Hearing the name 'Ardat Lily' made Eric uncomfortable for some reason. He couldn't understand why he was getting involved with every villain in one way or another. Considering it as all a coincidence didn't seem right after it happened a third time.
However, having a dark past like other villains, Ardat was somewhat different from them. Instead of enduring the suffering and accepting such a cruel reality like others, she was someone who overcame it by finding her own ways, but in the end, she was also forced to surrender.
At the age of twelve, she left behind a fortune to choose a peaceful life with her divorced mother rather than staying with her scum father for money. Faced many struggles but never let go of her hope and righteous behavior. However, she never expected that one day her righteous attitude would bring disaster to that peaceful life.
All she did was, try to save a child who had escaped from an illegal drug experiment gang. Even though she was just a normal person, she risked herself to report it to the police, but they betrayed her and sold her to the gang.
After that what waited for her was a living hell. She was forced to be an experimental subject for different types of drugs. The side effects from all those experiments turned her into more of a living corpse more than a human. Her hairs fell out, a foul smell emanated from her body, and she slowly began to rot. She was no more look like a human anymore.
In the darkness, witnessing the death of others every day slowly made her wish to die rather than continue living. But no god heard her prayers. She suffered for years, and finally, someone came to her rescue. Not an angel, but a true devil: Abaddon Mir. Instead of taking her life, he spared her.
The happiness of gaining freedom didn't last long when she faced reality. Her mother had gone missing while searching for her daughter. People looked at her with disgust and were sometimes even rude to the point of not seeing her as a human being. The people she had helped before turned a blind eye to her pathetic situation.
With no shelter or food, she would have died like a stray dog on the street if she hadn't encountered her savior once again. From that point on, her story changed. She turned herself into a weapon for him. Her body, which had undergone hundreds of tests of illegal drugs, became a poisonous seed powerful enough to destroy a country just by spreading a virus that made from her blood.
It's at this point that Nithane and Ardat's stories collide with each other. But now, despite everything, it seems they have become close to each other. Combining the present and the future, Eric figures out the hidden plot behind Nithane's self-sacrifice for Ardat – a one-sided love story with a sad ending.
"Is she that famous?" Eric asked curiously upon hearing Aiden's exaggerated talk.
"She is the most popular one in our school. The national wrestling champion, Ardat Lily. But why is she with him? She never showed interest in anyone before, so why is she interested in this fatso? Why?"
"Are you a stalker?"
"Can't you ask me if I'm her fan or something? Why are you turning it into something weird? I'm not a stalker...
But I still wonder how he became so close to her. She wasn't that friendly to anyone. Did he offer her a private tuition or something?" Aiden tried to figure out the situation through his judgmental skills, considering their personalities.
"What are you two doing here?" A middle-aged muscular man approached, seeing the two high schoolers peeking inside the gym.
"Nothing..." Aiden replied tensely upon observing the man's physique.
"One of our friends recently became a member of this gym and recommended it to us. We were just checking out the atmosphere inside. If it doesn't meet our expectations, we can leave quietly without disturbing anyone." Eric somehow managed the situation by stepping in.
"Oh, so both of you are Nithane's friends," the man observed their uniforms and spoke. They both confirmed, but they didn't expect the person they were talking to would turn out to be the gym owner, who then took them inside.
"What are you two doing here?" Caught red-handed by Nithane, they both found themselves in a tight spot.
"Are they your friends?" Ardat asked Nithane in a friendly tone to confirm.
"Yeah, they are. This is Aiden, and he's Eric." Nithane introduced them.
"Hi, Ardat." Ardat extended her hand for a handshake. Eric simply shook hands with her, while Aiden did so after cleaning his hands by rubbing them on his clothes.
Seeing the mischievous smile on Eric's face, which indicated that he understood everything, Nithane was put in an awkward situation, and he quickly take them out.
"How do you know her exactly? What's your relationship with her?..." Aiden bombarded Nithane with non-stop questions, while Eric waited silently for him to start.
"It's not what you are thinking. She's just helping me lose weight, nothing else." Nithane tried to give a genuine response.
'It doesn't seem like a lie. He was overweight, and she's a wrestler plus a half gym trainer. The possibilities of it being true are high.' [Aiden]
"Really?" Eric's voice was filled with suspicions, accompanied by a mischievous smile again. "But how did it even happen? Don't tell me it just happened somehow... like you ended up in a gym where she's working..."
"It all happened because of a bet."
"A bet? What bet?" Both Aiden and Eric asked simultaneously upon hearing Nithane's reply.
"In an unexpected situation, she bet with her friends that she could make me lose weight in just three months. It became a matter of pride for me that I couldn't back down from."