Princess Aereum held a small meeting among the senior guardians in order to find out Seokjin's location. His missing seemed to take a troll on each of his friends as they were genuinely worried for him. All of them cared for him and didn't want to imagine anything bad happening to him. They wanted to find him more than anything.
"Are you certain that he isn't present inside the universe?" Aereum asked for the 5th time, hoping to get a different answer.
"No, Princess. We have searched at least thrice. Every chamber, every corner, every place. Jin Hyung's got to be outside for sure." Nam Joon informed her.
To put it word, they were mostly worried of the fact when he returns, he might not be the guardian they all knew.
Jimin seized the opportunity to ask, "But you really don't think he's going to come back like Ozul Vex did, do you?"
Aereum didn't reply. She was thinking.
Yoongi decided to answer, "It's a possibility, Jimin. The princess fears Seokjin might travel to the same black hole and gain black magic, and then return to the universe to attack on us."
Jungkook interfered, "No! Hyung will never do something like that."
He wasn't entirely wrong. Seokjin wasn't the kind to take revenge because of love failure. But who knows?
"Can't we just take some spaceships and look for him?" Taehyung finally spoke after finding no other way out of this.
"And look where?" Hoseok scoffed at him. "Where will you possibly look for him in the space? He could be anywhere."
Nam Joon licked his lips, "We need to know his exact location, or close; in order to look for him. Till--"
"I just had the strangest thought in my head." Jungkook interfered for the second time. "What if he's hiding in Earth?"
All of them stared at him. Hiding in Earth? Why didn't they think of that soon?
"Smart thinking, Kook." Jimin patted his shoulder. "It's a possibility that he's in Earth."
The senior guardians were convinced their friend was staying in Earth as they started to make plans and preparations to search for him already. Even if he was in Earth, they needed to figure out where he could be and think of how to make him come with them.
It wasn't until Aereum opened her mouth.
"Guardian Yoon Min's coming. Let's ask her." That was her comment before taking her seat.
The senior guardians turned silent at the mention of her name. Yoongi stated the obvious, "Why do you need her? She's the reason Jin Hyung left the universe."
"Everyone has seen her going to the beach every day and she stands there for hours. She's not herself." Taehyung muttered.
The senior guardians grew an ill feeling towards her since that night. They got to know she had a presence in every part of their friend's life, and that didn't make them happy. Because of course, she was the human he couldn't save, she was the cause of his death, and now she's the reason he's missing from the universe. They were thinking her as a threat to their friend.
But not Aereum. She was wise and intelligent in every matter.
"Just wait till she gets here."
It was right after a minute there was a knock on the door and revealed Yoon Min and Beomgyu together. Only she entered while he waited outside. Times like this made him envy the fact why he wasn't a senior guardian yet.
She found all the senior guardians present there; their eyes on her, staring coldly. She could understand their disappointment in her.
"Guardian Yoon Min?" Princess Aereum urged her to stand in front of her desk. "There's something we need to talk about."
By the tone of her voice and the senior guardians' murmurs, it wasn't hard to guess the problem.
"You know where Seokjin is, don't you?"
Aereum wasn't guessing or asking. She was confident with her question. Because the guardian gave the exact reaction she was expecting from her. Being the ruler of the universe, she was very wise in many aspects.
Yoon Min shook her head, her pupils shaking a little, "W-Why would I know where he is?"
"Well, because you know him better than anyone else."
Yoongi scoffed and interrupted, "Princess Aereum, I highly think it's a waste of time to interrogate her. We should follow Jungkook's lead and go to Earth soon."
"There's no way she knows anything." Nam Joon added.
Aereum pretended not to hear them. "Guardian Yoon Min, we need to bring Senior Guardian Seokjin back. We don't know where he is, we have no clue where to start. There are a lot of guesses and I'm afraid that's gonna take a long time. I need you tell me where he could be."
Taehyung rolled his eyes, thinking they were wasting their time on her. So was Yoongi. These two were certainly mad at her the most. The others were only disappointed. They weren't sure if they should trust her.
When she received no reply, she added, "I gave back your memories just like you wanted. You said you needed to know your past in order to make things right. You have to work with me."
Seeing Yoon Min's silence, the other senior guardians started to argue with the princess. They were adamant to find him in Earth and not hear her opinion.
"Princess, please let us go down on Earth and find him. We cannot waste time like this."
"If there's any place he is, then it's Earth. That's where he's most likely to go."
"Guardian Yoon Min has no idea. Don't bother asking her."
Princess Aereum seemed pissed at their proposals and became upset how they were not giving the guardian a chance. She was about to bang her fist on the desk to shut them all up, but that's when Yoon Min finally let out softly.
"He's on the Moon."
The senior guardians stared at her, being flabbergasted by her response. So did the princess. She wasn't blinking.
Yoon Min took a breath and explained, "That's where he goes whenever he feels down or lonely. He must be there."
It wasn't long before the questions arose, "What on banana milk are you talking about? Guardians can travel to the Moon?" asked Jungkook surprisedly.
"Waah, Jin Hyung never told us about it." Jimin complained.
Nam Joon decided to ask a serious question, "How do you know Hyung is there?"
She turned around slowly and looked at them. Now that they could take a proper look at her appearance, all of them discovered a big lump in their throats, built out of anxiety. The dark shadows rimming her eyes, the thinness to her face and the spotless sadness made them realize she was still grieving. She wasn't the bright, passionate guardian they all knew before.
Lowering her eyes, she almost whispered, "Because...he took me there once."
Aereum wasn't interested in their questions. She had her own question to ask her. "And why didn't you inform me despite knowing his location?"
Turning around to face her, she was quite straight with her answer. "I know him. He needs some time alone. He has a lot to think about."
"He's been gone for two weeks, Guardian Yoon Min! How much time does he need?" The princess raised her voice.
Yoon Min gave a simple answer. But it was so powerful that shut down everyone present in the office.
"He just found out the human he didn't save was his wife." She looked straight into Aereum's eyes. "If you were him, how much time would you had needed?"
The air crackled with tension, the hazy drowsiness completely abated when she spoke. She could feel the senior guardians were impressed by her answer, though her voice had trembled slightly. Without bothering to stay there anymore, she turned around on her feet and walked out of the office, slamming the doors shut behind her while Beomgyu followed her, calling her name.
Yoon Min went back to her comfort place again, the sea under the open starry sky. Her mind was fuming over the fact how foolish the others were to think Seokjin was hiding. How could they think of him like that? After what he learned, he really needed a long time to think over things. Why couldn't they understand him?
Receiving her memories, she realized the terrible heartache every time she used to face whenever Seokjin was near her, wasn't triggered by him. The aching was always there since her birth. She was born with a weak heart and that heart had to go through some of the most emotional painful attacks when she was alive. The pain was at its worst when she lost him and the baby; resulting her heart to bear the unbearable pain even after her death. And Seokjin was the main reason she went through all of those. That's why the pain occured and tears came whenever she was around him. But also magically, he was the only one who could stop the pain.
Her dead heart had been giving away all those signs, that it was him. It was begging her to recognize him.
As she stood against the infinite glittering sea, she wondered how Seokjin was doing, what he was feeling, why he wasn't returning yet. One thing she was certain he was suffering in a maze of regret. She didn't want to feel what he was going through, because it's way too much terrible for anyone to just feel.
Beomgyu stood beside her and faced the ocean as well.
It was after a long silent minute he decided to ask, "Can I-I ask you something?"
She didn't answer because he was gonna ask anyway.
"Why are you still in love with him?"
Hearing his question, she tilted her head towards him.
"He cheated on you. He was the one who broke your trust and betrayed you. He doesn't deserve an ounce of forgiveness." Turning towards her, he continued, "You shouldn't forgive him. You need to think of yourself and your worth."
It wasn't surprising how he knew about her past. Everyone in the universe was aware of their shared past somehow. Some knew he cheated on her, some thought she cheated on him, some were told they both died together, some were still debating if they were connected in their past lives at all. Rumors will never stop changing the truth in different angles.
Yoon Min inhaled a deep breath, "It isn't about me, Beom." She slowly turned towards him. "There are people out there who show no remorse after the worst atrocities, who were never aware of any guilt. People who only pretended to feel guilty or never admitted their mistakes."
Beomgyu argued, "That doesn't mean you have to love him since he was guilty. Don't you know sometimes giving someone a second chance means giving him an extra bullet to shoot you since he missed the first time?"
She smiled, a smile that was invisible to his eyes. "Regret is the most painful feeling out there. It has the ability to change your mind and even make you kill yourself. For this reason, we avoid this emotion as much as we can, we blame others instead of us, we convince ourselves it isn't our fault." Pausing to think, she continued, "Once we surrender to this feeling, we finally understand what real pain is."
There was a distant call of a whale, causing the breeze to shiver and the waves to disassemble.
She breathed, "Back then, I wanted to think of my worth and leave him. But his death...God, his suicide damaged me. I couldn't think of anything else then; my self-worth, my self-esteem, nothing. It was like he proved damn hard how sorry he was. I was left to think it was my fault he killed himself, it was my fault he didn't see any other way. Those feelings, those raw bloody emotions--"
She couldn't bring herself to finish what she intended. But he was left speechless anyway. No matter what point he could find, it was pointless. He had no idea she felt so suffocated when she was alive. Her soul had died already, just her body was begging to die too. He didn't think it this deeply.
She faced the ocean again, "I know what he did was terribly wrong. But I believe no matter how grave any sin is, every sinner deserves a second chance to forgive themselves first before being forgiven. Everyone deserves a chance to redo certain things in life."
With a final exhale, she finished, "I simply just want that for Seokjin."
He scoffed mentally before asking, "You speak so highly of him. Why do you do that? When he did nothing but break you so goddamn much that the cracks in your heart are practically visible through your eyes."
She chuckled lightly, "That's the thing about love, isn't it? You'll let them get away with murder, even it's your own."
The light in her eyes couldn't be compared to the beauty of the sun's reflection. The way she considered things, the way she saw the world, the way she spoke as if she sings, he admired these little brave traits of her. He would never get tired of her and her beautiful personality.
Beomgyu chose not to speak with her anymore regarding this matter. He wasn't in the state to prove his point no longer. He was convinced she was something; something extraordinary enough to have a forgiving heart like that. Not just her, even Seokjin. Both weren't normal to him.
And right now, he wasn't sure of his feelings for her. After learning about Seokjin's love for her, he knew the other man's love was unmeasurable comparing to his own.
He hated to admit that.