Author’s note:

FIRST OF ALL, I AM SO SORRY

I made you all wait so long and I’m so mad at myself. I totally have a story to tell but with the stress of school and work last semester I wasn’t able to work on this at all. And then by the time I had free time I’d forgotten all about it.

I re-read everything I wrote recently and… well to be honest I hated it. So, please think of this as a reboot of Incarnate, and think of the original chapter I posted as something like a pilot episode… haha. I promise I will try very hard not to make you all wait so long this time. Thank you to all who commented and to everyone who waited around for so long.

P.S. I'll be deleting the original prologue chapter in probably 24 hours just to minimalize confusion.

It was in the summer when the scent first wafted through the air.

The monsoon-like rains of the wet season kicked up dust from the cracks in the sidewalks and purged them into the atmosphere, curling their musty scents into the noses of the city. But the scents he was able to discern were so unalike to those normal people smelled that the must hardly even went noticed. Those that he smelled were the freshly scraped knees of children who fell while playing on the sidewalk, the paper cuts of the office workers too busy to meet a deadline to notice their wound, the less-than-innocent car accidents from speeding in the rain where lives were put at risk in favor of a brisk commute.

In essence, he smelled blood.

Each body held a different flavor, a marking that distinguished one from the other, a recognizable trace even from a distance. And once he had smelled a flavor it was never truly forgotten in his more than clever mind. It stayed with him in his memory for later use, whether he wanted it to or not.

On this particular occasion however, memory seemed to be in error, for the scent that carried across the backs of the students crossing the courtyard had already belonged to someone and could no longer be in use. The scent of blood was like a finger print or the shape of an ear, no two were exactly alike. And Kyungsoo could not be mistaken, because this scent had enraptured him from the moment he could first truly smell. Since he could first taste a soul.

Yet he must have been mistaken. Because even though he turned in an instant, the scent dipped and disappeared among the masses along with the rest of the student body, never to be touched upon again throughout the rest of the summer.

Kyungsoo shrugged all thought of it off immediately, because in his grand scheme the mysterious smell was inconsequential. He had been brought to Seoul with a purpose – on a wild goose chase, the others liked to call it – which did not involve becoming side-tracked in the ordinary life he’d set up for himself as a cover.

No, his purpose and objective had been clear cut since the day he’d been reborn so many years ago. He was convinced of it, for even though he’d tried to forget the pain it had never really left him. It had stayed as cold and immovable as the dead and useless thing he called his heart. The only life-blood that drove through his veins now was not even his own, it was the physical blood that had been stolen at the expense of others. But that was more for another time.

So in Kyungsoo’s small world, the scent was easily forgotten, or more accurately put aside to look at another picture – the bigger picture. It had been so long since he’d really paid attention to anything other than his objective that he’d easily let slip a few incidents like this that certainly shouldn’t have gone unnoticed.

Had he been paying more attention, he might not have been so surprised the first time he truly laid eyes on him.

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“Do Kyungsoo?”

Kyungsoo’s head snapped up to the woman gesturing him from the small window across the lobby, her words ringing louder than necessary across the space to his extra sensitive ears. With a sigh he flipped the magazine he’d been idly leafing through closed and back into the rack by the front door before approaching the desk.

As if these kids really need garbage magazines pushed at them at school when they have access to cell phones, he thought with a scoff and a roll of his eyes.

However, he put on his most polite smile for the young secretary at the window, making sure his smile reached the corners of his eyes just like he’d practiced. He heard her pulse quicken and the slight stutter in her first words.

“Dr. Kim is ready for you,” she managed, and he nodded before passing by her into the department head’s office.

His ears perked as he settled across the desk from his professor, the secretary muttering under her breath from the other room, “He’s what? Like, at least 10 years younger than you. Get ahold of yourself.” Then there was the subtle swish of air as she attempted to fan her face with her hand. He smiled to himself at the irony – ah, to be young.

“I got your email, Mr. Do,” his professor began, wrinkles crinkling as he smiled. “I think you’d be a great fit for my class. I’ve been using your essay on Bram Stoker’s Dracula for almost 2 years now as an example for incoming freshman. It’s probably the best essay I’ve received in my entire career.”

“I’m glad, Professor. It’s one of my favorite fictions, so it’s an honor.”

“So, I see you already have the student contract filled out. I’ll just sign it and we can send it to the Academic Office. Your credits will show up probably in about a day or two when the site refreshes, but here you go!” he said ing the paper back into Kyungsoo’s face when he’d finished. “My official new Teacher’s Assistant! Hand this to Ms. Choi on the way out and you’re golden. I’ll send you an email with c