“You don’t look happy to be here…” Zelo turned to me, smiling half-heartedly at me.

"No Zelo, I-"

“I’m sorry hyung… I brought us here for nothing…. I couldn’t help but feel we should help Youngjae…” I nodded, petting my little brother’s hair. Even though he was so childish and mischievous, he still had a soft and kind heart-like the time he nursed a puppy from the streets back to health after seeing it fainted along the pavements. My naughty little brother was always like this.

“And we’re getting a very big scolding from father for coming here without him knowing right?”

“Of course we are… Why didn’t I know he would obviously tell father about our plan to sneak here?”

 Zelo nodded and I sighed-I have two things on my mind.

"Get your tomatoes for the next item! Tomatoes for the people of Mato! It’s free, you can use other things later too!" I frowned, wondering why there were a lot of people rushing for the man with the basket of tomatoes. Zelo just merely looked at them, looking at the tomatoes they had in their hands.

"Cherry tomatoes are better than those red tomatoes," I chuckled and groaning to myself when I heard the circus music being played louder in the tent.

“Argh, the circus music…”I was rubbing my temples, wondering why I was thinking about that mysterious person so much and found the lively circus music annoying- I rarely would find things annoying to me. I took a deep breath; the music reminded me of the signboard I saw at the entrance of the tent earlier. Something in my mind clicked and turned to Zelo, mirroring my expression as he looked at me with his eyes wide open and gasped softly.

“Zelo are we going to -“

“I think so, we never seen him-“

“Everyone gather around!” The short man with the top hat interrupted us, walking around the ring with a smile as he spinned his cane around like a professional. Once he got the audience’s attention, he slammed his cane on the floor, looking sinisterly at us.

“I am very sure you guys would truly love this segment, the Mysterious Man!” he spoke and looked behind, seeing his two burly men shoving a hooded man to the ring. His hands were chained yet his leg wasn’t chained with the black iron ball this time around.

He went closer to the man, glaring at him before looking at the crowd getting a round of applause from them. Zelo and I didn’t clap our hands- we were too surprised and were anticipating what the ringmaster would do next as he harshly shoved the man to the ground, earning some cheer from the crowd.

“Youngjae-” I muttered and was able to control myself from going out to the masked man, knowing well I needed to protect my identity from the mass of crowd here. It would be a disaster if they knew the princes were here, girls would flock over us and the men and women would keep bowing at us, wanting to talk to us eagerly. It would be a total chaos if they knew- we weren’t suppose to be in public all alone without any bodyguards. But I felt angry; I wasn’t able to help the poor Youngjae getting bullied by the ringmaster. Zelo clenched his fists, trying to calm his anger down when Youngjae was pushed to the ground.

“Prepare yourselves, people of Mato, the entertainment you all had been waiting for so long.  We present you… the Mysterious Boy- the Outcast!” All of them had their evil smirks on, getting their tomatoes ready to be thrown at the poor man on the ring except for us who remained still in their seats. The ringmaster smirked at us, his large hands gripping tightly onto Youngjae’s mask tightly. Without any warning, the mask pulled off, revealing Youngjae’s real face.

Everyone in the tent fell silent, taking in the revelation of Youngjae’s face while being all prepared with their tomatoes in hand. My eyes scanned Youngjae up and down, watching him squirming uncomfortably on the stage as the crowd nearest to the stage started to grumble to each other.
 

“You look so ugly, horrible!”
 

“You scum! You would have some tomatoes in your face! Haha outcast!”
 

“Disgusting outcast!”

"A Beast!"

"You outcast! Ugly bastard!"

I couldn’t believe what they were talking about. What I thought of Youngjae was completely the opposite of what the crowd had spoken to him. I couldn’t believe how unreal Youngjae looked without the mask. Short jet-black hair with a fringe that suited him well, his cute cheeks, flawless milky white skin and his sparkling beautiful black doe eyes that took my breath away. I blinked at him, Youngjae looked extremely pretty, handsome, beautiful…. and fluffy. I watched him scoot a little away from the crowd, eyes closed as he trembled with fear at the crowd glaring at him yet I couldn’t move, I couldn’t take my eyes off Youngjae. 

“Youngjae,” My breathing hitched.

“How are you ugly when you look so flawless to me?” I thought to myself, standing up from my seat as I watched the people rushing to the front row seats and mercilessly throwing the tomatoes at the poor Youngjae standing on the stage. I looked around, clenching my fists as I watched almost the whole audience throw the red tomatoes and laugh at the  red Youngjae. He suddenly fell to the ground after taking most of the many hits on him and he was covered with tomato juice and skin and was trying to block the tomatoes from hitting him by putting his feet into his chest and placing his chained hands out to cover the tomatoes from hitting his face.

Youngjae pulled his hands away, softly begging the audience to stop throwing at him and noticed that Zelo and I were the only ones left at the back seats and were not hitting him. He gasped when I caught his black eyes staring at me, whimpering as a tomato hit him and scooted further away from the audience.

"What? No," I gasped.

"Yeah, out with you outcasts coming into our country!"

"Get out of here you little piece of !"

They threw the tomatoes as well as those harmful remarks to Youngjae who cowered and let them throw those things at him. I shook my head, was this how the people would treat an outcast? Who was also a human like them?

"Youngjae…" I called out breathlessly, watching the ringmaster laugh at the miserable boy sitting on the floor. I shook my head, wanting this to end yet I couldn’t do anything to stop them to stop them from hitting the poor Youngjae. I felt someone tugging my shoulders and I turned, looking at the sad Zelo next to me.

"W-We can’t help him…can we?"

"W-We…" I was at lost for words before hearing ringmaster clapping to get everyone’s attention. He smiled and clapped at us before forcing Youngjae up on his feet with a hard pull on his shirt. He bowed at us, smiling his evil smile before glaring at the tomato-covered Youngjae and pointed the way out of stage. Youngjae gave him an obsequious nod before making his way out of the stage but slipped on the tomatoes stains on the floor and fell down. The ringmaster wasn’t happy with this and shoved him out, Youngjae tumbling out of the stage and getting up on his feet weakly before slowly walking off from the stage.

"Youngjae…I-"

"H-hyung… I-Is he going back to his cage?"

"Y-Yeah, he is…" I nodded, slowly walking down from the platform with Zelo following behind him and I saw a man among the crowd taking one of his shoes off.

"Eat my shoe you outcast!" I saw a flying brown shoe being thrown at Youngjae, who was close to getting out of the tent. It flew and hit his pretty face, causing him to cry out in pain. I gasped, watching Youngjae covering his red face while the whole crowd cheered for the short man who threw the shoe to him. I turned to Zelo, who stared emotionlessly at the happy crowd clapping and the man bowing graciously at them. He looked at me sadly, as if begging me to do something, to help the poor Youngjae out. I glanced back at Youngjae, widening my eyes as I noticed he pulled his hands apart a little to look at him-I could see the glistened tears on his cheek and his mouth quivering as he sobbed quietly on stage.

"Now you little outcast, get out of the tent. A shoe only hit your face, and you’re crying? You are weak aren’t you?" The ringmaster spoke, smiling as the crowd cheered for him before ‘boo’ing and frowning at Youngjae leaving the tent quickly. I glared at the crowd laughing at Youngjae before running off hurriedly after him, hearing Zelo’s footsteps behind me as I went off. We looked around, feeling lost when we couldn’t see Youngjae at all. I went further in, only to pull Zelo with me to stand quietly behind the tent. I saw the two bodyguards who were holding Youngjae earlier with him again, pouring water on him to wash him. I held my breath as I peeked again, carefully covering Zelo’s mouth to make sure he doesn’t make a sound.

"Poor Youngjae…" One of them said who went closer to Youngjae and removed his clothes quickly to pour water on him again. I looked away, my cheeks heating up when I saw the image of the Youngjae looking at the bodyguards with his cute face.

"Hyung?" Zelo frowned at me, mumbling into my hand. "Why are your cheeks red?"

"W-What? T-They are not," I whispered harshly, shaking my head at him. "I-It must be the heat."

Zelo looked at me, amused by my excuse. He nodded at me yet he was still looking at me skeptically.

"Really? Then my cheeks should be red too-"

"Can we not argue about this?" I replied and peeked at them again, glad or maybe not glad that Youngjae was cleaned up and had some new old clothes on. I leaned closer to them, hearing what they were talking about.

"Youngjae, wow, they threw a shoe at you," The same bodyguard spoke. "I can’t believe it, you already had a rock thrown at you before, this Mato country is insane…"

"Hey, please don’t talk about this. Youngjae hyung needs to relax for now before getting in his cage again." The shorter one of the two bodyguards spoke up and stood beside Youngjae.

"You want to stay with him I see, yeah sure. Man, sorry about that. I wanted to make him feel better; I just failed at that. I still can’t believe the ringmaster would do this to Youngjae." The bodyguard walked away dejectedly before waving at Youngjae who gave him a small smile in return.

"It’s okay hyung, I will get by this, thank you for worrying about me but you don’t need to." The bodyguard nodded, muttering to himself as he walked away from the two.

"That Youngjae is a good and nice kid, I hate that this country would want to throw and hurt people like him for fun, this is insane really," I sighed to myself, feeling ashamed that my own people would do such a thing to Youngjae. I waited for him to walk away before peeking back, noticing the other bodyguard was taking Youngjae back to his tent.

"Well, he seemed nice," Zelo spoke, gesturing to the tall bodyguard who walked away and I pulled him towards Youngjae’s tent, leaning against the tent as we eavesdropped their conversation inside the tent.

"Youngjae hyung, you can’t stay like this!"

"Jonguppie, I told you to not talk about this right? It’s okay, I am fine."

“But hyung!”

"Jonguppie, I understand that I am useless as a human being, that’s why I am here-"

"No hyung! Don’t say that, you’re not useless! You took care of me!"

"I have to accept what I am, Jonguppie. I am nothing but an ugly beast aren’t I?" I shook my head. Youngjae was ugly?

"Hyung-"

"I am ugly Jonguppie…..a-at least to the people in Mato I am" I couldn’t take anymore of Youngjae thinking he was ugly, even to me and busted into the tent along with Zelo. I frowned at the man in the cage, ignoring the short bodyguard who gaped at Zelo and me.

"Youngjae, stop saying that! You’re not ugly at all!" I shouted to him, watching Youngjae stare at me. It was as if he was in a trance-his pretty doe eyes were glued onto me, not believing that I was here again to see him before shaking his head aggressively at me.

"I..W-Why…A-Are …I-"

"I am sorry but you’re not allowed to be here!" The bodyguard spoke up, frowning at me and gestured me to the door.

"Says who?" I retorted back, glaring at the small eyed guard intensely as Zelo remained behind me.

"Me," The ringmaster appeared suddenly, grabbing at Zelo and I before dragging us out to the yellow tent again. I stared at Youngjae as I got dragged out, watching him panic as he looked at us and felt a little happy inside to see him look so worried for us and I heard him mumbled a soft "They are going to be alright right?" to the bodyguard as we left. I had a small smile on my face as he pulled us out, only to be shocked to see Jaesuk hyung, with his arms folded and feet tapping to the ground, waiting for us at the signboard.

"Here, the two boys" The ringmaster smiled and waved goodbye to us after leaving us at the entrance of the yellow circus with Jaesuk hyung. We both looked at each other before turning to our take caretaker unwillingly, smiling forcefully at the disappointed look he had.

"Hey Jaesuk hyung."

"Let’s go back, it’s already so late and you two are still here! Aish, you two. Come along now, you two need to talk to your father about this." We both pouted at him, trying to look innocent to Jaesuk but he was not having any of this and pushed us towards the dark blue car. We got in the car, three of us stayed silent during the car ride. I let out a soft sigh.

Was Youngjae going to be alright?

The ringmaster went back to the tent, whispering to the bodyguard to leave them alone. He went off reluctantly, giving Youngjae a worried look before leaving the tent. The ringmaster smiled at Youngjae, leaning down as he scanned the scared man inside the cage. Youngjae bit his lips, watching the ringmaster pulling out his traitorous whip out.

"Hello Youngjae?" Youngjae stared up at the ringmaster.

"You know you’re not suppose to talk to stranger again right? Be a good boy okay?" He whipped the cage thrice, smiling sadistically at Youngjae whimpering and cowering further into the cage.

"Now, would you talk to them if they come back again, Youngjae? Or if any outsider talks to?"

"N-No…I-" The whip hit his cage again and he nodded quickly, staring at the ringmaster with teary eyes.

"I-I won’t!" The ringmaster smiled.

"Good boy, Youngjae…"

Note:

Hello, here's an update^^

sorry it took a long time, i have the next chapter ready so please wait for me!!;-;

I am happy I found two betas^^!!!!

Hope you guys like it! Thank for for the comments and subsribe;-; and upvotes>.