Fractured • Choi Yeonjun

Chapter 7

Travel~

Taehyun looked over at Soobin as they pulled into the airport.

His heart was picking up its pace as he thought about how much closer he was getting to his old village.

A plane ride, a long car ride, and then a few day's trek through the forest he hasn't seen since he was a young kid. That was a long time ago.

He had no idea how bad the village was now if there was anything left at all of it, but this was his only lead.

"Where exactly is your old village? Is it still around?" Soobin asked as he put the car in park.

"It used to be in the Qinling mountains. I can't say what's all around it now, or what state it is in now. I do know that in the early 1900's they were all hunted down. Most were killed, some survived and ran."

"Sometimes I forget how old we really are," Soobin said with a sigh.

Taehyun let out a small laugh through his nose. Time does blend together when you've been around for so long.

"Do you ever want this all to end? To stop and fade away finally?" Soobin lifted his head and asked Taehyun. Soobin had faded away once. He was nothing but a memory after his death. He watched the people that knew him when he was alive fade away as well when he was just a wandering spirit.

Taehyun shakes his head. "I could never stop knowing what waits for humans if we did leave. We're the best team out there, why do you think they asked us to transfer a few years ago?"

Soobin smiled and agreed. They had worked their way up the line over the years as the best team of soul collectors out there. They used to stay in their home country in South Korea but were asked to come to America where the demons were getting worse. There weren't many soul collector teams here when they first came, but they helped train a few and now demons were under better control.

"Thanks for driving me here, I need to get going though." Taehyun opened his door and paused. "Keep Beomgyu out of my room. Tell him I put traps in there."

"Did you really?" Soobin asked with wide eyes.

Taehyun laughed as he got out of the car and opened the back door. He leaned his head in as he grabbed his bag. "Only one way to find out."

With that Taehyun shut the door and tapped the passenger window a few times before walking off.

~~

Most of the people on the plane either fell right back to sleep or got busy on phones or laptops.

Taehyun pulled his phone out and went to pictures.

He tapped on the picture of the map of his old village.

He used his thumb and forefinger to zoom in once more on where he used to live.

His friend's house was not too far from his.

The mountain where the pixies lived was just west of their village. They had beat themselves a path from how often they would go up there and bug them... until their village discovered they could kill the pixies and take their powers as well.

That day Taehyun knew Alse was right in telling him to keep his powers hidden.

Their people took anything that had even the smallest amount of power and killed it. Wiped it off the face of the earth for their own selfish gain.

He hated how his people were, Alse did as well. She never wanted to perform dark magic, her mother forced it on her when she was old enough. It was either perform the magic or die and become a source of it.