Hello readers! :)
So finally I'm updating this story! It took me a while but eventually I figured out how I will write this ^^
I hope you will have fun and enjoy~!

Engraved Destiny.

Chapter 1.

          Donghae was cute and he knew it. People kept telling him how adorable he was. He didn't mind, he liked getting some attention, being praised and pampered. It felt nice.

In school, everybody was nice to him. He had a lot of friends and admirers. Even the teachers were fond of him. No matter where he went or what he did, he had someone with him. He disliked being alone, even more because he wasn't used to it.

He had his own flaws of course. He was helplessly too talkative and he could be a bit immature, even childish, playing silly pranks on his friends. He was also very stubborn and way too honest for his own good sometimes. But he could easily get away with his flaws because everyone around him still loved his soft-hearted and genuinely kind personality.

He was the popular type, the one you can't find yourself to dislike or be jealous of. Donghae was too sweet to dislike, and the perpetual smile stretching up his lips could make your heart melt in a second. The brunet could never hurt anyone intentionally, and he seemed unable to hate someone.

He was an optimistic person and because he was a bit childish and open-hearted, he would easily trust people he barely knew. It didn't mean he was weak nor stupid. He was undoubtedly gullible, yes, but he had a strong personality. No matter the circumstances, he would always make sure he'd obtain everything he wanted. If an obstacle came on his way, he would without any hesitation fight to get things done the way he wanted them to be.

Nothing could defeat his stubbornness.

           Donghae was still young but he had a thousand dreams for his future.

His first passion was dancing. That was the fuel of his life, his reason to get up in the morning and make him smile throughout the day. He wanted to be a dancer, to perform in front of thousands of people, to feel the burning light-spots on his skin and hear the crowd erupts in deafening cheers for him. It was his dream. He didn't care about what his family said, he had decided he would be a dancer and nobody could make him change his mind.

The second thing that kept obsessing him was finding his soul-mate.

Like everyone else, on his eighteenth birthday, the name of the one person he was fated to fall in love with would appear on his body. Everybody was going through it, and he wasn't going to be an exception. He knew that, on that special day, he would wake up in the morning and the name would appear, engraved like a tattoo, somewhere on his body.

Yet Donghae was still only seventeen and he had a couple more months to wait. He couldn't help but grow more and more impatient. That day, his fate would be revealed. That day, he would start his quest of true love.

           Around the world, most people weren't as enthusiastic as he was. Too few were those who cared about the name anymore. Many didn't want to wait until their eighteenth birthday to get themselves a lover. Some others were just too lazy to look for their "special person". Knowing the name of your soul-mate didn't mean you could find them so easily. There was way too many people on earth and it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. Very few lucky ones had the chance to meet their soul-mate.

More than that, it was has-been, just like waiting until marriage to lose one's ity. Those things were from another time. And so, the majority of people just stopped caring about it.

But unlike most people, Donghae cared a lot. He had decided he would find his soul-mate and marry that person. No one else. He was strongly persuaded that he had to wait for his mate. For that reason, he refused to date.

His family and friends had tried to convince him to just give up about it, but Donghae was obstinated. Nobody but that special person could have him, no one except his mate could get his first kiss. He would find his mate and once found, he'd never let the other go.

That, of course, was what he had decided on his own. He wasn't even accepting the probability that he wouldn't find that person, or that the other wasn't going to wait for him. He was absolutely persuaded that things would go the way he wanted them. Despite everybody's warnings, he couldn't even doubt that he would find his mate someday.

“C'mon Hae! She's pretty, and funny, and she's head over heels for you!” Siwon tried to convince him again, his mumbles swallowed by his pants.

“I know, but I can't date her”, Donghae pouted as he eyed Jessica sitting at the opposite side of the basketball yard. The girl instantly flashed him a dazzling smile.

It was the middle of August, a sunny and warm day, but Donghae's friends had decided to play outside, under the burning sun. His best friend, Choi Siwon, loved sports and he would always say that they had to hang out during the holidays, or it would be a waste. Why spend such a beautiful day inside? That wasn't how he conceived summer!

And as a result, Donghae found himself running and jumping and sweating like crazy, just for a ball. He couldn't deny he was having fun. He had Siwon, Hangeng and Sungmin with him, his closest friends. It was always fun to hang out with them. Yet, as soon as the girls had appeared and settled themselves on the bench facing the playground, his friends had stopped paying attention to the game and it annoyed him.

Plus, there was this girl, Jessica. He didn't dislike her, but she seemed unable to understand that he wasn't interested.

“You can date her. You just don't want to”, Sungmin muttered, desperately trying to steal the ball from Donghae.

“That's right, I don't want to”, Donghae admitted. “No one can-”

“Have you~!” Hangeng chirped, cutting him, his eyes moving from the ball to the small group of girls watching them.

“Except your mate~!” Sungmin finished with a teasing smile, and in a swift movement, he took the ball from Donghae's hands.

“Cheater!” the brunet immediately whined and ran after the other.

Sungmin just giggled as he ran to the basket and threw the ball in the air. Siwon jumped, trying to get the ball, but the bouncing sphere passed over his big hands and went through the white circle. Sungmin and Hangeng shouted in victory, hugging each other and laughing at the two others.

Donghae's pout deepened.

“You cheated”, he said again, stomping on his feet.

“Didn't”, Sungmin retorted.

“You talked to me and made me loose my concentration”, Donghae argued stubbornly, his bottom lip jutting out.

“Siwon started it, and it's not my fault that you lost your concentration”, Sungmin crooned.

Donghae tried to glare at Siwon, because Sungmin was quite right, but he was really bad at it and he looked more like an offended puppy.

“Aww, Hae, don't be so cute”, Siwon and pinched his cheek playfully. “But you can't deny what I said. She's a nice girl, you should give her a chance.”

“I'll give her a chance if it's her name which appears on my skin”, Donghae snorted, but his eyes softened. “I don't want to hurt her”, he muttered. “I just want to wait for my soul-mate...”

Sungmin instantly wrapped an arm around his shoulders.

“We know that”, he said with a gentle smile. “We just don't want you to wait your whole life. It can take years before you find your mate, maybe you will never meet that person. People don't find their mates so easily.”

“It's because they're not even trying”, Donghae retorted quietly.

It was always the same speech. Yet, no matter how upset it made him every time his friends or his family tried to persuade him to give up, he couldn't find himself to be mad. It wasn't in his nature to get angry and he was well aware that they were just worried about him. No, no matter what, he couldn't get mad at them.

“So, we lost”, he said, trying to change the subject. “What's our dares?” he inquired, ready to pay the consequences of losing the game.

“Siwonnie is going to buy us ice-creams~!”, Sungmin immediately giggled and Donghae rolled his eyes. Of course, the cute bunny could never give a nasty dare to someone, he was just too soft for that.

“Okay, I'll do that”, the tall teen quickly nodded, happy to get away with nothing worse than that.

“What about me?” the brunet asked with a cute smile.

“Hmm”, Sungmin hummed and exchanged a glance with Hangeng, trying to think about something.

“I feel like drinking milk”, the Chinese said with his thick accent. “Get us some strawberry milk.”

“Fine”, Donghae grinned and then he grabbed Siwon's hand. “Let's go Siwonnie!”

The other nodded, smiling too, his two handsome dimples digging his cheeks as he did so. Donghae tightened his grip on the other's hand as they passed beside the bunch of giggling girls and he avoided their stares the best he could. He saw Jessica stand up, obviously decided to talk to him, but he wasn't in the mood of rejecting her again. He quickened his pace and almost ran away from the playground, ignoring his friends loud laughters behind him.

“Ah, Hae”, he heard Siwon chuckle. “That's exactly why she likes you. You're too cute.”

Donghae rolled his eyes and ignored his friend. He dragged the tall and muscular teen down the street.

He was used to be called cute. Not that he didn't like it or didn't care about it, but really he was used to it. He wasn't trying to act cute, he was just being himself. Hearing it all the time had become a routine and he had stopped blushing about it.

“Hae, I'm going this way”, Siwon suddenly struggled to get out of his grip.

“Where?” the brunet asked.

“There”, Siwon replied, pointing to the opposite street. “You just go to the shop to get the milk and I'll get the ice-creams, alright? Let's meet here in ten minutes.”

“Okay”, Donghae nodded but couldn't stop himself from pouting. He didn't like to go somewhere alone. It was a bit scary not to have someone with him, and he wasn't used to it.

Siwon sighed but smiled sweetly. “You need to grow up a bit Hae. It's just down the street, it'll be alright.”

“What if someone kidnaps me?” Donghae retorted with a small childish voice. “Since I'm cute, it could happen!”

“Not in the middle of the day, in a street with plenty of people”, Siwon smiled fondly, patting his friend's head. “Don't worry. Just go