The Last Guardian || KTH

23

A day passed by as a second. Zeila went back home with the warning Ji-wook had given her, finding Taehyung sitting alone watching the news on the television. Upon asking further she found out Jungkook had left to meet Hyejin and that he lived with her--which didn't come off as a surprise to Zeila but as a shock, because she neither did she bother to ask where he lived nor did she give it a thought. Jungkook always rented out places for a few months--courtesy of coming from a well owned family.

Zeila only told Taehyung the warning that she was given, the rest of the information transfixed in the back of her head when she looked at Taehyung too long. Her heart twisted with shame and remorse when the stark similarity between them pinched her thoughts. The day was supposed to be a day where she would mourn and bereave Taehyung's absence. But only the thought of her life on the pedestal and Ji-wook using someone close to her swirled inside.

So, the next day, when Zeila got up and let herself rest after hours of training and opening portals strong enough to last for minutes, she settled down to the idea of filling in Taehyung on the remaining information.

Taehyung who was with her as she trained spoke nothing to her. Riled up by the sequence of events that happened, Taehyung wasn't too sure what he could tell Zeila. Bringing up her birthday celebration a day after Taehyung died, two days after Ji-wook wished to kill her, managing to kill someone to satiate his desires and three days after she was cursed to kill herself all leading to one abstract idea of someone around her holding the knife to her life only made Taehyung lose the words he had to say.

Zeila wanted to laugh out the entire situation. But that would mean Ji-wook had made her mad as he promised, and Zeila wished not to give him that. If her life was tumultuous because of him then it would end with him. The zeritus or the guardian connection didn't let him see her memories alone.

It was a two way path.

She saw his, as much as he had seen hers. They were memories pinched of his mind, but if she saw it, there must be a reason. "Taehyung," she called him as she dropped her sword.

When the clattering paused to a still and silence reigned over, she narrowed her gaze onto him. "I saw Ji-wook."

"The magic connection," Taehyung chimed.

"He has someone who is with us working with him. There's a tattoo, the symbol of a rose with knives for leaves on their neck." Zeila walked towards him.

"If what I saw is true then when everyone comes today-"

"You know what we're gonna do today?" Taehyung looked surprised.

"It's not like Hyejin did a good job hiding it." Zeila dismissed his shock with a wave.

"-we can identify them."

Taehyung remembered the dull glow that emanated from Hyejins neck a week back, when she had come to visit them. It clicked back into his mind, maybe he wasn't wrong after all. He hesitated a bit wondering how she would react to this piece of information, but Zeila had the intention to know the truth, whatever unfurling next would be a bridge they'd cross later. "Zeila."

She looked at him, breaking away from her trance.

"When Hyejin came that day when you were sick, after the incident with Ji-wook and stuff-I saw something on her neck, I'm not sure what it was or if I'm mistaken."

Zeila tensed. "Nothing is what it seems."

"What do we do once we do find out who's with him?" Zeila asked. "Do we-" She stifled a breath, closing her eyes to give her words another thought. "Hurt them?"

Taehyung rubbed the back of his neck. "Knowing Ji-wook, he must have them under his control not by will but by force. He has something over them because if one of them truly was with him-"