BENEATH PERFECT SKIN

The sky looked as though it had been torn apart. Rain poured down in white, torrential sheets, filling the air with a bleak, suffocating dampness. The distant, low rumble of thunder left an eerie restlessness in the air, stirring a strange sense of discomfort. A luxury car sliced through the standing water, pulling silently into the courtyard of a lavish mansion. The moment the door swung open, a little girl around seven years old eagerly leaped out. Heavy raindrops splashed onto her pristine white socks, yet she paid them no mind. She smiled, radiant as a sunflower in midsummer, her large round eyes as clear as polished glass. They were filled with pure innocence, untouched by the ugliness of the world. In her arms, she clutched a fluffy teddy bear. Her small feet scrambled eagerly, water splashing all over her shoes and socks, but she didn’t care. Her eyes sparkled as she stared at the porch, turning to the old butler who was hurriedly chasing after her with an umbrella. Her voice rang out, clear as a bell. “Did you say Papa is home too? Are you telling the truth?” The butler nodded with a gentle smile. The little girl suddenly jumped for joy, the teddy bear nearly slipping from her grasp. “It’s been months since I last saw Papa! I miss him so much!” Without waiting for the butler to shield her with the umbrella, she skipped joyfully ahead, bursting into the house like a little bird rushing back to its warm nest. But the moment she stepped across the threshold, that smile froze instantly. Just a second ago, her eyes had still been clear and innocent, but now the light within them slowly faded into sheer terror. Her mother lay there, motionless on the freezing marble floor. A sickening, dark red stain was spreading from her head like a living creature, crawling through the gaps between the tiles until it seeped forward, touching the tip of the little girl's shoe. The pungent, metallic stench of rust rushed into her senses, suffocating her lungs. She trembled, her entire body plunging into an abyss of ice. Standing frozen in the middle of the pooling blood, her breath caught as sheer terror overtook her. Her eyes widened to their limits, her pupils constricting sharply. She couldn't breathe. Her chest heaved violently, her lips parted and began to shake, but not a single scream could escape. It felt as if an invisible hand was strangling her throat. Her legs wanted to run, wanted to fling her toward her mother, but those very legs felt nailed straight to the tiled floor. Driven by some desperate instinct, she slowly raised her eyes toward the staircase. There, her father stood. The man who was supposed to protect her now stood frozen in panic, his face pale with fear and cowardice. And right beside him stood a strange woman—sharp, beautiful, with eyes like switchblades. She showed no signs of panic; instead, she looked down at the little girl standing in the middle of the crime scene, her lips curling into a provocative, malicious smirk, dripping with twisted triumph and satisfaction. At that exact moment, the roaring rain outside seemed to fade into absolute silence, leaving only the sound of a child’s world quietly breaking apart. “Scarlett Sterling.” Her father's frantic cry echoed from the past, shattering into the reality of the present. Scarlett jolted, her breath coming in ragged gasps, her pupils constricting as if she had just escaped a blood-drenched nightmare. She sat curled in the dimly lit corner of the classroom, cold sweat soaking her spine. “Damn it, why am I remembering that now?” she cursed under her breath, her voice raspy with raw hatred. Scarlett fixed her icy glare toward the front row. There, a young man and woman sat side by side, their silhouettes so harmonious it made her eyes burn with irritation. The innocence of the seven-year-old girl was entirely gone; in its place was a gaze as sharp as a blade honed in the dark. On the cusp of eighteen, Scarlett possessed a breathtaking, toxic allure. Her porcelain skin stood in stark contrast to her ink-black hair, and her lips were a vivid crimson—looking as though they had been painted with the very blood from her memories. Hers was not a beauty meant to comfort, but to destroy. There was something dangerous in every glance she gave, something cold hidden beneath the faint curve of her lips, like a poisonous flower blooming in the dark. “Julian Vance, Sienna Sterling... you hypocritical bastards, why don't you just drop dead?” Each word was forced out through clenched teeth. A twisted smile contorted her face as her hand unconsciously clenched until her knuckles turned white. “Ha, f*ck it... And to think that bastard got to take everything from me.” The memories flooded back, bitter and suffocating like poison. Following her mother’s death, Arthur Sterling had twisted the bloody crime scene into a tragic, unfortunate fall down the stairs. Beneath a mask of manufactured grief, he took control of the vast fortune Scarlett’s grandfather had spent a lifetime building for her mother. The shamelessness did not end there. Before the earth on her mother’s grave could even dry, Arthur rushed to bring that murderous b***h into the house, proudly installing her as the new lady of the manor. As it turned out, while Scarlett's mother had been pouring her heart into loving and building their home, he had already built another family elsewhere. Sienna—the younger sister born just a few months after Scarlett—was the living, breathing proof of that vile betrayal. Afterward, Scarlett was discarded overseas without a shred of mercy, like a piece of expired trash. Under the guise of “studying abroad,” he had essentially signed a decree of exile, abandoning her to sink or swim in a foreign land. The ruthless beatings and brutal school bullying she endured silently reshaped Scarlett into a monster with the face of an angel. Abandonment shaped her. Isolation hardened her. Hatred kept her alive, waiting for the day she would return to tear apart the Sterling family's mask of happiness. Scarlett had waited ten long years for this exact day. Because the vast inheritance left by her late mother was finally about to pass into her hands, that man had been forced to bring this “insane daughter” back from the dead. Scarlett saw through it all. She knew that beneath the facade of a warm family reunion, they were quietly sharpening their knives, clearing the path, so Sienna could righteously enjoy a life of luxury. But instead of trembling with fear, her chest throbbed with a dark excitement. Her pale fingers trembled slightly with a dark excitement she could barely suppress. To Scarlett, their malicious plots were not a threat; they were a thrilling invitation to a game of death she had anticipated for a lifetime.