Jim's POV
"Seven, where do you go every night?"
The moment the words left my mouth, I knew they had not been born in that instant.
They had been lodged somewhere deep inside me for far longer than I wanted to admit—pressed down by habit, by hesitation, by the quiet understanding that some questions, once spoken, could no longer be taken back.
I couldn't even tell anymore whether it was curiosity that pushed them out…
or something closer to unease.
The hotel room was dim. Not dark enough to feel oppressive, but no longer bright enough to feel safe. The daylight that had filled the room in the morning was almost completely gone, leaving behind a thin, gray band of shadow clinging stubbornly to the edge of the curtains. It cut across the wall like an unhealed scar.
Seven stood by the window with his back to me.
As usual, he was adjusting his cuffs.
The motion was unhurried—precise, practiced, and almost ritualistic. Each movement carried the same calm restraint, as if time itself had agreed to slow down around him. It always struck me how nothing ever seemed to rush Seven. Not danger. Not urgency. Not even the world outside.
Watching his back, I suddenly felt something shift inside my chest.
The distance between us felt farther than it looked.
Not in steps.
Not in meters.
But in something harder to define.
"Is it… because of me?"
When I spoke again, my voice sounded lighter than I expected.
Too light.
So light it felt like I was testing the air before stepping forward—uncertain whether the ground beneath would hold.
So light that a part of me was afraid the words might dissolve before they reached him.
Seven's hands paused.
He didn't freeze.
Didn't stiffen.
He simply stopped—briefly—right where he was.
The room felt like it inhaled.
Then he smiled.
It wasn't obvious. It barely deserved the name. Just the slightest curve at the corner of his mouth, subtle enough that I might have missed it if I hadn't been staring so intently.
But it made my chest sink all the same.
"So you noticed," he said.
His voice was calm. Not defensive. Not surprised. It wasn't the tone of someone caught in a secret, but rather of someone acknowledging an outcome that had already been calculated.
As if this moment had always been inevitable.
My throat tightened.
"What… are you doing when you go out every night?"
Seven turned around and looked at me.
There was no reproach in his eyes.
No avoidance.
No attempt to soften the truth.
He was simply looking at me—directly, evenly, as though measuring whether I was ready to hear the answer.
"Don't make that face," he said. "You're not wrong."
He paused.
For a moment, I couldn't tell whether he was choosing his words carefully… or whether he simply didn't care how they would land.
"I'm destroying loan shark organization bases."
The sentence fell into the room without force.
And yet the air changed instantly.
The quiet that followed was unnatural. Too complete. Too sharp.
I could hear my own breathing—uneven, shallow, embarrassingly loud. I could feel the way my chest rose and fell, as if my body were trying to remind me that it was still functioning.
But my mind went blank.
Destroying.
Bases.
Those were words meant for news reports. Headlines scrolling across television screens. Stories that belonged to places far removed from my everyday life.
Not something said in a hotel room.
Not something spoken this casually.
And yet Seven had delivered them as if he were talking about running errands.
I realized my fingers had clenched the corner of my clothes without my noticing. The fabric was twisted tightly in my grip, creased and warm.
"Then…"
I swallowed hard.
"Can I go with you?"
The moment the words left my mouth, even I froze.
What was I saying?
Seven clearly hadn't expected that.
His eyebrow lifted slightly—just a fraction. The expression vanished almost as soon as it appeared, but it was enough to make my heart start racing.
"That wouldn't be a good idea," he said. "And I can't guarantee nothing will go wrong."
His answer was reasonable.
Rational.
Calm.
Perfectly sound.
The kind of response that should have ended the conversation.
And yet, instead of settling my thoughts, it only made them tangle tighter.
"I won't get in the way," I said, almost immediately. "I just… want to see."
The word see sounded ridiculous even as I said it.
These weren't exhibits.
Not scenes from a movie.
Not something meant to be observed from a safe distance.
They were criminal hideouts.
And yet, the words had already escaped me.
Seven didn't answer right away.
He looked at me—really looked at me—and held my gaze longer than before. It made my skin prickle with unease, but I couldn't look away.
"One day," he said quietly, "you'll have to face unavoidable battles."
My heart jolted.
"Think of it as preparation."
His tone was still calm. Still steady.
But something inside me shifted.
Not fear.
Not excitement.
More like the sense of a door opening—just a crack—letting in air I hadn't realized I was suffocating without.
Night fell quickly.
By the time we stepped onto the street, there were barely any pedestrians left. The old district seemed to retreat into itself after sunset, as if even the city wanted to avoid being seen.
The streetlights flickered unevenly, their pale glow scattered across the asphalt in broken patches. Shadows stretched and overlapped, distorted by the wind, making the road ahead look fragmented and unstable.
Seven walked ahead of me.
His pace wasn't fast, but it carried a steady rhythm that never faltered. I followed behind, careful with my steps, acutely aware of every sound my shoes made against the ground.
The deeper we went, the heavier the air became.
Dampness clung to my skin.
The sour smell of mold seeped into my lungs.
And beneath it all was a greasy undertone—like something left to rot slowly, accumulating layer by layer.
It made my stomach churn.
Finally, we stopped.
A three-story building stood before us.
It was old.
The paint on the outer walls had long since peeled away, exposing gray, weathered concrete beneath. Rust stained the edges of metal fixtures. Several windows were sealed with iron bars, bent and uneven, as if installed more to keep things in than to keep others out.
Dim light leaked through the gaps.
Not enough to illuminate—just enough to suggest movement inside.
The place felt dirty.
Suffocating.
I looked up at it, an inexplicable tension tightening in my chest.
"We're here," Seven said quietly.
He glanced back at me, confirming I was still standing behind him.
"The reason I didn't bring any weapons," he continued, "is because dealing with third-rate trash like this doesn't require preparation."
He bent down and picked up a few pieces of gravel from the ground.
The motion was casual. Natural. Like someone gathering pebbles absentmindedly while walking.
"Weapons can be improvised from the surroundings."
His wrist flicked.
I didn't see the movement itself.
I only heard two dull, muted sounds.
Two bodies collapsed almost at the same time.
They slid down the wall, scraping against the concrete before hitting the ground with a heavy thud.
It was over before I could even react.
My mouth fell open. I clamped a hand over it instinctively, terrified that a sound might escape.
My heart hammered violently against my ribs, each beat sharp and painful.
This wasn't slow motion.
There were no dramatic pauses.
No exaggerated effects.
Just reality.
Cold.
Efficient.
Direct.
Seven stood there, checking that the two men had completely lost consciousness.
Then he turned back to me.
"Let's go," he said softly.
And only then did I realize—
I was already standing somewhere I could no longer turn back from.