A kiss, huh?

Author: Ryan R Menezes

Why do people kiss? Love? Reassurance for the heart? A sense of security? Or perhaps... betrayal. Smashing one's keyboard all night, cursing at noobs online, and questioning the meaning of life at 3 AM—that is the "normal" path for a university student. But Noir wasn't normal. He had it all: the grades, the job, the respect, and a girlfriend who looked at him with stars in her eyes. He didn't want for anything. Yet, he received. Like the thorns of a wilted rose, a heart-throbbing kiss shattered it all. Such a cruel kiss it was! Punished for his naivety and stripped of dignity, he fell into a crimson abyss—a prison that demanded insanity for survival. He fell and fell until he was deeper than the crimson itself. Until all that remained was Noir... or rather, a stranger. WHAT TO EXPECT: - Character-Driven Story. - Slow-paced (at least in the first act) - Dark, Gritty Atmosphere. - Gore, dark themes. - Romance does exist, but it is not very prevalent (other than the early part) yet integral to the story. - Chapter length: Variable (100 to 10k words) (2.6k words on average) [NOTE] On the usage of AI: - The cover is AI-generated. - Writing style, story, plot, worldbuilding, mood, environment, and such are entirely my own. - AI is limited to research, feedback, punctuation errors, and grammar mistakes, with a few lines changed in structure only by AI. - Chapters 2 to 14 contain AI only for grammar; not a single sentence has been even rewritten or structured differently. Chapters 15 to 23 contain a sentence or two that have been rewritten, as I had a lack of time back then. And thereafter there will be zero Ai again other than punctuations, grammar, and spelling, of course.