Scene 1. The Gravel Path
Lee Kang stepped onto the garden's gravel.
Inside the broken iron gate. The main house's garden. A well-tended gravel path led all the way to the main hall. Lee Kang's bare feet met that gravel. Blood dripped from his soles. The blood that ran from his side, down his leg. Printing black dots on the gravel.
The garden was still.
The roar of the outskirts had receded. The gunfire too. The screams too. Here it was different. Night dew gathered on the blades of grass. Its smell was there. The smell of wet grass. The smell of a well-kept garden. Beneath it, another smell lay. The reek of Lee Kang's own blood.
Lee Kang's legs were heavy.
Because the blood was short. Each time he stepped, the gravel scattered beneath his feet. Lee Kang caught his balance. His vision blurred once, then returned. The main hall's lights looked far away. Though they were close. Far.
Moonlight had come down over the garden.
A cold light. Casting the shadows of the garden trees across the gravel path. Drawing the outlines of the statues. Lee Kang walked through that light. With a blood-soaked body. Between shadow and moonlight.
Then the air was split.
A faint sound. A thing cutting through the air. Lee Kang's ear caught it. Even within numbed nerves. The instinct honed through days of flight. It caught that sound. Something was flying in.
Lee Kang's body twisted.
By instinct. A half-beat. The thing that flew grazed Lee Kang's shoulder. Failing to lodge. Scoring the flesh shallowly. It was a small thing. A needle. A thin metal needle. It lodged in a garden tree behind Lee Kang. A small tunk.
Lee Kang's eyes turned toward the direction the needle had flown from.
It was the shadow of a garden tree. In the dark. Something was there. A human form. Black clothing. Soundless. Lee Kang's amber eyes pierced that dark.
Lee Kang sprang that way.
On heavy legs. But fast. With a beast's leap. Toward the shadow. Toward the form in the dark.
Scene 2. Shadows
The shadow scattered.
It was not one. In the place Lee Kang leapt to, there were several. Behind the garden trees. Behind the statues. In the shade of the fountain. Those clothed in black. The main house's shadow guard. From the days when Lee Kang was the idiot young master. The ones who had watched Lee Kang from every corner of the estate. The ones who had moved without a sound.
They drew their swords.
The blades flashed in the moonlight. A short sound. The sound of a blade leaving its sheath. It cut the garden's stillness. The shadows moved toward Lee Kang. From every side. At once. Without a sound.
Lee Kang's hand caught the nearest shadow.
The throat. He tried to twist it. The shadow lowered its body and slipped free. Fast. Different from the Ookami. It was human. A trained human. The shadow's blade scored Lee Kang's side. The burst wound. From Lee Kang's side, more blood welled.
Lee Kang chased that shadow.
Another shadow scored Lee Kang's back. The blade across the suture-line on his back. Shallowly. Keenly. A new line was drawn on Lee Kang's back. Yet another shadow at his thigh. Blade-cuts accumulated on Lee Kang's body. Shallow lacerations. Each one not fatal. But they piled up.
Blood kept draining out.
Lee Kang's vision blacked out.
For an instant. Before his eyes went black. The garden vanished. The shadows vanished. The moonlight vanished. There was only dark. Lee Kang shook his head. Hard. Once. Twice. His vision returned. The garden was visible again. The shadows were visible again.
It was hemorrhage.
Lee Kang's body was instinctively trying to switch off consciousness. To conserve blood. To survive. Lee Kang's will fought against it. Shaking his head. Clenching his teeth. He forced the fading mind back on. Because he had to kill Father. Because if he lost consciousness, he could not kill him.
Lee Kang's hand caught one shadow.
This time he did not lose it. The shadow's throat. His fingers bored in. Twisted. Crack. The shadow went slack. Lee Kang threw that body at another shadow. The two tangled. Lee Kang fell upon them.
His vision tried to black out again.
Lee Kang shook his head again. The blade flying at him in the dark. He could not see it. He felt it. With his body. The blade scored Lee Kang's arm. With that arm, Lee Kang caught the shadow. Crushed it.
Scene 3. The Last Fuel
Lee Kang's vision tried to black out completely.
A black film covered his eyes. This time, shaking his head did not bring it back. One of Lee Kang's knees buckled. Onto the gravel. Too much blood had drained out. His body had reached its limit. One shadow seized that gap. Raised a blade toward Lee Kang's neck. Behind Lee Kang.
A gunshot rang.
The shadow fell. The shadow that had aimed at Lee Kang's neck. With a hole bored in its head. It was Doctor Jang. Yeonhwa held in one arm. With the pistol in his other hand. The death flying in from outside Lee Kang's field of vision. He had removed it.
Doctor Jang came to Lee Kang.
Fast. Between the shadows' blades. Holding Yeonhwa. To Lee Kang's side. To the side of the kneeling Lee Kang. Doctor Jang's hand went inside his overcoat. He drew something from the leather case. A syringe. With liquid in it. Already filled.
"This is the last fuel."
Doctor Jang said.
He drove that syringe into Lee Kang's neck. Near the carotid. Without hesitation. Pressed the piston. The liquid went into Lee Kang's body.
"Get to the estate. After that, I don't know."
The drug spread.
Lee Kang's heart beat hard once. Then fast. Faster. The heart pumped as if it would burst. That beat struck his eardrums. It forced the missing blood to circulate. Blood rushed to the fading vision. Before his eyes flushed red. The black film lifted. A red film in its place.
The pain vanished.
The searing in his side. The lacerations on his back. The wound in his thigh. All of it receded. The drug had cut off the sense of pain. Temporarily. Lee Kang's body grew light. The heavy legs moved again. The fading consciousness was forced back on.
Lee Kang's brain mistranslated it.
The pain vanishing. The body growing light. As Father's time to die having come. As the last obstacle having been cleared. As being able to reach him now. Lee Kang's mouth pulled open. Within the red vision. Something close to exhilaration.
Lee Kang rose.
Straightening the buckled knee. On the blood the drug had set circulating. Lee Kang turned toward the shadows. The remaining shadows. Lee Kang's hands caught them. With the strength the drug had given. With a body without pain. He snapped the shadows' necks. Tore off arms. Broke spines.
Because the shadows were human.
Weaker than Ookami. Before the drugged Lee Kang. Before the Lee Kang who had lost his pain. The shadows were rent. One by one. Black clothing piled on the gravel. Blood was sprayed across the garden trees. Flowed into the fountain.
Lee Kang crushed the last shadow.
Scene 4. The Entrance
The garden went still again.
After all the shadows had fallen. On the gravel path. Beneath the garden trees. In the shade of the fountain. Black garments were strewn. Blood soaked the gravel. The fountain's water was stained red. Moonlight came down coldly over it.
Lee Kang stood before the main hall.
A massive entrance door. A Western double door. Brass handles on black wood. Above it, again, the crest of the Lee family. The door Lee Kang had passed in and out of since childhood. With a stooped back. With clouded eyes. With the gait of the idiot young master.
The drug was still circulating.
Lee Kang's heart beat fast. The red vision. The body without pain. But Lee Kang knew. Somewhere. That this was borrowed. That it was the last fuel. That when it ran out. His body would collapse all at once. Because Doctor Jang had said as much. That after that he did not know.
Even so, Lee Kang turned toward the door.
Lee Kang's hand caught the entrance door's handle. Brass. Cold. Lee Kang pushed. The door was heavy. It was not locked from within. It was simply heavy. Under Lee Kang's strength the door opened. Slowly. Creeeak.
Light poured out.
The light of the estate's interior. An opulent light. The entrance lobby. A marble floor. Over it, a red carpet. A chandelier on the high ceiling. Crystal scattering the light. Paintings hung on the walls. Gilt frames. A staircase. A curved staircase rising to the second floor. Carvings on the banister.
Lee Kang stepped into that light.
Lee Kang's bare feet met the marble floor. Cold. Smooth. Blood fell from Lee Kang's feet onto that smooth floor. A dark red thing. Onto the white marble. Into the opulent lobby. A blood-soaked beast.
The chandelier's light lit Lee Kang.
A body covered head to toe in blood. With his own blood and others' blood and the Ookami's black blood. The side where the bandage had burst. The body with shallow blade-cuts piled on it. The amber eyes. That light lit them. In the middle of the opulent lobby. Savagery stood.
There was someone in the lobby.
On the staircase. Halfway up the stairs rising to the second floor. A form stood. Looking down at Lee Kang. Lee Kang looked up at that form. Within the red vision. With drug-circling eyes.
That form stood frozen, looking at Lee Kang.
A blood-soaked beast having entered the opulent estate lobby. Having broken the front gate. Having stained the garden with blood. Having finally come into the estate. The form's eyes were wide with shock.
Lee Kang's amber eyes turned toward that form.
Dripping blood onto the marble floor.
Lee Kang took one step forward.
Into the estate.