Gong Yae-hwa lowers her eyes carefully as she reviews her essay one final time.
The classroom resembles a pristine museum of modern education—digitized, immaculate, cold. Electronic whiteboards replace traditional chalkboards, casting a faint, rhythmic hum across the front of the room. Glass tablets rest beside printed literature textbooks on uniform grey desks. Overhead, long tubes of white LED lights illuminate everything evenly, leaving no corners for shadows, leaving not a single trace of warmth. Across the room, thirty students type softly, their fingertips producing a muted, rain-like patter against silent mechanical keyboards. Near the doorway, the literature teacher navigates digital attendance documents on a handheld screen, her thumb flicking smoothly upward with practiced efficiency. Everything in the room feels optimized. Everything feels controlled.
Yae-hwa sits near the reinforced glass window, her spine locked in a posture of rigid perfection. A deep, bone-weary exhaustion lingers beneath her calm appearance, visible only in the faint, dark violet rings under her eyes. She wears her winter uniform jacket despite the comfortable, climate-controlled indoor temperature, the thick navy sleeves pulled all the way down to her knuckles to conceal her arms completely. Her straight, ink-black hair falls in a heavy curtain, partially covering the left side of her face. She keeps her gaze anchored to her desktop, her eyelids lowered to a slit. She rarely looks directly at anyone. Especially boys. When the male student two rows over shifts in his chair, the plastic legs scraping lightly against the floor, Yae-hwa's shoulder muscles instantly tighten, locking into a defensive brace before relaxing half a second later.
Her fingers grip the clean white edge of her essay paper tightly, the paper creak-crinkling under the pressure of her thumb as she reread the final paragraph. No mistakes. No stray ink marks. No imperfections.
She rises quietly from her chair, the fabric of her skirt rustling faintly. She glides toward the teacher's desk, her shoes making no sound against the polished floorboards.
The literature teacher accepts the paper, her eyes skimming the neat, small handwriting before she offers a gentle, practiced smile. "Well done again, student Gong."
Yae-hwa bows politely, her forehead dropping toward the edge of the desk, her eyes fixed entirely on the high-gloss shine of the wooden floorboards. "Thank you, teacher."
The teacher sets the essay atop a stack of digital readers, her gaze softening. "Are you leaving early for the counseling appointment?"
A tiny hesitation crosses Yae-hwa's rounded features. Her jaw tightens, a microscopic twitch appearing at the corner of her lip. Then she nods softly, the movement barely disturbing her dark bangs. "Yes, teacher."
"Take care of yourself," the teacher says, her voice dropping into a register of quiet, professional sympathy.
Yae-hwa bows once more, lower this time, before turning quickly back to her desk. She slides her pencil case into her canvas backpack, zips it shut with a short, sharp pull, and exits the classroom with light, silent footsteps that vanish down the long hallway.
The hallway feels quieter near the back of the building. Cleaner. Almost too clean. The sterile smell of floor wax and industrial bleach hangs heavy in the air, masking the faint odor of damp air ducts.
Yae-hwa enters the girl's restroom and locks herself inside the end stall immediately. The deadbolt slides into place with a heavy metal click.
Only then does her rigid composure crack. Her shoulders drop, trembling as a ragged breath escapes her lips. She leans her head back against the cold, smooth surface of the partition wall, her eyes closing tightly. Slowly, deliberately, her right hand reaches over to her left arm. She unbuttons the cuff and rolls up her sleeve inch by inch.
Deep, purple bruises spread across her pale forearm like dark watercolor stains. Old injuries, yellowing at the edges like dying autumn leaves, overlap with dark, swollen purple crescents that line the tissue near her wrist. Her breathing trembles faintly, the warm air condensing slightly against the cold porcelain tiles behind her.
From the front pocket of her bag, she removes a small metal tube of prescription ointment. She unscrews the cap with shaking fingers and squeezes a dollop of clear gel onto her forefinger. Gently, carefully, she presses the cold ointment onto the center of the dark bruise.
Pain flashes across her face instantly. Her brows knit together, a sharp intake of air hiss-gasping through her teeth. She bites her lower lip, pressing her face into the crook of her elbow to suppress any sound.
[It's ending now.]
Her fingers shake slightly as she works the gel into the tender skin.
[Mom filed the lawsuit.]
She exhales slowly, forcing her frantic pulse to settle.
[The court ruled already.]
She rolls the gel down toward her wrist, spreading it over another layer of darkened skin.
[Mother and my sister are safe now.]
Her dark, almond-shaped eyes lower toward the tiled floor, watching a tiny drop of water fall from the faucet outside the stall to splash into the drain.
[A new page. For me. For my big sis. For my dear mama.]
For the first time in months, her facial features soften. The tension in her jaw unclenches. Something fragile, resembling true hope, expands inside her chest, lifting the heavy weight from her lungs.
Then the restroom overhead light flickers.
The hum of the fluorescent tubes cuts out, replaced by a low, vibrating buzz that vibrates through the soles of her shoes. Yae-hwa pauses, her fingers frozen on her arm.
A strange, iridescent glow appears against the white tiled wall directly across from her stall. It bleeds through the gap beneath the stall door, shifting from shimmering violet to a blinding, fiery gold.
Yae-hwa turns slowly, her breath catching in her throat.
A glowing magic circle forms silently across the floor tiles outside the stall. Intricate, needle-thin lines of geometric light expand outward, burning through the darkness, etching strange, ancient symbols directly into the ceramic surface.
Her pupils shrink instantly. Fear grips her slender frame like an iron vice. Her heart hammers violently against her ribs, the quiet hope from seconds ago incinerated by pure, instinctual terror.
"What…?"
The light expands rapidly, rising upward in a blinding column that fills the room.
Unlike blind panic, her reaction comes from a life taught to expect sudden, brutal violence. She does not freeze. She immediately steps aside, throwing her weight sideways away from the center of the stall, shielding her face with her injured arm.
The beam erupts anyway.
A wave of blinding white light floods the restroom violently, blinding in its intensity. Yae-hwa gasps as an invisible, crushing force wraps around her waist like an iron band, squeezing the air completely out of her lungs.
"No—!"
Her hands fly forward. Her fingers slam against the metal stall door desperately, her fingernails scraping across the latch. The metal sheet bends slightly beneath her frantic grip, her fingernails leaving red streaks as they slide down the slick surface. The light drags her backward across the wet tiles, pulling her off her feet.
Her bag falls sideways, hitting the floor with a dull thud. Tubes of ointment, pens, and loose papers scatter across the wet floor, washing out in the brilliant glare.
"HELP—!"
The restroom outer door suddenly swings open with a sharp bang.
The literature teacher steps inside, holding a plastic attendance tablet in one hand. "Yae-hwa?"
Then she sees it.
The towering, blinding column of light. The unnatural, geometric glyphs burning into the floor. And the terrified fifteen-year-old girl being dragged backward into an impossible, blinding void, her hands reaching out into the empty air.
The teacher's eyes widen in absolute, paralyzing horror. The tablet slips from her hand, crashing against the floor tile and shattering its screen. "OH MY GOD—"
Yae-hwa reaches outward desperately, her blistered, ointment-slicked fingers outstretched toward the doorway. "Teacher!"
Their fingertips nearly touch, separated by a fraction of an inch.
Then—
The light implodes.
Yae-hwa vanishes.
A heavy, absolute silence crashes back into the restroom.
The column of light is gone. The geometric burning lines on the floor vanish without leaving a mark. Only scattered ointment tubes, fallen school supplies, and the low, trembling hum of the flickering fluorescent lights remain in the empty room.
The teacher stands frozen for barely half a second, her chest heaving, her eyes locked on the empty spot where the student stood.
Then her survival instinct kicks in. She spins around, her heels slipping on the slick floor, and sprints out of the restroom into the corridor.
"PRINCIPAL!" her scream echoes violently through the empty, sterile hallway. "PRINCIPAL!"
When the blinding light finally cleared, there were no clean white floor tiles, no electronic whiteboards, and no gentle literature teachers.
There was only the humid, suffocating heat of the Southern Garden Belt.
Yae-hwa awoke kneeling on cold, wet marble cobblestones. The abrupt change in air pressure made her ears pop, and the intense, heavy atmosphere smelled overwhelmingly of crushed jasmine blossoms, hot sulfur rising from thermal springs, and expensive, heavy botanical oils. Towering stone pillars carved into the likeness of blooming floral vines flanked a broad avenue ahead, opening into expansive, landscaped public squares where multi-tiered fountains sprayed mist into the sunlit air.
Around her neck sat a heavy, cold band of rough iron—a slave collar, its dark metal biting into her pale skin.
She gasped, pulling at the thick metal ring with both hands, but her soft fingers found no latch, no keyhole, only a solid, forged seam. Around her, dozens of other young people—some in dirt-streaked tunics, others in ragged robes—sat chained together in long, miserable rows.
Her modern school uniform—the crisp pleated dark skirt, the white collared shirt, the dark navy sweater—was instantly recognized by the slave merchants of the Duchy of Thromium. In Flora, a city elevated to grand status decades ago and famous for its vast network of thermal bathhouses, perfumeries, and luxury vice districts, body types were meticulously sorted. At fifteen years old, slender, youthful, and lacking any of the dense muscular development required for agricultural labor or the deep sulfur mines, Yae-hwa was instantly categorized as high-grade inventory for the city's burgeoning pleasure and service markets.
The cultural shock was not merely disorientation; it was a psychological catastrophe that shattered her fragile peace.
In South Korea, Yae-hwa had spent fifteen years viewing her father as the ultimate terror—a violent, unpredictable patriarch whose shifting moods dictated whether her home was a safe shelter or a torture chamber. She had believed that escaping him, hiding behind lawyers and court orders, would bring safety.
In Flora, she realized with sickening clarity that the entire world of Terre was populated by millions of men just like him, men who held absolute, unquestioned power over the bodies and lives of those beneath them, backed by law, steel, and custom.
When aristocratic buyers in embroidered silk doublets walked down the trade lines, lifting the chin of a sobbing boy with the polished tip of a wooden cane, checking teeth, and laughing about Yae-hwa's "exotic northern eyes," she did not weep. She did not cower like the other summoned children huddled on the cobblestones.
Her dark, almond eyes burned with a terrifying, unfiltered hatred. Her knuckles turned white as she clenched her small fists in her lap, her body locked into a rigid, defensive coil.
A fat slave merchant with grease-stained cuffs stepped up to her line, pointing a thick finger at her face. "Look at this one! Freshly summoned from the void! Pristine skin, dark hair, complete set of teeth! Perfect for the wine houses!"
An aristocratic buyer, wearing a tunic of deep violet velvet, stepped forward, his eyes traveling down her body. He reached out a broad, calloused hand, intending to brush her dark hair aside to check her collarbone. "A bit thin, isn't she? Let's see if she has any spirit—"
SPIT!
Yae-hwa spat directly into the nobleman's face.
The wet impact sounded sharply in the humid air. A glob of saliva ran down the nobleman's cheek, dripping onto his immaculate velvet collar.
The surrounding courtyard went deathly silent. The chatter of the market died away. The other chained captives cowered, pulling away from Yae-hwa as if she were ablaze.
The nobleman stood frozen, his eyes wide with shock, before slow, red anger flooded his face. He reached up, wiping his cheek with a silk handkerchief.
The slave merchant's face turned purple with sudden rage. "You ungrateful little brat!" He reached to his belt, uncurling a heavy, leather-bound whip with a sharp crack that echoed off the surrounding stone pillars. He stepped forward, his face contorted, raising the leather lash high above his head. "I'll strip the skin clean off your back—"
"Touch her, and I will have your merchant charter revoked by sunset."
The whip stopped mid-air. The merchant froze, the leather lash quivering in his raised hand.
Walking down the broad, marble avenue of Flora was a figure that seemed to command the very air itself.
It is Priscilla Lowe. She stood 175 centimeters tall, her statuesque, breathtaking vision of gold and silk that commanded the immediate attention of every merchant, guard, and noble in the square. Her long, spun-gold blonde hair cascaded down her back in loose, perfumed waves, held in place by delicate gold pins shaped like blossoming lotus flowers. Her hourglass curves were wrapped tightly in customized emerald silk that shimmered under the afternoon sun, trailing lightly over the marble cobblestones. But it was her eyes that held absolute authority—a striking, unnatural pair of heterochromatic eyes: the left a deep, piercing sapphire blue, the right a sharp, calculating emerald green.
She stepped onto the trade line, the rich, lingering scent of rare bath oils and night-blooming jasmine washing over the filthy, sweat-stained courtyard. Her gaze swept over the chained captives, slowing as it reached Yae-hwa—taking in the girl's guarded, rigid posture, her blistered, ointment-stained fingers, and the faint, faded scar visible just above her collarbone.
Priscilla recognized that look instantly. It was the look of a wild animal cornered in a trap—the look of a girl who had been hunted long before she ever crossed the boundary between worlds.
Priscilla stepped closer, her silk skirts swishing softly. She didn't look at the furious nobleman, nor did she acknowledge the cowering merchant. Instead, she reached into a heavy velvet pouch resting at her waist, pulled out a thick, jingling handful of gold florins, and tossed them carelessly against the merchant's chest.
The coins hit his leather vest with a series of sharp thuds before falling into his open palms.
Priscilla's eyes locked onto the merchant, cold and absolute. "I am taking her. She belongs to The Sanguine Lotus now."
Priscilla did not send Yae-hwa to the lower escort chambers or the private wine lounges where wealthy merchants gathered.
Instead, Priscilla built a matronly shield around the fifteen-year-old Korean girl. Yae-hwa was assigned strictly to the inner administrative quarters deep within the bathhouse complex: sorting dried botanical herbs, measuring perfume oils into precise glass vials, and cross-referencing ledger sheets for bathhouse supply deliveries.
Yet, the relationship between them was far from peaceful. It was fraught with an intense, volatile friction that erupted regularly behind closed doors.
High above the steamy public baths, inside Priscilla's private balcony overlooking Flora's landscaped central squares, the evening air was thick with the scent of burning incense and drying lavender.
A fierce argument was underway.
Yae-hwa stood rigidly near the wooden herb racks, her hands pulled tight against her stomach. Her fists were clenched so hard that her fresh blisters had broken, tiny specks of red bleeding through her coarse cloth bandages.
"I saw you talking to that noble earlier!" Yae-hwa shouted, her voice trembling with intense, unfiltered anger. Her eyes burned as she glared at the older woman. "Duke Ferris' captain! You were smiling at him! You let him touch your hand! How can you do that?! How can you laugh with him?! He's a monster who owns three hundred slaves in the southern mines!"
Priscilla didn't flinch. She remained seated at her ivory vanity, calmly applying a specialized, shimmering magical ointment to her porcelain neck with long, elegant fingers. Her expression remained fixed in an enigmatic, knowing smile, her reflection watching Yae-hwa through the oval silver mirror.
"He is an idiot with a heavy purse, Yae-hwa," Priscilla said, her voice smooth, measured, and entirely devoid of anger. She capped the ointment jar with a light click. "And while he was touching my hand, he gave me the operational movement orders for the Royal Company. That 'smile' bought grain, medicine, and protection for every girl in this house for the next six months."
"It's disgusting!" Yae-hwa's voice cracked, her chest heaving as she stepped forward, her small frame quivering. "You're sleeping with the enemy! You're smiling at the men who build the cages! You're helping them keep this horrible, rotten place alive!"
Priscilla stopped her movements. Slowly, deliberately, she turned around on her vanity chair. Her heterochromatic eyes—one blue, one green—locked onto Yae-hwa with a sudden, sharp intensity that made the air in the room feel instantly cold.
"Listen to me, you foolish child," Priscilla said, her voice dropping into a low, terrifying register that cut through Yae-hwa's anger like a blade. "In this world, raw anger gets you put in heavy iron chains or thrown into a ditch behind the slaughterhouses. You think your loud, honest hatred makes you strong? You think screaming at the guards makes you brave? It makes you weak! It makes you predictable! It makes you easy to kill!"
Priscilla stood up. Her tall, 175-centimeter frame towered over Yae-hwa's guarded, hunch-shouldered 164-centimeter posture. She crossed the room in two swift, fluid strides, her silk robes whispering against the floorboards. She reached out and firmly grabbed Yae-hwa's chin, her fingers holding the girl's face still.
Though her grip was firm, her tone softened into a maternal, stern firmness.
"I don't smile at them because I like them, Yae-hwa," Priscilla murmured, looking deep into the girl's furious, tear-streaked eyes. "I smile at them because desire is a leash, and I hold the handle. You want to survive Terre? You want to protect the people you care about? Learn to hide your teeth until you're close enough to bite."
Yae-hwa jerked her face away, pulling back against the edge of the herb rack. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears of deep insecurity, helplessness, and frustration.
"I can't do what you do..." Yae-hwa whispered, her voice dropping into a broken, fragile murmur. She looked down at her bandaged hands, her dark hair falling forward to hide her face. "I'm not glamorous like you. I'm not smart. I can't smile when I want to kill someone... I can't lie like you do... You're going to get tired of protecting me, aren't you? You're going to realize I'm useless and throw me out into the street!"
Priscilla stared at the girl for a long, quiet moment. The sharp, calculating edge in her expression melted away, replaced by a rare, quiet fatigue. She let out a soft sigh—a sound that bypassed all her practiced charm magic, stripping away the glamorous courtesan to reveal the tired Earthling beneath.
She stepped forward, closed the distance between them, and pulled Yae-hwa firmly into a tight, protective embrace.
Yae-hwa stiffened instantly, her arms pinned to her sides, her whole body locking up in shock. But Priscilla held on, resting her chin lightly on top of Yae-hwa's dark head, shielding her from the light of the room.
"I built this entire city's sewers so I would never have to step in filth again, Yae-hwa," Priscilla said quietly into her hair, her voice steady and warm. "I am not letting anyone throw you away. Not the nobles, not the merchants, and certainly not yourself."
She released the girl slowly, resting a hand on Yae-hwa's shoulder for a brief second before patting her cheek. "Now stop crying and go finish sorting the dried lavender."
While Priscilla operated in the high-society sphere of Flora's ruling elite, Yae-hwa found her true emotional anchor deep within the dark, cool subterranean chambers beneath The Sanguine Lotus.
At one o'clock in the morning, far below the luxurious steam rooms, hot mineral baths, and hidden listening alcoves, four girls sat cross-legged on woven straw mats. Surrounding them were towering wooden racks of drying mint, lavender, and chamomile, alongside heavy oak casks filled with unrefined perfume oils.
They were the Secret Sisterhood of the Strays—four summoned Earthling girls, all near the same age, brought together by shared trauma, displacement, and a desperate need for absolute, unfiltered honesty in a city built entirely on lies.
Down here, the humid, perfumed air of the surface gave way to the cool, earthy scent of damp stone and drying leaves. The only light came from a single, small oil lamp resting on an inverted wooden crate in the center of their circle, casting long, flickering shadows against the rough stone walls.
In the surface world of Flora, they were forced to speak the guttural trade language of the Duchy of Thromium, carefully modulating their tones to appear submissive. But down here, in the quiet subterranean gloom, they spoke a comforting, chaotic mix of Korean and Mandarin, their voices blending seamlessly in the dark.
Min-ji—a sixteen-year-old Korean girl with short-cropped black hair and bright, attentive eyes—reached into her linen apron and pulled out a small wooden box. She opened the lid carefully, revealing four small, pale steamed rice cakes made from hoarded grain reserves she had managed to tuck away from the kitchen deliveries.
"Eat quickly," Min-ji whispered in Korean, her fingers brushing off a stray grain of rice as she handed a cake to each girl. "Before the night watchman finishes his rounds near the upper cisterns."
Yae-hwa took a rice cake, holding it in her bandaged palms. She raised it to her mouth and bit into the soft, chewy dough. For the first time all day, the rigid, painful tension in her neck and shoulders melted away. Her guarded posture relaxed, her knees dropping lower onto the straw mat.
Lin Mei-ling—a fifteen-year-old girl from Beijing with a lean, athletic frame from years of competitive gymnastics—stretched her long legs out, flexing her ankles comfortably.
"Sister Yae-hwa looks like she fought another war with Lady Priscilla today," Mei-ling said in Mandarin, a playful smile twitching at the corner of her lips.
Yae-hwa chewed swallows her food, switching clumsily between Korean and her newly acquired Mandarin. "She makes me so angry! She spent two full hours today telling me how to 'modulate my vocal tone'! She wants me to make sure the noble buyers feel comfortable when they ask for inventory lists! I don't want them to feel comfortable! I want them to choke on their own expensive wine!"
Zhang Wei—the sharp, analytical sixteen-year-old ledger clerk from Shanghai—let out a quiet, knowing chuckle. She reached up with two fingers to adjust her small, round wire-rimmed spectacles, which were perched precariously on the bridge of her nose.
"Lady Priscilla is playing a grand game of chess, Yae-hwa," Zhang Wei said softly in Mandarin, her tone deliberate and calm. "She uses her beauty like a shield and a dagger. She buys us time. But you... you are too pure for this city. That is why she keeps you locked down here in the herb room."
Yae-hwa's hands tightened around the remnant of her rice cake. "I don't want to be 'pure'!" she snapped gently, keeping her voice low so it wouldn't carry up the ventilation shafts. "I want to be useful! I look at Volkov's rebels fighting in the south, or even Lady Lourdes Renaud, and I see people actually doing something! I see people fighting back! I feel like a coward hiding down here in the dark while Priscilla sells perfume and smiles at the very people who put these iron collars on our necks!"
Mei-ling reached across the small circle, taking Yae-hwa's hand in her own calloused grip. She traced her thumb gently over the coarse cloth bandages covering Yae-hwa's palm.
"You are not a coward, Yae-hwa," Mei-ling said softly, her eyes holding Yae-hwa's gaze in the dim oil light. "You survived your father back in Seoul. You survived the trade lines in Thromium without bowing your head. That makes you a survivor."
"We all have our roles," Min-ji added, leaning forward to pat Yae-hwa's knee. "Priscilla protects the top. She keeps the wolf away from the door. We build the network from the bottom."
Zhang Wei reached behind her back and pulled out a rolled sheet of heavy parchment. She unrolled it across the top of the wooden crate, anchoring the corners with small pebbles. It was a hand-drawn map—an intricate, detailed blueprint of Flora's subterranean sewer and drainage network, complete with water flow directions, cistern locations, and iron grate positions. It was the very system Priscilla had secretly designed for Duke Ferris II years ago, copied line by line by Zhang Wei during her night shifts in the administrative office.
"While Priscilla collects political secrets from the drunk lords in the steam rooms," Zhang Wei whispered, pointing a thin finger at a series of red ink lines running beneath the city's main avenues, "our sisterhood has mapped every single escape tunnel beneath Flora. If Volkov's red harvest ever reaches the gates, or if the Duchy falls to war, we won't be trapped in our cages. We will guide every summoned girl in this city out through the dark."
Yae-hwa looked down at the map, tracing the delicate ink lines with her eyes, and then looked back up at the three girls sitting around her in the warm, flickering lamp light.
Her dark, almond eyes—usually flashing with volatile anger or masked by deep insecurity—filled with a profound, quiet warmth.
She realized then what she had been missing. While Priscilla was her soaring, invincible shield above ground—holding back the dark world with smiles and velvet—these three girls were her roots below, keeping her grounded, keeping her alive, keeping her human.
Yae-hwa reached over to the edge of the crate, picking up her small earthenware cup of cool herbal tea. She raised it into the center of their small circle, holding it high.
"To our home on Earth..." Yae-hwa said, her voice steady, clear, and filled with a quiet, burning resolve. "...and to the day we burn every collar in this world."
Min-ji, Mei-ling, and Zhang Wei raised their cups immediately, bringing them together in the center.
"To the sisterhood!" they whispered in unison.
Their earthenware cups clinked softly together in the dark cellar, the muted sound lost amidst the quiet rustle of drying herbs.
High above them, past the stone vaults and the iron grates, the glittering, perfumed city of Flora slept under a blanket of stars, entirely unaware that beneath its pristine white marble avenues, four young girls were silently preparing for the storm that was coming.