The room was silent except for the steady tick of the analog clock on the wall — a rhythm far too calm for the storm brewing inside it.
Aara stared at the screen, her shoulders tense, fists clenched. The footage was everywhere now — her brutal match against DaeCorp's prized fighter, the unfiltered audio of the crowd turning on the organization, and the moment she stood, bloodied and defiant, shouting her name like a war cry. Aara. Not subject. Not experiment. Not property.
But war never ends with the first blow.
A soft ping echoed in the room as a new message blinked across the laptop screen.
FROM: UnknownSUBJECT: They're coming. Be ready. – P
She didn't flinch. Of course they were. DaeCorp didn't take humiliation lightly, especially not at the hands of a discarded weapon.
On the other side of the city, in a half-lit warehouse where Phoenix made its temporary nests, Jin adjusted the straps of his tactical vest, watching the monitors.
"Aara just got the warning," he muttered to himself. The overhead camera feed flickered, then stabilized again, showing her pacing her apartment like a panther locked in a cage. No fear — just fury.
He hated watching from the shadows. Hated the silence between them.
"She doesn't know you're the one protecting her," murmured his handler, a voice slicing through the comms. "That's how it stays."
"She's going to hate me when she finds out."
"That's not your concern. Your job is to keep her breathing. Nothing more."
Jin muted the line and stared at the blinking red dot marking her location. His jaw clenched. Everything more, he corrected silently.
Across town, in a penthouse apartment still soaked in expensive lies and bloodied legacy, Haru watched his father lose control for the first time in twenty years.
"This girl," hissed Kaito Watanabe, slamming the tablet onto the glass desk, "thinks she's untouchable. You made her that way."
"I didn't make her anything," Haru replied, his voice as cool as the whiskey in his hand. "She made herself."
Kaito turned sharply, eyes narrowing. "Are you loyal to this girl now? After everything—"
"No," Haru interrupted. "I'm loyal to what you were supposed to be. A king, not a butcher. But you let rot seep into the crown long ago."
The old man's face twisted, and Haru didn't miss the faint tremor in his father's right hand — the one he used to strike fear into men who once ruled nations.
"You walk away now," Kaito said, "you won't have a name left to walk with."
"I already gave it up," Haru murmured, placing the family crest ring on the table between them. "Now I'm free to say hers."
Aara was already halfway through packing when the door rattled.
Not a knock.
A test.
She moved silently, retrieving the blade hidden beneath the couch cushions. She'd once used it to slice the hand of a man who tried to buy her. She still remembered how his blood had felt — hot, desperate, human.
They never expected the girl to bite back.
The door cracked open. A figure stepped in, slow, unarmed — or pretending to be. Aara raised the blade without hesitation.
"Call me what you want," she said quietly. "Just make sure it's worth dying for."
The man froze — hood pulled low, hands slightly lifted. "I'm not with them."
She blinked. That voice.
"Haru?"
He pushed the hood back. No suit, no sleek arrogance — just sweat, exhaustion, and something close to guilt in his eyes.
"You shouldn't be here," she whispered.
"Neither should they," he replied, stepping forward. "But they are. You've started a war, Aara. And I want to bleed with you."
She didn't lower the knife. "Why?"
His eyes locked onto hers — not soft, not pleading. Just true.
"Because the only time I ever felt like I existed was when you looked at me like I wasn't just someone's son. When you hated me. When you didn't."
Silence stretched between them — electric and sharp.
"I don't need your loyalty," she finally said. "I need your hands steady and your lies honest."
"Then take them," he said, lifting his hand slowly toward her. "And call me what you want."
She stared a moment longer… then let the knife fall to her side.
Outside, unseen through the camera lenses buried in streetlamps and power boxes, Jin watched the scene unfold. His grip tightened on the receiver.
The girl and the traitor, standing in the calm before the flood.
Phoenix had warned him not to get attached.
But watching Aara now, no longer just surviving — fighting — Jin understood.
You don't get attached to fire.You burn with it.