Heavy sadness clouded Minji’s mind and rendered her unable to form a single positive thought. She had needed hours to comprehend that he had left her willingly and without hesitation. If Lucas hadn’t brought her home last night, she would have probably wandered through the city forever, feeling numb to everything but her pain. She didn’t care about what would happen to her, thinking only about the demon who turned his back on her. For hours, she had laid in bed and stared at the ceiling until she eventually cried herself to sleep.

When the sun rose the next morning, soft rays of light falling through her windows, she felt more dead than alive, not seeing a point in getting up. It wasn’t like anyone was waiting for her. It wasn’t like anyone would eat breakfast with her and keep her company. Minji stared at the white ceiling above her with empty eyes, her mind vacant.

Eventually, she reached for her phone on the nightstand, unlocking it and scrolling through social media for a while before she went through the photos saved on the device. It turned out to be a bad idea and served to make her feel even worse than before. The weight on her chest nearly crushed her when her red-rimmed eyes fell on a picture that Jangmi had sent her not long ago after their day at the beach. It showed Baëkhyun kissing her, glowing orbs of light floating around them. The photo looked surreally beautiful, almost like a painting, and it showed her what she had lost, painfully shoving it right in her face. It was a punch to her gut and the tears came back instantly. A pitiful sob shook her body and the screen blurred before her eyes.

“Why did you leave me?” she cried. “Am I not enough for a d-demon?”

She used her sleeve to dry her tears, erratically rubbing her eyes until her skin was red and raw, but her tears couldn’t be stopped. They kept flowing down her cheeks like an endless river, dripping down her chin and leaving dark blotches on her shirt. “C-Come back,” she hiccupped.  

Minji stared at the delete button on the screen conflictedly, part of her wanting to get rid of the damn photo. Her thumb hovered over it, trembled, but never moved. She couldn’t do it. Deleting it was the same to her as forgetting about him, but how could she? She wasn’t ready to forget the time they shared together and everything they went through. He was engraved in her heart, had left deep marks on her that could never be erased.

Her heart clenched painfully as her eyes traced the photo, lingering on his soft features, the warmth in his eyes, and the happiness her smile conveyed. She longed to see him again, to touch him, to be with him. Why had he turned his back on her? Why did he leave her without hesitation? She felt betrayed and alone. Curling her body to a ball, she lay on the bed and clawed at her shirt in desperation, the pain and sorrow unbearable to her. The memories of the day they had spent on the beach were still too clear in her mind. She couldn’t take seeing the photo any longer and put her phone away.

It was like he broke up with her even though they had never been a couple in the first place, but now that she thought about it, they had acted just like boyfriend and girlfriend around each other. They had kissed often, lived in the same flat, cooked together, spent time together. She knew him better than some of her own relatives, could effortlessly list his favorite dishes and the movies he loved to watch in the evenings.

She had gotten too attached to something that was never meant to be and now that it was gone, she struggled to accept it. She caught herself staring at her wrist again and again, seeing something that wasn’t there anymore. The star-shaped crest had been burned into her mind, so it wasn’t hard for her to envision it. She had already considered taking a sharpie to draw it on her skin just to see it again, but she knew that it would not change a thing. The bond would never come back, it would never be the same. Even if she went to a tattoo artist and had the star permanently inked on her skin, it would hold no meaning. The only thing it would do was make her feel pathetic for being unable to let him go.

Minji didn’t know for how long she had been awake, lying on her bed without moving, when Mochi joined her and snuggled up to her. She was grateful that at least this demon wanted to stay with her—it eased the pain in her heart a bit and made her feel a tad less lonely. She moved her fingers through Mochi’s glowing fur, hearing the cat purr happily. The warmth of its body offered comfort to Minji, and she hugged the small being close to her body. “Thank you for staying,” she whispered, the cat’s ears perking up at the sound of her voice.

Her eyes were fixed on her small friend, but she was lost in thoughts and her absentminded gaze didn’t focus on anything. She didn’t know how to deal with the pain in her heart, didn’t know how to cure the wound his departure had ripped into her being. Lucas had been right when he had told her that she would feel like something important was missing after the bond was broken. There was a void within her, making her feel as if someone had torn a chunk from her heart and thrown it far away. She had the constant urge to fill the void, to go back to him, but she couldn’t even if she wanted to. He was in a place that was unreachable for her… and he did not want her anymore. Again, her tears spilled over and ran down her cheeks like rivers. She sobbed pitifully and drowned in her own bitterness and anguish.

“I-I love you,” she sobbed, burying her face in her hands. “I love you! C-Come back.”

No matter how often she repeated it, the silence in her flat was encompassing and she never received an answer. Of course not. Who would have answered her when she was all alone?

At first, she didn’t hear Mochi’s meows, but when it touched her with its paws, she finally reacted and wiped her eyes with her sleeves, glancing at the demon. Maybe she was only imagining it, but its glowing eyes looked duller than before. She smiled sadly and petted its back. They only had each other now, but it would have to be enough.

A glance at the clock on the nightstand reminded Minji that she had an appointment later today, at three pm precisely, and since it was already one pm, she should make something to eat before it was too late. She got up from her bed with a sigh and trudged into the kitchen, Mochi trailing after her. Standing in front of the fridge, she looked around for a moment, but since she didn’t have an appetite, she really didn’t know what to cook. Biting her lip, she closed the fridge.

Her stomach churned. There was nobody who would eat lunch with her, or dinner. She was all alone and she knew she had to get used to it, but it was hard. He had always been with her, hardly ever letting her out of his sight. At first, because he thought he needed to keep an eye on her for his own sake, but later, he had begun to care for her. Or at least, that was what she had thought but apparently, she had judged him wrongly. He was a demon. They were unfeeling creatures who didn’t care for fickle things such as love.

Why did she expect him to love her back? He had never, not once, stated anything of the sort. She had just assumed that he was attracted to her because of the way he acted towards her. She had thought that his actions spoke louder than words and seen them as some sort of declaration of love when it hadn’t been like that at all. All the kisses they shared must have been nothing more than a game to him.

Why expect a demon to feel anything that wasn’t hate or anger? Wasn’t she naïve?

She was. More than anyone in the world, probably. He’d wrapped her around his finger, just for fun, to have some entertainment while he was stuck with her and she had read his behavior as attraction towards her. How easy it had been for him to leave her… as soon as the bond had been destroyed, he hadn’t hesitated to go back to hell where he belonged.

Instead of eating lunch like she should have, Minji ended up moping around in the kitchen, scrolling through Instagram. Her eyes burned with tears when she made the mistake to linger on one photo for too long. It showed Jangmi and Sehůn, holding hands and smiling at the camera as they took a selfie. They had posted it yesterday… yesterday when Minji’s world had still been in one piece.

Sighing to herself, she grabbed her purse and left her home to go and take care of today’s interview for the newspaper. She wasn’t ready to work since she had no energy and no motivation to do anything at all, but she couldn’t leave Yixing hanging. He counted on her to do the job and so she got herself together, sat in her car, and drove off.

It was the first day of many that she spent without Baëkhyun and it would take her a long time to finally accept that he was gone.

In the first two weeks, the pain in her heart was overwhelming and difficult to endure. She isolated herself from everyone—Jangmi, Sehůn, Yixing, Jisoo and Chaeyoung hardly ever saw her and they ended up worrying so much that they appeared at her doorstep one after another, demanding to know what was wrong. They were shocked when they learned what had happened, and although Chaeyoung didn’t know about the supernatural world, even she could tell that something was very wrong.

Sehůn and Yixing had been furious at Baëkhyun, the latter going so far as to enter hell to look for him. He was disappointed, and he wanted to hear from the demon why he would leave her without prior warning. Minji wasn’t surprised when he couldn’t find him, not even when asking his other friends. They didn’t know where he went either, but some of them came by to visit her and she found that surprisingly kind of them, considering they were demons.

Chanyeøl, Kāi, and Chën checked in on her first. They visited late in the evening when she had been busy staring gloomily at the tv without really seeing the movie she had been watching. The demons had distracted her and taken her thoughts away from her sadness. For a while, she didn’t feel as lonely anymore; finally there was life in her flat, and finally she had someone to talk to. Eventually, the conversation had drifted to Baëkhyun, but they hadn’t been able to tell her anything about his whereabouts.

Only a day later, Xiůmin, D.Ø. and Suhø had come by, though sadly they couldn’t tell her anything either. They made an effort to distract her, using their elemental magic to cause a little chaos.

The three demons reminded her that she shouldn’t neglect her own magic, and now that she was alone and had nobody to depend on if it went out of control again, it was more important than ever that she learned how to use it. Not knowing who she should ask for help, she ultimately decided to call Jangmi, and the young witch told her that she would gladly help her out. They decided to meet in a secluded part of the forest where nobody would see them.

Sehůn had accompanied her, looking worried and angry at the same time. Minji assumed that this was Baëkhyun’s fault even though he never stated anything of the sort. His piercing eyes surveyed their surroundings and his wind magic flared dangerously whenever a weaker demon dared to get close to them.

They stopped on a clearing in the middle of the forest where they wouldn’t be bothered by anyone. Sehůn sat down on a rock nearby and watched the two women with mild curiosity in his eyes. Jangmi put her violet hair up in a bun and got right down to business. Her eyes were sorrowful and serious when she studied Minji, noting how changed she looked. It was plain to see that she was a different person now—being stabbed in the back by the one she had trusted most had left its marks on her. She had gotten thinner and the shade of her skin appeared unhealthy, reminding Jangmi of grey. No longer did she smile or make funny remarks, no longer did her eyes light up when they met. If Jangmi ever got her hands on Baëkhyun, she would kick his selfish .

 “Judging by what you told me, you have trouble controlling the flow of magic,” the young witch said, furrowing her brow.

“Yes, that’s the problem. It goes out of control every time I try using it,” she answered hollowly. “Usually, he would help me, but…”

A tense silence fell over the clearing, bringing an extremely uncomfortable awkwardness. Jangmi cringed, attempting to steer the conversation in another direction. “I’ve brought something for you that