I thought I told you where to go.

I’m scared.

You’re scared because you won’t listen to me, pretty flower.

I don’t know you anymore.

You do, you’ve known me from the start, the beginning of all.

-

Hard is the life of mortals, only driven by fear and the need to make a name for themselves in their own fabricated world of tangled lies and preposterous social customs.

This small town is built of lies, violence and the blood that stains our hands. Except only his hands were pure, nimble fingers of a seasoned dancer whose eyes only see what is behind the curtain of darkness.

He worked at city hall, filing away papers for belligerent citizens, trying to blend in with all the other transients that inhabit this coastal town. You always avoided him ever since you moved to the city, pretending not to hear his name on your family’s lips when they would call you.

But now, you’re stuck in a well and there’s nobody else but him to help you. That’s what he said.

Him. Tall, dark, imposing and in control.

Ethereal.

That’s what he was, what he embodied and what you didn’t want to believe. He was there as often as the moon sat on the indigo sky. He was the dark stranger your subconscious wanted to avoid, yet his familiar voice was the chant that brought you home.

“I wonder what brings you here,” his whisper filled your ears, bringing you into a shiver and back into reality. “Is it, perhaps, me?”

Jongin’s whispers permeated the stuffy walls of your shrouded well but you couldn’t see him.

“I am a fool, Jongin,” your voice matched his soft tone, albeit with less grace, and a tinge of despair. “I don’t know what I’m living for.” The soft drops of summer rain clouded your senses.

Why?

“I lost my path while moving away, isn’t that ironic, Jongin?”

“But you saw the truth, didn’t you?” his breath tickled your ears and you closed your eyes. “You saw the blood hidden in the crevices of this town’s concrete walls, you saw the children grow into the perpetrators of this vaguely immoral society,” you could feel his fingers delicately tracing your jawline. “You saw the Deathless before anyone else, how could you feel regret?”

“How could you feel like you’ve wronged me?”

A violent tremor shook your whole body and you awoke to the wet pavement of your old town’s dimly lit main square. The magnolia tinged light of the lamp post hovering above you irritated your sensible eyes, coloring the heavy raindrops falling down upon your aching body. You stood up with anxious fervor as you tried to reorganize your memory. Why am I here?

“Good question.”

Your whole body shook at the silvery voice whose owner you could not see. But you knew whom it belonged to better than anyone else.

“J-jongin?” your voice came out in a shaken cry and then you truly started to get scared of your thoughts, your situation, of Jongin.

“Mortals always ask themselves where they come from, am I right?” you heard vague footsteps on your left side. “Why was I born? What am I here for? What shall I do?” he sighed. “These are the basic questions that every person asks themselves up until the day they die, not knowing the answers to any of those questions.”

He took a pause, perhaps watching you shake as you tried to find him in the darkness, not being able to see beyond the light supplied by the lamp post. The monsoon season was particularly severe this year, raindrops turning into a curtain of water that would claim the lives of many who would surrender themselves, like a moon hidden by the clouds.

“But you have never asked yourself this, haven’t you, my little flower?” his chuckle came to life as he appeared in front of you, a soft smile adorning his exquisite features as you froze in his presence.

“You don’t think you know, but you do.” his gaze purely aimed at you so profound you were petrified to look away. “All these years, have you never thought why you never asked yourself these questions?”

“Blind is the world, who seeks comfort and refuge in the evil and ephemeral.” 

You stood frozen as he approached you under the monsoon, the vanilla light of the lamp post casting shadows on his soft, chiseled features. He didn’t stop until his face was so close to yours you could feel his light breathing on you, and his bronze eyes were so close you could see the intricate pattern of his entrancing irises.

“You, my dear, you never once doubted me.” his whisper ran shivers through your body. “You’re scared of what you know, of your trust in my self, of your inexplicable pull towards what you consider to be nothing in this world.” 

“You don’t need to ask questions, my love.” he murmured through your parted lips, and you started to feel something overcome you. A soft feeling, perhaps even numb.

“Because you saw the truth in me before you set out to find me.”

Peaceful.