Freya felt a wave of emotion rush to her head and distractedly bumped against the door.

Ifrit was very keen and noticed it instantly.

She hurriedly stepped outside and did a double-take the moment she recognized Freya.

When she got a handle on her emotions, she regarded Freya with a brazen look and barely bothered to hide her contempt.

“Did you hear everything? Are you going to tell Magnus what you heard so he will give up on being with me?

“I doubt he’ll even believe you?”

Freya's expression darkened too.

“What makes you so sure that he would still want you?”

Ifrit frowned at the provocation.

Before she could say something, she spotted a familiar figure appearing at the end of the corridor.

She shoved Freya away before throwing herself to the ground.

Magnus ran to her as fast as he could and wrapped her in his arms.

He barely noticed Freya standing there.

Ifrit wept and timidly wrapped her arms around his neck while throwing glances at Freya.

“Miss Stein was begging me to leave you, Mr. Harett! And when I said no, she pricked me with a needle.

“She was saying something about how she had a lot of men waiting in line for me. I feel like I'm burning up, am I going to die?”

Magnus looked at her flushed cheeks and turned to confront Freya, his eyes manic.

“How dare you drug her! I didn’t think you would be this evil!” he yelled.

At the contempt in his eyes, Freya suddenly recalled how much he had abused her in her past life.

“I didn't do anything! You can check the surveillance camera footage!” she protested.

The moment Ifrit noticed Magnus glancing at the camera, she began to panic.

“Did you think I would use that kind of drug on myself?

“Are you going to check the footage? Why? Don’t you trust me?”

Magnus was convinced by her tears and proceeded to assure her, “Of course, I trust you. Forget about the cameras.”

“Ugh, it's so hot in here…,” Ifrit said in response.

Suddenly, her eyes took on a glassy look as she tilted her head for a kiss.

It was hard to read the look that came over Magnus as he immediately carried her into the adjacent room.

“What’s going to happen to Miss Stein?” she asked as she grabbed his arm.

“Maybe she only did this to me because of a misunderstanding, we—”

“Now that you mention it…” Magnus began as he turned to Freya.

“You said she had some men lined up for you? Where are they?”

Ifrit gestured timidly at the room at the end of the corridor.

Freya noticed the glacial look in Magnus’s eyes.

She felt her chest tighten with an ominous feeling that something bad was about to happen.

Just as she expected, Magnus suddenly announced, “Since she was the one who made the arrangements, she should enjoy them herself.”

His men seized Freya in an instant.

“No!” Freya squirmed desperately.

“You can't do this to me, Magnus!

“You’re going to regret this!”

Magnus paused.

“My only regret is being too kind to you and giving you a chance to hurt Ifrit again,” he said without even looking at her.

Then he took Ifrit and left Freya all alone to fend for herself.

Freya found herself shoved into a dark room.

She clenched a hand over a painful spot in her shoulder and soon felt the strength drained out of her body.

There was a mysterious heat emanating from her body as it engulfed her.

Ifrit must have drugged her when she shoved Freya!

Countless hands emerged from the darkness and began to touch her.

“Miss Lovewell is right, she sure is a looker.”

“I’m going to go first, I can’t wait anymore.”

“Take it easy, don’t forget what Miss Lovewell told us. We can do anything to her as long as we keep her alive!”

Then, countless pairs of grimy hands began to tear at her clothes.

Freya felt like throwing up at their touch.

But it also made her remember the pepper spray in her bag. She grabbed it and sprayed it at the men before fleeing the room.

“Ahhh! You bitch!” They cried out in pain before running after her.

“Get her! Make sure she gets what's coming to her!”

Freya anxiously pounded on the doors of each private room as she ran, but none of the occupants would help her.

It seemed like they were accustomed to such incidents.

By the time she pounded on the last door, she heard faint voices coming from inside.

It was Ifrit’s muffled voice.

“Mr. Harett, it's… It’s Miss Stein. She must have regretted what she said. Please stop kissing me, I… I can’t take it anymore!”

“Don't worry about her,” Magnus said thickly.

“You’re mine now. Nobody can stop me from being with you. Just surrender yourself to me.”

There were sounds of clothes ripping.

Freya shivered and stopped pounding on the door.

Tears began to fall against her will, and the numbing sensation in her heart slowly turned to pain. Its ripple spread to every part of her body.

Then she remembered the men who were drawing closer.

She panicked and ended up stumbling into the next room. She quickly rushed into the attached bathroom.

She dunked her head into a bucket of ice-cold water to regain her sense of reason before reaching for a fruit knife to jab it into her thigh.

The smell of blood filled her nose, and the pain helped her snap back to reality.

It was then that she realized the bathroom mirror allowed her to peek into the adjacent room.

Magnus and Ifrit were all over each other.

They had stripped, and Magnus had Ifrit perched on the sink, her legs in the air as he entered her.

Ifrit was crying with a mix of pain and pleasure.

He hungrily kissed her again and again, and when Ifrit grew accustomed to the feeling, his desire would take over, and he would dominate her again.

Freya dug her nails into the flesh of her palms at the sight.

She felt numb as she watched the pair go round after round.

She watched the way Magnus completely lost himself in his passion and the way Ifrit squirmed and pleaded with him.

Freya had lost count of how many times they went at it as she stabbed herself.

It was only when the bathtub was stained with blood and the effect of the drug subsided that she finally sobered up.

It was dawn when she limped out of the room on her injured leg.

Her face was pale, and her eyes were lifeless as she dragged herself along the corridor at the same time Magnus and Ifrit left their room.

Magnus saw the state she was in and felt a pang of concern deep inside him that he could not explain.

Ifrit seemed equally affected.

She gestured at the blood on Freya’s legs, “You weren’t drugged, weren’t you? Were you having some fun too?”

Then she turned to Magnus. “Do you think it’s because the men Miss Stein gathered were as excited as you were back in the room?”

The sheer suggestion of what might have happened made Magnus angry.

“Don’t you have any self-respect, Freya?” he asked through clenched teeth.

Freya could not stop replaying the scenes from the night before as she stared at Magnus.

It made her nauseated.

He was the one who threw her to the wolves, so what gave him the right to mock her now?

“It’s none of your business.”

She dragged her injured leg behind her and tried to limp away, but Ifrit stopped her.

“Who knows if those men are clean? What if you catch something from them… Mr. Harett, we have to take her to get tested.”

Freya turned down the offer.

Ifrit immediately began to cry. “I meant well… Did I do something wrong, Mr. Harett?”

“No, you didn’t. I know you meant well.” Magnus put his arm around her shoulders and fixed a dark look at Freya.

“If you want her to get tested, then she must get tested.”

“I won’t…”

Before Freya could even object, Magnus’ men showed up again and escorted her to the hospital.

It was a humiliating trip.

She was forced into the gynecology department under the scrutiny of many onlookers who seemed to be mocking her.

They began to conduct a series of examinations that felt invasive and uncomfortable.

And it was all Ifrit’s doing.

She felt like she was livestock on the slaughter table. The doctors certainly had their way with her.

She felt as if her heart was going to stop beating from complete apathy.

At one point, she had lost track of how long the grueling torture lasted and only realized it ended when she stepped out of the room in her tattered clothes.

Ifrit was all over Magnus’s arm when she approached.

“Doctor, how’s it looking? Did she catch anything?” she asked with feigned concern.

“She… there were so many men last night, and she bled so much. You don’t think it caused any permanent damage, did it?”

The doctor frowned at the question.

“I’m not sure what you are talking about, she is clearly still a virgin…”

Before he could even begin to explain, the onlookers began to drum up a wave of commotion.

They took pictures with their phones and began to speculate wildly.

“That explains why she had so many examinations done on her! She must have had a wild night!”

“A whole group of men! She might look innocent on the outside, but you would never expect how wild she is on the inside.”

“Hey, pretty lady! Count me in next time! I’ll even pay!”

The streams of insults they hurled at Freya stabbed at her already wounded heart.

She turned to Magnus. “Are you happy now?”

Magnus froze when she looked at him.

He gulped and just as he opened his mouth to reply, he noticed something on her waist exposed by her tattered clothes.

“Where did you get that scar?”

Freya instinctively reached for the bulging scar on her waist.

The pain from ages ago seemed to resurface in that moment, and her body recalled it as if it had just happened.

After she saved Magnus five years ago, she was hospitalized to recover from her injury. The housemaid informed her that Magnus was concerned about her injury and that she had taken a picture of the scar to show Magnus.

At the time, she assumed the scar would help bring them closer to each other. To her disappointment, Magnus had been nothing but cold toward her even after she had been discharged.

All he ever did was hover around Ifrit and ask about her well-being.

She assumed it was because Magnus had forgotten about the scar.

Now that she thought about it, what happened must have been that the housemaid had sent the picture to Ifrit beforehand.

“Answer my question, Freya!” Magnus demanded. “Why do you have that scar? Did you weasel your way into my family five years ago?”

Freya tried to suppress her turbulent emotions, and just as she was about to answer, Ifrit suddenly threw herself into Magnus's arms and burst into tears.

“So this was the trump card Miss Stein was telling me about! Now I understand why she told me that if you ever see the scar, you would abandon me and devote yourself to her.

“I can’t believe you would cut yourself so you can get a scar to fool Mr. Harett into thinking you were the one who saved him five years ago!

“All I have ever wanted was to love him with all my heart. Why do you have to come between us and tear us apart?”

Ifrit ran up to Freya and gripped her shoulders hysterically while launching her tirade.

Freya winced from the pain of her recent wounds.

Just as she tried to back away, Ifrit flopped away and launched herself into the doorframe.

The moment Magnus noticed a thin trickle of blood flowing from Ifrit's forehead, he shot a furious look at Freya.

"How much more cunning can you get?

“Did you think a scar is enough to make me change my mind and decide to fall in love with you? It only means something if it’s on Ifrit, whereas when it’s on you… It only disgusts me.”

Freya tried to speak but realized there was nothing worth explaining anymore. She knew nothing she said could ever hold up to Ifrit’s crying.

She was just about to excuse herself and walk through the crowd when she heard Magnus’s voice calling out from behind her.

“Did I permit you to leave?”

She paused and turned back to confront him, “What else do you want?"

Magnus ignored her question as he tenderly held Ifrit.

“Don't you ever use your sinful body to try to get in between me and Ifrit.

“I don’t know how you got that scar, but you better get rid of it.”

With that, he motioned to his men, who proceeded to drag Freya into the operating room.

She barely had the chance to struggle at all before she found herself pinned on the operating table.

The doctor did not bother to use anesthesia before putting the scalpel to her flesh.

She was butchered mercilessly.

Her agonizing cries became lodged in her throat. She had never felt so much pain in her life.

She looked at her reflection in the mirror and watched as the scar was forcefully cut apart from her flesh.

All of the memories contained in her flesh were brutally torn apart, effectively severing any connection she had to Magnus.

When the doctor sliced into another part of her flesh, she suddenly recalled a memory from when they got married.

She had picked out a wedding dress and cheerfully went to meet him, only to be met with a scowl.

With the next cut, the scene changed again.

She recalled making a pot of soup to visit Magnus, who was paralyzed. When she accidentally grazed against the bracelet that Ifrit gave him, he mercilessly threw the bowl at her and scalded her.

With the last cut, she recalled the sheer look of disgust and contempt in his eyes when he refused to collect her body from the morgue.

Try as hard as she might, she could not recall Magnus ever displaying an ounce of kindness toward her in their last life.

Her heart seemed to give up on all the pain she had suffered, and she could not feel anything anymore.

She let her body collapse onto the operating table and slowly closed her eyes to surrender to her fate.

Darkness engulfed her.

It effectively blocked off the sound of Magnus tenderly comforting Ifrit, along with all the cruel, nasty things he had said about Freya.

In that moment, the darkness kept her from harm.