Arin was not able to relax that day. As she went into her third extraction session with Larali, Sangbin, and Yoonsa, she found herself doubting whether she was helping the good guys or the bad guys. Larali helped to keep the anxiety at bay for a couple of hours, but when the session ended, and Arin went back to her temporary home, it came crashing down on her.

She was freaking out by the time she made it back. Her fingers were bleeding, and she found herself worrying about the hostage girl, and more importantly, worrying about ~. Would MRS find her? Would they kill her?

She remembered how even Jun looked guilty for what he was doing. She took out her phone and texted him, hoping he would ease her anxiety just a little bit.

Jun, are you there?

No reply. As the anxious over-thinker that she was, she found herself imagining the worst. Was he not replying because he decided to dissent from MRS, and now MRS was keeping him hostage and took away his phone? Maybe they killed him? Maybe Hyojung killed him? Then she imagined that Hyojung was now at MRS Headquarters, and had killed everyone else: Hoshi, Larali, Sangbin. Because of the potion, Arin was still in love with Sangbin, so the idea of him being hurt set her off like nothing else did.

She was freaking out so much. All of her fingers were bleeding.

Seconds later, the doorbell rang.

“Arin, it’s me,” it was Woozi’s voice from behind the door. “I know I promised to leave you alone and never return, but I need some of the equipment from my office. It’s urgent.”

It was not the right time for him right now. She wished he would go away and come back later, but she didn’t say anything and hoped he would get the hint. Instead, he took her silence as approval, and he came in anyway. He was met with the sight of Arin with her face blank and her hands covered in blood.

“Are you okay?” he asked as he approached, eyes fixated on her bleeding fingers.

“Just go get what you need and leave,” she requested, and continued to pick her tattered cuticles.

“You need to stop doing that…” Woozi said, taking a few steps closer.

“Leave me alone.”

“Doesn’t it hurt? Why are you still doing it?” he asked.

It did hurt. It hurt like hell, but that was the point. The physical pain was distracting in a good way, and she wanted to keep feeling it. She wanted it to hurt more. It was a dangerous mindset that could permanently hurt her hands, but at that moment, she didn’t care.

“Stop it!” he said with more insistence, coming closer than she was comfortable.

“Go away,” she yelled, but he didn’t listen. He was going for her wrists, trying to keep her from hurting herself, and it triggered her. She fought him off with her arms, using her bloodied hands to keep him off her. Somehow, her fingers went across his mouth.

Woozi then froze for a moment. There was a trail of her fingers’ blood going from his left cheek into his mouth.

Then, his whole body began to spasm, and he lost his balance and fell backwards.

It was exactly how her body reacted when she drank the love potion.

When he regained his composure, he peered at her with a strange look in his eyes.

“What the...” he peered at her, then closed his eyes and opened them, again, then again.

There was a different look in his eye. He looked genuinely hurt to see her suffer, genuinely afraid for her.

As she studied his facial expression, Arin began to understand what was going on. Her blood had gotten into his mouth; that blood probably absorbed remnants of the love potion, which meant that the love potion was taking effect on him. The first person he saw when he opened his eyes was her. He was in love with her now.

“Something is… umm…” he struggled to find the words, but he continued to peer at her with genuine concern.

“Please leave me alone,” she repeated more calmly, hoping he would listen to her this time.

He looked hurt by that request, but he just nodded his head, bowed, and retreated, continuously looking back at her as he did so, as if taking her all in.

Before he left, he stopped, turned to her again, and said, “I know it’s not the right time, but… did you do something to your hair?”

“No,” she answered him.

“Something is different about you, and I can’t place my finger on it.”

“I’m having a mental breakdown,” Arin answered. “That’s what’s different.”

“No, that’s not it,” he said, happy to keep speaking to her, talking a few careful steps back toward her.

“It’s your hair. It’s nicer. It’s… I don’t know. I can’t explain it.”

Arin would have laughed at that had her fingers not been bleeding dry. That’s what happened when you’re under the effect of the love potion: the person suddenly became beautiful in your eyes, even if nothing at all changed about them.

“Or maybe it’s your face. Are you wearing make-up or something?” Woozi asked.

“No.”

“Did you lose weight?”

“No.”

“Then why do you look so different?” The question seemed to genuinely trouble him.

As he spoke to her, she felt the release of tension in her body. She was calming down, being distracted by the thoughts that were suffocating her. He was also slowly getting closer and closer to her.

“Is it your clothes? Is that a new outfit?”

Arin looked down at her now bloodstained hoodie that she had worn at least four other times in front of him because of her meager wardrobe. She shook her head.

“You have very pretty eyes,” he said to her as he came closer. “I don’t know why I never noticed them before.”

At this point he was close enough to reach out for her hands. She let him take them this time. He held both of her hands gently, keeping both of her hands apart she couldn’t hurt herself anymore.

Arin, distracted by the sweet words and the reassuring way he held her hands, let herself get lost in his eyes. No one had ever looked at her like that before. Not since Minghao.

“Arin, please, please stop hurting yourself,” he requested with sincerity.

Arin just nodded.

“Whenever you feel like you’re falling into despair, just talk to me, okay?”

He slowly released both of her hands and put them on her lap. Arin could see that his hands were also now covered in her blood.

“Stay here. I’m going to get the first aid kit, okay?” he disappeared into his bedroom. When he left, Arin was tempted to hurt herself again, but didn’t, for his sake.

She wasn’t worried about her curse now, because the effects of the potion on her were still in effect. She had feelings for Sangbin, and there was no room for feelings for someone else.

Woozi came back shortly after with wet towels and a first aid kit.

Finger by finger, he cleaned her hands from the blood with water and alcohol, then bandaged them. He did this in complete silence, and Arin just let him, enjoying the feeling of someone’s hand over hers.

When he put on the last bandage, he took the hand, brought it to his lips and kissed it. He pulled away slowly while lifting his head to glean her reaction. When he saw that she wasn’t resisting, he inched closer to her and took her chin in his fingers.

The intimacy raised a glaring red flag for Arin. She flinched away from him and pulled her face and hands back.

She also glanced at her bracelet, and was relieved to see no color appear. Still, she wasn’t going to take any chances.

“You… you should go,” she stammered.

“I’m sorry,” he said, shaking his head, surprised at himself. “Something is wrong with me. I feel… so strange right now. I think I may be under the influence of something I didn’t even realize I took.”

Arin knew why he was feeling like that. He was in love with her all of the sudden, in one moment. It must be so confusing for him not to understand how.

“You should go sleep it off then,” Arin suggested.

Woozi nodded. “Okay. But…” he paused, peering at her.

Arin knew what he was feeling. She felt it at the end of each and every session, when she had to part from whomever it was she had to fall in love with, Jun or Sangbin; it was hard to part from someone you love.

“You’ll feel better in the morning,” she promised. The potion would always fade when she woke the following morning, and she could only assume the same would happen with Woozi.

“I’m afraid to leave,” Woozi said. “What if you hurt yourself?”

“I won’t. I feel calmer now,” Arin answered. “The episode has passed.”

“Okay,” he said, standing up. “Good night, then.”

“Good night.”

He hesitated a little before walking to the front door, and even then, he kept looking back at her, like he wanted her to ask him to stay. Deep down, she wanted him to stay. It was wonderful to be loved in that way, even if she knew that love was temporary and artificial.

-

The next morning, the team dispatched on the mission to find Hyojung returned.

Arin had just arrived, preparing herself mentally for another session under the effect of the potion. Upon hearing that the team with Jun in it had returned, she immediately went out into the main hall to see what had happened.

The hostage girl was not with them anymore. Neither was Hyojung. Arin’s eyes scanned for Jun, but he wasn’t there as well.

“What happened?” Dasinai came out of her office, eyes scanning the shrunken team.

“The took Jun!” said one of the large men that had been dragging that hostage girl the previous day. “Hyojung managed to take back the hostage and capture Jun as well.”

“What? How?!” Dasinai said. It was the first time Arin had ever seen the leader so uneasy.

“Magic!” he responded. “She was able to see our moves before we made them, and she fooled us.”

“Oh dear…”

“She said she’ll return Jun to us safely, on the condition that we return…” the man caught Arin’s eyes and pointed at her. “We have to return her. Hyojung wants her back in exchange for Jun.”