The Altar of White Roses

Chapter 3

The digital digits on the cracked screen of my stolen phone blinked a pale, mocking green against the shadows of the bedside table.

- 6:14 AM -

The morning brought no relief, only a cold, clinical exposure. Outside the towering arched windows, the quiet dawn was filled with the cheerful chirping of birds and the gentle rustle of leaves-a sweet, normal sound that felt like a direct insult to the freezing hell inside Baek Sunha's bedroom.

When I forced my eyes open, my body felt completely hollowed out, like an animal prepared for taxidermy. A heavy, throbbing numbness radiated from my lower limb, where a thick iron chain bound me securely to the base of the massive bed. Every single muscle ached with a dull, nauseating throb-the aftermath of my violent plunge from the window into the courtyard, mixed with the burning sting of the blade from the ritual hall. When I tried to turn my head, a sharp, white-hot spike of pain flared at the base of my skull. It was a brutal reminder of the tracking device Sunha had surgically embedded deep inside my neck the night before, sealing my geography to his whims.

I held myself perfectly still, my purple eyes scanning the space. The room was massive, sterile, and dripping with wealth, but it was completely devoid of life. There were no childhood photos on the mantle, no family portraits, none of the usual milestones a rich kid would display. It was an anonymous kingdom built purely for containment.

Driven by a desperate, hyperactive urge to escape, I slid off the edge of the mattress. My limbs shook violently. The second my feet touched the floor, the agonizing pain in my leg caused my knees to buckle, and I collapsed hard onto the icy linoleum.

Crawl. I had to crawl.

Dragging my battered frame, I managed to advance a few feet toward the heavy iron-reinforced door before the chain yanked taut against my ankle, pinning me to the floor.

Stranded there, my eyes fell upon a heavy, polished axe resting casually on a low table. It sat there openly, beautifully, as if placed on purpose. A test, my mind whispered through the heavy fog of pain. He left it here for his rabbit. He's testing my devotion, wanting to see exactly how far I'll go to make him happy.

A wild, frantic heat seized my chest. If he wanted to see how far I would go, I would show him. I would break the cage completely.

I dragged my trembling body toward the table, my fingers clawing at the polished wood until they wrapped around the cold, heavy handle of the axe. I pulled it down, the metal scraping sharply against the floor. Shaking violently, my breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps, I dragged the weapon over to my bound leg.

I didn't aim for the iron. I didn't aim for the wall.

I raised the heavy blade, my purple eyes wide and completely unhinged, and brought it slamming directly down into my own chained ankle.

My mouth ripped open in a shriek so loud and jagged it felt like it would tear my vocal cords to shreds. An explosion of agony erupted through my entire lower body, a blinding, devastating shockwave of pain that instantly shattered my vision into a million vibrating pieces. Every nerve ending in my leg screamed in a deafening chorus as the brutal impact ripped through the flesh. The sheer intensity of the trauma turned the air in my lungs to ash, a suffocating torment that made my heart hammer violently against my ribs as the severed link of the chain clattered away into a sudden, rushing pool of dark fluid.

Exhausted, gasping for a breath that wouldn't come, I dragged the heavy chain behind me and crawled out into the immense, dark corridor. The hallway was a freezing void. The only sound was the wet, rhythmic slide of my reopened wounds staining the polished marble black. My head pounded with a blinding pressure, a vicious headache making it nearly impossible to focus on the long stretch of stone ahead.

I glanced weakly at the grandfather clock standing like a dark sentinel near the grand staircase.

- 6:38 AM -

Before I could even reach the stairs, heavy, deliberate footsteps echoed from behind.

I tried to turn, but the stiffness in my operated neck locked my spine in place. Before a cry could tear from my throat, a heavy, metallic weight clashed against my skin-a thick iron collar, the kind used for vicious, untamed animals, was snapped shut around my neck from behind.

With a brutal, unyielding jerk, the chain attached to the collar was pulled backward. A ragged gasp escaped my lips as the sudden tension wrenched my neck, sending an excruciating shockwave straight down my spine.

"Looking for a way out, rabbit?"

Sunha's voice was completely devoid of his usual lazy amusement. It was pure, volatile irritation, his words laced with a dangerous anger that made the cold air feel even sharper. He didn't care about the agony ripping through my body; his grip on the leash tightened as he violently hauled me backward along the floor. The iron links clinked sharply against the marble, a deafening noise in the silent corridor, as he ruthlessly dragged me right back toward the bedroom like captured prey.

He threw me onto the mattress, the sheer force pinning me down beneath his heavy frame. The world turned into a blurred, suffocating rush of rough weight as he took hold of me completely, entirely indifferent to the pain tearing through my existing injuries.

There was no warmth in his touch, no hesitation; it was a clinical, heavy exercise in absolute dominance. When his hands gripped my waist to anchor me down, his fingers dug directly into the fresh, deep bruising from my fall, pressing the damaged muscle against my own hip bones until the breath left my lungs in a ragged gasp. Every movement he made felt like a crushing weight designed to flatten me into the mattress, trapping my limbs under a rigid, unyielding mass that left no room for escape. The coarse texture of his clothes ground against my bare, sensitive skin, cold and friction-laden, turning every forced interaction into a sharp, burning ache.

As he ruthlessly claimed me, punishing my defiance, a sudden, blinding agony tore through the absolute center of my core-a sharp, tearing barrier breaking violently beneath his weight. It wasn't the slow, dramatic pain of a storybook; it was a localized, stinging rip that made my entire lower abdomen seize in a tight, protective spasm. The sensation was sharp and hot, a sudden internal trauma that sent a shuddering wave of nausea straight to my stomach.

In that exact fraction of a second, the relentless rhythm of his fury fractured into a tense, heavy silence. Sunha's movements stalled completely. His heavy frame turned entirely rigid above me, and the sudden drop in his breathing made my heart hammer against my ribs. Through the hazy veil of my agony, I watched his face darken as a profound, unreadable stillness took over his features.

Why did he stop? My mind fractured, spinning into a wild, frantic tailspin under the weight of the physical trauma. Min-seo had been harassed countless times. She had survived a wild, chaotic past with so many men that there was absolutely no way she would possess this untouched, pristine barrier. There was no way she could bleed like this. The way his jaw tightly clenched told me everything. He knew. Beneath the stolen skin, he realized the puzzle didn't match.

My body felt utterly ruined beneath him, the raw sting of the fresh tear throbbing in perfect, agonizing sync with the heavy pulse in my neck. Every place his skin pressed against mine felt hot and contaminated, a marking of absolute ownership that ignored my trembling and the cold sweat breaking out across my collarbone. The physical reality was a visceral nightmare of friction, pressure, and the sickeningly sweet scent of his cologne mixing with the metallic tang of fresh blood on the sheets.

Yet, as my vision began to split and decay under the pressure, my brain scrambled to protect itself from the devastating truth by building a desperate, defensive fortress of delusion. No, he isn't angry because I'm a fake. He's stunned because I'm pure. He's realizing I am entirely his, untouched by anyone else. He doesn't want Min-seo anymore... he wants me.

Every painful press of his weight is just him embedding himself into my soul. He's going to cherish his secret, fragile doll. I clung to the comfort of that lie with white-knuckled desperation, letting the forced warmth of his possessive, punishing hold swallow me entirely as the world went completely black around me.

The shadows on the stone walls shifted as the hours bled away. After the long, suffocating blur of the afternoon, the icy sting of cold water dragged me back to reality. He had roughly, efficiently washed the fresh blood from my thighs and skin himself, leaving me shivering, numb, and utterly detached from my own flesh.

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