At my father’s funeral, my childhood friend Larry drove his SUV straight through my father’s portrait, screaming, “Your father deserved to die!”

A week later, I smashed his mother’s urn on the docks and told him, “So did yours.”

He stole the money meant to save my mother’s life. I blinded his sister in one eye.

For nine long years, we tore into each other, clawing and ripping until nothing was left but exhaustion.

In the end, he fled to Northern Myanmar. I stayed behind as the city’s top bounty hunter—codename “Moon Goddess.”

…

The day of my father’s funeral, Larry roared up in a black SUV like a madman.

He plowed through rows of white funeral wreaths, shattered my father’s black-and-white portrait, and finally—amid the screams—slammed hard into the coffin.

The heavy casket lurched with a sickening scrape.

My mother fainted on the spot.

Standing in the wreckage in my black mourning clothes, I watched coldly as the red-eyed boy behind the wheel rolled down his window and gave me a cruel smile. “Ellie,” he spat. “Your father deserved to die.”

I didn’t speak. I just stood there, calm, as his bodyguards dragged him out and pinned him to the ground, where he thrashed and roared like a trapped animal.

A week later, his mother’s ashes were to be interred.

I went to the docks alone.

When no one was looking, I snatched the rosewood urn. Under Larry’s furious, wide-eyed stare, I ran to the windiest spot on the pier and hurled it down.

*Crash.*

Gray-white powder scattered, caught by the sea wind, vanishing instantly into the murky water.

I looked straight at him and said, slow and clear, “Larry. So did yours.”

That day, he tried to kill me.

If his father’s men hadn’t held him back, I’d be fish food at the bottom of the sea.

And so began our nine-year war.

I’d denied his mother peace in death.

In revenge, when my mother lay critically ill and desperate for money, he pulled the rug out from under us—stealing every last cent that could have saved her.

I blinded his half-sister in one eye.

So he arranged a car accident that put my mother in a wheelchair for life.

We were like wild beasts, tearing into each other with the sharpest claws, leaving nothing but ruin and blood behind.

Nine years.

The war only paused when I was twenty-eight—the year he fled to Southeast Asia.

I stayed in Seaport City and became its top shadow operator: the bounty hunter called “Moon Goddess.”

On the surface, I ran a little dessert shop named Moonlight.

And Larry? Once the golden boy of Seaport City, he remade himself as the most ruthless arms dealer in the gunfire and chaos of Southeast Asia.

I thought we’d never see each other again.

Until the Seaport City news reported that the infamous Mr. Larry—the man who’d raised hell across Southeast Asia—was coming home in style, fiancée in tow.

Nestled in the quietest alley of the old town is my dessert shop, "Moonlight."

Inside, the air hangs thick with the scent of butter and sugar—a fragrance that can make you forget the world, if only for a little while.

It’s my perfect disguise.

No one would ever connect the gentle-eyed woman in an apron, carefully piping frosting, with "Luna," the name that makes Seaport City’s entire underworld tremble… the one who takes lives in the dead of night.

Three days after Larry’s return, the shop door opened to a young girl in a white dress.

She looked no more than eighteen, fresh-faced and innocent as a blank slate. Her large, bright eyes held a trace of timid curiosity as they took in the little shop.

"Hello," she said, her voice soft and sweet. "Are you Miss Ellie?"

I looked up from behind the counter, wiping cream from my hands, and nodded. "I am."

"Oh, good." She sighed with relief, a sweet smile spreading across her face. "I'm Linda. My… my fiancé says you make the best tiramisu. Today is his birthday, and I wanted to make one for him myself."

*Fiancé.*

A needle of pain pricked my heart.

"And who is your fiancé?"

I asked, already knowing the answer.

"His name is Larry."

When Linda said his name, her eyes shone with a light only a girl deeply in love could possess.

I fell silent for a moment. An invisible fist closed around my heart, stealing my breath.

Beneath the counter, my pill case held only half a tablet left. Lately, the pain had been striking more and more often.

I smiled as if nothing were wrong. "Of course. Come with me."

Step by step, I guided her: whipping the egg whites, melting the chocolate, soaking the ladyfingers.

She learned earnestly, and once, with curiosity, asked, "Miss Ellie, did you know my fiancé before? When he mentions you, his expression always seems a little… strange."

Stirring the mascarpone, I kept my voice flat. "You could say we knew each other. We were neighbors."

Childhood sweethearts. Inseparable. Bound by a love that could have just as easily been hate.

As the cake was nearly finished, the wind chime at the door jingled.

A tall figure walked in, silhouetted against the light. He wore a perfectly tailored black suit, his posture erect, features sharp and deep-set. But the eyes he turned on me held a frost that hadn’t thawed in nine years.

It was Larry.

Behind him followed Richard, his brother in arms. Seeing me, Richard’s expression turned awkward; he gave a slight nod, a silent greeting.

Linda ran over in delight, holding up the cake like a treasure. "Yanhou! Look, I made you a birthday cake!"

But Larry’s gaze didn’t settle on her. It was locked on me.

Nine years had stripped away the boyish softness. He stood more mature now, more dangerous—like a panther lying in wait, his presence oppressive and suffocating.

"Ellie," he said, his voice low and rough, edged with mockery. "You really know how to pick a place. Hiding out here like a turtle in its shell, living the good life?"

I untied my apron, wiped my hands clean, and met his gaze calmly. "Can't compare to the empire you've built, Mr. Larry. All that bloodshed must be so rewarding."

The air froze instantly.

Linda seemed to sense something was off. She tugged nervously at his sleeve. "Yanhou, don’t be like this… Miss Ellie has been very kind."

Larry let out a cold laugh, ignoring her completely.

He pulled a black card from his suit pocket and tossed it onto the counter. The sound was sharp, jarring.

"Pack up every single dessert in this place."

He paused, his eyes scraping over my face like blades. "Then get behind the counter with your little creations. I want a picture."

He looked at me, each word a calculated insult. "Smile for the camera, Miss Ellie. This is probably the biggest payoff you’ll ever see."

Richard’s face paled. Stepping forward, he lowered his voice, trying to intervene. “Larry, not today—it’s—”

“Shut up!”

Larry cut him off sharply, his bloodshot eyes locked on me, waiting—for my breakdown, my rage, my hysteria.

Nine years ago, that’s exactly how I would have reacted.

But he didn’t know. Over the past nine years, I had ground every last emotion down to nothing and buried it in the deepest trench of the sea.

I even laughed. Picking up the black card, I spun it slowly between my fingers.

“Mr. Larry certainly isn’t shy about throwing his money around.”

I walked over to the freshly made tiramisu. Right in front of them, I used the card’s hard edge to scrape off a thick chunk of cream dusted with cocoa powder.

Then I stopped in front of Larry.

His eyes widened in shock. Lunging forward, I grabbed his chin and shoved the cream-smeared card straight into his mouth.

“Taste it,” I leaned in, my voice a low, icy whisper. “Is cake bought with your dirty money especially sweet?”

Time seemed to freeze.

Everyone stood stunned.

Linda let out a sharp, choked gasp.

Richard’s jaw went slack.

Larry’s face was streaked with cream. On his tongue, the bitterness of cocoa clashed with the cloying sweetness of the frosting. A furious tempest darkened his gaze.

He probably never imagined that nine years later, this would be my answer to his provocation.

“You’re asking for death!”

Shoving me away violently, he wiped the cream from his face. His glare was ferocious, as if he wanted to tear me apart with his bare hands.

One of the bodyguards behind him immediately stepped forward, reaching for me.

My gaze hardened. In one fluid motion, I snatched the offset spatula from the counter and, without even looking, pressed its metal edge precisely against the guard’s throat.

“Get out.”

A single word.

The guard froze, a cold sweat breaking on his forehead. He could feel the chill of the metal against his skin—and the unmistakable, unrestrained threat she radiated. The quiet, deadly promise of someone who had truly seen blood.

“Ellie!”

Larry roared.

I didn’t even glance his way. My focus shifted to Linda, whose face had gone sheet-white.

*Slap!*

A crisp, sharp sound echoed through the dessert shop.

I’d put my full strength into it. Linda’s delicate cheek flushed and swelled instantly.

Clutching her face, she stared at me in disbelief, tears welling in her eyes. “How… how dare you hit me?”

“I dare,” I retracted my hand, my voice cold as ice, “because you shouldn’t have brought the person I hate most into my space. You’ve dirtied it.”

“And,” I looked at Larry, my lips twisting into a faint, bitter smile, “I dare because you look a little too much like I used to.”

The words pierced him—venomous and precise.

His face turned a shade paler than death.

Yes, Linda. Eighteen. Fresh-faced. With those two shallow dimples when she smiles.

So much like… so much like the Ellie from nine years ago, before hatred consumed her.

Larry, keeping a replica like this by your side… who exactly are you trying to punish? And who are you really torturing?