Chronic Dreamer
There was an old man living away and alone in his cottage. This day, two villagers who hated him deeply came for a visit. Without greetings, the intruders bind the old man to a wall. While keeping him as their audience, one beats the man while the other heats up a branding iron in the fireplace. They then take turns burning and beating, malicious grins pulled across their faces.
While the two took recess to gobble the old man’s food, he freed himself and fled. Unhappy with their missing play thing upon their return, the two decide to methodically destroy all the old man had. The old man did not get far before a third stranger finds him. The shadowed figure takes a cast iron poker with four prongs and impales the old man; the red tips sizzle as they pass through and out his back.
A little girl who cared for the old man hurries after hearing rumour of the two villager’s nasty plan. She finds the villagers drinking and eating in the old man’s kitchen. Without the two noticing, she rushes upstairs to see how badly the villagers had treated her friend. She finds him unmoving, slumped over with a wicked poker through his chest. She confronts the two villagers and screams at them. The villagers, mortified, flee, claiming they only went as far as poking him with a branding iron.
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