The Heirs of the Dragons

"Of course, she's not human!", exclaimed Yoseob. "She's a nutcase."

"Aniya, jinjja-ya. She's su..supernatural. She . . she spoke to my . .mind." Junhyung breathed these words out as he collapsed into Yoseob's bed.

"Yeah, she spoke to your mind. I guess she's what you need. Somebody who can speak to your mind", Yoseob smirked and Junhyung stared with a puzzled look. "A psychiatrist, you idiot!” Yoseob added.

“Junhyung-ah, just go to sleep now. We’ll talk about it later.” Yoseob turned off the light and pushed Junhyung to the bed.

And at some hour between night and dawn, he slowly slipped into dreamless sleep.

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Incheon airport was teeming with fans from all over. The sight never failed to amaze the Junhyung. Being the shy one, the maximum he would do was to nod or to smile slightly. With their new album “Hard to Love, How to Love” all set to release soon, he knew that they were all looking up to him. He was yet to compose the main song, the first one that they’ll release. And right now, with all the things going on in his head, he had no idea how he would do it.

“I have booked an appointment with a shrink and I’m going to make sure that you do go.” Yoseob was determined.

“When’s the appointment, I’ll go.” Junhyung really wanted it to be a glitch in his mind because if it was all real, it’s scarier than him being insane. The mere thought sent shivers along his spine. He looked out of the window and he saw some girls waving crazily at their car. He knew that they wouldn’t be ale to see but he still smiled and waved a little. Something then caught his eyes: one of the girls, she must be around 16 or 17, was wearing a shirt with the symbol he saw in his dream. What was it called? Ouroboros.

He wanted to pull his hairs off in frustration but instead he took his ipod and tried to slip into the world of words, melodies and music.

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“……Shadows, millions and millions of shadows, float around you everyday, every moment. To see them or un-see them is up to you. A thousand years or more before us, there lived people, who decided to embrace the shadows and live with them, in harmony. Their descendants came to be called the Heirs of the Dragons.

Why Dragons?

Legend has it that Dragons were the sole creatures that could see humans as well as shadows and in a way, they were the only medium of interaction between the two. And the legend goes on to say that these “Heirs” who inherited the world were born of Dragons and young human maids. And these young ones were gifted with the ability to see shadows. The story goes on to tell us that not ALL the descendants are chosen as Heirs but they are chosen by a spirit which will show itself to the dragonborn alone. That is, one who truly inherited the power of the Dragons.

And here’s a sketch by Pablo Picasso, who was supposedly one of the Heirs. In this picture the young woman is ….”

The voice trailed off and the projector showed the sketch. Junhyung was in the classroom but as soon as the projector flashed to show this image, he woke up with a start.

They had already reached the dorms and Dongwoon was trying to wake him up. "Hyung, how can you sleep like this? I have been trying to wake you up since the last 10 minutes, do you know?! Phew.. now get out."

Junhyung made a point in his mind to try not to fall asleep until he meets the psychiatrist. He couldn't afford to slip away into other stages of consciousness at all. What if he wakes up as a different person or something? His limited but sufficient knowledge in psychology had taught him this much. But then again, another part of him was telling him that lack of sleep could drive him mad too. But there wasn't any time to care about that now.

Yoseob was looking at Junhyung with a worried expression when he got out of the van. This was enough reason to not tell him about this "dream voyages" that he had been having.

In the dorm, they were busy tearing apart wrappers of the gifts that fans handed to them. Junhyung had been getting more gifts than usual, thanks to the drama he was doing.

Hyunseung was esctatic when he started opening a package which was for all the six of them but moments later when he took out the T-shirts, Junhyung was sweating profusely with a word "Ouroboros" slipping out of his mouth, before he collapsed completely.

A letter, not fully dried yet, had dropped out from among the shirts. Its red ink was, unmistakably, something closely related to....blood.