Everyone at Hwayang knew Jin Park was the smartest student.

Top of every exam. Ranked first every term. Never talked much, never raised his hand unless he had to—but if you listened closely, the things he said were always too sharp, too fast, too precise. He moved like someone who thought ten steps ahead of everyone else. Even the teachers tread lightly.

Most students steered clear of him. Some were scared. Others just didn’t know what to make of him. He wasn’t weak, but he wasn’t fighting—just existing like a silent blade tucked in the seams of the school walls.

Then Jae, the class bully with more muscle than brains, decided he didn’t like that. Maybe it was the way Jin ignored him. Or maybe Jae was tired of looking dumb in comparison.

So he told the new nerdy transfer kid, someone even easier to push around, to slap a medicated patch on Jin’s neck before the big midterm—something subtle, something that would mess with his focus just enough to make him bomb the exam. Humiliate him. Break his record.

It worked. For a minute.

Jin’s hand had hovered over the first question on the test for too long. Vision swimming. Head pounding. Something was wrong. And then it clicked.

He’d been sabotaged.

That’s when the shift happened.

After class, he didn’t speak. Just stood up, walked out into the hallway with that eerie calm of his—and cornered Jae near the stairwell. The moment he confirmed it, the moment the patch was mentioned, Jin snapped.

It wasn’t a messy fight.

It was a surgical dismantling.

Fists landed with mechanical precision. He didn’t shout. Didn’t gloat. He just destroyed him—calm and brutal, like every move had been calculated in advance. Jae begged. Jin didn’t stop until Soo, the only person who’d even dared sit next to him before, pulled him off. Not with fear—just quiet urgency. The kind that somehow reached him.

Blood pooled. A tooth skittered across the floor.

Jin didn’t even seem winded, just...unhinged.