Trying to Save my Favorite Character from His Tragic Fate

Chapter 46: Then... I will be your brother!

*** Warning: death ***

Laurel looks away and stares back again. She cannot believe what she is seeing.

"Tobias? Brother? Is that you?" asks Laurel despite the answer.

Tobias smiled at the sight of Laurel with relief eyes, then he hardened his expression, unsleeved his sword. He intended to stab the person that was behind him, but a blade passed through him first. He looked stunned at the man who he wanted to kill with his own hands first. Tobias never expected that Anthony saw through his schemes.

Laurel screams like a maniac while tears flowed down her eyes. Imogen stops her from running to the horde of ghouls.

"No!!! Tobias!!! Anthony! What are you doing? Let me go, Imogen! Let go!!!" screamed Laurel on top of her lungs.

Anthony looks into Tobias's eyes with mockery.

"You really think that a person like you would betray Laurel? Do you think I am blind or what?" Anthony says while smirking at the stunned Tobias, "From the beginning, you were already charmed by that prostitute that thinks she can be equal to us, men. There is no way that you will join us with the intentions to kill Laurel and the people with her. Who wouldn't know that you joined us just to stop us?"

"Anthony... You betrayed your own comrades... You are less than a man..." says Tobias.

"Shut up! What do you know? Do you enjoy other people's mockery so much about that prostitute being our leader? Oh, wait... haha... Of course, you do! Now that we are ghouls, she would not even bat an eye to raise her sword against us! You expect me to accept this with open arms as you do? How is that you can lower yourself so much to a dirty woman that came from a whore house? Are you stuck in some fantasy romance that someday she will return your feelings? That whore? Ha! Funny! Doesn't she think she is looking too highly on herself?"

"Me? Waiting for my feelings to be returned? hehe! Right... When did I start to be like this?" thought Tobias.

---

<Tobias's flashback of meeting Laurel>

A little girl wept when she got pushed down to a puddle of mud.

"Why are you like this? I have never done anything bad to you..." Laurel cried as she was surrounded by children of her age.

"My mom says that you are dirty! That you should never have been born!"

"Yeah! My mom also said that! You are dirty!"

"Too bad, you did not die like your mom! My mom says that women like her are bad!"

A kid picks up mud and throws the handful of mud to Laurel. Laurel, in tears, tries to wipe the mud off her dress with her bare hands.

"This is the only thing that my mom left me..." Laurel starts crying even harder.

Tobias observed Laurel being bullied by the kids but was hesitant to go to Laurel to help her.

"Tobias? Tobias! I told you to buy bread! Why are you taking so long?" Catherine scolded.

"Mom..." Tobias turned around to look at Catherine with a hesitant expression and pointed towards where Laurel and the other kids were, "Look!"

Catherine looked towards where her son pointed to and gets astonished. She rushed towards the group of kids and screamed, "What are you kids doing? Why are you doing this to your friend?"

The kids, scared, ran away while screaming, "She is not a friend! She is a dirty girl!"

"These kids! Argh! I really need to talk to their parents. So cruel despite their age..." Catherine screams as she looks at the bullies running away.

"What am I going to do? My dress is dirty now... Mommy only left me this... Mommy will hate me for it..." Laurel cries as she tries to continue to wipe her dress with her hands.

Catherine lifts up Laurel from her armpits and puts her back to her feet on the road. Laurel is covered in mud, and her dress is soaked through.

"Don't cry, my child... It's alright... I can wash it for you. Okay? Don't cry..." says Catherine as she wipes Laurel's tears with her thumb.

Laurel cries even harder when Catherine sympathized with her. She couldn't stop. Catherine, seeing that Laurel's dress is soaked through, lifts Laurel up to her arms without caring that the mud could get to her clothes.

"Let's go home, and I will clean it for you, okay? If you continue to cry, I would think that you don't want me to clean it for you," says Catherine.

Laurel holds her cry when she hears Catherine's words. Laurel tries to hold her hiccups but fails as she quietly let Catherine bring her back to Catherine's home.

Tobias followed from a distance, exchanging glances from the ground to Laurel, who is in his mother's arms and then back to the ground.

Catherine baths Laurel and feeds her. Laurel, tired from crying, falls asleep in Catherine's couch. The little tiny thing looks pitiful as she hugs her knees in her sleep.

"Mom... Why are we letting this stranger in?" Tobias pouts.

"She is just a kid, Tobias. Didn't you see that she had a tough day?" says Catherine to her son.

"But you always told me that I should not let a stranger in," says Tobias.

"She is different, Tobias! There are times for caution, but also times for kindness," says Catherine after she kneels in front of Tobias to meet his eyes.

"Okay, mom..." says Tobias reluctantly.

"My son... Mommy is trying her best to help this girl. Could you also help mommy, too?" asks Catherine.

"Okay..." says Tobias nodding his head.

"My son is so kind!"

Catherine hugs Tobias, and Tobias giggles in his mother's embrace.

Laurel opens her eyes when the sun is already high up in the sky. She looks at Catherine, who is fuming from anger.

"How can they be like that to a kid? They acted like this child does not even need to come back! This is too much! I can't believe these people!" Catherine fumes as she walked back and forth, talking to herself.

Catherine looks back to where Laurel was sleeping and sees the kid already awake. She changes her mood and walks towards Laurel.

"Dear, are you hungry?" asks Catherine kindly.

"Lady... Where is my dress?" asks Laurel.

"What lady? Haha!!! Just call me Catherine," says Catherine, " Your dress is getting dried. Do you want to see it?"

Laurel nods enthusiastically. Catherine chuckles and extends her hand for Laurel to take. Laurel looks at Catherine with her big round eyes, and shyly takes Catherine's hand. They walk towards the row of laundry hung on a robe that was attached to two poles. Laurel lets go of Catherine's hand and runs towards her dress as soon as the dress caught her eyes. She bounces around excitedly when she sees that her dress is cleaner than when she first wore it yesterday.

"Well, isn't it super clean now?" says Catherine

"Yeah! Super clean!" Laurel says.

"Are you hungry?" asks Catherine.

Laurel nods timidly.

"Let's go eat then!" says Catherine while guiding Laurel back to the house.

Tobias looks at them in a corner and pouts that Laurel is with his mother.

Later that day, when Laurel was walking around the grassy hills, Tobias pushes Laurel and shouts, "You should go back home! Stop taking mom away from me! You go back to your mom!"

Laurel purses her lips and mumbles, "I don't have one."

Tobias freezes and says, "You don't? But everyone does..."

"I don't... Mommy... Mommy left to somewhere far, and she is not coming back... Aunty says that mommy left me alone because she was in a lot of pain. She says that mommy is in a better place and that I should not be selfish."

"Why is she not coming back?"

"I don't know. Maybe because I was a bad girl," says Laurel sadly.

"I don't think Laurel is a bad girl! Mom says that you are a good girl! Mom told me to be kind... So... so... You can stay with us... I will let you stay with us!" Tobias shouts, looking very serious.

Laurel's eyes glisten, and she asks, "I can?"

"Hmm! I will be your brother from now on! Although your mommy is gone, I will be your brother!" declares Tobias.

"Okay! Then I will be your sister!"

---

Tobias laughs at Anthony and says, "I already have her feelings returned... I am her big brother, and I... I WILL NOT LET SCUMS LIKE YOU GET TO HER!!!"

Tobias thrusts his sword into Anthony's abdomen and looks at him intensely into Anthony's eyes till Anthony slumps, dangling on his sword. He takes out the sword and then starts to go into an onslaught towards the rest of the ghouls despite his failing body. Imogen lets Laurel off and runs towards the horde with her.

"I don't know what we thought that we can win this second time..." Tobias laughed as he looked at the horde of ghouls that have been slew down so easily by that frightening woman. He coughs up a black substance off his mouth and crashes to his knees.