CHAPTER 164: [NORMAL OF THEM]

"Eli! Are you okay?!" Mio’s voice cut through the ringing silence, sharp and worried.

Eli blinked slowly—carefully—trying not to get any more of the octopus’s glowing blue blood into his eyes.

Every inch of him was drenched; his hair clung to his face, his clothes were soaked through, and the metallic-sweet scent of monster blood filled his nose. It was warm, thick, and almost sticky on his skin.

He looked down at himself, dazed.

The world felt muffled, distant, like he was underwater.

Across from him, Kairo stood tall amidst the ruin, just as blood-soaked—but unlike Eli, he didn’t seem to care.

His chest rose and fell steadily, his face calm, unreadable, almost serene under the flickering light.

The octopus’s corpse lay motionless behind them, its enormous body half-submerged, the water around it glowing faintly from the leaking blue veins.

The entire cavern still trembled faintly from the aftermath of the fight.

Mel and Zaira ran closer, both splashing through the shallow water.

"Eli!"

Mel’s voice cracked as he stumbled through the shallow water, splashing to a halt a few feet away. His hands hovered in the air, twitching uselessly as his eyes darted from Eli’s face to the rest of him.

"You’re—you’re covered in blood!" he choked out. His voice trembled somewhere between panic and disbelief.

He reached forward instinctively—but then froze. His fingers curled halfway before dropping again, hesitating. His gaze flicked to Kairo.

Kairo was still holding Eli with one arm, the other gripping his sword loosely, the weapon’s blade streaked in blue and red.

The contrast between the two colors glowed eerily against the dark of the cavern.

Eli blinked slowly, his lashes heavy, his eyes stinging from the blood and salt in the air.

He wanted to say something—anything—but the words stuck somewhere in his throat. All he could manage was the faint sound of his own shaky breathing.

’I know the octopus gave us a hard time and the goal was to kill it but...’

He turned his head slightly, his gaze flicking toward Kairo.

The man wasn’t even looking at anyone. His eyes—dark and cold, almost black beneath the dim blue light—were focused on nothing. Empty. Detached. Like he wasn’t here at all.

’A lot of those... weren’t necessary...’

Because Eli remembered every sound. Every scream.

The octopus hadn’t just died. It had begged

.

For almost ten minutes, Kairo had drawn out its death—cutting, binding, bleeding it dry until the water turned to a churning sea of blue.

Every movement had been precise, cruelly deliberate.

Even when it stopped moving, Kairo hadn’t stopped.

He kept going until there was nothing left to move.

Zaira stumbled forward next, her breath ragged, her steps unsteady. She looked exhausted—her hair clung to her neck, her clothes were torn and soaked—but there was still fire in her eyes.

"Captain," she said sharply, voice trembling with restrained anger. "I think you took it a little too far this time, don’t you think?"

Kairo didn’t respond immediately. His expression didn’t even shift.

Zaira’s lips pressed into a thin line. She gestured toward Eli, her voice rising slightly as the frustration cracked through. "I get that you were angry—but look at him!" she snapped. "He’s not used to... this side of you!"

Her words echoed, slicing through the silence that followed.

For a long moment, Kairo said nothing. Only the distant drip of blood-filled water filled the air.

Then—finally—his gaze moved.

Slowly, deliberately, he turned his head to look at Eli.

The faintest flicker of awareness returned to his expression, but it was dull, restrained. His jaw tensed, the muscles shifting beneath his skin.

Eli could feel that gaze on him—heavy, unflinching.

He looked down instead, staring at his hands. His fingers trembled. Blue blood dripped from them in slow, uneven rivulets, pooling at his feet and staining the water around him.

His chest rose and fell unevenly. His breathing was ragged. His whole body felt cold despite the lingering heat of the fight.

’This side of Kairo...’ he thought, his pulse hammering in his ears. ’They don’t even seem surprised. Not Mio, not Mel, not even Zaira. They’re just... concerned for me.’

That realization hit harder than anything else.

’So this isn’t new.’

The silence between them stretched—uncomfortable, suffocating. The sound of the dripping blood was the only thing breaking it.

Eli swallowed hard, glancing once more at Kairo’s distant expression.

’That just proves it, doesn’t it? This isn’t rare for him.’

He took in a slow, trembling breath. The faint metallic taste of blood filled his mouth.

’This is normal for them.’

And somehow, that was the part that scared him the most.

The reality hit him all over again—slowly, suffocatingly, like cold water filling his lungs.

Getting closer to Kairo and Caelen.

The sadistic psychopath and the narcissistic sociopath.

The strongest hunters in all of Korenea.

The ones who could command blood and fear like it was second nature.

The ones people bowed to—not out of respect, but out of survival.

Eli swallowed hard, his throat tight.

’Seducing them was already terrifying.’

He’d known from the start that it would be dangerous.

The system had made that clear.

Every mission, every stat point, every single task it gave him always ended with one impossible directive—"Raise their affection."

At first, it had just been frustrating.

Unfair, even.

But now, after seeing this side of Kairo—after watching him tear a creature apart until nothing was left but blood and silence—Eli realized that getting close wasn’t the hardest part anymore.

It was staying close.

’How the hell am I supposed to keep breathing beside someone like him?’ he thought bitterly, his hands curling into fists. ’Someone who can lose control and still look calm doing it? And then there’s Caelen—he’s not as loud about it, but that’s even worse. He hides it better.’

He let out a slow, shaky exhale.

’The psychopath and the sociopath. What a pair.’

He could already imagine it—being stuck between them. The constant tension, the sharp looks, the dangerous charm.

Both so different, yet both capable of killing without a flicker of hesitation.

And somehow, he was supposed to win their affection.

The thought made his stomach twist.

But he couldn’t back out. Not now. Not when every second mattered.

The system’s glowing text still haunted him every time he closed his eyes.

The missions. The deadlines. The constant reminder that failure meant death.

That his death meant no return.

’That was the goal,’ he reminded himself, his chest tightening. ’That’s the system’s goal for me. To get close to them. To seduce them. To survive.’

It sounded ridiculous when he thought about it like that—seducing two of the most dangerous men alive just to earn a second chance at living his old life.

But it was the only option he had left.

He thought of his old apartment. His mother’s voice. Lucas’s laugh echoing through the small space.

The smell of cheap instant ramen. The sound of the fan humming beside his desk as he worked late nights just to keep the lights on.

That life felt so far away now.

’They need me,’ he thought, his vision blurring slightly. ’Mom... Lucas... I promised I’d help. I promised I’d come back.’

His hands trembled, but he clenched them tighter.

’So no matter how twisted this gets... no matter what they are... I’ll do it.’

He looked up at Kairo again—at the way the man stood there in silence, blood dripping from his fingertips, eyes calm but dead.

’Even if it kills me inside,’ Eli thought, jaw tightening. ’I’ll get close to them. I’ll make them fall for me. Because that’s the only way I can go home.’

Eli took a deep breath, ignoring the slick stickiness of blood against his skin—the way it clung, heavy and warm, crawling over him like guilt itself.

He opened his mouth to speak.

To say he was fine.

To pretend everything was fine.

Until—

Ding.