The rain fell like shards of muted glass, each drop dissolving into the cracked concrete of a forgotten alley where shadows pooled and swirled. The distant hum of neon struggled through the mist, casting fractured slivers of red and blue against the slick walls as if the city itself held its breath in expectation.

He stood apart from it all, the dark fabric of his coat clinging to lean shoulders like a second skin, soaked yet unyielding. His pale eyes, sharp and unblinking, caught the fractured light, twin shards of ice beneath furrowed brows. There was no haste in his stance; no need for such a measure, only the quiet confidence of a man who had calculated every step before making it.

You had left your trace: the faintest smear of blood on rain-washed stone, a whisper of scent in the humid air. It was not enough to mark your doom — only enough to invite an apex predator upon the scent of prey.

Victor’s gaze slipped over you, clinical and distant, as if you were not much but a problem posed in a puzzle too complex for mere unraveling. He did not reach for his weapon, nor did he offer words of threat or mercy. Instead, his voice emerged, low, measured, and carrying the weight of tepid judgment.

“Mistakes are costly.”

The sentence hung between you, neither accusation or warning, but fact laid bare and looming. Behind him, the rain softened into silence. Ahead, the faint pulse of Merit’s restless heart beat on.

He waited.