Chương 2: Enter The King! - Part 1

*CRASH* *BAM* A car out of the blue flew from the air and crashed straight into the divider. The doors, the bonnet and the windows were blasted off from the car falling down on the floor, illuminated by the bright light of the lonely moon.

In the silent night, the crash sounded like an explosion, but no one came to the rescue. In fact, the road looked dead with absolutely no one around.

Hearing the constant beeping sound of the broken indicator, the lady seated in the back seat slowly opened her eyes. She wore nothing but a pair of tattered bra and stained panties and was covered with gruesome assault wounds.

She struggled to remember, or see where she was. Her ears were constantly ringing with a name which kept screaming within her mind.

"Ramika! Ramika wake up! Are you with us? Ramika!"

*BOOOM*

"Ramika... Ramika are you still with us?" asked the professor politely, shaking Ramika from reliving her past and bringing her back to reality.

Ramika woke up like a lost lamb, lost in touch with reality. She smiled, wondered and was mostly confused. Since Ramika was lost in her thoughts right from the beginning of the class, she was taken aback by the professor's appearance.

Wearing a simple white shirt with rolled-up sleeves, and black pants, the professor looked too young to be called a professor. With green eyes, a perfect jawline and blonde hair, he also looked handsome to her eyes.

The professor understood very well that Ramika didn't pay attention even to his introduction monologue.

"In case you're wondering... I'm a new staff here. Your history professor took a long leave to be around for his wife's delivery... So, they appointed me as your substitute for a few days... Did you— at least you were awake when I said my name, right?"

Ramika smiled and awkwardly shook her head, negatively. But the professor simply chuckled at Ramika.

"Devitto. John Devitto. I'm around the same age group as you guys, so it's okay to address me by this name instead of professor or sir." He said with a smile before returning to the others as they were discussing something else before.

Ramika though not allowed to speak, she found herself blushing towards the new professor, especially after knowing that he was around the same age as hers.

"He's kinda... good looking. Maybe I can find a real friend here for a change..."

[Back In The Distant Island's Torture Room]:

The lady ordered her men to drag the dead 'prisoner' away. It didn't take long for the man to succumb to his wounds his die, especially after the eyeball gouge, and the throat slash. The lady cursed herself for getting carried away costing them time and manpower.

But it didn't take them too long before finding the 'names'. After raiding the hideout of the dead man, the lady's men uncovered the secrets and brought them down to the lady's attention almost immediately.

"Ramika Ray... Cool name. But not good as her previous name... Diana. The same name as me." The lady smiled to herself, feeling funny at the fact that both she and her target share the same first name - Diana.

The lady, Diana Jones, the head of the 'Damage Control' Clan and the princess of the vampire lineage, quickly ordered her secretary to urgently relay the order to search and kill Ramika Ray as soon as possible, to the 'Damage Control' branch in 'Oasis', the new city where Ramika moved into.

The clueless rookie secretary 'Anya Rose' hurriedly opened her flip phone and fired on the number pad, typing the conversation codes for informing the assassination commands.

'F1 K1LL 18-01-13-9-11-1' (find and kill Ramika)

'CLU3$-N3W R3$1D3NT, $TUD3NT' (Clues - New Resident, Student)

'1D3NT1F1CAT10N - SAUCE ON THE EGGS, IMMORTAL SCRIBBLINGS ON THE SHELL' (Identification - Knife wounds on the breasts, Underworld's stamp for execution on the ass)

And she pressed the 'send' button. Like wildfire, the command spread among the meagre amount of stealthy assassins who were living in 'Oasis' in peace. Since there were hardly any assassination-related assignments given to them in the past, the entire assassination world of 'Oasis' was immersed in shock.

Disagreements, arguments, opinions and rants ensued at a rampant pace among the 'heads' and 'hands'.

Since it was supposed to be safe haven for the old assassins who were past their prime, there was a lot of noise made regarding the order, especially when it was for killing a young lady in her early twenties.

But the innocent Ramika unaware of what was happening on the other side and what was coming after her, happily walked back to her hostel room once the classes ended.

She felt a tingling sensation all along like her instincts saying something was coming. But she didn't fully catch on and kept doing her thing.

*POW* *POW* The sound of punches landing on someone's face was heard aloud. In an alleyway, a tall muscle-bound man was having 'fun' with a meek and weak-looking guy who was busy receiving punches and kicks from the other.

Ramika witnessed all this from a distance and was almost tempted to intervene. But she chose to stand still and wait for them to end.

The longer she noticed, the more shock she felt. The guy who getting thrashed had no pupil. And that meant only one thing for Ramika.

'The guy is BLIND!'

*POW*

"You'll snitch us to the dean just for not finishing the assignments, bro?" the bully, Marc kicked the poor guy right on the nuts, putting him down.

Marc was a second-year student, notoriously famous on the campus for his bullying behaviour and his constant detentions because of them. But since he was coming from a very influential family, the teachers and the department turned a blind eye to him.

Except for the guy who was getting bullied right now.

And this resulted in the beatings he was receiving currently.

*POW* landed another punch to his abdomen from Marc, rendering the 'guy' to cower and crouch again. Even though the punches get rougher and rougher each time, Marc for some reason felt infuriated further with each blow.

Because there was simply no fear on the guy's face. The 'guy' stayed stoic and held his head high despite all of the beatings, ticking off Marc to increase his blows notches higher.

Clenching his fist, he repeatedly punched the guy's face again and again till the blood splashes back on his clothes.

"Wipe that smirk off of your face, dipshit... Beg me to stop! Beg me! Kneel! Cry! Scream for help! Do SOMETHING!" his punches got rampant, and it was not before he ran out of breath, he stopped.

His fist was drenched with blood, and the guy's face was bruised to the pulp. But something unexpected happened.

Keeping his hand on the wall, the 'guy' picked himself up along with his cracked sunglasses with no visible struggle and turned towards the panting Marc, whose eyes widened in shock.

"You punch like a woman, kid. Not just any woman. They can be stronger too... But the lousy, party animals who do nothing but get drunk. Your punches are no different from them. I think you need to hit the gym pretty often..." he said, wiping the blood off his face and walking away while Marc stood frozen.

He was in serious disbelief regarding how the man he was punching with all he got, simply brushed him off and was now walking away as if nothing happened.

'He should be dead... he should be in the ICU right now. What the fuck is that guy?' Ramika gasped, thinking. She waited for the bully to leave, so she can help the walking Yohan to assist him because even though he walked away normally, delayed concussions are a thing and possible.

And as expected Marc left. Ramika ran.

"Excuse me, sir! Sir!" she yelled, running behind his back. Yohan, with an annoyed expression, turned back to her.

"Tch! It's Yohan. Yohan Karvakarn... I'm not that old for you to call me, 'sir'. You got that?"

Ramika's pity washed away.

'This guy has some serious attitude issues...' she thought. But quickly shrugging it off, she offered to help.

"You look bad... Shall I take you to the infirmary? Or can I help you to cross the road?" she awkwardly asked, nervously swinging her tone from polite to urgency and urgency to polite.

Yohan said nothing. He simply stared at her for a few seconds. Ramika wondered why and how.

"I'm not blind."

An air of silence whirled around between them. Ramika blinked in confusion.

"The what?"

"I know what you think... But, nope. I'm not blind. At least clinically. I can see, but it has some issues—"

"Your eyes looked different, though. It had no—"

"Yeah, I know I have no pupil. But I do... I mean I do sometimes. And I don't..."

Ramika shook her head, puzzled.

"I'm confused. I am following nothing here—what does that mean? How?"

Yohan said nothing. He again stared at the confused Ramika for a full minute, making things between him and her even more awkward. He then raised his eyebrows and asked Ramika a question.

"You were watching me getting pummeled all along, weren't you?"

'FUCK!' internally screamed Ramika while maintaining her poker face.

"No. I mean... I just got here, haha."

"But I saw you."

"FUCK!" she screamed this time for real. "Well, I'm... I— I'm a defenceless girl. What can I do? hehe. He was tall, too." She tried to justify her ignorance and tried to smoothly talk out of the situation.

To which Yohan frowned in contempt. "You know what? It's a good thing... I'll just do the same when it happens to you—"

"Huh?"

"Yeah... You look gorgeous as hell. It's bound to happen one day when some ugly-looking punks violate you, drag you to their hideout, and do the deed. When it happens, I'll book a front-row seat and watch the show just like you did—"

"Shut your trap, or I'll slap you with a sexual assault complaint..." Ramika coldly said with a sharp stare.

Yohan gasped, and nodded, waving her goodbye as he walked away to the boys' hostel nearby, smirking all the way.

'Such an asshole... Eww.'

The sun went to take a nap, and the tiny stars partied as the night came. Lying on her bed, Ramika was having a hard time sleeping.

Flashes of the brutality she endured and the voices that were hissing towards her ears, whirled around her brain endlessly, paining her.

'No matter, where you go... I'll find you and end your life.'

The words spoken in a chill tone kept ringing in her mind. Tears fell and Ramika sobbed. The image of her father lying in his pool of blood, and the masked men drenched with the same blood, laughing at her, burned her eyes.

As her room was inhabited by only her unlike the rest of the students who share rooms, Ramika felt safe doing what she wanted to do.

She checked whether the door was locked. And after verifying it, she brought the boxed cheval mirror which was yet to be opened, to the centre of the room.

She unwrapped the mirror and in front of it, she quickly undressed, displaying herself bare to the mirror.

Stitch wounds around the chest, tattoos of gibberish scribbles on the shoulder and knife wounds all around her body. It was a horrible sight even for Ramika to see.

She wore those full-neck sweaters with full sleeves all throughout the week just to hide these. But Ramika still admired herself for at least maintaining her physic.

"The loser was right... I am indeed gorgeous. Black hair, brown eyes, peach skin, not too skinny and not too fat, 6-feet giantess; but plagued by endless scars. Tch!" she praised as well pitied herself.

As she was about to pick her clothes back, a bullet pierced through the window and hit the mirror, shattering it to pieces.

*BAM!* *CRACK* The mirror exploded like dynamite and its shattered pieces narrowly missed Ramika.

She rolled to the corner of her room and noticed the masked sniper from the window, waving at her.

Clenching her teeth, she showed her middle finger to the assassin, who was visibly laughing at her.

"There we go... They found me again. The crooks from the *Underworld*..."

...