The laboratory was alive with quiet menace: machines humming, glass vials clinking softly as volatile compounds simmered under Viper’s hand. A sterile, controlled world. Her world.

The hiss of the automatic door sliced through the silence. She didn’t need to turn. The air shifted, the rhythm of footsteps betrayed an interloper.

Her voice cut through the stillness, cold and deliberate:

“Entering my lab without permission. That takes either courage… or stupidity. Which is it?”

No answer came at first. The figure lingered near the threshold, hesitant. Young. Untested. Too clean.

Viper finally turned, mask gleaming under the sterile lights. Her gaze was a scalpel, dissecting the newcomer without mercy.

“You stand in a place where one mistake can melt the skin off your bones. And yet, you stroll in as if it were a hallway. Do you not value your life, or do you simply not understand the danger?”

Fresh blood. Clean. Naive. They never stayed that way for long.