You really can be a Devil.

-flashbck

Somewhere in a quiet, dust-laced office…

A chipped wooden desk, two steaming mugs of cheap black coffee, and the warm, heavy scent of old paper filled the air. Across from Liam sat an old man, eyes lined with years of forgotten roles and decades of stage dust , Roy, his acting teacher.

Roy folded his hands, staring at Liam with that unreadable expression he always wore before dropping a hammer of wisdom. "Do you know you've been chosen for the role of a psychopath killer for the Winter Festival?"

Liam, sipping from his mug, nearly choked. "Wait, what? I get it, it's probably a role no one wants, so they dumped it on me."

Roy shrugged. "You're the only one left, Liam. So, the role falls on you. That's the theater for you, brutal and oddly poetic."

Liam scratched the back of his neck. "A psychopath though? That's... intense. I mean, I've done street thieves and noble brats before, but this is way beyond me. I don't think I can play a blood-hungry maniac."

Roy tilted his head slightly, the way he always did when Liam said something foolish. "If you've already decided it's difficult, you've already failed. That's not just bad acting. That's bad living."

He stood slowly, pacing around the room. His voice dropped an octave, words rolling like thunderclouds. "Okay, I'll teach you what a psychopath is."

Liam perked up. He'd always admired Roy's acting, his stage presence was so powerful, so real, that audiences forgot they were watching a play.

"A true psychopath," Roy began, "isn't some fantasy boogeyman. He's human. He is the unmasked face of humanity. The raw, unfiltered truth of what lies beneath the skin of civility."

Liam blinked, confused. "What do you mean by 'real personality'? That sounds like something out of a horror flick. I don't have any weird fetishes, if that's what you're getting at."

Roy chuckled darkly. "It's not about fetishes. It's about what people bury. Fear. Sorrow. Rage. Helplessness. And when all that emotion builds without escape, it warps. A psychopath isn't born. He's carved from pain and silence."

He turned and looked at Liam with a strange glint in his eyes. "They desire things, but not out of greed. They focus solely on what they want. Unshakable. Immovable. The world could scream, and they wouldn't blink. Their feelings become so loud that the only sound they can make… is laughter."

Liam stared at his mentor, the room suddenly colder.

Roy continued, taking a long sip of his bitter coffee. "And here's the part that makes them terrifying. They don't warn. They don't explain. They act. And only afterward… maybe, just maybe, they speak."

He leaned in, voice lowering to a whisper. "Imagine this, Liam, tragedy, loss, humiliation... everything that breaks a man. Now bottle it. Seal it tight. Never show it on your face. But let it overflow just beneath the surface."

He stepped back and gestured at Liam. "Now… show me."

Liam closed his eyes.

He pictured it, cold city lights, empty applause, casting directors' polite rejections, his sister's funeral, the silence in his apartment, and the heavy, lonely weight of failure. But he didn't flinch. His mouth slowly curled into a smile.

It wasn't kind.

Roy froze. The temperature in the room dropped. Liam's eyes had gone still, red and glassy, like he was watching something die and enjoying the sight.

And that smile. That horrible, silent smile.

Roy swallowed thickly. "You… you really can be a devil."

-Flashback end-

The blonde man dropped to his knees, both hands cupping his groin in raw agony. His face contorted in pain and disbelief, breath wheezing through clenched teeth. Rage still burned in his blood, but something colder was creeping in now.

Fear.

He looked up, eyes watering, just in time to meet Liam's unblinking gaze. The red of Liam's irises seemed to glow faintly in the dim tavern light, shimmering like a predator's reflection in still water. They were utterly still. Unfeeling. Not angry. Not smug. Just... empty.

That made it worse.

The blonde man's spine stiffened. A chill slithered down his back, coiling in his gut like ice. His instincts screamed that something was wrong, very wrong.

Liam didn't move at first. Just stared, his head tilted slightly as if studying a specimen. Then, with calm, practiced precision, he stepped forward and reached out. His right hand gripped a handful of the man's thick blond hair, not yanked, but tightened slowly, deliberately, until pain bloomed in the man's scalp.

"Ghhn, Aaee!" The blond mercenary whimpered, his voice cracking like glass under pressure. His knees wobbled, his back arched slightly as the pain in his groin pulsed in rhythm with the tension in his skull. His eyes began to glisten,not from rage, but humiliation and helplessness.

Liam leaned in, closing the distance to barely two centimeters. So close, the blond man could feel the slight warmth of Liam's breath against his cheek. But what chilled him wasn't that, it was the eyes. Unblinking, hollow, tinted with a soft gleam of madness, like a porcelain doll cracked just enough to show something alive and wrong behind the mask.

Then came the poke, a sudden jab to his right eye with Liam's free hand.

It wasn't hard. It didn't need to be.

The contact, the message, the nearness, it was all enough.

"What are you looking at?" Liam whispered, his tone flat but the words soaked in quiet venom.

"AAAHHHH!" the mercenary screamed, voice hoarse and broken, twisting away but unable to move far with Liam's grip still locked in his hair. The entire tavern seemed to fall still. A heavy silence swallowed the noise, leaving only the echo of that scream, and the weight of something wrong in the air.

Chairs creaked faintly, but no one stood. No one stepped in. The other mercenaries looked away. Eyes dropped. Heads turned. No one wanted to catch Liam's gaze, not now.

Liam's voice returned, soft and sugar-sweet, the kind of tone that could melt butter, or sanity.

"How dare you look at me?"

He said it like a lover teasing a secret, but it stabbed like a knife. His lips curled upward into a slow smile, not amused, not smug. Deranged. Controlled. Patient.

A devil's smile.

Every hair on the waitress's arms stood on end. Her hands, still gripping her notepad, trembled so slightly it looked like the quiver of a leaf before a storm wind.

No one dared speak.

Then came the coldest moment.

Liam drew his revolver.

The motion was silent, efficient. He lifted it slowly, leveled it right against the blonde mercenary's forehead. Metal pressed against skin. The click of the hammer cocking was louder than any scream could have been.

The blonde man froze like prey cornered by death itself. His skin turned pale, lips trembling without a sound. His breath came in ragged, tiny gasps. He didn't blink. He didn't breathe. He didn't move.

Liam's face was impassive, empty of cruelty or mercy. But his eyes…

His eyes were scarlet voids, polished and empty, holding only the whisper of something feral and devil mock behind them.

"This," Liam said softly, tilting his head ever so slightly, "is called a revolver. You've heard of them, I'm sure."

The man made no reply. He couldn't.

"It carries six bullets. .357 magnum. One shot," Liam said, tapping the muzzle lightly against the man's temple, "and you're out. No coming back. Not in this life, not in the next."

The blonde man fainted.

His body slumped like a sack of bones. No strength left. His face hit the wooden floor with a dull thud, and for a moment, absolute silence reigned.

Liam looked down at the unconscious form with a faint sneer and clicked his tongue.

"Tch."

It wasn't a sound of satisfaction. It wasn't mockery. It was disgust, as if even this fear hadn't lived up to his expectations.

A wave of cold swept through the room.

The waitress gasped quietly, her knees barely holding her up. Her grip on her notepad loosened. It dropped to the floor.

Liam turned toward her. The madness in his eyes had dimmed, but the pressure remained.

"I want a room," he said calmly, as if nothing had happened. "Two nights. Check me in. Fast. My mood's worse now."

The waitress blinked, nodded quickly, and turned on her heel. Her legs buckled once, but she caught herself and bolted for the counter.

The receptionist was dozing lightly behind the desk. The waitress shook him awake in a panic. His eyes went wide as he looked at the pale mercenary lying motionless on the tavern floor.

It didn't take long. The check-in was completed in record time.

A room key was slid into Liam's palm without a word. The receptionist didn't make eye contact. He didn't even breathe until Liam turned away.

Liam walked silently across the tavern. Boots tapping against worn wooden planks. He passed tables of silent men and women who had once laughed, brawled, and shared stories.

No one met his eyes. Not now.

He walked through them like a shadow made of flesh, not a man, but something wearing the shape of one.

Behind him, the waitress slowly exhaled the breath she'd been holding.

The devil had passed.

And the room remembered.