"YOU FUCKING BITCH!"
I bolted upright, throat raw, chest heaving. For a split second I still felt her perfume in my nose, her nails raking down my back, the husband's ugly laugh rattling in my ears. Then it all snapped—gone.
I wasn't in some candlelit apartment. I wasn't on silk sheets. I was in a fucking classroom.
Rows of desks. Chalk dust hanging in the air. Fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. The smell of cigarettes even though I could see a teacher at the board, droning in Japanese. A couple kids were slouched in the back with smoke curling from their lips, like they owned the place.
The entire room froze when I yelled. Dozens of heads turned.
"What the hell…" I muttered, my voice not sounding like mine. It was a high pitched voice.
The teacher—a tired-looking guy with glasses—slammed his chalk down. "Oi! Noah! What are you shouting for? Sit down!"
Noah?
The word cut into me. I blinked, my heart pounding harder than the bass in any club I'd been in.
I looked down at my body. Thin arms. Pale hands. My legs were shaking just from standing up too fast. I wasn't Allen Cross anymore. Not the rich brat. Not the cocky bastard with women clinging to him every night. This body wasn't mine.
Kids snickered. A few whispered. The ones in the back just stared like wolves sizing up meat.
"What the fuck is going on?" I whispered, running my hands over myself. My uniform—a Japanese high school blazer, buttoned wrong—felt stiff and alien. My shoes were scuffed to hell. I'd never worn something this cheap in my life.
My head was spinning. I shoved my hands into my pockets and felt something there. A wallet. I yanked it out. Inside was a plastic id card.
Noah Hayashi – Second Year
A student ID. My face on it.
But not my real face.
Messy black hair, pale skin, sharp chin. But what stood out most were the eyes—blue, clear as ice.
No wonder everyone was staring.
"Half," someone muttered from the back. A laugh followed. "Stupid half freak lost it."
Half. Half-Japanese, half-foreign. I didn't need the memories leaking into my head to know this body had been carrying that label all its life. Outsider. Not one of them. Easy target.
The teacher turned back to the board like nothing happened. Chalk screeched. The rest of the class started up again—paper balls tossed, girls whispering, smoke drifting from the back corner.
But I just sat there, staring at the ID, trying to swallow the truth.
Allen Cross was gone. The rich brat with money, the cocky bastard who bent the world to his will—that guy had been snuffed out with a blow to the head.
Now I was Noah Hayashi. Sixteen, maybe seventeen. A nobody. A half-blood boy in a shitty Japanese high school.
Memories weren't mine but they slid in like poison. Running errands for the punks in the back. Buying their cigarettes. Taking their punches. Always the bitch of the class.
My stomach twisted. You've gotta be fucking kidding me.
The scrape of a chair snapped me out of it. Heavy footsteps. One of the punks from the back was heading my way, smirking like he'd been waiting for this. Fried blond hair, reeking of smoke. He leaned against my desk, eyes glinting.
"Oi, half," he said in lazy Japanese, flicking his cigarette into my desk tray. "Where's my money? You were supposed to bring it yesterday."
The name hit me—Suda. Third year. One of the assholes who owned this body.
I clenched my fists. Every part of me screamed to lash out, to shove that cigarette back down his throat. That was the Allen in me. The spoiled brat who never bowed to anyone.
But my arms felt weak, my legs shaky. This wasn't Allen's body. It was Noah's.
Still, my mouth curled into a grin. "I'm not going to give you anything, you fucking asshole."
The class went quiet again. All eyes on me.
Suda blinked, then laughed, loud and ugly. "What's this? The half finally grew a pair?"
He shoved my shoulder. Hard. My body flew back into the desk, ribs aching like they'd crack.
"You fucking blue eyed freak", Suda's spit hit my cheek as he snarled. His buddies in the back laughed like hyenas, their smoke rising thicker now that the show had started.
I wiped my face with the back of my sleeve and smirked, even though my ribs ached like hell. "That all you got? My grandma hits harder."
The words slipped out before I could stop them.
Suda's eyes widened, then narrowed into slits. His fist drew back, knuckles cracked from a hundred cheap fights.
I barely had time to think oh, shit before it slammed into my face.
White light burst behind my eyes. My skull rang like a bell. My body—Noah's body—folded like paper as I hit the floor, desks rattling around me. Gasps and laughter mixed like a cruel chorus.
The taste of iron filled my mouth. My nose was wet, dripping. My vision blurred. But I refused to kneel—forced a laugh through the blood.
"That it? I've had girls slap me harder, asshole."
The class roared. Not with me. At me. Half laughing, half chanting Suda's name. The punk looked down at me like a cat about to finish playing with its food.
He stomped down, heel aimed for my stomach.
Move.
My body didn't move fast enough. His boot crushed into me, driving the air out of my lungs. I gagged, clutching my gut, the laughter around me blurring into static.
Memories hit me between each blow—Noah kneeling in alleys, handing over stolen cash, crying when no one watched. Always folding. Always breaking.
No. Not this time.
I forced my hand up, caught Suda's ankle on instinct. My arm trembled, weak, but I held it. I held him.
"I'm not your fucking slave, Suda," I growled, voice low, blood dripping down my chin. "I'm the one who's going to bury you."
For a split second, the room went silent. No laughter. No whispers. Just me, gripping that bastard's ankle with shaking fingers, daring him to test me again.