From Apocalypse To Entertainment Circle (BL)-Chapter 147: Extra II: Provoke The Abyss…

That night was the ugliest night of Kira’s life.

Fear, disgust, and shock left her scarred with a trauma that haunted her long after. The mere thought of a man’s hand on her skin—just one finger brushing against her—was enough to unravel her entirely. Her body would convulse violently, nausea would crawl up her throat like acid, and panic would rip through her chest, hollowing her out until she could no longer breathe.

One could even say her condition was worse than Shin’s when he suffered his episodes. At least Shin could sometimes ground himself in rage or silence. Kira had nothing to ground herself with—her body betrayed her, her heart betrayed her, and the world itself had betrayed her.

Yet Kira had always been strong. Perhaps stronger than her mother, who had lived her own life of bitterness and compromise. Her mother had been a singer, a dancer in seedy, smoke-choked brothels, yet even there she carried herself with dignity, refusing the "special requests" whispered by drunk men whose hands clutched coins. Her words had been iron. No patron had ever managed to trick her into their beds. She lived poor but proud, and Kira had believed, for a time, that same blood of defiance flowed in her veins.

And so, her stepfather’s attempt to force himself upon her that night had failed. He had underestimated her. The strike she dealt him had been instinctive, fierce, and precise. He had tumbled down the stairs like a sack of filth, howling as his body smacked each step.

But even in victory, she was broken. Because no matter how strong a girl may be, she was still only a minor—a child who had yet to fully face the cruelty of human society. That was why the instant his hand touched her, she had already been shattered.

Even though he had not succeeded in violating her completely, her mind was irreparably scarred. The sensation of his skin on hers was a poison that soaked into her blood, eating at her until she no longer felt clean. She scrubbed her body raw that night in the bath, rubbing until her skin turned crimson and her flesh stung like fire. In some places, she rubbed so hard the skin broke, beads of blood blooming to the surface. Still, she could not rid herself of the filth.

The most shocking part was not her pain, but his indifference.

The next morning, her stepfather behaved as though nothing had happened. He strolled into the kitchen, grumbling about a sore back, claiming he had drunk too much and tumbled asleep on the stairs. His face bore a faint bruise, but his expression was infuriatingly calm, like the events of last night were no more than a dream.

Kira had no desire to confront him. Whether he lied or truly convinced himself of that false memory mattered little. All she thought of was leaving that house. Escaping that hell.

But custody remained in his hands. He held her freedom like a leash, smug in his power. And worse still, she was months away from turning eighteen—the age of choice, the age of freedom. Her liberation coincided cruelly with her final university examinations.

It was a wall. One she slammed into again and again, clawing desperately for cracks. Each time, she found none. Worse, she began to sense his eyes on her wherever she went. In the corridors. At the dinner table. Even when she tried to sleep.

Kira learned to quiet her breathing, to feign calm, to bury her terror deep enough that he might forget how vulnerable she truly was. That was when she began to think with a chilling clarity.

Any ordinary girl might have broken beneath such fear, slipped into despair, chosen the wrong path, and ended in tragedy. Many would have chosen suicide.

Kira thought of suicide too. She pictured tying a rope to the beams of her closet. She pictured swallowing her mother’s leftover pills. She imagined stepping in front of a bus.

But Kira was harsher on herself than most.

No, she told herself. If she were ever to end her life, it would not be quietly. She swore with venom in her blood that if she died, it would only be after killing that vile old man. Her life would not be a waste. Her death would be her revenge.

So when her mother died, when the neighbors and classmates whispered that it was because the daughter had shamed her, when society spat its venom and painted Kira as immoral and worthless—she bore it with a frightening calm.

She understood this was his design.

The old bastard had orchestrated it, weaving lies into the air until she was seen as rotten. He painted himself as the poor, misunderstood stepfather who had done everything he could for an ungrateful girl. By the time she would ever dare accuse him, her reputation would already be shredded. Who would believe the fallen girl? Who would trust her words against his?

Kira was no fool. She never went to the police. She never confided in teachers. She never gave him the satisfaction of watching her beg.

She endured.

She waited.

She sharpened herself like a blade hidden in cloth.

She studied with a relentless hunger, each exam paper her battlefield, each score her weapon. And at last, she achieved the highest marks. Her acceptance letter to a prestigious university arrived like a breath of divine mercy.

One week.

In one week, she would move into the dormitories. She would finally spread her wings and sleep in peace—no longer curling up in closets, no longer barricading herself in locked bathrooms, catching an hour of shallow sleep before dawn.

Her exhaustion was killing her.

Perhaps it was the relief that night. Perhaps it was knowing her stepfather had supposedly left on a business trip. Either way, on the eve of her departure for university, Kira let herself rest.

She lay on her bed. She closed her eyes. For the first time in months, she drifted into true sleep.

She dreamed of sunlight. Of campus courtyards and bustling students. Of laughter, of freedom. She dreamed of leaving that cursed villa behind forever.

But in the midst of her dream, something seized her foot.

At first, she dismissed it. In her exhaustion, her brain whispered that it was only a cramp, a twitch, an itch. She twitched her leg, brushed it off.

The grip tightened. Hard.

Her eyes snapped open.

Moonlight streamed through the half-open curtains, pale and cold. And beneath that light, she saw him.

Her heart lurched.

A face hovered over her—the face of her stepfather. Bloated, wrinkled, with a scraggly white beard. But his eyes were not those of a guardian or elder. They burned with lust, sharp and clear, no veil of drunkenness to mask them.

He gripped her ankle with crushing strength, enough to bruise bone. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

"Dearest Kira," he rasped, his voice gravelly, his lips glistening with spit, "how could you think of leaving your father and living alone?"

His grip tightened. "Your old father is very, very sad."

And then, with a monstrous grin, he added:

"So tonight... You must comfort me. Satisfy me well, to ease my sorrow."

Those words...

That voice...

There was no mistaking his intent now. No drunken excuse. No false memory. No mask.

He was a predator. And in his eyes, the prey had no rights.

Kira’s eyes widened, her lashes trembling as tears fell silently down her cheeks. The sight of her vulnerability only thrilled him more. His tongue lolled from his mouth, saliva dripping onto her bedsheets, his chest heaving with greed. He was no man. He was a beast dressed in flesh.

She lowered her head, inching her leg back, her trembling hand sliding under her pillow.

He did not notice. He did not care. His world was consumed by the hunger in his veins, the fever in his brain.

But perhaps it was his obsession that sealed his fate.

Because beneath that pillow lay a knife. A long kitchen knife she had stolen weeks ago, hidden as her last lifeline.

Her fingers wrapped around the handle now.

Her hand shook, her breath came ragged, her body trembled with terror. Yet her eyes—those tear-stained eyes—carried something he did not see.

A terrifying cruelty.

A deadly resolve.

Her gaze was an abyss.

And as the saying goes: when you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back.

But if you provoke the abyss...

It will consume you whole—bones, flesh, and soul.

Kira’s grip on the knife tightened.

Her stepfather leaned closer, his foul breath hot against her cheek.

"You belong to me," he whispered. "Don’t you dare—"

Steel flashed in the moonlight.

And the night was split by the sound of something wet, something final.

That night was truly unforgettable in Kira’s memory. Yet, at the same time, she felt the intoxicating thrill of release—of freedom, of life itself. Her emotions shifted wildly, from despair to sorrow, from fear to terror, and then to exhilaration. Yes, it was the ecstasy of being alive—the rapture of survival—that seized hold of Kira’s nerves and ruled her entirely on that night.