Swan Lake (ATEEZ JongSang story)

Chapter 4 - A Secret Place

Yeosang was following the unicorn deep inside the forest. Once even his clothes got stuck on the bushes, but the unicorn's situation was even worse. The rope got stuck on literally anything, but somehow it always escaped before Yeosang could catch up to it. This made the creature's moves quite slow, so Yeosang could keep up with its pace.

Suddenly the unicorn reached a bridge. Well, it wasn't exactly a bridge, it was a tree that was laying across the small river and led the way to a cave. On the two sides of the tree there was a beautiful waterfall which also made the tree really slippery. Yeosang stopped as he was about to step on the tree trunk.

The unicorn slowly started walking on the trunk over the river. Yeosang paid attention to its every move, even though he had no idea what he can do if the horse slipped - which actually happened and the animal fell onto its knees. Yeosang hissed and stepped closer on the trunk.

'Shhh, don't worry, I'll help you!' he said, but no matter how calm his voice sounded, it startled the animal. It quickly got up and ran into the cave on the other side. Yeosang wanted nothing but to turn around and rush back home, but curiousity got the best of him and followed the unicorn.

He came out on the other side of the cave and he was in awe. There was a big lake there with a beautiful forest scenery surrounding it. He slowly walked ahead, but then he heard noises. He followed the voice and realized that it was the red unicorn - the rope stuck on a branch again. He looked at the animal as it stared back at him. It gave up on fighting the rope and looked at Yeosang with pleading eyes instead. Its red color was almost glowing in the sunshine and its horn was sparkling.

'You're quite a strange color for a unicorn, huh?' Yeosang mumbled as he walked closer to the unicorn, holding out his hand for it to smell. He just wanted to pet its nose. 'I would've expect something like pink or purple.'

'It would be nice if you didn't just criticize me about my color and helped.'

'Huh?!' Yeosang pulled his hand away. 'Did you just talk?' The animal rolled its eyes and looked back at Yeosang.

'Well, what did you expect? Because I'm positive you've never seen a unicorn before. I mean you didn't even know that we can be any color.'

'That's true' nodded Yeosang. 'By the way I didn't mean to criticize you. You are beautiful. And your voice is deep. It suits you.'

'Well thank you' said the unicorn. 'But I'd still appreciate it if you helped me.'

'Oh, yes. Sorry, my bad' smiled Yeosang sweetly. His eyes spotted a crystal that was somehow stuck in a big rock that was in between a tree's roots. 'Maybe that'll do.'

Because that's what people normally do, pick up random crystals that are casually stuck in between rocks without any effort to cut stuck unicorns' ropes. Well, at least that's what Yeosang did. He walked back to the unicorn with the stone in his hand.

'Wow, where did you get that thing from?' The unicorn looked at him amazed. He stared at the stone.

'From that rock thingy. Don't worry, I'll put it back, I'm not a thief' Yeosang ensured and cut the rope with the crystal. It fell off the unicorn's neck. It shook its head and looked over Yeosang's shoulder with an excited expression on his face.

'Did you just see that?!' he shouted. Yeosang froze and turned around slowly.