The End of Gods (A Welcome to the Underworld Novel, Book 4) (61 page)

“I didn’t know she was pregnant!” Yoori finally shouted as she twisted herself in the air and successfully slashed him across the arm.

She thought about his betrayal, about how he had ruined everything. Then, when she thought about him and what he was going to do to her and Tae Hyun, she lost it. She didn’t want to apologize because in the end, Young Jae would always be the origin that started
everything
.

“
You
jumpstarted
every
decision I’ve made,” Yoori seethed furiously. She loved him, but she could
never
forgive him for ruining her life. “With your greed, with your love for power, and with your need to rule over the Underworld. You murdered your own father and
f
ucked up everyone’s lives in the process!” Her lips began to quiver as her emotions overtook her. “I feel guilty for killing your wife and your unborn child. I wish I could take it back, but I can’t. But the difference between us is that I actually feel guilt. I haven’t lost my soul like you think I have, Young Jae.” She stopped fighting and simply looked at him with tears rippling in her eyes. “But what about you? Do you even feel anything? Do you even feel guilt anymore? It’s been five years since you’ve killed our father. Five years since you colluded with our brother to end his life and tore this family apart. Do you even feel guilt for that?”

He ceased with his attacks and stared at her with unreadable eyes.

After a long pause, he finally said, “No, I don’t.”

It was a simple and honest answer. He had no guilt for what he did to their father, and he had no guilt for using Ho Young to kill him. This was the final nail on the coffin for Yoori. It was no longer possible for her to contain her rage.

“Do you not think that you deserve this fate?!” she launched heatedly, well aware that she would incur his wrath by stating this. “Do you think all the good you did in the past for me will excuse your actions now? Look at what you’ve become! You’re not even human anymore.”

Fuming and no longer wanting to stand here and discuss this—
to further distend a pain that both of them would never be able to reconcile
—a now agonized Yoori used this opportunity to attack him. She speedily swept her leg over the five-inch wide marble ledge and stole the air from beneath Young Jae’s feet. Gravity tried to claim him, but he was resourceful enough to deny its call. With one hand stretched out, he caught himself on the ledge before he fell down. Displaying the strength of the undefeatable God that he was, he easily lifted himself back onto the marble wall.

“You’re right,” Young Jae casually concurred as he stood peacefully on that ledge. He nodded with a smirk. “You’re right. I have jumpstarted every decision that you’ve made. I’ve pushed you to your breaking point, and I deserve every bit of the misery you’ve afflicted onto me.” Yoori wondered what he was getting at until his cruel eyes strayed across the arena. His gaze settled on Tae Hyun as he fought Ji Hoon. “I deserve every bit of the misery you’ve inflicted on me, so in turn, because you’ve now pushed me to
my
breaking point, it is only right that you jumpstart all the decisions that I’m about to make.” He returned his focus to her, his eyes swelling with unforgiving fire. His next declaration was a vicious promise that chilled every inch of Yoori’s soul. “You will lose
everything
tonight, little one. You will pay for everything that you’ve done, and I will return the misery that you’ve given me tenfold.”

“You will not touch him!” she breathed tightly, panicked at the thought of him doing anything to Tae Hyun.

“After you lose him,” Young Jae persevered cruelly, “I want to see what you become. Will you be human . . . or will you be a monster like me?”

The last vestige of her control dispersed into oblivion. Fiery indignation began to engulf her very being. With her protective instincts for Tae Hyun blinding her, she let out a growl and abruptly charged at Young Jae.

She swept her leg on the ledge again, knocking him off his feet. Only this time, she did not allow him to be at the mercy of gravity. She wanted him to be at
her
mercy. On the heels of her first attack, she suddenly extended both her legs up and locked them around his neck as he was about to fall. Forming an iron grip around his neck, she hoisted Young Jae down with the force of a bulldozer. The assault sent him flying down onto the onyx floor. He tumbled over several dead bodies like a skipping rock and came to a violent stop at the center of the arena.

Determined to put an end to this fight, Yoori seized the opportunity to finish him off while he was still discombobulated. She jumped back onto the onyx floor and ran after his immobile body with her sword in hand. She raised her sword when she was near him, and without any hesitation, she stabbed the sword into the ground where his body laid. Regrettably for Yoori, finishing her brother off was not as easy as she anticipated. The sword that was supposed to impale him missed by a mere inch when several bullets came down upon her, sidetracking her while giving Young Jae the opening to gather his strength and use her momentary distraction against her.

Young Jae soared into the air and extended his right leg out, giving her a triple spin kick that literally left the bones within her body to vibrate in pain. The force of this attack blinded her temporarily, leaving her unable to shield herself.
Despite the fact that she could hear the bullets coming
, there was little Yoori could do when a bullet flew past her, searing off a good amount of skin off her right shoulder. Hot flashes of pain assailed her, nearly knocking her out.

“How about you protect yourself first?” Young Jae murmured haughtily, kicking her so hard in the stomach that she could feel her intestines contract in pain. There was no moment of reprieve when he delivered a second kick that sent her soaring through the air. Just like Young Jae’s previous fall, her body tumbled and bounced mercilessly against the floor, exponentially increasing the pain that spread like cancer inside her body. Yoori expelled a sharp breath when Young Jae grabbed the back of her neck. Tipping her head back so that she was forced to stare up at him, he ruthlessly said, “How about we put you through your punishment before we talk more about Tae Hyun?”

Bam!

There was no time for Yoori to digest his words. In that same second, Young Jae grabbed a chunk of her hair and slammed her head against the marble wall. The force was so brutally hard that Yoori’s entire body trembled from the excruciating throbbing. As Yoori struggled to breathe, Young Jae allowed her severely injured body to fall to the floor beside his feet.

He gripped his sword, staring down at her with malice in his eyes.

“You took it all from me. So now,” he began, getting ready to raise his sword, “I’m going to take it all from you.”

All the while as this occurred, moments before Yoori laid helpless beside Young Jae’s feet, another battle raged on—a battle between old rivals who were finally getting a taste of war.

“You have no idea how long I’ve waited for this moment,” Tae Hyun said angrily, staring down at a newly fallen Ji Hoon from the marble wall. Various parts of Tae Hyun’s body were now covered with sword wounds that infiltrated his clothes and skin. However hurt he was, it did not compare to Ji Hoon’s current condition.

With blood seeping profusely from the areas of his body that Tae Hyun was able to successfully cut, along with the areas of his body that had skin seared off because Tae Hyun used him as a shield to protect against incoming bullets, it was an understatement to say that Ji Hoon was in worse shape than Tae Hyun.

Regardless of his physical injuries, Ji Hoon’s arrogance did not cease. “Yes, the death of daddy dearest is probably still with you, isn’t it?” he provoked derisively, laughing even as blood was dripping relentlessly from his arm. Standing up from the fall he just took, Ji Hoon comfortably cracked his neck as if the fall meant nothing to him. He turned back around and stared up at Tae Hyun with mocking eyes. “Is this the best you can do?”

“You should have listened to my warning over the phone, Ji Hoon,” Tae Hyun reminded, jumping down from the marble wall with ease. His sword outstretched, he swung it again, this time cutting Ji Hoon two more times before he performed an axe kick that sent Ji Hoon crashing against the marble wall behind him. “I would’ve left you alone. I would’ve swept everything under a rug and forgotten about you.”

Ji Hoon smirked mockingly. He couldn’t care less of what Tae Hyun warned him. All he cared about was his hatred for Tae Hyun and his need to hurt him.

Without uttering a response, he simply charged at Tae Hyun again, fighting with all the skills that made them renowned Kings of the Underworld. Though they appeared evenly matched in strength, the one with the most skills—Tae Hyun—was proving to be the better opponent. He jumped against the marble wall, used it as a prop to propel himself in the air, and proceeded to deliver a spin kick once against Ji Hoon’s face, another when Ji Hoon was in the process of collapsing onto the floor, and a final spin kick that knocked Ji Hoon to the floor.

Tae Hyun breathed angrily, finally preparing for his final attack. He was sick and tired of Ji Hoon and was ready to end him once and for all. Just as Ji Hoon was about to meet the ground, Tae Hyun seized the kendo sword that was lying on the floor. He positioned the butt of the stick to meet Ji Hoon’s chin when he fell and performed an uppercut that had his head twisting back up. As his finale, Tae Hyun twirled the bamboo sword with unmatched velocity and slammed it like a baseball bat against Ji Hoon’s neck. The stick cracked in half when this occurred, and Ji Hoon was left rocketing backwards onto the floor.

Tae Hyun watched him with pity.

“You should’ve backed off while you had the chance to live,” Tae Hyun said coldly, bloodlust present in his eyes. From his demeanor and the way he approached Ji Hoon, it was apparent that Tae Hyun was no longer interested in allowing Ji Hoon to breathe any longer.

“What fun . . . would that be?” Ji Hoon coughed, resting his head against the marble wall. His breathing was rapid and shallow. Even though he was at Tae Hyun’s mercy, Ji Hoon was anything but humble. “
Especially
when I wanted to be the one who took everything away from you tonight.”

“It’s over, Ji Hoon,” Tae Hyun replied, picking up the sword from the ground. “It’s over for you.”

Ji Hoon smiled before eyeing the scene on the opposite end of the arena. “Maybe you should see how your little Yoori is doing before you focus too much on my death.”

Perturbed by this unusual prompt, a newly distracted Tae Hyun veered his attention to the other side of the arena. Alarm entered his eyes. Instead of seeing Yoori hold her own as he obviously expected, he was horrified to find that she was actually struggling while fighting with Young Jae. Even through her thick black hoodie, he could see that blood was dripping freely from her left arm. She was hurt and was also about to be finished off by Young Jae.

The sight of Yoori in this treacherous state rocked Tae Hyun’s sensibilities. Abandoning all focus on Ji Hoon, he took off for the other side of the arena—for Yoori.

“Yoori,” he whispered. The soles of his shoes sped over the tiles as he flew towards her.

Yoori was lying face down on the ground, her breathing raspy. She did her best to fight through the throbbing of her newly assaulted head and the pain shooting throughout her body. Although she managed to keep herself from blacking out, she could not find the strength to get up and fight. She was too monopolized by the pain—too crippled to save herself when Young Jae emerged from behind her and raised his sword . . .

Swish!

Speeding up just as Young Jae was about to cut into Yoori’s back with his sword, Tae Hyun lunged towards him. He grabbed onto a harness in front of him and swung forward, viciously kicking Young Jae across the face.

Young Jae screamed a curse before dropping his sword and collapsing to the ground.

Tae Hyun landed easily onto the balls of his feet and grabbed two corpses as he did so. He transported his lifeless cargo over to the marble wall where Yoori laid. Without missing a beat, he set up the corpses as shields around them. Half a second later, a stream of bullets came for them, burying into the lifeless bodies as Tae Hyun tended to Yoori.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

“Hey,” he called to her after the gunfire came and went. He gently placed his hand on the back of her head and helped her sit up. “Hey, how you doing?” he continued, making conversation to keep her awake, to keep her from blacking out. This arena wasn’t the place for her to pass out.

As Yoori fluttered in and out of consciousness, Tae Hyun took inventory of her left arm. He carefully touched the blood that formed around the fresh sword wound of the jacket. Anger poured into his eyes when he noted that the bullet wound that was once healing had been re-aggravated. His eyes shifted along her slow breathing body, and he could see the maladies plaguing her. The swollenness of her face, the various cuts on her body, and the newly seared flesh on her right shoulder caused more fury to seep into his observant eyes.

“I’m okay,” Yoori whispered after regaining her full consciousness. She hissed in pain as she sat straighter, relieved that Tae Hyun was sitting beside her. All she needed was a moment away from Young Jae, a moment to breathe and work through her pain. After being given that grace period by Tae Hyun, she was feeling slightly better already.