Samhain

chapter twenty seven: where it ends

Wooyoung's footsteps echo loudly against the unforgiving frozen landscape.

Icy needles stab into his lungs with every breath he takes. The cold air wraps around him with an intensity he has never felt before, biting into every sliver of exposed skin and burrowing through his thick jacket.

Stillness envelopes them, as does the darkness. His fingers, already stiff and numb from the cold air, clench his broom so tightly he can feel the latent magic resonating from the polished wood.

The broom was one of many random magical items jammed into the van's trunk. They stopped by his apartment before leaving for Target. In his rush, he grabbed a little bit of everything - crystals, magical trinkets, enchanted jewelry, and even more crystals.

He wasn't sure what they would be facing... and he still isn't.

That's what scares him the most.

"There there," Jongho coos, patting Cerberus' massive nose. The guardian seems to recognize Jongho's touch, whining with concern. With an unspoken understanding, the three-headed canine leads them into the dark, cavernous ninth layer of hell.

As they traverse the tunnels the walls pulse with an otherworldly energy. Beneath the ice are hundreds of thousands of faces frozen in various states of horror, pain, and shock. Souls of the damned dating back thousands of years, trapped inside the ice.

They line the walls from floor to ceiling. Even the rocky ice beneath their feet bears countless tormented spirits frozen in collective suffering.

It's as though the spectral eyes follow their every move. Wooyoung shivers and averts his gaze, mindful not to look at the souls of the damned longer than necessary.

Hongjoong might have said something to him. Jongho might have given them a pep talk, but if they did, he missed it entirely. The biting cold envelops him, rendering his surroundings a blur of frozen eyes and a vacuum of sound.

The cold overwhelms his senses, and he feels his ears go numb. Why aren't the others as bothered as he is?

Wooyoung's legs shake beneath him. A sudden weakness overtakes him, and every instinct within screams for him to surrender to the ice.

His legs start to tremble more and more with every step. He feels weak all of a sudden, and every part of his being is screaming at him to curl up into a ball to conserve heat.

"Is something wrong with Wooyoung?"

"Woo, can you hear me?"

He hears voices. Yes, he wants to say, but his lips are numb, too. He collapses to his knees, vaguely registering the concerned voices of his friends.

Aren't they cold?

Aren't they scared, too?

Two warm hands clasp his shoulders.

Wooyoung feels an angelic warmth spread through his arms and slowly into his chest. He gasps and wiggles his fingers, which have begun to stick together.

"Wooyoung, didn't you hear me when we arrived?" Jongho asks, lowering his head to Wooyoung's eye level. "Come on, keep moving. You can't show fear. These caves can sense it. If you show weakness, the ice will claim your soul."

"S-Sorry, I didn't, I..." Disoriented, he trails off, feeling another set of arms hook under his shoulders to hoist him up. He turns to see San pressing himself against his back, and he melts into the warmth.