The girl who’s been hanging around in my room without others noticing has been gone now for two days. I'm supposed to be happy about this because I'm not having any more nightmares about her, but I know she’ll come back, definitely, and the next time she does, I will come with her, because that’s what we came up with. That’s what I agreed to.

                The extra time I asked for so I can prepare myself for what’s to come. I needed to find a leeway, a distraction, and in the meantime, try to make sure I couldn’t extract the information from Kai and Luhan myself before I completely walk to my doom on my own will. I know it isn’t the best option for me, and there’s no telling if I could come back alive after seeing Seo Ji Hye, but I have to try. I know she would tell me the truth because there’s no particular reason for her not to, and also practically, because she thinks the information would destroy me. I quite agree with her because I’m already having speculations about what that information could be.

                For one, Luhan has been somewhat more elusive. Any mention of the fight with Kai would make him want to leave me and rest in his own room. I noticed Sehun occupies most of the time I’m not with Luhan. It feels as if he’s advising Luhan about something. What it is, however, is something that’s beyond my knowledge. As for Kai, I couldn’t really seek a one-on-one confrontation with him because I’m afraid what happened before might happen again. Now is not the time to even get more confused, and to be honest, I always feel kind of trapped in his black eyes. I feel very conscious whenever he’s looking at me, as if Kris always use his time duire to make that particular moment longer. I couldn’t fall even deeper in those eyes because I might not be able to get out of them myself.

                Everything about our lives now is making me restless. I spend most of my time egging Kyungsoo to let something slip, but I know it would be going against his nature if he does say something. He did tell me that it is the principle of the seers to keep their mouths shut. I couldn’t fight him anymore if he argues with me in that way, because it just makes me feel bad that I’m asking him to do something he doesn’t like. Xiumin also doesn’t want to talk about anything. The way he looks at me nowadays, however, makes me think as if he’s seeing someone else and it makes me more nervous. It makes my heart throb in a painful way.

                Sehun, on the other hand, whenever I see him, it feels as if he wants to talk to me about something. And he did, just the night I was about to put my other plans in action. It made me think he suspects that I would do something bad. However, if he really did know what I was planning, I doubt he would be as calm as when he talked to me.

                “Mi Yeon,” he stopped me while I was passing him to get to Chanyeol’s room.

                “Hey,” I said casually, though my heart practically stopped when he called me. I am already nervous as it is.

                “Look,” he said and then took a deep breath. “All things aside, I just want you to be prepared.”

                “Prepared for what?”

                “Just…you know,” he shrugged. “This world is a ed-up place and it’s even more ed up for us. So…I guess…just, well, I’d like it if you just stay like you right now without giving a care about anything else.”

                “Uhm…” I didn’t quite comprehend him. Maybe because I was thinking then of other things. “Okay?”

                “That’s all,” he said and then turned his back on me. “Good night.”

                I watched as he entered his and Luhan’s shared room. When he’s completely out of sight, I knocked on Chanyeol’s room and showed myself right away.

                “Mi Yeon!” Chanyeol greeted me with his usual cheerful self. I tried to stick a gentle smile on my face. D.O. was sitting on the corner of the room, playing with his fortune cards. At the sight of me, he also smiled and nodded at me in acknowledgement. Kai, who’s sharing a room with them, was nowhere in sight, a fact that I’m secretly grateful about.

                “Chanyeol do you have a moment?” I asked, because I couldn’t talk to him openly with Kyungsoo around.

                “Yeah, sure,” he said. ‘I’m cool. What is it?”

                I motioned him to come out of the room with me. He’s a bit puzzled but still optimistic. I led him silently to another room which isn’t occupied at all. Since this is only an inn and the staff aren’t very particular with the lock system, any person could just practically use any room that’s vacant.

                “So,” he said once we’re in. Meanwhile, I was checking if we are completely alone. You never know these days. “What are we gonna talk about?”

                “There’s a place I need to go…” I started, checking his expression.

                “Okay?” Chanyeol said quite unsurely.

                “It’s not a very nice place,” I tried to be as vague as possible. “And I need someone to accompany me.”

                “I’m not sure about this, Mi Yeon,” he said. I expected him to say so. “You’re not supposed to be going anywhere.”

                “That’s why I’m asking you to help me,” I pleaded, practically asking him to understand. “Please.”

                “Where is it anyway?” he asked.

                “Outside,” I said because I don’t know where the destination is too as we will have a guide later. Before he gets even more suspicious, I asked, “Can you transform into an ant?”

                “Uhhh…” he said, distracted. “No?”

                “You can’t?”

                “It’s not that I can’t…” Chanyeol said and shrugged. “But, it’s dangerous. I don’t transform into something that small because my body and organs really transform like that of the animal. Someone could easily kill me if I did that. I can’t risk it.”

                “Oh…” I said. “How about a hamster? Can you do that for me?”

                “What are we really doing, Mi Yeon?” Chanyeol asked and I can see that he’s barely convinced about this plan.

                “The place we’re going…” I said, sighing. I’m having a hard time making him understand without giving out unnecessary information. “I need to look like I’m alone so I need you to disguise.”

                “So…” he said, thinking hard. “You’re going to meet someone important?”

                “Kinda,” I said, though I don’t really want to think of Seo Ji Hye as important. No, it disgusts me to the core.

                It took Chanyeol quite some time to respond, but when he did, it was on a positive note. He probably interpreted that I’m seeing an old friend or a relative. He probably thought better to accompany me than do another one of my previous mistake.

                “Ok then,” and Chanyeol was back to his happy self. I felt bad that I’m doing this to him.

                I’m sorry Chanyeol. Really am.

                In a second, he already transformed into a hamster and is placed inside the pocket of my jacket. Then I left the room and headed to the entrance of the inn where the veiled girl was waiting for me. As soon as I caught sight of her, I concentrated all my power on keeping Chanyeol intact. In short, I was stopping him from being able to transform back to his human self.

                I know I was doing something bad to him, and I deserved to be hated by Chanyeol, but I have to make sure that he’s safe. I have to make sure that if something bad happens to me, someone will be able to recover my body. It’s the best plan I could ever think.

                As soon as the night breeze hit my skin, I knew I was completely outside. The veiled girl levitated towards me. This time, the surroundings is so dark I can’t even see her pale scary face. It felt as if I’m just looking at a veil connected to a tiny body. It made me want to back out, but I know I can’t. I’m not sure if Chanyeol can see her, probably not because I don’t feel him retaliating.

                “I’m ready,” I said in a low voice.

                The veil was quite transfixed, and the voice didn’t come in my head until I saw a little white hand held itself to me, as if telling me to take hold of it.

                I held out my hand, ready to touch hers when a familiar voice called me from behind, “Mi Yeon?”

                I turned my head slightly and saw that it was Kai. He was dumbfounded at first, and then his expression changed faster than the traffic light turning from yellow to red. That’s how I know he can see the creature I’m with and he doesn’t agree with what I’m supposed to do.

                He started to run as fast as he can towards me, but he was too late. Because at the time, the veiled girl latched her hand on mine and I was into darkness, spinning here and there, giving me a terrible churning in my stomach. I hit the ground quite indecently. I held my hand out so I would not fall face first on to the soil. When my head finally recovered from the spin, I stood up and saw that I landed in what seemed like a mini-forest, or just probably a clearing secluded by clumped trees. In any case, I don’t feel like we disapparated in a place too far from the inn.

                I looked around me and there was practically no one. The veiled girl was gone, but then balls of blue light suddenly appeared.

                When I looked straight, a figure was walking towards me. Someone tall, and wearing all white. Someone familiar.

                “You!” I exclaimed in recognition.

                But he didn’t reply to me. He did look but then turned to his side, and said to no one in particular, “Lady Seo.”

                That’s when Seo Ji Hye appeared out of the literal black. She appeared as how I remember her to be, surrounded in a mysterious, evil aura. At the sight of me, she put on a horrible smile, a taunting one and held her arms wide to each of her side as if expecting me to come there and just embrace her. I felt the hamster Chanyeol moving crazily inside my pocket as if finally realizing what’s happening. I tried to control him with my power, covering his own with mine, and put a hand harshly over the pocket to quiet him down.

                Aside from the guy wearing all white, Ji Hye brought no shadows nor any other miserable being with her.

                “Lee Mi Yeon,” she said in her tiny voice that annoys me every single time. “My friend. How I missed you so much. It took so long for you to agree to this.”

                “Cut the crap,” I said though I’m starting to feel her effect on me once again. Weird images were being produced in my head. Vivid ones of blood and old nightmares, like that dream where my father jumped in front of me and took all the knives. That particular one which gave me cold sweats before. Now, my head is reminiscing the feeling of jumping off the cliff with Sehun who’s preparing himself to hit the ice. I continued what I wanted to say to distract my insides from turning all soft, “Now tell me what I should know.”

                “Impatient as usual,” Ji Hye remarked, the awful grin still plastered on her face like a tattoo. When she spoke, the scene of Luhan getting tortured back in the boulder played in my head like a sick movie. “I see you didn’t bring the medal. Does that mean you’re trading Kai?”

                “No,” I said, my voice a little weaker, or probably because I just can’t hear myself well. The effect she has on me is terrible.  As for the medal, I left it with my magic necklace under Xiumin’s pillow. I thought that Ji Hye might attempt to steal it from me that’s why I didn’t bring it. It’s nice to know that I made the right choice. “Why would I give Kai? So you can feed on him?”

                “Feed on him?” Ji Hye asked and then she let out a mirthless laugh, well, more of like a cackle. “That’s a nice way of phrasing it! But no