The moment Chae Hyungwon received his soulmate’s name on the back of his nape, he had it burned off. It was better that way, for people like him, not to get involved in the whole soulmate business. He didn’t even look at it. The moment he felt it form on his skin, a tingling sensation that took a while to go away, Hyungwon marched right up to Minhyuk’s room with a lighter in hand and pushed it towards the other boy.

“Are you sure?” Minhyuk had asked, one last time.

“Of course.”

Soulmates, romance, everything of the like—those things were meant for people who deserved to be loved, after all. Hyungwon knew he was better off without such a hindrance in his life. He’s got too much blood on his hands; too many lives taken, too many people who probably lost their own soulmate due to him, too many sins that weighed him down. Sometimes, he wished he never took the job to begin with.

He’s thought about it. He’s thought about what it would be like to just jump back in time for the last time, destroy the watch, and then live on as if he never became part of The Clan. Unfortunately, they found him at a crucial point in his life. Orphaned and reckless, it was all too easy for Hyungwon to accept a chance to escape his miserable life and wreak havoc. It had felt liberating, at first, until he realized there was no escape.

Even if he kept running away, they would always end up finding him.

He was eighteen when his soulmark appeared on his skin.

When Hyungwon was twenty years old, it appeared again, this time on the back of his left leg. He felt it happen in the middle of a job, just as he had shot the target on the back of her head and watched her slump onto the floor, the sensation familiar and unwelcome. When he had cursed, loudly, Hyunwoo actually thought he missed. The younger man gave his superior an incredulous look and said, “when have I ever missed?”

He still didn’t look at the name when he entered Minhyuk’s room again.

The other man had looked surprised, “soulmarks can do that?”

“How am I supposed to know?” Hyungwon asked, flopping down on his friend’s bed, still tired from the latest mission. 36 hours without sleeping had taken its toll on him, but he knew he had to get rid of the name before he slept, otherwise he would wake up tempted to look at it. That wouldn’t have been good. He tossed the blonde his lighter again as Minhyuk caught it with swift fingers and sighed.

“Maybe this is a sign,” Minhyuk said, despite the way he clicked the lighter on regardless. “Maybe you shouldn’t run away from this.”

“Just do it.”

Hyungwon fell asleep despite the sharp pain on his leg, ignoring the way it seemed to spark all the way up his heart, making his chest ache.

It was when Lee Minhyuk was charged guilty—for stealing a watch and using it to bring his brother back—and sentenced to time banishment, that Hyungwon realized he was right about the fact that he couldn’t escape even if he tried. He thought about the way death seemed like an even better punishment than banishment. The thought of immediate death was better than being transported into a dark world, unsure when death would even come, all alone.

Still, he knew how he was The Clan’s best asset.

Even if he killed himself, which was highly tempting now that his best friend was gone from the world, he would just be brought back.

Punished, sure, but it wouldn’t be like what Minhyuk received. They considered the blonde dispensable, his work could easily be picked up by a new recruit, so they had no qualms getting rid of him. All he did was go through the texts that would give them their next target, since he with a gun. They knew of Hyungwon’s stunning track record. At most, he was probably just going to get his brain zapped into obedience like they did the first time he had tried to rebel against his leaders.

It felt weird having the room across his empty.

Just a few days later, Hyungwon heard that someone was going to be moving in.

“They couldn’t have waited at least a few weeks before replacing him?” He complained to Kihyun in private, when the other man had dropped by to give him his latest mission files. Sure, he didn’t like knowing that the room was empty, but it made his blood boil to see how little they thought of Minhyuk. The latter had been around even before he was recruited, did most of The Clan’s dirty work when nobody was willing, and what do they do? Find some fresh blood to replace him, just like that.

Kihyun merely shrugged, “are you really surprised? You know how things around here are. Don’t be too harsh on the new recruit, I heard he’s softer than even Minhyuk.”

The raven-haired man winced at the thought.

He was twenty-three years old when he met Wen Junhui, the recruit who had the pleasure of moving into the room across his, and also the unfortunate job of taking over what Minhyuk once did. The poor kid was swimming in data that had to be organized almost immediately, barely giving him the time to actually get properly integrated with the way things worked. Junhui had eyes that sparkled, Hyungwon couldn’t help but noticed, a rare sight for a job like theirs.

The Chinese man also liked visiting his room.

“Why are you here again?” Hyungwon asked after the third time he heard the knocks on his door.

“My eyes get tired easily,” Junhui replied, making his way through the dimly lit room like he had already memorized it despite it only being his third visit. He always sat on the chair across Hyungwon’s bed, mainly because the older man would choose to lie back down after opening the door, and that day was no different. He spun the chair around once, twice, before shrugging, “besides, you’re not as scary as Hoseok. Have you seen his muscles? He could probably break me in half.”

Hyungwon scoffed, “I’m kind of insulted. You don’t think I’m scary?”

He remembered, far too vividly, the way Junhui blinked at him before a wide smile spread across the younger boy’s face.

“Of course not.”

“Well,” Hyungwon replied after a moment’s pause, meaning every word. “You should be.”

He doesn’t think about soulmates or anything of the sort for a long time after he had his mark burned off