The Million-Dollar Heart

With a thunderous bang, Diana's gun fired, but the bullet whizzed past Vivienne's ear, barely grazing a hair.

Unfazed, Vivienne did not even flinch.

Diana, panic-stricken, stared at the figure before her, feeling her wrist trapped as if in an iron vise, pain radiating through her bones like a fracture in progress. "You... you're Sasha!"

Karen's gaze was heavy, a mix of the strange and the familiar.

She had never imagined that the story behind her kidnapping was so convoluted!

Clenching her fist, Karen threw a punch that landed squarely in Diana's gut with the force of a sledgehammer.

"Touch my daughter, and you're dead meat!"

Diana's punch could take down a full-grown mastiff, but Karen's blow could kill a full-grown bull.

The difference in strength was enormous.

Diana felt as if her insides had been rearranged, her nerves and flesh overwhelmed by pain. It was as if she was about to be ripped apart. The agony was excruciating!

Karen then slapped Diana's face repeatedly, and in no time, Diana's once delicate features swelled up like a balloon.

Diana tried to steady herself, to take another look at her adversary, but her swollen cheeks pressed so tightly against her eyes that they would not open!

Lifting Diana off her feet, Karen's fingers flew, sending needle after needle into Diana's scalp.

"Ah!"

Diana fell to her knees, screaming in torment.

The pain was unbearable!

the ground, Diana banged her head against rocks as if the blunt trauma could somehow dull the

was bloodied and bruised, Diana

anger boiling inside Karen

herself. Karen had already neutralized the poison in her system the

still bound, and settled her against a tree before coming

all, F-Poison was their

still, watching the display as if enjoying

I wonder if all daughters look like their mothers." Wearing Gillian's face, she sipped a glass of red wine with

the silver needles in her hand

on high alert, determined not to let F-Poison

you F-Poison?" Karen asked softly, as if in casual conversation, "You seem... younger than I

a soft stroke as if indulging

she quipped. "This face is all I have left to charm the days

ripped off her mask and flung it towards Karen and Vivienne, the skin transforming mid-air into a whirling blade aimed at

"Frost!"

narrowly missing the skin-blade, and

airborne stones to gain momentum, Karen accelerated, grabbing a rock and turning it into a projectile. With a burst of energy, she hurled it towards F-Poison with lethal precision. The skin-blade buried itself in the tree where Vivienne had been tied, while

seeped from F-Poison's wound, and Karen's breaths grew

about to unleash her poison, Karen raised

something invisible in the air-particles that could trigger a violent explosion upon contact with poison. It was the

stood side by

clutching her wounded leg, threw down

smoke, Karen and Vivienne quickly traced F-Poison's escape

the smoke cleared, they saw F-Poison holding Zelda

overpower me together, but with this hostage, what can you really do?" F-Poison taunted, gripping Zelda's neck tightly, ready to snap it at any moment. Then, from above, the sound of a helicopter's rotors sliced through

up or down?