RED HOUR | VKOOK ✔

bonus part. (read with caution.)

i started writing this book when i was seventeen but now i'm twenty one! this is my 21st birthday gift to you all. enjoy reading!

also, this chapter will be very VERY dark and very disturbing. i advise you to read with caution. don't read this at night. thank you so much.

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The light blue hues of the sky illuminated, painting all over above. Birds chirping, plants and trees growing, butterflies and insects all over freshly watered gardens. They are very green and healthy.The air was fresh, clean yet breezy cold. The sun was at its peak, burning and shining like the star it is, providing sunlight. The clouds looked like marshmallows, a pure foggy white.

Everything was peaceful. A serenity. No harm. No evil. No burning fires and lava floods. Such a beautiful, harmless world. A perfect one.

Jeongguk flutters his eyelashes open, his body seemingly and weirdly calm. His mind is empty of dark negative thoughts and chaos. It was peacefully empty. He doesn't feel the usual burning pain on his skin, and doesn't feel his insides getting stained by the familiar feeling of Taehyung.

Wait a minute. His body became more alert.

Taehyung.

The man he loved. Where is he?

The seventeen year old quickly roses up from his bed. His head suddenly became alert. All the memories come crashing back to him like a tidal wave. His eyebrows furrowed in confusion once he saw he was in a different room. It was more wide and luxurious than his old bedroom.

Spotting a mirror, Jeongguk dashed over, his eyes widening in astonishment as he took in his reflection. He was clad in a white blouse that reached past his knees, with white shorts peeking out underneath. His hair was tousled, and his eyes, once empty, now glimmered with life.

"W-Where am I?" His voice was slightly broken, throat dry. Weird. He didn't feel the usual thorn and chains wrapping around his throat.

It felt like he's free. A free bird who was finally given a chance to escape literal hell.

Jeongguk then wanders his eyes everywhere in the room. It was quiet. There was only him. No one else. The bedroom walls were elegantly adorned in a palette of white and gold. The doors from his balcony were open, welcoming a serene and ethereal view of outside, shocking him.

"No way..." He mumbles, eyes growing wide in disbelief. This can't be. Jeongguk is in hell!

He should be there, burning with Taehyung for eternity. Not here. Everything felt like a surreal dream—one he desperately wished was real.

His feet touched the cold marble floor, making him flinch in the process. It had been a while since he had felt the cold breeze on his skin. He had been deprived of it for so long, and now, as the chill seeped through the soles of his feet, a rush of sensations flooded his senses.

The cold was now an old friend of his. He had grown accustomed to it, having spent years enveloped in the warmth of fire burning in the pits of hell. The infernal heat had become a constant companion, mingling with the sensation of Taehyung's arms wrapped tightly around his waist during their most intimate moments. Those encounters had taken place on the hard, unforgiving stone, surrounded by the chilling presence of blood and the sins of trapped souls.

Yet now, as he faced the cold once more, it carried a new layer of familiarity—a stark contrast to the searing heat and dark passions of his past.

His legs were a bit jelly but he managed to stand up straight, heart racing fast against his chest. The whole house seemed too quiet. Awfully quiet for his liking.