Chapter 1

I suffered from severe pyrophobia and haphephobia.

My fiancé, a top psychologist, spent three years of gentle patience, pulling me back from hell.

I thought he was my savior and decided to say yes to his hundredth proposal.

But on the day I was trying on my wedding dress, I accidentally pushed open the secret door in his study, disguised as a bookshelf.

Behind a one-way mirror, the walls were covered with photos of my agonizing struggles, along with an experimental report about to be published.

And he was holding another heavily pregnant woman in his arms, his voice chilling: "She's just a lab rat for me to overcome academic challenges. With one more severe fire stimulus, my data will be perfect."

In that moment, my world turned to ice. Later, I died in that fire as he wished, but he went completely insane.

A cold dread washed over me, my blood freezing in my veins.

Through a one-way mirror, I watched Julian Vance, my fiancé of three years, gently caressing another woman's swollen pregnant belly.

"Julian, I'm pregnant." The woman cooed, her voice full of possessiveness. "When are you going to get rid of that crazy woman?"

Julian. My treating therapist. My fiancé.

The man who had spent three sleepless years proposing to me ninety-nine times, all to cure my pyrophobia and touch aversion.

Now, his face bore a coldness and calculation I'd never seen before.

"Scarlett, don't be childish." He lowered his head and kissed her forehead. "You know, Ember is just an extremely valuable research subject to me."

"My new desensitization therapy is at a critical stage. All I need to do is put her in a simulated fire chamber next week, get her final physiological data under extreme fear, and my research will win an international award."

"Then, we'll get married."

Every word was a knife twisting in my heart.

I covered my mouth, biting hard into the back of my hand, desperate not to make a sound.

The taste of rust spread in my mouth.

Just ten minutes ago, I was preparing for his hundredth proposal, joyfully looking for his tie in his study.

But I accidentally triggered a mechanism on the bookshelf.

This secret room, hidden behind the study, felt like a massive mockery.

The walls were plastered with photos of me convulsing in agony during my episodes, annotated with meticulous data: heart rate, blood pressure, fear index.

It turned out that every gentle embrace, every patient reassurance, even every proposal. None of it was out of love.

It was all to test the obedience of a lab rat.

I stumbled backward, knocking over a nearby chair.

A muffled thud.

Julian, on the other side of the glass, suddenly looked up, his gaze shooting towards the wall like a blade.

"Who's in there?"