The city glittered beneath me like a cheap whore dressed in diamonds. I floated in the infinity pool, top floor of my glass palace, cigarette burning down between my fingers, smoke curling around my head like a crown.
And at the edge of the pool—forty-seven trembling bodies.
Every Omega and Beta Zhang Lu Rang had ever fucked, kissed, dated, touched. Forty-seven toys, discarded and rotting, now kneeling in my house like offerings.
I grinned. Wide. Too wide. My teeth tasted like smoke and liquor.
"Playboy," I muttered, voice bouncing against the water. "But ahh—he likes them weak, doesn't he?"
Secretary Chang's voice was steady, clinical. He always tried to be steady around me. "Yes, sir. Fair-skinned. Slim. The women curvaceous, the men lean. Black hair. The type who cry easily."
The type who cry easily.
I laughed—too sharp, too loud. A bark that made a few of them flinch. Their shoulders shook. Some covered their mouths to keep from sobbing. Delicious.
"Tell me about them," I said, rolling onto my back in the water, staring up at the stars like they belonged to me. "All of them."
And so he did.
One by one. Like reading off the names of the dead. One lasted three days. Another lasted a week. Most didn't survive a month before Zhang Lu Rang got bored. Forty-six delicate dolls smashed and tossed aside.
"Forty-seventh," Chang's voice paused, heavier now. "The longest. Two months. His name—Sky."
I sat up, water dripping from my skin, cigarette clinging wet to my fingers. A grin split across my face, jagged and unholy.
"Sky," I purred, smoke spilling from my lips. "Come here, pet."
He crawled forward. Hands shaking, knees scraping against marble, sweat beading at his temple. Black hair plastered to his forehead, pale as porcelain, eyes big and wet like a rabbit waiting for the knife.
My pulse thrummed. I licked my teeth.
"So tell me, Sky," I whispered, leaning close, watching his throat bob as he swallowed. "How does it feel? To be Zhang Lu Rang's longest? His little record?"
He swallowed. Stammered. And then he said it—
"R-Rang Rang…"
Silence slammed down.
That name. That goddamn name.
I wasn't in the pool anymore. I was eight again, cornered by older boys in the schoolyard. Bloodied lip, fists ready—until another boy stormed in, eyes blazing, chasing them off like a storm. He turned to me, grin fearless, voice steady.
"Don't worry. My name's Rang Rang. Remember it."
My Rang Rang. Mine. Only mine.
I snapped back, the cigarette burning low between my fingers, and stared at Sky like he was a worm wriggling under glass.
My smile twitched, widened, cracked into something manic. "No one calls him that," I hissed, voice climbing higher, sharp enough to split the night. "No one! That name—" I pressed a wet finger to my temple, eyes rolling back as I giggled—"lives here. In me. It's mine. My Rang Rang."
Sky tried to speak. Too slow.
Bang.
The bullet bloomed in the center of his forehead. He dropped like a rag doll, blood spilling warm across marble, running into the pool. The water shivered crimson.
I laughed. I laughed so hard my ribs hurt, the sound cracked and broken, echoing against the glass walls. I slapped the water, splashing it over the trembling Omegas and Betas. "Too slow! Too stupid! Too dead!"
They cried. They all cried. And I loved it. Their sobs were a symphony, their fear the sweetest perfume.
I drifted back on my back in the pool, water turning pink around me, cigarette soggy but still between my teeth, grin carved into my face.
Because Zhang Lu Rang thought he was untouchable. The Alpha above all.But I wasn't Alpha. I wasn't Omega.
I was lunacy given flesh. The Enigma.And I was the only one who could ever call him Rang Rang.