Chapter 2 – The Miserable Past

The rain hit against the glass windows like it wanted to come in, like it knew the kind of story Taehyung carried inside him. He sat there, staring out, cigarette burning between his fingers but never reaching his lips. He didn’t smoke much—just liked watching the thin line of smoke curl up and vanish. It reminded him of himself. Something here, then gone.

Taehyung wasn’t born cold. He was made that way.

Back then, before the mafia, before the guns and money, he had been just a boy. A boy with soft hands and a smile that could’ve been innocent, if life had let it stay that way. But life didn’t.

His father’s drunken shouts filled his earliest memories. The way glass bottles shattered against the walls. The way fists felt against his skin—sharp, heavy, unending. His mother was never there to shield him; she was too broken herself, too busy surviving in her own hell. So Taehyung learned early that crying got him nowhere. He learned silence. Silence was safer.

At school, people only saw the bruises he hid behind long sleeves, the quiet boy who never joined games. They never knew he was too busy figuring out whether tonight he’d get dinner or another scar.

One night, it went too far. His father threw him against the corner of the table, splitting his lip and cutting deep into his side. Taehyung remembered lying on the floor, blood pooling, wondering if maybe this was it—maybe life was finally done with him.

But life wasn’t.

It was the mafia who found him first. Not out of kindness, no. They saw a desperate kid with sharp eyes and no one to protect him. Perfect to shape, perfect to use. But for Taehyung, it was still better than the hell he came from. At least here, the rules were clear. At least here, pain meant survival.

He grew up fast. Too fast. The boy disappeared, and in his place came the cold, ruthless V—the name he gave himself like armor. V didn’t flinch. V didn’t cry. V didn’t break.

Still, scars don’t vanish. Sometimes, when he undressed, he caught sight of them in the mirror. The thin lines across his ribs, the faint marks on his back, the cigarette burns on his arms. Memories carved into his body, proof of the boy he once was.

People only saw the mafia prince now. Sharp suits, dangerous smirk, eyes that could freeze fire itself. But underneath, he was still that boy who had once begged for kindness and got fists instead. He carried that misery in silence, locking it away because showing weakness meant death in this world.

That night, after the deal went wrong, after seeing Jungkook again with all that burning hatred in his eyes, Taehyung lay in bed staring at the ceiling. The gun was on his nightstand, as always. Safety within reach. But his chest ached with something else—something he hated to admit.

Seeing Jungkook had cracked something open. It dragged him back, not to the beatings, not to the blood, but to the one time someone had smiled at him like he mattered. Back when Jungkook had been different. Back when they’d both been different.

Taehyung closed his eyes, jaw tightening. He couldn’t afford to feel. Feelings were dangerous. Feelings made him weak. And weak was the last thing V could ever be.

So he buried it again. Like he always did.

Outside, the rain kept falling, just like it always had.

***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***