The floorboards were worn now that he looked at them.
  With only a few days of absence, he needed to get used to the place all over again, but now he could see many details of the old shop that he once missed.
  Dreamcatchers and strange hangings rotated serenely from the ceiling. The shelves were lined with strange bottles and vases each painted with amazing detail and jewellery glinted from under the glass displays.
  The floor was old, having long lost its polished shine and become dull and scratched, but the path from the entrance to Yira’s little green door was the most worn, having become yellow with the years of customers.
  The smell of herbs was especially potent that day, coming down from the stairs in fumes. His face paled as he imagined the concoction Yira’s grandmother must be cooking upstairs.
  Bracing himself as if it were the first time all over again, he brought his hand to the brass knob, but as he opened the door he felt the tense atmosphere billow out with the smoke.
  There was a silhouette of a customer with Yira. Yira’s lips moved rapidly as if uttering a mantra but all he could hear were whispers. The customer’s posture was tense and hard, her hands balling into fists on her lap.
  Cautiously, he stepped into the room, trying to minimise his presence as he tried to observe the scene. He saw Yira, the picture of calm, speak with her. Even through the dim lighting he could see the colour in her face. Her lips were rosy and glossy, and her eyes shone. He was reminded partly why he liked her.
  “No, you’re wrong,” the girl insisted through gritted teeth. “That can’t be my fate. Do it again.”
  Despite her agitation, he noticed she was rather beautiful. A young woman he guessed to be in her early twenties. Her face was not so correct but she wore thick makeup and her figure was flawless like a model’s.
  Yira held her hand in her own, gazing at the lines with an apathetic stare. “It is as I told you,” she said harshly.
  “I paid you good money!”
  “I am not paid to tell you anything but the truth,” she replied, letting go of her hand and sitting back. “I am not in the business of lying, although many would believe otherwise.”
  “But!”
  Yira looked at her with her almond eyes empty of concern. Taehyung had been around her long enough to know that she found the woman an annoyance. “I suggest you save the finances you receive for the future.”
  The woman growled; her eyes wide and her face red through the smoke. She grabbed her shiny, chain string handbag and pushed out of her seat.
  “You know what? I’m going to tell everyone this place is a fraud. Good luck with your business; I am never coming back here again.”
  Taehyung caught a glimpse of a brand name swinging from her arm and the glint of enormous jewellery on her hands as she marched out the door, slamming it behind her.
  They were left alone in the dim, dark room; the candles looked like mounds of melted wax as the flames flickered close to the base.
  “You know, you’re going to lose all your customers if you keep it up,” he predicted as he approached.
  Yira waved her hand dismissively. “The ones worth keeping stay,” she said. She gestured to the candles. “While you’re here, make yourself useful and relight those candles.”
  Taehyung sighed and pulled out new ones from a cabinet behind her. It was difficult to see in the dimming light but he managed. “Why can’t you do it yourself?”
  “Since you’re taking up space you may as well earn it.”
  “Hey,” he began in a serious tone, the gong of a clock sounded from outside.
  “Hm?” she replied in a low hum. Her eyes were shut as if she were resting.
  “I’ve wanted to ask this for a while,” he said. “What are you? How does the whole psychic thing work?”
  Yira made no reply but she slowly opened her eyes like a waiting cat, revealing her almost golden irises.
  “Please don’t say I have to pay you,” he pleaded quickly as he sparked a flame with a sizzle of a matchstick.
  “We’re past that,” she answered. She picked up the pen and held it between her fingers, swaying it back and forth as if she were about to throw it like a dart.
  “What’s that other girl’s name?” he asked. “The one that’s out to kill me. Jun Jihyun? Jun Jiyoung? Jun Jiyoon?”
  “You wish it was Jun Jihyun. Her name is Jun Jirin,” she answered, flipping the pen between her fingers.
  “Why?” he asked. “What did I do to deserve this?”
  “Nothing. You were just unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. It’s quite a talent of yours.”
  “Can you give me a little more than that?” he asked, sounding annoyed. “I might die from this and I really don’t want to. What are you? What is she?”
  Yira breathed in a long breath of air and held up her free hand. “People like Jirin and I,” she began. “There is only a classroom’s worth of us scattered throughout the entire world. That’s roughly thirty in over eight billion. People with a strong sixth sense or intuition are much higher in number, but people you can say have true other worldly ability are rare. The chances of one of use coming across the other are extraordinarily low.”
  “How do you know this?” he questioned with a look of cautious curiosity.
  “It doesn’t matter,” she dismissed. “She moved here due to circumstances surrounding her father’s job. She is like me, however even if you strip away her powers she is still unusually gifted, a rapid learner and exceedingly bright as well as eccentric. This has left her largely alone and isolated. She was bored, that is, until she came here and discovered I exist.”
  “Basically,” she continued. “She 'found' another one of her kind, although I don’t particularly care to be lumped in with her. So for the first time, she thinks she has someone who can measure up to her, someone who can provide a challenge, which is why she started the game despite my lack of interest. To put it simply,” she said with a weary sigh. “She’s a child who wants a playmate.”
  She pointed the pen directly at Taehyung. “You were just unlucky enough to be within her sight.”
  “Wow,” he uttered sarcastically, his brows knitted in an offended frown. “Looks like I won the lottery.”
  “I have to admit, you do have an abnormal talent for these things,” she told him.
  “Son of a…” he muttered under his breath.
  She placed the pen back onto the table top and Taehyung took the customer seat, a dark look marring his face. “Okay, I’ve been asking this from day one, but how do you do the whole fortune telling thing? Seeing the future and knowing things without asking.”
  Yira leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs, showing him the palm of her left hand. “Remember what I said about hands?”
  “Yeah?”
  “You can tell a lot from a person by their hands,” she reminded. “For the most part, psychic powers are unnecessary, people are obvious creatures. Humans can’t even tell a lie without showing a physical sign.” She pointed a ringed hand to the door. “That girl that just left, can you tell me what she wore?”
  “Huh?” he replied, surprised. “How am I supposed to know that?”
  “Try.”
  He struggled to remember. “Uh, brand name bag, jewellery, nice clothes I guess.”
  “Aside from hands, you should look to the feet,” she advised. “They are usually the next best indicator. Now, her shoes resemble a certain pricey brand name, but are without a doubt, fake. It is the same with her handbag. It is quite convincing, but there was a loose seam on the side that would never exist on a real one.”
  “How do you notice all these things?” he questioned, admittedly amazed.
  “I suggest you do too if you want to be a policeman or detective, Kim Taehyung.” She suggested. “But let’s remain on topic. Then she gave me her hand. The jewellery is impressive, large, real, and without a doubt, expensive. Now tell me, future detective boy, why would a woman wear fake shoes and carry a dupe bag, yet have expensive jewellery?”
  “Someone else bought it for her,” he answered instantly.
  “Good, you’re learning,” she praised. “If you looked closely to her rings, you could see the designer’s engravings in the silver band. E. C. That particular designer is a skilled man with forty years of crafting experience. He is famous and favoured among the older generation due to his rather traditional and classic designs. One ring alone would have cost more than your car. So, put the pieces together; poor girl given pricey gifts favoured by the old.”
  A look of disgust and realisation crossed his face.
  “Yes, an older, wealthier man gave it to her, specifically a fifty eight year old with a wife and two kids. She is having an affair with a married man.”
  “Oh God,” he said in disgust.
  Yira gave an almost cocky smile. “And she wanted me to give her a positive fortune on her relationship. I assume you can understand why that was not possible.”
  “No wonder.”
  Yira sighed but the smile remained on her lips. “I don’t lie. It’s usually unnecessary anyway. She is a kept woman. She wanted to know if they would ever marry, and as you’ve seen, she reacted badly when she was told the truth.”
  “She probably deserves it,” he said harshly. “What the hell is she doing with a married man?”
  Yira’s smile maintained but her eyes grew stern. She raised a single finger. “Don’t place all the blame on her alone,” she advised in a wise tone. “Consider the man. How old do you think she was when they met?”
  “I don’t know? Twenty two maybe?” he guessed.
  “The girl is only twenty; he met her when she was eighteen.”
  “What?” he exclaimed in shock.
  “Yes, her makeup does make her quite a bit older looking doesn’t it?” she smiled. “But in reality, she is only our senior by a few years. He targeted her specifically because she was young and malleable. She may have been of legal age but legality does not determine emotional maturity. She is naïve and she still carries with her a good amount of adolescent selfishness. He is the one with all the power, and he willingly and methodically chose to be unfaithful, choosing someone he could control.”
  She clapped her hands together and sat back. “And then there are the consequences. When the time comes, the girl will have nothing. She would have wasted her prime, and be left with nothing. She will have to pawn everything he gave her and be shamed as well as heartbroken. However, he will suffer nothing. He is rich and powerful. Even if his wife leaves, he wouldn’t care. His children are already grown, and he will move on to the next girl. He is a predator in every sense of the word.”
  “That’s not right,” he growled angrily. “People like that deserve to have something coming to them.”
  “True,” she agreed. “But our society tends to favour the rich and male.”
  “It shouldn’t.”
  “Then I suggest you do something about it when you’re a policeman or a detective. Make friends with some talented prosecutors while you are are at it.”
  His eyes narrowed at her. “Okay then, I can get how you can tell she was having an affair with an older man, but how do you know the rest? The age, the family, and what happens?”
  Yira sighed. “It’s involuntary,” she explained. “When a person comes within my line of sight, there are things I know about them straight off. Much like how you can tell their hair colour by looking, I can tell their fate and life just by looking. It’s like how I know you have a date with Chaerin tomorrow at midnight.”
  “What?!” he spluttered, going as red as a tomato. “Don’t do that!”
  “Not my choice,” she replied. “Like I said, it’s involuntary. However, I do have to say, midnight is quite the suggestive-”
  “Can we go back on topic?!” he redirected. He hated the thought of Yira knowing, it made him feel like he was doing something wrong. “And we aren’t going to do anything!”
  Her eyebrow rose.
  “Don’t look further!” he yelled, raising his hands out in front of him.
  Yira shrugged. “It’s not my concern what you do.”
  Ouch. He flinched. That hurt for some reason.
  “Well, back on topic like you asked,” she sighed. “What I have is a combination of remote viewing, retrocognition, psychometry, precognition, and clairvoyance. Those are the technical terms anyway.”
  “I see a lot but I don’t see everything,” she clarified. “There is only a certain amount of information I receive straight off. To pry further I’d have to expend effort.”
  “Then why don’t you?”
  “It’s needless,” she replied coldly. “Theoretically, I can see the fate of the whole world if I tried hard enough, but it’s a waste of time and energy.”
  “How can you think like that?” he questioned. “If you knew the fate of the world, you could do something about it.”
  Yira chuckled a little, as if laughing at his idealism. “Even if say, I know. So what? The fate of the world will come regardless. There are few people with that much influence so as to change the world. What will happen will happen regardless of what you want. It’s useless, and it extends to customers too. You only need to know a little about them and it’s enough. It’s not necessary to expend the effort, and I’d rather save my energy.”
  Taehyung frowned at her reasoning but he couldn’t fault her. What truly bothered her was the lack of concern she had. Even if it was helpless, he felt like she should at least be worried.
  “So do you see visions or hear voices?” he asked.
  “No,” she answered simply. “Most thoughts in a person’s mind are not in auditory or visual form. It’s raw impulse. For example, if you move to pick up the pen, you do not think the words 'pick up the pen'. You have an impulse to just do it. It is raw information with no form. That’s what I receive when I look at people.”
  He looked to the ground and his face was dark with shadows. “…Is that what you see when you look at me?”
  Yira’s eyes glanced down and a melancholy smile fell on her lips. To her, his face still bore a mark as powerful as the visage of the reaper himself. “Yes. It’s rather clear and vivid, metaphorically speaking.”
  He gripped at the fabric of his pants and his lips tightened in a straight line.
  Yira looked to him and shrugged. “Who knows, you survived to this point. Maybe you’ll win.”
  He gave a dark chuckle. “Yeah, I already escaped three deaths.”
  “Actually, it’s four.”
  “Wait, what-”