Chinsun stifled a yawn as she made her way towards Naesae. She had gone back home very late the previous evening, and even after that was done, she was unable to rest properly due to a constant unsettling feeling that had crawled its way inside her stomach. Unanswered questions simply kept piling up and Chinsun was left at a loss as to how to handle it all.

As she was unlocking the front door of the bookshop, Chinsun felt her tattoo tingle, warning her of approaching danger. Spinning around and ready to attack, she locked gazes with no other than Jongdae and immediately let out a sigh of relief.

“You scared me.” Chinsun turned back towards the door. “What are you doing out so early?”

Hearing no response from the usually loud and lively male, Chinsun looked at him in worry and her brows etched together in a frown upon seeing an uncharacteristically blank expression on his face.

“Jongdae? You ok?” Chinsun nudged the male, seeing the bottle of milk he was holding. “You guys ran out of milk?”

Jongdae nodded listlessly, though his eyes remained fixated on the key still inserted on the door.

“Do you need something from the shop?” Chinsun asked. “Oh, did Mama Kim ask you to fetch the tea I mentioned last time? Tell her I’ll bring it over later.”

Still not giving a verbal response, Jongdae’s hand reached for the door handle and Chinsun hurriedly chanted the unlocking spell under her breath. Chinsun managed to finish the spell just as Jongdae’s hand touched the door handle and Jongdae’s hand jolted back as though he had just received a static shock. Blinking slowly, his eyes slowly came back into focus.

“Chinsun?” Jongdae stared at her in confusion while scratching his head.

“Are you still asleep or something?” Chinsun raised an eyebrow.

“Maybe,” Jongdae chuckled. “I was up late chatting with Baekhyun and mum kicked me out of bed at an ungodly hour.”

“Try to sneak in a quick nap now then,” Chinsun urged the male. “I’ll bring over the tea later.”

“Huh— Ok…” Jongdae nodded uncertainly, giving Chinsun a lop-sided grin.

Before Chinsun could comment on Jongdae’s bizarre behaviour, Jongin stepped out of the funeral home, giving Jongdae a scolding look.

“You just had to buy a bottle of milk. What took you so long?”

“Jonginnie is so mean to me,” Jongdae whined while playfully tugging at Chinsun’s arm. “He’s stricter than my mum. You know he’s actually guarding the secret passage, as if I’d try to slack off by sneaking over and hide at Naesae.”

“That is exactly what you would do,” Jongin scoffed. “Come on, we have a client coming in later.”

Jongdae stuck his tongue out at Jongin in protest, but obeyed the younger male nonetheless. Chinsun squinted her eyes as Jongdae let go of her, noticing what appeared to be a fading burn mark on the hand that had previously touched the door handle of the bookshop. By the time her brain processed the information however, Jongdae and Jongin had both entered the funeral home already.

“My brain is probably playing tricks on me from lack of sleep,” Chinsun mumbled to herself.

Lightly tapping her head, Chinsun pushed the door of the bookshop open and flipped over the sign to ‘open’.

・・・

Baekhyun whistled a cheerful tune as he made his way towards Naesae. Although the day had barely even started, he had already given up on working on his manuscript. His brain was still refusing to cooperate and he knew that if he stayed home, he would just be wasting the whole day staring at an empty document on his laptop. So Baekhyun decided that at the very least he should do something relatively more productive: reading up on the supernatural.

Like always there were the occasional spirits that would appear out of nowhere in the streets, however Baekhyun had already gotten used to their presence and had learnt to ignore them and not attract unnecessary attention. Deciding to take a shortcut, Baekhyun hurried his way through a desolate alleyway. He did not really like that route since it looked exactly like the type of location where a murder would take place or a vengeful spirit would appear. However, since it was daytime, Baekhyun found it less scary to walk through — though just barely.

The sound of something rolling against the uneven ground caught Baekhyun’s