Brother! You Need to Restrain Yourself!

Late at night, on the second-floor hallway.

The faint sound of running water came from the pipes.

Jordan Kent, his curly hair a complete mess, carefully dried the "cherished artifact" he had just cleaned. It was the indispensable tool of adolescence that he needed every night.

After diligently dusting the artifact with powder and completing its maintenance, Jordan stored it away in a box. Moving as quietly as if afraid of waking the rest of the family, he gently opened the bathroom door.

However.

The moment the door opened a crack, he was so startled he nearly awakened his Superman bloodline on the spot.

"Fuck—!"

Jordan cried out instinctively.

A thin figure stood silently outside the door, hunched over, with a waxy complexion and sunken eye sockets. He looked utterly drained, as though a banshee had sucked every last bit of vitality from him.

If Jordan had not reacted quickly enough to recognize the person outside as his younger brother, he really would have smashed the "collector-grade artifact" in his hand straight into his face.

"Ian?"

Jordan swallowed, still shaken.

Ian slowly raised his head, his eyes unfocused.

"Yeah, I need to use the bathroom." Even his voice sounded weak, as if he might collapse onto the floor and restart from scratch at any moment.

"What happened to you? Are you sick?"

Jordan wore a strange expression as he tucked his artifact into his pocket and looked Ian up and down. He was still concerned about the youngest brother in the family.

"I'm fine. My body's just been drained dry."

There was a trace of annoyance in Ian's voice. People said you had to be ruthless enough, and he had truly gone too hard. He had not expected the [Self-Healing Tide] skill to consume so much stamina.

His injuries had recovered, but the energy reserves in his body had been depleted. Ian was so hungry he could barely stand straight. How could he not look listless, pale, and gaunt?

"Uh..."

Jordan had clearly misunderstood what Ian meant.

His expression became rather colorful.

In the end, it settled into the awkward look of someone thinking, I get it, but I really shouldn't get it.

"..."

The atmosphere froze slightly.

"Uh... then... go wash up first?" Jordan gave an awkward laugh to ease the heavy mood, then stepped out of the bathroom to make room for him.

"Okay."

Ian dragged his feet into the bathroom. Just as he was about to close the door, Jordan suddenly reached out to stop it, looking like he wanted to say something but could not quite bring himself to.

"Um... Ian." He chose his words carefully, struggling to speak as though becoming a life mentor for the first time. "I... I know you might have opened the door to some new world."

"But... as a person, especially as a man, you need to know moderation. If you don't take care of your body now, you'll regret it later!" Jordan spoke with earnest gravity.

He truly had never imagined such words would come out of his own mouth. But he had no choice—Ian looked too terrifying. The young older brother could hardly imagine how many rounds his little brother had gone through alone in his bedroom.

Clearly.

Jordan was judging Ian by his own standards.

There was a misunderstanding between the two brothers.

"..."

Ian opened his mouth, wanting to explain, but he had no idea what to say. In the end, he could only nod as though resigning himself to fate, force out a smile, and slowly close the bathroom door.

The sound of running water soon came from inside.

Ian was washing the knife he used to "grow stronger," but in his second brother Jordan's mind, Ian was perhaps cleaning the same sort of "tool" Jordan used to train certain muscles.

"Ian really matured early."

Even a kid like Jordan could not help sighing over it. Clutching the artifact hidden in his pocket, he prepared to return to his bedroom and play a few more games.

However.

He had only just reached the stairway when he ran straight into his father, Clark, who happened to be coming upstairs. Father and son exchanged a look, and the atmosphere became awkward again.

"Good evening, Jordan."

Clark, still wearing a wrinkled suit, was the first to break the silence.

"Yeah."

Jordan nodded stiffly in greeting and turned sideways to head back to his room. Of all the children in the family, his relationship with Clark was undoubtedly the most strained.

"Wait."

Clark stopped Jordan.

"Ian's in the bathroom?"

He looked toward the bathroom, where sounds were still coming from inside.

Jordan paused and nodded in answer to his father's question. As for Jordan's somewhat distant attitude, Clark had no time to try improving it right now.

"Has anything seemed off about him lately?" What Clark cared about most now was Ian's mental health. The sight of Ian self-harming in his room while laughing manically had genuinely worried him.

Sure enough.

Living too close to Gotham meant being influenced by that damned place—though he did not know whether it was just his imagination, Clark felt that Ian's behavior carried a hint of Gotham madness.

That was completely at odds with Ian's usual image as a well-behaved, obedient good student who only cared about schoolwork. Given the situation, Clark naturally had to consider the mental illness Dr. Hannibal had mentioned.

Could it be... Ian had truly reached the point of schizophrenia? Clark's expression grew even more serious at the thought, and he tried to get some information out of Jordan.

However.

"What could possibly be wrong with Ian?"

Ian's "overindulgent" face and that shocking line—"My body's been drained dry"—flashed through Jordan's mind. He hesitated for a moment before ultimately deciding to keep his brother's "unspeakable secret."

In other words, a private matter that could not be told to their parents.

"What could be wrong with him? He gets great grades, teachers love him, girls practically want to fall into his arms ten times a day, and even those troublemakers who love fighting count on the real exam papers he sells before tests... I'd dare say not even Jonathan was as popular as him in middle school."

There was a faintly sour note in Jordan's voice. Was it jealousy? Maybe a little, but it was more envy than anything else. After all, because of his social anxiety, he did not have many friends.

"Yeah, Ian is practically a model student. He's perfect... but he's too perfect, and that's what makes it worrying." Clark mainly felt that Ian might be under too much pressure because of that.

However.

To rebellious teenage Jordan, it just sounded like his father, who was hardly ever home, was picking faults for no reason.

"If you have flaws, you lecture us. If you don't have flaws, you're still unhappy... heh, parents these days." Jordan rolled his eyes, walked around the "troublemaking" father in his mind, and headed straight back to his bedroom.

Bang!

Jordan shut the door loudly.

It was as though he were venting his dissatisfaction with his father.

Clark sighed helplessly and withdrew his gaze from Jordan. He looked at the tightly shut bathroom door, hesitated for a moment, then narrowed his eyes slightly.

The next instant.

The superhero's expression suddenly became uncertain with shock.

Light flickered in his eyes.

It was as though he had seen something utterly unbelievable.