• This was the story of when Ana was kidnapped...
The night was dim, stars scattered faintly above. And Ana sat beneath them, lost in thought. Something about those stars always made her wonder — maybe about freedom, or maybe about the stories they carried.
She turned her gaze toward her brother, watching him from a distance. For a moment, she said nothing… just smiled softly and walked away into the dark.
Far away in the forest, the wind whispered through the leaves. That's when she saw him — a man standing in her path, a knife glinting faintly in his hand. Still, Ana didn't flinch. She simply changed her path, pretending not to notice.
"Hey, girl!" the man barked.
He stepped forward, blocking her way. Behind him, shadows moved, it was his group, a pack of lowlifes who had been terrorizing the nearby villages.
"Where do you think you're going? You're coming with us."
Their laughter echoed through the trees.
They caught her easily. But Ana didn't resist — not even once. She didn't scream, didn't even run.
Instead… she laughed.
"Why are you laughing?" one of them asked, irritated.
"Shut her up!" another shouted.
A sharp slap echoed through the forest. Her face turned, but the laughter didn't stop. It grew louder… unsettling.
"Stop!" one of them yelled again, voice cracking with anger.
They threw her to the ground, lashing her with a leather whip. Blood traced thin red lines down her back. Yet she kept laughing — a sound that made their spines crawl.
"Enough!" They shoved a piece of cloth into her mouth, tying it tight to silence her. Her laughter still trembled beneath it, muffled but relentless.
They forced her into a rusted cage, too small even for her to sit properly.
"This is better," one of the goons sneered, spitting in her face. "People like you piss me off."
Inside the cage, her eyes glimmered, it was wild and knowing.
Even with the gag, her smile didn't fade..
"She's crazy. Just sell her and get rid of her," one of them said.
They climbed onto their chariot, cracked the whip, and the horses galloped into the dark.
They were heading toward the Mountain of Nori.
By morning, the sky turned pale gold. After an eight-hour ride, the wheels finally stopped creaking.
And for the first time since the night… she stopped laughing.
"She's finally quiet," grunted a huge goon — bald, with thick slabs of muscle crowding his face. A heavy sword rested on his back.
He smirked and tapped the iron cage with his knuckles.
Clang.
Ana blinked awake. Her vision was blurry at first, but soon she saw them clearly — half a dozen men, towering, deformed, and ugly.
Their eyes weren't just cruel… they were hungry.
The kind of hunger that made the air itself feel unsafe and creepy.
A thin, skeletal man knelt before the cage, lips drawn into a sick grin. He licked them and raised a rusted knife, eyes glittering with a predator's hunger.
"Anzi," he hissed, voice oily, "can I have a go?"
Anzi — broad-shouldered, scarred, the leader among them — scowled and pushed the man back with the flat of his palm.
"No, Deil. We're selling her. She's worth more intact."
Deil spat, sneering. "Look at her face. It's ruined. Who'd pay for that?"
Ana's features were swollen and scarred; her face had not yet healed. She looked like something the world had nearly finished breaking. Deil's words were cruel but practical.
Anzi studied her for a long moment, then shrugged. "Maybe. But her body's still whole. We'll get a month's worth of coin easy."
He stepped close enough that his men could not touch her. "Not a single hand on her until we sell. Got it?"
The goons muttered assent, eyes sliding back to the cage as if measuring the price they could make on a life they'd already ruined.
"Fine," Deil muttered, licking his cracked lips. "If she doesn't sell for much, I'm taking her. Who cares about the face when the body's still there…"
His voice was thick with lust, his stare crawling over her. The other captive girls shrank back, their fear filling the air like smoke.
Anzi's jaw tightened. Something in the wind shifted — a sudden stillness, heavy and sharp. He could feel it. The air was thinning. Something was coming.
Meanwhile...
Atom was sprinting through the outer corridors of the king's castle. His body ached, but his resolve burned brighter than ever. He was one step away from escaping.
And then — he did.
The outer wall cracked open like glass under pressure as Atom's blade cut through it. He emerged into the open wild — the Mountain of Nori stood before him, vast and shadowed, its mist curling like ghosts around the peaks.
No guards behind. No chains. No king.
He had finally escaped.
But now came the hardest part.
Finding her.
The mountain stretched endlessly before him — larger, darker, and more silent than any prison he'd ever known.
"Looking at this place… they must be hiding somewhere." Atom whispered, scanning the thick mist curling between the rocks. The mountain of Nori was silent — too silent. Not even the wind dared to move.
"I can't use my mantra here," he muttered, his hand tightening around the hilt of his sword. "If I do… I might hurt her."
He clenched his teeth. Every instinct screamed to tear the mountain apart, to unleash everything he had — but one wrong move, and his sister could be gone forever.
He stayed alert, careful… yet terrified.
And then, a voice echoed in his mind — soft, trembling, familiar.
"Will you protect me, brother?"
His eyes widened. The words pulled him back into the past — that night, that promise, that moment when he swore never to let her cry again.
It was his fault.
Everything.
"If I hadn't fallen asleep… it wouldn't have happened."
The thought stabbed through him like a blade.
He bit his lip and whispered to the wind, "Ana… just hold on. I'm coming."