"Yes, that's right, what a beauty," A gruff voice swooned nearby. Seohyun kept her eyes closed, not daring to lift her eyelids and reveal she was conscious. Her skin was exposed to the biting cold of the freezing air, and she could feel her wrists dangling above her head.

She felt like a dead pig hanging in a butcher shop, minutes away from being slaughtered, and having her meat sold to anyone who'd crave a taste.

A score of camera shutters split in the silence, and Seohyun could only imagine the creep must be taking lewd photos of her. Her arms, limbs, feet, and even her back and waist felt bare. She could tell she was no longer in the arms of her lab coat or the clothes she wore earlier. A hushed shudder could only hold her at the thought of someone undressing her, and doing God knows what while she was unconscious.

Rape? No, can't be, I feel normal except for the migraine in my head.

But for how long can I preserve myself before-

The camera stopped making noise, and so did her heart. Footsteps sounded, and Seohyun could feel the presence of the man nearing her with every second that passed. Her breathing clogged in the tunnel of her throat as his warm breath slithered her neck like a ghostly snake. His calloused fingers began to scour over bare skin, exploring every curve and crevasse of her exposed body.

Seohyun wanted to whimper, but she bit back the tears brimming her closed eyes as the man's lips trailed from her neck down to her shoulder, leaving wet kisses. She felt sick watching Kitel being played like a toy, and she just felt that sickness intensify in that vile moment. She prayed to any divine power out there watching over her, I won't be greedy and ask you to keep me safe, but can I at least make it out of here alive? Or is it even worth living after this whole ordeal?

"Hey! What are you doing! Boss said not to touch her!"

A scratchy grunt emitted from the man who mangled her, and his hands and lips instantly left her. She repeatedly thanked whoever the second man was, even if she knew he was in on the whole act.

"Fuck off! I'm not allowed to play once in a while?"

"Stupid! We don't even know if we're going to sell her, or if Boss is going to slice her open!" Silent curses wisped and dissipated like sugar dissolving in water. Then Seohyun heard footsteps crunch away. She could finally grasp at that moment a good gist of what this shady business must be all about. Indeed, she had an idea beforehand, but the interaction between the two men had just solidified her theory.

Sex trafficking... Not only that, they must be cutting up these poor victims and selling their organs.

Seohyun finally clicked her eyes open, and she blinked several times to adjust to the bright fluorescent lights of the sick room. She needed to get out of her, fast. There was no chance she would linger in this room, and perhaps by the time they arrived back, she would already be dead meat.

Looking down at herself, she found her body clad in a cropped bralette that was certainly not hers, and a pair of skin-tight shorts that almost didn't deserve to be called shorts. It could be worse I guess... I could be naked for all I know. Lifting her head, she watched her pale wrists dangle by a thin piece of straw to a metal rod. If I can just force my hands out, it should break easily, and I won't even need a pair of scissors.

She slowly swung her body back and forth, like a kid playing at a swing. The momentum slowly increased, until finally, she took a chance as she lunged forward. She threw her legs up in the air and backward, catching the thick metal rod between them. Perfect.

She sat on the metal as if she was riding a horse and easily pulled her hands out just as she had predicted. She beamed at her success, mentally giving herself a pat on the back.

She hopped off the metal, her bare feet bounding to the cool concrete. She looked around the room, and in the far corner she caught a glimpse of her clothes all piled up on a chair. She tiptoed to the place and began rummaging through her clothes.

She quickly pulled her sweater over her head and slipped on her white sneakers. She decided against putting on her jeans since she didn't want to get caught stripping the shorts down. She had her lab coat all crumpled in her hands, and stared down at it in woe. Now's not the time to worry about the cost of getting another. Unless I want this thing flapping all over while I wear it.

She threw it back down on the chair as a final farewell and spun around to exit the room. Seohyun quietly opened the door, almost half-expecting to see someone guarding the room. Lucky, but why is it almost too good to be true?

As she escaped her room, she found herself standing in a dank, poorly-lit hallway with dirty concrete walls and flickering light bulbs flopping above. Numerous doors paneling down the walls, a pang of sadness struck her heart at the thought of each victim confined to each room. She wanted so badly to visit each one and free a poor soul that may be lurking inside. But if she got caught, then what? Her combat skills could only go so far against knives and guns.

I'll come back to save you, I promise.

Seohyun stealthily snaked down the corridor to meet the corner, her back pressed on the wall. Just a little closer... With each step, her hope grew, and she felt almost too excited. Voices then boomed in the distance.

Seohyun gasped, before sliding into the room standing behind her. She quickly closed the door, hoping no one had seen her slip in.

The room she entered was dark, pitch-black. It wasn't exaggerated when she swore she couldn't see anything except a canvas of a pure shade of onyx. A foul smell penetrated the air as if something had been decaying for months, sleazily mixed with the familiar scent of antiseptic. It was like she was back working in the hospital, but the stench reminded her of the place where she despised the most; The morgue.

Seohyun waved her hands on the wall, searching for a light switch. She found one, flicking it open. However, unlike her room, there were no bright fluorescent lights. Instead, only a single bulb came to life, glowing a small portion of the center of the room like a single firefly in the brisk night.

Seohyun approached it like a moth drawn to the light, and what she saw made her jerk forward, almost gagging at the sight.

A woman was lying on a steel table, naked and severely mutilated. Her skin was as pale as a ghost, and her eyes were wrinkled gelatin masses of murky grey. Cuts and slashes painted her face as if a child had fiercely whipped at a piece of paper with a red crayon. Her mouth hung wide open, and her stomach had been hollowed out. None of her vital organs were anywhere to be seen.

Instead, a growing nest of maggots slinked in every gaping hole of her body. The white chubby worms wriggled around in excitement across her skin, and oozed out of her ears and nose, piling like an avalanche in between her lips like white creamy pasta.

Seohyun blacked out, right then and there. It seemed like the only escape to end this perpetual nightmare.

* * *

This is the darkness that robs you of your best sense and replaces it with a paralyzing fear.

In this darkness Seohyun sat, muscles cramped and unable to move. She knew her eyes were still there because she could blink and feel them glide under her eyelids. She couldn't hear anything either. That should've brought her heart rate down to a steady tempo, but it didn't. And then there was darkness. Darkness suffocating her body like a damp, musty, thick blanket, clinging to every inch of pale skin.

A crushing pain racked just on one side of her head that throbbed like someone had plunged a machete down her skull and cracked it wide open. It made her want to pace about; she couldn't sit, couldn't lie down, or relax. But she found herself bound to cold steel, ropes searing through her sweater like a grill. and burning her ankles.

Icy liquid suddenly doused all over her from above like a rough waterfall, forcing her to gasp and flitter her eyes open. Someone had thrown a bucket aside, the plastic bouncing off the ground. "Wake up, bitch."

The voice stung her ears; she instantly recognized the voice.

"So it was you all along..." Seohyun seethed, her chest heaved up and down under the strangling grip of the ropes. She was pinned to the chair, no matter how much she tried to break free from the ropes, it was no use.

Flickering the lights open, a white and unnatural, almost dim glow was shadowed over the room. And the perpetrator sauntered towards Seohyun with light steps, a lopsided smirk coiled on strawberry lips.

She was no other than what was supposedly the loyal nurse, Kang Aera.

"How does it feel? Finally, to be squeezed in our hands like a tiny little mouse."

"Kang Aera... how could you! You lowly bitch-" Seohyun was cut off. Aera's hand cracked across the doctor's face, snapping it back with the force of a sharp blow that caused her head to reel sickeningly as it slams to the right. Slowly, Seohyun moved her head back in place and glowered back at the nurse with a newfound rage building up like swirling flames.

Her face had darkened like a drawing sketched with charcoal. The velvet, almost-obsidian blood trickled from a cut on her cheek, and some even dried at the corner of her forehead where she had been hit earlier at her apartment.

"That is for everything you did," Aera hissed, squinting her eyes at Seohyun, returning the challenging stare. Her arms held down either side of the chair Seohyun was glued to. "Don't you know how bad I've wanted to slap you?" she snickered, a grin stretching so far wide she was almost a Cheshire cat.

Seohyun stayed silent, the blood rushing to her head and popping the veins that crawled on her temples.

"It all started when you fucking found that stupid bullet. I've worked so hard to hide it; you just had to ruin me! Don't you know much shit I got from that mistake?! I was crying all fucking week because of little Ms. Perfect Min Seohyun. Oh... how the tables have turned." Aera chuckled, the spark of sin igniting ablaze in her raven eyes.

"So you were the one who framed me for Mr. Ahn's death. You idiot, you killed him!"

Aera cackled like a menacing witch at Seohyun's remark, her streaky voice poisoning the dead silence of the room.

"You've finally put two and two together now, huh? It was supposed to be the perfect revenge, but that stupid receptionist had to just snoop around and tattletale on that equally stupid crime investigator."

"Don't you fucking dare call him stupid."

"Or what? You'll cry? Joke's on you! Your knight in shining armor is nowhere to be found. Such a shame, really, he was quite the charmer when I spoke to him. But unfortunately, I just had to go behind his back and slip a little something in his suitcase." Aera waved the little microchip pressed in between her fingertips, before erupting in a myriad of wicked giggling. "Oh, I could go on about locking you in that room, how I told daddy about you, how he promised to get rid of you, and everything you've ever built upon this moment."

"You call yourself a nurse? Shame on you Kang Aera! I'm more than disappointed in you, dumb bitch!"

"Do you know what I hate most about you?" Aera clenched her teeth down, violently shaking the chair. "I hate someone as lowly as you can even think of having a chance to be someone great. So what if you're a star surgeon? You will always be an isolated, pathetic doctor. No friends, no connections, and we've finally gotten rid of your brother. It'll be just you and your pitiful self."

Aera raised a hand in the air, and Seohyun squeezed her eyes shut to prepare for the incoming impact. Seconds passed, and she didn't feel anything. A delicate finger swept across her cheek, wiping off a strip of red.

Seohyun peeled her eyes open, and before her was the man she least expected to see. Her blood ran cold in her veins, almost freezing up. She watched him glance down at his finger, before licking the blood off clean.

"You taste like AB, what a pleasant surprise, my blood type is AB as well," Daehyun laughed, before waving off the nurse. "Leave, Aera, I told you not to touch Seohyun."

Seohyun heard a childish huff, before a bang quaked the whole room, signaling Aera had left them. Seohyun peered up at Daehyun past her wet tresses that obscured her view. His endearing eyes that were once filled with so much purpose and love were all lies. The only thing that showed any resemblance to the familiar senior was the shell the cynical soul inhabited. Jong Daehyun had betrayed her all along.

Hello guys! What's up! New update! Things are getting wild now, aren't they? This is a short chapter as opposed to the regular 3k words I usually do, but that is because this chapter was so long I had to break up into to parts. So you can expect pt. 2 later in the day! Of course, filled with even more surprises for you guys. Huehuehue, as always, please leave comments and let me know your honest thoughts! And please show some love and support this book by clicking the tiny little star so it can light up! Cheers everyone~