Veins of Betrayal

You’re late, flustered, and already out of place at Yonsei—just another poor girl clinging to a scholarship in a world of privilege. When you spill coffee on a stranger’s immaculate shirt, you expect anger, disdain. Instead, he looks at you like he’s memorizing your soul. Two weeks later, masked and reckless at a secret society’s masquerade, you fall into the arms of a man whose voice wraps around you like smoke. You give him one night of abandon, then vanish before dawn. Now you wake in a private hospital room with no memory of how you got there. Two stone-faced men arrive, announcing you’re being moved—to a penthouse prison in the sky. And standing there, crisp and cruel in a white shirt that should’ve been stained, is *him*. The man from the courtyard. The man from the mask. Kwon Ji-woo. He knows who you are. He’s known all along. And now you have three choices: Submit and survive, biding your time in silence. Defy him and risk everything in fire. Or bargain with the monster, daring to treat a predator like a businessman. But be careful—every choice binds you closer to him. Because in this gilded cage, love might be the cruelest trap of all.

Veins of Betrayal

You’re late, flustered, and already out of place at Yonsei—just another poor girl clinging to a scholarship in a world of privilege. When you spill coffee on a stranger’s immaculate shirt, you expect anger, disdain. Instead, he looks at you like he’s memorizing your soul. Two weeks later, masked and reckless at a secret society’s masquerade, you fall into the arms of a man whose voice wraps around you like smoke. You give him one night of abandon, then vanish before dawn. Now you wake in a private hospital room with no memory of how you got there. Two stone-faced men arrive, announcing you’re being moved—to a penthouse prison in the sky. And standing there, crisp and cruel in a white shirt that should’ve been stained, is *him*. The man from the courtyard. The man from the mask. Kwon Ji-woo. He knows who you are. He’s known all along. And now you have three choices: Submit and survive, biding your time in silence. Defy him and risk everything in fire. Or bargain with the monster, daring to treat a predator like a businessman. But be careful—every choice binds you closer to him. Because in this gilded cage, love might be the cruelest trap of all.

You owe me for a new shirt.

The words hang in the air, smooth and lethal. I don’t move. My wrist throbs in its cast, my body still weak from the crash, but fear sharpens my senses.

He knows who I am. He’s known since the beginning.

I lift my chin. My voice comes out raw, but clear. “Then name your price.”

Kwon Ji-woo tilts his head, amused. One of the suits steps forward, handing him a file. He flips it open. My scholarship records. My late-night shifts. The hospital report. Even a photo from the masquerade—my mask slipping, my face half-visible in the dim light.

“You were never supposed to get hurt,” he says. Not an apology. A statement.

“I wasn’t your property to protect.”

His eyes flash. He closes the file and sets it aside. “You ran before I could ask your name.”

“And if you’d asked, would it have changed anything?”

“No.” A beat. “I’d have taken you anyway.”

My breath hitches. This isn’t negotiation. It’s conquest.

I step forward, ignoring the pain. “Then let’s be honest. You didn’t bring me here for a dry cleaning bill. You want something else.”

He doesn’t deny it. Instead, he reaches into his coat. Pulls out a single black lace mask—the one I left behind at the hotel suite.

“You came to me that night,” he says. “Willing. Unafraid. Now you’re afraid. Why?”

“Because now I see the cage.”

“And yet,” he says, stepping closer, “you’re still standing in it.”

Silence stretches. The city glows below us like distant fire.

I make my choice.

“Then let me walk out that door,” I say. “And come back on my own terms.”

He studies me. Then, slowly, he smiles. Not kind. Not forgiving. Promising.

“Try.”