CH338

CH337
Ren

The bell above the door jingled as I stepped into the noodle shop, and a rush of soy, broth, and familiarity washed over me.
“Ren!” Haruka dropped the ladle she was holding and all but ran to hug me. “You’re back. Thank the gods. Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I promise,” I said, hugging her back just as tightly. “And I’ll take it slow.”
She gave me a knowing look. “I get it. Bored out of your mind, right? I always hated staying at a hospital.”
“You have no idea.”
We laughed, and for a moment, everything felt normal again. My apron was still hanging in the back. The rhythm of service came back to me like muscle memory.
And then Morgan walked in and I knew it wasn’t an accident. Dressed to perfection, not a hair out of place, and wearing a smile so sour it could curdle cream, she looked dead at me and took a seat where my section had been before like she owned the entire city. Haruka pursed her lips.
“I’ll--”
“It’s fine,” I said, grabbing a notepad and heading towards her. I approached her table with practiced calm. “What can I get you?”
She didn’t look at the menu. Just at me. “I’m here to give you a choice.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“You can disappear on your own,” she said, still smiling, “or I can make you disappear. Either way, you’re leaving. I’m not going to tolerate you distracting Ryuu from what matters.”
I stared at her. Then I let out a short breath and shook my head.
“You haven’t changed a bit,” I said quietly. “Still a desperate snake, hm?”
Her smile faltered. Her eyes widened as I looked down at her, glaring down at the face I knew well, worn all wrong.
“How’s that working out for you, by the way?” I asked, tilting my head. “Threats. Obsession. Acting like you’ve already won something that was never yours to begin with.”
Her jaw clenched. But she said nothing.
“Now, I’m going to give you a choice,” I gave her a thin smile. “You can order something to eat, pay for it and leave like it’s the best meal you’ve had today, or you can just leave and stop taking up space on Haruka’s floor.”
She pursed her lips, glaring up at me. A blue light flickered in her eyes, and something in me reared up, like a fiery hiss from the back of my mind. Whatever she saw must have scared her senseless because she went paler and slowly rose to her feet, glaring at me.
“I gave you the chance. What happens next is on you.”
“No,” I said. “It’s on you. Have a nice day.”
I didn’t wait for her to speak again. I simply turned and walked back to the bar to grab my apron, letting her stew in the silence. I had work to do. And she was not worth the air I spent breathing her name. The sight of her was infuriating. My hands twitched, clenching at air like there was something I was supposed to have but didn’t.
Morgan, to her credit, took the hint and stormed out, flipping the table she’d been at over. Soy sauce and all the condiments went spilling onto the floor. The table itself was broken and half-embedded in the wall. Everyone else looked nervous.
I took a photo of it with her in frame and called after her. “I’ll be sure to pass the bill for the damage to Ryuu.”
She turned back and bared her teeth at me before stomping out.
Haruka let out a low whistle. “I don’t know what happened to you since you were last here, but I like it.”
I smiled at her. “I’ll grab the mop.”



Morgan


I stomped out, getting in the car and screaming, slamming my fists on the back of the front row seats, kicking and shrieking, dragging my nails through the leather and rocking the car. The driver said nothing, not even when I stopped and was panting and staring furiously, glowing blue holes in the floorboards. My insides were cold with fear and fury, disbelief and worry.
How.
How.
How?
It was her.
I knew for certain it was her. The way she looked at me confirmed what I’d feared since the moment I put this world together. I should have seen it when I first saw her with Ryuu, but I had never thought she would come back with such a different face, in his city, right under his nose. I thought I’d snuffed out every possible spark. Taken every precaution. Blocked every path back.
But I failed.
She came back anyway.
Morgan. The other Morgan. The real Morgan, Pyra. The one who had everything in the first two lives. The one who always stood between me and him. I should have made sure she was never reborn. I thought I had.
And yet, despite replacing every facet that had once been her with images of myself, she was still here. My gaze drifted toward the decor—burnished gold accents, crimson threads woven through hanging tapestries, stylized birds stitched along the fabric lining the booth walls of Haruka’s noodle shop. It should have been impossible for that design to even surface in this world. Yet there was no doubting what the motifs were.
Phoenixes.
I hadn’t noticed it before, and I had no one to blame but my own vast oversight. I had not even thought to remove, or even consider, getting rid of Tsuneo’s mother... I had made sure that Ryuu’s father and mother were murdered. I hadn’t checked or cared about anything else. I’d found it amusing that he had siblings in this lifetime.
I should have ensured that he was completely alone. I should have remembered to get rid of his mother’s soul, but I had never thought that she carried a spark of Pyra in her. The fact that she’d decorated the entire shop made it feel like she was mocking me with Pyra’s resurrection, her eternal rebirth. Pyra, Morgan, and now Ren Black.
How many other fragments were scattered throughout the world, serving as footholds to help her claw her way into this world? How long would it take to destroy them all?
The light streaming into the window wavered, bending awkwardly and trembling as the air seemed to rip apart. I glared at it.
The world was unraveling, I couldn’t keep this up much longer. I needed Ryuu to marry me to solidify the world I’d created for us. I would have to kill her.
I pushed back into my seat, glaring into the window as Ren moved around cleaning up the table I’d flipped. Bile rose in my throat. I pulled my phone from my bag as I watched her.
It rang once before someone picked up.
“Set it up,” I said coolly. “Make it look like it’s from Hotaru’s people. Burn it to ashes, and I want chaos. I want death enough to force a response. But don’t hurt her. Not yet.”
A pause. “And after that?”
“Bring her to the Pearl Palace,” I said. “I don’t care how. Bribe her, sedate her, carry her out in a box. I want her in my hands.”
I hung up. I was going to finish what should’ve been done lifetimes ago. I’d absorb her soul. Every last flicker. And once she was gone, he’d have no one left to turn to but me. He couldn’t turn me away then without denying his so-called love for her.
Ren, Morgan, Pyra—they would all understand soon enough, watching from within the lock and cage of my soul as I had everything that was always meant to be mine. Once she was part of me, once her light was mine, one Tarofu could do nothing but be mine and love me.
He’d have to.
Because there’d be no one else in existence that could equal him.