Ama closed her eyes, turned her head very slightly.

The first blade slipped through her hair, cutting a few strands. The second blade missed her completely, aiming for Jaebum, but the way the young woman was placed didn’t allow the blade to reach its target, at least not perfectly. It went for the neck and slashed the skin, tracing a line there but mostly breaking the delicate silver chain around Jaebum’s neck.

The reaction wasn’t all that long. By the time the blades wielded by the two men who had attacked went back up, ready to strike again, two pure red eyes glowed brightly.

Jaebum’s beast form had awakened.

He looked up with a deep growl, showing enormous fangs, his hair turning pitch black, so dark light wasn’t even reflecting on it. His skin had also turned black, becoming shadowy, pure black smoke coming out of it. The tattooed symbol on his body had turned pure red and was covering his entire torso. There was some sort of spiky chain rolled around the left arm, digging into the smoke-skin, and it was obvious it could act both as a weapon, as part of it was dangling on the floor, as well as a shield, since it looked really durable.

Jaebum chose this moment to prove that, simply raising his left arm, not caring that he lacked a hand there. The blades that had started slashing downwards were stopped easily by the chain. Jaebum’s growl became a roar as he got up, moving at an incredible speed and using the only hand he had to break both blades before he punched one of the foes, making the latter fly into a wall, dead before he even touched it. In the same movement, he used his other arm, controlling the chain using his own will, wrapping the end of his wrist with the spikes, turning it into a dangerous weapon he immediately used on the remaining opponent, shoving it right into the man’s heart.

Once this was done, the creature, the beast Jaebum had become started devouring his opponents. Ama opened her eyes, keeping quiet, scared. The two guys had been shadow spirits… they didn’t have a lot of Stripes, so they still had blood, they were still made of edible matter. It took about an hour before Jaebum was done, turning his head slowly towards the only living thing remaining in the room except for himself.

Edible? He was curious. He let his chain dangle back down, stalking his way slowly towards the warm-blooded creature that was hiding in a corner. Useless. He lifted a clawed hand, ready to kill.

“If you kill me now, I will haunt you for the rest of your life and force you to stay alive and regret all the you did. And I’ll give you the biggest indigestion you’ve ever had.”

Jaebum stopped with a curious and surprised growl. The creature had spoken? Weird. The prey had been so calm. Why was that? Was it not afraid of death? Tsk. Not that it mattered to him, he was hungry still, and-

Wait. It did matter to him.

He stopped, staring straight at the warm-blooded creature. He was hungry. He wanted to devour the little human.

He had to stop.

But the hunger…

She was not a prey.

All humans were preys.

Not her.

There was a flash of light and, suddenly, the broken chain was whole and around his neck again. He shook himself as his hair went back to its natural color, his eyes losing their beastly glow, going back to their normal colors. The chain melted into his arm as his skin got paler and paler.

And then, there he was. Half- because of the transformation, which had made him turn much bigger than he usually was, but he was back. A little mocking smile appeared on his lips.

“I won’t let you haunt me,” was all he had time to say before he lost consciousness, the transformation having been extremely tough on his weakened body.

Ama just chuckled and touched his cheek gently as he was lying down, his head on her lap. He was such a fluffy puppy when he was allowing himself to have feelings. And even when he wasn’t… he was… different. He was kind in a cold way, mean in a warm way. He was so weird and yet, she knew about her own feelings. She loved Jaebum. If she hadn’t, she wouldn’t have come to see him. She wouldn’t have done such a lengthy research just to find him and she was pretty damn glad she had managed to find him on that day.

Once he’d wake up, she would wish him a happy birthday. They were on January 6^th, after all.