The Fall of Gods (A Welcome to the Underworld Novel, Book 2)

by Con Template

  She could feel the tears coat her eyes. She could feel her heart wrench in agony and she could feel the anxiety puncture itself through every nerve in her body. Yoori veered through the opened door. The darkness in the diner threw her off, rendering her blind for a split second. The distraction was enough for her to slip on a piece of fabric. She fell forward. Her chest slammed onto the hard tiles before her Blackberry slipped free from her grasp.

  Spikes of pain attacked her chest, causing Yoori to gasp painfully for air. Groaning, Yoori reached for her Blackberry. Her vision had gradually acclimated to the darkness. Once she saw something twinkle in the shadows, she reached out for it and found her phone. Her eyes widened when she observed that the fabric she slipped on was a turtleneck. Chae Young’s red turtleneck. The fine hairs on the back of her neck stood, not because she realized she slipped on Chae Young’s top, but because she realized that the screen of the phone was wet…wet with blood.

  “Chae Young!” Yoori sprang to her feet.

  Her eyes roamed the room in horror. It was Chae Young’s blood. She had no doubt about it. Yoori’s surveying eyes caught sight of something in the corner. Chae Young’s white apron hung on one of the booths. Her eyes continued to roam the room and there on the floor, she saw something that drained the color from her face.

  Chae Young was sprawled on the floor, naked and unmoving.

  She was covered in blood.

  The world stood still as Yoori froze there, the seconds distending to eternities. Other than the screams of anguish bellowing within her, nothing was discernible to her ears. Her eyes ran over the blood, the torn clothes, and Chae Young’s lifeless body.

  Yoori was ready to keel over when she heard soft moaning. The dark spiral she felt herself being dragged into was lifted when light held onto her.

  Chae Young was still alive.

  “CHAE YOUNG!” Yoori shouted. She ran over to Chae Young so fast that she almost slipped on the trail of blood that led up to her body. “Oh God, oh God. Thank God!”

  Yoori fell to the ground, picked Chae Young’s head up, and carefully placed her knee underneath Chae Young’s neck.

  “Chae Young, please open your eyes,” Yoori pleaded, her chest tightening in agony. Tears threatened to rise up through her. She gently slapped Chae Young’s cheek so that she would lift her lids. Chae Young was ice cold and it was killing Yoori, ripping her apart to see her friend like this. “Please…Please look at me.”

  “Yoori?” Chae Young finally whispered, opening her bruised and swollen eyes slightly. Her eyes were merely slits, its full bloom prevented by the huge swelling surrounding her eyes.

  “I’m here, I’m here,” Yoori assured, warming her cold cheeks with her hands.

  Tears welled up in Chae Young’s eyes. She gazed up at Yoori with such horror that it tugged at Yoori’s heartstrings. Sobs began to filter from her lips.

  “Y—Yoo—Yoori,” she cried, shaking with tears. Her bloody fingers gripped onto Yoori like she couldn’t believe she was still alive to see her.

  “I’m here. You’re going to be okay, sweetie,” Yoori whispered. She lifted her arms up and took off her hoodie. She placed it over Chae Young’s upper body as a means to keep her warm. “Can you keep your eyes open for me?” Yoori struggled to dial for help. “I’m calling for help now.”

  Her fingers were shaking as she held back her own tears. She was trying to stay strong for Chae Young but she was losing it, especially when she realized that she couldn’t make the phone call. The battery to her phone was missing. It must’ve broken off when she tripped earlier.

  “Fuck! The battery!” Yoori hissed, whipping around as Chae Young continued to shake with sobs in the background.

  Carefully placing Chae Young’s head back on the tiles, Yoori crawled on her hands and knees. She tried to find the battery for her phone. She was going crazy. She was hurting from hearing Chae Young cry in the background and she was losing it herself. Where was it? Where the fuck was the battery?

  “You better be ready to jog when I come pick you up in a bit...”

  Yoori’s gaze snapped toward the door once she heard the male voice stream from outside. As if hearing her savior, Yoori staggered to her feet and barreled out of the diner, catching a jogger on the phone just before he swept past the diner.

  “Please help me!” she cried, opening the door and catching the teenage boy in time. He wore a black workout jacket and windbreakers. He nearly jumped off the sidewalk when she came out.

  She went on, barely able to keep her own sanity intact. “M—My friend was attacked! I—I need a phone!”

  “Oh God!” Instantly heeding Yoori’s plea, the boy immediately hung up on his friend. He ran back into the diner with Yoori and dialed for help.

  “Hurry! She was attacked. She’s lost a lot of blood!” The boy shouted into the phone. Blood drained from his face once he saw the condition Chae Young was in. He didn’t look a day over 15 and he looked petrified.

  “Hey hun, you’re going to be okay,” Yoori whispered, her voice shaking once she got back onto the ground and stroked Chae Young’s forehead. Sobs choked her chest yet she held it in.

  As though it was hurting for her to breathe, Chae Young inhaled sharply, held back her sobs, and said something that chilled Yoori’s blood.

  “Y—Yoori—you shouldn’t be here,” she cried desperately.

  All of a sudden, she tried to push Yoori away from her. She was too weak. Yoori didn’t even budge. She didn’t budge physically but mentally, Yoori was being pushed over the brink of insanity.

  “Wh – What?” Yoori whispered as she heard the boy tell the operator on the other line the condition Chae Young was in.

  Chae Young’s eyes were coated with fear as she spoke. “They—They…” She gasped for air. She seemed delirious. “Y—You can’t be here— they’re coming back—they’re coming back – and they’ll do this to you too!”

  “They won’t, they won’t. They’re gone,” Yoori assured Chae Young, biting her lips to keep from screaming in frustration. It pained Yoori to see Chae Young so afraid.

  More sobs elicited from her lips. Chae Young shook her head. “Th—They said they’d come back for me.” Violence overtook her shaking body. She chaotically recalled what they did to her. “Th—They said they’ll keep me alive because they w—wanted to come back for me.” Tears slid down her bloodstained face. “They—They took turns. They used knives and—they—they took their clothes off and—th—they took turns with me…”

  Unable to finish, Chae Young just shook and shook, her tears mixing with her blood.

  The entire time, as Yoori absorbed Chae Young’s words, she felt her heart grow heavy with anger. Every word Chae Young spoke, it felt like nails were being drilled into her. Yoori knew that Chae Young had been raped…mercilessly and heinously. But to hear her best friend, the one she loved so much, voice it out loud and to see the fear in her eyes….

  Yoori’s eyes narrowed onto the cuts on Chae Young. She took stock of the bruises, the blood covering her and her naked body. She ran the scenario in her furious mind, the control she held already withering under the fire of rage burning within her.

  Those bastards raped Chae Young. They slit her skin, beat her and tortured her…and they told Chae Young they would come back for her.

  Yoori’s blood boiled.

  No, she wouldn’t let them come back for Chae Young.

  She wouldn’t.

  She wouldn’t let those fuckers come back.

  Those fuckers…

  Those fuckers were never coming back!

  “Where are you going?” the boy shouted when Yoori pushed past him and ran out of the diner.

  She didn’t answer him.

  Everything had faded in her world but Chae Young’s pain, the eleven bastards and the knowledge of what they did to Chae Young.

  The fires of hell singed in her eyes.

  At that moment, all excess emotions were stripped out of her soul.

  Al
l that was left within her was wrath.

  Pure, unadulterated wrath.

  Blood…

  It was all that she sought as she ran like a predatory wolf.

  Their agonized screams…

  It was all that she wanted to hear as she barreled through a group of joggers, causing them to fall every which way. She jumped over their bodies and continued down the snow-strewn sidewalk.

  The feel of her hands ripping their skins apart…

  That was all that mattered to her as she bent down, never slowing down her pace to grab an empty beer bottle near the curb.

  The feel of their blood squirting onto her skin…

  That was what she wanted to feel as she smashed the bottle onto the side of a building. Trinkets of broken glass flew into the sky like crystals and then fell back down, snipping her skin as she continued to run, her eyes unblinking with rage. Jagged edges ornamented the broken bottle.

  Holding onto it with the strongest of grips, Yoori swung it up and down, her nostrils flaring.

  Yoori cared about nothing.

  Nothing but making them suffer.

  Those fuckers would pay…

  They would pay for everything they did.

  They would pay for everything they did to Chae Young.

  “But you’ll also have to answer to the people you’ve hurt. . .”

  26: Wrath of the Queen

  Yoori swung past a row of dilapidated buildings that were well-known for harboring street gangs. It was a neighborhood that cops purposely deviated from and it was a block that Yoori purposely threw herself into because she knew the people she was looking for were there.

  “That was the best fuck I’ve had,” said a laughing voice. “I’m tempted to go back.”

  “Bitch put up a hell of a fight. I had to knife her a couple of times to get her to stay still.”

  “We should do it again.”

  “You know where she works and where she lives. If the bitch isn’t dead, I’m sure you can pay her another visit.”

  Yoori stopped running once she saw them. She could feel the hatred flow like acid in her veins as she listened to them gloat about what they did to Chae Young.

  Fucking bastards.

  “Look boys, we have a lost kitten,” one of the fatter, bald men in his early thirties spoke. Standing at about 6’1, he was one of the biggest in the group. The other men were almost as big and just as intimidating, but this one just radiated arrogance that told Yoori he was the leader.

  He was the one who probably raped Chae Young first...

  He was the one who should die first.

  She tightened her grasp on the bottle, revolted that this pig was breathing in the same air that she was. Yoori didn’t say anything when she walked in, her boots stepping on the snow that lined the alleyway. The alley was big. Big enough for her to do what she needed to do and narrow enough for her to take them all on at once. It was the perfect killing field.

  “Now will you look at that little weapon she’s holding.” The leader’s eyes glittered. He rubbed his chin in glee. It was clear to him where Yoori came from and what she found in the diner.

  “Did you like the present we left you at that diner, baby? Was she your friend?” His voice pulsed with guiltless mockery. He didn’t wait for her answer. He already knew by the anger emanating from her stance. “That whore friend of yours has a hell of a pussy…”

  His eyes glistened as more of his gang members piled out of a nearby building and walked into the alley.

  Eleven. There were eleven of them now. Some were sitting on the steps, some were leaning against the walls and some were standing in the center of the alley. They were all staring at her, their perverted gazes already undressing her and fantasizing about all the things they would do to her in this secluded place.

  “But I’m sure your pussy is a hell of a lot better than hers, isn’t it?” he continued to croon, laughing. He pulled a pocketknife from his back pocket. He lifted the blade. The sharpness of the tip winked in her direction. Snow had just descended, layering the once quiet alley with white fluff. He carefully pointed it in her direction. The rest watched in the background, amusement covering their faces.

  “Don’t hurt her too badly, Spi,” one reminded the leader.

  “She’ll be alive,” Spi sneered. “She’ll be more than damaged and she’ll be begging for death, but she’ll be alive.” He sharpened his eyes on her, smiling as though he expected her to be kneeling in the seconds to come. “Who do you think you are walking into this alley like you own it, you stupid little bitch?”

  Yoori’s face was still stoic, deadly.

  “Show me what you got and I’ll show you who the little bitch is,” Yoori stated gravely. There was a different tone to her voice. It was one that was unfamiliar to her and one that didn’t belong to her.

  Mocking laughter saturated the alleyway.

  Spi’s eyes became vicious. He was ready to make her pay for her insulting words. "I'm going to make you scream, my little bitch."

  And then, with his knife faced out, he charged at her with glee on his face.

  She watched him accelerate, his boots digging into the snow beneath them. She waited for him to draw closer. When he was an inch away from her, he snarled, lowering his knife with the intent of stabbing her in the hip.

  She couldn’t have that.

  Finally picking her legs off the ground, Yoori sped to him and swerved to the side. He swished the knife toward her hip and missed her by an inch. As his eyes enlarged at her evasion, he was thrown into an even bigger shock when Yoori doubled back for him, extended her glass weapon and pierced it through his left cheek, causing a hole to form as the jagged edge buried into the flesh of his face. His head bashed against the wall at the force of her attack. He screamed in agony. He shook at the feel of his skin hanging off his cheek by mere strips.

  Yoori was far from done.

  With the bottle still pierced in his cheek, Yoori, who had nothing but hatred in her eyes, twisted the bottle like clockwork. The meat of his skin began to rip. He tried to wiggle out of her hold. Her strength proved to be unyielding. He cried against her grasp, begging her to let him go.

  He wasn’t so pompous anymore.

  Yoori smiled when the blood from his cheeks doused the snow beneath them. She leaned in close to his shaking ear.

  “Did she tremble like this when you raped her? Did you show her any mercy when she begged you to let her go?”

  Yoori knew he didn’t and she wouldn’t give him any mercy either.

  She twisted the bottle again, tearing into the finalities of the meat on his cheek. It tore like fabric…slowly, easily, and painfully.

  “Go to hell, motherfucker,” she spat out before pulling the bottle out of his cheek. She proceeded to stab it into his right temple, causing another scream to emit while she grabbed the pocketknife from his trembling hand and stabbed him below, right through the jeans of his pants and cutting off his penis in the process.

  His eyes dilated in the purest of agony. He opened his mouth to scream. Nothing came out. He had no power to scream when Yoori finished the attack by stabbing into his neck and hitting a jugular vein. Nothing but blood sprayed onto her once she pulled the knife out of his neck.

  She stared into his eyes, watching him take his final breath.

  No guilt overcame her. Just satisfaction.

  She let go and allowed his heavy figure to fall lifelessly to the ground with a big thud. It was easy. It was that easy to kill a piece of shit. She turned her blood-splattered face over to the ten remaining men. They were gaping at the scene before them in horror.

  The curve of a small smile appeared on her lips. It was like a part of her had just been woken up; it was like a part of her just surged with life.

  One down.

  Ten more to go.

  “Let’s play.”

  Snapped out of his trance before the others, one pulled a knife from behind his back.

  “You bitch!” he scre
amed, determined to slit her throat. He made the same mistake as his leader, thinking he could take her down by fighting her with a measly knife. He was no match for her.

  Running as well, Yoori easily jumped off a step for a boost. She flew in the snow filled air, kicked the side of the alley wall and spun toward him. She extended her leg out and kicked him down just before he reached her. His skull collided with the ground after he fell backward. When Yoori landed back down, she made sure the heels of her boots slammed down onto his fingers. Sounds of bones cracking spilled into the air with his screams.

  “You…” she said gravely, staring down at his petrified face. “All of you will pay for everything that you did.”

  She reached down and stabbed the side of his face, cutting through the skin and effectively cutting off an ear. She recalled he was one of the ones who wanted to go back to see Chae Young. For good measure, she pulled the knife out, grabbed the back of his head, and pounded his face into the alley wall. She bashed his head three times – once to break his nose, twice to break his forehead and the third to turn his face into mush. His blood sprayed onto her and she smiled. His blood wasn’t enough. She wanted more.

  When Yoori was satisfied, she threw his screaming body to the floor. She stood to her feet and anxiously watched as the rest charged for her.

  “You fucking bitch! I’m going to shoot your brains out!”

  The two ahead of the pack were smarter than the previous two. Instead of deeming her to be someone they could easily overpower with the force of a knife, they pulled out their black guns to shoot her down instead. The rest were running behind them, seemingly afraid to use their guns as they might fire on their own.

  Idiots, she thought with a smile.

  Reacting quickly while dodging the bullets, Yoori grabbed two knives from the ground. She strategically raised her arms, recoiled them backward, and threw the knives straight toward each of the men. The sharpness of the tip pierced into the bull’s eye of their foreheads, sending them to brutally snap their necks backward before their lifeless bodies fell to the ground.