The morning air was biting cold, but the chill running down my spine had nothing to do with the weather. I walked toward the school gates with my head lowered, my chin buried deep into the wool collar of my coat. I pulled my scarf up until it nearly covered my eyes, looking like someone trying to hide from a crime scene.
In a way, I was. The crime scene was my own face.
I kept touching my cheek underneath the scarf. Smooth. Perfect. Too perfect. Yesterday, this skin was purple, swollen, and bleeding. Today, it felt like brand new porcelain. I dreaded the questions. How did you heal so fast? Did you go to a plastic surgeon overnight? Are you an alien? But deep down, I knew the questions weren't the real danger. The real danger was the person who put those bruises there in the first place.
Kang.
In every ecosystem, there is an apex predator. In the concrete jungle of our high school, that was Kang. He wasn't your average, cliché bully who stole lunch money to buy cheap cigarettes behind the gym. That would have been manageable. No, Kang was something far worse. He was the son of a Chaebol family—wealthy, corrupt, and untouchable. He walked these halls believing the school was just another branch of his father's kingdom.
His vice wasn't simple violence. Violence was just a tool. His true addiction was humiliation. He didn't just want to break your bones; he wanted to break your spirit. He wanted to see the light go out in your eyes.
[The Courtyard]
As I entered the main courtyard, the atmosphere shifted. The usual morning chatter was hushed in one specific corner. Students were walking in a wide arc, avoiding a particular spot near the fountain. I looked over, and my stomach twisted into a knot.
There he was. Kang stood with his hands in the pockets of his tailored uniform, flanked by his usual entourage of sycophants who laughed at jokes he didn't even make. Towering over a small, trembling first-year student, Kang looked bored. The student was on his knees, weeping silently, clutching a torn sketchbook to his chest. Pages of intricate drawings—landscapes, portraits, anime characters—were scattered across the dirty pavement like fallen leaves.
Kang hadn't hit him. There was no blood. Instead, Kang was smiling. A calm, terrifyingly polite smile. He lifted his right foot—clad in a pristine, expensive Italian leather shoe—and wiped the sole slowly, deliberately, on the remains of a charcoal drawing the student had likely spent weeks perfecting.
"How filthy..." Kang said, his voice smooth and low, carrying a provoking calmness that was more infuriating than shouting. "Look what you did. You sullied my shoe with your cheap graphite dust. Do you know how much these cost?"
"I... I'm sorry..." the student sobbed, his shoulders shaking.
"I can't hear you." Kang pressed down. He didn't step on the paper this time. He stepped on the student's fingers. The boy gasped in pain, but didn't dare pull his hand away.
Kang leaned down, his eyes gleaming with sadistic pleasure. "Say it properly. Say: 'I am sorry, expensive shoe, for being trash.'"
The scene made my blood boil. It surged through my veins, hot and acidic. The injustice of it was suffocating. Kang didn't want a fight. A fight implies two sides. He wanted absolute submission. He fed on the cracking sound of human dignity.
I wanted to look away. I wanted to run to class and pretend I saw nothing, just like everyone else. Just like the "tree" I tried to be. But my feet stopped moving.
Suddenly, Kang looked up. His predatory instincts must have sensed eyes on him. He spotted me. His boredom vanished instantly. His smile widened, revealing perfect white teeth. He abandoned the sobbing first-year student like a discarded toy and turned his entire body toward me.
"Oh! Look who's back!" he announced loudly, spreading his arms as if welcoming an old friend. "Yesterday's hero! The punching bag that talks!"
His entourage snickered, falling into formation behind him as he marched toward me. My heart hammered against my ribs. Thump. Thump. Thump. He stopped less than a foot away from me. He was tall, looming over me, smelling of expensive cologne and tobacco.
He stared at my face. I had lowered my scarf when I stopped, exposing my skin. Kang's smile slowly, gradually faded. His expression shifted from mockery to confusion, and then to suspicion. He furrowed his thick brows, leaning in until his nose nearly touched mine. His dark eyes scanned my left eye, my forehead, my jawline. He was looking for the purple swelling. He was looking for the cut on my eyebrow. He was looking for his "masterpiece."
But there was nothing.
"What is this?" he whispered, his voice dropping to a dangerous hiss. "Where are the bruises? Where is the imprint of the ring I stamped on your cheek yesterday?"
He reached out with a rough hand, pinching my cheek hard, twisting the skin as if checking if I was wearing a mask. "Did you wear makeup to hide your shame, flower boy? Or did you run home to mommy and have her fix you with magic?"
The pain of the pinch was real, but it was annoying rather than debilitating. I swatted his hand away. A sharp, crisp motion. "Back off," I said. My voice was calm. surprisingly steady.
Silence fell over the immediate area. Students stopped walking. No one swats Kang's hand away.
"Ooooh!" Kang laughed, a loud, barking sound. He turned to his followers, feigning shock. "Did you see that? The mouse has claws! He hasn't learned his lesson!"
He turned back to me, and the laughter died. His eyes went dead cold. "You annoy me, Ray. Your existence annoys me. And this clean, unblemished face of yours... it irks me. It's an insult to my hard work. It's like you're erasing my signature."
He raised his right hand. The large silver ring on his middle finger glinted in the morning sun. "I'll just have to redraw them," he sneered. "And this time, I'll make the scars permanent."
[The Awakening]
His hand began to descend. A heavy, vicious slap aimed squarely at my temple. In that fraction of a second... It happened.
The world didn't just slow down; it froze. The sounds of the schoolyard—the wind, the distant chatter, the cars—were sucked into a vacuum. The only sound I could hear was a low, digital hum at the base of my skull. And then, a voice. Not the robotic system voice I had heard before. This was different. This was guttural. Wet. Violent. It was the voice of a Primal Instinct.
(He is slow...) The voice whispered. (Look at his wrist. It is exposed.)(Break his finger... snap it backward like a dry twig.)(No... grab the wrist. Pull. Twist. Drive the ulna bone into his throat.)
My vision changed. I didn't see Kang's face anymore. I saw anatomy. I saw the tendons in his wrist. I saw the weak point in his elbow joint. I saw red lines drawing the trajectory of destruction.
My hand moved. It wasn't a conscious decision. I didn't tell my brain to move my arm. My body simply reacted to the instinct. My hand shot up, faster than I thought possible. My fingers curled into a claw, rigid as steel, intercepting the path of his slap. I wasn't blocking. I was catching. I was going to catch his wrist, crush the bones, and pull him into a knee strike that would shatter his ribs.
I felt an immense, terrifying power gathering in my forearm. A heat that demanded release. Just one squeeze...Just one snap...
"Stop!"
A hand grabbed my collar from behind and yanked me backward with violent force. My body jerked back. Kang's hand swiped through empty air, missing my face by an inch.
The spell broke. The gray world flooded back with color and sound. Jin stood between us, bowing frantically, his face pale with terror. He was holding me back with one hand and apologizing with the other.
"We apologize! We apologize, Mr. Kang!" Jin shouted quickly, his voice trembling with feigned fear. "Please forgive him! He's still out of it from yesterday's accident! He took too much pain medication! He doesn't know what he's doing! We won't bother you!"
Kang stood there, his hand still suspended in the air. He looked confused. He looked at Jin, then at me. His eyes narrowed. He wasn't looking at my face anymore. He was staring at my hand.
My hand was still raised in the air. My fingers were locked in a predatory claw shape, trembling with unreleased tension. It looked like the talon of a hawk ready to snatch a prey.
"What the hell..." Kang muttered, sensing something wrong.
"We're leaving! Sorry!" Jin didn't wait for a response. He grabbed my arm and dragged me away, practically running toward the building.
[The Tremor]
We put distance between us and the wolf pack. We turned the corner, entering the safety of the busy hallway. Jin finally let go of my arm and leaned against the lockers, gasping for breath.
"Are you insane?!" Jin whispered, his eyes wide with horror. "What got into you, Ray? Were you actually going to hit Kang? Do you have a death wish? Do you want to get expelled? His father is on the school board!"
I didn't answer him. I couldn't. I was staring at my hand. It was trembling uncontrollably.
"Ray?" Jin waved his hand in front of my face. "You're shaking. You're scared, right? It's okay, we got away."
I looked up at him. "No," I whispered, my voice sounding foreign to my own ears.
I wasn't trembling from fear. I wasn't shaking because I almost got beaten up. I clenched my fist, feeling the lingering phantom sensation of Kang's wrist snapping in my grip. I was trembling because... for the first time in my life... I felt an overwhelming, intoxicating desire to hear the sound of bones breaking.
And what was more terrifying than the desire... Was the absolute certainty that I could have done it. The monster inside me wasn't scared of Kang. It was disappointed that it didn't get to feed.