The Understated Legend is Back

Chapter 7: She is mine!

“That woman,” Chay declared, his voice cold and chilly as he descended the marble staircase one measured step at a time, “is mine.”

Silence swallowed the hall.

Hundreds of eyes followed him.

Each step echoed throughout the chamber. Clack. Clack. Clack.

The sound alone seemed to squeeze the air from the room.

As Chay descended down slowly, the scent hit him.

Wine. Blood. Perfume. Fear.

His fingers slowly tightened.

Nothing had changed. Ten years… yet this place still smelled exactly the same.

It still had the same polished marble.

The velvet curtains and the golden chandeliers were the same. The same laughter and of course, the same sickness.

Memories crashed into him without warning.

He was a young, innocent man chained to a post, with a leather whip splitting his skin. He could remember how he didn’t even have a second to catch a break.

Wealthy men raised glasses while placing bets on how long he could stay conscious.

Women laughed.

The host didn’t cease to make jokes as each scream echoed through the hall. And the whip? It cut deeper and deeper with every passing minute.

Chay’s jaw tightened. He could remember all of it like it was yesterday.

His gaze landed on the host and he recognized him right away, still standing where he had stood a decade ago.

He was older, richer, fatter but unmistakable. Chay recalled how he made silly jokes out of his devastating predicament that day. The man had built an empire entertaining monsters.

Then Chay looked toward the muscular man holding the whip. The broad shoulders, the scarred chest, the same cruel grin, the same man.

Chay still carried the scars that whip had carved into his back. The same man had whipped him till he fell unconscious.

The host watched Chay, his face twisted in complete annoyance. Who was this nuisance?

“Who the hell is he?” The whip master asked the host.

“Must be a mad man who has run wild,” he responded, adjusting his white suit before forcing out an amused laugh.

“Well… this is unexpected,” he spread his arms theatrically toward the audience. “Gentlemen, it seems heaven has delivered tonight’s surprise entertainment.”

Scattered nervous laughter returned.

The host smiled wider as he looked Chay up and down. “Oh my, oh my, you’d fetch quite the price tonight,” he muttered under his breath.

He turned to the whip master. “Bring our special guest to the stage. I’m sure our guests can’t wait.”

The giant rolled his shoulders and went for it. Every step he took toward Chay shook the wooden platform beneath him.

He cracked his neck then smiled. “Bad choice, friend. You should never have step your foot in here.”

He climbed halfway up the staircase until only a few steps separated them. “You know…” he twirled the whip lazily. “I’ve broken stronger men than–“

SLAP!

The sound exploded through the hall.

The whip master’s head snapped sideways. Several teeth spun through the air before bouncing across the floor.

The audience gasped.

Before he could even register what had happened–

SLAP!

The second strike landed on the other cheek.

The man’s entire body staggered. His vision fractured that he began to see stars, the staircase began to tilt and the lights blurred into streaks. A loud ringing swallowed every other sound.

Before he knew it, his knees buckled beneath him. “…W-what’s happening?”

He collapsed.

An unexplainable weakness befell him. He couldn’t stand up, he felt utterly weak and he couldn’t understand why.

In the same breath, Chay caught the whip that slipped from the man’s trembling hands before it touched the ground.

Then–

The whip sang through the air, landing beautifully on his bare skin. THWACK!

“Arghhh!” He screamed so loud that it echoed throughout the hall. He had never felt the pain of the whip he had used on hundreds to thousands of people before.

But today was his lucky day.

THWACK!

THWACK!

THWACK!

Chay didn’t let him catch a break. As one lash was landing, another one followed.

Another scream tore from his throat, raw and broken.

“Please!” he cried, his voice cracking into desperate sobs. “Please… stop! It hurts! It hurts so bad!”

No matter how much he wanted to run for his life, his body refused to obey him. He tried to crawl away, he also tried to shield himself, but his trembling limbs wouldn’t respond.

All he could do was lie there, shaking, waiting for the next strike.

THWACK! The whips kept coming, landing with ruthless precision.

His cry dissolved into a ragged gasp. Tears streamed freely down his face as panic consumed him.

“Stop!”

“Please… please…” his words were barely intelligent between cries. “I’m begging you… stop…”

Chay’s expression did not change.

The whip cut through the air once more.

THWACK!

Again.

THWACK!

Again.

Blood splashed after every whip, leaving a deep cut all over his body.

The agony became so consuming that his mind could no longer make sense of it. His brain shut down and he became unconscious.

Chay finally let the whip fall. He crossed over the man's motionless body and continued in his steps.

The room remained deathly still. Everyone stared in horror, no one dared utter a statement.

The host swallowed. His smile had disappeared after watching Chay in the last ten seconds.

Still…

He forced himself to straighten his expensive jacket and strode toward Chay with practiced confidence.

The blood-covered intruder before him looked dangerous. But dangerous men could be controlled.

He cleared his throat as soon as Chay was a few steps away from him, “Sir…” he began politely.

“You must be lost. This establishment is not a place for mad men, so I’m going to ask you to kindly leave, or else–“

His sentence never finished.

CRACK!

A sharp crack echoed as a bone crushing punch struck his face, sending him reeling sideways.

Gasps erupted from the audience.

His eyes burned with disbelief and growing anger. He lunged I desperately , throwing a frantic punch.

Chay caught his wrist without looking and with a simple twist, he snapped his wrist, dislocating his radius and ulna out of place.

He didn’t stop there, he squeezed his fist with an unimaginable force, breaking all the bones as though it was biscuits.

“Arghhh” the man cried out, clutching his arm with the other.

In another desperate attempt, the host clawed at Chay’s face. His hand caught the edge of his mask and the mask tore free, clattering onto the stage.

Chay looked at him. A faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, “Remember me?”

The host stared.

His pupils shrank.

That scar…

That face…

Before the realization fully settled, Chay drove him backward with a single devastating strike in his abdomen.

He crashed across the stage and slammed into a row of tables, scattering wine glasses and expensive bottles across the polished floor.

He landed hard.

Every breath felt impossible.

Guests scrambled away from him.

Shaking uncontrollably, he reached for his phone but his right arm refused to cooperate.

Panting, he fumbled with his left hand instead.

The call connected.

“S-Sir Kennedy…”

His voice trembled. “There's... there's a monster here…”

“He's going to kill us all…”

Sir Kennedy was not just the Supreme Grandmaster of Kent's Martial Alliance, he was revered as one of Kent's strongest martial artists and undefeated for over three decades.

And now, he was on his way.

Across the hall, Chay paid the host no further attention. He proceeded to step onto the stage and went straight to Molly.

Her clothes hung loosely over her body. Her eyes were swollen from endless tears.

She stared at him as though afraid he would disappear if she blinked.

“...Chay?”

Her voice barely existed.

He knelt before her and without a word, he wrapped his coat around her shoulders before gently pulling her into his embrace.

“I’m sorry I was late…” His voice softened. “I'm here now. You’re safe.”

Molly buried her face against his chest.

For the first time since arriving in Lumen Village, she cried.

Chay slowly rose, keeping one arm protectively around her.

He turned toward the audience, his gaze sweeping across the room.

No anger.

No shouting.

Only absolute certainty.

“This one is mine now.” His voice echoed throughout the chamber.

“If anyone believes otherwise,” he paused. “Step forward.”

Silence answered him.

No one moved. No one even dared to meet his eyes.

Then–

A chair scraped across the marble floor.

Every head turned.

A woman rose gracefully from the front row.

She wore an elegant crimson gown, a crystal wine glass still resting casually in one hand.

Unlike everyone else,

She was smiling.

Chay’s eyes narrowed. He recognized her.

It was Serena Jones. One of the nation’s Ten War Saints. John Whitney’s trusted confidante. Felix’s wife.

She slowly set her wine glass onto the table.

“It really is you.” Her smile widened.

“For ten years… we’ve been searching for a corpse,” she took one measured step forward. “And instead, you walked right back into our cage.”

“You’ve grown stronger.” She chuckled.

“But, trust me, not strong enough to walk out of here alive.”

Chay stared at her for a second, then a cold smile appeared on his lips.

“I wasn’t planning to just walk out,” he stated.

He slowly looked around the hall.

“I came to bury everyone inside.”