Smoke billows over the marble floors, dense and suffocating, as flames consume the only home I ever knew.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5UPVX7uj5b
The walls strain with the heat. Flickering shadows assume grotesque shapes, engulfing the gold-leaf ceilings and the gleaming chandeliers.
I always hear the shots first before noticing the blood.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSMQfVsAb6g
There was a ripping, violent noise—like the earth tearing open at the seams.
Screams cut through the corridors.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdNRLSmeVbM
The ground trembles with sprinting footsteps.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbhSb5Bs3RY
In the distance, there is the shattering of a glass vase sounding like a gunshot.
My heart is pounding so quickly it feels like it's about to burst.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGKF9jotzdK
I have coppery taste in my mouth.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvgsAIDqzRj
I do not know whose blood it is.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbsHvtGgZ4d
I don’t even know if it’s mine.
That's all I know, that I need to run.
I sprint through the smoke-filled hallways, my bare feet skidding across the cold, slick marble wet with some dark liquid.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuuidex6IvX
I do not dwell.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡltvmTxP3AZ
I can't.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPvB3aMMTyk
Reflecting back is slowing down, and slowing down is dying.
The villa, which was partly a palace of gilded splendor, is now a grave.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpIkB42FXHD
A tomb of shattered trust and shattered limbs.
I ought to have foreseen it.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2AaDnCrgsq
I would have known.
But at that time, I still held onto things such as loyalty.
Vows exchanged over flasks of aged whiskey and hushed offers in mahogany-lined back rooms.
I didn’t realize in my father's chosen world loyalty existed as just another blade—double-edged, ever so cutting.
It wasn't the shooting that broke me.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhmAR8amcHZ
It wasn't the massacre that made me into a ghost.
It was the evening before.
The evening when I was tricked into an ambush disguised as a party.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡY6uKfu3PYD
A party thrown in our honor, they said.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHdH5zJIVb9
The sign of peace, they asserted.
I recall the wine that they pressed gently into my hands.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5TFfkHSnbu
The laughter that felt wrong in my mouth.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4gVgS6lGGc
The lights blurred together, the world tilting askew beneath my feet.
Then darkness.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsFSSQ6EYhY
I slept like a drugged person, incredibly deep, unable to struggle free even though I struggled with all my might.
And when I woke—
The Lee heir's soft, low, and deadly voice, whispering it hadn't been personal.
I was simply a lesson.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzpchcR76Hl
A warning.
Even today, my body still remembers what my mind is attempting to forget.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYzZoFLQ3jj
The sensation of helplessness.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡARsREngaio
The taste of betrayal.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2OzXxR29M7
The manner in which the room whirled and my voice cracked when I attempted to scream.
They broke into everything that evening.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2txSq9twRA
My innocence.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSkoyb7TpPF
My trust.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAoRT8QjFZQ
My future.
And yet, inexplicably, they still weren’t completed
The following day, they returned to get the rest of us.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaIjTL0FIr2
My father.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡP3NFwITPwA
My mum.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCYTFSxgP6k
Our dedicated guards.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO1f4eVm8iL
Our friends.
All swept away in an explosion of bullets and flames.
I saw my father fall from across the marble hall, a neat hole punched through his chest.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaerE4bSrqj
His dreams-filled, foolishly shining eyes were already empty when he fell to the ground.
There just wasn’t time to grieve.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡs4a67mR8eu
I didn't even have time to breathe.
I sprinted until my lungs hemorrhaged.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgIHgLVmkzq
I sprinted along back streets and muddy side streets, in my bare feet, shaking, with blood and smoke trailing after me.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkZYnrFRGjo
I ran because survival became my sole act of rebellion.
And somehow, I managed.
Survival, however, wasn't freedom330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVMMGB9qFqw
Not for me.
For weeks afterward, when the nightmares still lingered, carrying an almost dull, persistent throb, I discovered that I wasn’t alone.
The baby developing in my belly wasn't miraculous.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYjEP9TdxW0
She served as reminder.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSBxCZ8k4AT
A reminder of all that I lost and all that would forever elude me.
I disliked her at first.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9BhDXEAD4O
I resented the transformation my body underwent, how the world treated me as pitiful, broken, damaged.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLPYCBWqWiZ
I despised the fact that she bound me to the monsters who stole everything from me forever.
But when the baby arrived, small and perfect, with eyes too large for her delicate face, I broke.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhwG0oKO94Y
An old, withered, and just barely alive
An unsafe item.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxZr4GGvsiF
But all the same, mine.
I named her Yuna.
Because she was proof that even among the ruins, there was still something alive.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡB8ybDIUDnR
Because she was mine.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ35Z04gZ63F
Because I would not let the Lees take anything else.
I created a new lifestyle in obscurity.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡONVnejFwzB
No longer marble villas.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡa2TTQ50NKj
No more silken gowns and crystal chandeliers.
Now, my realm was neon-lit backrooms, grimy apartments, forgotten Internet cafes.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUMiIDp577o
My weaponry wasn't guns or knives, but my firewalls, my passwords, my lines of code more deadly than any blade.
I have trained myself to become invisible.
They schooled me in cruelty without even knowing it.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvxU2OUTDkh
They shaped me into something more deadly than their finest assassins.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6SFzVycxgT
Colder than their best enforcers.
Every pilfered account, each leaked secret, each overthrown competitor—I did them all with one purpose in mind:330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEIJvu25zj3
To cut out a route back to them. To insert a knife under their ribs, just as they inserted one into my life.
The Lee family still dominates the underworld of South Korea—untouchable, untouchable, untouchable
They have grown even wealthier.
They spread like a virus.
Their transgressions are hidden under layers of excess and deception.
But I know that.
I know the corruption at their very center.
I know the right pressure at the right point makes their golden walls crumble.
And I'll keep pushing.
It starts with him—the heir.
Seong-jin Lee.
The lad that broke me.
The individual who stands poised to inherit all.
Eloquent. Aff
Covered in a suit and with a smile, concealing the poison beneath.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAfwxsECHSL
But now, I am not the same girl he harmed.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfOuo24sdfR
I am somebody else now.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgWIRW42NEV
Worse still.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡee7sWR1QBH
I will soon enter his world.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbRmh2DVAhH
Sink into his pores.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUhiipM5nbg
Smile when he does.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXVgXlRltMk
Lie when he does.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡn6XzkoyI8j
Bleed him out from the inside.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbEiPN2SE0H
I would destroy all that he holds dear.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqVHLZIXTME
I shall make him witness as the empire which he perceives as impregnable goes up in flames around him.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuuI8uZErL2
And when there's nothing left—330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡch7xc3BmuX
When the black smoke ascends into the heavens—330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡA8It1BEQZT
Finally, when he gazes into my eyes and notices the girl he believed he shattered—330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmqOnG8c5lg
It will already be too late.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiSpZDxCCYH
For justice is coming.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡngVJX7z0dO
It covers my face.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9eagfzYHQc
It courses through my veins.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡR8wTHmuls2
It pulses in my daughter's little heart each time that she smiles at me.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpgmGF3L87A
The Lee family believes they have put the past behind them.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBGWJO7mFMV
That the ghosts of their wrongdoings have long disappeared into dust.
They are mistaken.
I am the ghost who failed to stay.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2TchAdNG2k
I am the tempest unfolding over their idyllic skyline.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLD8wEBLI3l
I am the reckoning they never thought would happen.
And when I attack, it shall be a merciless, lovely devastation.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPqFACqV8vi
Symphony of revenge created from all the broken fragments they left behind.
They stole all my possessions once.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMuCt2sN9ic
I will take everything they have this time.330Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdoWMAUzpIZ
Piece by bloody piece.
