I took my first step into the Dark Market…
and immediately felt my breath being pulled from me.
The air here was different… heavy, saturated with blood and ash.
The sky above me was black, with a broken moon bleeding red light.
The ground beneath my feet was made of piled bones, screaming with every step.
In the streets, creatures unlike humans walked slowly:
some were faceless, others dragged chains tied to their shadows, and one‑eyed children sold things resembling hearts in glass bags.
I shouted in a broken voice:
"What is this place…?!"
The short man smiled and pointed his cane at a huge sign written in a strange language.
But the words lodged in my head as if I'd been born knowing them:
> Laws of the Dark Market:
1‑ Everything has a price.
2‑ The price is not money… but blood, years, or memories.
3‑ Whoever refuses to pay the price… becomes the price itself.
My bones trembled; I whispered:
"Blood… years… memories…?"
The short man laughed:
"Here, a dead man can buy a new life… but at the cost of his old life.
A weak one can buy power… but at the cost of his soul.
And you, Kim, can buy your revenge… if you dare pay."
I moved through the market, watching the vendors:
– One sold swords that burned with the sounds of souls.
– Another displayed bottles containing living human eyes.
– An old woman sat on the ground, offering passersby something invisible… but anyone who touched it fell crying, as if they'd seen their worst nightmare.
I stood stunned, until I saw a scene that froze my heart:
A young man reached toward a merchant, and in a moment… his face began to vanish.
He screamed hoarsely, but the merchant smiled as he trapped the face in a glass bottle.
The short man whispered:
"He sold his memories… he no longer knows who he is. Just an empty shell."
I pressed my hand to my chest.
This place… is not a market.
It is hell walking the earth.
But inside me, something smiled.
The voice of the shadow that lives in me whispered again:
> "Here… you will find what you seek. Here, the blood road begins."
I lifted my head, my eyes blazing:
"Then… let's see what revenge can buy."