Chapter X "House of Doubt"   

"Even the sky without a single cloud. Everything feels cold." ~ Bangtan Boys 'Hold Me TIght'   

“A phoenix being?” He asked, his mouth holding on to the words as slight doubt lingering. Minyoung nodded, her lips pressed into a thin line as she looked down at the black snake asking for her attention.

“That’s not all. Minyoung and I are phoenix beings, but we think you are something different.” Junhoe spoke, his eyes closing as if it was painful to say such a thing. Junhoe had a theory but he was afraid of the truth that extended in that theory.

“What exactly do you think I am then? Why is it different from what you are?” Jungkook asked, the question posing a slight tension in the room. Minyoung seemed surprised his questions came out with ease, she was shocked that he was actually taking in all of this information and not pushing it aside as a lie.

“We think, well, I think you are a mortal phoenix.” Junhoe spoke, taking the first step into conversation. He inched closer, dreading having to explain his entire theory to Jungkook. The simple name caused something inside of Jungkook to jump, taken off guard. He remembered them discussing this possibility up on the roof.

“No human can turn into a phoenix being. If the attempt is even made, the human will die.” Minyoung spoke, her eyes feeling too afraid to even look Jungkook in the eyes. She simple looked at her pet in a slight panful stare as Junhoe took the lead.

“My theory is that a phoenix can pass down part of his power to a human, then the human will be one of us. I came up with this theory years ago, and it sounded so bizarre and terrible I brushed it aside. I decided it was impossible.” Junhoe spoke, his feet moving him slowly towards Jungkook who simply sat there. He was breathing normally but he could tell that from the way he hugged the pillow, he was frozen in shock.

“Why do you think I’m one then? Why is it so bad?” Jungkook asked, his gaze was deeply buried in the golden snake that was wrapping around Junhoe’s leg. His throat was in a knot, he didn’t know how much he could believe and how this will change his life. The mere thought was terrifying in its own.

“The other day I helped you, try hard to recall what really happened that day.” Junhoe spoke, his eyes filling up with guilt to the brim as his throat was forming a knot from keeping that day hidden from Minyoung and him.

Jungkook stared off in the coffee table, feeling like this little memory that was chained inside of a box at the back of his head becoming free. On the roof top, he remembered the room and who was there, but he didn’t know why. The pure memory begun to flash before his mind, it felt like still shot of the entire incident were passing by his eyes.

“The vampire. She said my blood was special, and you had her give me this wound to see how special it was.” He spoke, his words igniting a sight anger look from Minyoung as she shot Junhoe a deathly glare.

“I’m sorry, what?” She asked, her voice tinted in disbelief and confusion as Jungkook nodded, his thoughts somehow trailing to that wound. He thought it was from when he tripped and dozed off. He believed he skidded against a piece of glass that was left from a dropped soju bottle, but he guessed his memories were played with.

“I was kidnapped by two vampires, they took a liking to my blood. Junhoe showed up with a huge white and grey wolf to save me. Why did you ask her to do this?” He asked, his hand shaking as he reached for the bandage that was tightly wrapped around his forearm. The wound looked completely healed. The stitches even came off as no trace of a wound was found.

“She described your blood in an inhumane way and my theory of the mortal phoenix flashed inside my head. I needed to see if she was telling the truth. I knew she was when I saw your blood.” Junhoe tried to subdue the situation, knowing lying to Minyoung about what really happened was going to backlash completely.  

“Your blood was darker than any human and it was mixed with white chakra. Look.” Jungkook felt his heart drop slightly as Junhoe pulled a glass blade from the drawer next to him. He felt his body move back as Junhoe glided the glass blade up his forearm.

“Stop!” Jungkook screamed, his voice trembling as his eyes flew shut. He felt a prick of pain traveling through his own body at the pure thought of Junhoe hurting himself.

“No, he isn’t hurting himself. The glass is enchanted to hide our human aspects and reveal our phoenix ones. Look.” Minyoung spoke, her voice full of slight amusement and assurance. She forgot she was supposed to be angry at Junhoe. Jungkook felt his senses at ease as he slowly opened his eyes.

Junhoe’s arm was almost stripped of skin, it was like a window opened to reveal the abnormality on the inside. Jungkook’s eyebrows knitted in confusion as he saw his veins. They pumped a black liquid and a light blue one.

“We have blood, but its black blood. The other one is chakra, it’s our source of energy that allows us to use our powers. Phoenix beings have blue chakra, Phoenixes have white chakra, like the light that created them.” Minyoung spoke, her eyes oddly dragging Jungkook in as he felt the fear drain out of him.

Not realizing what he was doing, Jungkook placed his forearm next to Junhoe’s. The bandage being stripped from his arm as Junhoe looked at him with a concern visage. Sighing, he lifted his hand and scrapped softly Jungkook’s forearm with the cold glass blade.

Almost everything was stripped and transparent due to the fact that he was born and still is human. But they could see it barely, a vein that carried a white substance mixed with some blood. If it wasn’t for the color, Jungkook would say it was just like Junhoe’s arm.

Panic arose from inside off him, this slight feeling of fear and a suffocating force that wanted him to leave the room. He stepped away from them, retreating to his spot, not knowing what he should do.

“If we are correct, there is great power inside of you. The reason it’s terrifying is because this power is one the dark forces will kill to get. If they find out about you, they will hunt you down and turn you into one of them.” Junhoe’s words were cold and stiff. He feared for his life as much as he did. His heart sunk and he wondered who would have done such a thing to him.

“How we are made are through the tears of the Phoenixes themselves. Since you were born human, you are mortal but with part of the phoenix power inside of you. You are a mortal phoenix.” Minyoung spoke, meeting his eyes for the first time in the conversation as Jungkook sunk back in the couch slightly.

He recalled those words Jin whispered in the fire. Before Jin died, he apologized, telling Jungkook he will be a mortal phoenix. Could Jin be the one who planted this great power inside of him? Then Jin must have been a phoenix himself. The thought was overwhelming. But now that he thought about it, it made sense. He always felt safe and whole near Jin. And since that fire happened, he has been seeing weird thing he never noticed before, having odd about creatures he has never seen.

“What happens now then? Will I be hunted down my entire life? Why would I be targeted by darkness?” Jungkook spoke, his voice soft and out of breath. It sounded like someone hit him in the stomach. There was a painful look in his eyes, they glimmered with a sad realization that he was in danger. Minyoung bit her lip, feeling the right side of her torso stinging and burning, they were causing harm to a human.

“Your power and the fact that you are half human makes it easy for anyone to manipulate the power you hold. You’ll turn into the main weapon of the darkness if they find you.” Junhoe spoke, not sparing to sugar coat what he was saying. It was the raw reality that they were living in.

Everything begun to pile up. The gravity of the situation was finally setting in and it felt like a chunk of concrete was on top of him. A knot was forming in his throat as he begun to think what would happen now.

“We need to move you into the academy before anyone else notices it. Your power was awoken, and you don’t know how to control it. We can read your mind and mood and even put you to sleep, that power you bestow can prevent us from doing all of that. If we could do it so easily, some dark being will be able to read it too.” Minyoung spoke, her words were picked carefully as she stared at Jungkook with an apologetic set of eyes.

She saw something, she saw his path. A path that was not easy and one that could even kill him. She saw this great power that’s dangerous. She didn’t know how we Jungkook’s human side will handle everything, how well he will be able to control this power before someone tries to get it to consume him.

“Put me to sleep? You guys did that before, but how?” Jungkook was lost in a train of thought, thoughts that he didn’t know he was so comfortable in having. Hell, if someone told him a month ago about this, he would cackle at the insane thought. But noting all the things that he has been seeing, it wasn’t that insane.

“Yes. We did it in the roof top, that’s why you didn’t know how you got here. Have you ever felt oddly comfortable, feeling your mood change and feeling…attracted to us in an unexplainable way?” Minyoung spoke, her voice was soft and hypnotizing, it oddly made Jungkook comfortable in spilling everything he has been feeling around them.

“Yes, for both of you.” His cheeks were turning red as the tip of his ears were flushing a bright crimson color too. The latter wanted to hide under his covers, realizing he admitted feeling attracted to both Minyoung and Junhoe. Minyoung held in her giggle of amusement as she took a deep breath and explained everything.

“We were created to protect humanity. Everything about us is meant to get human’s attraction. My voice can hypnotize you and make you believe what I say. My touch can reassure you safety and make you feel like you’re not alone. My presence can make you feel like the world stopped and there is only good. This attraction can be felt by any human and towards any being, that’s why Junhoe can also make you feel like this.” Minyoung smiled, feeling amusement from the situation. Jungkook stared at Junhoe, the same smug smile appeared on his face and it didn’t help the situation when he send a flirty wink towards him.

“This shows your human side is strong. One of the powers we hold is that we can hypnotize humans and put them to sleep in dangerous situations. This is usually done through the mind, you are tricked into smelling a scent unique to you, a scent so attached to your memories and senses that your mind shuts down.” Junhoe spoke, his flirty smile appearing as he explained everything in a very happy manner that lifted the entire aura in the room.

Jin’s cologne. That’s all he remembered smelling before he was completely knocked out. Jin was that attached to his memories then, but why? He loved Jin, he was the best friend he could have asked for, but he never felt a greater love for him that wasn’t on a friend basis.

“So this academy you mentioned, why must I go there?” Jungkook shook his head out of that pool of thoughts he forgot was there. He didn’t want to think about it too much, he didn’t know why.

He was having this off feeling, he was feeling very sketchy and skeptical. He didn’t know why but the usual feeling of trust that they emitted was no longer there, or it was but it was very thin and disappearing. He didn’t want to go anywhere, he didn’t even ask for this.

“The Breaking Dawn Academy was established by the master Phoenixes to teach us how to control our powers and how to fight monsters that pose a threat to the human world.” Minyoung spoke, flipping through pages of her book, everything she spoke of was depicted by a pencil drawing. The academy caught Jungkook’s eyes, it looked like a big pavilion with a giant maze for a backyard. The maze. That must have been the maze that he has been dreaming about since that fire.

“We need to prepare for your departure. We can’t make you disappear from the face of the earth, you have to make sure people know you are leaving out of your own will.” Junhoe spoke his words were sincere and to the point. But it all still didn’t make full sense in Jungkook’s mind. The snakes were coiling around everything that their spineless bodies could reach.

"But I don’t want to leave. I don’t want to go anywhere. Besides, what’s to say that you two aren’t the bad guys?” His question was spoken in slight fear but it wasn’t out of the blue.

In fact, Minyoung felt like praising the kid. He caught on into something and that is, thing’s aren’t always what they appear. He had every right to not trust them but that doubt was something they can’t afford to give him.

“You’re right, who would say that? I did in fact take your memories and gave you a deep wound, but I saved you. Don’t forget that.” His neck pulsated at those words. It was as if Junhoe’s words were jabbing at his neck, the same spot the vampires would penetrate to drink his blood.

“I can’t. This is all too much, I didn’t even want any of this. I never asked for some power that I don’t even know if I really do have. For all I know, I could be crazy.” Jungkook spoke, his words spoken with doubt and shaking nerves. He was questioning everything and anything.

“Neither did we. Think about it, you know in your heart we mean no harm.” Minyoung spoke, her eyes becoming dull but soon, they were a burning fire. The black snake that was coiling around her body looked at him and smiled.

No, they couldn’t. Why is it that the thing in his dream, the thing that is out to kill him in the maze is their pet? It didn’t seem right. That snake thing was evil, it was out to get rid of him and it didn’t seem right that they were owners of that same demon snake.

“Please, just stay away. You’ve harmed me enough.” Jungkook found himself stumbling on the words. One of the s hissed and his entire body was consumed by fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of them attacking and fear that everything they said was right.

His body jumped off his seat, his legs moving before he even noticed they were and he got out of there. The room had felt so suffocating, as if the air was so thick and hot he would have died if he stayed there one more second.

The moment he stepped outside, the streets of Seoul felt more suffocating that the apartment. Words, people’s unspoken words were all jumbled in his head. If he wanted to pick out a person through their thoughts, it’d be like finding a needle in the hay stack. Every countenance his eyes picked out, had their cheeks coated in a dense cloud of color.

Everything was worse than before, more enhanced and it didn’t seem to stop.

He felt the very light vibrations his phone usually gives off vibrating to a new level. It felt like a full and strong wave of power throughout his entire body. His eye darted to the right and left, his attention being grabbed by the faintest of smells and the smallest of details.

He didn’t know what it was. But inside the apartment, he felt normal. He didn’t sense all of this and he didn’t know why. They were probably doing something to him. Yeah, and it was best to stay away from them.

‘Kookie, where are you. You ditch class and you’re supposed to cover my shift at work. I have a date remember.’ Yugyeom’s words were so vibrant, the text itself seemed like a detailed paining was being shoved in his eyes.

He needed it to stop. All the noise, all the colors, all the enhancing. He needed it all to go away. He wanted to be normal and there was only one person responsible for this. Jin.