─────── 𝐂 𝐇 𝐀 𝐏 𝐓 𝐄 𝐑    𝟐𝟎 ───────

[4:36pm]

The group decided to meet up after school with Jake, to let him know what was happening and his reaction wasn't any less different to the rest.

"Why?!" was his first word after the whole explanation.

"That's what we're wondering too Jake," Sunghoon said. "It's so random."

"And to make things weirder, we all got the same message from an unknown number about her coming," Jungwon added.

Jake frowned, "Unknown number? Hold on... I got one too." He pulled out his phone from his pockets, opening his messages and clicking on the profile of his most recent sender.

He showed it to Ahyeun who was next to him. "Wait," she mumbled before pulling out her own phone and opening the text message from earlier.

"It's the same number," Ahyeun gulped, looking up at everyone.

"So this person that's fucking messing with us.. is most likely the killer," Hari slowly came to the realisation.

"That's what's most likely, yeah," Yeram nodded.

"This is actually kinda scaring me guys," Aera inhaled sharply. "Whoever this person is, is dangerous."

"We just have to be careful," Heeseung sounds calm, like he isn't getting the severity of the situation.

"More than that, I think," Sunoo says.

"They haven't really done anything yet, to be honest," Riki shrugged.

"Exactly, yet. Who knows what they have prepared for us for the future?" Yeram said.

"It's that dumb bitch, I know it is. It can't be a coincidence she's back at Pendulin and stuff begins happening," Jongseong sneered, eyes rolling back in resentment.

"Yesol?"

Heeseung turned to Jake, "It would make sense."

"She's after revenge you think?" Ahyeun gulped.

"Probably," Jongseon shrugged.

"It's been ages since it happened, if it is her then she needs to let go of what's happened. It's been a goddamn year," Jungwon reiterated.

"It's easier to want payback than to forgive and forget guys," Yeram argued. "It's just in human nature."

"Yeah, of course you'd know that," Jongseong mocked.

Sunghoon glared at him. "Jongseong," he warned. "We'd all know that if you really think about it."

"Don't be dense all the time, Park," Hari hissed at him.

"Oh, don't all come at me at once. Christ," Jongseong put up his hands in surrender.

"Guys?"

The feminine voice made them all turn back.

Jiu was standing behind them, in her casual clothes.

"Jiu? What are you doing here?" Heeseung asked.

"Oh nothing, just came to get some drinks," she replied, holding up two cups of iced coffee drinks. "What are you guys doing?"

The group looked around at each other before saying anything, so there wouldn't be any miscommunication.

Everyone looked at Jungwon, ushering at him with their eyes.

"Oh- us?" Jungwon chuckled. "We're just catching up with each other, you know."

Jiu forced out an awkward smile, not really believing what he told her but since it was not in her position to ask about it so much she decided to just go along with it. "Well, have fun then. I'll see you all tomorrow."

"Bye," the group waved at her, secretly wanting her to leave as soon as possible. Not that they didn't like her, just... they had important issues to discuss.

"Bye, guys," Jiu waved back, sipping on her drink and walking away.

They all waited until she left the café and disappeared round the bend.

Jungwon turned his head straight back to everyone, "What were we talking about again?"

"How Yesol might be," Ahyeun paused and lowered her voice to a hushed whisper. "The killer."

"But it wouldn't make sense, she just got here. And the incidents happened a while back now," Sunoo brought up a puzzling point.

"No," Hari spoke up. "No. It would make sense."

"How?" Aera was confused.

Hari looked up from her phone, "She didn't just get here Sunoo, she's been here since new years."

"How do you know?" Sunghoon frowned.

"I unblocked her socials, and she posted about being on a flight to Seoul on new years eve. Look."

Everyone stared, open-mouthed, at the image taken of the view through an airplane window. The caption read 'on my way to seoul' with the hashtags 'can't wait' and 'excited'.

"Ok, now that's weird," Jake leaned back on his chair, suddenly feeling unsettled.

"You're overthinking this, there's no way Yesol would ever be able to do something like that. She's just a weak, pathetic bitch. We don't have to worry about her," Heeseung scoffed, ever so confident that Yesol had nothing to do with this.

The others, however, weren't so sure. Expect the unexpected, that's what you have to take away from situations like this.

And as though someone was listening in and knew exactly when to press send at the right time, all of their phones pinged, just like before- one at a time.

"Not again," Riki dreaded for what was to come.

"Let's open it altogether," Yeram suggested, earning a round of nods.

They all clicked on it, the notification leading them straight to their message box and into their chats with 'unknown'.

u thought no one would ever find out what u did to yesol. hahah well the secret got into the wrong hands, and you guys WILL be paying for what u did. you know what they say, karmas a bitch but i would say i'm pretty good competition. i'll destroy you all one by one- i'll make sure you pay for every life you ruined. dana was just unlucky with her punishment, stupid bitch shouldn't have doubted me, i just have a really short temper lol. but just take that as a little taste of what i can actually do, dont underestimate me, it'll end up being your biggest regret.

If anyone wasn't scared before, they definitely were now.

Chills and shivers went down everyone's spine as under the message piled up an endless list of evidence of their deviant deeds.

From text message screenshots to audio recordings, CCTV footages, gruesome images and large notes with nasty messages piled up in a huge stack.

Someone knew their secret, and they were planning to use it to bring down every single one of them.

"Fuck," Heeseung gritted.

[26 | 02 | 23 , 00:00]

If you were new to Pendulin Academy, starting school just from last year, you'd think that the Pendulin Diamonds were mere strangers to each other, simply acquaintances at the most. 12 bright, young minds who were known as the smartest, most prestigious students of the school. 12 bright, young minds put together just by fate.

But it wasn't fate. It wasn't even a coincidence.

These 12 students played their way up to the top positions as a group. Played a dirty and foul game.

Tarnishing the lives of multiple people, even innocent ones all whilst creating monsters within themselves.

*2 YEARS AGO*

They were all friends from the very beginning of their time at Pendulin, with some rooted connections going back several years.

They were quite far up the social hierarchy, all coming from very privileged backgrounds. They all got on with most people.

But there was something about Kang Yesol that the 12 friends seemed to hate, despise to their cores.

She was significantly smarter than all of them, being in the top ranking of the entire school and having exceptional grades every round of tests. She was perfect, almost too perfect for their liking. And she didn't even come from a rich background.

Yesol was at Pendulin from a scholarship, something that was looked down upon in such an affluent society. Yet, she still seemed to have all the respect, all the eyes of the public on her. And with that her image grew, as did her family's name and they gradually became Pendulin's very own 'rags to riches' fairytale.

The coming of age is difficult for all teenagers, but it felt extra hard hitting on Heeseung, Yeram, Riki, Jungwon, Hari, Sunghoon, Sunoo, Jongseong, Aera, Jake, Ahyeun and Dana.

Being influential always comes with its ups and down.

Pressure, standards and expectations kept on piling up on their shoulders all whilst the world around them slowly began to crumble. Everyone thought of them as inch-perfect people, living a 'too good to be true life', but that was far from the truth.

Behind closed doors, they were all suffering in their own ways. Whether that be with family issues, personal ones or even the existential ones, point is they were all struggling.

And in the mind of 12 fifteen/sixteen year olds how do you overcome that? How can you soothe that damned pain?

Take it out on others of course.

Kang Yesol, to be more specific. She seemed to have everything they wanted.

The human mind naturally thinks of displaced aggression when it comes to letting out anger, which is ironic since we are all 'encouraged' to speak up about our problems and solve them accordingly.

But how can we when no one wants to listen?

No one was able to see through their suffering. Maybe they hid it well, but how far can that be successful until someone notices?

Most of the time, very far, because it's all just words when they say 'It's easy to see when someone's going through a lot' and 'It's so obvious that this person is having troubles'.

Pathetic that we're trying to make the world a better place for teenagers when all they've ever been done was outcast and neglected, stripped of their rights and freedoms.

No one cares about your unhappiness, they never have. You have to find your own feet and build yourself up. Don't depend on the worthless words of adults.

And with that idea growing in their brains, they began their evil scheme.

Eliminate Kang Yesol, that way you'll be better. Life will be better.

That rotten, ugly thought began to deteriorate through their moral compass as day by day as they made the life of Kang Yesol a living misery.

She was never told why they were doing this to her. All she ever really got was spiteful hisses of 'you deserve this', 'you're too good for nothing', 'did you sleep your way up there?', 'rank1 is no place for a cheap scum like you' and 'this is what you get for taking what's rightfully ours'.

Some from the group may look innocent, but boy were they just pure wicked.

Most were even believers of God, some even wore crosses on their rings or necklaces, yet they were so unholy.

They bullied her, beat her up, always downgraded her, forcefully cut various parts of her body and even made her eat garbage from bins outside and got away with it with some money and power tripping. Utter, utter shameless doings.

And those were just some of the things Yesol had to endure-

It didn't take long before they began tormenting her friends too. One of the most notable ones was this one girl named Kim Zia. Always by Yesol's side, they were like two peas in a pod.

That girl would get bullied too, especially for wearing these big, round glasses and being 'chubby'. This same girl was also found dead, floating lifeless inside her overflowing family bathtub a few weeks later.

There was another one too, a boy this time. He wasn't much of an association to Yesol, but that didn't stop him from becoming a victim.

Oh no- he ended up leaving the school.

The reason for his departure? 'Struggling to keep up with the pressures of school work'.

That lie was all Heeseung's doing.

And there was another girl who also ended up transferring school. Hari's mom ended up paying her parents a substantial amount of money so that they wouldn't use the term 'bullying' as her reason for wanting to leave.

Worked like magic.

And another one; they didn't even know her name but she appeared quite close to Yesol. They did horrible things to her too. None of them really knew what happened to this girl after Yesol left, but thay assumed she probably left since they haven't seen her since.

Funny story, Jungwon hit on her for quite a bit.

Never dared admit it though. It was embarrassing.

Teachers knew about everything  that they did, but they didn't do anything.

They were being kept in place with wads of cash or promises of good omen on them. Such a sick, twisted life they were creating for others and themselves.

And with their systematic ploy, they pushed Yesol out of her top spot. She fell really down. Not just her ranking, but her mental state. She was driven to madness by people who were purely jealous of her.

Yesol eventually had to leave the school due to her 'poor behavior' around others and seek some 'professional' help, in other words some time at the mental asylum with intense therapy.

Everyone moved up one spot higher in school and the Pendulin 12 were finally the 12 they wanted to be.

Maybe that's what drifted them apart, because it felt like after they all got what they wanted at the expense of others, they didn't need each other anymore.

They all stayed friends, but that was it. Some made their own little duos, trios and small groups but all had people they considered themselves closer to.

And that's how they're lives went by for the next year. All was quiet in their once tumultuous world.

Rather, anti-climatic.

Don't you think?

———

how was the chapter?