In order to get rich, my best friend made a pact with the devil. The pact was fulfilled successfully, but she suddenly regretted it and didn't want to give up her soul.

To repay her debt, she bound me and my daughter to the devil's lair, intending for us to pay with our bodies.

Looking at the pile of demons in the castle, my heart trembled slightly, not out of fear, but excitement.

Damn it, this was Lucien's lair.

A few years ago, we had a huge fight and I returned to the human world, only to later discover I was pregnant with his child. I refused to reach out, even after the child was born.

Now, I was back here, bound and dragged along with my daughter.

"What are you looking at! If you try to run, I'll kill your daughter and feed her to the dogs!"

My heart suddenly tightened and I dared not look around anymore.

My daughter was beside me, tightly bound, her eyes full of fear. She couldn't help it and cried out loudly.

I was about to comfort her when the man in front of me impatiently shoved a cloth into her mouth and slapped her across the face, instantly leaving a swollen five-finger mark on it.

The child couldn't withstand the force, so she immediately fainted.

“Don't hit my daughter!”

As soon as the words left my mouth, someone kicked me in the chest, causing immense pain that made my vision go blurry and blood spurt from my mouth.

“You filthy woman still dares to shout? You really think this is your home? Shut your mouth!”

I opened my eyes, the thin layer of blood covering my sight, my head buzzing.

"My daughter and I haven’t wronged you. If there’s a grievance, it has its origin and a debt has its rightful owner. Please, I beg you, let us go."

My daughter was lying beside me, her small face swollen in a large area, looking pitiful.

I crawled toward her, but was quickly stepped on by someone.

The man snorted coldly. “If you want to blame someone, blame your best friend. She traded your lives for ours. She was the one who made a pact with us, but then suddenly reneged. Now, we can only take your souls as our food."

The word "food" made my whole body shudder and my heart was filled with regret.

My best friend and I grew up together and we had a very close relationship.

She had been desperately raising money lately, so to show my gratitude, I transferred a hundred thousand dollars to her.

In return, she invited my daughter and me out for a meal. But halfway through, we both suddenly passed out. When I regained consciousness, I found myself locked in a car, being taken to an old mansion.

It turned out that she had made some dark, secret deal and was using my daughter’s and my lives as payment.

How dare she! How could she do this to us?

I gritted my teeth, tasting blood in my mouth, as hatred surged within me.

A man approached me, holding a bowl and chanting something under his breath.

When I saw him cut my arm, a sense of dread flooded my mind. Summoning every ounce of strength, I knocked the bowl from his hand. “Let me go!”

With a loud crash, the bowl shattered.

The man’s eyes widened with rage and he forcefully pressed my face into the shards of glass. "Dammit, you ungrateful bitch! How dare you resist! I’ll take your life!"

I struggled, crying out in pain as sharp agony shot through my face. My nails dug into the ground, leaving deep blood marks.

Just as I felt like I was going to die from the pain, someone grabbed me and forced me to stand. "Forget it, she won’t last much longer anyway. A soul that dies from struggling isn’t very tasty."

Another man spoke in a calm voice, trying to comfort me.

I squinted, gasping for breath.

Then, something even more shocking happened.

The man who had been beating me suddenly grew black horns and a tail.

The words "soul", “deal" and the vague image of the mansion I had seen along the way suddenly clicked and my memory came rushing back.

This was the lair of the demon, Lucien.

A few years ago, he and I had a huge argument over something. I took advantage of the chaos to escape from the mansion, only to find out I was pregnant with my daughter.

I was not one to give up, so I never contacted him, even after my daughter was born. I never expected that, after all this time, I would end up being dragged back here.

Realizing this, my panic slowly started to subside.

"I know you’re demons! Let me go!"

The two men exchanged a glance and suddenly burst out laughing.

"So what if you know? You’ll be dead soon anyway."

Their eyes were filled with mockery as they looked at me. One of them pulled a sharp knife from his pocket and stabbed it hard into my palm.

I let out a scream, coughing up a mouthful of blood.

The man dipped his fingers into my blood and brought it to his mouth, inhaling deeply as if savoring it.

Trembling, I managed to say, "Lucien is my boyfriend! If you dare lay another hand on me, he’ll twist your heads off and use them as footballs!"

The mention of Lucien seemed to shock them. But before I could process their reaction, I was slapped hard across the face.

"How dare you mention our boss? Our lady boss has been dead for a long time!"

Dead?

I froze, suddenly realizing that my disappearance must have made Lucien think I was dead.

"It’s me! I even gave him a daughter!" I tried to explain anxiously, but I didn’t know where to start.

One of the men sneered, grabbed my hair and ran his disgusting tongue over the wound on my face, causing sharp pain to shoot through it.

My hands trembled and as my eyes landed on my unconscious daughter nearby, an idea struck me. I shouted, "If you don’t believe me, look at her! My daughter is a demon!"

The two men exchanged a thoughtful glance before rushing over to sniff my daughter’s arm.

Their expressions immediately changed.

Hope sparked in my heart, thinking I was saved. But the next moment, he kicked me hard, sending me sprawling to the ground.

"Damn it, just a filthy half-breed born of a human and a demon! There’s no way our boss would ever be with a human! You wretched woman, how dare you lie to us! I’ll tear your soul into eighty-one pieces!"

I had heard of soul shredders before, back when Lucien jokingly used it to threaten me.

A human soul was made up of three Ethereal Soul and nine Corporeal Soul. The twelve fragments that demons could consume were called the "soul breaths."

Normally, demons only needed to cook their food before eating it, but some demons were violent by nature and cruelly broke souls apart piece by piece.

Just the thought of it was utterly disgusting. It was precisely because I couldn’t tolerate this that I had a huge fight with Lucien.

He had coaxed me back then, promising that he would never let demons feed on humans again. But now, it seemed he was just lying to me.

I struggled violently, terrified to my core. Just as the man was about to swing the knife down on me, the door was pushed open from the outside.

"The boss is awake, don't make too much noise."

He saw the mess in the room and frowned. "You can't even handle a mere human, huh?”

I let out a soft sob, recognizing him as Lucien's assistant. Maybe he could recognize me.

With that thought, I immediately raised my head and tried to grab his pant leg. Before I could reach him, two men from behind grabbed me.

In a panic, I quickly said, "Dorian! I'm Lucien's girlfriend!"

Dorian froze for a moment, then his expression darkened. He stepped forward and asked, "Where did you get this woman from?"

The two men saw this and immediately grabbed my neck, nervously saying, "She's the spy we just captured. Everything she's saying is made up to save her own life!"

"Besides, Boss’s girlfriend died a few years ago, right? I think this shameless woman is trying to impersonate her. I was about to teach her a lesson!"

I widened my eyes, my mouth covered and unable to make any sound, only able to let out soft whimpering noises.

I instinctively reached my arm towards Dorian's direction. ‘Help me.’

"Let her go."

Dorian stepped forward, gripping my chin as he examined me closely.

A spark of hope flickered in my heart.

The next second, I was thrown to the ground. Then came Dorian's cold voice. "She's not Lucien's girlfriend, you guys deal with her yourself."

As soon as the voice fell, the two men spat at me fiercely. "Damn it, I knew you were lying!"

Before I could react, my right face stung with pain as my head jerked to one side and a buzzing sound filled my ears.

One of the men kicked me in the waist, sending my knees hitting the ground heavily and the pain attacked me instantly.

In the end, blood soaked my clothes.

The man smiled grimly and pretended to take off my clothes. "If you don't want to die obediently, then let us play with you before you die."

I raised my hand to block and the next moment, I screamed. My ten fingers were forcibly broken.

The intense pain made my body tremble and I lost all strength to stop them. Just as I was sinking into despair, I heard a lazy voice.

"What’s going on, why so noisy?"

The voice was one I knew all too well. It was Lucien.

With just those words, the two men in the room immediately lowered their heads and fell silent.

Hope surged in my heart at that moment.

Lucien was here.

If he was here, he would surely be able to save me. With that thought, I summoned all my remaining strength to break free from the grip of the two men and rushed toward the door, shouting at the top of my lungs. "Lucien!"

The two men reacted quickly, blocked my mouth with their hands and dragged me back into the room.

With a bang, the door closed again.

I tried to struggle, but my tongue felt a sharp pain and blood filled my mouth.

They actually cut off my tongue with a knife.

The pain almost knocked me unconscious and I let out soft whimpering sounds.

"I hear a woman's voice?" Lucien's voice was getting closer and eventually, it seemed to stop right outside the door.

The two men, their faces cold, ignored the fact that Lucien was still nearby and twisted my limbs painfully.

With a loud crash, I felt every bone in my body shift out of place.

I tried to scream, but all that came out was a faint wheeze. They forced my head down to the ground, pressing it into the shards from earlier.

The smell of blood spread and I was on the brink of losing consciousness. In the chaos, I decided to slam my head hard against the ground, making a loud noise.

With a loud thud, the door was kicked open.

Lucien walked in with a stern expression, his face full of displeasure. "Didn't I tell you not to..."

Before he could finish, the two men immediately knelt on the floor, their heads bowed as they spoke in a submissive tone. "Boss, this woman learned our secret, so we had no choice but to silence her."

"That's right. If we let her go, who knows what kind of trouble she might cause."

Lucien glanced at them, his brows furrowing. It seemed like he sensed a familiar smell.

He pointed at me and asked, "Where did you get her from?"

A wheezing sound escaped from my throat. No, he couldn’t hear me.

With that thought, I crawled toward him. Before I could speak, Lucien recoiled in disgust and took a step back.