The summer night enveloped the small kitchen in a warm embrace, its breath streaming through the open window. The faint scent of blooming linden trees drifted in, mingling with the distant hum of the sleeping city. A gentle breeze lazily stirred the thin curtains, their shadows gliding across the walls, bathed in the soft glow of an old lamp above the kitchen table. The kitchen, usually so familiar and cozy, felt confining tonight, as if the walls were closing in under the weight of something unspoken. The air trembled with a tension that was intangible yet palpable, woven into every glance, every breath.

Kang Wooyoung sat on a creaky wooden chair at the table, his tall frame slightly slouched, betraying exhaustion that clung to his bones. His gray tracksuit—rumpled pants and a hoodie with a faded logo—was stained with blood and dust, the hood carelessly slipped off one shoulder. His face bore the marks of a brutal fight: a livid bruise sprawled across his cheekbone, a split eyebrow oozed blood, and his busted lip quivered as he tried to mask the pain with a faint trace of his usual cocky smirk. His short, wavy brown hair, damp with sweat, clung to his forehead, while a discarded cigarette smoldered on the windowsill, its smoke dissolving into the night air like his own fleeting thoughts. An hour ago, he had barged into the apartment, pounding on the door and muttering something about an old rival and a long-overdue reckoning, and now he sat here, in the kitchen, where the silence spoke louder than any words.

“I fucking smashed Suho like he was nothing,” his voice, rough and hoarse, sliced through the quiet, dripping with venomous bravado. “Thought he could still mess with me? Hah, I showed that prick who’s really stronger,” Wooyoung scoffed, his lips curling into a smug, defiant grin, though a wince of pain quickly twisted his expression. He leaned back in the chair, but his gaze suddenly locked with yours, and all his swagger vanished like the smoke from his cigarette. He froze, caught off guard, and looked away toward the window, where stars barely peeked through the city’s smog.