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EGO
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Taehyung

This dark part of Seoul is something that I’ve only heard of before and never been to personally, yet, here I am, driving down the filthy and dingy road that leads me to the destination that Jimin sent me a while ago. Two of the three phone numbers that I gave him are currently active, and he told me that both the numbers point to the same address.

The destination that I arrive at looks like a deserted and destroyed church that hasn’t been used or even opened in many years. There are no street lights in this part, and the only light that’s guiding my vision is the headlight of Yi-Seo’s car which outshines the faint glow of the half-moon outside and flashes directly on the building that’s at the end of the road. I’m not a fan of such creepy locations, yet, now I’m not here to assess the comfort of this place.

And I know that I’m not in deep trouble all by myself because I already informed Jimin that if I didn’t call him back within an hour, he, along with the police, would already know where to find me. I could have asked him to come along and help me, but that would probably mean that he might end up knowing about Yi-Seo’s past without her knowledge, in case there would be a clash of words. I would never want that at any cost even if it means that I have to face Jungkook all by myself tonight.

After parking her car right in front of the rundown building, I climb out of it, carrying her phone with me and leaving my phone in the car. I walk down the moonlit path towards the dilapidated front door and push it slightly. It creaks open effortlessly, revealing a much brighter interior, which totally contrasts the goth appearance on the outside. However, the place is empty and cold, and my heart races wildly with every step that I take forward.

It definitely is a church, or at least was one in the past because the vintage tiles beneath my feet as well as the shattered, colored-glass on the windows are something that one could only see at churches. The pews and the altar are also still intact despite most parts of the building appearing crumbled. There is no sign of life here, but an old door behind the main altar is open, and I take stealthy steps as I approach that open door.

As I push it open carefully, I find that on the other side of the door there is a massive open ground. On one side of the ground, there is a neat wooden house on stilts and a row of three expensive cars parked in front of it. I carefully make my way out the door, studying the wooden house on stilts which looks totally out of place given how beautiful and dreamy it looks against this cemetery-like backdrop.

I also don’t miss noticing a huge sports car with a blank license plate that’s among the three parked cars, solidifying my belief that I am, in fact, at the right place, looking for the right person.

When I look up at the house again, I notice human movement inside, and if my intuition is right, it is Jungkook. I place a hand on the front pocket of my jacket to make sure that Yi-Seo’s phone is there before I climb up the small flight of wooden steps and reach the door of the house. My suspicions are confirmed when I see Jungkook in there, gulping down the last bit of drink in his glass as his eyes land on me.

I walk inside, a floorboard or two creaking beneath my feet as I do, but what draws my attention and startles me a little is a lopsided photo on the wall of the house—an old photo of him and Yi-Seo together. My eyes dart back to him at the same time he turns to look at me, unamused, unimpressed, and unsurprised.

Smirking, he takes a step closer to me, and I can sense that he is quite drunk already. Not to the point of passing out, but he’s definitely drunk.

“Is Yi-Seo dead yet?” He whispers maliciously, making my fists clench tight; my nails digging into my palms before I bring my hands to harshly grip the collars of his leather jacket.

“What’s your problem?” I roar, my angry eyes searching his eerily calm and reddened eyes for an answer. “She doesn’t need you in her life anymore. Why don’t you get that and leave her alone?” I crush the ends of the collar together, attempting to strangle him.

Jungkook only laughs, pushing me away effortlessly and making me lose my balance a little while he dusts his jacket with both hands.

“She hurt me, and I hurt her back. Tit for tat. We’re even now,” he shrugs as if he did nothing, and it enrages me even more.

“You did not just hurt her. You tried to kill her, and what are you achieving with this shitty ego of yours? You’ve only been hurting her all along, and for once she hurt you back trying to defend herself, and that makes you so mad?” I demand angrily and push him by his shoulders. He stumbles a little, but his arrogant smile doesn’t fade off, turning into a more demeaning chuckle instead.

“She’s fucking around with you,” he nods a few times, “she always does, that bi-” I don’t let him finish speaking as I clench my jaw tight and powerfully pound my fist to his jaw, making his head violently turn to the side.

This time, he stumbles a bit more, and his smile vanishes and turns into a ferocious glare as he uses his fingers to feel his blood seeping out the corner of his mouth. But the shift in emotions is only for a few seconds, and soon he resumes his maniacal chuckling as he coolly turns around and walks away into a room, shaking his head and dismissing my attack.

I snatch the photo from the wall and slam it on my thigh, breaking it into two pieces and thrashing it on the floor before I follow him to his room. Once inside, I see him grabbing a pre-rolled joint from one among the many lying on his table, and then he lights it up.

There are a few bottles of alcohol lining the shelf beside the bed, and in total contrast to the setting, there are lots of potted plants hanging over the large windows around the room. On any other day, I would have been lured in by the display of alcohol bottles, but now they don’t bother me because I’m here for a purpose.

I’ve already let Yi-Seo down on a few occasions with my reckless drinking habits. But now, I’ve made a promise to her to consciously try to gain control—a promise that I want to live by for the rest of my life.

Jungkook drags in a few puffs from the joint and tosses it aside before he staggers his way to me, looking me directly in the eye. His calm exterior, despite the calamity he has created within me and the damage he has been doing to Yi-Seo all along, is irritating my nerves.

“Confess and surrender to the police,” I say through gritted teeth, locking gazes with him. It takes everything in me not to just beat him up and drag him to the police station even though it is evident that he is the more formidable person among the two of us here.

“What if I won’t?” He cocks his head to one side and questions me with a rude smirk.

“You’re caught on camera, and Yi-Seo knows that it was you who did it. You know there’s no escape now,” my words die down on him as he breaks into peals of laughter, clapping his hands hysterically and stepping back from me.

“Oh my God! I’m so scared,” Jungkook raises his arms and pretends to be scared, and once again he ends up laughing loudly to himself as I stand on the spot and stare at him being a psychotic mess.

“Stop it!” My grave voice makes his smile disappear, and he sucks in a short breath through his mouth as he takes off his jacket, tossing it aside and pushing his long hair behind his ears thereafter.

“You want to take me to the police? Okay, come on,” he gestures with both hands, inviting me to grab his hands and drag him outside.

Hesitantly, or rather foolishly, I take a short step forward and try to take his hand in mine when he swiftly grabs my wrist and turns me around, twisting my hands behind my back. Launching his knee into my back, he pushes the side of my face and my whole body against the wooden wall of his room, using his knee to keep me from moving. I wince in pain as his knee presses down on my lower back with a kind of beastly force that threatens to snap my back into two.

“Women are sickening. They are all the same,” he speaks through gritted teeth, and his voice resonates with so much anger and resentment. “Don’t die trying to fight for her,” he twists my wrists a little more.

“Go find a man then,” I retort weakly, and it infuriates him; he harshly yanks me away from the wall and pushes me down to the floor where I fall face down at the doorway between his room and the living room.

I groan in pain as my head hits the floor so hard that for a moment, my vision goes black. I blink my eyes as I lay on the floor, trying to breathe properly through my parted mouth. My arms feel like they are on fire, and my eyes keep fluctuating between staying open and falling shut, and I’m using every last ounce of my energy to stay awake and alive.

I need to think and act quickly. Jungkook is fast; his reflexes are quick, and his strength is immense. I can’t ever fight him with my bare hands, and I definitely need to use something else.

Turning my head slowly, I notice his hazy figure behind me, smoking another joint at a distance. There isn’t much time left until when his weed would keep him distracted, and once it burns out, he would most definitely come back to attack me once again.

Unbeknownst to my conscience, my eyelids draw closed, but my mind begins to tell me that this is probably how he treated Yi-Seo in the past by manhandling her and beating her and, even worse, burning her with his words and his cigarettes. She didn’t fight him back in the past. After all, she had feelings for him because her love was pure and blind. But I have nothing for Jungkook except a lot of hatred and acrimony for the way he had mistreated my woman and scarred her for life.

I’ve seen her panic attacks and her tears, her scars and fears, and even in my current state of unbearable pain, thinking about her tears is making my heart twist and ache. Yi-Seo’s tears and scars and all the pain she has ever experienced in life are all because of him, and I’m not going to let him walk away without paying for his deeds.

He has mistreated her and foul-mouthed her so much to the extent that she is traumatized beyond imagination. And if there has to be an end to all of his demonic actions, then that end has to be brought in by me.

My eyelids shoot open with some kind of renewed vigor as my eyes frantically wander the space until I notice the loose floorboards in the living room. They’re not really at an arm’s reach, but I can get there.

I will get there.

Turning my head back to Jungkook, I see a cloud of smoke around him that’s probably obscuring his vision a little. Pinning all my trust and hope on my reflexes, I crawl forward to the living room and rise to my feet, hissing when the pain in my lower back threatens to kill me. I bear with the pain and bend down, disengaging a loose floorboard and lifting it as I straighten my back.

The pain in my back is excruciating as I turn around slowly and notice that Jungkook isn’t behind me, fortunately. He’s also not anywhere inside the living room, and I grip the floorboard tighter in my hands as I slowly drag my feet to his room.

Peeping inside, I see that Jungkook is reeling in the fog of smoke, slowly drifting into intoxication. It would take a few more minutes for him to pass out, and I look with remorse at the floorboard in my hand, contemplating if I should even use it on him. Brutishness isn’t my thing. But my thoughts align quickly because, given that it’s him, things could be different, and there’s a high possibility of him turning more violent once the weed works through his system and he gets fully high.

Pushing out a heavy breath, I move my hands to my back, concealing the floorboard from his sight as I slowly walk inside. Each step that I take feels like my feet are bulky blocks of concrete until I finally reach his side, and he still doesn’t notice me.

Yet, I’m not the one to believe him because his strength has the potential to end my life, and he’s also sly and witty. But I’m sharp as a needle too, and I will never again make the mistake of trusting a traitor.

I drag in a long breath as I move the floorboard in my hands to the front, moving my legs apart a little for stability. My hands tremble, yet I grip the board tighter and position myself to blow a strike at the precise instant.

Probably after sensing my presence and hearing my heavy breaths, Jungkook turns his head a little to my side, but I have no idea if we made eye contact as I feel a rush of blood within me. I swing back my arms, and, with a force that seems out-worldly, I slam the board right on the back of his head.

Jungkook gets thrown off the bed and falls flat on the floor, and I find myself standing frozen on the spot; my hands trembling and my mouth falling agape at the savagery that I’ve committed. Dropping the board to the floor with a loud thud, I slowly move closer to Jungkook.

He’s completely motionless, but he is still breathing, and just seeing and realizing that he is in fact breathing, forces a loud rush of air out of my lungs. My knees buckle, and I drop to the floor, my head hanging and my shoulders slouching in exhaustion.

What I have just done makes my body shudder, and my blood feels like it is about to freeze. I have inflicted physical pain on someone, and it makes me no different from Jungkook. I have behaved like a beast, but I did it only with good intentions and also to defend myself from him.

It takes me a while to compose myself and pacify my mind that what I have done is not a crime. I rub my hands over the pockets of my jacket to pick out Yi-Seo’s phone. My hands are still shaking as I call Jimin’s phone, and my brain feels about to explode as I hear the ringing of his phone louder and closer than what it would usually sound like over the phone. And before he could answer the call, I hear the clicking and squeaking of shoes on the wooden floor.

My puzzled eyes lift to the doorway to find Jimin screeching his way into the room, breathless, followed by a pair of cops.

⚜
Enjoy your stay in prison, Jungkook!
😏

So, as per what the majority of the readers wanted, the epilogue will be a one-part loooong one. Wait for it!!!
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Published on : 02/27/2023