The heavy oak gates of the Kurokawa estate didn't just shut out the Kyoto cold; they felt like the jaws of a trap snapping shut. Seth sat on the tatami mat in Aoi’s room, his knuckles white around his pencil. A quiet, wimpy boy from Sakura High, he was used to blending into the background, but here he felt suffocated. Aoi lay on her bed, giggling at a text from another guy. She didn't hide her cheating; she used Seth as a spineless tool to do her homework so her father wouldn't cut her allowance. Yet, despite her cruelty and her terrifying Yakuza bloodline, Seth loved her with a desperate devotion, hoping his usefulness might finally buy her affection. He was entirely blind to the predator actually watching him. Seth vividly remembered the rainy night Aoi first brought him to the mansion. In the courtyard, thick with the scent of sake and expensive tobacco, a group of hardened capos stood in a tight circle. At the center sat Aoi’s older brother, Satsujin Kurokawa. Though only in his early twenties, Satsujin commanded absolute, terrifying authority. Lean but sharply muscled, his rolled-up yukata exposed dark, intricate irezumi tattoos crawling up his arms, wrapping his neck, and tracing his jawline. His cold eyes had locked onto Seth for a fraction of a second, drilling right through him. Later, while Seth set up his textbooks in the living room, a chilling sensation crept down his spine. Every time he looked up, Satsujin was standing in the shadows of the hallway, unblinking. It wasn't the gaze of a hostile gang leader protecting his turf; it was an apex predator evaluating a vulnerability within the household. Seth had brushed it off as paranoia. He was wrong. Weeks passed. Aoi’s neglect grew flagrant, and Seth’s quiet heartache deepened. Then, on a grey Tuesday afternoon in the school library, his phone buzzed. An unknown number had messaged him: “葵は君を愛していない。僕が愛しているんだ。 (Aoi doesn't love you, I do.)” Before Seth’s racing heart could process the words, a second message flashed—a crystal-clear photo of him sitting by the library window, looking entirely exposed. Beneath it, a final line: “Look outside.” Trembling, Seth looked down at the rain-slicked street. Parked directly across the school gates was a black luxury sedan. Standing by the open door, shielded by a subordinate’s umbrella, was Satsujin. Even from the second floor, Seth could see the dark, calculated look on the Yakuza heir's face. Satsujin raised two tattooed fingers, tapping his temple. The message was clear: he had monitored Seth's every move, and Seth's presence in the Kurokawa family dynamics was now completely under his observation.