Eva locked the door behind her with trembling hands. Every instinct told her to stay home, but she needed to go.
In hindsight, she should have brought some form of self-defense or asked someone to come with her. She did neither.
She was too nervous to think straight.
The girl took a taxi to an area close to her destination. Then she covered the final stretch on foot
Finally, she reached the place.
An old house stood before her, looking abandoned. Piles of trash littered the outside, the stench making her nauseous.
Eva stopped at the edge of the property, her breath shallow.
She forced herself to move.
The front door was already ajar, as if it were expecting her. She pushed it open and stepped inside. The air reeked of trash; the place was clearly neglected for a long time.
Still, it didn't look abandoned; it was just very badly kept.
Then she saw him. A man stood watching her, his posture crooked, shoulders tense.
Long, unkempt hair hid most of his face. However, one thing was unmistakable: the knife in his hand.
His voice was low, "Do you remember the name… Izumi?" He asked.
Eva's breath caught. The name was familiar, but not important.
She barely remembered it... Maybe it was the boy who had refused to pass her answers during a test.
Eva couldn't remember his face or what she did as a punishment. It had happened almost two years ago, and she didn't care at all at the time.
She probably just started rumors about him, or made him the joke of the class.
For her, destroying someone's social life was as natural as breathing. No wonder she couldn't remember every time she'd done it.
"Yes, the name is vaguely familiar," she said, her voice shaking. "What does Izumi have to do with all this?"
For a heartbeat, he was still.
Then something inside him snapped.
Izumi lunged sideways and slammed his fist into a cracked mirror on the wall.
Glass shattered with a sharp, violent sound. He didn't even flinch as shards cut into his skin.
Blood ran down his knuckles, dripping onto the floor.
"You don't even remember me, you bitch!" he screamed, his voice raw with hatred.
"Because of you, my life was destroyed!"
He laughed, a broken and hollow laughter that sounded almost demoniac.
Then kept talking, words spilling out like poison.
He told her how school had become hell. How whispers followed him down every hallway. How the girl he loved started looking at him with disgust. How his friends slowly stopped sitting next to him, stopped answering his messages, stopped caring
He gestured exaggeratedly with every word, waving his knife dangerously through the air.
Izumi spoke about his tragedy, caused by the whims of a cruel social queen. About sinking deeper and deeper into a cycle of ruin, he couldn't escape.
Eva stood frozen, every word cutting deeper than the blade in his hand.
And then it hit her.
The fear. The shame. The helplessness she felt now was the consequence of what she had done in the past.
It's funny how humans can have such a distorted view of the world.
They are incapable of understanding their own mistakes without someone to point them out. Incapable of understanding others, simply because their worlds are too different.
An arrogant social queen could never understand the terror of social pressure.
Not until someone dragged her down from her throne and humiliated her.
Only then was she able to see reality.
It's curious… people carry two sides within themselves: selfishness and altruism, both born from the desire to belong to society.
Almost every decision in life can be explained by these two poles.
On one side, there is self-preservation, which gives rise to selfishness.
On the other hand, humans need a group, and for the sake of that group, they act altruistically.
However, selfishness and social status can align.
If someone is always treated as special within a group and is rewarded for their selfishness instead of being punished, the balance is lost.
No one, with the rare exception of people born with truly twisted minds, wants to be a villain.
Eva, for example, had never seen herself as one.
Even when she destroyed people's lives out of pure selfishness, she saw herself merely as an ambitious person, doing whatever it took to achieve her goals.
She had never stopped to think about how her actions affected others.
After taking revenge on Izumi, for instance, she never once bothered to check what had become of him.
He no longer existed in her world.
Her distorted pride made her see herself as a goddess among men. That belief allowed her to align her selfishness with her altruism.
But what would happen when that pride was broken?
Eva could already feel the fractures spreading through her ego, which had been nearly shattered.
And for the first time in her life, her chest tightened with a new feeling: guilt.
"No!" she screamed violently, suppressing her thoughts.
Desperately, she clung to the illusion that she was a goddess among men. That she had the right to do everything she had done.
But once an illusion is broken, it cannot be rebuilt.
Little by little, the weight of guilt, fear, and insecurity began to crush her.
Then Eva fell to her knees, her eyes turning hollow, as if she had finally noticed something painfully obvious.
She was the villain in this story.
She was a terrible person.
And this would be her end, because villains do not get salvation.
"I hate you! You ruined my life!" Izumi shouted.
He moved with a knife in hand, aiming perfectly for the fallen queen's neck.
Eva saw the strike coming and accepted her death, but…
Her body still moved, instinctively blocking the blow with her arm. She couldn't accept death, even if she deserved it.
"Die!" Izumi screamed once more.
He kicked her away, sending her body rolling across the floor.
Eva tried to stand, but she was already weak. The next blow would be fatal.
"That's enough," Shin's voice thundered through the room. He could not allow his future slave to die in that place.
The plan had gone exactly as expected. Now it was time to reap the rewards. With no fear in his eyes, he placed his heavy body between Eva and Izumi, shielding her.
"Then die too!" Izumi shouted as he charged, intending to kill Shin.
But before he could do anything, Hiroto appeared and restrained Izumi easily.
At the same time, Eva, still lost in her thoughts, caught Shin's attention.
Her empty eyes met his, and she asked:
"Will you be my master?"