“The House of Mirrors,” Sehun whispered breathlessly. “I only heard of it once.”

“What is it?” Sowon asked. The building they were standing in front of was covered in sheets of silver that showed the extremely blurry reflections of the three and the background of colorful booths and busily moving Natives. The double doors were made of wood with a glossy black. The elegant-looking doorknobs looked like they were made of gold. Strangely, there were no windows at all.

Sehun ignored her and stepped forward to open the door. A cold breeze flowed from the dark inside. A chill ran down Sowon’s spine. She would rather have gone straight to the inn and wait there for Prince Baekhyun, but her two companions had already entered. With a heavy sigh, she followed.

The door closed silently behind her, trapping the three in a dimly lit corridor. The walls were made of stone and the ceiling seemed to be as tall as three people. Candles were dotted high across the walls. To Sowon’s surprise, they did not flicker in the slightest, nor did any wax seem to drip. Magic.

The candles were placed so that Sowon could only see a few feet in front of her. When looking to see where the corridor ended, she could only see darkness. On each side of the hallway, on the walls, were what looked like a mix of Arab writing and Egyptian hieroglyphics.

“Wow! Look at these runes!” Sehun called out softly. Sowon had never seen her so immersed in something – well, other than sewing. Her face showed how enraptured she was with the ancient writing on the walls. Sowon wondered if it was the language of the Yang.

“What is this place? A museum?” Sowon whispered.

“It’s the oldest building in the Yang Kingdom. It’s probably even older than the Castle itself. It’s known to contain the history of the Yin and the Yang,” Chanyeol explained. He stopped in front of a passage of runes on the opposite side of Sehun to study it.

Sowon took several steps forward. The runes ended and were replaced with mirrors. Sowon frowned. Several reflections of her frowned back at her. Another chill ran down her spine. She quickly turned back to Sehun and Chanyeol, preparing to beg them to leave. However, there was no one in the corridor.

“Chanyeol? Sehun?” Sowon called out, softly. Only silence replied to her. Sowon felt the speed of her heart picking up. “Chanyeol? Sehun?” she called out a little louder. She backtracked to find the stone walls of runes. Nothing but mirrors met her eyes. A spark of panic lit up in her stomach.

Her frantic walking turned into a run. She dashed into the direction where the two had been a minute before, hoping for a glimpse of her friends. Where did they disappear to? Strangely, the passage seemed to be endless. She couldn’t find the runes or the doors. As she kept running, her reflections on either side of her ran with her. A look of panic formed on her face. She hadn’t gone so far off, yet why couldn’t she see the entrance?

To her surprise, a fork lay in front of her. Bemused, she skidded to a halt. There wasn’t a split in the passage before. After a moment’s hesitation, she took the right passage. The walls there were also decorated with mirrors. She glanced at one of them. Her frightened face stared back at her. She turned back to the front, somewhat unnerved. After a few yards, she ended up facing a huge mirror with a small entranceway leading to another passage each on the left and right of the mirror.

She stopped again. Her whole crystal-clear reflection stared back at her from the mirror. Then to her shock, the figure in the mirror became distorted. First, it became fuzzy, and then cleared again. Then her reflection smiled – actually smiled – at her. It was a sinister smile, along with a dark glint in the eyes. A chill ran up her spine. The reflection was of her, but had a mind of its own. Too scared to even scream, Sowon tore her eyes from her demented reflection.

Sowon turned left and ran. She was greeted once again by her own reflection, twisted in the wall of mirrors. It was a dead end, with only mirrors all around. Her heart was about to leap out of her chest and she felt frustration and fear pile up inside of her. Cold sweat coated her forehead. A name fell from her lips without any thought, colored with desperation. “Joonmyeon!”

Her cry seemed to bounce off the mirrors surrounding her and echo through the endless hallways. Sowon closed her eyes, refusing to look at the numerous, gruesome reflections of herself everywhere.

She felt a cold hand clamp on her shoulder, and she let out an ear-piercing yell. “Whoa, Sowon! It’s me, Chanyeol.” At his familiar voice, Sowon opened her eyes to see the boy standing in front of her with a worried expression on his face. Relief flooded into her, but her heart was still pounding furiously.

“Th-the reflections. They’re alive,” Sowon whispered. She only looked into Chanyeol’s blue eyes in order to not see the mirrors around her. Chanyeol could see the fear clearly in her eyes. He pulled Sowon into an embrace, burying her head in his chest as if to protect her from seeing the reflections.

“They can’t get at you. Don’t worry; I’ll protect you. They’re just the demon spirits of the House of Mirrors playing a trick on you,” Chanyeol murmured. He gently patted the back of Sowon’s head. “It’s alright.”

“Where were you?” Sowon’s voice was muffled.

“Sehun and I were standing in the room reading the runes – which were about the beginnings of this World – but then you were gone. Sehun said that you went on into the passage ahead, so we ran into the dark passage. I got separated from him and in a few minutes, I saw mirrors in front of me. I had wound up in the Hall of Mirrors. I should’ve known that the demons of the House would try to play a trick on us.” Chanyeol’s voice was grim.

“Demons?” Sowon asked, looking up. Their faces were only a few inches away, and Chanyeol found himself blinking rapidly from being taken aback by the close proximity. He had the sudden urge to brush the stray hairs away from her hazel eyes.

“The House of Mirrors is haunted by the demon spirits. No one knows exactly when or how, though there was a speculation that a rich Yang was chased away from his own house several centuries ago because of them – at least, that’s what I’ve heard. I’m not exactly sure what those spirits are, but be thankful that the spirits are only here out of all the known places in the Other World. They’re practically harmless – they like to play tricks on people’s reflections when intruders enter. Seems like they’re trapped inside those mirrors.”

Sowon shuddered in his arms. “Are there are any weird creatures in the Other World that I must know about?”

Chanyeol gave her a half-smile. “Other than the demon spirits here and waterbirds like Gorgioh? Well, I’ve heard of firebirds, the fire counterparts of waterbirds that were raised by the Yin, and implings, the tiny fairies living among the flowers of the Great Meadow that come out when it’s a full moon. There must be more. But I believe they’re still surviving from the age of dawn because magic lingers in the Other World. I doubt they can survive in the Real World.”

Sowon gritted her teeth and pulled away. She couldn’t rely on Chanyeol all the time. She felt like a little child who was afraid of everything, although the demons would shock anyone who had no knowledge of them. She took a deep breath and glared at the nearest reflection. It just smiled back at her, with the same evil smile. Although she learned that it couldn’t leave its mirror, it still unnerved her. Its smile grew wider – it seemed to be gloating at its success in frightening her.

“How do we get out of here?” she asked, forcing her voice to sound strong.

Chanyeol glanced at his own reflection, which was making faces at him. He uttered a small sigh, as if he found the demon’s antics to be childish. “I’d say break all the mirrors until we find the exit,” he stated, loudly, as though he was talking to all the demons nearby. Sowon turned around in a half-circle and realized that all the reflections were grimacing like they had swallowed something funny. Chanyeol cocked an eyebrow at her. “Turn around,” he mouthed.

Sowon turned fully around and saw an opening in the hallway of mirrors which emitted light from the outside world. She blinked. When she had first entered this part of the Hall, there had been nothing in front of her but an endless pathway with mirrors. She looked up at Chanyeol with lifted eyebrows. Were the demons letting them escape because they would supposedly perish if their mirrors were broken?

They exited the House of Mirrors, only to be met with a black night, for the sun had long gone. Nearby, the booths and tents in the marketplace were either wrapping up for the day or hanging lanterns that illuminated the goods. High above in the sky was a silver coin moon.

Sehun was standing right outside the House with his arms crossed and an eyebrow raised. “Took you a while to find her,” he commented to Chanyeol. “I just managed to find the exit after the demons nearly scared me half to death after I bumped into a huge mirror in the middle of the hallways.” His tone was very dry.

Sowon stared at him curiously. His complexion was normal and his features had nothing but a hint of impatience. Sowon doubted anything that wasn’t major could frighten him, much less surprise him. She guessed that the boy was joking about being scared half to death. Sowon couldn’t help but wonder what in the world Sehun had seen in the huge mirror he ran into. Then she realized that it wasn’t wise to let her imagination get better of herself.

“Well, we better enter the inn before Hyun gets worried,” Chanyeol suggested.

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