her face, punishment followed immediately.

  One day, during a particularly brutal session, Rigo stumbled while running across rocky ground. Her knee split open, blood streaming down her leg.

  Yet she stood up again without a sound.

  From a distance, her father watched.

  He gave a small nod of approval.

  To him, it was progress.

  That night, her mother found Rigo limping into her room. The wound on her knee was deep and raw, yet Rigo showed no sign of pain.

  Her mother hurried to her side.

  “Sweetheart, you’re hurt… let Mother clean it,” she said anxiously.

  But Rigo gently stopped her hand.

  “It’s alright, Mother,” she said in the same emotionless tone.

  “I don’t feel it.”

  Those words pierced her mother more deeply than any blade.

  She froze, staring at her daughter—who could no longer even feel pain.

  Her worst fear had come true.

  Rigo was no longer truly her child.

  She had become a product of the Gelar Clan’s merciless system.

  Her mother knew she had to do something.

  But what could she possibly do?

  Every attempt to awaken Rigo’s humanity seemed futile.

  Slowly, despair began to consume her. On one hand, she could not bear to see Rigo continue suffering. On the other, she refused to lose her daughter completely to the darkness of the Gelar Clan.

  One night, overwhelmed by hopelessness, she made a painful decision.

  Alone in her quiet room, she wrote a short letter filled with love.

  “To my dearest Rigo. Forgive your mother for being unable to save you from this cruelty. But in my heart, you will always remain the little girl I long to hold in my arms.”

  She slipped the letter beneath Rigo’s pillow as the girl slept.

  Then she gently kissed her daughter’s forehead, hoping for one final miracle.

  “Good night, my love,” she whispered.

  But the next morning, the letter was discovered by one of the instructors.

  Within moments, it reached Rigo’s father.

  His gaze remained cold as he read the words filled with love.

  Without hesitation, he tore the letter into small pieces in front of Rigo.

  “This is weakness,” he said emotionlessly.

  “You must sever all attachments. Even to your mother.”

  Rigo watched the fragments of the letter fall to the floor.

  Her eyes remained empty.

  There were no tears.

  No sadness.

  Only a deeper, darker void.

  Perhaps somewhere deep within her buried heart, a wound still bled—but it was silent and unseen. A wound that nothing could heal.

  Not even her mother’s love.

  Days passed.

  Rigo continued moving like a perfectly programmed machine. She ate without tasting, trained without protest, and slept without dreams.

  In the quiet of the night, her mother could only watch her sleeping daughter—eyes that no longer held even a spark of hope.

  She knew that Rigo now belonged entirely to the Gelar Clan.

  And yet…

  Deep within her heart, a small hope still remained.

  Fragile, trembling—like a tiny candle flame flickering in the darkness.

  The same candle that had once symbolized the cruelty of Rigo’s training had now become her mother’s final hope.

  That one day, somehow…

  Rigo would find her humanity again.

  She did not know when.

  Or how.

  But she believed that true love never truly dies.

  Even buried within darkness, there must still be a tiny flame surviving inside Rigo’s heart.

  A flame that, one day, might light her path again.