𝓕𝓪𝓽𝓮 𝓿𝓼 𝓢𝓲𝓷

The alley smelled of gasoline, gunpowder, and something worse—fear.

Rain fell in angry sheets, slicing through the black night like knives. The neon sign of a closed butcher shop blinked erratically above, casting red flashes on the wet ground. Taehyung stood motionless, his boots pressing into the throat of a man begging for breath.

“Last chance,” Taehyung muttered, his voice like a blade—sharp, quiet, deadly.

The man beneath him whimpered something about loyalty and debts. Taehyung pulled the trigger before he could finish.

Silence.

Blood mixed with rain and flowed into the gutter like ink from a broken pen.

He turned around to walk away—cold, calculated, untouchable. That was until he saw her.

Across the alley, barely visible under a broken awning, stood a girl. Clothed head to toe in black. Hijab wrapped tightly. Niqab covering everything but her ice-blue eyes—the kind of eyes that didn’t belong in a place like this.

She didn’t run. She didn’t scream. But her eyes—those eyes—screamed enough for both.

Taehyung stopped mid-step.

For the first time in years, something in his chest…moved.

She had seen everything, and he couldn’t let her walk away.

“You lost, little girl?” His voice rolled through the alley, deep and soaked in power.

She didn’t answer. She just clutched her bag tighter and took a single step back.

He walked toward her, slow and steady, like a lion stalking a rabbit. His black coat flared with each step, blood still dripping from the barrel of his gun.

“Wrong place, wrong time,” he said, cocking his head. “Or maybe…just the right one for me.”

“I don’t talk to devils,” she replied softly, voice shaking but steady.

Taehyung’s lips curled into something between a smirk and a threat.

“Oh, you talk to God,” he said, eyeing her niqab. “Let’s see if He answers when I take you.”

She flinched. That’s when he saw it—not weakness-but—but fire behind her fear. She turned around and ran.

Taehyung didn’t chase her.

He didn’t need to.

He had her scent. Her fire. Her eyes burned into him like a curse he wanted to wear.

Minutes later, back in his armored car, his right hand asked, “Problem taken care of?”

Taehyung stared out the window. Rain smeared the glass like tears.

“Not yet,” he said. “But soon.”

“Witness?”

Taehyung lit a cigarette with steady hands.

“No. Not a witness.”

He took a drag, eyes narrowing.

“She’s a reminder. That even in hell, heaven can walk by…and not even look at you.”

He flicked the cigarette out. The car disappeared into the storm.

And across the city, the girl with the blue eyes prayed for the devil to forget her.

She didn’t know the devil had already decided—he wouldn’t rest until she wore his name.

Seoul, South Korea 1:13 AM

The city never really slept. It just shifted masks.

In Gangnam’s underbelly, the bright lights faded. Glass towers gave way to warehouses, neon signs buzzed like broken bones, and screams echoed behind steel doors no one dared to open. This was no place for saints. This was Taehyung’s kingdom.

A door burst open. A man stumbled out, crawling on broken legs, coughing blood onto the pavement. Behind him, heavy boots clicked in perfect rhythm.

Taehyung stepped into the alley, dressed in black from coat to gloves. No expression. Just a purpose.

He crouched down and whispered near the man’s ear, almost kindly.

“You thought Jesus would save you?” “You should’ve fucking prayed to me first.”

He stood, pulled the trigger, and left the body slumped like trash. Blood painted the wall behind it, dark and final.

He lit a cigarette as his men pulled up in a matte black car.

“Burn it. Clean it.” “And if any rats speak…” he exhaled smoke, “…I’ll make their ghosts beg to die again.”

Meanwhile, College Dormitories

It was peaceful.

Inside a fourth-floor room, a girl knelt in sujood, forehead pressed against the prayer mat, whispering Arabic verses that echoed against her soul.

Dua.

Her room was small—books everywhere, a warm cream hijab hanging from a hook, a Qur’an open beside a flickering candle. Outside, sirens screamed through distant streets. But inside, it was light.

She raised her head and completed her prayer, whispering softly, “Ya Allah... protect me from the evil I cannot see, and the evil that sees me.”

She stared at the night sky outside her window. Cold wind pushed the curtain slightly, and for a moment, her heart felt tight.

Like someone… somewhere… was watching her.

Earlier That Night

Dua had been on her way back from a late class when the storm began. Her umbrella had broken, and she’d taken a shortcut through an alley. That’s when she heard the gunshot.

She didn’t mean to look. But curiosity had cursed her.

She saw him—the man in black, standing over a corpse like he’d killed a mosquito. Cold eyes. Unbothered by blood. Alive in darkness.

Their eyes met.

Just for a second.

She saw a demon dressed like a man. And he saw light behind a veil of black.

Now

Taehyung sat in his mansion’s cathedral-sized living room. The fireplace crackled. His weapons were laid out on the glass table. A glass of whiskey balanced in his hand, untouched.

He couldn’t get her eyes out of his head.

That veil. That fire behind her fear.

“Who the fuck walks through a war zone dressed like salvation?” His jaw clenched.

“She saw me. She looked at me like I was... filth.” He remembered her lips moving—she had been praying.

Praying. While looking at him.

That pissed him off more than anything.

“I burn men alive, and she has the nerve to pray like I’m not even real?” “Fucking delusional…”

But the truth is — he hated how she made him feel. Like maybe... just maybe… he wasn’t untouchable.

Back in Her Dorm

Dua sat by her window, holding her Qur’an to her chest.

“Astaghfirullah…” she whispered.

She didn’t know why her heart beat so fast. She didn’t even see his face properly. But the aura she felt—cold, evil, magnetic—was something she couldn’t shake.

“Ya Allah… I don’t want to cross paths with that man again.”

She didn’t know that somewhere, not far away, that very man had already decided…

“I’ll find her. Not now. But someday.”

“Let’s see if her God protects her from me.”