Sitting cross-legged in a private room of a club, a young woman in her twenties chewed on the cap of her pen while writing something frantically in her notebook. She had to finish it before she was found, or she would die.
Well, she was going to die anyway, but if she could finish before being discovered, she could take her enemies down with her.
Soon, she heard noise coming from outside the room. They were already on her track.
Furrowing her brows, her hands sped up. "Just thirty more seconds..." she muttered as she glanced at her watch.
Twenty-five! She was nearly done.
Twenty! Just a bit more.
Fifteen! Nearly done.
Ten! Almost!
But she already heard people gathering by the door.
Five seconds!
The door burst open, and shooting followed after.
But the girl ignored the wounds forming on her body. Her head was still intact. They wanted her alive for a while. So she didn't stop her hands.
"Zero!" she said with a smile and pressed the last button.
With that, she plugged a USB into the notebook and shut it down. The USB would kill the motherboard of the notebook once the program was finished.
Not caring about the pain from being shot in her limbs, the young woman put the notebook aside and stepped toward the armed men. They instantly arrested her. All they knew was that she was a dangerous criminal and that they had to capture her alive. Nothing else. They had no clue that it was already too late.
Even handcuffed and led into the house of the people she hated so much, she was smiling.
Once there, a middle-aged man pressed a gun to her forehead. "Where's the program?" he asked coldly, his eyes gleaming with malice. It was clear what he was thinking. That he finally got what he wanted. That he won. That he would soon stand on the top of the world.
But the woman's smile was unsettling. And her words nearly drove him mad: "I activated it!" she said lazily.
Just then, a servant ran into the room. "Boss, reporters came demanding an explanation about our involvement in the recent case!"
Soon, another servant came, and then another one.
Then, the man's face twisted in anger. "How dare you!" He suddenly landed a tight slap on the woman's face, forcing her to cock her head to the side.
But her smile remained present. "Father, you were the one who cast me out! Don't blame me for getting back at you when you kept sending assassins at me after I got successful!"
In an instant, the man raised his gun and shot at the woman. She was smiling even as her body slumped against the guard who was holding her restrained.
She thought she had died, but she woke up to someone calling her name. "Sera, Sera! Wake up, my dear!" The words were somehow sweet, but the voice was twisted and malicious.
Sera opened her eyes and looked for the source of the voice. All around her, she saw empty chairs. Slowly, people appeared on them, all smiling. And all half-transparent.
"Welcome to the underworld!" the person sitting the highest spoke. Michelle couldn't see them properly, and even from the voice, she couldn't make out anything about the person. Not even their gender. Just that their voice was malicious and creepy.
"Is this what happens after death...?" Sera asked lazily as she stood up. Just then, she realized there was no ground beneath her. Just gaping emptiness all around her, except the chairs and the ghosts.
"No, you are special!" the person spoke again. "Souls usually go to the afterlife right away, but since you were interesting, we caught you before you could go there. We've decided to give you a second chance at life!"
Hearing that, Sera frowned. "I doubt it's for free!" she said suspiciously. "What do you want in exchange?"
"You will find out once you are in your new body!"
"Then I don't agree!" Sera wasn't planning to take such a shady deal.
"That's not for you to choose!"
With that, the person waved their hand, and Sera felt light-headed. "From now on, you are Seraphine Valerius!" After hearing that, she fainted.
Soon after, she heard a baby crying, making her frown. "Can't someone make the baby shut up!" she shouted, but instead, the crying just intensified.
"Aaagh—" Seraphine felt like she was going crazy and opened her eyes. Just then, she saw a beautiful face right above her. But it was big. And she couldn't move properly. She could just flail her hands around.
When she saw them, she froze. And the crying stopped at the same time. So she was the crying baby. And she couldn't control it.
For a while, she was too shocked to think about anything. But once she woke up from the shock, her head started throbbing, preventing her from thinking about anything. Her small hands clenched into fists, and her small mouth started wailing. No longer crying, but it was still annoying. Especially because she had no control over it.
For a long while, Seraphine couldn't focus on anything. She felt stuffed, her head was aching, and her thoughts were scattered. Most of the time she kept her eyes tightly shut, her limbs curled to herself, wailing quietly. Her cute little face was holding a painful frown, hiding her beauty. She had no way of knowing how much time had passed, but nothing changed.
Until one day, someone lifted her out of her bed and made her fall asleep. When she woke up, her head was clear, and she found herself staring into a devilishly handsome face. The purple eyes that seemed to have been made out of void, filled with deep-rooted contempt for everything, the long purple hair cascading over that strong body, and the black horns poking out of the head.
But Seraphine wasn't captivated by any of it. She felt a clawed hand on the back of her neck, keeping her suspended in air. It was a painful position. Still, she didn't make a single sound. She could easily see that the man in front of her was clearly dangerous.