Ranker's Return - Supplementary Story 23

She is an elder miss from a modern secret society family. She is very cold and heartless, but her appearance is very enchanting. She thinks of men as playthings. She was schemed against and her body was thrown into the sea.

"There was a time in my life where I struggled to breathe. A time where I felt suffocated everyday, but then I met you."

-Turning the gears of fate.

A drop of ink can penetrate the walls, even the walls you took too long to build.

After losing her first love due to a traffic accident, Ibuki Sumire transfers to Tokyo. She wanted to escape, to run away from everything that happened. To start over in a place that didn't have him. But a series of clues lead her to investigating the case behind the accident.

In that place she learns about the masks people wear. The masks people wear to disgui se their feelings. Sometimes you have to look past what you see on the surface.

There she meets him, the person who helps her move forward. But Sumire quickly learns how alike they are. His cold personality is different than the kindness she is used to. However, he is the only one who understands her feelings.

It keeps going around in circles, like a drop of paint. Round and round - an endless stream of pain and lies. But, that stream ended the moment she laid her eyes on his paintings.

Such rich and vibrant colors, it felt like his emotions exploded. Yet, in the corner of his studio, she found it. The real him, a sakura painting of two people walking hand in hand.

A gentle and sweet feeling, something she has never felt before.

[Commissioned Cover by: Vatarison]

The first time they met, the little boy had pulled her hair, hoping to get her attention.

When they met at the kindergarten again, the boy was glad that the girl had no longer remembered the previous incident. However, getting close to her was not an easy task as the girl was always surrounded by others who admired her.

Once the boy finally got the girl’s attention, his family decided to move to another country.

Years later, the two of them crossed paths again. This time, the boy pulled the girl’s hand, heading straight to the Civil Affairs Bureau.

Holding a newly registered red book and meeting her gaze, the corner of his lips finally turned up as he finally got her absolute attention.

An Yin, a delicate beauty caught in a risky charade, pretends to date playboy Bo Cheng to escape her troubles—until she meets his brother, ​Bo Shaojin: the ruthless, untouchable CEO whose icy dominance rules both boardrooms and high society.Their first encounter crackles with sizzling tension. Shaojin’s piercing gaze lingers on An Yin, his brother’s “girlfriend,” as she trembles under his scrutiny. But when their paths collide again—her, half-dressed and panic-stricken in his bathroom; him, a storm of restraint and hunger—the line between duty and desire shatters.As An Yin’s fake relationship unravels, Shaojin’s ironclad control dissolves. Drunk on obsession, he corners her in a midnight confession, his hardened facade crumbling as he vows, “I won’t touch you…” But his hands whisper promises his words deny.