◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎

◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎◎

𝐓𝐇𝐄 sudden brush of the penetrating ice cold air traveled against the shell of her ears, as if it was trickling back into one of her senses one by one, as the next victim was the skin burning in the abrupt movement of faltering back.

Her eyes snapped open to find nothing. Absolute nothing. The darkness that swept around her,almost swallowing down her whole as she could not find anything to focus on her gaze within the voidness of light that she seeked.

It must be a dream.

She tried to console herself by the words of comfort to dig up from the plight. However, for her horror of the instance, the words that her mind brewed out echoed like an bleeding voice against her, enclosing her in the stance of fear.

Then it happened again. The undervalued thoughts that neglected over away til now to her dismay as every one alike her, rumbled through her ears all at once.

The anger, fear, disgust, envy, enjoyment, disappointment, happiness, sadness, confusion, anxious , irritation and everything more.

It was sickening to hear her own thoughts that interlaced all at once without having the ability to focus on the concern.

Ears nearly bleeding, her hands tugging onto the root of her hair wanting to take out her brain if that's what stops the voices before her legs crumpled to the ground like an weakling.

Then it stopped. All at once.

Her shaking hands slowly loosening the grip in her hair before it returned back to her side. The voices of her own that taunted her, halted in a abrupt manner.
The silence almost unwelcoming by the thoughts of impulsive deprivation of one of her senses.

Hands that are still trembling, she seeked dependence on the ground as she was still on her knees, catching her uneven breath.

Then the torture of an another sense began.

A sharp light that could burn her sight, irradiated before her sight from the sink of darkness. The light she seeked upon til now from the darkness, almost blinding her as if it's motive to let her not have any sort of hope to arise ever again in her.

The Trembling hands quickly tried to cover her own eyes from the blinding lights. Nevertheless, the hands that topped on the floor could not move a single muscle, as if it was molded onto the cold floor for her own dismay.

Head drooped low to the ground to block away from the tearing light, she wanted to curse the one insinuated behind this, which she had a good guess by who but not for why.

After an torturous moment,that felt like an eternity that could could diminish her vision and burn down her eyelashes, it dimmed into a new found one.

By the aftermath of the torture she held, she couldn't look forth in the second. The hands that molded on to the ground gradually loosening away and pressed onto her eyes in relief of the moment before her eyes looked forth straight into the gloomy light til it fell right down on to the painting that it unveiled. A similar one to be exact.

Her painting.

The one she drew, before it was torn into pieces by her own hands like many others.

It was strangely a peaceful one of a girl surrounded by four walls at first glance.
However, the one who created before destroyed knew the emotions that quilted in every trace and line of it.

The feeling of abysmal inside her own rules that inflicted upon by the corrupted morals of others, that confined her own soul inside the four walls with no door to turn to, atleast not without a stance in her own morals that could wreck the facade of others surmise for her own life.

Without a second wasting in,another light beside the one lighten up in a trance. Another painting that made by the same hands before tearing apart, relived in the light.

Then another, another and another til it encircled her.

Familiar to the tears that sided along everyday, it never came up this time. The tears were all too, dried up for to waste away for this moment.

Then a screeching sound reverberated her taking away from the trance, an sudden ember caught up in the paintings with no trace of where it created before it soon started to decipher into food that fed for the fire that shortly fell into the floor.

The fear that faded away in the long minute, soon seeked back into her as the flame that was supposed to go out only grew before it circled her as an sacrifice, as it moved closer to her in seconds.

Her eyes set wide in anxious and fear that taken aback her thoughts of saving herself in the moment of disbelief. She knew this is nothing but an mere dream, she rambled the same words of comfort til now, however the heat that burned her skin from the flames that closing in said otherwise and she had too much at stake to gamble at the moment.

Not thinking away more for a second that could take away her life, she tries to stand up from the spot. However, the realisation of her body that reluctant to her command freezed her mind.

Her heart was dropped onto her stomach as she could not move, not even a finger. The foul scream of agony was build up in her throat, However, not even her lips could move to let it out.

The fire that grew like a storm closed in
Seconds as her eyes were set on in the fear of ending everything, the fear that consumed her whole as the heat of the flames ran closer and closer until it touched one of her fingertips, and with no struggle, her hands were taken aback into closer to her chest within a second.

However,she was no more kneeling, she was upright stood in her stance.

There was no more fire that encircled her, only a candle that is about to die down.

She was in no more in the void room of darkness, only a room that brimmed with light .

She was no more alone , three more familiar individuals staring right at her.

What in the seven hells was she doing here??

Her eyes swept around the room before she recognised the familiar inn of Chwiseonru. Sure, she remembered walking into the room and hearing out the emotional rambling of the familiar summer boy while waiting for the other two,but that was all.

She doesn't remember Yul walking in, she doesn't remember her own brother walking in but, she sure as hell remembered the fact her life almost seeped away before her eyes.

The mild burn mark on her fingertip remained there, as if the dream was too real to inflict into the reality. Heartbeats quickened in the pace of her breath that abruptly came out uneven in the revelation of loosing her own mind as she chose to ignore the three pair of concern and confused eyes as her gaze was too busy focusing back and forth to the finger and the candle which just died down that inflicted the burn.

I probably must have tried to touch the flame..... But why?..

✿

The fingertips of another kept caressing her palm under the table of the quad sat down,where the eyes cannot reach over with interlacing concern by the scene that happened minutes ago .

His leisure touch and the continuous glances of concern after refusing to visit Sejukwon transparent, yet the one with the trouble in their love life, and the one with the blindness in between the two, looking past with no regard.

Questions were certainly raised against her, and the girl without no doubt ignored and slide it away hiding her slight burn mark. Smiling as if the past minute events that happened in her life didn't faltered her mind even for an instance.

It was all too confusing not to let the thread of curious coiled in her curious mind.

Even when her ears were about to bleed out ironically from Dang-gu, who was crying out his eyes because of his early potential-love-life-down-fall, the girl couldn't help but to dig out the lingered thoughts that stabbed inside her mind like knives. All she wanted to do was untangle the coiled threads that fall upon.

Was she finally losing control of her own mind??

Can't she hold out any longer??

After all this time, just when she have enough to live this life than just rather being alive, is it going to end like this??

Why is the reflection no longer paying a visit like in the past to question her own??

Was that a good sign or bad??

What if -

The lines of endless questions towards herself, came to an abrupt halt by the realisation of the soft squeeze on her hand. Yul's thump were wandering in between her white knuckles, taking her aback from the thoughts that clouded her surroundings.

Only then she knew, the pair of three eyes were focused on her again, two with curious interlaced while the one beside her with anxious over for a reasonable fact.

" Oh I'm sorry, I didn't get much sleep last night...What are we talking about again??"

Feeling the eyes of curiousness fall upon her, she immediately dusted it off with a smile before sipping her tea, rather to slide off from the topic than to reveal.

" We were talking about the soul shifter case. Uncle looked into Mu-deok. "

Right, just as when the girl was too suspicious why the snake has been silent over time with no move, he surprised them with a new lead.

" If there are soul shifters in the palace, Songrim may have too. "

This time the girl inevitably chose to stand over and do nothing, not even hearing out anything that could get her self involved and lead to another, which ends her in a not so desirable position.

So, even when her usual instinct to unravel everything to a point arisen, she solely chose to ignore it for once. Even the point her brother and her friend made assumptions she didn't give out an ear until, the ceaseless caress on her palm with certain boy's thump in circles, came to uneasy halt.

Her eyes quickly climbed over his features, the tense air that surrounded him finally catching up to her. Na-ra knew he was in charge of the the soul shifter case, yet the uneasiness that disturbed her was something else. 

Even when she swore not to intervene in the subject, she couldn't help but not to now to understand the sudden change of distress that overcame the one enough to  ran his fingers of the other hand over the tea cup's edges as if he's anxious of the secret he held inside.

A abrupt position of their fingers were exchanged, Na-ra's fingers cradled his cold ones into a warm touch of hers. The sudden anguish of thoughts that Perturbed one's mind with a reassuring smile and a thousands of warm words that interlaced in her glance.

Don't think too much, I'm here. With you.

Visibly letting out a heavy sigh, the boy's tense shoulders finally slumped into the comfort , resisting his best not lean onto the shoulders that was close to him in every way possible.

" Why is the cast-out successor of songrim worrying about such thing?? "

As if Uk was in the same state as the other that is bounded by the same secret, he immediately changed the subject into a light jest.

" I'm not totally cast out! "

Dang-gu quick tried to defend off the offending words that was thrown out towards him, as if the words weren't too highly plausibility for him.

" Goodness, don't tell me you're already regretting your decision. "

" He so is~"

" You were so confident yesterday. "

The Jang siblings knotted down to emotionally hunt the summer boy, who was naive into jump into their trap and unusual enough, Yul didn't mind to join them.

" Uk is the one who always kicked out, What am I even doing here?.... "

The boy's regret were clearly passed down through his heavy sigh and the self questioning words, which Na-ra found amusing by hearing the parallel words from her other friend that stressed by the same situation lately in the morning.

" You will get used to it, it is quite miserable for the first time. "

The words were far from consolation and not so far from offending to anyone.

" Only these two have no idea how we feel. "

Uk's fingers pointed towards the two in a condescending manner. The two, who sustained the title from the rumours of preferred students of their Masters .

It was visible from the wide smile that could be reach upto her corner of her eyes, that the girl enjoyed the title too much even if it came from the rumours. While, the latter who sat beside only appeared to be admiring the smile of hers.

" What can I say, guess I'm someone that is too valuable and obedient to be kicked out, unlike you two. "

Not forgetting to throw shade towards the two in front of her, the girl Inaudibly let out a squeal of ' I'm better than you', mostly directed towards her twin . Uk in return as a reply, fake gagged as if he's nauseous by her act, all while the other two remained with a smile of understanding that the two siblings are never going to change in this lifetime.

" Wait- Yul have been kicked out . "

Dang-gu, who just recalled an forgetful past, excitedly pulled the boy under the water with him as the Jang siblings could not remember such a remarkable past in their head in instance. 

" Don't you remember the time I broke an Gold-plated and we all lied together??"

The subtle memory inflicting a broken out smile from each other's lips. The regretting cry of Dang-gu, Na-ra's awful silence of planning to escape from the spot, Yul's wise words to turning in by telling the truth and Uk's manipulative negotiation of corrupting Yul's decisions were all too historic to forget yet, they did.

" Eventually we agreed to cover it up, but Yul became ill afterwards....Yul had never done wrong, He got sick worrying we would get caught. We ended up confessing because we thought Yul would die. "

The girl remembered it all too well now, however the ending words the latter described was whole another story then the one in her head. The real one.

" We were all kicked out together. "

A pang of guilt slapped across her face by Dang-gu's words before she sheepishly smiled before taking a sip of her drink.

" I got kicked out so many times so, I do not remember everything. But I doubt Yul was sick because he was afraid of getting caught. "

Uk's eyes admirably glanced over the table to his friend's, the fragments of the past eventually coming back in time gradually.

" He suffered because he knew what he was doing wrong, and the fact was hard for him to endure.... He is someone who gets lost, if he is caught off guard. He must have been worried and scared to do something he knew he was wrong. Just to protect his friends. "

" Yes, I remember it clearly. I suffered quite a bit. "

Yul's response to Uk's words took back the girl's memory to the pale little boy who suffered greatly by a lie, and mostly the playful guilt of knowing her own actions as she couldn't sit around and see the boy in more pain by the same lie in the past.

She bit back her own lip not to reveal the secrecy that haunted her for years, and for a few more years from now if she doesn't expose to the three.

" To punish oneself more harshly than others, Is it some heightened state of morality?.... Gosh, you were already there at that young age?... That's incredible. "

The twins nodded in agreement to rare wise words of the summer boy, two of them staring at the same boy in admire with different gazes.

" Can you imagine what I felt, burying a broken inkstone with my immature friends?...We could not even bury it well , we were soon caught. "

By the last words of confession, Na-ra's hands slightly faltered from the cup she held. Praying that the three would not remember, and go along with the one Dang-gu made going down on the hill.

" What?? "

" What?...You said we confessed. "

Uk's question towards Dang-gu , who was equally confused and in more disbelief of the words all while the girl sat in silence, biting down her lower lip not to spill out the guilt.

" Dang-gu is remembering it wrong, we did not confess. Sang-ho found the half buried inkstones. That is how we got caught. "

" Really?? Then, I must have romanticized the memory. "

An scoff of disbelief left from the elder Jang's lips before the other three chose to laugh it off the memory which, gave off a heavy relief to the girl who was on toes til now however, as if the devil cannot reach and gave her a twin as Souvenir, Uk suddenly recalled something.

" Wait- I remember it now....but Na-ra didnt kicked out ,it was only three of us...Privilege of being the favorite student of Master Heo. "

The boy's words laced in envy of the past ignored punishment for the girl, sure she may not be the one who broke it, yet she stood silenced like him and Yul, who certainly took the punishment.

The girl physically shifted in her seat , gulping down the words that trying to seep out which will be the cause of her inevitable death from the two, yet the secret has been brimming inside too much that made her nauseous before she vomited out the words of confession.

" I got the privilege of not getting kicked out because...I'm the one who told Sang-ho the truth..."

" What?!? "

The story ends here with her being killed by her brother and her friend while her lover stood over and watched ᐠ(ᐛ)ᐟ ......
                                                                          

Just kidding if you guys even falled for that -

◐◐◐◐◐

𝐍𝐚-𝐫𝐚 𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐠𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐮𝐦𝐚 𝐢𝐧 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐝𝐚𝐦𝐧 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐠𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐧 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞:

𝐎𝐤𝐤𝐤𝐤𝐤𝐤......

𝐇𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐨𝐨𝐨 𝐠𝐮𝐲𝐬,
𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐠𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐤𝐥𝐲 𝐮𝐩𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐞.
𝐓𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐨 𝐬𝐜𝐫𝐮𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐳𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝𝐧'𝐭... 𝐌𝐚𝐲𝐛𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐥𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐈 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐧 𝐭𝐢𝐥 𝐧𝐨𝐰 𝐬𝐨....

𝐄𝐧𝐣𝐨𝐲𝐞𝐝? 𝐍𝐨𝐭 𝐦𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬𝐞-

𝐎𝐤𝐚𝐲, 𝐈'𝐥𝐥 𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐲 𝐮𝐩𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲 𝐚 𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐥𝐞 𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐭𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐭𝐨𝐨 𝐦𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐡, 𝐈'𝐥𝐥 𝐬𝐞𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐠𝐮𝐲𝐬 𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐫𝐫𝐫𝐫

𝐋𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐮𝐮𝐮𝐮𝐮𝐮𝐮 ♡