People call him the Shadowdancer.

Never been beaten. Fights at the ring, every week. Thousands come to watch him.

The Ring.

I knew where that was. The street fights were famous in the Underground— for allowing every weapon, every dirty play imaginable. Hundreds bet money on the biggest fights.

Every dirty play imaginable.

I was planning to kill him tonight.

I can already hear the bloodthirsty roars— and it only grows as I get closer towards the Ring. My fingertips glide over the knife hidden in my waistband, another hidden on my thigh.

In my pocket, there is a handful of sand.

There is already fighting going on inside the caged Ring. I can see two figures tangled over one another, one clearly in dominance over the other. His back is turned to mine, and I watch as he rains down blows against the challenger's face.

So that must be him.

My heart starts to beat faster, from the rush of adrenaline. An uncontrollable smile starts to tug against my lips.

I couldn't wait to get my hands on him.

I'd been looking for a place for vengeance after Aemin's death six years ago. Aemin's death, which had lead to the complete destruction of my entire family.

And the person I was looking for was standing just a few hundred meters in front of me.

Then he turns, standing over the fallen challenger. His dark eyes sweep over the wild crowd, his face stained with blood.

My smile dissipates.

...V?

V.

I laugh. It spills out of me, bursting out of my throat like a choked sound. Even if half of his face is covered in red and his features have lost all the youth, I can tell it's him.

How could I forget the face of the only man who I had held onto? The only man who I'd trusted to be different from the others, as I experienced countless of them in the Underground?

I'd dreamt about him. So many nights. I'd dreamt of his hooded eyes, the dangerous, seductive aura. The smell of smoke as he spoke to me in the husky tone of his voice.

As I'd grown.

So many nights I had fantasized over him, those fantasies only growing more lustful as I'd grown into an adult.

I had prayed every night. To meet him one day.

My laugh turns harder. It wracks my entire body.

It really is V.

My laughter stops. And I look up, my eyes painted with twice the bloodlust and thrice of the shadow.

I was going to tear him apart.

"Next challenger!" The announcer screams into the microphone, and my hand raises into the air higher above all the others. The blood in my body is chilled to ice.

"Lady in the black! Come on up!"

I don't even know how to describe how I feel. It's something deeper than betrayal— deeper than hatred. It burns my senses dull.

Kill him.

Kill the man you adored so much.

The roars of the crowd grow to another level of volume as I step onto the blood-spattered platform. I don't look up until the announcer has shut the cage door behind me, and has turned the lock shut.

And if I die here today.

Whatever.

________________________________

Aeri.

I stare at her, almost mesmerized as she steps into the Ring. Her soft, round features that I remember are gone, replaced by a harsh, seductive beauty. Her shoulder-length hair now comes down to her waistline, in a dark ponytail pulled behind her.

I breathe, voice stunned.

"Aeri. How—"

She leaps at me. And I see the flash of a knife, drawing a silver arc in the air. I'm so taken aback that I nearly let the blade take me.

I stumble backwards, my back slamming into the metal of the cage wall. Then I grip her wrist when she aims for me again, angling the knifepoint to my side.

"Aeri! Stop." I say breathlessly, feeling her strength under my grasp. "Stop. Just—"

"Was it funny?"

Pain squeezes my leg, before it gives out underneath my body. And I don't even realize that she'd kicked down on my right shin until sparks of pain explode in the side of my head.

I feel the heat of blood.

This was— This was not how I'd expected this to go.

I barely avoid her blow as she swings the knife down on my face. The crowd is screaming so loudly that I can barely hear myself.

"I don't underst— Aeri, nothing is funny about this situation right now."

She lunges at me again. And I can't even speak another word as I twist out of her hungry reach, her fingertips coming at me like claws. She had never been trained to fight, but a person set on murder was more dangerous than a trained fighter.

Her blade catches on my shoulder. And I wince as it leaves behind a shallow cut, spilling blood down the cloth of my arm.

"Aeri!"

"Was it funny to play with me? When you were going to kill off my brother that same night."

She screams.

"You're the worst of them all."

Her brother.

What brother?

Tears stream down her cheeks. And I can see her slowly losing control over her own attacks, her blows becoming emotional and less accurate. I see her expression.

It's an expression I would've never dreamt that I would see on her.

"You don't even remember, do you?" She cries, the shadows deepening under her eyes. "Because you're a psychopath, V. You are selfish, and I hope you rot in hell. I really do."

"Seohan University."

And the moment she whispers, I realize. I realize everything, all that I'd been missing.

Her brother had been a victim of Seohan. Over the shock of losing her eldest son, her mother must've suffered something traumatic— had most likely died. And her father had committed suicide because he wasn't able to handle the grief.

She had been left to fend for herself at the age of thirteen.

My father had been behind the entire Seohan massacre.

She had the right to kill me.

So I don't make a move the next time she swings her fist at me. It crashes into the side of my face, and I stumble, losing my balance. Another heavy blow sends me on my knees.

My own family had ruined her.

I had ruined her.

"Why aren't you doing anything." She murmurs, her voice cracking. The bloodlust is replaced with the heaviest sorrow at her next words, full of confirmation.

"You did kill him."

"Murderer."

Her fingers wrap around my throat. My vision is hazy through the blood, but the tears that gleam on her ashen cheeks are clearer than anything.

"Killer." She repeats, pressing harder into my neck. My breath turns shallow. "Coward. Why didn't you just kill me too?"

"That day, you should've just killed me."

"Then maybe I wouldn't have turned out this way. I would've rather been the first one to go."

I feel her teardrops mix with the blood on my cheeks. And I feel like my soul might just split apart seeing her like this— this broken, this shattered.

She would never be the same again.

But if she found even the tiniest comfort from killing me, I would gladly let her.

I would.

"So just disappear," She sobs, her fingers tightening. "Just disappear forever."

"Die."