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In a gray-and-cream brick building on an out-of-the-way side street of Hapjeong-dong in the Mapo-gu district in Seoul, witches and wizards carve a living for themselves behind the veil that divides magic and non-magic communities. If someone would squint and tilt their head just right, they may notice that people walking into the old post office actually don’t pass by the glass of the foyer.

They don’t have to look so hard to notice the owls and magpies that fly in and out of the building at all hours. Ornithologists remain mystified.

Within the brick office is a mall teeming with magic shops selling books, supplies, and food. Restaurants and cafes cluster in the middle, surrounding a statue of the mall’s founder posed with her fat toad, most famous for saving its witch by wedging itself in the throat of a charging graphorn and suffocating it.

Between a cauldron shop and a broom repair shop stands a store with a swinging sign scorched with silhouettes that caterwaul and call to people passing beneath it. Beneath the sign is a door scored with claw marks and scuff marks. Behind the door is a lively room filled with the cacophonous noise of many magical creatures and animals wanting to be freed from their crates and cages that are bigger on the inside.

Along with the creatures and animals, there are supplies and books about them. Photos cluster over the walls, leaving little room for actual wall and sometimes being just as noisy as the actual occupants of the shop.

An ancient cash register sits just off-center on the long, dark counter. Behind the long, dark counter is Byun Baekhyun.

Byun Baekhyun runs the animal shop with as much pride and care as a centaur. He never planned to be a store owner, but he’s happy and has learned more than his Care for Magical Creatures class ever taught him.

He scolds a book of narcissistic creatures of the night when it flings its cover open to push aside neighboring books for the third time that morning. He warned it each time that if it keeps acting up, it’s being bound, and he’s not about to back down on a promise. The book shifts and shuffles but finally settles down when wedged back onto the bookshelf.

Dealing with creatures is one thing; he had no idea that the books about the creatures could be as challenging. Back-to-school is a trying time because of the shipments of monster textbooks.

No other shop will carry the book anymore. Customers were threatening hexes or legal actions after getting bitten. (All one has to do is the spine, and it calms down.)

They’re great at pest control, though, but Baekhyun still has bad dreams of finding rat corpses between pages.

Such a glamorous life he leads. Glorified pet store and carnivorous book keeper.

He really could’ve been anything, and not just because his professors told him so, during those long stints in detention for pranks.

He’s a talented wizard. In school, his grades reliably Exceeded Expectations or were Outstanding, and he balanced schoolwork with Quidditch, playing as a chaser. He used to want to be an auror or a professional Quidditch player and he even briefly considered becoming a professor. By graduation, he’d had more than enough of his classmates and students in general, however.

He attended the Wizarding Academy of Dramatic Arts for a year before dropping out. After that, he worked a couple years at the Wizarding Wireless Network. Eventually, he left there, too. A friend of a friend’s mom’s uncle died, leaving his shop empty of management. Baekhyun likes animals. He needs to make a living somehow, so he moved his life to an area of the world he knew nothing about but quickly made friends.

First, he met Park Chanyeol after he tripped over a loose flagstone and dropped the chest of Quidditch balls. (No matter how old he is or what shape he’s in, it still hurts getting hit by a Bludger.)

Through Chanyeol, he met Jongin, a shy wizard focused on performance magic more than anything else.

Then, there was Chen, who came with the shop.

He’s rather plain as far as looks go, except his eyes are just as bold, pumpkin orange as his stripes. Few people know that, because Chen always seems to be smiling. Tail over his white feet, back straight, basking in the attention from his adoring audience with his mouth turned up in a friendly grin.

It’s a little creepy. When he first met him, Baekhyun thought he was a statue, but the owner had shooed the cat off the work contract for Baekhyun to sign. Chen spent the rest of the time winding around Baekhyun’s ankles and being as close as possible without climbing into his clothes.

Now, he’s just another life to look after and try to sell. Prime time for customers is the beginning of the school year, when first year students look for their own companions. Owls are the most popular, followed by cats, then toads and frogs. Some kids try to beg for a sprite or dragon, but their guardians never budge. Stingy.

Chen’s always popular, but adults don’t seem to trust a smiling cat. Plus, there were a couple times when Baekhyun looked over at a parent and pleading child and the tabby seemed to slant his eyes at the parent, like a threat or a dare.

It’s probably just how his face looks, though, with the eyes curved over his catty smile. He’s just very personable and smart and weirdly affectionate.

Baekhyun hopes waking up to a weight on his chest and claws lightly puncturing his neck is affection, anyway. Chen purrs in his sleep as he gently strangles him.

Often the only reason people come into the shop—although they do leave with some sort of purchase, because Baekhyun is a great salesman as well as very adept at suggestion spells—is Chen.

(Even Chanyeol, who’s allergic to dander, can’t pass by the shop without greeting Chen and leaving with some sort of purchase, usually recommended by the cat.)

Chen’s favorite place to hang out is the front window, where cages of owls hover. Baekhyun once had to save a small scops owl when Chen decided he wanted to have a friend for lunch.

The owl lived in Baekhyun’s upstairs apartment until all of its feathers grew back. It was adopted by a young witch about to enter school. Reserved as the owl had been for most of its time with Baekhyun, the little girl coaxed some happy hoots while her father paid.

That’s what Baekhyun likes to see. Sad as he is to see some of the animals go, there’s a sense of pride and happiness when someone leaves with a new pet or companion.

Beyond the companion animals, the shop hosts various beasts and creatures not for purchase by the common witch or wizard. They’re not illegal—at least, not all of them—but they range all over the scale of dangerousness. It took him a little while to memorize the five categories of creatures, which includes all beasts, beings, and spirits—the shop only carries beasts.

The first category is boring, the creatures that really do not do much and have no sense of aggression, vengeance, or even motivation. (Baekhyun feels like that, sometimes.)

Then there are harmless creatures, the ones that can be domesticated, such as bowtruckles. They usually stay in their tree, but every once in a full moon Baekhyun has to track down one or two that got lost among the clutter of the shop.

Third are creatures that any competent wizard should be able to cope with. Creatures that are mischievous or strong but usually mean. Just understand what they are and their capabilities and act accordingly. (With how Chen is with the Bowtruckles, he’d fit into this XXX category.)

The shop rarely carries category XXXX creatures due to their more dangerous nature, but arrangements can be made for a skilled witch or wizard to acquire them.

Category XXXXX creatures are never in any shop. Baekhyun has only seen such creatures in books. These creatures are known killers and impossible to train. Some have tried. Some even had some very marginal success. All ultimately end up dead or mostly dead.

Baekhyun would like to see a XXXXX creature someday. From a safe distance, of course. His curiosity is guided by a healthy sense of self-preservation.

“Because death would not be fun,” he tells one of the cats, who trills and bumps Baekhyun’s chin with its head. There’s actually a category XXXX beast in the back room of the shop, exactly beneath Baekhyun’s bed on the second story. Merpeople didn’t want to be classified as Beings due to some bad blood with certain other Beings, and being mostly aquatic meant travel over land isn’t all that easy. Someone contacted Baekhyun asking him to host the merman until his transport arrived.

This merman is young, according to the letter, and visiting relatives overland. He enjoys swimming, singing, and throwing geysers of water into Baekhyun’s bedroom at all hours.

He does not miss him, when a big wizard with a bushy beard and eyebrows envelops the merman in a water bubble and walks into the back street with it floating just over his shoulder, a rope tied to the creature’s tail.

Helping him keep the shop in order are a trio of one-legged goblin siblings. During the day, one takes the form of a broom, another a bucket, and the third a feather duster. They came with the building and manage marvelously, considering how precariously they stand. They use their clubs like canes but are more than willing to weaponize them, if an unruly witch tries to haggle prices.

“All sales final!”

“No money, no merchandise!”

Baekhyun still has some unpaid tickets from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement because of them.

Chen takes on the role of overseer, yowling commands and demands and knocking things over just when they’d been picked up. He enjoys mischief.

A couple shops down is a sweets and tea shop run by a witch who’s about as sweet as lemon zinger candy. Baekhyun tries to pick what he wants and leave, but it turns out the witch has a really cute son with big eyes and a heart-shaped smile. He works in front when his mom is in the back of the store, and that’s when Baekhyun times his appearance.

Unfortunately, he had no idea he had a tail until Chen rubs along his ankles and sets a blue package at his feet. When Baekhyun is watching, the cat paws open the box and frees its chocolate frog.

“What are you doing?” Rear wiggling, Chen leaps at the frog. It dodges but loses a leg to quick claws. “Cats can’t eat chocolate…”

“Is that your cat?” The witch scowls at him; her son is laughing behind his hand.

“Uh, no! He’s just a shop cat—” The cat leaps onto his shoulder and perches precariously, watching the chocolate prey from a higher vantage point. As though sensing he’s being talked about, Chen nuzzles Baekyhun’s head with a hearty purr.

The sweets witch is not impressed. “You have to pay for that.”

Chen smiles as Baekhyun counts out coins. As they leave, he lies across Baekhyun’s neck and the chocolate from his claws.

That becomes habit. Whenever and however Baekhyun should move, the cat adjusts like fluid—draping across his neck, stepping onto his back or chest, or even holding onto the back of his head with his claws sheathed.

People will stare, sometimes. Magic is commonplace. Cats are commonplace. This particular cat with this particular wizard is strange. There’s still the typical feline aloofness, but there’s a haughty entitlement, as well, as though this cat deserves this perch to look down upon the other people. Flaunting his status with that permanent pleasant smile.

Baekhyun just laughs and teases Chen when someone points it out, tickling his chin or rubbing his soft white chest. “He’s just a pussycat. Don’t let the expression fool you!”

But everyone does.

Apparently, a grinning cat is just too much for a witch or wizard. Too much personality. Carnivorous books, murderous plantlife, flying cleaning supplies are all fine well and good, but it's hard to trust something that smiles so much.

“I don’t get it,” Baekhyun says to his mother, lifting the mirror out of Chen’s way before he nudges it off the table. “He’d would be a great witch’s cat, but no one wants him!”

“You know it goes both ways, honey. Someone may like him, but he may not like them. There needs to be balance.” Sniffing the surface of the mirror, the cat rubs his cheeks over it.

“Well, he seems to like you. Want a cat? He keeps terrorizing the toads.” Poor things keep screaming and peeing themselves, distressing the goblins trying to keep everything clean and in order.

His mother laughs. “I don’t think he’d be nearly as happy with me.”

“I just don’t understand why no one wants him.” As he slouches, Chen steps on his belly and brings all of his paws together to lie on top of him. His eyes slowly shut to squint at Baekhyun’s nose.

“Maybe he’s happy right where he is.” Chen meows and stretches a foreleg out so his paw is on Baekhyun’s mouth.

“Well,” Baekhyun lifts his head and sighs, pulling the paw down while rubbing along the cat’s nose with a fingertip. “I guess I can take a hint.”

Chen purrs and lifts his head so Baekhyun’s fingers are at his chin.

“Amazing. You had me trained, and I didn’t even realize it.”

The cat smiles.

Along with the creatures and animals, there is a wizard and his cat. (More accurately: a cat and his wizard.)

a/n: Written for round one of Wingarbyun Leviosa. (prompt no/R1-014 Baekhyun works in an animal shop catering to witches and wizards. This one cat is always freaking him out with how /human-like/ its expressions and reactions are. Everyone enjoys petting the pretty kitty, but no one wants to adopt one with quite so much personality, and it's sad, because it's got a lot of potential to make someone really happy.)

AsianFanfics

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