too fragile for your love (too strong for your heart)

and i dedicate to you (my entire destiny) pt two

     ignoring the less than subtle implications that he and heeseung are more than platonic, karina is a great conversational host. she wastes no time in taking them straight up to the hidden top floor, keeping up a steady stream of what seems to be inane chatter, all the while. paying attention reveals a much more serious tinge to her words, though.

     “-been away for weeks. it’s apparently nothing to worry about, but yunjin seems to think it’s worth checking out, though that’s probably because she’s eager to fulfil her kleptomaniac tendencies. it’s quite cute of her, if you ask me-”

     at this point, she stops in front of what looks like a dry-colored brick wall at the top of the stairwell, and claps her hands thrice, with no distinguishable pattern in the lengths of time between the claps. the wall splits into two halves, which move away in opposite directions, revealing a long length of blue carpeting, leading off into the far distance.

     “expansion spell,” karina interjects for his benefit, between fondly chiding yunjin’s habits and starting on a discourse about lee chan’s massive crush on jeon wonwoo.

     jake catches hold of heeseung’s sleeve, as they trace karina’s steps down the hallway. “the thing you said about wards,” he says, when the other man turns to look at him questioningly. “about it being magic, and not an ability-”

     “you’re so well-adjusted for your age, i often forget how young of a newborn you are,” heeseung says, shaking his head. the praise makes his chest swell up with pride. “there are a number of other undead species co-habiting our communities. naturally, witches are one of them.”

     a giggle escapes his lips, despite the unbelievable conversation he’s having. “naturally.”

     “aren’t you two adorable?” karina remarks, a sly grin on her face, as she pulls aside a pair of emerald green drapes, halfway down the hallway wall, revealing a large, rectangular door with a circular knob. it yields easily to her grip with a soft puff of smoke, and swings open on its hinges noiselessly. “come along, jake. you’re going to enjoy this.”

     he steps into the room, and is instantly struck dumb at its sheer size. it’s cavernous, for lack of a better description. no one, casing out the apartment from outside, would be able to guess what it’s holding up here, without prior information, and even then, it would take some fair imagination on their part.

     on top of resembling a concert hall, it’s chock-full of things.

     there’s really no suitable category that the contents of the room can be put into. not unless there’s a category that grand piano and gold-plated painting and gigantic shield can be fit into, all together. they are all floating in neat, orderly rows, held aloft in the air by rings of blue fire.

    “everything in here is either cursed, or important, or a magical artifact,” karina declares, turning around to face him as she spreads her arms, greatest showman style. there’s a proud smile on her face. “it’s the skvhc’s greatest and most well-kept secret. we needed somewhere unobtrusive and inconspicuous to store all of our war spoils, and after a ton of concealment spells, fine print, and oaths of secrecies from twenty different witches, the blue room was born.”

     “karina headed the project,” heeseung says, in an undertone. “this is basically her success story.”

     “well, i wouldn’t say mine alone,” karina modestly rebuffs his statement. “if you hadn’t persuaded minho to go along with my design details, i shudder to think of what lengths we would have had to go to, to get this done.”