Chapter 112: Ghosts of Prague

The jet touched down under cover of midnight. No lights. No signals. No official records.

 

The air in Prague was sharp and ancient, biting through their coats with the ghost of frost that never quite melted. It smelled like cobblestone, old metal, and forgotten sins.

 

Jungkook stepped out first.

 

He wore black head to toe—combat boots, fitted pants, a thick coat that had been tailored around the twin shoulder holsters V insisted he wear. His hoodie was gone now, replaced with armor beneath his shirt. No one could tell. He still moved like water.

 

But his eyes were different.

 

V came second, a step behind but always beside. His coat flared in the wind like a shadow’s wing. He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. Every movement was controlled, deliberate. Calculated.

 

Taehyung followed them both, gloves snug over his long fingers, scarf wrapped loosely around his neck. He carried the duffle bag that rattled faintly with the weight of their past.

 

No entourage. No guards.

 

This wasn’t a business trip.

 

It was a war path.

 

Their safe house was an abandoned mansion on the edge of the old quarter, tucked behind towering trees and iron gates eaten by rust. The city had forgotten it long ago.

 

But Jungkook remembered every corner.

 

He hadn’t been back since he was seventeen.

 

Taehyung walked ahead to check the security feeds while V disappeared to set up their gear.

 

Jungkook stood in the center of the dust-covered hall, eyes fluttering closed.

 

He remembered the room where they once held him for three days. Remembered the crack in the marble column where he’d slammed his hand just to feel something. Remembered the dull ache in his chest when he realized his parents would never come.

 

His throat tightened.

 

He reached into his coat pocket, fingers brushing against the smooth edge of his old blade.

 

And then… a hand slid gently over his from behind.

 

V’s.

 

No words. Just touch. A silent tether.

 

A moment later, another hand—Taehyung’s—pressed against his back, anchoring him there between them.

 

“We’re with you,” V said softly.

 

“Always,” Taehyung echoed.

 

And Jungkook, caught between warmth and steel, whispered, “Then let’s burn it down.”

 

The first lead came from an old contact of V’s—a cleaner who now ran a bakery with too many cameras for a man who claimed to have left the life behind. He didn’t greet them when they arrived, just slipped them a note inside a warm croissant.

 

Valter is rebuilding. Underground. The Crown Bar.

 

Jungkook smiled.

 

“Of course it’s called that.”

 

The Crown Bar sat beneath a forgotten opera house, draped in crimson velvet and shadowed chandeliers. It was a haunt for the old elite—those who thrived in post-war power vacuums, who knew how to buy silence and sell fear.

 

V and Taehyung entered first.

 

Jungkook came in last, hood low, movements sharp.

 

He walked like a ghost through the noise.

 

The music shifted the second he passed through the entrance. Eyes turned. Men straightened. A woman at the bar dropped her glass.

 

Because no matter how many years had passed, the face of the blood prince hadn’t been erased from memory.

 

He stopped in front of the private suite door.

 

Two guards moved to intercept.

 

They didn’t get the chance.

 

V took one down with a silent strike to the neck. Taehyung flipped the other over his shoulder with a bone-snapping twist. Neither screamed.

 

Jungkook pushed open the door.

 

Inside: a long red table, a dozen men in suits, and at the head—Valter’s right-hand man, Petrov.

 

The room fell silent.

 

Petrov stood slowly, aged but still proud. “You shouldn’t be here.”

 

Jungkook tilted his head.

 

“Then it’s a good thing I never listen.”

 

A beat.

 

And then everything exploded.

 

V launched forward first, pinning two men against the wall with surgical efficiency. Taehyung pulled a blade from his belt and slid it through a throat like silk. Jungkook moved like a storm—low, precise, and utterly lethal. No hesitation.

 

Within ninety seconds, the table was drenched in red.

 

Petrov backed away, breath ragged, arms raised. “You think this is over?”

 

Jungkook stepped forward.

 

“No,” he whispered. “This is just the beginning.”

 

Then he drove his blade into the man’s chest with one clean, final motion.

 

Petrov’s gasp echoed through the hall.

 

But Jungkook didn’t flinch.

 

He pulled the blade free, wiped it clean with a white cloth, and turned toward the exit.

 

Outside, the wind howled like wolves.

 

The twins walked on either side of him again, blood on their sleeves, calm in their bones.

 

“Was that necessary?” Taehyung asked.

 

Jungkook smiled faintly.

 

“Yes.”

 

V adjusted his gloves. “You enjoyed it.”

 

Jungkook didn’t deny it.

 

Because something inside him had shifted. Not broken—but unlocked.

 

Not the soft bunny. Not the giggling artist.

 

But the original Jungkook.

 

The one who had built empires from whispers.

 

The one who had buried kings.

 

That night, as they lay together in the safehouse bed—Jungkook between them, arms tangled, bare chests rising and falling in soft, shared silence—he whispered into the dark:

 

“He’s close. I can feel it.”

 

Taehyung pressed a kiss to his temple. “Then we’ll find him.”

 

V's voice came like thunder in a whisper. “And we’ll end him.”

 

Jungkook smiled against Taehyung’s throat.

 

“Yes.”

 

Because the boy had died.

 

And the king was awake.

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