The fluorescent lights in the makeup room buzzed with an irritating hum. The harsh white glare reflected off every surface. The chrome handles of the drawers, the glossy countertops, the countless bottles of product arranged in neat rows that suddenly seemed to mock her with their perfect order.

Lilianna stared at her reflection in the vanity mirror, barely recognizing the woman who stared back at her.

Her eyes were bloodshot, her foundation streaked with tear tracks that had carved paths down to her neck. Her lips were bitten raw from the effort of holding back sobs during the shoot. Her gold hair hung limp and tangled around her shoulders.

This was the face of a woman breaking apart at the seams.

Twenty-seven takes.

Twenty-seven goddamn takes for a simple perfume commercial that should have wrapped in three.

She had snapped at the robot holding the lighting because it was too bright. She barked at the cameraman for calling her name a few more times to ’adjust’ her emotion.

She nearly threw a compact at the assistant who had brought her the wrong shade of lipstick. Her manager, Bingli, had spent the entire afternoon bowing and apologizing to the crew. She ignored her desperate, pleading looks while shooting.

The door clicked shut behind the last staff member who had fled the room. They knew better than to stick around when she was like this.

The moment she became completely alone, something inside Lilianna’s chest cracked wide open. She grabbed the first thing within reach and hurled it at the opposite wall.

CRASH!

It exploded on impact, raining liquid mist across the surface. The crash was so satisfying that she craved more.

"Fuck!"

CRASH!

SPLASH!

CRACK!

BANG!

One after another, Lilianna threw everything she saw. She even turned over everything that she could.

"Fuck, fuck, FUCK!"

Each item was followed by another curse, another sob that tore from her throat like glass. She wasn’t even sure what she was trying to destroy anymore—the room, herself, or the memory of last night’s group chat conversation.

The worst part was that she had joined in that conversation with hope.

Stupid, foolish, utterly pathetic hope.

That, Grayson, was just being forced by Gloria.

But she also knew from the moment her mom told her those things that she should’ve prepared for this to happen.

Yet, she told herself that there must be something more to it, that it was a mistake—that it had been a business arrangement and nothing more.

But knowing and reading how serious things were going were entirely different beasts.

Last night, with their inner circle of friends, she watched Grayson become troubled with his relationship as if it were the most natural thing in the universe.

Even worse was that he admitted to liking Neville.

Like the years of silent devotion, of standing beside him through war and peace, of building herself into someone worthy of a man like Grayson Maxwell, had been nothing more than another person’s success story.

Like it had nothing to do with other people’s romantic love story.

Lilianna’s knees buckled and crumpled against the vanity, sliding down until she sat on the floor amidst the debris. Her chest heaved with ragged breaths; breathing became a chore.

She hadn’t told her mother. She couldn’t bear tell her mother.

The thought of shattering that hope, of watching her mother’s face fall the same way hers had last night, was unbearable.

So she would carry this alone.

Lock it away behind the same mask she wore for cameras, for crowds, for everyone.

She didn’t know how long she sat there, but eventually the storm inside her began to recede.

Knock.

A knock echoed through the room.

In the part of the room that was hidden by the shadow, Chronos appeared. He was already inside, knocking mockingly for courtesy with a smirk.

Lilianna didn’t bother getting up, nor did she bother composing herself. She didn’t know how long he had been there, but she couldn’t care less.

Chronos’s new hair color, platinum blonde hair, should be striking and eye-catching. But he had a knack for making his presence invisible and unrecognizable to everyone, regardless of his appearance. This was precisely the reason why he gained Grayson’s recognition and earned the nickname Shadow.

His makeup was flawless, accentuating the delicate beauty of features that had made him the Empire’s most beloved idol. His silk shirt in pale lavender, fitted trousers, and designer clothes perfectly highlighted his best features.

He looked like he had just stepped out of a photoshoot.

Meanwhile, she looked like something a cosmic beast had coughed up.

Looks like he was really enjoying her misery.

"Having fun?" he asked, that infuriating smile tugging at the corners of his lips. His voice made everything sound like a joke, even when it wasn’t.

Lilianna said nothing. Just fixed him with a glare that would have sent lesser men running. 𝕗𝕣𝐞𝐞𝘄𝐞𝚋𝚗𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹.𝚌𝕠𝚖

Chronos, of course, was not a simple man.

He stepped inside, carefully threading through the shattered cosmetics and overturned furniture, until he found a chair that had somehow stayed perfectly fine. He picked it up, set it upright, and sat down comfortably.

"I knew you’d be like this after last night’s talk," he said, crossing one leg over the other. "Very predictable, Lilianna."

Hearing her name uttered in a playful tone made her teeth grind together.

"Chronos."

"Call me Zero." He said nonchalantly. "We’re at work."

She didn’t respond and watched him with wariness.

He might be a beauty, but he was absolutely poisonous.

"Aww~, don’t look at me like that." Chronos pressed a hand to his chest in mock hurt. "I came all the way here to comfort you, you know?"

"I don’t need that."

He blinked at her with wide, innocent eyes filled with undisguised insincerity.

As if her words had simply failed to reach his ears, he continued, "I understand where you’re coming from."

Something hot and bitter surged in Lilianna’s chest.

"Do you?" The sarcasm dripped from her words like venom.

To avoid breaking down again, she pushed herself to her feet, grabbed a makeup wipe that hadn’t fallen down, and began scrubbing at her ruined face with more force than necessary.

The playful mask Chronos wore flickered a little as his eyes sharpened, "But you shouldn’t take it out on other people."

The wipe came away black with mascara and foundation. Lilianna reached for another, refusing to meet Chrono’s gaze in the mirror.

"Tsk. What can I do about it?"

"Get a grip, will you?"

Chronos’s voice lost its sing-song quality, settling into something colder, harder. "You’re going to lose yourself. Your career. And for what? Because some man who couldn’t see you eye to eye broke your heart?"

Lilianna’s head snapped around, glaring at him murderously. Chronos met her glare head-on, his expression unchanging.

"We’ve all been telling you," he said simply. "Move on."