From the moment Ikes apologized to the time his entourage left, the entire ordeal took no more than fifteen minutes.

Under the old lady's "gentle" persuasion, Ikes finally caved. He swallowed his pride and apologized, ordering his people to clean Dick up. In the end, they carried Dick out, slinking away from the Lither family's front door like dogs with their tails between their legs.

Judging by their silence and haste as they departed, it was clear just how utterly humiliated they felt. Yet the old lady, the mastermind behind their shame, seemed blissfully oblivious, instead wearing a benevolent smile as she saw them off.

"Take care on the road, my dears. The Lither family's door is always open to you."

Ikes shot the old lady a vicious glare, not saying a word, and strode out the door without so much as a backward glance.

Just like that, the Fur family was gone.

Benjamin was positively giddy. Of course, he made a valiant effort to keep a straight face, not letting his unbridled glee show.

This was probably the first time since he'd transmigrated to this madhouse that someone had swooped in to save his bacon when all hope seemed lost. As a mentally mature adult (or so he liked to think), he prided himself on his rugged self-reliance, but damn if it didn't feel good to win one without lifting a finger.

Did this mean the universe was finally throwing him a bone?

Alas, he quickly realized he'd been counting his chickens before they hatched.

"Benjamin, what in the world happened last night? Was it truly you who perpetrated this… this farce?"

The moment the Fur family was out of earshot, the old lady clammed up, while Claude seemed to regain his patriarchal authority, suddenly speaking up and interrogating Benjamin with utmost severity.

Benjamin's heart sank like a stone. He immediately shot the old lady a pleading look, channeling his best "sad puppy" impression.

The old lady blinked once, slowly, then turned a blind eye with a jaw-cracking yawn.

"Welp, it was nice knowing me," Benjamin's inner voice supplied helpfully. "Time to start working on my 'it's not you, it's me' speech for the afterlife."

Claude had clearly seen Benjamin's guilty reaction. He let out a disapproving snort, his expression turning downright thunderous. He gave the old lady a sidelong look positively dripping with disdain before continuing to lambaste Benjamin:

"Don't delude yourself into thinking this matter is settled, young man. Have you forgotten everything I've taught you? Where's your noble pride? Running away from home like a common thief is bad enough, but stirring up this kind of ludicrous spectacle not a day after darkening our door again? Is it too much to ask for a moment's peace from you?"

As Benjamin listened, gears turning frantically in his head, a question mark suddenly popped up in his mind at a certain phrase.

"Running away from home"?

What in the seven hells was this about? Why did it feel like he'd missed a crucial plot point in the absurdist theatre production that was his life?

"Yo, GPTSD! Hit me with the deets on this whole 'running away from home' sitch. Is this, like, a thing Original Flavor Benny pulled on the reg or what?" Benjamin pinged the AI, equal parts perplexed and annoyed.

"Negative, bossman," the AI chirped back immediately, its metaphorical eyes glinting with smug certainty. "Our boy was a homebody through and through. His personal best escape attempt was that one time he made it to the kitchen before the scullery maids caught him."

"Then what in the name of RNGesus is going on here?" Benjamin mentally threw up his hands, exasperated.

"Error 404: clue not found," the AI replied, its virtual voice dripping with synthesized apathy.

"You're about as useful as a screen door on a submarine, you know that?" Benjamin fired back, his inner snark levels reaching critical mass.

The AI's tone was flatter than a crepe: "Hey, it's not my job to make sense of your family's drama. I'm just here to provide color commentary and witty one-liners. If you want Dr. Phil, try another dimension."

"…"

This AI was going to be the death of him.

Snapping back to reality (or what passed for it in this asylum), Benjamin quickly ran the numbers in his head, piecing together the timeline like a sleep-deprived detective in a seedy noir flick.

A singular, improbable explanation emerged from the chaos, crystalizing with the clarity of a nat 20 insight check. Could it be? His missing time, the stony welcomes, the lingering miasma of disapproval from his so-called kin…

They didn't know! Not a single one of them had any idea he'd been kidnapped, dragged off to some villain's lair, brought to the brink of death. They all thought he'd just… run away. Like a bratty kid throwing a tantrum.

That crafty Archbishop and his cronies! They'd kept the Lithers in the dark to cover their own hides. Probably didn't want to admit they'd let a noble heir get snatched right under their noses.

Meanwhile, he'd come back battered and bruised, barely escaping with his life - and these people were acting like he'd just skipped school! Didn't they notice the wounds? The haunted look in his eyes? The scars on his very soul?!

He almost couldn't blame Claude for wanting to tear him a new one. In his eyes, Benjamin must look like the most ungrateful, inconsiderate son imaginable.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

So instead, he swallowed his indignation, shoveled the bitter words back down into the roiling pit of his stomach.

"I didn't run away from home, I was-" he began, trying to construct a half-truth that wouldn't cut too deep.

And was cut off himself like a careless mook stepping on a pressure plate.

"Silence! I'll not brook any more of your lies, boy. Or have you been studying to become a court jester in your absence? Because I assure you, a noble house is no place for such japery." Claude's face darkened further, like a storm fit to rip shingles from roofs.

"Not run away? Very well, do enlighten me. Where have you been gallivanting off to this past fortnight, if not fleeing the consequences of your actions like a craven dog? Oh, I suppose you'll claim you were kidnapped next, is that it?"

"…"

I mean, yeah. That's exactly it, actually. Ding ding ding, give the man a gold star.

But Benjamin wasn't foolish enough to voice that thought. Even if it was the bald-faced truth, saying so now - with Claude's temper riding high and that thrice-bedamned cane so close at hand - would be tantamount to suicide.

Judging by Claude's state, his anger was even more intense than before. Chances were, mixed in with that fury was the pent-up frustration of being put in his place by the old lady in front of outsiders. Claude couldn't very well lash out at her, so poor Benjamin was left holding the bag.

With Claude this enraged, anything Benjamin said would probably fall on deaf ears.

He could only hang his head and weather the storm of scolding.

Sure enough, luck was fleeting, but misfortune was the only constant.

And so, Benjamin gritted his teeth as Claude raked him over the coals for a solid fifteen minutes in front of everyone, the specifics of which we'll mercifully gloss over. During this whole process, the others in the living room were as still as statues, not moving or speaking, eyes glued to the floor, while the maids tremblingly cleaned up the mess.

Finally, after this barrage of admonishment, Claude's anger gradually subsided. He looked at the tight-lipped Benjamin, paused for a moment, then suddenly said:

"Go to the basement and reflect on your actions. Don't even think about eating until you've properly atoned!"

Thus, Benjamin was unceremoniously frog-marched to the basement.

With the kangaroo court adjourned, everyone in the living room scattered to the winds. Meanwhile, under Claude's stormy scowl and baleful glare, a maid was tasked with locking Benjamin up and led him to the Lither family's basement.

Unlike in typical fantasy novels, where basements always hide the family's darkest secrets and you can conjure demons by cracking open a random grimoire, the Lither family's basement… was really just a small, ordinary basement.

A tiny room, roughly eighty square feet, with walls of dark stone bricks, the crevices crawling with moss. And inside this basement, instead of any arcane treasures or eldritch tomes, there were simply sacks upon sacks of potatoes.

The moment Benjamin entered the basement, he stepped on a potato. Losing his balance, he went ass over teakettle into the sea of spuds.

Dazed and discombobulated, he was about to turn back and holler for help when, with a resounding bang, the maid who had led him in pulled a vanishing act. Only the black iron door remained, tightly shut, the lock snapping closed in an instant.

Benjamin gawked at the thin slivers of light seeping through the keyhole, flabbergasted for a moment, then heaved a sigh.

He slowly clambered out of the potato pile.

"Solitary confinement, huh…" He scoped out his new digs, confirming the lay of the land.

Brushing the dust off his clothes, he found an empty spot without potatoes and plopped down, using a large sack of spuds behind him as a backrest. Once he found a position that wasn't too much of a pain in the rump, he finally began to unclench.

"Phew… Well, even if it's punishment, at least I get a chance to catch my breath," he muttered to himself.

Sure, he'd still ended up getting his knuckles rapped, but hey, beats getting a face full of chamber pot any day of the week. It was just a little alone time in the clink. What were they gonna do, leave him to rot for a year? He'd probably be out in a couple days, no worse for wear.

Heck, he could even treat this as a golden opportunity for some R&R.

Come to think of it, he'd only been in this bonkers world for five measly days. Excluding the three he'd spent out cold, for the remaining two, he'd been wound tighter than a two dollar watch. Matching wits with Michelle, throwing chamber pots at sleepwalking Dicks, getting shanked by assassins, snooping around the Church for intel, enduring a kangaroo court with the Fur family… He'd sure been put through the wringer lately.

It felt… like he was trapped in some fever dream.

This new life was a far cry from smooth sailing. So much crap hitting the fan, it was like trying to herd cats while juggling chainsaws. Each new disaster more migraine-inducing than the last.

He felt like a wrung-out dishrag.

In this moment, he was starting to feel like getting banished to the basement by Claude was the best thing that had happened to him since he'd taken a wrong turn into this mixed-up universe.

Sure, the basement was small and cramped, but it wasn't half bad, considering. The dim lighting and blessed quiet were like aloe on his frayed nerves. And don't even get him started on the faint, comforting scent of potatoes perfuming the air.

The aroma of potatoes… actually smelled pretty darn good.

Maybe it was just because he was hungry enough to eat the butt end of a skunk.

At this thought, Benjamin suddenly remembered a very pressing issue. This problem had been lurking for a while now, and had already proven its devastating potential. If he let it rage unchecked, there was no telling what fresh hell it might unleash.

That problem was: he was so ravenous he could barely see straight.

Incredibly… bone-achingly, soul-crushingly famished.

He hadn't had a bite in over twenty-four hours. The fierce hunger pangs ricocheted from his gullet to his gut to his intestines, then shot right back up to his poor, abused throat. That overwhelming, sanity-eroding sensation could only be described as… slow starvation.

At this point, he recalled Claude's parting shot: "Don't even think about eating until you've properly atoned!" That ominous decree echoed in his skull like a demonic chant, repeating until it cast a pall over his every thought.

Don't think about eating…

Think about eating…

Eating…

Eat…

He was thunderstruck for a moment. Then, like a lightbulb exploding to life, he rocketed to his feet and charged the iron door, scrabbling frantically at the rusted keyhole.

"Let me out! I want to atone! You can't bar the path to my glorious redemption! If you open up I can still repent! I was born to grovel! Penance is my middle name…"

His gut-wrenching howls reverberated through the basement again and again.

Until Benjamin was so weak from hunger he slid down the door like an exhausted gecko, so hoarse from caterwauling that he collapsed in a limp heap, hacking and wheezing. But the world beyond remained deaf to his pleas. Sprawled on the cold, hard ground, he felt the tiniest bit… defeated.

He was starting to realize what a cruel and unusual punishment solitary confinement could be.

After playing dead on the floor for a while, his eyes began to stray toward the scattered potatoes all around.

They might be raw, and the flavor was sure to be a few fries short of a Happy Meal, but… beggars can't be choosers, right?

"So, uh, Skynet - any clue if raw potatoes are kosher? Or am I gonna be seeing that Happy Meal a lot sooner than planned if I chow down?" he pinged the AI.

"Beats me, chief. Never had a chance to sample the raw variety myself, on account of the whole 'no digestive system' thing. Guess you'll be boldly going where no spud has gone before," the AI replied flippantly.

"…"

If he hadn't been too pooped to pop, Benjamin would've unleashed a blistering barrage of F-bombs at the cheeky AI.

Ah, screw it! He was too far gone to give a flying fig.

He'd rather die with a bellyful of dicey starches than waste away to nothing.

Driven by the gnawing hunger, Benjamin snatched up a potato, opened wide, and prepared to take a big, life-altering chomp.

Right at that moment, a soft click pierced the silence of the basement.

A small flap on the iron door creaked open, and a pair of saucer-like baby blues appeared in the opening, boring into Benjamin with unblinking intensity, scaring ten years off his life.

What fresh shenanigans were these?