AVA
Jung steps forward, his face a look of icy satisfaction. He opens the folder under his arm and drops a file onto the mahogany table.
"These are the transactions, Mr. Kim. The elimination orders. The names of those who died protecting your secret. Justice has arrived," Jung articulates.
Grandpa doesn't even look at the papers. His eyes, covered by those dark lenses that seem to hide the abyss, remain fixed on me.
"Justice?" he repeats with a sneer. "Justice is for little men. Tae-Hyun, your father, Ava... he didn't die because he wanted to protect you. He died because he was the only one who understood that you would be the ruin of this family. He pushed you away to turn you into what you are now: predators."
My blood runs cold.
"What do you mean?"
"I wanted to see if the Kim blood could overcome the pain," he says, his voice starting to grow hoarse. "You sought the truth, you found it. But the truth is a poison, Ava. It doesn't heal. It corrodes."
He reaches for his collar, extracting a small glass vial he kept hidden in a secret pocket of his jacket.
"There's one last thing you need to know," he continues, his fingers tightening on the cap. "Jung's kiss? The key? The evidence in the vault? They weren't gifts. They were the tools to turn you into murderers. If you turn me over to the police, you'll have to admit to stealing, blackmailing, tampering with evidence, and breaking every law. You are complicit, Ava. You have become my purest legacy."
I look at him, horrified.
He's right.
We've dirtied our hands to get this far.
"I'm not going to prison," he hisses, his gaze glowing with a mad light. "I built this world, and I'll be the one to close the door."
He drinks the liquid in a single gulp. There's a moment of absolute silence in the room, broken only by the labored breathing of my cousins behind us.
Old Kim staggers, clutching the chair, then falls forward. The silver bastard falls to the floor with a metallic clink.
He slumps, his bluish lips curling in a final, sneering smile.
"Ava," he whispers before exhaling his last breath. "Look... your hands... they're just like mine."
I collapse to my knees beside him, feeling the void opening beneath me.
Jung slowly approaches, placing a hand on my shoulder.
Is it a gesture of pity or control?
I don't know.
"Is it over?" Roori asks, her voice breaking with tears, clinging to Min-Jun.
I look at my hands. They're dirty, trembling, marked by anger.
"No," I reply, standing and looking at the terrified faces of my cousins and Jung's unreadable expression. "Now we must decide if we are truly what he wanted us to be, or if we can still save ourselves."
Outside, police sirens begin to tear through the silence of the night.
The villa, once a fortress of secrets, is now nothing but a tomb of glass and lies.