I was doodling absentmindedly in the back of my classroom, half-listening to the teacher drone on about quadratic equations, when reality simply… stopped.
One heartbeat I was there. The next, I ripped awake with a strangled gasp, chest heaving, cold sweat already prickling down my spine.
A flood of foreign memories poured in vile, sticky, nauseating. Faces contorted in terror. Women weeping after being promised the world and given nothing but bruises and silence.
Villains slipping him envelopes thick with cash while he turned his back on screaming civilians. Every single act of betrayal, every lazy abuse of power, every casual cruelty the original owner of this body had committed slammed into my skull like shards of glass.
I wasn't me anymore.
I was Nox.
S-rank protector.
One of the three absolute apex predators that Alfar the tiny, fiercely independent nation officially boasted to the world.
Alfar was small on a map, barely a speck between larger powers, but no one sane laughed at it anymore.
Not with three confirmed S-ranks calling it home. Not when villain gates tore open almost daily along its jagged borders, spitting out monsters and raiders like clockwork.
The constant sieges had turned Alfar into a pressure cooker of talent and violence. Strength wasn't a luxury here; it was oxygen. And Nox had been born breathing fire.
He could have been a hero.
Instead he became a monster wearing hero's skin.
Fortunately, impossibly, I had arrived at the very beginning. Before the mask slipped in public. Before the betrayals became headlines. Before the world learned just how rotten one of Alfar's three pillars really was.
I forced my eyes wider, dragging myself back to the present.
The room was obscene luxury: charcoal-gray walls trimmed in matte gold, a sprawling panoramic window showing the capital's glittering nightscape far below, heavy blackout curtains half-drawn.
I lay sprawled across an enormous king-sized bed, black Egyptian-cotton sheets twisted around my hips, the air still thick with the musk of sex and expensive cologne.
A soft, amused voice floated from the ensuite bathroom.
"Nox? Did you fall asleep already?"
Steam drifted out first.
Then she appeared.
She stepped into the dim bedroom light wrapped in nothing but a pitiful scrap of white towel clutched against her chest. The cloth barely skimmed the tops of her thighs.
Water droplets traced slow, glittering paths down the elegant column of her throat, over the swell of her breasts, disappearing beneath the edge of fabric.
Her long red hair still wet from the shower hung in dark, heavy ropes over her shoulders and back, dripping onto the marble floor.
Those unmistakable scarlet eyes found mine instantly, sharp and glittering with mischief, full lips curving into a slow, predatory smile.
Fuck.
Vice President of the Protector Association.
Altoria
Second only to the President in raw administrative power. Rumored to be S-rank in her own right. One of the handful of people in the entire country who could theoretically give even me orders.
Why the hell is she here in my bed?
The memories answered before the question fully formed.
Midnight meetings that bled into dawn. Hotel penthouses. Private rooftops under starlight. The way he'd unraveled her composure with lazy smiles, feather-light touches, perfectly timed whispers.
Nox hadn't just seduced Altoria he had mastered her. Step by deliberate step. And not one word of it had ever appeared in the main story I remembered reading.
A side route? An unrevealed arc? Something the author deliberately kept off-page?
I was still reeling when Altoria cocked her head, wet strands sliding sensually over one bare shoulder.
"Hmm… well, well, dear Nox," she drawled, voice velvet and teasing.
"You're thinking about something else when I'm standing right here, practically naked."
She let the towel loosen just enough for it to slip an inch lower then climbed onto the bed with liquid grace.
The mattress dipped under her knees as she crawled forward. Closer. Closer still. Until her face hovered mere centimeters from mine.
Her breath warm, faintly mint-scented brushed my lips like a promise. I could smell the rose body wash clinging to her skin, see the tiny beads of water still caught in her lashes.
Nox's body reacted before my mind could veto it: pulse hammering, heat pooling low, every nerve remembering exactly what came next.
Altoria's scarlet eyes darkened, pupils blowing wide with heat and anticipation.
"So…" she murmured, lips ghosting mine with every syllable, "…when will you complete my request?"
The request.
The memory crashed over me like arctic water.
It was suicide. Political assassination wrapped in impossibility. A target so heavily guarded, so deeply entrenched, that even the other two S-ranks would think twice. For anyone else in Alfar it was a death sentence.
But Nox because of that one grotesque, overpowered ability he possessed could actually do it.
That was why she kept returning. Why she let him dangle her on a string.
I went utterly still.
Altoria searched my face for several long seconds. Then her expression flickered playfulness giving way to something rawer, hungrier.
She surged forward and claimed my mouth in a punishing kiss.
Hard. Deep. Desperate. Her tongue swept in without permission, fingers knotting painfully in my hair, yanking my head back to give herself better access.
My lungs burned. Stars burst behind my closed eyelids. When she finally tore away, we were both panting.
"It's been a month, Nox," she rasped, voice thick with frustration and need. "A whole damn month since I first asked. I've had enough of your games."
She paused, lips still brushing mine, breath ragged.
"Please," she whispered almost broken. "Just do it. If you do… you know exactly what you'll get."
The unspoken offer hung heavy between us: her body, her influence, her loyalty everything the original Nox had ever craved.
I swallowed hard.
I know why she isn't forcing the issue. If it's really that request… I can actually pull it off.
Out loud, the words came out rougher than I intended.
"Give me a bit more time."
Altoria stared at me long enough that I thought she might actually strike me.
Then she let out a furious, exasperated groan and collapsed onto her side, stretching out along the sheets beside me.
The towel had long since fallen away completely during the kiss. She lay there naked, skin flushed pink from the hot shower and rising anger, crimson hair fanning across the black silk like spilled wine.
"Ughhh, you absolute fucker," she muttered, glaring up at the ceiling. "You said the exact same thing a week ago. And what did you do instead? You fucked me until I couldn't walk straight… and then you did absolutely nothing about the request."
She rolled onto her side to face me, propping her cheek on one fist. Those scarlet eyes dragged down my body slowly, deliberately, lingering.
My gaze Nox's gaze dropped with it.
The elegant dip of her waist. The full curve of her breasts rising and falling with each frustrated breath. The long, powerful legs tangled carelessly in the sheets. Every line of her was lethal beauty.
And in that moment, staring at her sprawled out and furious and still impossibly tempting, the truth hit me like a sledgehammer.
Shit.
I think I finally understand why the original Nox kept delaying the request.
It wasn't cowardice.
It wasn't laziness.
He was addicted to the power.
To having one of the strongest women in the country crawling back to his bed, begging, bargaining, offering everything simply because he refused to give her the one thing she needed most.
And now… that twisted leverage belonged to me.