Centuries and centuries ago, when the world had just started to grow and civilizations were sparse, the humans and the spirits lived together in peace and harmony. Spirits roam freely in the face of the earth, and humans have the capability of using their energy and essence. Humans can have either of the two essences: the light essence, which comes from the sun, and the dark essence, from the moon. The light essence grants anybody powers over the light, water, wind, and other derivatives of it, while the dark essence gives control over the dark, fire, and earth and its derivatives. Those aside, all humans can interact with spirits and travel to and from the earth and the spirit world. With these, civilizations grew, the population rose, and peace roamed around everywhere.

However, not everybody was happy.

A family of dark users somewhere in the east of the world desired more power than they had. They started terrorizing the area they resided in, experimenting with neighbours to test how they can get more power. From the highest to the lowest, they killed people and did the most unthinkable spells, and rituals humans should never do.

They tried to control the sun, the moon, and the spirit world.

War broke out from the east, and it reached the entire world. Most dark users came and supported the family’s cause, and the light users fought against them. It looked like a losing fight for the light with all the spells and rituals that they had done.

Seeing so much destruction, the gods got angered, and they interfered. They started taking essences away from the human population, with only a handful of capable people left. They banished the family that started everything, and they wiped the memories of those whose essences were taken away. The gates to the spirit world are closed, and spirits are not allowed to roam the earth anymore, while humans can’t travel to the spirit world anymore. The war was called the “The great dimensional war.”

Thus, the world was reborn. Countries were rebuilt, civilizations were reestablished, and people forgot about the existence of the other world. Those few who had retained their essences were warned not to make people remember, else they would be banished from the world as well. They were also tasked to send rogue spirits back to the spirit world where they belong.

With their memory erased, people shunned them away and called them spiritists. The light users, understanding the situation, never retaliated and hid from them until they forgot. The dark users, who are lesser in numbers than the light, held grudges to both the gods and the people. Thus they started terrorizing people. Years later, the people would start accepting spiritists again, specifically the light users, which now they call “mediums.” While they continue to fear and drive out the dark users, now called “berserkers.”

Without ordinary people knowing, the war of the light and dark continued on everywhere. The gods are getting tired, and when the most gruesome war since the great dimensional war happened, they decided to interfere again, indirectly this time. The gods stopped the war of the 1900s, and they sent out a prophecy to all spiritists– 

“Im, what are you reading?” In her ear, a deep voice whispers, and Nayeon yelps in surprise, suddenly closing the book she was reading. She looks up with wide eyes, looking like a deer caught in the headlights.

“Nakamoto.” She narrows her eyes. “Uhh, nothing, silly stuff.” She mumbles, answering the question vaguely. The truth is that she sneaked out of the room when Sojung announced that their Physics teacher is out, and they have the next hour and a half to themselves. She immediately rushed to the library and borrowed the first book about the supernatural world before going back unnoticed. 

“Well, suit yourself.” Luckily for Nayeon, her classmate drops the topic and leaves her alone. A sigh of relief escapes . She puts the book she’s been reading away, afraid that other people would notice the old hardbound book she suddenly has.

“Didn’t think Yuta would talk to you, bunny.” An arm slings around her shoulders. “Maybe it’s because you suddenly decided to wear contacts, damn girl, you’re hot.” Nayeon just let her classmates assume that she started wearing contacts today to avoid interrogations. She found her glasses in her bag a while ago, and she lets it be.

“No, that’s stupid. I’m pretty sure Nakamoto’s not like that.”

“Then what did he want? And are you okay with going to classes today? You looked like a dying cat yesterday.” She rolls her eyes.

“Where did you get that, Sowon? A dying cat? Have you been spending time with Eunbi Sr. lately?” Nayeon rebuffs, and she ignores the quiet “it’s Eunha” from Sojung’s mouth. “Well, he just asked something. And I’m fine, as you can see.” She waved her hand towards herself. “Yesterday was just not my day.”

Sojung noisily drags a chair towards Nayeon, and the latter chuckles when she sees a classmate glare in their direction. She might’ve felt it because she ducks her head when she sits down beside Nayeon and avoids the glare. 

“Are you sure? Eunha told me it must’ve been that bad if Sana just went running out of their room yesterday and didn’t return since. She heard Jihyo telling their teachers that Sana came to help a senior from our class. I’m pretty sure it’s you since you’re the only one who ditched Hangul and English.” Nayeon zones out from Sojung’s blabber and stares outside their room instead, her chin propped up on her hand, elbow on her desk.

“Seriously, I’m fine, it’s just–” Sojung looks up in surprise when Nayeon abruptly stands up, her eyes wide while staring at the door of their room. She looks to where the gaping bunny was looking and raises her eyebrows.

She sees a glimpse of Momo walking past their room, not even sparing a glance, which she finds weird since the said junior would always peek at their room and wave at a blushing Nayeon. From her peripheral vision, she notices Nayeon slowly sitting down, a frown on her face.

“Not gonna run after her?” After a few beats, she asks Nayeon to shake her head, sad eyes looking at the board in front, and her earlier mood visibly dampening.

“She might be late for her History class. Don’t want to hold her back.” Nayeon’s monotone voice makes Sojung sigh.

“Trouble in paradise?” Nayeon doesn’t answer her.

“I wish it was paradise.” Sojung hears after a few seconds. “I messed up. But I pushed her away. Maybe it’s for the best.” Sojung scoffs but says nothing. A dazed Nayeon looks down at her desk.

“She might be my paradise, but clearly, I’m not hers.”

Sojung swears she saw Shiah subtley cringe because of Nayeon’s cheesiness, but both give sad, subtle glances to their downhearted friend (but deep down, they think Nayeon is stupid for pushing her crush and best friend away instead of clearing things out, but they don’t tell her that because they don’t really know what exactly is going on).

A stack of papers dropping in front of her snaps Jeongyeon out of her daze. She blinks for a few moments, noticing a paper of math homework on top of it, and she looks up. Myoui Mina stands in front of her, looking everywhere but at Jeongyeon. The latter, surprised, quickly looked around to see their classmates looking at them. She spots Jihyo looking at them, and she gives her a questioning glance. The younger girl just shrugs.

“Uhm, I told Miss Hwang I’ll give you copies of the homework you missed,” Mina mumbles, still not looking at Jeongyeon. She sees Momo appear on the door, giving her an amused smirk, and she looks away and looks at the window instead.

“Oh, thank you, Mina-ssi.” Jeongyeon smiles and grabs the papers in front of her. She puts it in her bag and pauses, then looks back at Mina, narrowing her eyes. “Mina-ssi, I hope you’re not doing this out of guilt.” Mina sharply looks at her, and she sighs, knowing she just caught the younger one.

“I–I am–I don’t–” Mina shuffles at where she’s standing, and Jeongyeon chuckles in amusement. She stands and grabs the younger’s hand, baffling the latter, who’s looking at their hands with wide eyes.

“I’ll have you know, Mina-ssi, that you have nothing to do with what happened.” Jeongyeon might’ve tried to give her a reassuring smile, but Mina sees the pain behind it. “And I hope you gave me copies of homework as a gesture of friendship.” Jeongyeon changes the positions of their hands to make it look like they are shaking hands. “You can call me Jeong.”

Despite all the encouraging words she’s heard from Jeongyeon (and from Momo yesterday), she couldn’t help but feel partially responsible. Seeing Jeongyeon’s small (albeit a little pained) smile, however, she decides to go with it and shove her guilt away, even for a while. (It’s not because she’s her crush. No, not at all. But maybe becoming friends with her and her circle would be suitable for her so tha