The knife fits her hand like a second skin—cold, sharp, and unrelenting. Verena doesn’t hesitate. She steps forward, her gaze locking onto the man’s trembling form. He tries to beg, but the words are lost on her. He’s already dead in her mind.
The first strike is clean—right to the chest. His breath catches, eyes wide in shock. But it doesn’t stop her.
She pulls the knife out, quick, like it’s nothing, and slams it back into his side with brutal precision. Blood bursts from the wound, spraying across her face like a fine mist. His scream is cut off by another blow, and then another, and another.
Each stab is faster, more frenzied than the last. The blood splatters across her face, over her clothes, dripping down the handle of her blade.
Her breath is steady, controlled, even as her knife rips through flesh again and again, until the man’s body is nothing but a broken heap of mangled flesh beneath her.
Only when she’s sure there’s no life left in him does she stop. She takes a breath, slowly, and wipes the blood from her face with the back of her gloved hand. The knife still trembles in her grip, as if it wants more.
She steps back, eyes cold and empty.