“Don’t say that,” Jihyo whispers, her voice cracks through the quite night, the hopeless tone stirring the hairs on the back of his neck. He has his hands shoved in the pocket of his jeans, watching her silently. Her hands are clenced into fists at her sides, they tremble slightly.  "Don't say that you love me do you hear?" There is a pause before he responds as he takes a step closer to her, "Why shouldn't I?" "I'm serious Jaehwan, I'll just ruin you..." There was a hesitant pause and then a hushed whisper. “I don’t care.”  She flinches. Appearantly even the smartest of souls could not deny love.  Jihyo shouldn't have come. She should have stopped showing up all together when she'd realized his identity but she'd needed human contact more than she cared about the consequences. “You can't love me...” Her voice is small, timid even, as if she were afraid of being right.  He couldn't love her. She was a monster. Half human and half manananggal.  “Well unfortunatly for you it's too late.” He said forcibly. His reply elicited a bitter laugh from her.  “Don't you see?” she sneered, “Nothing can ever happen between us! We are two very different people from two completely different worlds. You live within the walls of human sanctuary and I am cursed to roam the dead lands. If anyone found out that you were sneaking away from the city to meet with a monster what do you think they would do to you?" "It doesn't matter. Let them kill me. Let them torture me, no matter what they do they could never change my feelings for you!”  Jaehwan hadn't intended to fall in love with her. But she was different. She wasn't like the other undead, she could feel regret and guilt. She could cry and laugh. The elders were wrong, not all monsters were evil. She wasn't. Jihyo feels tears in her eyes and blinks them away angrily. “Why do you always make things sound so simple? This isn't simple Jaehwan. You're human and I'm the daughter of an awful creature that preys on humans...”  He drags his eyes away from her to look off in the distance. Towards the towering walls of the city.  “Because it’s easier to convince myself that there is a chance for us than to give in to the inevitable truth that we are two different. That are worlds are worlds were never supposed to cross." Jaehwan turns back to her and takes a final step, closing the distance betweem them. He trails his thumb lightly on her bottom lip and gazes into her eyes. They sparkle in the moonlight with unshead tears