Daniel's Madness [WonKyun - Eng. version]

III. The Red Guard

The cup of tea that was on the bedside table, waiting to be drunk, had stopped steaming long time ago. ChangKyun laid on the bed, staring at the ceiling where the strings of beads and feathers tinkled delicately, apparently watching over his sleep.

Until he couldn't stand it anymore and got up. Perhaps he was unconsciously waiting for Wonho to return; maybe the discovery that he wasn't really human should have scared him, but he had taken care of him when he fainted. He didn't know if he was a bad person or not, and a part inside him wanted to trust him.

And yet another part of him was screaming at him that he had to get out of there. The coldness with which he had treated ChangKyun didn't give him a good feeling, and he shouldn't trust him blindly. Besides, Wonho had told him that he wanted him to leave, and he wasn't going to wait until the next morning to fulfill his request.

He had to find out why he had come to this world, and he wasn't going to discover it if he stayed all day lying on a bed.

Nervousness flowed through his veins as he went through the room in search of his shoes. He still wore the torn clothes of his uniform, so he rummaged in an old closet among Wonho's clothes and pulled out a black shirt and a leather jacket of the same color. Anyway, he wouldn't see him again, so he didn't even have time to feel bad about stealing his clothes.

Although his pants were stained with dry mud, he didn't change them since those in the closet were a size much larger than his own. He tied the laces of his school shoes and left through the red door, arriving at a small earth tunnel that gave place to what appeared to be the kitchen. The heat that reigned in all the rooms had gone from being pleasant to suffocating, causing a thin layer of sweat to form under his bangs.

It was like a burrow.

ChangKyun intended to get out of there without taking anything else, but his guts roared at the smell of food that came from two bowls covered by a rag on the wooden countertop. He approached cautiously, looking towards the door that faced the outside judging by the sun's rays that came out through the slit below, and removed the garment that covered the food. In one of the bowls there were different cut vegetables, not yet cooked, and in the other some kind of dried fish, chopped until being almost crumbled.

He wasn't a big fan of fish, but he didn't hesitate to gulp down his contents in a few seconds using only his fingers, a little distracted by the thin layer of smoke that an incense stick gave off inside a wooden bottle and by the sound of the three clocks on the kitchen's earth walls: he wondered why the hell Wonho would want three of them. He also ate the raw vegetables and, although he was dying of thirst, the urge to get out of there before Wonho returned was greater than his need to drink some liquid.

After wiping his hands with the cloth and his mouth with the back of his hand, he hurriedly tried to open the door. ChangKyun turned the golden knob repeatedly, but of course, it was closed; he scanned the place in search of some other exit, there were not even windows. The only light that illuminated the place were some glass containers, scattered around the countertop, inside which were some melted candles.

He returned to the bedroom where his torn clothes lay on the unmade bed and tried his luck with another door that was next to the mattress. This time, it gave way to a poorly lit room; there were shelves with boxes by the walls and the circular, tiled floor shone with the light that came from the other side of the door that was right in front of him: it was another exit.

Relief flooded his body and he crossed the room decidedly, but an object to his right caught his attention and stopped, making ChanKyun's feline eyes stare in that direction. He had to leave and, nevertheless, that wooden chest with black straps was inviting him to come closer and look inside. And so he did.