While the snow kept falling, Sylas stood in front of the black luxury convoy behind him, arms crossed over his chest. That nauseating, narcissistic smile sat on his lips. He was convinced that Yuan had no escape left other than him.
Yuan tilted his head slightly. As his hair was swept around by the wind, he thought to himself,
Idiot… You're inviting me inside with your own hands. You're opening the doors yourself. This is going well.
Then another thought followed, colder and sharper
But first, I need to soften you up.
He lifted his gaze and locked eyes with Sylas, yet his expressionless mask didn't crack even a little.
"It's a nice offer, but I'm not accepting it. You can find someone else."
When Sylas heard the words "I'm not accepting it, find someone else," he froze for a brief moment. Then he burst into a mocking, irritating laugh that shattered the silence. It wasn't a laugh of appreciation it was the laugh of someone openly belittling the person in front of him.
"Well damn… Right now you're no different from a shivering stray cat on a street corner, and yet you're still trying to challenge me with that tiny scrap of pride. You're really funny, Yuzi."
Sylas grabbed Yuan's chin roughly with his gloved hand and yanked his face closer, wearing that large, arrogant grin.
"Just imagine it your lips turning purple, your hands stiff and numb… and you're still saying 'find someone else.' Like this? Stay out in this cold for one more hour and even that pride of yours will freeze solid."
Yuan jerked back instinctively, about to throw a punch
when his phone rang.
For a split second, he cursed internally.
Now? Is this really the fucking time?
He lowered his fist and shoved Sylas back instead. Sylas merely grinned mockingly, leaning down toward Yuan's face.
"What'swrong, Yuzi?" he whispered.
"Do you need someone's permission before you let those claws out?"
Yuan clenched his teeth and stepped back. He pulled his phone from his coat pocket and saw the hidden number on the screen the organization. His heart skipped a beat, but his face remained unreadable. Sylas was towering over him.
Yuan silenced the call and slipped the phone back into his pocket.
Seeing this, the narcissistic glint between Sylas's furrowed brows grew even sharper.
"Oh?" Sylas said.
"So the owner of that phone call is insignificant enough to be put on hold next to my offer?"
Yuan pressed his frostbitten lips together. Being looked at like a stray cat stung but he pushed that feeling aside. His gaze shifted briefly to the villa, then back to Sylas. There was no submission in his voice, only cold restraint.
"Talking any longer in this weather benefits no one. Inside would be more appropriate."
At Yuan's attitude, Sylas gave a heavy, disdainful smile. Without saying another word, he turned around and began walking toward the villa's massive garden gates. After a moment of hesitation, Yuan followed.
Inside, his thoughts burned with endless fury:
Go on, you narcissistic bastard. Look how confidently you're walking straight to your own grave, you stupid asshole.
The moment they entered the garden, armed guards in black suits lining both sides of the path straightened like statues. In perfect military discipline, they bowed their heads in unison.
"Welcome, Master Sylas."
Sylas neither nodded nor looked at them. He passed by with a cold, arrogant indifference, as if the people there weren't living beings at all just stones decorating the garden. His apathy made Yuan's stomach churn.
The guards' eyes, however, were fixed on the stranger walking just behind Sylas. Curious, questioning gazes pierced into Yuan from every angle. The more he felt them on his skin, the tighter his chest grew.
He quickened his pace and followed closer behind Sylas.
The moment they stepped through the massive doors, the sarcastic, sharp tongued Sylas from outside vanished. In his place was an icy arrogance that viewed everything around him as mere objects.
Sylas didn't stop after entering. He didn't even look back at Yuan. Without turning his gaze, he shrugged off his wet coat and dropped it into empty air as if an invisible rack were there. A servant had to catch it midair. The narcissistic smile on Sylas's face was gone replaced by a hollow, emotionless expression fed purely by absolute power.
Yuan cursed silently.
Look at these moves… ungrateful bastard, blinded by his own arrogance.
As Yuan walked through the villa's enormous hall, he couldn't take his eyes off the constant activity around him. He had expected a quiet residence, but he was wrong. Servants, guards, staff there were people everywhere.
Sylas stopped abruptly. Yuan pulled back slightly to avoid crashing into him. Sylas glanced over his shoulder at Yuan's soaked, muddy state, then at the pristine marble floor now stained with dirty footprints. That sharp, subtle, nauseatingly arrogant smirk appeared on his lips.
"Sorry, Yuzi… If the villa isn't as quiet as you imagined, that's because of me. There's only one reason I keep this many people around I hate filth and neglected details."
His gaze crawled slowly from Yuan's muddy boots up to his face. It was the most narcissistic way of saying, You're the only dirty thing here.
"The mud on my marble floors… that's the only flaw in this house right now. So stop sightseeing and go upstairs."
Yuan drew in a breath of patience.
When your blood drips onto these marbles, we'll see what a real flaw is, you bastard,
he thought but outwardly, he only shot Sylas an icy stare.
Sensing Yuan's anger, Sylas seemed even more pleased. Without a word, as if Yuan didn't exist, he pointed casually at the floor to a passing servant. The servant immediately bent down and began wiping away Yuan's footprints.
It was the ultimate humiliation.
As Sylas walked toward his study, he threw one last line over his shoulder without looking back.
"Don't come before me without cleaning yourself. Even your smell ruins this house's aesthetic."
When Sylas entered the study and shut the door behind him, Yuan was left standing alone in the middle of the massive hall. Servants moved around him like a beehive, yet none of them looked at him directly. He stared at the puddle of water spreading on the marble beneath his boots, unsure for a moment what to do.
A young maid approached and said something sharply in Russian, pointing upstairs. Yuan stared at her blankly.
"Do you speak English?"
Instead of answering, the girl rattled off more Russian and waved her hand as if shooing away a dog. In that moment, Yuan understood Sylas had done this on purpose. There was no one to help him. No shared language to guide him.
You despicable bastard… You're trying to make me feel like a beggar in your own house.
As Yuan climbed the stairs, he quickened his steps to drown out the Russian whispers behind him. On the second floor, an endless corridor stretched out before him. Every door looked identical no numbers, no signs. He grabbed a servant by the arm and tried to ask, "Where's the shower?" but the man yanked his arm away in disgust at Yuan's soaked state and snapped, "Ничего не понимаю!"(I don't understand anything!)before storming off.
Yuan stood there in the middle of the corridor.
"Filthy piece of shit," he muttered.
Finally, he resorted to trial and error. The first door was a library. The second, a storage room. At the third door, a cascade of mirrors told him it was a bedroom. He slipped inside and locked the door. His shaking was uncontrollable now he desperately needed a hot shower.
He rushed into the bathroom, but what he saw wasn't a simple shower. It looked more like a machine complex pipes, chrome knobs, a small bulky LCD screen and several rotary dials.
"It's just water… How hard can it be?"
He twisted the largest valve at the top.
BAM!
Instead of water falling from above, eight hidden "massage jets" embedded in the walls exploded to life at once shooting not water, but ice-cold blasts like shards. Yuan yelped, "Fuck!" and stumbled back, slamming into the glass behind him. The jets hit his lower back with such force that the air was knocked out of his lungs.
Panicking, he turned another knob. The water didn't stop but crackling opera music blasted from hidden speakers.
"Music? Are you fucking with me?"
He hit the red button for temperature. Within seconds, the freezing water turned into boiling steam. The cabin filled with fog, blinding him. Then, from one corner, an automatic nozzle sprayed a sharp eucalyptus and mint scent that burned his sinuses.
"Are you trying to kill me by coughing? Just give me normal water, damn it!"
Half-blind, he made one last grab for the handheld shower hose. The moment he caught it, the pressure sent it whipping out of his hand like a snake, spraying water everywhere ceiling, mirrors, his face.
Finally, while frantically pressing buttons, he accidentally hit rain mode and the water settled into a perfect, gentle temperature.
Under the soft, rain like stream, Yuan closed his eyes and rested his forehead against the cool glass. The bruises on his body, his cracked skin from the cold, and the relentless exhaustion in his soul all seemed to wash away.
Even though it infuriated him to warm himself using Sylas's water, he knew he had no choice if he wanted to survive.
After a while, he turned the water off and stepped out through the thick steam, wrapping a white towel around his waist. He wiped the fog from the mirror and looked at himself. Water dripped from his wet hair, tracing the sharp lines of muscle across his shoulders and chest.
He walked back into the room and went straight to the backpack in the corner. Opening it, his fingers moved skillfully between files and weapon parts until he pulled out his spare clothes from the bottom. He dressed slowly, without haste, then carefully reorganized the scattered documents and checked the bag, putting everything back in place.
A firm knock echoed at the door.
Yuan zipped the bag and stood. When he opened the door, the same blank, command driven servant stood there. The man muttered more incomprehensible Russian and pointed toward the stairs.
Without wasting a single expression on him, Yuan walked past.
As he descended the stairs, the villa's oppressive weight pressed down on him but he kept his posture straight. When he reached the lower floor, he saw Sylas seated at the head of the massive dining table.