Arin did not know how much time had passed before she finally regained consciousness.

The first thing she felt was the shooting pain in her arm where she was injected. Her muscles felt sore, as if her body had been haphazardly thrown around in the time she was knocked out. She groaned in pain as she tried to sit up.

The ground was cold and hard beneath her, and when her eyes adjusted to the light, she saw that the floor was made of shiny white marble.

She turned her head to take in the unfamiliar place around her. It was not MRS or Jeonghan’s building or Woozi’s apartment. It was a room with a high ceiling, sleek furniture, and shiny polished floors.

It was a living space for someone wealthy. The only misplaced object in the entire room, the only thing that did not scream luxury, was the large metal dog cage she was trapped in.

She groaned as she moved, holding her arm and taking in her surroundings in panic. She had no idea what was happening, but she knew in the depths of her heart that it had something to do with Woozi.

“Who’s there?!” Arin yelled out into the void of the empty room. No answer.

Arin hissed in pain when she accidentally hit her arm against the metal bars of the cage. Everything hurt, and she was scared. The person who trapped her there clearly did not have good intentions.

The cage was big enough for her to stand in. As soon as she did, she tried opening the door, but it was closed with a sturdy lock, and no amount of cage rattling could compromise it.

She kept trying to break the cage, to find some fault with the iron bars that stayed steady no matter how angrily she tried to kick them.

It was in the middle of one kick that she suddenly stopped, her eyes catching sight of something familiar in a distant shelf many meters away from her cage. It was unmistakable; her eyes could spot them from miles away: on the shelf were Chilli albums, and so much of them. There were limited edition albums from their early years when S.Coups was still alive. Also unmistakable was S.Coups’ picture, signed and displayed on the shelf like a precious relic.

The person who owned this house was an avid Chilli fan, a fan of many years, a fan who owned merchandise that only early fans could ever have...

It was then that she heard the sound of the new Chilli album very faintly playing in the distance, along with the sound of click-clacking heels, growing louder and closer with every second.

Her captor appeared in the doorway, phone in her hand, streaming the songs of her favorite band.

The captor was a well-dressed young woman in branded clothing and perfect make-up. She stood with the cruel confidence of a powerful heiress, not a semblance of remorse to see Arin caged up like a dog in front of her.

Something about her felt very faintly familiar, but Arin could not put her finger on it.

“So… you’re that , Arin?” the woman said with a scoff, like she did not like what she saw in the cage. Like she expected someone different, someone better.

Arin swallowed and trembled. There was no sympathy in her voice at all, only malice.

“You were the one who killed S.Coups that night at the concert,” the heiress stated, crossing her arms over her chest nonchalantly.

Arin’s chest tightened and her breath became labored. Recalling S.Coups’ death always did that to her, especially when the events of that night were phrased in this specific way. You killed S.Coups. For so long, she had been trying to undo that impression in her own head, to convince herself that she was not a killer, but hearing someone else say that she was the killer set her off and reaffirmed her self-contempt. Her lower lip began to tremble and her eyes were wide as the memory of that night flashed before her eyes.

“Are you mute or something? Talk, !”

“W...what do you want from me?” Arin stammered as she backed against the bars of the cage, as far away from that frightening woman as possible.

“I want you to confess.”

Looking at her face more carefully, it finally clicked. Arin recognized her. It took her a while because she’d only seen it in passing on photos of Chilli events and occasionally on fandom selca days.

It was EyesScreamScoups, the fandom-famous, ultra-rich Chilli fan.

“Eyes…” She wanted to say the full name, but she trailed off as the realization hit her.

Eyes.

Eyes banged on the cage with her fist. “Answer me, girl! You killed S.Coups, right!?”

Arin remained silent. She wouldn’t admit anything to a stranger who obviously meant her harm.

“Fine, if you won’t talk, I have ways to make you talk,” Eyes said. She turned toward the door and put her hands around to project her voice. “Boys! Come out here!” she called.

Two men with a large build and unsympathetic expressions on their faces appeared at her call. They looked prepared to hurt her if Eyes wanted them to; they already had their fists balled threateningly at their sides.

“Hold her,” the heiress demanded, pointing at her. One of them produced a key from his belt and unlocked the door, and the other entered and grabbed her pained arms, pulling her out of the cage.

Arin whimpered and shook in their arms. She knew it was futile to struggle against them, so she yielded as both of them pinned her pained arms at her back, grabbed her head, and made her face the heiress.

“Who are you?” Arin asked her, stammering. “Why are you doing this to me?”

“I’m a fan of S.Coups,” Eyes answered. “And I just want to find out the truth about his death.”

“What do you mean?” Arin tried to act like she didn’t understand the question, hoping that maybe she would be spared from whatever physical pain that Eyes had waiting for her.

“I never believed the reports that he died of a sudden heart attack out of nowhere. I knew he was poisoned by a stalker, and I know it’s you. Confess now or I’ll force it out of you one way or the other!”

“I… I…” Arin didn’t know what to say. She trembled and stammered as she tried to think of how to explain this.

“Answer me!”

Arin shook her head. “I didn’t poison him…”

“Liar! It was you! I know it! Woozi told me!”

Hearing Woozi’s name shook Arin up even more and confirmed all of the suspicions she had. Woozi and everything he did – it all amounted to this: her being captured in the home of a rich heiress that clearly wanted revenge on the death of her idol.

“Yeah, you know Woozi, don’t you?” Eyes taunted her. “I hired him. Since S.Coups’ death, I’ve been getting private investigators to look into the case. Woozi finally led me to you.”

Arin shook her head, tears forming in her eyes. “I loved S.Coups. I would never hurt him on purp...”

Before she could continue, one of the men clenched his fists and plunged it into her stomach. Arin gagged and coughed in response.

“Enough with the lies,” Eyes said as Arin groaned and caught her breath to recover from the blow. “Admit that you killed him before we torture it out of you!”

“He died because I’m cursed,” Arin said in between heavy breaths.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“That’s the truth,” Arin whimpered as the men tightened their grip around her throbbing arm. “It’s magic. If I say the name of someone I love out loud, they die. That’s how S.Coups died.”

“Are you mental or something?”

“I’m telling you the truth,” Arin said, desperate tears streaming down her face.

“If you think I’m going to believe that bull, then you’re severely mistaken!” The man punched her again, and this time it hurt so much that Arin felt like she was going to pass out.

The men then shoved her back into the cage, and she hit her head against the metal rods as her body skidded across the floor from the force of their throw.

Arin stayed one the floor, crying and struggling from the kinds of pain she was feeling all over her body. She felt completely hopeless in that moment, at the mercy of someone who seemed convinced she murdered her idol in cold blood.

As she huddled in a ball on the ground, Arin heard the cage door lock again. Eyes’ heels clicked and clacked louder and louder as she approached the cage, and Arin could see her heels in view as she stood over her like a menace.

“Listen here, murderer,” the heiress spat. “I want to know what poison you used to kill him, because I want to give that poison to you. If you don’t tell me, I’ll just give you amatoxin instead, and that’s a lot more painful than the one you gave S.Coups. When you take it, you’ll be in excruciating pain for six full days, suffering from muscle spasms, dizziness, abdominal pain, hallucinations, and convulsions. Whatever you gave S.Coups would be quicker and easier for you, so I suggest you cooperate.”

In a strange way, Arin did not care about the threats against her life. It was a worthless life to begin with – a life filled with nothing but sadness and pain. A life where she could not love and trust people, and not just because that made them vulnerable to a mystical curse, but because everyone lied to and manipulated her. Her Woozi, to whom she had opened her heart, actually put her there. He was the reason she ached all over, in body and in soul.

She didn’t mind dying in retribution for the death of her idol. She did kill him after all, as this woman had so wickedly reminded her. Arin thought she deserved to die a horrible painful death for what she did to S.Coups, to Minghao, to her mother, to Joshua, to Jitae, and to ~. Six days of torture, one for every life she cut short. Amatoxin was the perfect poison, and she was ready to take it.

“Just give it to me,” Arin stuttered in between heavy breaths and endless sniffles. “Just let me die.”

The woman frowned. “You know I’m not ing around with you. I will seriously give you the poison and force it into your mouth and watch you as you suffer in that cage…”

“Please give it to me.”

The heiress scoffed. “Fine.” She reached into her purse, and pulled out a bottle of an orange liquid. “I have it right here. You think these are empty threats, don’t you? You think I don’t have it in me to avenge S.Coups’ death? I loved him with all of my heart, and I vowed to make the person who killed him suffer…” she trailed off, her eyes glistening with tears that she wiped away with her perfectly manicured fingers. “Now I finally have you,” she said, “and I will kill you and show you the same mercy you showed him the night of the concert.”

Arin found that she agreed with everything that Eyes was saying. In a strange case of Stockholm syndrome, Arin even admired her. What a strong and determined woman – who finally managed to capture the scum who ended a precious life.

Arin finally sat up and looked up at that orange bottle. “Let me have it. I want it. You’re right. I’m the killer, and I need to be punished.”

Eyes held the bottle in her hand, but she froze in place as she looked at Arin’s pitiful, crying face. The heiress seemed to hesitate, but Arin did not want her to hesitate. She wanted Eyes’ goons to pin her down and force the poison down . She wanted to feel the poison course through her body and burn her. She wanted to feel the spasming muscles and the torturous agony. Most importantly, she just wanted it all to end after six days. She wanted to close her eyes and just be removed from a world that deceived her into a temporary happiness that just slipped right through her fingers.

Eyes gulped and clutched the bottle in her hand, like she was afraid to let it go. If it had not been for the bars that separated them, Arin would have pried it out of her hands and drank it herself.

Just then, a loud knock resounded from the other side of the door, and Woozi’s voice thundered from behind it. “Open the goddamn door!”

Eyes gasped a little and turned to her men with narrowed eyes. “How the hell did he find me?” she muttered through gritted teeth.

“If you don’t open the door, I’m calling the police, and you’ll be charged for unlawful abduction!” Woozi yelled.

“What are you waiting for?” she whispered to the men. “Get him!”

The men rushed over to the door that Woozi was banging. They opened it and immediately restrained him. He struggled to get out of their grip, throwing around his body like a fish out of water. “Let me go!” he yelled.

“How did you find me and get past security?” Eyes muttered under her breath as she approached him, slipping the orange bottle back into her purse.

He stopped shaking when he heard her voice, then turned his neck to scan the room until he spotted Arin in the dog cage. In that brief moment of eye contact, the light in his eyes dimmed, like he was trying to say something to her.

“Let her go,” Woozi muttered, turning back to the heiress.

“You’ve got some nerve!” Eyes replied with a frown. “Lock him in the cage with her!” She ordered her men.

Woozi did not resist. He did not even look afraid, much opposed to Arin who was still trembling with fear.

They unlocked the cage and threw Woozi inside. He landed on his stomach, and the glasses fell from his face, skidding across the floor to her feet.

He got up and fumbled around for his glasses until he found them and put them on again, looking at Arin.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

Arin was in too much shock and mental anguish to respond. The truth was that she was more afraid of Woozi than she was of her captor. Such a person was able to manipulate her and lie to her for so long, and it made her spine run cold at the sight of him. She backed against the bars of the cage and swallowed. “Leave me alone.”

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly so only she could hear. Arin was not sure what he was apologizing for. Was it for something he had already done, or for something he was about to do?

Eyes told her men to check for other security breaches, so they both left, leaving Arin and Woozi at her mercy.

“I have no intention of hurting you, Woozi. But her…”

“She’s innocent! Targeting her was a mistake,” Woozi replied in a frenzy. “I made a mistake.”

“Don’t even try that, . It’s too late; she confessed already.” Eyes crossed her arms over her chest. “And I’m going to get my long overdue justice.”

“Just listen to me. It wasn’t her. It was her curse.”

“There you go again with this bull! I’m not an idiot!”

Woozi sighed and closed his eyes, seeming desperate. “I’m not lying.”

“And why the are you defending her now! You seemed awfully convinced she was the killer until you ghosted me a few weeks ago…”

“I’m defending her because she’s innocent! I’ll pay you back every penny you gave me for this investigation; just let her go.”

“I don’t want your money.”

Arin finally began piecing it all together as she listened to the conversation: EyesScreamScoups was Woozi’s client. She hired him to investigate S.Coups’ death, and so he investigated her. Arin felt stupid for not realizing it earlier: she knew that Woozi had a questionable job that required him to spy on people and track them down, so how could Arin not realize that she herself was the subject of his work? It was right in front of her the whole time. Right before her very eyes.

“I’ll prove it to you,” Woozi said to the heiress. “I’ll prove that magic killed S.Coups.”

“Will you?” the heiress seemed amused. “Well then, come on, show me a magic trick. See if I’ll believe it!”

Woozi sighed and pursed his lips, like he was thinking. “You have to let her go if I prove it.”

“If she’s not the one who killed S.Coups, I don’t want her.”

“I need you to promise me...”

“Stop wasting my time!”

“Arin’s curse works when she says someone’s name out loud,” Woozi explained. “She doesn’t know my real name, but I can change that right now. I’ll tell her my real name. She’ll say it, and I’ll probably drop dead, before her very eyes.”

Arin gasped and shook her head when Woozi revealed his plan. She immediately stuck her fingers into her ears, blocking out the name in case he said it. She hated this plan with all of her heart. Even though he deceived her, even though he lied to her and manipulated her, she still cared about him. Her curse would still kill him. She would rather die herself than to watch him die like everyone else did.

“No, no, no, no…” she kept saying as she frantically shook her head and closed her eyes, trying to drown out his voice before he sentenced himself to an ugly, purple death.

Woozi put his arms on her shoulders, trying to calm her down, to get her to stop and listen to him, but she refused. He then forcefully grabbed her wrists and pulled her fingers out of her ears. “Arin, listen to me!” he yelled.

Arin stopped shaking her head and held his gaze.

“Please don’t do this,” she begged him as she hyperventilated. Her heart physically hurt inside her chest, and it felt like it was about to explode. Woozi pulled her close to his chest and wrapped his arms around her to calm her down.

“It’s okay, Arin. It’s my fault you’re in this situation, so it’s my responsibility to get you out of it.”

“No, please. Please don’t say it…” She continued to cry on his shoulder. “Just let me die. I deserve to die.”

He pulled away from the hug and wiped her tears with his thumbs. He stared into her eyes intently, then said: “your cat, Mini, she needs you. You remember Mini, right? Mini’s probably in the apartment waiting for you, so you need to get back to her.”

The tears in Arin’s eyes stopped falling. She tilted her head, confused.

“Say hi to Mini for me.”

Woozi took a step back.

“My name – my real name – is Kihoon.”