Veiled | JHS | ✓

Back at home

"Alright, I get it!" He cried somehow collecting himself before she woke up her whole family from her awful singing. It was still pretty early in the morning and from what he deduced, her parents didn't know about her brief escape from home to fight supernatural monsters. And he'd like to keep it that way and make his exit without any interventions to take his well-deserved rest.

She huffed indignantly at his blatant interjection and sighed, "Well then spill. What happened? How are you alive? Cuz I'm pretty sure I stabbed you with a sword through your heart."

"Wow, are you serious?" Hoseok gawked at the airiness of the real Sia Winters and the stark contrast between her and the Vile One Sia he encountered earlier. The memory sent a shudder through him. Sia shrugged unfazed by his shock. "And I asked NJ to bring you back. That smartas$ angel must've figured out a way then. Strange... I can't remember anything after that."

"Well about that," Hoseok scratched the nape of his neck, "You got possessed by Vile One."

"I WHAT?!"

Retelling the story took more energy than he thought as he was already completely drained and besides, he figured he needed to omit a great deal about Vile One's actions, stumbling over some of the delicate details that he wanted to keep a secret a little while longer, earning a few suspicious glances from Sia. In the end, he managed to choke out exactly how he ended the Vile One's existence with Sia fangirling over certain aspects of the story that he strongly believed weren't supposed to be taken in the context she was shamelessly taking it in. The girl was the weirdest thing he'd ever encountered in life, he swore. But then, he'd been with her long enough to figure out that it was simply Sia's coping mechanism.

"So that's how it all ended. I swear Si, I was so scared when I suddenly felt him coming out of me. It was nothing like before where I would just blank out. It was different. I could see into his head! I could see what he planned! I was so afraid, I tried to fight but I guess that annoyed him because the next thing I knew, he was reaching for the bracelet and I couldn't hold him back..."

Sia silently gazed down at her lap, an emotion that he'd never seen before flaming in her eyes. At the end of his retelling, she raised her eyes to meet him. "So what did you do about it? Did you give him what he deserved?"

"Ran the sword through his heart and gave him a taste of his own medicine. Just the way he did it a thousand times. He died. Pathetically. Erased from existence actually." Hoseok answered her with conviction, the flame burning his own molten irises and Sia sighed in satisfaction. "Atta boy! That's how you do it."

The Hoseok he was before would have scowled at the compliment. The Hobi in him would have shied away. But right then, the Jung Hoseok he was grinned out wide, mischief twinkling from the golden set of his eyes that shone in the dim lighting. "Pleasure to be of your service."

Comfortable silence engulfed them as they sat, conveying all words of gratitude and praise with their eyes before Hoseok decided it was time for him to go. Apparently, Sia didn't feel the same.

"Wait, you're leaving?"

He shrugged, "Yeah, cuz my job's done. Besides, I don't think I can stand for a second longer in this pigsty." He replied, gesturing to her room and she protested.

"Hey, it's not that bad!"

"Not bad?" he asked incredulously, unable to believe his ears as he ran a judgmental eye over all the papers and articles of clothing littered on her floor, not to mention the atrocities she plastered on her walls as 'decorations'. He pointed to a mountain of her apparel lying in a corner, "How long has it been since you last did your laundry?"