Three years after I landed on the wanted list, all 88 pieces of my dismembered corpse were thrown in front of the police station.

After the forensics team put my body together, they identified my body as Julian Colt, the fiancé of the Organized Crime Department, Captain Kyra Schneider.

Everyone, from elders in their eighties to young children, wanted me to see justice because not only had I betrayed Kyra and her team, but I had also publicly joined the criminal organization and become the lover of its leader.

I was fired from the police force and hated by my loved ones.

Kyra hated me the most, and she used the most cruel method of retrieving my memories to be broadcast to the world.

On judgment day, the city square was filled with spectators, but when my memories were retrieved, along with the huge word 'innocent' splashed on it, everyone went crazy.

"Traitor! A man like him should have been executed."

"The evidence clearly points to his guilt. How is he innocent? Everyone knows how he helped the criminal organization to kill numerous police officers!"

"Don't be tricked by him! He must have altered those memories!"

There was an uproar with curses filling the air. A woman in a police uniform looked pale as she roared into her walkie-talkie, "Find out right now who altered the memory source!"

The woman speaking was my financée, Kyra Schneider.

"Don't be mad, Kyra. My big brother… He… You know how good he is at pretending and manipulating others." Sean Jacobs, my adopted younger brother, walked up right away to hold Kyra by the arms, looking worried and in pain. "He betrayed you and caused the death of so many of our colleagues. A man like that isn't worth you getting mad over."

Kyra's body stiffened slightly at his words, and the look in her eyes turned even colder. She held Sean's hand and said hoarsely with determination. "I won't let him get to me, Sean. I won't be shaken by him anymore. You're the person I trust and the man I love. The only man worth standing by my side is you."

My soul quivered at her words while floating midair. That was when memories came flooding into my mind, almost causing the remaining fragment of my soul to be torn apart.

Kyra and I were a legendary pair back in the police academy. We swore to serve our country under the flag and promised to have each other's backs for better or for worse. She used to celebrate with me whenever I cracked a major case, knit a scarf for me, even though she was clumsy at it and hurt her fingers in the process, and came to the hospital to see me in the storm with warm soup, smiling brightly at me while drenched, saying chidingly, "Julian Colt, hurt yourself again and I'll handcuff you to my side for the rest of your life."

It never occurred to me that she would end up falling in love with Sean after my death.

My dead heart tightened with intense pain inside of me, and my soul was almost destroyed.

Sean was adopted from the orphanage by my parents, and he was the brother that I had single-handedly brought up. I gave him the best of everything in life, teaching him to fight and introducing him to the job. I never would have thought that he would…

My memories were interrupted by a new bout of vulgar cursing in the square.

"Julian Colt is a son-of-a-b*tch! How can he be so different from Sean Jacobs when they grew up in the same family?!"

"Lieutenant Jacobs is a kind man who donates to charity annually. What about Julian Colt?"

"He's just the lover of Eva Waller, the brains behind the organization, and he helped that witch hurt others!"

A technician drenched in sweat came running over amidst the cussing crowd, and he stood in salute. "Reporting to Captain Schneider! We have conducted a thorough investigation of the memory source and there are no signs of it being altered!"

The technician paused before continuing, "According to brainwave theory, the retrieved memories are from the host's deepest and unforgettable recollections…"

Before he could finish, the giant screen started to vibrate violently with a sharp screech of the electrical current, and an indescribable pain pierced my soul!

It felt like numerous steel needles were stabbing deep inside me and stirring madly within. I curled up into a ball from the pain but could not make a sound.

When the pain finally ended, the screeching from the electrical current stopped, and the vibrating screen finally became still. The noisy square suddenly turned silent and ,through my blurry vision, I could see a tense Kyra suddenly take an agitated step forward.

For the first time, her eyes, which were filled with hate, looked emotional with disbelief. Her eyes were red as the bloody red word of 'Innocent' vanished gradually and was replaced by a dim image with lightning flashing.

The image displayed a raging storm with two skinny children of about seven or eight, hugging each other tightly in a muddy corner of an alley.

Those children were Kyra and me. I wanted to take her to the park to play, but we ended up getting caught in a typhoon that the area had not experienced in more than a decade.

I pulled her along into hiding at the harbor and tried to protect her with my frail, little body. "Don't be afraid. It's just lightning. I'm here with you."

My hands were frozen stiff from the cold, but I still tried to cover her ears clumsily. Right after I tried comforting her with my words, a loud crack was heard in the sky. I looked up right away to see a gigantic piece of zinc that probably used to be part of a shed, being ripped up into the sky and falling right down above our heads.

I did not have much time to think, and I instinctively shielded Kyra under me with my body. I was prepared to take the lethal blow on my unprotected back.

All I felt was pain. It was so intense that I could feel my heart being torn apart. I could almost hear my bones cracking, and warm blood drenched the clothes on my back.

When I woke up next, I was covered with bandages while Kyra sat by the side of my bed with swollen, red eyes. When she saw my eyes open, she immediately came up to me. "You scared me, Julian! The doctors told me you almost died. Didn't you promise to marry me when we grew up? I don't care what you're thinking, but you're the only person I want to marry!"

It sounded like yesterday when Kyra made the promise. Back in reality, a warm tear fell uncontrollably from Kyra's eye. She did not seem to realize the falling tear as she stared at the screen while her body trembled slightly. An older woman in the crowd could not help lamenting in a small voice, "Is that his most precious memory? He must really care for Captain Schneider."

Sean immediately blew his top when he heard her words. He retorted shrilly, "Care for her? If he really cared about Kyra, he wouldn't have betrayed us publicly by joining Eva Waller's criminal organization when Kyra was suspended and placed under investigation for revealing classified information. Do you know how much pain Kyra was in then?"

He turned to look deeply and painfully at Kyra. "Look at him, Kyra! Look at how he betrayed you! You did everything for him and he repaid you with betrayal!"

Sean's words seemed to knock some sense into Kyra as the last of her feelings for me turned into extreme rage and humiliation. She wiped away her tears and stared at the screen with clenched teeth. "You're right. He's nothing but a liar. A disgusting liar who doesn't deserve my tears!"

The next second, the image on the big screen suddenly changed. The memory of our happy childhood vanished, and was replaced by an image of a luxurious yet decadent private room. I was kneeling by Eva's feet while deafening music played.

Eva was wearing bright, red heels when she raised a foot to lift my chin while smiling with amusement. The image was a shock to everyone watching, and it said more than any words put together.

"Ugh! How disgusting!"

"That gigolo is an embarrassment to the police force! He should just die!"

The crowd gathered at the square exploded with curses even worse than before.

Kyra was shocked to see me bend over to lick the wine from the floor. She turned pale and almost fell as she stumbled.

"You shouldn't be watching this, Kyra. This disgusting image will only dirty your eyes." Sean tried to cover her eyes right away.

"Let go! I want to continue watching!"

Kyra's eyes were red, and her fingers dug deep into her palms, causing them to bleed. She stared at the screen and watched as I lost my dignity in front of Eva, and said miserably, "I'd like to see how far this man, who claimed that he loved me, will stoop."

I continued floating in the air as I watched the deep hatred in her eyes, and my soul curled up in pain.

The timeline on the screen flashed forward quickly, and I soon became Eva's favorite lover. That was also when the police force held a press conference to announce my dismissal from the team, and my parents made a public announcement via the papers to cut ties with me at the same time.

During the darkest hour of my betrayal and my loved ones abandoning me, the image changed scenes to a late night during a storm. Kyra was drenched in the rain as she stopped me in front of my high-end condo.

She broke down when she saw me in a robe with love marks all over my neck that were left behind by Eva on purpose. She grabbed me by the collar as tears streamed down her face, along with the rainwater she was drenched in.

"Tell me this isn't true, Julian! Tell me that you're doing this for a reason!"

Kyra was filled with pain as she begged me for a reason. Her knees went weak, and she fell hard on them right in front of me. My soul felt like it was being torn into pieces as I continued floating midair while watching her sob and beg without dignity on the screen.

She had always been a proud woman who refused to give in to anything, but she was hugging my leg as she begged with great humility, "Come back with me and give yourself up, Julian, please! If you're willing to change your ways and come back to me, I'm willing to start all over again with you, even if I have to give up this uniform…"

On the big screen, I looked down slowly at her as I pulled her trembling fingers away from my leg one by one in an utterly cruel, yet calm manner.

"You're being naive, Kyra. Power and money mean the most to me right now." I looked down at her superiorly with taunt and disdain, a look she had never seen me give her before. "Love? That's just a lie weaklings use to numb themselves, and I've gotten tired of it."

Kyra's head jerked up at me immediately as she stared at me in disbelief. I pulled the corner of my robe away from her hand and turned to leave, but she quickly stood up and said to me sorrowfully, "Julian Colt! If you leave, I'll make sure to finish you myself the next time we meet!"

I watched myself stop in my tracks on the screen while midair. My heart tightened. I was in so much pain that I could hardly make a sound. The next second, my cold voice spoke from the huge screen, "If that's the way it is, I'll be waiting for you."

After that, I turned and disappeared into the rain.

There was a major outburst on the square.

"Who does he think he is! How can he leave like that when she's kneeling in front of him?!"

"How can he say something so cruel?! He's not worthy to be a man! He's just a cold-blooded animal that should be shot!"

"Captain Schneider is a good woman. How did she end up falling in love with a traitor like that?!"

Kyra stared at the screen with reddened eyes. There was no sadness in them, and all that was left in her eyes was humiliation and fiery hate that my betrayal had fueled.

The screen continued to flash quickly.

It was now showing me as a core member of Eva's organization, where I had successfully helped them avoid major risks and streamline their operations using my experience from the police force. Every scene shown on the screen was shocking.

I was sitting in the meeting room, drawing a route with a red pen while marking where the police would be conducting a raid. The scene quickly changed to an arrest scene where an elite police team barged into an empty warehouse, triggering bombs that had been previously planted inside.

Huge bursts of flames filled the air as several colleagues fell to the ground with burning flesh.

Back in the square, several policemen watched with widened eyes as the air filled with their angry roars.

"Traitor! He killed our brothers!"

"Kill him! Kill him!"

However, the look on Kyra's face slowly changed amidst the furious roars. She remembered how that operation ended up a failure with wounded members on the team, but…

The number of wounded members was less than they anticipated, and most of them only suffered slight physical wounds. No one had experienced a life-threatening sacrifice. Kyra had always attributed this to the team's quick reaction, but now that she thought about it, could it be that…

"Kyra, are you all right?"

Sean's voice made her snap out of it. Kyra took a deep breath and forced herself to suppress the ridiculous guess that crossed her mind.

The image on the screen continued to change.

Eva's organization was plotting to cause an explosion at the chemical industrial plant in the suburbs as a distraction for them to rob the place of their fuel. I helped them plan it out flawlessly until one late night when no one was noticing.

I quietly switched out the explosives in the bomb and sent out an anonymous warning to the surrounding residents to conduct an emergency evacuation.

On the night when the plant was supposed to explode, the bomb failed to go off, and the suburbs remained in one piece while the organization suffered a major loss. Eva was furious. She tied my hands behind my back and threw me into the dark water dungeon.

The ice-cold water reached my waist, and Eva kept pushing my head violently underwater and pulling it out with a jerk before pressing it down into the water again.

"I can't believe you turned out to be a traitor, Julian Colt! Talk! Who ordered you to do that?!"

Her reddened eyes stared right into mine as her fingers were almost digging into my flesh.

The water dungeon's air was filled with a rotting smell, and the ice-cold water hurt my bones horribly. Every time my head was pushed underwater, my lungs felt like exploding from the pain of suffocation, but I clenched my teeth as I remained silent while she tortured me incessantly. Blood started to spread out on the surface of the water, making the entire sight look particularly sinister.

Everyone stopped cussing in the square as they turned silent while watching me being tortured inhumanely in the water dungeon with troubled looks on their faces. Weak voices started to spread across the crowd.

"He… He seemed to have sabotaged that mission on purpose."

"It looks like he switched out the explosives to save everyone staying around the chemical industrial plant…"

Just as everyone's opinion about me was about to change, a sharp voice yelled out from the crowd, "So what if he suddenly found his conscience and did one good thing?"

"Don't forget about the failed mission where he caused serious wounds to the police team! He's a criminal!"

The shout pulled everyone back to reality, and the empathetic voices were buried under fury once more as angry curses filled the air, except this time, the angry voices seemed unsure.

Sean watched this happen, and a gleeful smile appeared subtly on his face. However, he froze before his smile became wider because his face appeared on the big screen.