A knock was heard from inside of the old rusty deposit, but the brunette girl hidden in there just ignored the noise. Another knock and the only reaction earned by the younger was her flipping an page of one of her favorite childhood book.

“Krystal? Krystal???? Krystal Jung! I know you’re there.” Her older sister’s voice said after knocking once again.

“I’m busy now, Jessica. What do you want?” Krystal replied in the coldest tone she could mutter.

“Well I just wanted to take my lovely anti social sister to go shopping but she stuck herself in a dirty little closet.” Jessica half whined half nagged whilst Krystal rolled her eyes at her older sister antics.

“I don’t want to go shopping, Jess. And this isn’t just a dirty little closet; there are books and other equally interesting things in here.” The younger muttered.

“Always going for books over people… Krys you know you can’t live like that forever, right?” Worry was clear in the elder’s voice,  still Krystal was impassive.

“Jess, don’t worry about me. Just go shopping, buy yourself cute things.” And as she said that, Krystal heard the other Jung sighing loud so she quickly added. “And if you want to buy some for me too, I’ll be grateful.”

“Okay, okay but promise me you’ll be out of that place at least for a walk in the sidewalk. Geez, you need some fresh air and sunlight or something.” Jessica started to nag again so Krystal just shushed her with a:

“Okay Jess, I promise you that when I finish this, I’ll go out for a walk.” 

“Good, I’m going now. Love you, sis.” Jessica hummed.

Krystal had always despised strangers. Both her and her sister were born with a natural cold royal-like appearance, but differently from Jessica, Krystal didn’t soft up, she didn’t try to open up or talk with the others. Therefore people did their best to avoid her and she quickly became an outcast, not that Krystal ever bothered with that, in the end she preferred like this.  

“American snobby girl.”

“She has no manners!”

“So rude!”

“Always acting like she’s better than everyone else…”

“Who in the world she thinks she is?”

“Ice princess, huh?”

     “More like an Ice !”

“! ! !”

“! ! ! ! ! ”

Krystal woke up in pants and sweat. This is what you get from thinking of  people and the stupidness before you sleep. She mentally scolded herself.

As she tried to sit up straight, many stings of pain shot throughout her body. And this is what you get from sleeping in a cold and narrow deposit floor. She started stretching her body in hopes that the pain and the numbness would go away when she realized the afternoon sunlight peeking through a little window in the top of all shelves.

“I bet it’s the sunset already.” She murmured to herself and she was completely right as the sun was giving its last goodbye before disappearing into the horizon while the girl was sleeping.

She kicked away the fairytale book she managed to read twice (thrice in her favorite tale: The Beauty and The Beast), got up and thought to herself:

It won’t kill if I go outside now, there mustn’t be many people in the streets and the sunset is something too beautiful to go to waste. And managing to force a soft smile that looked more like a grimace out of herself, Krystal finally left the room.

As she walked in the house, she noticed how everything was deadly quiet. Krystal shrugged it off knowing that her parents were most likely in one of those boring social meetings they had to cope since it was part of their job as Korean ambassadors in the world. Nonetheless she had expected to see her sister or grandma around but she guessed Qingdao shops and knitting in the balcony were the reasons behind their absences.

“SooJung, is that you?” Her grandmother’s soft and barely hearable voice said.

“Yes, granny. It’s me.” Krystal really enjoyed how Grandmother always called her by her Korean name, how she never raised her voice and how she was blind but still handle it all by herself.

“Oh, I thought you went out with SooYeon.” SooYeon being Jessica here.

“No. She invited but I refused.” Krystal replied in a calm tone, she just couldn’t be the cold ice princess Krystal with Granny Jung. With her she was just cute little SooJung.

“Di you refuse it to go to the forest? Take a walk perharps.” The old lady replied with a mysterious smile.

“No, I refused to stay in home reading.” Krystal stated a while taken aback by the weird question. Who would refuse going shopping with their sister to go to a forest alone?

“Oh and now are you going to the forest?” Her grandmother asked sounding a little bit too excited.

“No, I was just going in a walk to see the sunset.” Krystal stared at the smiling old lady. “Granny why are you so insistent in this forest thing?”

“Nothing much. I just think you should go there, my dear.” The latter replied, resuming her previous knitting.

“Oh, yeah, okay. Anyway I’m going now. See you later granny.” Krystal said considering the possibility that maybe just maybe her grandmother wasn’t as lucid as she thought.

It wasn’t long until she saw the perfect place to watch the sunset peacefully: an earth formation that was too big to be a stone but too small to be considered as a hill, right under a tree. That seemed perfect to her.

Even though it was hard to climb on it, the view was worth it. The sunset was just beautiful, so natural, so calming, and so quiet. It was like the whole nature had stopped to admire the sky’s concert, the sun’s final act before leaving the stage.

Krystal took a deep breath, allowing herself to smile widely and forgetting the nightmare she had before. Like the sunset she felt natural, calm and quiet. That was something she really appreciated.

But all that was broken when a male voice said right from behind her:

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

Some curses ,that are better to not leave registered, left the girl’s mouth and the boy’s eyes widened.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I didn’t want to scare you.” He said obviously nervous and embarrassed.

“Well, but you did.” She stated annoyed. Why do people always have to ruin the good moments of her life?

“I’m sorry. I really am.” He said in a low voice, looking at the ground, reminding Krystal of a kid that was getting scolded for something that he did it. But that only softened her for a half minute and the annoyed self was back in the next instant.

“How and when did you get up here without me noticing? And who the hell are you, by the way?”

“I climbed just now; I guess you were too absorbed in the sunset to notice. And hm... My name is Kim JongIn.” He replied looking everywhere else other than the girl in front of him.

“The sunset which I had just lost, thanks to you.” Krystal nagged. “And could you look at my face at least.” Krystal didn’t like how he didn’t even bother to look at her more than once since they started talking. Everyone should be distrusted but people that don't even look you in the eye have a special place in that category.

“You should look people straight in the eye when you're talking with them. Otherwise they’ll think you’re too weak or soft. Or that you're up to something.” She said when he was finally brave enough to raise his head. “And trust me weakness is something unbearable and softness is for clothing fabrics and old people.” She quickly reminded of her sweet, nice and blind grandmother. "Plus the last thing you want is someone watching over his back because of you."

“You sound like a scary army captain.” He whispered loud enough to her to catch it but it didn’t anger her just made her let out a dry chuckle.

“There is a reason why everyone tends to fear the army captains. They’re fearless. But you don’t have to be one of them to be fearless too.” Krystal assured looking deep in JongIn’s chocolate eyes. “Anyhow you made me lost the sunset, but apologized already, so no reason for me to stay here any longer. Goodbye JongIn or whatever is your name.”

Her grave tone made him a little starstrucked but seeing her getting down and quickly making her way out he recomposed himself.

“Wait, you didn’t tell me your name!”

Krystal Jung was sure of two things now:

number one is how dumb is to go in the woods without knowing where you going or without marking the way back just like she did.

Number two was that the forest changed completely by the moonlight, it got darker, scarier and much more dangerous. She reached those conclusions after what seemed to be an eternity walking in hexagons between the trees.

After stopping in a place she knew she has been before the reality crashed her. She was lost, completely lost. In a forest. Alone. Without a phone, food or water. And to close the whole package her shin was throbbing and wet with a substance she was almost sure it was her blood.

In other words she was ed up and she knew it.

“Okay, okay. Keep calm.” She tried to comfort herself aware that there was no one there willing to do that for her. “I’m sure they already missed me. They must be looking for me right now.”

“Are you lost?” His voice snapped her out of her trance once again. But this time she was more than grateful to see a live soul but her y little tongue couldn’t be tamed so:

“What do you think, creeper?”

“I’m not a creeper, I was just checking you up. You looked desperate just now.”

“Because I am.”

“Desperate or Lost?”

“Both.”

“What happened to the scary army captain that was on you?”

“The captain is injured, dumb soldier.”

He kept quiet for a moment until he saw her sitting and analyzing her leg’s state.

“You’re bleeding.”

“You don’t say?”

“Let’s go to my home. I’m sure Victoria can take care of you.” JongIn said fondly.

Sadly she didn’t share that same fondness. “No.”

“Why not?” He tilted his head.

“Because i'm not stupid. I know where this is going.” She hissed through gritted teeth after seeing that the cut wasn't too deep but it was over her whole leg.

 “Where is this going then?” He sighed, he had never met such a stubborn person like her.

“Well we have many possibilities like: a) you me b) you kill me c) you torture me d) you sacrifice me for some kind of satanic ritual and so on.” 

He looked utterly shocked from her suppositions by the point of letting out a dry chuckle. “No, no, no. I promise you I don’t want to do any kind of that stuff with you. It’s just… you’re bleeding.”

She didn’t reply, just tried to clean the blood off  her hands with the help of her coat.

“Fine, I’m going to go get Victoria to come here and see that.” He sighed.

“No! Wait!” Krystal shouted before he even turned around. 

“What?” JongIn was startled and so was she.

“Don’t leave me alone in here.” Krystal hated to admit, but she was scared and hurt. She needed someone there with her. A person. Like her.

“But we have to get that cut checked and you don’t want go to Victoria, so i should get her to come here.” JongIn smiled sweetly and tried to convince her.

Krystal stayed quiet thinking for a moment or two.

“Is your house too far from here?” She said in softest of the whispers.

“No.”

“Carry me there then. And if you dare to complain about my weight I’ll kick you in the balls with my good leg.” She ordered with her head high again and JongIn half smirked half smiled and started to approach her.

“Yes, captain, now hold on tight.” He said as he pulled her up to his back trying not to touch in her harmed leg.

As they walked Krystal tried to convince herself that the creepy shy boy was really willing to help her, that he was the rare kind of good people like her grandmother and sister and that he was the best she could have now so she shouldn’t complain or deny his help when she needed that much.

“There it is.” And she saw a huge chalet with a pretty garden in the front and a chimney that coughed a thin trail of smoke. It was bright lit and there were clearly many people in there.

“You really live in here?” She asked, feeling hesistant about accepting his help for nth time in the last 4 minutes.

“Yes, I do.” And Krystal saw by his tone that he was very happy and proud about it.

When they reached the house JongIn sat Krystal in a bench near the roses and shouted “Victoria! Kris! I’m here and I need your help.”

Soon she heard the turmoil inside the house and a brunette opened the door in a hush and went out followed by the tallest man Krystal had ever seen.

“What happened? Are you okay, JongIn?” She heard the brunette asking in a motherly tone to the boy.

JongIn just pointed at Krystal and soon the brunette was in front of her, caressing her cheek.

“Hello, my dear. I’m Victoria. Are you okay? What happened? Did you get lost in the forest?” Worry was so clear in Victoria’s eyes Krystal actually felt uncomfortable. Why was this stranger being so nice and caring to her? People were never like that unless they wanted something from you. “Talk to me, I don’t want to hurt you. I promise” Victoria smiled sincerely.

“I’m okay, but my left leg is not and yes, I got lost in the woods.” Krystal answered trying to avoid those big eyes filled with care.

And Victoria started examine her leg. “Well, you’ve cut it. It’s pretty big cut, but I’m sure an ointment and a bandage will do” and she smiled warmly, reminding Krystal of when she hurt herself in grandmother’s house back in the time where she had one and she said the same things with the same look Victoria was giving her now.

“Thanks, i guess.” she muttered.

“Let’s get inside. It’s too cold and dark for us to stay out.” A very deep voice said and Krystal found out that was the tall man that exited the house with Victoria. Differently from her motherly aura, he had more of an intimidating aura, like a true army captain.

“You’re right, Kris. I don’t any of my kids with a cold.” Victoria said and Krystal noticed how Victoria included her in my kids. “Can you carry her inside, JongIn?”

He nodded and went closer to Krystal again, putting her in his back again.

“Are they your parents?” They looked too young to have a son of the size of JongIn but never know.

“No!” He laughed. “But they are like family to me.”

Krystal just muttered something incomprehensible and clung tighter around the boy’s neck as they stepped on the stairs.

“By the way, you didn’t tell me your name yet.”

And for some reason she would never understand why, she replied with a barely audible: