Chapter 1

My name is Min-ji. I was born into a house completely devoid of warmth.

Long ago, I was just a five-year-old girl who had already witnessed far too much for her age. Back then, I loved walking to the park. Sometimes I would examine butterflies, trying to catch one to add to my collection. It was comforting in moments, but doing it entirely without friends left an ache of profound loneliness.

My family was a well-known, wealthy dynasty-or at least, that was how it felt when my father, Min-jun, still held the status of a respected businessman. He was revered in our town. Everyone knew him as a wise, authoritative man who always carried himself with public dignity, a man who completely knew what he was doing. His business ran flawlessly, and on the surface, everything seemed picture-perfect.

But that was before I discovered he had been playing house with another family.

He had been cheating on my mother behind her back for three years. It started when I was five, and by the time I turned seven, the illusion shattered completely. Every single night, I woke up to the sound of my mother screaming from the depths of her throat. Her voice was thick with unbridled rage, agony, and the sharp sting of betrayal. From my bedroom, I listened to the devastating symphony of their arguments: the violent crash of furniture, the sharp shatter of glass hitting the floor, and the heavy, echoing crack of a harsh slap. I would curl up in my bed, hugging my knees tightly to my chest, desperately trying to make myself as small as possible.

It was agonizing to hear my mother suffer, trapped in a marriage she genuinely believed would bring her eternal happiness. She had once said yes to a man who kissed her gently, promising her the world and the devotion she rightfully deserved.

​It was all a beautiful lie.

​At one point, he had been a good man-a father who held his wife and children tightly in his arms as she read us bedtime stories.

But almost overnight, he transformed into a cold, distant ghost who ceased to exist for his own family.

My sister, my brother, and I became the ultimate casualties of his selfishness.

Day and night, we were forced to watch him bring that other woman into our home, treating her as if she were the only thing that mattered. He eventually replaced our very presence with the new children he had fathered with her.

Driven mad by the betrayal, my mother became deeply unstable. Year after year, she choked down the bitter memory of his lies. It broke my heart to see her deteriorate, knowing our father didn't care enough to look back at the living hell he had created for us.

​I thought that was the worst of it. I thought the nightmare would eventually end.

But my innocent mind could never have anticipated the night my mother finally lost control. Through the cracked doorway, I saw her holding a kitchen knife, confronting her husband as he desperately shielded the other woman behind his back. The details blurred, and the next time I forced my eyes open, my father, that woman, and the infant she held in her arms were all sprawled across the floor, pooling in blood.

​My mother stood over them like a wild animal, her trembling hand still gripping the crimson-stained knife.

​She was completely gone, consumed by terror and shock. But when her eyes slowly drifted to meet mine, a smile spread across her face-a breathtakingly beautiful, tragic smile. It was the last expression I would ever see on her face before she turned the blade on herself, plunging it into her own chest.

. . .

​"Wake up."

​A deep, commanding voice boomed from above, followed immediately by a bucket of freezing water slamming into my face. The shock dragged me violently out of the darkness. My head spun as I found myself splayed out on the icy linoleum floor of the school hallway. My entire body throbbed with a heavy, agonizing soreness.

Blinking through the wet chill, I noticed dark blood dripping onto the floor, mixing with the puddle forming around my damp uniform. I shivered violently and tried to push myself up, but a heavy leather shoe connected brutally with the side of my head. The world instantly went white, the blinding pain amplifying the ringing in my ears.

​"I said wake up, loser."

The voice spoke again, its edge growing sharper, far more dangerous. When I managed to lift my chin, the harsh overhead lights stung my eyes. Looming over me like a towering shadow was

Baek Sunha.

​"What do you think you're doing? Get up," he commanded, his tone dropping into a cruel sneer. When I struggled to find my footing, he drove his shoe directly into my stomach. A ragged cry of pain escaped my lips as I curled into a ball around the impact.

​All along the corridor, a crowd of students had formed. Fear was written plainly across their faces as they maintained a wide, panicked distance from the scene-like a pack of stray cats trying to avoid a lethal predator. And Sunha was a predator. He wasn't just a common troublemaker who bullied people for fun; he was a monster. An insatiable monster driven by pure violence, crushing anyone who dared cross his path. And right now, I was firmly in his crosshairs.

​Sunha's hand suddenly clamped onto my arm with a crushing grip, completely indifferent to my agonizing winces. He hauled me roughly to my feet, nearly causing my weak knees to buckle, before shifting his grip to seize a handful of my hair. He pulled back so hard I was certain the roots would tear from my scalp.

​"Do you think you're clever, Min-seo? You're just a stupid bitch trying to get attention with empty threats," a girl's voice venomously chimed in. It didn't belong to Sunha. It came from the girl stepping out from beneath his shadow:

Ji-woo.

​She was right there. My living nightmare.

That absolute psychopath.

​Ji-woo had spent months making my life a living hell, mocking me ruthlessly in front of the entire class. She was the one who had systematically cyberbullied my sister, posting relentless insults about our family online. She was the sole reason my sister had tragically ended her own life long ago.

​But my thoughts short-circuited. Wait... what did she just call me?

​Min-seo?

​I froze in absolute shock, my mind suddenly flooded with a paralyzing wave of confusion. Min-seo was the name of my deceased sister. Why on earth was Ji-woo addressing me by the name of the girl she had driven to suicide?

​Terrified, I forced my gaze past Sunha's broad shoulder, catching my reflection in the large glass windowpane behind him. The words died instantly in my throat. What I saw left me completely paralyzed.

​Staring back at me from the glass was a familiar face with long, raven-black hair and striking purple eyes completely different from my appearance i used to see through the mirror of my room.

​Min-seo. It was undeniably her face, but it was moving in perfect synchronization with my own movements. Is my mind playing tricks on me? Or am I somehow wearing my dead sister's face? It felt entirely impossible. She was dead. She had been gone for a long time.

​"I... I don't know what you're talking about..." I croaked out. The words tore through my throat, revealing a raw, scratching pain I hadn't realized was there.

​The only response I received was a devastating strike across my cheek. A sharp crack echoed as my jaw absorbed the impact. Sunha's face was twisted in pure fury, dark shadows casting over his features to make him look entirely unhuman. He towered over me, a predator cornering helpless prey, his hand still raised from the merciless slap.

​"Deaf, ungrateful bitch," he spat.

​In that brief, agonizing moment, the pieces of reality began to violently click into place.

​"What threat did you make?" he demanded.

​"I don't know-"

​Another heavy slap rattled my skull.

​"I said, what threat did you make against my girlfriend?" he roared, tightening his grip on my hair.

​"I don't know! I really didn't do anything!"

​The blows kept coming-one after the other-until my cheeks burned a fierce crimson and my jaw throbbed so violently the bone felt ready to splinter. My vision blurred into a hazy smear of colors. My head spun fiercely; I hadn't eaten a single meal in two days. Ever since my father's company went bankrupt after his death. I had been surviving alone in the ruins of a dilapidated, abandoned building. I had absolutely no one left in the world to hold onto.

​"Do you hear me?" Sunha growled.

​"That's enough, Sunha... maybe she just needs a little rest," Ji-woo purred.

My knees gave out completely at the sound of her voice. Ji-woo stepped forward, casually shoving Sunha aside. Her touch was purely sadistic as she reached down, bypassing my hair to clamp her fingers directly over my face. Her sharp nails dug deep into the skin of my cheek, tearing small scratches that sent warm trails of blood trickling down to her hand.

​"Cry, Min-seo... cry," she whispered maliciously against my ear. Her breath was sickeningly hot, contrasting sharply against my freezing skin. I felt as though I were being suffocated inside a block of ice. Stop calling me Min-seo! my mind screamed in a burst of unexplainable rage. My heart felt as though it were being systematically carved into pieces and thrown into a consuming fire. I despised hearing Min-seo's name leave her lips-but I couldn't understand why the reaction was so visceral.

​"I... really don't know..." a ragged gasp escaped my torn lips. My throat was entirely parched.

​Before I could breathe, Ji-woo's hands shifted to my throat, squeezing with a lethal pressure, as if she genuinely believed I deserved to die right then and there. She choked me as if she wanted to break my neck and add my silence to her collection of terrors.

​As the lack of oxygen began to turn my vision black, disjointed memories began to assault my mind like old, reopening scars, bringing with them a profound psychological agony.

. . .

​"Min-ji, you're so useless!"

​"Min-ji, don't touch my toys! Your hands are dirty, eww!"

​"It was Min-ji! She stole my toy!"

​My head throbbed to the rhythm of the phantom voices. Suddenly, I saw a memory through the eyes of my childhood self. I looked down at my hands-small, delicate, and soft-holding a single, worn-out toy. I remembered that afternoon vividly. I had been sitting quietly on the floor, watching Min-seo fight with our brother over a toy they both desperately claimed as their own. I was entirely innocent. A good, quiet little girl who just wanted to be loved.

​*RRRIP*

​An abrupt, heavy silence had blanketed the living room.

​"Mama! The toy-"

​"Mamaaa! Min-ji broke the toy!"

​I had been sitting right there on the rug, watching like an innocent rabbit. So why did they blame it all on me?! Why me? Why was it always me?!

​*SLAP*

​The memory of the sting on my delicate five-year-old cheek felt incredibly real. I had survived a living hell without a single sin to my name, only to receive a harsh strike from the mother I loved more than anyone else. All the while, my siblings stood safely behind her skirts, completely devoid of guilt for framing their sister. Their expressions had been sorrowful, but never for me. They only mourned the toy they wouldn't get to sleep with that night.

​

. . .

​My eyes snapped open, a harsh light piercing through my retinas.

​The memory had just been a nightmare-a fractured piece of a past I had spent a lifetime trying to erase.

​My entire body was wrapped in tight bandages, the deep bruises burning directly into my muscles. Beneath me were the soft sheets of a cot. I was lying in the school infirmary. Someone must have dragged my battered body here, refusing to let me die in peace.

​I stared blankly at the ceiling, my mind a chaotic mess of thoughts I couldn't format into words. I am Min-seo now. My fingers twitched, slowly curling into a tight fist. I couldn't even process the words the school nurse was saying as she clinical applied ointment to my wounds. Her face was an expressionless mask, her voice a flat, professional monotone devoid of any real comfort.

​"You're going to need time to recover. Get some rest... or don't."

​Whatever she meant by that, it faded into background noise. She stood up and walked away, completely ignoring my existence as if I were a ghost she wasn't required to acknowledge. Outside, the cheerful chirping of birds and the gentle rustle of leaves drifted through the open window. A stray beam of sunlight cut through the shifting curtains, forcing its way into the bleak room.

​Every burn and bruise screamed in protest as I forced myself into a sitting position. Slipping off the edge of the bed, I stood on trembling limbs, my body reacting to a lingering trauma. My legs heavily dragged me toward the window. From this vantage point, I could see the massive, incredibly expensive school campus-a place my family could never have afforded, yet somehow, I was here. Unwanted, unaccepted, but physically present.

​Sunha.

​His cruel face dominated my thoughts. I remembered the sheer intensity in his dark eyes as he had loomed over me in the hallway-an intensity that felt incredibly lethal, yet strangely intoxicating. When Ji-woo had been torturing me, he hadn't lifted a finger to stop her. Yet, the way he had stared down at me... it felt like a predatory fixation. It almost looked like attraction. Didn't it?

​I let out a tired sigh, running a bandaged hand down my face. The sheer misery of the situation weighed heavily on my chest. I looked back out at the courtyard, watching groups of students laughing and enjoying their youth.

​Suddenly, the air in the infirmary turned freezing cold. A sharp shiver traveled straight down my spine. Someone was standing right behind me. I could feel an immense, dangerous presence bleeding into the room, heavy enough to bury me alive. The atmosphere became suffocating, leaving me feeling like a solitary living soul trapped in an open grave.

​"Planning to jump, Min-seo?"

​Sunha was always there, hovering like an inescapable shadow. He took slow, deliberate steps until he was standing directly behind me. I could feel the warmth of his breath against the side of my neck as he leaned down to my level. His piercing gaze locked onto my profile. He reached out, slowly tracing the back of his fingers down the length of my hair as if handling a fragile piece of porcelain that belonged exclusively to him.

​"Don't bother trying to kill yourself. You're already entirely lifeless, Min-seo."

​The words sent a violent shock through my system, making my breath hitch. He knows.

He knows Min-seo is dead. But how? It was an absolute mystery. Everyone in this school recognized me as Min-seo, long before I could even comprehend why or how I was wearing her face. To their absolute disappointment, they believed Min-seo had survived her suicide attempt just to ruin their days. And they blamed me for it. It was always my fault.

​"There is no gate open for you to run through, Min-seo..." Sunha whispered, his voice casting a profound darkness over the room.

​My hands began to tremble uncontrollably. Sunha's hand slowly trailed down from my hair, sliding along my arm until he reached my shaking fingers. Without warning, his grip tightened into a brutal, crushing vice. He twisted my fingers backward until a sickening sound echoed through the quiet room.

​*CRACK*

​A sharp gasp escaped my lips as tears immediately flooded my eyes. The pain was blinding. He had broken my bones, damaged my jaw with his slaps, and now he was crushing my fingers, piling entirely new physical trauma onto my body.

​"I'm sorry about the slap," he murmured, his voice shifting into a sudden, terrifying gentleness that hid a lethal poison. He was playing masterfully with my sanity. His free hand slid down to rest heavily on my hip, his fingers digging deep into the fabric of my uniform as he nuzzled his nose into the crook of my neck. His breath made my skin prickle with goosebumps. After everything he had done to me, he genuinely expected my grace.

​And yet, despite the burning pain in my cheek and the fresh bandages covering my skin, a terrifying realization washed over me.

​"Of course... I forgive you, Sunha..."

​The words shocked me the moment they left my mouth. I had forgiven him instantly, without a single second thought. My heart battered against my ribs, racing uncontrollably from his mere proximity.

Twelve years of living in a loveless, freezing hell had left me starving. I had never known affection, gentle touches, or whispered endearments. My fractured mind had twisted his horrific cruelty, disguising it as a form of distorted love. It was completely insane-he had humiliated me, beaten me, and stood by while his girlfriend tortured me. So why do I keep craving the very hand that breaks me?

​Have I completely lost my mind to his charm? Have I actually fallen in love with the monster who wants to see me suffer?

​A dark, menacing grin carved its way across Sunha's face, a dangerous glint flashing in his eyes. Before I could process the sudden shift, he threw his head back and unleashed a manic, booming laughter that caused the nurse in the front office to visibly flinch.

​"Pathetic bitch. Always so perfectly obedient for her future husband, hm?" he mocked, his voice completely devoid of genuine amusement. There was only a sick, twisted pleasure derived from my pathetic compliance. In his eyes, I was nothing more than a helpless little rabbit begging for scraps of attention-a desperate girl who had never known a real home.

​"Good girl," he whispered darkly against my ear.

​Suddenly, his grip shifted back to my hair. With terrifying force, he violently slammed me forward against the window sill. I wanted to scream, to fight back, to tear myself away from him-

​"Let's see if you can survive this time," he smirked.

​Before a single word could form in my throat, Sunha shoved my body directly out of the open window.

​There was no protection, no warning, and no preparation. I fell through the empty air, plummeting toward the hard ground below.

*​THUD*

​A weak, pathetic cry was knocked from my lungs as my body collided violently with the earth. A wave of agonizing pain rippled through my spine, completely paralyzing me. Tears streamed down my face, mixing with the dirt on the ground. I lay there completely prone, entirely weak. Nobody was going to run to my rescue.

​Except him.

​Sunha wouldn't let me die-not yet. His sick little game was far from finished.

​"It hurts... it hurts..." I whimpered, my voice sounding incredibly rough and husky from the sheer trauma. My throat was bone-dry. Everything had happened far too fast for my broken body to keep up, and I was entirely certain several of my bones were fractured. I felt entirely numb, yet consumed by agonizing pain all at once.

​"How pathetic. Look at her... she can't even stand up straight."

​"So incredibly weak. That's typical Min-seo for you, she can't do anything but cry."

​From a safe distance, dozens of students stood in a loose circle, watching me writhe in the dirt. Not a single person moved to help. They simply stood there, hiding mocking laughter behind their hands as my head began to bleed through the fresh bandages. Sunha's apology had been an absolute lie.

​The blinding sunlight burned my vision as I lay broken on the filthy ground, my freshly wrapped wounds reopening to stain the earth red.

No.

it's absolutely wrong, he loves me. he do.

He wouldn't hurt me this badly if he didn't care.

​

​

Chapter 2

The digital digits on the cracked, scratched screen of my burner phone glowed a sharp, mocking blue against the suffocating darkness of the night.

- ​12:47 AM -

​Midnight had long since bled into the early hours of the new day, leaving the world around me entirely cold, hollow, and utterly indifferent.

I walked with a slow, dragging stride down the center of the empty asphalt street.

The neighborhood was dead. The streetlamps were spaced far too apart, casting long, skeletal shadows that stretched across the cracked pavement before swallowing me whole in the massive gaps of pitch blackness.

​A bitter, damp wind sliced through the thin fabric of my clothes, forcing me to tightly pull the oversized, dark hoodie closer around my frame. I had just stolen it ten minutes ago from a small, dimly lit convenience store I passed by on the edge of this desolate neighborhood, desperation driving my hands to snatch anything to mask my shivering form. The store had been completely empty, the cashier dozing off behind the counter, allowing me to slip the item off a low display rack near the door and walk out unnoticed into the freezing night.

It was far too large, hanging off my frail shoulders like a heavy shroud, but it was the only shield I had against the biting midnight air.

​Every single step I took was a symphony of dull, throbbing agony.

My jaw, still tender and completely misaligned from Sunha's brutal slaps in the school hallway, clicked rhythmically with every ragged breath I drew from my lungs. My fingers, crudely wrapped in cheap, stiff gauze I had filched from the school infirmary trash before fleeing, felt bloated, stiff, and utterly ruined.

The bone Sunha had twisted until it cracked was a focal point of white-hot heat that radiated up my forearm, a constant, sickening reminder of his touch.

​Yet, despite the overwhelming physical distress, my mind was a hyperactive engine, turning over the same agonizing questions, grinding them down into dust, and rebuilding them into fresh monuments of absolute despair.

​Why?

​The syllable echoed in the deep cavern of my chest, heavy and suffocating.

​Why does nobody see me? Why does nobody notice me as the real Min-ji? Why is all of this happening to me?

​I pulled the stolen hood lower over my face, my gaze fixed entirely on the scuffed, dirty toes of my shoes as they moved across the asphalt. I had looked directly into the expressionless eyes of the school nurse. I had looked into the eyes of the dozens of students who stood in that mocking circle in the courtyard, watching me writhe and bleed into the dirt after Sunha threw me from the second-story window.

I had even looked into the mirror.

The glass didn't lie, but it didn't tell the truth either. Staring back at me from the windowpane and the mirrors had been those striking, deep purple eyes. The long, flawless raven-black hair. The elegant, sharp jawline that belonged exclusively to my deceased sister, Min-seo.

​But beneath that stolen, angelic skin, I was screaming. My true soul was clawing at the inside of those purple eyes, begging for someone-anyone-to look past the beautiful, problematic facade and see the pathetic, love-starved girl shivering in the dark.

​I am Min-ji. Why am I the one trapped in this skin? Why am I the one being addressed as Min-seo, forced to take the absolute blame for her actions, her reputation, and the absolute chaos she left behind? How did reality even twist itself into this impossible anomaly? It made absolutely no sense. My mind kept spinning in circles, desperately grasping for a rational answer that simply wasn't there. Why did the world decide to erase my identity? Why did it force me into the center of a violent storm I never asked to be a part of?

​And yet, despite the terrifying confusion of my existence, I couldn't stop my mind from spinning back to the school. I couldn't stop thinking about the way they all looked at me with such pure, unbridled malice, treating me like an object meant to be broken.

​But Sunha...

​My thoughts took a sharp, volatile turn, my heart hammering against my ribs at the mere mental invocation of his name. A strange, intoxicating warmth bloomed in my chest, fighting against the midnight chill and my own broken logic.

​Sunha is different. He must be.

​It was a delusional, desperate thought, but my fractured mind clung to it like a drowning person clutching a razor-sharp blade. Sunha had beaten me. He had broken my bone. He had stood by while I was choked. But when he looked at me, his eyes weren't empty.

​He loves me, I whispered to myself, my lips trembling in the dark as I denied his horrific violence. He wouldn't hurt me this badly if he didn't care. The slaps, the broken fingers, the window... it's just his way of holding onto me. He knows I'm Min-ji. We belong together in the dark.

​I was so deeply entangled in the web of my own rationalizations, so completely lost in the labyrinth of my pathetic trauma, that I became entirely detached from my surroundings. I didn't hear the soft, deliberate scrape of a rubber-soled shoe on the pavement behind me. I didn't notice the way the distant streetlamp flickered and died, plunging the stretch of road ahead into total obscurity.

​The sudden realization of danger came a fraction of a second too late-a sharp shift in the air pressure, the faint scent of rusted iron, and the rush of displaced wind.

​*CRACK*

​A sharp, blinding explosion of agony erupted at the base of my skull. A heavy, solid wood baseball bat connected brutally with the back of my head with harsh, unyielding force. The sheer power of the impact sent a violent vibration straight down my spine. I didn't even have time to scream.

​ The world instantly inverted, spinning into a dizzying smear of blackness. My knees buckled beneath me instantly, my body collapsing onto the asphalt. The metallic taste of blood flooded my mouth as my cheek scraped the rough pavement. The wet chill of blood began to seep from the back of my head, matting my raven hair, before the darkness finally rushed in, dragging me down into a deep, heavy void.

​The transition from the darkness was a violent shock to my entire system.

​My eyes snapped open, my retinas instantly scorched by a blinding, oppressive glare coming from high above. A sharp, ragged breath tore through my parched throat, revealing a raw, scratching pain. I tried to move, tried to bring my hands up to shield my eyes, but my limbs refused to respond to my commands.

​A sudden, terrifying weight pulled against my shoulders and wrists. I blinked rapidly, tears of pain clearing the crust from my eyes, and the horror of my physical situation began to materialize through the haze.

​I wasn't on the dark street anymore.

​I was suspended high in the air, my body entirely upright, pinned and tied tightly to a massive, rough-hewn wooden pole that extended from the floor up into the darkness of an impossibly high ceiling. My arms were stretched out wide to my sides, my wrists bound securely to a crossbeam with thick, coarse hemp ropes that bit deep into my skin, cutting off the circulation until my hands turned a sickly, bruised purple. My feet were pressed together, bound tightly at the base of the pole.

​I was tied exactly like a sacrificial lamb-like Jesus tied to a pole when he died, left to hang, suffer, and bleed.

​The room I was in was incredibly fancy, carrying the terrifying, grand scale of an ancient, perverted kingdom. High above, the ceiling was lost in shadows, supported by monolithic stone pillars. The air was thick and heavy, carrying the suffocating stench of copper, stale sweat, and decaying flesh.

​My breath came in rapid, panicked wheezes as I forced my head to turn, my purple eyes widening as I took in the details of the walls around me.

​The walls were a living nightmare.

​Pinned and tied directly to the stone surfaces were what appeared to be real human body parts-arms, torsos, and legs, arranged in a grotesque display.

Some parts still twitched with residual nerve endings against the stone. Below them, sitting on the polished, dark floor, were several human heads, completely separated from their bodies, their dead, cloudy eyes staring blankly at the center of the room where I hung.

​And interspersed between these grisly trophies were hundreds of photographs of me.

​I felt a sickening lurch in my stomach as I recognized my current face in the pictures. The photographs captured me in the most horrible, degrading, and injured states imaginable-bloody, bruised, crying, captured through hidden lenses in the school hallways and the infirmary.

​Directly opposite me, mounted on the wall like a profane altar, was a massive television screen. The screen flickered to life with a sharp, static hum, displaying a large picture of me completely bare, my body trembling, while a grotesque, oversized pig mask was forced onto my head.

​"No..." I croaked out, my voice a pathetic, husky whisper that was instantly swallowed by the vast emptiness of the hall. "Please... help me..."

​My plea was answered by a sudden, synchronized movement from the shadows surrounding the base of my pole.

​From the darkness between the stone pillars, figures began to step forward. They moved with a slow, deliberate, almost mechanical grace, forming a wide, impenetrable circle around me. There were dozens of them, all clad in heavy, midnight-black robes that dragged along the floor, completely concealing their forms. But it was their faces that sent a violent wave of pure terror through my system.

​They were all wearing masks. Terrifying, scary masks designed to induce absolute horror.

​Directly in front of me stood a figure wearing a mask with a human face, but the features were violently distorted, the mouth stretched wide open in a permanent, scary look that seemed to mimic a silent scream of agony.

​To my left, another figure loomed, its face hidden behind a massive, matte-black crow mask.

From the temples of the avian skull, two jagged, crimson demon horns curled upward toward the ceiling.

The eyes of the crow mask were deep, synthetic rings that glowed a piercing red, with trails of wet, artificial blood painted to look like they were permanently bleeding down the black feathers.

​Every direction I turned, a new terror awaited me.

​Another robe-clad figure wore a heavy, fleshy pig mask. But the skin of the pig wasn't smooth; it was covered in slimy, iridescent fish skins that caught the harsh light like a rotting sea creature. Direct in the center of the pig's forehead, a strange geometric symbol was burned deep into the material.

​Next to the fish-skin pig was a figure wearing an oversized baby mask. The plastic skin was unnaturally pale, but the jaw had been completely detached, hanging wide open to reveal rows of jagged, rusted iron teeth inside the dark cavity of the scary mouth.

​And right beside it was a figure standing slightly closer than the rest, its head covered in a massive, bulbous cockroach mask. The surface of the mask was a dark, greasy brown, and it was entirely covered in dozens of small, twitching, multifaceted eyes that seemed to track my every micro-expression.

​The floor beneath these figures was a lake of crimson. A thick, dark pool of blood covered the entire central area of the room, reflecting the harsh spotlights above like a mirror of pure gore. I could feel the coldness of the atmosphere seeping into my bare feet, which hung just inches above the bloody surface.

​I was entirely trapped. A helpless little rabbit surrounded by a pack of apex predators wearing the faces of demons.

​-Hahaha... Hahahahaha!-

​A sound erupted from high above, shattering the tense, heavy silence of the room. It was a loud, manic, booming laughter that carried an absolute, terrifying sense of amusement. The laughter echoed off the stone pillars, amplifying until it filled every corner of the vast cathedral, vibrating right through the wooden pole I was bound to.

​My head snapped upward, my purple eyes desperately searching the upper levels of the room.

Enclosing the entire hall at the second-story level was a grand, circular interior balcony​. Standing right at the center of that balcony, leaning over the gilded iron railing with an air of complete, lazy dominance, was Baek Sunha.

​He had discarded his school uniform jacket, his white shirt unbuttoned at the collar, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows to reveal his pale, strong forearms. In his right hand, he casually swirled a delicate, long-stemmed crystal glass filled with dark, blood-red wine. On his face was a lazy, crooked grin-an expression of pure, unadulterated sadistic pleasure.

​"Look at you," Sunha called down, his voice dripping with a cruel, dangerous playfulness that made my heart leap in a sick mixture of terror and intense, broken affection. "Look at how perfectly you fit on that pole, Min-seo. A pathetic little martyr."

​"Sunha..." I cried out, my voice cracking, my body straining against the heavy ropes as I looked up at him. My eyes were wide with a sickening, desperate hope, pleading for him to look at me, to claim me, to end this nightmare.

I didn't see the monster who had ordered my kidnapping; my broken mind saw the only anchor I had left in the world. "Sunha, please! Help me! What is this place?"

​Sunha didn't answer me directly. Instead, his lazy grin widened into something completely unhuman, dark shadows casting over his sharp features from the lights below. He threw his head back and unleashed another manic, booming laugh, a sound so loud and crazed that it echoed violently through the room.

​"Help you?" Sunha roared, his voice dropping into a deep, commanding register that vibrated with absolute insanity.

He stepped away from the railing, throwing his arms out wide as if embracing the entire grotesque room, his gaze locking onto my trembling form with a cold, predatory ownership that proved he held my life completely in his hands.

"Why would I help you? You look so much more beautiful when you're broken, Min-seo. Look around you This is my kingdom! These are my disciples!"

​He began to pace along the circular balcony, his leather boots clicking sharply against the floor. His movements were erratic, driven by a manic, terrifying energy.

​"​ Look at me. I am the god of this room!" he shouted down at me, his dark eyes flashing with a lethal, intoxicating intensity. ​"​You think death is an escape? I will break you, mend you, and slaughter you ten thousand times over on this very floor-and each time, you will crawl back to press your lips against my boots. Because I am the only deity that hears your screams. I am the hand that molds your flesh, the master who owns your breath, the author of your pulse. I am your genesis, your damnation, your everything. Worship me, or choke on the vacuum of a world without me!"

​I stared up at him, my breath completely catching in my throat.

The sheer weight of his words, the absolute certainty in his voice-it was terrifying, yet to my warped, starving psyche, it was the most intense form of validation I had ever received.

He wasn't ignoring me. He was claiming me. He was telling me that my entire existence belonged to him, even if that existence meant dying a thousand times.

​He loves me, my mind screamed through the terror, denying the horrific reality of his violence. He thinks I'm his. He's a god, and I'm his creature.

​Before I could process the thought, Sunha's expression shifted from manic grandeur to sudden, volatile fury. With a swift, aggressive motion, he raised the crystal glass of wine in his hand and hurled it directly down at my head.

​"Worship me!" he screamed, his manic laughter cutting through the air.

​The glass cut through the empty space, spinning rapidly, the dark red wine spraying out like an arc of fresh blood. I flinched violently, closing my eyes and bracing for the impact that would shatter my skull.

​*SMASH*

​The crystal glass didn't hit my head. It collided brutally with the wooden pole just beside my head instead, shattering into a thousand glittering shards that broke apart and rained down onto my shoulder and into the pool of blood below.

​Sunha didn't care that he missed. In fact, the violence of the act seemed to fuel his mania even further. He began to dance-a slow, erratic, completely crazy dance along the balcony of the second floor, his body moving to an internal, broken rhythm as his manic laughter continued to echo through the high ceiling. He was dancing like crazy upstairs, completely lost in his own sick amusement, deriving a twisted pleasure from watching me tremble helplessly beneath him.

​Then, the people around me in the black robes began to move.

​They didn't approach my pole. Instead, they raised their hands, their long black sleeves swaying like the wings of vultures, and began to sway in unison to a sudden, terrifying sound that began to rise from the edges of the room.

​A low, discordant hymn rose from the masked crowd.

​It was a slow, deliberately paced melody that carried a profound, heavy tone of horror for my ears. The figures didn't have instruments, but their voices blended together into a deep, guttural chant that sounded completely devoid of human warmth. The melody was discordant, the intervals between the notes designed to grate against my mind, creating a suffocating sense of dread that compressed the air inside my lungs.

​"In the garden of the blind, the rabbit learns to bleed..." they chanted, their voices muffled and distorted through the scary masks. "The master carves the skin, the creature begs to feed..."

​To my ears, the music was pure, unadulterated horror. It vibrated through my bound bones, every low note sending a violent shiver down my spine, making my head throb to the point of nausea where the baseball bat had struck me. It was a funeral dirge for my sanity, a soundtrack to my impending execution.

​But high above, Sunha was enjoying it completely.

​He spun and moved along the railing, his white shirt catching the light as he danced like crazy from the balcony to the horrifying chant of his masked disciples. He looked down at me through the gaps in his fingers as he covered his own face, his lazy grin never fading, his dark eyes locked onto my trembling form with a predatory, intoxicating fixation, savoring every ounce of my suffering.

​I hung from the pole, my body broken, my mind entirely shattered, suspended between a lake of blood and a dancing god who wanted to watch me die thousands of times. And as the slow, horrifying music grew louder, filling my ears until I couldn't even hear my own gasps for air, I looked up at the silhouette of Baek Sunha and felt a terrifying, absolute certainty wash over me.

​I was completely, utterly in love with the monster who had built this hell just for me.