The Time of Destruction

At twenty, studying abroad was Heeju’s escape.
Except for the moments she had to face him—Ryu Iseok.

Every two weeks, when she visited the Paris villa, he would sit there, silently watching her with a cigarette in hand. For an entire year, that bizarre ritual continued—until he vanished without a trace.

Then, at twenty-five, he reappeared. As her fiancé.

“I let you live however you wanted until twenty-five, didn’t I? Even if you ended up pregnant, I was prepared to take responsibility for that much.”

Muttering incomprehensible words.

“Why are you doing this to me?”
“Because it’s amusing. Like watching someone who’s just opened their eyes to the world.”

Ryu Iseok suffered from prosopagnosia—an inability to recognize faces due to the aftereffects of an accident. The rumors about his deteriorating sanity were endless, and the gossip surrounding him was nothing short of terrifying.

And yet, there was one face he could recognize.
Yeon Heeju’s.

“What should I do? I just want to breathe a little… by your side.”

But what he showed her wasn’t love. It was a possessiveness too overwhelming to bear.

Why did it have to be her?
She struggled to escape the inevitable, desperate to avoid marriage with him. But the more she resisted, the deeper she sank into the quicksand.

“I told you, you’re my light.”

Where would this fate lead them in the end?