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Chapter Text

Each year, on the 13th of January, one girl or boy from one country is chosen to descend to hell and please the demons to protect the world from their wrath. Since ancient times, humanity has bowed to the devil, and even if heaven tells them not to fear, the tradition of satisfying the creatures of night with one human life a year has never been abandoned. This year, a certain someone from a certain country was chosen, and as of now just waits for their soul to be devoured by those known as The Seven Sins.

"It's the 13th", a rough voice sounded through the dark. At first it seemed as if nobody was going to respond, but after a few seconds someone snickered."I noticed", the second voice hummed. "How could I not? The ground is trembling with all the feet, and I can smell their fear from here." 
"Do you remember last year?", a third person spoke up. "That one was quite the surprise, wasn't it? Too bad he didn't last too long. He would've made a good companion." 
The first voice hissed. "Don't even think about it."
The third chuckled, obviously amused. "Don't worry. I have lived long enough to know the boundaries." 
The second voice interrupted. "What do you think, how is this year gonna go?" 
A pause formed before a fourth voice, calm and deep, replied. "I have a feeling this year is going to be interesting to say the least." 

Silence filled the void before the first one spoke up again. "It sounds like a challenge." 
The second voice hummed. "I like challenges." 
"Careful", chided the fourth voice. "Don't go overboard. Interesting can mean dangerous too." 
The first chuckled roughly. "Dangerous? Look at you, all careful now. I don't think we need to fear anything."

The fourth just huffed and silence spread through the dark once again, but just as the humans above, the Seven Sins we're excited - even if they didn't show. 
Not one of them remembered the fourth's words, and not one of them noticed how the aura of their place changed when the girl set her first foot onto the stairs to the netherworld.

Chapter Text

Your mother’s hands were shaking as she fumbled around with your dress, draping the lace in the way the government had told her to. You could tell by her silence that she was worrying, and tears were pricking in your eyes when she got up slowly and looked at you. She raised her hand and caressed your cheek. “My beautiful, beautiful child”, she whispered and you took a deep breath when the feelings threatened to spill over. “I’m so sorry this happened to you.”
You swallowed. Since the Day of the Choice, your mother had apologized to you every single day, and every time you had explained to her that it didn’t matter to you because it wasn’t her fault. But she kept doing it, and only now did you realize how hard this must’ve been for her. Taking a quick step forward, you hugged her, and soon you could feel her hands rubbing your back soothingly. “Shhh”, she murmured and you gritted your teeth. “I’ll come back”, you hiccuped, forcing back the sobs forming in your throat. “I promise.”
Your mother didn’t reply, and you knew exactly why. So far, not one of the hundreds of chosen girls and boys had ever come back, and even if you wanted to believe that you would, it was so, so likely that you wouldn’t.
You swallowed and stepped back again, the slim fingers of your mother immediately fluttering over your clothes again, checking for any imperfections. You took her hands into yours and kept her from touching it any further. “It’s fine”, you said and watched as her shoulders sunk down. “I’m sure devils don’t care how their food looks.”
It was supposed to be a joke, but your mom flinched. “Don’t say such things”, she chided sharply. You sighed. “Okay.”
The two of you spent the rest of the time in silence, not knowing what you were supposed to say. When the speakers finally announced your arrival, your mother pulled you into a tight hug, and although she didn’t say anything, you knew what she wanted to express.
Following the tradition of the mother accompanying her child to the entrance of the netherworld, your mother took your hand and straightened her back. You followed her lead and together, you stepped out of the waiting room.

The entrance was huge and dark, a threatening aura lingering in the air and making you shiver. Steep stairs were leading into the abyss, being swallowed by the darkness after only a few meters, and you instinctively took a tiny step back when you approached the hole. Only the vicelike grip of your mother’s hand kept you from turning around and running away.
You could see the fear in the faces of the audience standing close to the entrance, and it showed in the silence suddenly weighing down on your shoulders. The announcer cleared his throat. “We are here to witness the 1956^th Day of Descent today, honoring this year’s Chosen One’s courage to save us all from the wrath of The Seven Sins.”
Your mother huffed next to you, and you knew exactly why. Courage? You had been chosen to step down these stairs a few weeks ago, and there was no way you would have volunteered for being The Chosen One. You simply were forced to.
“It is time”, the man announced. Every pair of eyes was focused on you now. Your mother squeezed your hand one last time, tears shimmering in her eyes as she took a step back and left you alone in front of the intimidating darkness leading to the netherworld.
Silence surrounded you as you took a deep breath and then walked step by step, careful not to slip on the wet stones. You didn’t turn around like you were advised by the woman who put you into the dress a few hours ago. “It’ll be too hard to leave if you turn around”, she said, but right now, you couldn’t imagine. It was hard enough without turning around.
It only took a few meters before every sound and every trace of light from the outside vanished completely. You couldn’t see nor hear anything, and insecurely stopped. The high heels the woman had put you in hurt your feet, and without light it was absolutely impossible to walk down the stairs. Without hesitating even for a second, you bowed down, took off your shoes and continued to descend with the high heels in your hands.

It took long before you saw light again. Your feet were tired and hurting, and your hands ached from the times you nearly fell and had to grasp for support on the stairs. The light was different from the sun’s, it seemed as if someone took a dim lamp and put a pinkish cloth over it. It was weird, but not threatening, and so you climbed down further until suddenly, the stairs ended and you stood on even ground.
You looked around, then slowly proceeded. It seemed you were entering a giant cave, and when you finally left the tunnel you had been walking in, you realized it was a cave indeed. A huge cave, to be exact, the ceiling hovering over you so high that you couldn’t even make it out, and there was enough space on the uneven ground to place a palace five times the size of your mom’s house on it.
It was so cold you could see your breath vanishing into the air in little clouds, you shivered and pulled your thin jacket tighter around your shoulders. It didn’t seem anyone was here, but if you would try to search the whole cave, you would die before you even saw half of it. Nevertheless you climbed further, careful not to slip on the wet ground, and looked around. Though it looked like a normal cave, something was lingering in the air, telling you very clearly that this was not an ordinary place at all.

Your assumption was confirmed when you heard a quiet snicker echoing through the hall. “It’s that time of the year again?”, a voice asked, and next thing you knew someone landed just a few meters behind you with a loud thump. A pause formed as you froze, breath hitching when you felt the sting of glances on your body.
A hum sounded through the cave, the voice a bit deeper than it seemed at first, but just as smooth and relaxed. “They brought a nice one this time.”
You shivered in the sudden wave of cold air that washed through the cave. “Turn around”, the voice said, and although you were clenching your hands in fear, you slowly obeyed.

Chapter Text

You were greeted by a sharp glance out of dark eyes and a tiny smile. The young man standing in front of you seemed nothing like a dark, evil being, more like a totally normal human you would expect to encounter in the streets. Only when he tilted his head and his almost black eyes turned a reddish color for a heartbeat, you knew for sure he wasn’t human.
With a dry swallow, you attempted to do a step back, but the young man clicked his tongue disapprovingly. “No need to run away”, he reassured, but the slight relief you felt turned into panic when he grinned and added: “Not that you could run from me anyway.”
You gasped and squeezed your eyes shut, counting to ten like your mom had taught you for moments like this when you were a kid. Then you opened them again and were met with the sight of his chest.
The young man had come closer. He was nothing but a few centimeters away from you now, and your eyes widened. The reason why you could only see his chest was because he was so tall. Taller than any of the guys you had ever met, and you had to admit, it was pretty intimidating.
The man hummed. “Look up”, he demanded, and after a few seconds, you obeyed. His dark eyes looked down at you with a mixture of interest and contempt. “My name is Namjoon”, he spoke after a few seconds. “What’s your name?”
You swallowed, took a deep breath, swallowed again and finally managed to croak out your name. Namjoon tilted his head to the side. “Y/N, huh”, he murmured, then shrugged. “Not that it would matter anyway.”
You flinched when he bowed down abruptly, his face hovering next to yours, and then he sniffed. You stood straight, eyes widening with shock. He was smelling you. Probably deciding whether you were delicious or not, and whether he should rip you apart right here right now or should keep you as a late night snack.
You took a shuddering breath and Namjoon straightened. “We’ll see what the others have to say to this”, he murmured, eyes fixating you and making you shift uncomfortably. “W-where are the others?”, you squeaked, and Namjoon looked up. “They’ll introduce themselves when they feel like it”, he replied. “But don’t worry, they’re watching.”
You shivered, unaware of the six pairs of reddish eyes narrowing in amusement. Namjoon sighed when he saw you gripping your jacket tighter. “Follow me”, he demanded, then proceeded to walk further into the cave. “And don’t fall behind. I don’t know what else is living in this cave, to be honest.”
Terrified by the thought of monsters devouring your body, you were quick to catch up to him and followed him deeper into the dimly lit hall.

You felt like it took you hours until Namjoon finally stopped. Your breath was heavy, your feet were bleeding and your muscles screamed at you to stop with every step you took. You had the strength to keep yourself upright when you reached the young man though, not willing to admit your weakness.
Namjoon turned around to you when he heard you step up to him and quirked an eyebrow. “Oh”, he exclaimed, seeming genuinely surprised. “You’re still here. Half of the others didn’t even survive the walk.” You didn’t even attempt to ask about what happened to them because you could imagine too clearly, and Namjoon turned back immediately. “We’re here”, he declared.
You frowned. You could see nothing but stone and darkness, but just when you opened your mouth to ask about it, Namjoon moved his hand just an inch and suddenly, the air began to glisten. In front of your eyes, some sort of spell you couldn’t even hope to figure out unveiled a huge palace built in the middle of the cave, larger and darker than you had expected. Every human being would have taken a step back as the mansion rose out of nothing, and so did you, but Namjoon just shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and watched the spectacle calmly.
It took a few minutes until everything calmed down, and then Namjoon stepped towards the palace without saying anything. Still intimidated by the castle’s appearance, you followed quickly but carefully, looking around every few seconds to make sure no monsters were following you. That was probably why you missed the big stone in your way, bumped into it with your foot and stumbled immediately.
When Namjoon turned around slowly at the sound of stone on stone and your little whimper, you were already on the ground. Your foot and knees hurt and you bit the inside of your cheek to prevent any further sounds from slipping past your lips. The man watched you for a few seconds, then turned around and came to you. He didn’t seem surprised or affected in the slightest way, instead he just stopped right in front of you and looked down on you. “You know I was joking about the other things living in this cave, right”, he said and you lowered your head and forced back the tears of humiliation and shame. Namjoon kneeled down. “That’s because no one would dare to live in one cave with us anyway”, he added and you could hear the evil smirk in his voice. “Not voluntarily, that is.”
Anger took control of your body, you raised your head and flashed your eyes at him. “Don’t you talk a bit much for a devil?”, you snapped. Immediately his face turned hard and cold. You only realized you made a mistake when red rage flickered in his eyes. “Listen, human”, he hissed, bringing his face dangerously close to yours. “I will talk as much and whenever I want, and you’re not going to complain. Do you understand?”
You averted your glance, heart beating against your rib cage hard and fast, and you gritted your teeth to stop them from chattering. Namjoon waited a few seconds, then you felt his huge hand in your hair. He yanked your head back, forcing you to look at him. “Do. You. Understand”, he growled, emphasizing each word, and you immediately nodded just so he would let go of you, just so you didn’t have to look into his eyes anymore. He let go and stood up. “Come”, he demanded coldly.
You gathered the stuff that slipped out of your hands when you fell and quietly followed him. When you slowed down in the shadow of the mansion, intimidated and tired, he grabbed your wrist and forced you forward, not giving in until you stood in the huge entrance. Only then did he let go of you, and when he turned around again, he still seemed absolutely furious. “There are free rooms on the second floor. Choose one”, he snarled, turning around to leave you alone. “I hope you know how to behave now.”
He vanished into the dark and you were standing in the huge, empty hall all by yourself.

It took you a while to find stairs, and it took you even longer to find the corridor on the second floor Namjoon had talked about. You looked at room after room, and each one was different and nicely furnished, but empty. No human soul to be found. Of course you had known that you were the only one going down here, but for some reason, you had still hoped to find someone – a friendly soul, maybe a survivor of the previous years – just to realize you were all alone.
You finally decided for the one you thought was the brightest, unpacked the few things you had brought into the netherworld, and then sat on the huge bed and tried to calm yourself down. Your heartbeat was still racing, and your head was filled with so many impressions and thoughts that you thought it was going to burst. But after an hour passed and no more devils knocked on your door to scare you, your breath had calmed down and you found the energy to curl up on your bed and close your eyes. You were so tired you didn’t even notice you fell asleep in mere seconds.

Namjoon wandered up the stairs to the fourth floor. He could hear you breathing calmly in your room below him and gritted his teeth, pressing out a curse. He had promised himself not to snap at the stupid comments of senseless little humans anymore, but for some reason, his brain always got in his way.
When he opened the huge door to the corridor where the rooms of the seven devils were, he was immediately met with the sight of a lazy devil playing with a black cat on the windowsill. “Namjoon”, the silver-haired young man greeted.  “How did it go?”
Namjoon growled as an answer and stepped past him only to feel a tight grip on his wrist. It was a brunette man with a smile brighter than the sun. Only that now, he wasn’t really smiling. “I want details”, he demanded. Namjoon shrugged him off. “Go and see for yourself”, he snapped, then turned around and entered his room, closing the door behind him. The two others looked at each other until the silver-haired male grinned. “He seems to like this year’s.” The brunette smirked in response.
“My turn.”

Chapter Text

You didn’t know how long you had slept when you woke up, but you felt way better than before. When you looked around, expecting to see some dark figure sitting there and watching you, the room was empty to your relief. Carefully, you sat up. You felt refreshed even though your muscles were still hurting and your feet had left a bit of blood on the sheets. When you inspected them further, you realized you went into bed without washing yourself. The soles of your feet were dry and dirty, and you immediately got up to go to the bathroom.
With a few fresh clothes, you entered the bathroom of the chamber. It was big and – to your surprise – completely white and clean. While you undressed and stepped into the spacious shower, you wondered who was cleaning this huge mansion. It was almost impossible that the devils themselves kept it tidy, especially if they all acted like the one you met yesterday.
With a huff, you turned on the water. Namjoon. “What kind of name is that anyway”, you mumbled to yourself, letting out a sigh as the warm water trickled down your body. Though it burned in the scratches on your knees, hands and feet, you were glad to be able to clean off, and stayed in the shower longer than necessary.
When you finally got out the bathroom, relaxed and comfortable in clean skin and clothes, you noticed a piece of paper on your bed. With a frown, you stepped closer and read the few words written on it.

Dear visitor,
I hereby invite you to have breakfast with me downstairs. Come and join me,

H. 

You put the note back and shoved your dirty clothes into a bag you brought just for that purpose. “H?”, you murmured as you took a look in the mirror. “Hopefully the name isn’t as weird as the other one’s.” You snickered to yourself. “Hamjoon?”

Only after a few seconds, the smile vanished from your features, and you were shocked that you actually forgot you had been brought here to be eaten. For that reason alone. This surely wasn’t a situation to laugh in. 
Your good mood was gone and suddenly, you felt like staying inside your room all day and avoiding every contact with your hosts. But you were aware that if you didn’t come out, they would come for you, and thinking of yesterday’s events, you weren’t eager to provoke that. And to be honest, this room was so dark and cold that it wouldn’t make a difference if you stepped outside.
With a sigh, you straightened your blouse and opened the door.

You had realized the palace was huge, but it turned out to be more of a problem than you thought it would be. You didn’t remember how you got up here, and it took you a while to find the stairs you assumed you took. While you descended, you looked around – the architecture wasn’t something you had been able to appreciate yesterday – and were quite impressed. Though it seemed so dark and intimidating, you noticed the mansion was quite skillfully built, and the closer you looked at statues and gargoyles, you noticed they were way more beautiful than you had assumed. Scary, yes, and a bit weird, but still beautiful in their own way.
When the stairs finally ended, you found yourself standing in the entrance hall where Namjoon had left you yesterday, and you immediately shivered. It wasn’t a nice memory, but before you could dive into it too deeply and go back to your room, you heard a voice humming something, and then you noticed the flickering light of flames at the other end of the hall. Curious, but also careful, you walked closer slowly. Two torches lit up the area around an open door, and when you stood in front of it, you could make out the room behind it. It seemed quite friendly and not as cold and stony as the rest of the mansion, so you gathered your courage and entered.

At first sight, the room appeared to be empty, and even more so since you were distracted by the luxurious breakfast on the big wooden table – pancakes, bread, fresh fruit and vegetables, milk, tea… It was everything someone could ask for if they were positively starving like you, and with a dry swallow you took a step closer.
“Ahhh”, someone announced and you winced, quickly searching the room for the source of the voice. The someone chuckled. “A woman. I should’ve guessed.”
You bit your lip, hiding your trembling hands behind your back as you scanned the room a second time, but nobody was there. “W-who are you?”, you asked, trying to suppress the insecure tone of your voice. It was quiet for a while, then you heard steps and a second later a young man entered your field of vision. He was shorter than Namjoon and not quite as bulky, his figure was slim but you were pretty sure he was toned. His movements were elegant, quite as if he was dancing, and when he approached you, you were surprised by the warm and bright smile on his face. “Welcome”, he hummed. “My name is Hoseok.”
You had to swallow a giggle – those creatures knew pancakes, but their names were out of this world. “N-nice to meet you”, you then answered, still nervous even though the young man didn’t seem like a threat. He dipped his head to the side and watched you curiously. “Well”, he finally said. “Who are you, then?”
You forced your nervousness back and stood straight. “My name’s Y/N”, you introduced yourself, and a sweet smile took over Hoseok’s face. “Y/N”, he repeated. “What a nice name.”
Although he was smiling, you were starting to feel uncomfortable. He didn’t seem quite as impulsive and aggressive as Namjoon, but his eyes were the same – this weird mixture of darkness and a red spark, something that caused an intuitive fear within you. Hoseok watched you, and his smile turned into a bit of an evil grin. Apparently he noticed your fidgeting hands and the tension in your body. “No need to fear me”, he mumbled. “I won’t hurt you.”
You could feel the unspoken “yet” lingering in the air and huffed quietly. Hoseok looked at you sharply. “What is it?” His voice sounded a bit harsher than before, so you were quick to explain. “Ah, just… One of your friends said the same to me yesterday, and in the end…” You bit back a tiny smile. Hoseok raised an eyebrow. “He touched you?”
At his choice of words, you could feel the blood rushing to your cheeks, and the shame diffused the tension. “Not like that”, you protested. “He threatened me.”
The demon looked at you, then he snickered. It wasn’t a nice sound, but he didn’t seem angry at all. If anything, he sounded genuinely amused. “Yeah, that’s just like him”, he replied with a knowing grin. You looked down, your face still burning. In the world you had been growing up in, talking about a man’s and woman’s business was nothing you even thought about doing, especially not if you were a woman. But this demon seemed like it didn’t bother him at all, no, he even seemed to enjoy it.
“But don’t worry”, Hoseok interrupted your thoughts. He smirked. “I am not interested in that kind of stuff.” It was obvious he wasn’t just talking about hurting someone, and you wanted the ground to open up and swallow you. “Good”, you managed to croak out, and the young man chuckled. “Well, now that that’s settled, let’s eat, huh”, he offered, and although you still moved carefully, you were just too glad to get to sit at the table and have a proper meal. These last days, you hadn’t been able to eat out of pure nervousness and fear. A meal would be just the right thing to make you feel better.

Chapter Text

To your surprise, the demon didn’t eat. Instead, he just sat there and watched you indulge in the unbelievable variety of food. There were some fruits and snacks you had never seen before, and you tasted all of it. You weren’t too sure about the Seven Sins’ good intentions with you, and since you didn’t trust them to offer you food regularly yet, you ate as much as you could. It took you at least 30 minutes, and when you were finally stuffed to the point that your stomach was aching, you leaned back and let out a long, content sigh.
Hoseok watched you curiously and you noticed his glance. “What is it?”, you asked, feeling so satisfied you didn’t have the brain capacity to be nervous. He shook his head. “Oh, nothing”, he answered. “I just find it pretty interesting to watch humans eat.”
You sat up a bit and frowned. “Don’t you guys eat, too?”, you asked, curious as to why the young man seemed so unexperienced with food. He hadn’t touched anything of it, either.
The male shrugged. “We do”, he replied. “But in a different way than you mortal beings.” When he realized your quizzical glance, he sighed, but was quick to explain. “We don’t eat food in the sense of this”, he made a vague hand movement towards all of the dishes, “but depending on our species, we get strength from feasting on souls, emotions, thoughts… Most of what we consume isn’t solid food. There are a few types of demons and devils that eat human flesh, but that’s just nasty.”
You listened, both surprised and fascinated. But suddenly you had a thought that didn’t seem nice to you, and you swallowed. “So… What happens with mortal beings when you eat their souls?”
Hoseok looked up. “They die normally”, he answered, seeming a bit confused. “Sometimes they survive, but they are nothing but empty bodies after that. It’s best to kill them before they do something stupid in that state.” You tensed up at his words. “So”, you said, trying to keep your voice calm, “when you eat me…”
“… you’ll die”, the young male finished your sentence. “But don’t worry. It doesn’t take long, and it’s not painful at all.”
You frowned, interlocking your hands to keep them still. “How do you know?” The demon took an apple and looked at it curiously. “How I know?”, he snickered. “You don’t know how demons are made, do you?”
You held your breath at his piercing glance. “No”, you whispered. “I don’t.”
The apple flew against the wall and with a disgustingly wet sound, burst into little pieces. You flinched. “Maybe it had been better to inform yourself before descending to the netherworld”, Hoseok said sharply. Obviously, he didn’t seem too pleased. You wondered why he acted like this since he had been fine with questions just a second ago, but now his eyes were glistening maliciously. “Well”, he continued, getting up from the table abruptly, “one of the others will probably explain it to you later. Until then, don’t ask me any more questions, understand?”
You didn’t dare to speak up, so you just nodded quietly. Hoseok glanced down on you and to your surprise, his features softened a bit, but not so much that he didn’t seem dangerous anymore. “Oh, and about Namjoon… Don’t behave as familiar with him as you have been with me. He doesn’t like getting close to scum.”
You lowered your head at the curse word, closing your eyes and expecting a hit, but Hoseok simply stepped past you and left the room without any further word, just like Namjoon had done yesterday. You waited until his faint steps vanished into the distance, then you sighed and relaxed a bit. “What is it with those demons”, you mumbled, getting up from the table because the heaps of food suddenly made you feel sick. Turning around to leave the room, you groaned quietly.
“Why can’t they just eat me already”, you growled as you stepped into the entrance hall.

Someone laughed quietly. You flinched in surprise, but the blonde man lounging on one of the benches lazily just grinned.
He had a nice face and seemed like even less of a threat than Hoseok. “The answer is simple”, he said, and while you still wondered what he was referring to, he got up and approached you. “They don’t eat you because they want to have fun.” He cocked his head to the side and eyed you in interest.
“Have fun?”, you asked confusedly, so taken by surprise that you didn’t even think of getting out of the devil’s reach. “How?”
The young man stared at you, and his grin grew. “You really are a bit naïve”, he declared. “Don’t be fooled by Hoseok’s appearance, he’s a pretty ruthless person. And Namjoon, well”, he crossed his arms behind his head, “that guy’s even worse.”
You sighed. “I noticed”, you mumbled. “But have fun…?”
The blonde sighed. “Listen, cutie”, he said. “How often do you think a human is stupid enough to enter this cave?”
You shrugged. “Not too often?”, you replied.
The young man smiled at you widely, but judging from the ugly dark-reddish color of his eyes, you assumed he was being sarcastic. “Correct! Now, if you were locked into a room with nothing to eat, and once a year, someone would come by with a bit of food, would you eat it all at once or keep it so you can enjoy it longer?”
Your breath hitched and you stared at him with wide eyes. “I would keep it”, you replied, your voice trailing off as you realized what he meant. “Don’t tell me…”
The demon grinned, and this time it didn’t seem nice at all. “Oh yes. So you better be careful and behave, right beautiful?”
You couldn’t do anything else than nod, your head spinning with panic. The conversation with Hoseok and the nice atmosphere made you forget what you were actually here for, and now that this blonde creature mentioned it to you unabashedly, you felt cold creeping up your spine.
The demon chuckled. “Now, now, don’t be so afraid.” He lifted your chin with one finger and you recoiled from his cold touch. His eyes narrowed into slits. “We’ll make sure to have a lot of fun before you go”, he purred. “Just enjoy it while you can.”
You saw the pleasure he got from scaring you dancing in his eyes and took a tiny step back. The blonde male straightened and looked at you arrogantly. “Well, I think that’s all for today. We don’t want to ruin our little girl too early, right?” He smirked.
You gathered all of your courage and quickly walked past him, nearly running. The expression on his face was all but friendly.
“Oh, and little one”, he called after you while you hurried up the stairs. “My name is Taehyung. Don’t forget it, right?”
You didn’t dare to look back or reply. Instead, you just fled to the second floor and escaped into your room as quickly as possible.

Chapter Text

You didn’t even realize you fell asleep until you opened your eyes and noticed the room had gotten even darker than before. Sitting up, you assumed that it had gotten night – at least on the surface of the earth. You climbed out of bed, straightened your clothes and carefully opened the door to glance at the corridor.
It was dark, but empty, and you sighed in relief, opening the door a bit further.
A black shadow darted through your legs and vanished in your room. You squeaked and turned around hastily, just to make sure it wasn’t a devil in any form who wanted to suck out your soul from behind.
A silent meow and a pair of silvery eyes glistening in the dark made you relax. “A cat”, you decided with a bit of a tremble in your voice. “Thank god. A cat.”
The animal meowed again and then it came back out of the dark, nearly invisible due to its deep black fur color. It stood in front of you and looked up to you with its weirdly colored eyes, then it started purring and rubbed its head against your legs.
You had always liked pets, especially cats. With a quiet chuckle, you kneeled down. The cat hissed and quickly returned to the dark parts of your room, but after you had spent a while kneeling on the ground motionlessly, it dared to come back. Soon, it was practically climbing into your lap, eager to get every single one of your strokes. The purrs of the little creature calmed you down and you even started to enjoy yourself. “I have a cat too, you know”, you said, and your new friend blinked at you slowly as if it understood. “She would love to play with you.”

“Daimon doesn’t play with other cats.”
You flinched at the sudden voice above your head. In the darkness, you didn’t even notice someone had appeared behind you. The cat’s purrs got louder and it left your lap in a hurry, stroking around its owner’s legs.
When you looked up, the unknown young man looked at you with a tiny smile tucking at his full lips. You struggled to your feet and noticed that the demon’s hair color was the same as the cat’s eye color – silver. When you finally managed to stand, you quickly brushed over your blouse and took a deep breath to calm yourself down. “You scared me”, you admitted. The devil’s eyes turned into little crescents. “I can see that”, he commented. His voice was soft and nothing about him seemed devilish to you.
The young man reached down and picked up his cat, resting it on his arm. “I think we haven’t been properly introduced yet”, he mentioned and ruffled Daimon’s head. “My name is Jimin.”
You swallowed. Jimin was extraordinarily handsome. Now that you thought of it, all of the devils you had met so far had been very attractive, but in a state of fear and nervousness, you hadn’t been able to react to it. Now, you were quite calm, and you could admire the young man’s beauty.
“M-my name is Y/N”, you stuttered and lowered your glance, unable to look Jimin in the eyes. He chuckled lowly. “Y/N, huh? You’re this year’s, I suppose?” You nodded.
He sighed. “All of this worshipping the devils and satisfying us… Don’t you think it’s a bit much?” He winked at you, and again you were only able to nod.
A husky laughter lingered in the air and you winced when you noticed a dark figure moving in the shadows of the corridor. “Jimin”, the unknown male greeted. He had deep black hair with a few blue accents, and he didn’t even look at you. “Aren’t you overdoing it now?”
Jimin turned towards the other and smirked. “Come on”, he hummed. “Let me have my fun, no?”
You took a step back. It had been so obvious, but still you had been blinded by the demon’s charm. Of course Jimin didn’t mean what he said to you, and of course he was only playing with your mind.

The other grinned, then his glance shifted towards you. He eyed you up and down and quirked an eyebrow. “Her?”, he simply asked, and Jimin nodded. “Y/N, as far as I remember”, he replied and threw you an amused glance. “I’ve never been good with names.”
The black haired chuckled, then he approached you. “Y/N”, he repeated. His voice was deep and very unique. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. My name is Yoongi.” The demon stopped in front of you and studied your face. “Did Daimon like her?”, he asked without looking at Jimin, and the latter snickered. “He did”, he said. “A lot.”
Yoongi turned away from you and threw his friend a smile. “Well, that’s good then”, he hummed. “Cats have better noses than a lot of other beings after all.”
You felt anger boiling in your stomach at his arrogant statement, but you clenched your fist and kept quiet. Still, Yoongi stopped in his tracks and Jimin looked at you, seeming surprised. The black-haired male groaned quietly. “Anger… Such an exquisite smell.”
Jimin chuckled and his eyes darkened as he watched your every movement. “Shall we have a taste?”, he purred, letting Daimon jump to the ground. “She looks perfect.”
Yoongi clicked his tongue. “Naughty boy”, he smirked. “It seems tempting, but Namjoon surely wouldn’t appreciate us snacking before everyone else, right?” Jimin relaxed and sighed. “No, that’s for sure… Hands off, then?”
His companion nodded. “Hands off… For now.” He smiled, but it wasn’t a nice expression. His eyes flickered and you could practically see the hunger within them.

“I’m looking forward to meeting you again”, he purred, and goosebumps formed on your skin. Jimin noticed and bit his lip with pure, devilish pleasure, exposing two sharp canine teeth. “What a good girl”, he praised and you shivered at the tone in his voice for some inexplicable reason. To escape this uncomfortable situation, you took an insecure step back, and the silver-haired demon’s eyes flashed up. “It’s going to be a lot of fun”, he hummed and turned around. “Anticipate it.”
Yoongi smirked at you before he followed his friend. “See you later, Y/N.”
Only seconds after the both of them had vanished into the shadows, you slumped to the ground and curled up into a little ball.
There really was no friendly soul here.
You were in hell.

Chapter Text

You spent the night on the floor. It wasn’t that you were unable to move, but you just didn’t find the motivation to. In the end, it didn’t matter anyway. You would be dead in a few days, maybe a bit more. Nothing really mattered.
In the morning, you only got up to take a shower. The palace was relatively quiet – when you went downstairs, the room you had been eating in yesterday wasn’t occupied by any of the devils, but someone still prepared something to eat. Although you didn’t feel hungry or thirsty, you still sat down and ate a few bites, even if the food tasted bland. After breakfast, you roamed the mansion and found a few interesting places, but you certainly weren’t able to bring up any excitement or happiness. Everything just seemed like a blur, and when you finally sat down in one random, dark room, you stared up to the ceiling and wished for a window, for blue sky and sunshine. Even rain or snow would’ve been fine, really anything at all that would get you out of your apathy.
You only moved when you heard the door clicked. A dark figure was standing in the frame, and you quickly sat up. You certainly weren’t in the mood to deal with any of the moody demons, but you didn’t have the strength to engage in any kind of game or argument either. Because of that, you just waited quietly until the person stepped out of the shadows.
When you were able to make out his face, you grew aware that this was one of the two demons you hadn’t met already. He had dark brown hair, so dark it seemed nearly black, and beautiful almond-shaped eyes. The devil approached you silently and stopped right in front of you. Judging from his expression, he seemed to expect you to get up, but you didn’t feel like it, so you sat there quietly and looked up to him.
“You’re the Chosen One, right?”, the demon asked. His voice was deep but smooth, and you nodded. “Yeah”, you replied, unable to say anything else. “I am.”
A pause formed before he spoke up again. “My name is Jungkook.” He sounded indifferent to say the least, and you replied in the same manner. “My name is Y/N”, you tiredly answered, expecting the young man to start snickering or humiliating you in some form. But nothing like that happened. Instead, he just looked at you for a while, then he turned around. “Don’t worry”, he said before he left the room. “You don’t have to endure it for long anymore.”
You watched him leave, surprised that he didn’t seem interested to torture you like the others did. On the other hand, you thought when you returned to your original position, not engaging with someone at all was some kind of torture too. And his last words certainly didn’t help to lighten up your mood.

You spent the whole day in this room, dozing on and off for hours. Only when it got darker again and you felt like evening arrived, your stomach demanded something to eat, and you decided to go downstairs and get something to eat. While you walked down the corridor, you prayed to every god you knew that there wouldn’t be any demons around, even though you knew close to none of your prayers would ever leave this cave and reach heaven.
When you reached the entrance hall, everything was quiet and you relaxed a bit, making your way down the room to look for dinner. When you entered the chamber you and Hoseok had been having breakfast in, you noticed a variety of warm food waited on the table for you. The smell was delicious, and even though you were still suspicious, you sat down slowly and started eating. At first, every bite seemed like rubber in your mouth, and the taste was revolting to your tongue, but after you gulped down the first few pieces of food, it got better, and soon you were eating slowly, but steadily – until a sound made you look up.
You hadn’t noticed before, but on the opposite side of the door to the entrance hall, there was a second one. It had been closed so far, so you didn’t really notice because the dark wood blended in perfectly with the color of the walls, but this time, it was slightly open and you could see a thin streak of light shining through the gap.
You quietly put down your fork and stood up only to approach the room carefully. When you opened the door a bit more, you grew aware of the big figure standing in front of a counter, and when you looked around, you realized you were looking at a kitchen. A gasp escaped your mouth, and before you could move, the person froze and then turned around.
Dark eyes met yours as you were looking at a quite handsome face. The young man turned towards you fully and straightened his back, exposing his wide shoulders. “Who are you?”, he asked. Despite his intimidating figure which was also as scary as Namjoon’s, his voice was soft and smooth and he didn’t sound dangerous at all.
You swallowed, then took a hesitant step forward. “I am Y/N”, you replied silently. The demon looked at you for a while, then seemed to relax a little. “My name is Jin”, he answered. “What are you doing here?”
You pointed over your shoulder. “I was eating”, you said, and suddenly, the young man’s eyes began to sparkle. “You ate?”, he asked, sounding excited all of a sudden, and you realized he had been the first of the seven to actually behave like a human. For now.
You stayed careful and nodded slowly. “Yes?”, you answered. “There was food on the table, so…”
Instead of replying, the devil stepped aside and exposed a variety of foods on the countertop. You frowned and opened your mouth in confusion. “But… Demon’s don’t eat, or d-do they?” Jin’s expression darkened at your question and you could see how he gritted his teeth. “No”, he replied, forcing himself to stay calm, “but they can cook.”
You were surprised. None of the others had acted like they wanted to be human or despised their demon life, but it was obvious that Jin was different. When he looked down on the foods he prepared and yet had to prepare, his eyes turned a bit sad. Feeling bad for confronting him about it, you stepped forward and attempted to touch his arm – a completely normal human act.
You had forgotten that those guys weren’t human just again.

Chapter Text

When he noticed what you were up to, Jin hissed and took a quick step back, something between panic and grief flickering up in his eyes. “Don’t touch me”, he said, sharply, but not aggressively.
You were shocked at yourself and quickly pulled your hand back. “S-sorry”, you mumbled, distancing yourself from the devil with a quick step. A short pause formed when neither of you said anything, but finally Jin was overwhelmed by curiosity.
“And?”, he asked. “How did it taste?”
You looked up, surprised yet again. “What?”, you replied, completely lost, and he sighed. “The food”, he explained, “the food on the table”, and you finally understood. “It was delicious”, you answered. “Like the food I am used to from home.”
A smile rushed over Jin’s face, but your shoulders sank down. You missed home. You missed your mom. You missed the sunlight, the wind, the smell of earth after a rain…
Jin’s smooth voice interrupted your thoughts. He seemed to have figured what was going on in your mind. “What is your favourite dish?”, he asked, sounding genuinely interested. You frowned, but then you started to think. “Favourite dish… Ah! I know.” At the thought, your lips curled into a faint smile. “Sushi.”
Jin chuckled, and it was one of the friendliest sounds you had heard since you descended down here. “Easy”, he said. “Should I make it for dinner tomorrow?”
Your eyes widened. “You mean, you…?”, you started, and Jin nodded with a proud expression. “I have been cooking everything, yes.”

You were surprised, but also impressed. “Why do you cook?”, you asked. The demon seemed conflicted, but finally decided to answer. “A bit complicated”, he said and indicated for you to sit down on one of the stools at the counter. “I think Hoseok told you how eating works for us?”
You didn’t think about where he knew that from, but just nodded as you sat down. Jin turned around and proceeded to cut vegetables. “Well, you might also have figured we don’t get to have a meal very often. Apart from the annual…” He hesitated and looked at you insecurely. You nodded and he proceeded. “Annual sacrifi- Chosen Ones, there aren’t a lot of worthy souls who find their way down here. Maybe a rabbit or a few mice every few months, but that isn’t really satisfying. As sad as it is, their souls are tiny and very bland.” He sounded apologetic but you just hummed to let him know that it was fine.
His wide shoulders relaxed a bit and while he reached for a bunch of carrots, he kept talking. “Anyway, we’re just hungry a lot of the time. And maybe it’s not the same kind of hunger or appetite that humans feel – not that I would know – but it’s more of a desire. A really deep desire. We don’t feed on physical food after all, and it certainly makes a difference. Even if I don’t know how much of a difference it really is.”
He shrugged, but you were sure he wasn’t that indifferent about it. “You get used to it, but it’s hard. And when someone like you comes down here, well…” He threw you a glance and smiled. “It doesn’t make it any easier. The whole mansion smells of you. And when everyone is starving, it’s hard to resist.”
You frowned. “Resist?”, you asked. “Why would you resist?”
The demon sighed. “It’s not necessary, you’re right”, he replied while shifting uncomfortably. “But it’s more of a thrill, to be honest, and the more interesting it is, the longer it satisfies.” He paused. “I personally don’t appreciate the effort the others make with the postponing, but I can’t do anything against it.”
You winced at his words, but forced yourself not to jump up and flee. It seemed like Jin seriously didn’t intend to play with you like the others did, and you decided to stay for just a little while longer.
Suddenly, another question popped up in your head. “What if you don’t feed at all, though?”
Jin seemed to freeze for a second, then he grabbed the next carrot. You could see his hands shaking. “You know”, he started, but he seemed very reluctant. “The humans are right for offering sacrifices. If we wouldn’t be feeding for a long time, we would just lose our minds. And you certainly don’t want demons to lose their ability to think rationally and control themselves…”
A short pause formed before you replied. Although it made you shiver, you said: “I should be glad to be down here to protect humankind then…”
Jin stopped in his tracks and looked at you. He smiled sadly and just attempted to speak up when he was harshly interrupted.

“What is this?”
You knew the voice just too well and winced immediately, backing away from the door when you noticed the huge figure standing in the frame. Namjoon stepped out of the shadows and fixated Jin. “Having a nice chat?”, he asked, but didn’t seem pleased in the slightest of ways. Instead, his expression darkened even more when he approached Jin.
Even the other demon tensed up when Namjoon’s aura washed over him, dark and heavy and completely terrifying. The latter’s eyes narrowed into slits. “Are you getting familiar with the food already?”, he growled, and you winced when you realized he didn’t mean the food on the countertop. He meant you.
Jin frowned. “She’s not-“
Namjoon interrupted almost immediately. “Yes, she is”, he snarled back. “And you better back off and wait your turn.”
Jin swallowed, you could almost feel his nervousness from where you stood, and finally gave in with a slight nod.
Namjoon took a step back and watched him quietly. “Good”, he finally said. “And you.” When he turned to you, you avoided his eyes. “Don’t get the impression you will be able to become friends with us.” Everything was quiet, then he added: “Don’t forget your position, human.”
Without anything else, he left the room. Jin threw you an apologetic glance, but then urged you to leave the room. You felt both sad and angry when you walked up the stairs to your room, but you knew it was better to obey. Namjoon wasn’t someone you wanted to mess with.
While you opened the door to your bedroom, the demon’s words echoed in your head.
“Don’t forget your position, human.”

During that night, your sleep was restless. Your thoughts were haunted by a tall demon with bright red eyes and a terrifying voice. When you woke up in the early morning, your sheets were sticking to your skin with sweat and your brain was fighting to tell fantasy and reality apart.
The rest of the dim morning hours, you spent curled up in one corner of your bed, hiding under the sheets as if they could protect you from any of the monsters you were living with.

Chapter Text

Namjoon closed the door to the living room and approached his companions, sitting down quietly in one of the huge seats. Hoseok was the one who broke the silence. “What do you think of her?”
Namjoon kept quiet and waited for the others to reply. They exchanged a few glances, then Jin spoke up. “She is nice.” His glance flickered towards the leader insecurely, but when the latter didn’t show any signs of anger, he took a deep breath and kept going. “I feel like she doesn’t belong here. Even less than the ones before her.”
Jimin cocked his head to the side and hummed. “Yet she doesn’t seem too frightened”, he answered. “It’s a bit weird.”
“She is frightened.”
The calm voice made everyone look up in surprise. Jungkook was leaning against the wall, and his expression was dark. “Don’t tell me you don’t hear her.”
The other demons looked at each other, then concentrated. And really, they could hear her – shallow breathing, suppressed hiccups and a heartbeat so fast it could be the one of a tiny bird trying to escape its cage.
Jimin looked down, suddenly feeling bad for not noticing, and Yoongi rubbed his back. “It’s not for long”, he insisted, his black eyes fixating Jungkook until the younger lowered his glance. “When will you learn that?”
Namjoon huffed and everyone looked at him. “It doesn’t matter”, he said. “Whether he will learn it or not, it’s the same every year. Of course she is frightened. So?” A small smirk flickered across his face. “It makes the taste more exquisite.”
The demons swallowed, their throats getting dry and aching when they thought of the taste of a soul. It’d been so long since they had eaten. They were starving.
Jungkook was the first to get a grip on himself. “Then let’s just end it”, he said, but his voice was hoarse, giving away that his throat hurt just as much as the others’. Namjoon chuckled and leaned back.
“Patience”, he chided. “Now that she’s here, we can have all the fun we want.”
He didn’t notice the glances his fellow devils exchanged, wavering between excited and uncomfortable. Instead, he got up. “Yoongi will be first. Don’t mess it up.”
All he got was a little nod, then Namjoon turned around and left the others behind.

When you woke up, you felt horrible. You hadn’t slept, instead you had been dozing on and off, chased by the dark fantasies your traumatized brain produced. When you looked out the window, you realized it was already early evening. You had slept a whole day, still you didn’t feel rested.
But although you felt exhausted, you also realized you had gotten a little less scared and intimidated. This new courage was why you got out of bed, showered quickly and then walked downstairs without hesitation when your stomach grumbled. Whatever you did, it didn’t matter in the end anyway, so why not let it all go?
When you entered the dining room, the table was full with food, but the door at the other end of the room was closed. You felt a bit sad when you looked at it, contemplating whether you should go inside or not, but finally decided against it. It was better if you stayed away from those boys as much as possible. Quietly, you sat down and started eating.
The longer you sat there, the harder it got to bear with the silence. At some point, you started wishing you had some kind of music to play, but of course you didn’t. You hadn’t been allowed to take a lot of stuff with you, and since you hadn’t expected to be alive for so long, your phone hadn’t been one of the things you had packed.

“It’s quiet, right?”
A rough voice made you flinch and you looked around, but couldn’t find anything. Thinking that you had imagined it, you returned to your food, but a few seconds later, someone chuckled. “Look up.”
You raised your head and grew aware of the young man hanging from the ceiling. He smiled, then let go and landed in front of you. You drew back a bit, but Yoongi raised his hands and sat down. “No evil intentions”, he said and smiled, and if you wouldn’t have known he was a demon, you would’ve believed him.
With a frown, you reached for your slice of bread and took a bite. Whether he was here or not, you had decided to keep going with your life – if it could be called a life – and the young man didn’t seem to mind. He watched you quietly, but after a while, you started to get more comfortable. Yoongi noticed the tension vanishing from your body and hummed. “There we go”, he said. “That’s better.”
You didn’t respond to his words, and he shifted in his seat. “Are you angry at me, kitten?”, he smiled, and you threw him a sharp glance. His lips formed an appreciative “Ohhh”, but he didn’t let it slip. Instead, he just leaned back again and kept watching you.
You finished your meal quickly and without saying anything, and then you sat there and waited for Yoongi to react. Even though you didn’t want to give in, you were unsure about what the demon would do if you just got up and left, so you stayed still. Yoongi eyed you.
“You’re not scared anymore”, he noted. “That’s good.”
You looked up and decided to interrupt. “Good?”, you asked. “Don’t you want me to be scared?”
Yoongi stared at you for a second, then a quiet laughter escaped his lips. “You’re a good observer”, he smiled. “Yes, we want you to be scared. Most of the time, that is.” He leaned back and relaxed. “But it’s very boring if our prey always runs from us, you know?”
You sucked in a breath, but didn’t answer. Yoongi shrugged. “Also, if a soul is surrounded by too much fear, it goes bitter.” His eyes formed little crescents as he smiled again. “And I hate bitter food.”
You lowered your glance and Yoongi got serious. “As nice as it seems”, he continued, “you should never start to believe that we do this for you. Keeping you alive for longer simply because we enjoy your company.”
His insides twitched as he listened to himself. What he said was mostly right, but not fully. To be honest, it was very lonely down here – especially in this part of the netherworld, very few demons came to visit, and the Seven Sins had been to themselves a lot anyway. As they were some of the strongest demons, most of the downworlders didn’t dare to meet with them. It was nice to have somebody to play with. But being the kind of man he was, he was unable to admit it to himself.

“You guys are The Seven Sins, right”, his thoughts were interrupted by your voice. Your eyes narrowed. “Which sin are you?”
Yoongi smiled. “Guess”, he replied. “Guess which sin I am.”
You looked at him sharply, remembering the school lessons about the demons. History had been a big part of your school’s curriculum, and you had listened to the story of the demon’s a thousand times. That’s why you clearly remembered the Seven Sins you had been taught about – everything you had to do was assign Yoongi to one of them.
Yoongi smirked while you thought for a while, but finally you decided and straightened your back. His eyes sparkled dangerously. “So?”, he asked. His voice was deeper and rougher now. “Did you decide?”
You swallowed the slight nervousness creeping up your back and looked him dead in the eye.

“Pride”, you said quietly. “You’re Pride.”

Chapter Text

Yoongi’s face went blank for a second as he stared at you, but then his lips curled upwards. “Correct”, he replied without any shame. “I’m Pride.” He bowed his head slightly. “Nice to meet you.”
You relaxed into the chair. You hadn’t been sure, but you knew that if you had guessed wrong, the demon could’ve flipped – and then your soul would’ve been nothing more than history. Luckily, he seemed very laid-back, and not prideful at all, but when you looked closer, you could see the little arrogant glimmer in his eyes.
“What sin are the others?”, you asked. The young man chuckled. “I don’t know if I am allowed to tell you”, he replied. “Maybe you should go ask them for yourself. I am sure they will gladly tell you.”
You were a bit disappointed, but didn’t let it show. Yoongi smirked. “Curious?”, he asked, but it wasn’t a question he wanted you to reply to. “You’ll find out soon enough, and believe me, not all of them are nice like me.”
You nearly laughed. “Nice?”, you mumbled to yourself, slightly amused at the kind of view the demons had on themselves. In the human realm, nobody would’ve described the young men as “nice”, let alone “friendly”. But to the devils themselves, it seemed like not too bad behavior if they didn’t consume their meal at the first day of its arrival, and to some extent, you could understand it. Those creatures had been locked in here for so long that their perception of what was right and wrong was completely distorted.
The thought of it made a question appear in your head. “How did you guys end up in this cave?”, you asked, remembering how you had entered it the first time. It had been scary and not very welcoming, and since those demons were thousands of years old – at least that’s what you were told in school – you couldn’t imagine they chose this place to live in voluntarily.
Yoongi’s eyes narrowed into slits. “They didn’t tell you?”, he asked quietly, and you slowly shook your head. He leaned back and sighed, seemingly frustrated. “Humans”, he mumbled to himself. His jaw muscles tightened. “Only seeing what they want to see.”

You frowned. “What?”, you asked. “What do humans want to see?”
Yoongi looked at you sharply. “Humans are stupid beings”, he sneered and you stiffened when you saw the hate and arrogance flickering in his eyes. But it was gone after just a few heartbeats, and then the demon smirked.
It wasn’t a nice smirk.
“You know why humanity offers one sacrifice a year to us, right?”, he said and you took a deep breath. “Yes”, you answered quietly. “So that your wrath doesn’t come over us and destroys our world.”
Yoongi nodded. “Correct”, he said. “Easy. But do you know how the threat of our wrath became a thing to worry about in the first place?”
You frowned, utterly confused. “You guys are demons”, you replied. “Your wrath is something always to worry about.”
The devil hissed quietly. “You really have no clue, do you?” Your answer was a simple head shake. Yoongi sighed. “Well, I probably can’t blame you for it”, he murmured. “Human education systems have always lacked.”
He paused and you patiently waited for him to keep going. It took a while, silence filling the room and crawling into every corner, but finally he sat up a bit and started explaining.

“We demons have lived for hundreds and thousands of years”, he started. “We weren’t necessarily alive before humanity, but we’ve watched you for a very, very long time.”
You nodded, careful not to interrupt. You had figured so much.
“When humans found out we existed, they panicked pretty quickly.” Yoongi chuckled. “The whole world was debating how and how soon they could defeat and banish the evil for all times.” He shook his head. “Not that they would’ve managed, but the fear grew, and at some point they even started to fight each other – remember Salem, for example.”
He sighed. “But for us, the humans were nothing more than a rat is to you.”
You quirked an eyebrow. “An animal?”
Yoongi rolled his eyes in annoyance. “A nuisance”, he said. “But you wouldn’t kill a rat with your own hands, would you?”
You shook your head. “No.”
The demon shrugged. “Same for us. The netherworld didn’t really care about humans. Apart from when we had a meal to sustain ourselves, we ignored them for the most part. Of course there were demons who ravaged and eliminated whole towns, but they were rare.”
He snickered. “Because there were so few of them, humans underestimate the number of demons to this day. But”, he became serious, “they noticed us. And when they realized the danger wasn’t coming from other humans but from those demons, they attacked.”

Silence settled in for a while. Yoongi shook his head. “They killed a lot of those who dared to raze towns and people to the ground. Mostly lower demons, but still.”
His expression darkened. “Of course, the netherworld noticed, and more and more demons came out to fight back and seek revenge for those who were killed by humankind.”
Your eyes widened. In the human world, no one had ever spoken about this. All the details had been left out.
Yoongi looked at you directly and continued. “Of course the higher demons like us kept away from the human world. We knew that is was dangerous and did everything we could to protect the others, but the rage was growing. Still most of us managed to contain or anger and stay calm.”
Your expression softened a bit without you noticing. You knew too well how it felt to suppress emotions. “It must’ve been hard”, you whispered, and the darkness vanished from Yoongi’s face a bit. “It was”, he said, “but not as much as you may think. A demon’s emotional system works a bit different from a human’s.”
You cocked your head to the side, suddenly interested. “How is that?”, you asked, and Yoongi seemed surprised. “What?”, he asked.
You repeated your question and he relaxed into his seat a bit, apparently glad he could get away from the topic of how they ended up in the cave. “It’s a bit hard to explain”, he said. “But first of all, a demon’s emotions are much stronger than a human’s. In comparison to a human’s emotions, ours are several times more aggressive and intense. That’s why we need to learn how to control them quickly, or we will become a threat to ourselves and others.” You blinked and he smiled. “Other demons, not humans. I told you we don’t care about them.”
You swallowed and Yoongi waited a second before he continued. “But controlling them is also easier for us than it is for you”, he said. “We can practically switch them off. Many of the demons who bulldozed little towns in the earlier years used that technique to escape the feelings of guilt and disgust afterwards, and the stronger ones used it to keep the anger contained.”
You frowned, another question having popped up in your head at his words. “Guilt?”, you asked. “Demons can feel guilty?”
Yoongi’s dark eyes pierced right through you.
“Yes”, he answered quietly. “Demons can feel guilty.”

Chapter Text

You were stunned by his blunt answer and lost for words for a few minutes. Yoongi waited patiently until you had recovered, then looked at you sharply. “Can I continue?”
You nodded and he leaned back again.
“As I said, most of the higher demons managed to keep calm. Until one day”, he looked down, “one of them died. Her name was Claire.”
You looked up. The demon seemed genuinely sad and you wondered why. “Was she close to you guys?”, you asked quietly and Yoongi shrugged. “Not to all of us”, he replied, still avoiding eye contact. “But she was a wonderful woman, and she was especially close to one of us. When she died, that certain person flipped."
He finally seemed to get a grip on himself and looked up again. “He went to the surface and killed every single human he saw. Even for us demons, it was terrifying.”
You swallowed. “Who was it?”, you rasped out. Yoongi looked at you firmly. “You’ll know at the end of the story. Be patient”, he replied.
“Unfortunately, he was so caught up in his rage that he didn’t notice the demon hunters who were very popular at that time.” He sighed. “They caught him easily in the middle of devouring a woman. He wasn’t paying attention, it was his fault. But we still couldn’t let him get killed.”

He crossed his arms in front of his chest. “The remaining six of us went up. At first, the demon hunters attempted to catch us too, but unless a devil is distracted, we aren’t that easily to get a hold of. But they had a lot of weapons and even though we could’ve killed them with a bit of effort, we had a youngling with us, a young demon who had just recently become a part of our group. He hadn’t experienced something like this before. We couldn’t just kill a dozen of men in front of his eyes.”
“A youngling?”, you interrupted. “Who?”
Yoongi chuckled. “I’m not sure he wants you to know that.”
“But why couldn’t you kill them?”, you insisted. “Even though he was a youngling, he still was a demon, right?”
Yoongi sighed. “That I will explain at a different time”, he said. “Now listen.”
You held back and kept quiet. The demon waited a few seconds before he was sure you wouldn’t interrupt him a second time.
“Because we couldn’t get rid of them, our only chance to get all of us out of there was to make a deal.” His expression darkened and he interlaced his fingers, resting his elbows on the armrests of his chair.
“We were lucky. After a little while, the demon hunters agreed to the deal.”
You swallowed dryly. It was pretty obvious what kind of deal that was, but you wanted to hear it.
“They would keep the whole group alive, including the ravaging demon. But only if we agreed to live in this cage deep, deep under the ground where we couldn’t harm anybody.” He seemed lost in his memories now, eyes so dark you couldn’t even make out his pupils anymore. “Of course we agreed.”
You kept quiet as his voice trailed off. It took a while for him to keep going, and when he did, he seemed tired.
“That demon has never forgiven himself for practically locking us all in down here. Since we arrived, he has shut himself off and only comes out when the human sacrifice arrives. Because he barely speaks, he is slowly turning more bitter and aggressive than ever before.”
He looked up at you. “Even if you are a sacrifice, it’s better to stay away from him as far as possible for as long as you can.”
You gasped, now just too well aware of who he had been speaking of the whole time. “Namjoon”, you whispered, eyes widening. “It’s Namjoon.”

The door opened with a quiet screech before Yoongi could react. “Thank you, Yoongi”, a deep voice scoffed sharply. You flinched at the sound and even Yoongi straightened, watching Namjoon enter the room. “Thank you so much for explaining our life story to her. I’m pretty sure she feels better now.”
He looked at you and his dark eyes with the always-evident red spark within them narrowed. With one glance he noticed your trembling hands and your frightened expression. His lips twitched. “Or maybe not.”
The other demon didn’t react in any way. Instead, he just relaxed a bit again. “Namjoon”, he greeted. “You’re welcome.”
Before Namjoon averted his glance from you to look at the other demon, you could see the rage flickering in his eyes at Yoongi’s words, and for some reason you wished for the latter to just give in.
Yoongi didn’t seem very eager to do that. Instead, he got up and stood straight when Namjoon approached him. The latter was taller and towered in front of him, but Yoongi didn’t even blink. “You know I am stronger”, he said calmly, close to condescending. “You better behave.”
Yoongi’s arrogant words made Namjoon snap. He closed his hand around the other’s throat, crossed the room at lightning speed and banged him against the wall. The sound of splintering wood and shattering stone filled the room and it took a while until silence returned. “Behave?”, Namjoon snapped and his eyes were glowing aggressively. “You’re telling our story to food!”
Yoongi blankly returned Namjoon’s glance, then he quickly moved his wrist.
Namjoon’s grip loosened and he coughed, falling to his knees in a mere seconds. Even though he wasn’t screaming, his eyes looked as if he was in unbelievable pain, and Yoongi looked down on him coldly. “Behave”, he repeated before he walked around him. He noticed your scared look almost immediately and nearly all the cold vanished from his face. “You better leave quickly”, he mumbled when he stopped in front of you. You nodded, intertwining your fingers to stop them from trembling.
Something like a smile creeped up on Yoongi’s face, very small and nearly unnoticeable, but it was there. “I enjoyed talking to you”, he whispered before he straightened and walked past you.

After he had left the room, you stood there a few seconds motionlessly, left speechless by the change you had seen in Yoongi’s face when he had looked at you. Only when Namjoon grunted and unsteadily came to his feet, you remembered he was still there too. His glance searched the room for Yoongi, but when he couldn’t find the other, he leaned against the wall and calmed his breath.
You took a few staggering steps back but Namjoon didn’t seem like he cared. He tried to walk but slumped back against the wall immediately, gritting his teeth in frustration.
“I’m sorry”, you broke the silence and Namjoon looked up. “I-I made him tell these things. I-if it upsets you, I w-won’t do it again.” You couldn’t suppress the stutter. Namjoon still looked wild and you were sure he could kill you if he wanted to.
The demon looked at you quietly. “What’s done is done”, he finally said. “Forget it.” He took another experimental step, and this time it worked. Although he was slow, he approached you and automatically, you froze.
Namjoon walked past you to the door, but before he left the room, he turned around once more. “Oh, and about the sacrifice”, he said, referring to your question from the beginning. “Humanity knows very well that we could escape from here if we really wanted to and give us the sacrifices to keep us satisfied. But even more so, even if they can’t kill us, they give us food only once a year to keep us weak.”
You quickly turned around and suddenly noticed the dark eyebags and his sunken face. As soon as he noticed your glance, his expression hardened.
“Now you know.”
And before you could say anything else, he vanished into the dark.

Chapter Text

The evening with Yoongi and Namjoon had left you a bit upset, but if anything, you were confused. It wasn’t clear to you why the people wouldn’t talk about what happened on the surface and avoided the topic of The Seven Sins at any costs.
In the story Yoongi had told you, it seemed as if the demons were innocent of committing any crimes, if not more or less harmless to humanity at all. But at the same time, you could understand the reaction of the demon hunters – one of their feared enemies had killed countless people and devastated everything in his field of vision, so naturally they would seek to destroy or at least lock it up.
“For the safety of everyone” had been a sentence you encountered every single day in the human world, and still the doubts kept you awake this night. You couldn’t quite wrap your head around what happened and your confusion only grew the more you thought about it.
It took hours before you fell asleep, partly because of all the thoughts, partly because you had slept so much that day, and when you finally did, you dreamed of a beast with glowing red eyes that started weeping bitterly as soon as the hunters surrounded it.

Naturally, you weren’t very well-rested when you walked down the stairs for breakfast. You were even so exhausted you had skipped the shower and appeared in the dining room with a messy bun and comfy clothes. Funnily enough, you found Namjoon sitting at the table, and as soon as he looked up, you blushed and attempted to turn around to change.
His glance rested on you coldly, but he seemed somewhat harmless. “Sit down”, he demanded, but it sounded a bit exhausted. You hesitated, but when he waved for you to join him impatiently and when the delicious smell of fresh breakfast made your mouth water, you finally gathered all your courage and sat down quietly.
You ate in silence for the first ten minutes. Namjoon just sat a few seats away from you and studied a newspaper. It wasn’t a surprise to you; you had seen the newest editions of several newspapers in different languages laying around in the entrance hall even if you weren’t sure how they got there. But them existing meant that someone read them quite frequently, and it wasn’t a shock that it was Namjoon.
“You’ve been declared dead”, the demon broke the silence after you had finished your first slice of bread. You looked up and swallowed the bite. “What?”, you asked, and he returned your glance for a second before it returned back to the paper in front of him. “Your death”, he said. “It’s been declared in the newspaper.”
Your face went numb and you quickly stood up to look over his shoulder, all fear forgotten. “Where?”, you asked, fervently searching the page for your name. You didn’t notice the glance Namjoon threw you when you leaned closer, almost brushing against his shoulder.
He pointed to a little box in the middle of the page with one slender finger. “There”, he said.
You froze as you read the few lines, holding your breath. He was right. It was your name, accompanied by the title of “The Chosen One” and several expressions of condolence.
“It’s true”, you whispered, stunned with disbelief. Your eyes were glued to the page. “They think I’m dead.” You could feel tears creeping to your eyes at the thought of your mom reading the short declaration. Namjoon was quiet for a while, then he closed the newspaper. “They always assume their death far too early”, he said. “It’s easier that way.”
You gritted your teeth, reminding yourself not to let the tears spill – at least not in front of him – and returned to your seat. “Probably”, you croaked out. Namjoon’s attentive glance rested on your figure.
“Your mom is well”, he finally said, and your head jerked up. He returned your glance firmly. “I can hear her.”
You opened your mouth, but no words made it past your lips. Instead, you couldn’t hold your tears anymore, and before you or Namjoon could react, they rolled down your cheeks.
The demon seemed astonished. He didn’t dare to say anything as he watched you wipe them away and force them back, but some kind of emotion danced in his eyes. Even if you would’ve noticed, you wouldn’t have been able to identify it, but you were busy regaining your composure, and when you looked up again, the emotion was long gone.

Silence spread through the room, but it was interrupted a second later. Jimin came in and when he saw the two of you, he smiled brightly. “Good morning, Y/N”, he greeted you, but you didn’t react.
Namjoon stood up and left the room without a word, leaving the newspaper behind on the table. Jimin stepped closer curiously and while you were busy with sorting out your emotions, he opened it and took a look inside.
It didn’t take him long to notice the death notice. An expression of sadness flickered across his face. “Oh”, he mumbled. “I’m sorry.”
You finally awoke from your trance. “No”, you were quick to reply, burying your emotions deep inside so you would forget about them quickly. “No need to be sorry.”
Jimin looked up and eyed you sharply. “You can’t really fool me”, he then smiled, “but in that case, I’ll leave the matter alone.” He closed the newspaper and put it aside, sitting down in the chair Namjoon had previously rested in.
Although you weren’t that hungry anymore, you put a few fruit into a bowl and started snacking on them quietly just so you didn’t have to bear with the uncomfortable silence settling in between Jimin and you. The demon watched you eat, but not for long.

“Hey”, he finally said after a while, and even though you didn’t really feel like engaging with him, you raised your glance from your fruits. His expression was kind of friendly. “How do you feel about me showing you the cave a bit?”
You frowned. “It’s just a cave”, you said. “I saw it when I arrived. It’s boring.” Your inner uproar didn’t leave any time and space for thinking about being polite and careful, and you surely didn’t miss the short angry shimmer in Jimin’s eyes. But the demon got a grip on himself quickly. “It might seem like it”, he said, sounding rather mysterious. “But I can show you some of the stuff I can do.”
Despite your lacking motivation, his words caused a spark of interest within you, and after a few seconds of thinking and Jimin looking at you curiously, you finally nodded. “Okay”, you said. “I’ll go with you.”
Jimin smiled, he seemed pretty content with himself. “Great!”, he replied. “We’ll leave after breakfast. Meet me in the entrance hall.”
He got up, twirled around and left you alone with all the food and a blank mind.

Chapter Text

You weren’t too eager about leaving the palace, which was the reason for you spending at least half an hour more in the dining room after Jimin had left, mostly just sitting around and staring at the ceiling.
The disappointment and pain about the death notice caused your heart to ache every time you remembered it, and the thought of having to walk around with a demon in the dark cave didn’t help at all. But you finally got up, thinking that Jimin would be furious if he found out you missed their appointment, and as much as you felt indifferent about everything right now, your life was still something very dear to you.

When you stepped out of the room into the entrance hall, Jimin was already leaning against one of the posts which supported the ceiling high above your heads. Noticing you, his lips curled into a smile, and even though you didn’t trust the happy expression on his face, you decided to forget about your grief for the time being and stepped up to him.
Jimin eyed you from head to toe. “You ready?”, he asked, but you figured he wasn’t just talking about the breakfast. The demon seemed as if he was asking how you felt and whether you were in the emotional state of accompanying him on a walk – which seemed a bit odd, given that none of the seven guys had ever seemed like they really cared about you and your well-being.
After hesitating a few seconds, you finally nodded, and Jimin hummed. Something thoughtful shimmered in his eyes, but he didn’t say anything and just turned around, assuming you would follow him.
Even though a part of you just wanted to run up the stairs and lock yourself in your room, you decided to go after him.
Immediately after you stepped through the huge wooden door and entered the cave, you held your breath. Spending the recent days within the mansion only, you had forgotten how huge hence impressive it really was. You looked up and tried to make out the ceiling, but couldn’t find anything but intense darkness.
Jimin turned around and chuckled. “You can’t see it, at least not with human eyes.” He seemed to think, then quickly snipped his fingers and suddenly a reddish flame was flickering over your heads, illuminating the cave a bit and enabling you to make out the true size of it.
You couldn’t prevent a little gasp. In the flickering light of the fireball, you realized the cave was actually a lot bigger than you had assumed so far. Even the mansion didn’t compare to it, taking up not even a fraction of the room. And until now, even the house of the demons had seemed unbelievably big to you. The wonder about the fire above you drowned in appreciation for the spectacular view.
“How is this real?”, you whispered to yourself, the announcement of your death long forgotten as you looked around in awe. Jimin seemed very content with himself.
“We assume it’s been a magma bubble long ago”, he replied, taking in the view as well now. “Such a huge cage is hard to explain. But the humans seem to have found it first, so it belongs to them.” He shrugged.
You pulled yourself together and looked at him. “Are there interesting parts to this cave, too?”, you asked dryly. “It’s huge, but still just a cave.”
The demon snickered at your words. “You’re right”, he said. “But it is not just a cave. After all, we’re living in here.”
Intrigued, you followed as he stepped further in the darkness only dim lit by the flame hanging in the air as if he had pulled it up by invisible strings.
Jimin didn’t talk while he led you through the cave, over gravel hills and around huge boulders. It amazed you how wild and rough the surroundings were, never touched or altered by human hand, but you kept quiet. In the silence of the cave, every step seemed a bit too loud, and your voice would only have interrupted it even more.
Finally, after what felt like an hour to you, Jimin stopped. He glanced at you and pressed a finger to his full lips, gesturing for you to come closer.
You noticed a warm orange shimmer as you stepped up to him, looking around for what he was trying to show you, but your human eyes gave up to the total darkness of the cave. The flame over your head was not good enough anymore.
The devil noticed your struggle and chuckled quietly, grabbing your elbow to guide you. You instinctively pulled away from the feeling of his fingers and his weird temperature, somewhere between warm and cold but unsettlingly not human. Only then did you realize his grip wasn’t rough, not even an inch too tight. He just pulled you forward slowly and gently, leading you into the darkness step after step.

Suddenly, fear filled your heart and you felt the urge to turn around and just run – from the blackness, the fingers around your arm and Jimin’s glowing eyes in the dark, bizarre and frightening and not even a bit reassuring.
But it only felt like that for a heartbeat, because then the scenery lit up and the air got warmer with every hesitant step you took. You extended your hand, sighing as the warmth stroked over your skin as if to calm you down.
In the vanishing dark, Jimin’s eyes stopped glowing and you could see they formed little crescents now as he smiled at you. “Just a bit more”, he whispered. “Come on.” You threw him a skeptical glance, but gave in to the nudge of his hand. He led you forward a bit more until the glow seemed to come from right underneath you.
Suddenly his arm was in front of you, preventing you from tumbling down into a hole that opened up in front of you. You gasped, taking a wiggly step back, and Jimin laughed quietly. “Don’t be scared”, he hummed, his voice nothing but velvet in the dark. The shimmer from out of the abyss illuminated his face and painted soft shadows onto his features. “Take a look.”
You rubbed your arms nervously, suddenly shivering, but after another reassuring nod of Jimin, you took a deep breath and stepped forward again, glancing into the hole.

Chapter Text

Underneath you, a sea of fiery orange lava opened up to your eyes, seeming like candy mass at first, but when the heat and the smell of burned stone raised up to your face, you very quickly realized it was not. You raised your head and looked at Jimin. “Impressive”, you said, returning to the view after you saw Jimin’s smile brighten. “It’s beautiful, right?”, he asked. “But wait, it only gets better.”
Even though you wouldn’t have called the spectacle “beautiful” exactly, you had to admit, the view was something different. For a short moment you even realized very few humans had been able to see something like this for themselves on the surface, but you suppressed the feeling of pride dwelling in your chest. This was nice, but still you didn’t trust Jimin.

The devil noticed that your thoughts were wandering and shifted from one feet on the other impatiently, which ripped you out of your daze. You continued to stare at the moving, boiling mass beneath you for a little while longer, wondering what Jimin meant when he said “It only gets better”, because you at least couldn’t see anything. Only when Jimin leaned forward to you, whispering “There, lower right hand corner” into your ear, you realized it wasn’t only the lava which was moving.
Just shortly above the surface of the hot stone mass, you noticed a movement which didn’t stem from the bubbling and boiling of the lava. Instead, you were able to make out the flapping of tiny wings, and, hanging below them, the body of a highly mysterious creature.
When the being turned around, you were able to make out a scrunched up, little face which did resemble the one of a cat vaguely and was kind of cute in a very weird way – if you were able to ignore the bilious green eyes. The big ears were also similar to those of a cat, but they were accompanied by two totally cliché horns. The creature had four legs (or arms?) and when it flew up and attached itself to the stone wall, you automatically flinched back. But the thing, obviously noticing the visitors, just turned its head in curiosity and stared at the two of you.
You stared back, but Jimin chuckled next to you, only to shove his fingers between his lips and emit a sharp whistle. The creature’s eyes widened, and before you could react, it jumped from the wall in your direction, glided over the lava lake and then landed on Jimin’s shoulder.
The demon smiled and pulled something from his pocket that looked like a gemstome, but you couldn’t make out what kind, because before you could comprehend, the little thing on his shoulder snatched the stone from his fingers and crunched it up in his mouth.
When it was done, it showed sharp fangs and then emitted a sound similar to a purr, but with a much higher pitch and at a much faster frequency. It snuggled up to Jimin’s neck, and then the demon turned towards you carefully.
You stared at him and the creature.
“What is that?”

Jimin seemed like he wanted to shrug, but then refrained from it due to the guest on his shoulder. “We don’t know”, he replied. “They seem to be a lower form of demons, but they’re harmless and only eat stone. We haven’t seen them before we came down here, so we supposed it’s a specially adapted species, but with rarely any power within ourselves, we can’t evaluate them, let alone communicate with them.” He took a step closer to you. “Do you wanna hold it?”
First, you declined firmly, taking a step back everytime Jimin urged you to extend your arm. Finally, the demon rolled his eyes in annoyance. “Come on, he won’t bite”, he said, and before you could flee, he grabbed another gemstone from his pocket and shoved it into your hand.
The creature’s whole body wiggled as it focused on the treat in your hand, then it stared in your face in anticipation and emitted another purr. It reminded you of one of your neighbour’s puppies who would come by and beg for a bit of bread every now and then. With a sigh, you gave in to the pleading eyes and extended your arm so it could climb on your shoulder. With a content sound, the tiny demon left Jimin’s shoulder and clawed his way to yours, the sensation somewhat similar to what you thought it would feel like if a huge parrot climbed around your body. When it was finally safe next to your neck, it purred into your ear and after a nod of Jimin, you raised your hand and let it eat the gemstone.
Jimin approached you and grinned. “See”, he said, running the palm of his hand over the weirdly scaly back of the demon. “They aren’t dangerous.” Despite his words, you still felt highly uncomfortable with this thing on your shoulder, and after Jimin had petted him some more, you shook your arm and watched it fly off.

When it was gone, you turned away to continue staring into the abyss, fascinated by the movement of the lava. “It looks like orange candy”, you mumbled to yourself, but of course Jimin caught on to your words. He looked at you in interest. “Orange candy?”, he asked.
You chuckled to yourself and looked up. “When you make candy, the sugar and water get molten first.” You pointed to the pit in front of you. “This lava looks just like the mass before it cools down and can be formed.” With a heavy feeling in your chest, you lowered your arm again. “My mom used to make them for me, for special occasions”, you ended your explanation, swallowing the lump in your throat.
Jimin, who had been listening carefully, was quiet for a while. Then he suddenly extended his hand and slowly took yours, searching in your face for any disapproval if not fear, but you were too immersed in memories to care.
“Would you like to make them?”, he asked softly.
You raised your glance, furrowing your brows. “What?”, you asked. Jimin smiled warmly and suddenly, his face lit up and his eyes seemed much more human than before.
“Would you like to make orange candy with me?”

Chapter Text

You were astounded at the sincere flicker in Jimin's eyes, and in your surprise, you shrugged and agreed with a quiet "Sure". You wern't so sure if this was gonna go well, but Jimin's lips curled into a smile right after and he pressed his hand into your lower back to steady you on your way back over the rocky path.
It took a while for the both of you to get back to the mansion, and it was mostly filled with silence. Unlike all the previous times though, it didn't weigh heavy on your shoulders. You had to admit that Jimin's presence was the most likeable so far, even if Yoongi showed some signs of a pleasant nature too when he explained most of the demon's history to you. But with the silver-haired male that was walking next to you right now, it was almost too easy to forget that he could rip out your throat in a mere heartbeat. Maybe he's too good at hiding it, you thought to yourself as you climbed through the harsh landscape, or he really is better than the rest of them.
It felt like someone electrocuted your mind when you realized that you yet again tried to make one of the demons less scary and less dangerous than they actually were. May it be your good nature, may it be a sliver of hope to get out of this alive, but your mind seemed hell-bent on lowering the demons' potential to actually kill you – even if it was only wishful thinking.

You scolded yourself quietly, but Jimin seemed to notice. "Is something wrong?", he asked, and you were quick to shake your head no. "Just concentrating on not breaking my ankles", you tried a joke, and Jimin's bell-like laughter filled the cold air. "Let me help you, princess", he chuckled and with a slick motion – you were sure he either practiced this with his cat or did this one too many times already – he swooped you off your feet and carried you across the stony area effortlessly.
"Way more comfortable, huh", he grinned to you, and you nodded, heart pounding at the close proximity to his body and, admittedly, the perfection of his face near yours. Your mother had once mentioned that the faces of demons, just like the faces of angels, were made to lure you in and make you feel safe. Apparently, one of the first demons to ever live possessed the gift of shape-shifting to enormous extents, which allowed him to copy the facial features of every being he encountered. When times for the downworld got rough, he allegedly took on the looks of an angel which earned him the trust of many humans and meant an increase in human souls to be consumed by him and other demons. Since then, every single of his offsprings had both incredibly beautiful looks to lure humans in, and the shape-shifting ability, even if not as developed as in the original demon. Being one of the first ones to roam earth, he was father to a lot of lower demons; hence the high quantity of beautiful and shape-shifting demons nowadays.
Looking into Jimin's face, you could imagine very clearly why times were so good for demons in those days. It was luring you in, practically begging for you to press yourself against him and let him consume your soul. You felt the urge overtake and turned away from his looks, staring into the darkness of the cave to distract yourself until you arrived at the mansion.

Jimin set you down carefully and smiled at you. "Let's make orange candy, shall we?"
You frowned. "Now?", you asked. "Do we have the ingredients?"
Jimin looked at you curiously. "I don't know", he stated bluntly. "What do we need?"
A silent snicker escaped your mouth. "You have no idea what goes in candy?", you asked, and he shrugged. "Jin is the one cooking", he replied. "We don't eat, so why should I cook?"
His explanation made so much sense that you stifled your chuckle and pushed open the door with a bit of effort. "Let's go and see what you have then", you said, and Jimin followed diligently.

When you entered the kitchen, to your surprise, it was lying there quiet and dark and empty. No sign of Jin. He would've been a great help with finding ingredients, but since he was nowhere in sight, you just shrugged and started searching the cupboards. Jimin leaned against the giant wooden table in the middle of the kitchen and watched you. "So, what do we need?", he inquired again, and you replied while pulling out a pot of sugar from one of the cupboards. "Sugar", you said and put it down next to him. He eyed the pot curiously. "And?", he asked further.
You looked around the kitchen. "Oranges", you said, and Jimin's eyes lit up with childish excitement. You couldn't tell if it was fake or not when he whirled around and searched the countertops as well. "I know how those look!"
'Not very hard to judge their looks from their name', you were tempted to say, but since you didn't know how well demons could handle sarcasm and the experiences with talking back at them didn't end well so far, you refrained from saying it. Before you could search another cupboard, though, Jimin held up a net filled with oranges. "Found them."
You chuckled, having just discovered the huge spice rack located over the stove. "Then I guess we should start making the candy, huh?"

You were painfully aware of Jimin's presence when you started squeezing the juice out of the oranges. He was right behind you, carefully watching your hands. It wasn't just the weird warmth of his demonic body, but also his scent and the slightest tingle of his breath that fanned over your neck. When he attempted to take one more step closer, you flinched and turned around to him. "You're too close", you complained, and a smirk flickered over his face. "I'm sorry", he said and stepped back, but the amusement in his eyes told you he wasn't at all sorry.
"Help me with the oranges", you huffed, and the arrogant attitude dropped in an instant.

A bit helpless, Jimin stared down at the round fruit in his palm and then threw you a questioning glance. Now it was your turn to smirk. "It just takes a bit of strength and-"
Jimin's fist balled around the orange and it exploded everywhere, juice dripping from the countertop and the nearby cupboards. You blinked through drops of orange juice on your face and Jimin sucked in a sharp breath, dropping the crumpled orange. "Sorry", he said, looking down at his ruined shirt and jeans. "Sometimes evaluating my own strength is a bit..."
You couldn't supress a tiny giggle and Jimin looked up at you, a relieved smile lighting up his features. You reached for another orange.
"Try it like this", you chuckled, cutting the orange in half and then pressing it out with one hand into the bowl in front of you, holding one hand underneath to catch any seeds. Jimin watched for a second, then pulled a second orange out of its net with a faint amused smile tucking at the corners of his mouth.

"Yes, Ma'am."

Chapter Text

You found yourself almost thinking Jimin was cute when he watched you pour the sugar into a pot and drop in some cinnamon, cloves and star anis before you added the orange juice. He seemed like a clueless kid, and when the mass began to melt, he was even more fascinated, his body almost touching yours as he came a step closer and looked into the pot. 
Apparently the concept of steam was something he wasn't familiar with either, because as soon as it hit his eyes, he jumped back and hissed like an angry cat.
You chuckled and turned down the heat, approaching Jimin who rubbed his eyes and muttered slurs in a language you couldn't understand. On your way to the grumpy demon, you grabbed one of the kitchen towels and drenched it in cold water. When you finally stood in front of Jimin, you cleared your throat, and when you didn't get a reaction, you carefully pulled his hands from his reddened eyes, folded the kitchen towel to a kind of blind fold and pressed it on Jimin's eyelids.

The young man sighed in relief, now holding the towel in place himself, and you returned to the stove where the candy mass slowly but surely turned a golden color. "Jimin", you called when the sugar began to bubble, "they're almost ready!" 
The demon pulled the towel from his face and wiped away a few drops of water, then approached you and – carefully, very carefully – peeked into the pot. His lips formed a pout. "That's not candy yet", he said, almost complaining like a little child. You chuckled. "We need to cool them", you said. "Do you have a mold?"
His expression told you that he had no clue what you were talking about. "A mold?"

Silent laughter came from the kitchen door and you twirled around while Jimin stayed totally relaxed. Jin was leaning against the doorframe, an amused grin tucking at the corners of his mouth. "Jimin", he almost scolded while pushing himself off the doorframe and approaching the two of you. "You've watched me so often in the kitchen, don't you remember where all the stuff goes?" 
You eyed Jimin in surprise, remembering him proudly declaring that since they didn't eat, why should he cook? He avoided your glance and you couldn't help a tiny snicker. The angry glance you earned wasn't something you took serious.
"Jin, do you have molds?", you asked, keeping an eye on the bubbling candy mass. The demon shook his head. "Unfortunately", he said. "But a baking try should do the trick, right?" He pulled one of them from one of the cupboards and quickly lined it with some parchment paper before handing you a spoon. "Quick", he said, "it's already hardening."

"Thanks, Sherlock", you murmured while taking the pot to the tray, and started to drop little puddles of the sugar mass onto it. Jin leaned against the kitchen table, watching you, and then glanced at Jimin. "This was your idea?", he assumed and nodded towards the candy. Jimin shrugged and ran his fingers through his silvery hair. "Maybe", he replied with a cunning spark in his eyes, and Jin chuckled. "Of course it was."
You dropped the spoon into the pot and whirled around. "Done", you smiled, and Jimin came closer to inspect the candy curiously. "It's hot", you warned him, "don't touch", and he threw you an annoyed glance. "I am always careful", he scoffs, and you grin, picking up the wet towel from the kitchen table to wave it in front of his face. "Sure."
Jimin only rolled his eyes while Jin watched the two of you with a faint smile. "I'm sure they're delicious, Y/N", he turned to you, and you returned his smile. "I hope so, I made them too often for them to not be", you said. Jin chuckled. "Hard work pays off", he simply replied and straightened his back. "Let's take a look at them together later when they're cooled, but now I need the kitchen myself." 
You nodded. "Sure thing!"

Jimin accompanied out of the kitchen after Jin caught him playing around with some ingredients and kicked both of you out of the room, even if with an amused spark in his eyes. "I'll call when food's ready", he said before you left, and then, with a wink: "Or when the candy's hardened." 
In the entrance hall, you were greeted by Daimon, who effortlessly jumped on his owner's shoulder and rubbed his black face against his cheek. Jimin laughed quietly and stroked his jaw, Daimon enjoying the attention with a deep purr.
You also extended your hand to give him a short rub. "How did the two of you end up together?", you asked, and Jimin looked up. "Daimon and I?"
You nodded yes.
He shrugged. "You may have already figured he's not a normal cat. Everything in the downworld, even the most ordinary-looking animal, is a demonic being, even if they're treated as pets or companions. Daimon is my familiar."

You cocked your head to the side questioningly. "What's a familiar?" 
Jimin chuckled, seeming a bit amused by your lack of knowledge. “He’s a friend, but he’s also a protector.” He thought about it for a second. “Think of him like a hunting dog. They are meant to assist during a hunt, but also live in the house as companions. That’s what Daimon is.”
The cat blinked, as if he understood every word his owner said. Jimin ran his fingers through the soft fur on his head. You eyed the familiar curiously.
“Are you the only one who has a familiar?”, you asked. Jimin hummed. “Good question”, he said. “I don’t know. If there are others around, I haven’t noticed them yet. They don’t always have the form of an animal; they can be nearly anything: a flame, a light ball, a stone figurine. Not all of them move, and not all of them demand cuddles.”

You couldn’t prevent a small laugh. “Well, Daimon seems hell-bent on them”, you commented when the familiar rubbed his head into Jimin’s palm. The demon chuckled. “Quite.”
“You mentioned a lot of demons can shapeshift”, you suddenly remembered, extending one hand to squish Daimon’s paw. The familiar’s purr got louder. “Can he shapeshift?”
Jimin looked over to the cat, a knowing smirk tucking at his lips. “I don’t know, Daimon, can you?”, he asked, and the familiar blinked. He slowly pulled his paw from your grip and slid down Jimin’s shoulder. For a few seconds, he just stood there on the ground, innocently staring up to the two of you, then you noticed a few quivering red light dots around him and before you could take a step back, the black cat exploded in a ball of light. It was so bright it blinded you, and when you finally wiped the tears out of your eyes and gained back your vision, you were looking at a ridiculously handsome teenager with black, messy hair standing in front of you, silvery eyes staring back with arrogance.

“Hello, Y/N”, the teenager greeted, his deep voice laced with the typical bored teenager-tone. “My name’s Daimon. Nice to meet you.”

Chapter Text

It took a while for you to gain your ability to speak back, but Jimin seemed unfazed, ruffling Daimon’s dark hair with a grin. The familiar’s lips twitched, but he didn’t say anything or pulled away from his owner’s touch. Instead, his silver eyes rested on your face and he seemed to be waiting for your reaction.
“Y/N”, you finally managed to say, “nice to meet you”. Daimon’s eyes seemed to soften a bit, their silver colour vanishing into more of a light grey. Jimin pulled his hand away from his hair. “He can, in fact, shapeshift”, he unnecessarily answered your question, and you smiled weakly, taking in the former cat’s appearance. “I can see that.”

Daimon didn’t really seem to know what to do with himself, unrest bordering on discomfort evident in the way he was shifting from one foot to the other, and before Jimin could mention it, you turned towards the familiar with a frown. “Are you hurting?”
The teenager seemed a bit surprised at your words, but he got a grip on himself quickly. “No”, he replied, and it sounded honest. “I’m just… not used to this form.” He violently rubbed his left arm. “I much prefer being a cat.”
You instantly felt a bit bad for forcing him to take on a human form. “I’m sorry”, you apologized, hoping it sounded genuine. “I didn’t want to force you-“
Daimon shook his head, and Jimin looked over to him with a faint smile. “I don’t think you forced him”, he said, voice surprisingly soft. Again, he ruffled Daimon’s hair. “He wouldn’t have done it if he didn’t want to. He may be a familiar, but that doesn’t mean he has to obey.”
To your surprise, Daimon seemed to relax at Jimin’s touch, leaning his head into said demon’s palm. The latter chuckled. “He’s a friend rather than a servant. He belongs to himself more than he belongs to me.”

With a shake of his head that clearly wasn’t human, Daimon now stepped to the side and out of Jimin’s reach. “Well, I was lucky to have you as a Bound, and not the monster”, he dryly commented, and for a second, Jimin’s face turned white.
It was the first time for you to see something on one of the demons that equaled fear or shock. He looked around a few times, eyes dancing over walls and doors, and when he made sure no one was around, he turned towards the young boy next to him and threw him a sharp glance. “Be careful what you say”, he scolded harshly, red spark flickering in his dark eyes and voice rougher and deeper than usual. Daimon returned the glance seemingly unfazed, but you noticed how his body tensed up. “Forgive me”, he finally mumbled when Jimin didn’t back down, and lowered his glance, to which his owner finally relaxed. Jimin sighed, deeply. “You know I don’t want to do that”, he murmured back, so quiet you could barely hear it. “But I don’t want you or me or both of us beheaded either.” He surprised you; his wish to not harm his familiar in any way seemed genuine, and even the apology you could half believe. But then again, all of the demons had been good at lying, so you tried not to fall for it.
Daimon however gave back a short nod and straightened his posture. “I know.” He at least seemed to trust his master fully.
The previously tensed atmosphere vanished and both of them turned to you, Jimin with a small smile. “Should we go and see how the candy is doing?”, he asked, and Daimon raised his eyebrows. He seemed in disbelief about what Jimin just said when he asked: “Candy?”
Instead of answering, Jimin nudged him and you forward to the kitchen.

“What’s a Bound?”, you asked when you entered the kitchen where Jin was still preparing food. He looked up shortly when he noticed the guests, facial expression softening at the sight, and nodded towards the trays with the hardened candy on it. Jimin rushed over to the orange candy, but Daimon stayed with you as you followed a tad slower. “A Bound is the other half equivalent to a familiar”, he silently explained. “It’s the person or being a familiar devotes its life to, and it’s a bond that stays for a lifetime, hence the master, if you will, is called a Bound. It shows that not only the familiar does its bit, but that the master as a Bound has responsibilities too. He can’t just get rid of me or erase what we have. We’re in this together for as long as we live.” Daimon nodded towards Jimin, who now proceeded to hold up one of the candies up against the light and admired the colour. “A familiar chooses its Bound, but a Bound chooses to keep the familiar. If they don’t, we die.” His voice sound emotionless as he said this, and you looked up to him. “I’m sorry to hear that”, you replied, thinking that it was a cruel way to end someone’s life.
If rejection led to death, it came to your mind, the human world would be reigned by death. But you kept that thought to yourself.

Reaching Jimin, you discovered that the candies had hardened nicely. Picking one up and sticking it into your mouth, you sighed at the sweet, yet slightly sour orange flavor of it. The taste of cinnamon, anis and cloves awoke nice memories in you, and immediately, a smile crept onto your face. Making these with your mom had always been one of your favourite things to do.
Both Jimin and Daimon looked at you curiously, then the familiar took a candy too and popped it into his mouth. He played around with it a little and it took a while till the flavor hit him, but then he sighed and closed his eyes. “It’s good”, he mumbled, and you smiled – until you saw Jimin, with a slight smirk, closing his lips around his candy and eating it.

You frowned. Didn’t Jin say that ‘Demons don’t eat’?
Yet here was Jimin who clearly seemed to be enjoying his candy. You turned around to the cooking demon, throwing him a questioning glance, and Jin turned away.
Jimin noticed, and snickered. Something mean sparkled in his eyes, something you didn’t like at all. “Oh. He hasn’t actually told you”, he figured coldly and even Daimon seemed a bit uncomfortable now. Jimin swallowed his candy and licked his lips.
“Listen, Y/N”, he said, leaning over to you a bit. “Jin here may have told you that demons don’t eat, but he’s not quite right.” The silver haired male straightened his back again. “We normally don’t, which is right, and it doesn’t give us satisfaction as it does to humans, but we can eat it we want to, and if we’re lucky, we will taste it, too.”
A small grin crept onto his face and he leaned onto the counter. His glance flickered towards Jin. “Well, most of us.”

Before you could ask what he meant, he clicked his tongue and motioned for Daimon to follow him. With a short bow in your direction, the familiar obeyed, eyes resting on you till the both of them had vanished out the door.
When they were gone, you turned around to Jin, opening your mouth to ask the question that was burning in your throat – why did he lie?
Jin returned your glance, eyes as dark as coal. “Hello, Y/N”, he said, voice deep and rough and rasping over your skin.

“My name’s Gluttony. Nice to meet you.”

Chapter Text

You were lost for words for quite a while, staring back into Jin’s eyes. There was no emotion within them as he turned away from the food he was making and waited for you to recover.
“Nice to meet you”, you croaked, because you didn’t know what else to say. Jin’s lips twitched. “Surprised?”, he asked, leaning against the kitchen counter and crossing his arms in front of his chest. You nodded, and he let out a joyless laugh. “Understandably”, he commented, and then he remained silent.

The silence filled the kitchen and threatened to take away your breath. Jin didn’t seem dangerous, but very intimidating just standing there and looking at you, as if he was waiting for something.
You couldn’t hold back your question when the silence got too much. “Why did you lie to me?”, you burst out, kind of regretting your decision when Jin’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t rip out your throat like you expected him to.
Instead, he sighed. “Humans never listen”, he murmured to himself, and before you could ask about that mysterious statement, he turned towards you. “I never said we can’t eat”, he coldly explained. “I just said we don’t, which, for the most part, is correct.” He nodded towards the door. “I’m surprised Jimin tasted your food. Every normal demon wouldn’t.”

You changed your question. “Why do you not eat?”, you now asked quietly. Jimin’s statement from earlier – “well, most of us” – swirled in your head.
Jin smiled bitterly. “Gluttony has nothing to do with enjoyment, Y/N.” He turned away. “I don’t eat because I don’t have a sense of taste or smell.”
He left you speechless with the emotionless way of stating this, as if it was nothing. “You don’t… taste?”, you repeated, now a bit confused, and Jin snickered.
It wasn’t a happy snicker.
“That's right”, he then replied, anger lacing his voice. “I don’t.”

He sounded harsh, and you backed up the tiniest bit. Jin looked over his shoulder. “Scared?”, he purred. “You should be. Everyone here is evil, despite acting nice every once in a while.”
He swirled around to you and raised his arms as if to present something to you. “We’re the Seven Sins, Y/N. Everyone here has a past and a purpose.” His expression darkened. “But we don’t have a future.”
Everything you could do was quietly and motionlessly listen to what he was saying. It hurt your head and compressed your lungs, but your feet were too heavy to move. Jin chuckled yet again, and again it didn’t sound friendly. “I am Gluttony”, he stated. “I am fullness, I am too much of everything, but I am not enjoyment. That’s why I don’t have a sense of smell or scent, but still cook for everyone in this house despite no one being there to eat it.” His fist crashed down on the kitchen counter next to him, leaving visible cracks in the stone surface.
“I am the discomfort of having too much of everything, yet never being satisfied. Satisfaction is something that doesn’t exist in my world, nor does it exist in the world of the people I haunt.” He fixated you. “Do you understand now?”

You swallowed, knuckles turning white around the edge of the countertop you just grabbed for support. “Yes”, you replied, voice still raspy. Jin seemed glooming with anger and… sadness? It frightened you to your bones, and now you understood the people who feared the demons so much.
They were dangerous. You just forgot over the few days you had been here.
Jin’s expression was grim. “I am Gluttony, and you are in my domain. Leave.” He pointed towards the door, and suddenly, your feet could move again. You shuffled to the door as quickly as possible, careful not to annoy the demon that sharply watched you leave. When you weren’t even one step out the room, the door was slammed shut without the demon even touching it, the loud crash ringing in your ears.
You stumbled a few steps further and then stood in the entrance hall, lost and upset.
Jin had seemed so nice when you first met him. It felt as if you just lost an ally.

If you hadn’t been in some kind of downworld palace in a dark, dark cave right now, you would’ve curled up in your mother’s lap and would’ve listened to her calm breath and her silent humming while she was working to calm you down. But she wasn’t here, no one was here, and you nearly felt sad due to the fact that you could talk to none of the demons about what just happened.
You needed a shoulder to lean on right now, but apart from the stony, cold gargoyles sitting under the ceiling, there was none in sight – and you doubted that gargoyle shoulders were either comforting or comfortable.
Apart from that, even if you wanted to cry, the burning sensation in your throat and eyes was missing. Your body didn’t seem to be willing to shed a tear about the demons, and even though you felt miserable, you were kind of thankful for that. Those guys didn’t deserve your tears.
You didn’t have a choice, so you just started to wonder through the palace. No one had ever told you not to enter a certain part of the castle, so you simply roamed around without thinking about where you were going. After a while, you were hopelessly lost, but you didn’t even care. You just kept straying further and further into the stone walls of this place, trying to get rid of all the thoughts swirling in your head.

You turned left at a small intersection, and found yourself standing in front of a door at the end of the floor. It didn’t seem locked, and since you didn’t care about where you were going at this point of time anyway, you simply tried to open it.
To your surprise, it wasn’t locked, and you entered the room.

It was dominated by the huge bed in its middle, filled with red sheets and red pillows. Some of them had fallen down and were scattered around the bed. It seemed comfortable, almost human even, apart from the fact that the room, like all the others in this castle, smelled like nothing. It was disturbing and unpleasant for a human like you because the air bore no evidence to the people that were roaming this house.
Your thoughts were interrupted by the wooden floor creaking in front of the door, and before you could hide or get out, the door opened.

The demon stopped in his tracks for a second, then a low chuckle filled the air, accompanied by a thump as he leaned against the doorframe heavily. “Y/N”, he spoke up mockingly. “Breaking into my habitat?”
You were frozen on the spot, but very slowly managed to turn around. The blonde’s expression was amused, he didn’t seem angry. His lips formed a lazy smile. “I didn’t hold you for a burglar”, he mocked yet again and pushed himself off the wall only to step past you and fall down on his bed. “What brings you here?”

“Taehyung”, you remembered his name, and the grin widened. “You remember my name. Good.”
You shook your head, sorting your thoughts. “Sorry for barging in, I didn’t mean to…”
Taehyung chuckled and patted the spot next to him. “Come here, sweetheart. Let’s have a chat.”

Chapter Text

The blonde’s dark eyes followed you as you slowly approached and finally sat down next to him. Silence filled the air for a while, then Taehyung spoke up. His voice was surprisingly soft.
“You’re scared, right?”
You turned towards him, expecting some form of compassion to be evident in his eyes, given that his tone was so friendly, but you discovered that the expression on his face was rather that of a curious young boy watching ants burning to death under the merciless heat of his magnifier.
You avoided his glance. “A bit”, you said as emotionlessly as you could, looking at your hands. “It takes a while to get used to.”

The young man’s glance grew even more curious, maybe a bit more genuine this time. “Why do you even try to get used to it?”, he inquired dryly. “You won’t be here for long anyway.”
You gritted your teeth. “Do I look stupid to you?”, you quietly answered. “But being miserable about it doesn’t help.”
Taehyung’s tongue wet his lips, pearl white teeth showing in a small smirk. “It makes you more delicious though”, he purred. “Fear, sadness and anger are… exquisite tastes.” He swallowed and looked hungry for a split moment, but then he turned away and sighed. “Too bad I’m not first…”

You frowned, ignoring the tight feeling in your chest that had been caused by his words. “Who is first then?”, you dared to ask, and Taehyung chuckled deeply.
“Yoongi, as far as I know”, he replied. “He’s the strongest, after all.”
You grew a bit curious at his words. “Is he the oldest too?” The demon shook his head no. “That would be Jin”, he answered. “But Jin… lacks the punch to be the strongest.” He shrugged. “He has the power. He just doesn’t use it.”
“Why?”, you couldn’t help but ask. Taehyung’s lips curled into a grin. “Why, you think he’s a good guy?”, he asked – a rhetorical question, of course – and when you still waited for an answer, the grin grew.
“He’s saving it.”
“For what?”
The demon shrugged again, his eyes sparkling with amusement. “Who knows.”

His ominous answer didn’t exactly make you feel better, but you refrained from asking anything else. Taehyung seemed like a laid-back guy, yet there was something looming around him that made you uncomfortable. It seemed as if he could go from chill to furious in a few milliseconds.
You didn’t quite want to provoke that, even if seeing Taehyung being ripped apart by Yoongi for his audacity to taste you first would've been a thing of great satisfaction.
A second later, you were disgusted by your own thoughts. What did this place turn you into?
A monster, similar to those demons?

Taehyung watched you curiously from the side. He really seemed interested in you, as if he’d never seen a human before. A species that he didn’t understand and whose mysteries he wanted to solve under all circumstances – with force, if he had to.
The glance burned on your skin and you shifted your weight. The demon noticed, the corners of his mouth twitching suspiciously, then he sighed deeply and fell down onto his back, the mattress bouncing under his weight.
“Are you a good person, Y/N?”

“Pardon?”
His question caught you by surprise, and on top of that it was a question you didn’t know what to reply to. Were you a good person?
Taehyung’s glance made your back itch. “I asked if you believe that you are a good person. As in…” He seemed to think for a second. “- as in, do you think you deserve all this?” You couldn’t see him, but judging from the moving of the mattress, he motioned around the room with his hand, including the cave, the castle and its owners in his movement.
“Do you deserve being the Chosen One?”

You swallowed. Your body couldn’t decide whether the feeling in your chest originated from hot anger or icy sadness.
Did you deserve being the Chosen One?
Before you could do anything about it, words slipped out your mouth.
“Who on earth deserves this?” Your voice was quiet and unnaturally calm, but Taehyung could understand your words nevertheless. “Who on earth deserves being stripped of their dignity, their humanity and their soul just for satisfying some old demons?”
You turned around to said demon, who looked at you in a mixture of genuine surprise and fascination. Your eyes were burning, but they felt as dry as your heart felt cold.
“Tell me, Taehyung, who on earth deserves that?”

For a second, something like an emotion flickered in his eyes, so quick you couldn’t make out what it was – anger? Sadness? Compassion? Pity? – but you weren’t finished yet.
“So, yes, I believe I was a good human. I tried to be nice to others, honor their decisions and their choices. I tried to live a life that would be worth living without harming anyone.” You made a short pause. Of course there had been moments when you could’ve been classified as “bad”, but what was that compared to all the other times when you had helped your mom’s friend or cared for your father’s parents or got the neighbor’s boys their ball back from a tree they had kicked it into? What was it compared to picking up a stranger’s fruit at the supermarket when their bag broke three weeks ago, or buying the homeless woman who resided next to the self-serve laundry a bunch of apples and bread?
You forced the tears back. “I was a good human, and I still am one. And that’s why I don’t deserve this.”

You got up without saying anything else, ignoring Taehyung’s utterly surprised expression and opening the door. You were sick and tired of the demons’ ignorance.
He could’ve run as fast as he could, you would’ve still seen him.
Next to the door stood Jungkook, dark and mysterious as he had always been when you had occasionally encountered him, apart from the fact that his eyes were wide open in shock and you believed to see something glittering within them, something fatally similar to a tear, but before you could’ve stepped closer and taken a better look at it, he twirled around - with one cold blast of air, he was gone, and left you standing in the floor by yourself.

You went back to your room. It felt like you hadn’t slept for days, and when you thought about it, it became clear that it had actually been a little more than a day since you had last slept. Tiredness replaced your agitation, and the anger and grief in your chest slowly turned into an empty feeling. 
To your surprise, your room seemed to have been cleaned and tidied since you had last been there, and you found a cup of hot tea on the nightstand, accompanied by a short note.

Forgive me.

J.

Too tired to drink the tea, you curled up on the bed, wrapped yourself in one of the sheets and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Chapter Text

When you woke up the next morning – night? Afternoon? You couldn't tell anymore – the tea on your nightstand had grown cold and it took you a while to find your way back into the reality you had been forced into. 
In your head echoed voices of familiar people, the chirping of birds in the morning and the rustle of the wind in trees; and your sleepy brain struggled with the fact that you wouldn't hear those voices and sounds ever again. But after a while, you managed to sit up a bit and, without thinking, reached for the cup of cold tea to take a sip. 
It was well brewed, and only the note that had been stuck beneath it reminded you of what happened the day before, ripping you out of the content, comfortable haze that normally surrounds people when they just woke up. 
You put the cup down, crossed your legs and contemplated on what to do. 

The note seemed genuine, at least as much as you believed a demon could be genuine, and the first impression that you had gotten of Jin – friendly, tame, kind of humane even – still hadn't vanished from your memory. You were sure that to some extent, he really felt sorry for what happened. 
On the other hand it probably wasn't a good idea to hang out like that with any of them for much longer. You played around with them on a close base for far too long, and had actually forgotten why and as what you came here: a prisoner, a trophy to be consumed. 
Maybe this was a sign and an opportunity for you to stop talking to at least one of them. 
Back in your normal life, you would've never even considered that someone could forget their near death, and at the same time you harshly reminded yourself that what you were experiencing right now wasn't even a life but just a short period of calm before the demons would decide they had enough of either you or their hunger. You were somewhere, somewhat in between alive and dead, a confusing state that probably no one else apart from the prior Chosen Ones could understand.

You took another sip of the cold tea which was surprisingly refreshing and helped clear your mind from the shadowy figures that liked to dance in your head at night since you came to this place. It was as if the demons hadn’t only penetrated your reality, but also your mind.
A knock on the door ripped you out of your thoughts. Startled, you wrapped yourself up in your blanket. “Who’s there”, you called after a few moments.
It took a while before your visitor replied.
“Jungkook.”
You frowned. Over the course of your visit, the young man had barely spoken to you, let alone without anyone else around. “What do you want?”, you therefore asked. You felt relieved that it wasn’t Jin or Namjoon, but after everything that happened yesterday, you still felt uncomfortable.
You caught yourself almost wishing they would end this soon, and were terrified when you realized what you had just thought about.
Jungkook seemed to hesitate, but then gave in. “I wanted to check on you”, you could hear his muffled voice. “It’s almost noon and you haven’t come out of your room yet.”
You opened your mouth to give him some kind of excuse, but then stopped in your tracks. “Noon?”, you asked. “How do you know?” There was no sunlight, moonlight or even any change of climate down here which would indicate a change of daytime, and you had struggled with keeping up a proper rhythm of life since you had arrived. You sincerely wondered how Jungkook could tell – even if you knew it probably didn’t matter to a demon.
It was quiet for a while, then Jungkook’s quiet, lifeless voice reached your ears once again.
“The shadows tell me.”

Is answer was so abstract that it caught your interest. Sitting up properly in bed, you frowned. “The shadows?”, you asked. “How so?”
Jungkook’s reply was quick. “You wouldn’t understand”, he said. “Now, are you coming out or not?”
You were quick on the tongue yourself and your reply just as sharp as his.
“Make me understand, and I’ll come out.”
A deep sigh behind the door, then a silent huff. “Fine. Entrance hall in twenty minutes.” Jungkook paused for a second.
“And you’re having breakfast beforehand.”
You were too excited about the dubious shadows to notice how Jungkook was the first one in this row of demons who seemed to worry about you like a human. Instead, you quickly sprung out of bed and grabbed a few clothes to get ready.

Fifteen minutes later, you were downstairs in the entrance hall. Jungkook was leaning against one of the cold stone pillars, eyeing you up and down as you approached him, then he nodded towards the dining room. “Breakfast first”, he grumbled, and when you threw him a surprised glance – surprised, because he seemed to care, and surprised because a grumble indicated some form of emotion within the devil – his expression turned blank and his glance arrogant. “I don’t really want you fainting on your way over there”, he replied to your unspoken question. “Go. You have ten minutes.”
With a roll of your eyes, you turned towards the dining room and entered, surprised to still find a big breakfast on the table. Maybe, just maybe, you thought as you sat down and grabbed some bread, you were too harsh on Jin. His note from the morning and this served breakfast showed that he held no grudge against you anymore, and it felt almost as if he was sorry.
You decided to approach him after your excursion with Jungkook, quickly finished your breakfast – you had been hungrier than you thought – and then hurried back to the entrance hall were Jungkook was still waiting in the same spot.

When he saw you coming, he casually pushed himself off of the pillar and turned towards the entrance doors. “You ready?”, he asked when you reached his side, and you nodded.
His glance lingered on your face for a few more seconds, then he shrugged, and the doors in front of you swung open slowly at a mere wave of his hand.
Magic tricks like this didn’t impress you anymore, yet the enormous size of the outside cave did. Everytime you stepped out of the castle, it intimidated you anew, and Jungkook chuckled at the tension that vibrated around you.
“No worries, little one”, he mused, redness sparking in his eyes for the first time since you had met him. “It’s not far.”
The glance you threw him clearly told him to stop belittling you, and his grin grew with obvious amusement. Yet he didn’t say anything for the rest of the way. He just offered you his hand whenever there was a rocky part coming up, and after denying him the first times, at some point, you rested your hand in his palm for support and somewhere along the way forgot that you were beside a demon, not a man.

Chapter Text

“We’re here.”
Jungkook stopped somewhere in the middle of the way which was rather a tiny, barely noticeable path between all the shattered rocks and boulders.
You stopped right behind him, furrowing your brows in confusion. “Here?”, you repeated. “Where’s here? I don’t see anything.”
Jungkook chuckled lowly. “I just needed to get away from the castle a bit”, he admittede. “The others don’t like me talking to the shadows, and even though they can still hear us if they want to, they won’t be bothered by it at this distance.”
“Hm.” You frowned. “Why don’t they like you ‘talking to the shadows’?”
Jungkook grinned. “They think it makes me too attached to the human world.” Something unspecific that you couldn’t quite comprehend flickered in his eyes. “That being said… I just like a bit of distraction from this cave. After all, and you know that”, his expression got serious and his eyes darkened, “we aren’t here out of free will, are we.”
It wasn’t a question and you refrained from commenting on it. Instead, you cocked your head to the side with an attempt on a smile. “So?”, you asked. “Back to the topic, where are your shadows?”

Jungkook’s lips twitched as if your disbelief and mocking tone amused him. Averting his eyes, he seemed to search for the darkness he was supposed to talk to, glance flickering through the emptiness of the cave. “Where?”, he asked quietly, turning towards you again. His eyes, burning with a bright red in the dark, stared you down. “We’re in a cave with no light. There’s darkness everywhere, and where darkness is, shadows follow.”
You were about to interrupt him, saying ‘Shadows can’t exist without light’, but he seemed to watch through you just fine. “I’m not talking about the literal shadows.” His eyes narrowed. “That’s a name the small human brain came up with for the lack of sunlight, and in a human’s eyes, it’s just that.” He sighed. “The human view on the world is so narrow… So restricted. So finite.”
While he spoke, darkness seemed to pool around his feet, much deeper and endless than the one you were used to by now, and you realized it was because this was another kind of darkness, not natural due to the lack of light, but one that was attracted by and alive in all the creatures of the night, be it the devils in the castle or the demons above the lava lake Jimin had shown you.
A kind of darkness that didn’t go well with humans, and that humans weren’t supposed to see.
You stumbled one, two steps back, eyes glued to the emptiness under Jungkook’s feet, and the demon chuckled. “Scared?”, he asked, and before you could say anything, he vanished into nothingness.

For a heartbeat, there was nothing but the empty, dark cave around you, and just when unrest started to settle in your heart, there was a slight breeze behind you and when you took another step back, you bumped into something.
Frozen with fear, your body didn’t even have the capacities to scream or jump away. Instead, you just stared straight forward, waiting for whatever was behind you to end you.
Jungkook snickered, obviously amused, and you realized he was the one standing behind you, your back pressed against his chest.
He now leaned down so his lips were right beside your ear, and with a low voice hummed: “They aren’t that bad. Look closer.”
And then, the demon placed his hands over your ears and your mind fell into velvety darkness.

Only for a second, though, because when you blinked, you saw the cave again, everything as it had been before, and you were about to sigh in relief when you realized that the slight pressure in back – assuring you that Jungkook was still there – had gone.
You twirled around, and a shaky swear escaped your mouth when you saw nothing but darkness again.
Jungkook was gone, and you were alone.
That’s what you thought at least, because a heartbeat later the air was filled with whispers and murmurs. Goosebumps formed on your skin and you looked around for whoever was talking to you, but nothing was moving in between the rocks. No glimpse of red eyes or alabaster skin, no demon in sight.
“Who is it?”, you asked into the void, the voices dying away for a second, only to come back a bit louder.
Poor child.
Have you been left alone, beautiful?
Look at you, princess. What are you doing here all alone?

The tone of the voices creeped you out, but it was not scary enough for you to flee. Instead, you tried to find the body of who was talking to you before you realized what Jungkook had taken you here to do.
“Shadows”, you whispered.
The voices erupted in gleeful giggles, not scary at all anymore, seeming more excited than threatening.
So you know us, princess?
You swallowed and mustered some courage to stand straight. “Jungkook took me”, you replied defiantly.
The voices hummed.
Pretty boy.
Good boy.
He’s our favourite, princess.
So he wanted to introduce you to us?
What an honor, beautiful.

You noticed a movement in the dark, and it took you a few seconds to realize it wasn’t worldly bodies you were noticing.
The shadows were moving around the cave, reminding you of mice or squirrels in their movements – rushing from place to place, halting in between as if to assess the situation, then going on.
Some were coming closer, some halting in the distance, but all seemed to assemble around you.
Are we scaring you, beautiful?
No reason to be scared, child.
We’re just shadows.
Princess, come talk to us.
Now that you were listening closely, their voices were breathy, like wind in the leaves of an autumn tree, and yet had a sweet and soft tone to them. It was a pleasant sound to listen to, and you chuckled.
“So you’re telling me you’re not dangerous?”
The voices giggled again, snickering all around you.
Oh, no, princess.
Not dangerous.
For people we like, that is, beautiful.
And we like you.

A smile spread on your face without you actually wanting it.
“Really? Tell me more about yourselves then.”
The shadows huddled closer around you.
Whatever you want, princess.

Chapter Text

Your feeling for time and space started to cease while the shadows whispered stories and compliments into your ears, pulling you into their invisible grasp more and more. Slowly, darkness began to spread in your mind, unnoticed and quiet, and it swallowed all the memories and knowledge the shadows found interesting.
Until a heavy arm slung around your neck and a body bumped into your side.

“Oh?”, a deep voice purred, the tone stirring something inside you. Your body moved slowly, as if you were walking under water, and you turned towards the man, being greeted with a smirk and glistening red eyes.
“It’s barely been a few minutes, darling”, he hummed, glance resting on you. “Have they already stolen you?”
The shadowy whispers greeted the man with the same glee they had displayed when they met you.
Jungkook!
Our prince.
Why, coming to see us, handsome?

“Jungkook?”
The name fell from your lips without you realizing it, and immediately after, you frowned. “Jungkook? Who’s-“
The young man’s grip around your shoulder tightened and he chuckled, but it didn’t sound nice. “They really took whatever they could get their greedy little hands on, huh?” He shot the shadows a scowling glance, causing them to scurry over the walls in even more of a hurry, their voices dying down to a fine whisper of incomprehensible words.
The man at your side seemed to understand them nevertheless, because he now clicked his tongue in disapproval and turned back to you. “Let me help you”, he murmured softly and leaned forward, hellish flames dancing in his eyes as his face came closer and closer to yours.
Your mind was still empty, and therefore you weren’t quite able to react the way you would’ve if you were still fully yourself when Jungkook, his grin now showing sharp canine teeth, loomed up in front of you just to rush in a heartbeat later and press his lips onto yours.

His lips were soft, almost like velvet moving against yours, and they immediately wiped out all remaining rationality in your brain. Jungkook’s hand was pressed in your back, preventing you from falling to your knees, and even in your delirious state, you could feel his lips curling into a satisfied smile.
“Good girl”, he hummed, intensified his kiss and took advantage of your weakness to slip his tongue into your mouth. It felt good – not that you had any experience to compare it to – but despite the fact that you were kissing a demon, you couldn’t help but react in the way he probably wanted you to. That was why you didn’t grow aware of the shadows’ snickers all around you, their forms fluttering in the dark.
Anyone else would’ve noticed there was something going on, but with almost all of your brain empty and any awareness for danger swallowed by the shadows earlier, you stood no chance.

You gasped for air when suddenly, a sharp pain stung in your chest, so severe it knocked the air from your lungs for a second. You pulled back from Jungkook, hands resting against his chest for support because you felt like you were about to faint while you waited for the pain to ease.
It didn’t.
The ache was almost unbearable even if it wasn’t as severe as in the first moment, and you gritted your teeth when tears started to well up in your eyes.
Jungkook didn’t move an inch. In fact, when you looked up, he was standing there with an ecstatic expression on his face, eyes glowing with a more vibrant red than ever before, his cat-like pupils almost invisible. Even when you moved a bit more away from him, his aura everything but reassuring, he didn’t move. The shadows had shut up a while ago, the cave now filled with eerie silence, and their shadows were barely visible to the human eye.
You regained your voice, and between two hasty breaths managed a “What the hell did you do to me?”
Jungkook’s eyes focused on you for only a second and his lips twitched, but before he could reply, there was an almost unnoticeable flicker next to you and then Jungkook was flung through the air and crashed against one of the boulders, his back shattering the stone into a million pieces. He dropped to the ground with the shards and didn’t move any further.

The noise of the crash slowly died down in the air while you took an insecure step back and tried to process what had just happened. When you averted your eyes to the side, there was another young man standing there, dark black hair ruffled in his forehead. His whole body was tensed like a bowstring, and you noticed he had balled his fists at his sides. His expression was one of pure fury.
Only now did he react to your presence, jerkily raising his head and looking at you with blood red eyes. “Are you okay?”, he asked in a husky voice, eyeing you up and down.
You took another step back, now utterly confused, and ignored the sting in your chest. The man’s eyes narrowed. “Come here”, he demanded and waved in your direction, and then an invisible force pulled you closer to him. You were too out of it to fight against the hidden grip, and when you reached him, he mustered your face before placing the tip of his finger on your forehead and moving it across the skin in a quick pattern.
“Xoyt.”
Light flooded your mind and back with it came the memories and all the things that defined you, things that had been taken and swallowed by the shadows earlier. Shadows which were nowhere to be seen after a silent hiss and sharp glance from the demon. The cave was laying empty and quiet once again.
“Yoongi”, you managed to mumble before collapsing to your knees when an especially severe pain in your chest made your whole body tremble. You coughed.
“What happened to me?”, you asked, voice rough from the effort of speaking.
Yoongi looked down on you, eyes cold, but you had a feeling he wasn’t angry at you. He raised his glance again, staring at Jungkook who at that moment slowly got up from beneath the parts of the boulder he destroyed.
“He couldn’t bear it anymore”, Yoongi mumbled, quietly, but his voice vibrated with rage.

“He took a bite.”

Chapter Text

“Bear what?”, you asked, voice trembling out of weakness, not fear. “And what kind of bite?”
“Who knows”, Yoongi mumbled while looking into the distance where Jungkook had risen to his feet by now. Insecurely swaying, he stared at the elder, bloodlust burning in his eyes.
You knew what was about to come without Jungkook even moving yet. “Watch out!”, you wanted to warn Yoongi just when the younger demon pushed himself off the ground with unbelievable speed and practically zoomed towards the other, mouth open with a loud growl and his hand ready to punch Yoongi as hard as he could.

The older merely raised a hand when the younger demon had reached him, and reacted with what rather looked like a hesitant slap in the face than a real attack, yet his blow wiped Jungkook out the air and whacked him to the side.
Yoongi watched unfazed when his opponent flew several hundred meters before crashing to the ground and skidding over the rough stones.
It took him a while to get up again after he finally stopped.
“Jungkook, stop”, Yoongi said calmly, aware that Jungkook could hear him just fine even from the distance. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
The younger’s face convulsed with a loud snarl and he approached the other at a rapid speed yet again, only for his opponent to step out the way almost lazily, letting him quite literally eat dirt again.
He got up and turned around within seconds this time, rage still flickering in his eyes but when Yoongi raised his hand in a threatening motion, a scowl evident on his face, he refrained from attacking a third time.
Instead, he sunk to his knees, and his expression turned desperate.
“You know why I did it!”, he screamed at his elder, hands balling into fists on the ground. “Everyone’s just playing around, like last time, and the time before that, and…”
His voice broke and he lowered his head, staring at the gravel on the ground. Yoongi had listened to his words without moving an inch, but now his expression softened the tiniest bit. “I know, Jungkook”, he said quietly. “I know.”

But then he straightened his back.
“Still, just a part?” He threw you a glance, watching silently when you curled up one more time to ease the pain in your chest area. “You should’ve taken her whole while being at it.”
You couldn’t see him, but Jungkook’s glance burned on your skin. “I wanted to”, he finally said, voice rough and spiritless. “But I couldn’t.”
Yoongi’s eyes flared up with anger. A heartbeat later, he was with the younger, grabbing him by the throat with one hand and mercilessly dragging him over the ground to a big boulder where he pressed him up against the hard stone.

“When will you grow up?”, the demon roared, the grit on the ground starting to tremble at the sheer volume of his voice. “When will you finally understand that it is your job, no, your duty as a being of the underworld to keep the balance?”
His grip tightened, Jungkook’s head now leaving a dent in the stone.
“And when will you accept that the only favor you can do the beings of the world above is to make. it. quick.”
Yoongi let go of the younger who dropped to the ground without any resistance, and looked down on him coldly.
“Grow up, youngling”, he said, his tone more soft than anything else. “Just grow up.”

When he returned to you, Jungkook not moving from the spot where Yoongi had left him, he knelt down to you and looked at you with something bordering on worry in his eyes. “Let’s go back”, he mumbled, and when he saw you lacking the will and strength to get up on your feet, he silently shoved his arms under your body and lifted you from the ground effortlessly.
With a last glance back to Jungkook who had sunken back against the boulder and stared into the void of the cave’s ceiling, he turned around and carried you towards the castle of the demons.

“What did he do to me?”
You were wrapped in a blanket, Daimon curled up in your lap, and with a cup of tea between your hands. The other demons had been surprised when Yoongi carried you through the door of the palace – “other demons” included Jimin, Jin and Taehyung; Hoseok and Namjoon had been nowhere to be found – but he didn’t answer to any of their questions. He carried you to what seemed to be the living room and placed you on one of the sofas gently before pulling a blanket over your shivering body. Jimin had left to go look for Jungkook, leaving Daimon in your care, and Jin had returned only to hand you a cup of tea, then he went to prepare the dinner. Taehyung hadn’t even entered the living room; you suspected he had gone and reported to Namjoon.
Yoongi had placed himself to your feet, staring into the flames of the chimney fire in silence. Only when you sat up and touched his arm to rip him out of his thoughts, he slowly turned to you. His eyes were almost black as he looked at you.
“What did he do to me?”
Yoongi’s expression turned from blank to almost warm and soft. He looked at you for a few more seconds, then sighed. The warmth and softness from his face vanished, but he didn’t seem angry or tense.
“He swallowed a part of your soul.”

The mention of your soul alone caused your chest to sting and you wheezed. Something like a sad smile flickered over Yoongi’s face.
“A part? What part?” you breathed, rubbing your chest to ease the pain.
The demon shook his head. “I have no idea”, he admitted. “It rarely happens among our kind – lower demon species tend to consume souls in parts for their own entertainment and to torture their victims, but we have no interest in that.” He averted his glance. “Once a soul or a part of a soul is swallowed, there is no way of getting it back, and no one will ever know what part was taken.”
He frowned. “Jungkook luckily stopped after a few heartbeats, so it won’t impact your life too much. But the pain”, he pointed towards his own chest, “will stay for a while at least.”
You swallowed. “How much did he take?”, you asked, quietly. A weird feeling of emptiness filled your body.
Yoongi looked at you sharply, then sighed and raised his fingers while he closed his eyes. “l'tael ya zaeuh”, he mumbled, brows furrowed with concentration. It didn’t hurt nor did you feel anything unusual, and after a minute or so, Yoongi opened his eyes and lowered his hand.
“It’s not a lot”, he said. “I can’t see it specifically, but you should be fine… For a while.”

You relaxed as well, taking a sip of your tea and staring into it for a while as you processed what had been happening. When the silence weighed too heavy on your shoulder, you looked up again.
“What is the language you were just speaking?”, you asked.
Yoongi looked up, seeming a bit surprised. “Language?”, he repeated, then his lips twitched. “Ah, right. I forgot you can’t understand. That’s Qaay, tongue of demons. Meaning our language, if you will.”
You chuckled. “It sounds like you’re swallowing your tongue indeed…”
The demon’s face softened a bit, the corners of his mouth curling upwards the tiniest bit.

“Don’t worry. I don’t need to go that far.”

Chapter Text

The comfortable silence between you and Yoongi was interrupted when the heavy wooden door of the living room was pushed open with so much force that it banged against the wall. When the both of you looked up, you startled with the loud crash but Yoongi unfazed as always, you grew aware of Namjoon standing in the doorway, Taehyung behind him, eyeing you up and down sharply before a low growl escaped his mouth.
“Where is he”, he snarled, anger flickering in his eyes. You could see Taehyung pulling up his shoulders and even Yoongi stiffened, as if both of them could sense something in the air that indicated how furious Namjoon really was.
“Here he is.”
Daimon’s ears perked up as Jimin spoke up from the entrance hall, the familiar jumping from your lap and running towards his master. Jimin didn’t spare him a glance, instead he lifted a lifeless Jungkook up in the air before dropping him to the ground.
“He refuses to talk”, he mentioned before squeezing through next to Namjoon and approaching you. When he reached you, he knelt down next to the sofa and cocked his head to the side. “Are you feeling alright?”, he asked, and you replied with a faint smile. “I’m okay.”

Jimin eyed you up and down at your reply but didn’t inquire any further. Instead, everyone focused on Namjoon again who now loomed up in front of Jungkook.
The younger didn’t move a muscle, didn’t even bother to look up.
Namjoon’s face darkened even more, shivers running up and down your spine as his aura turned even more threatening than it already was.
“Yoongi”, he coldly ordered, to which said demon rose from the sofa and approached the two. Namjoon’s voice had been quiet, but you had a feeling that it sounded way more dangerous than if he had shouted.
Yoongi halted next to the taller devil and looked down on Jungkook. “What do you want”, he quietly asked, face as emotionless as it could get, and Namjoon threw him a short glance.
But instead of saying something, he turned around and looked at you. “Y/N”, he spoke up, voice a bit softer than before and not as intimidating. “How is your chest?”
You froze, four pairs of red eyes now resting on you.
“Uhm”, you stammered, gathering your thoughts as much as you could despite the ache  in your chest and, even more so, the sight of Jungkook on his knees, “it still hurts… But I’m fine!”

Namjoon didn’t seem to care about the last part, his expression hardened and he turned back to Yoongi.
“Make him feel it.”
Yoongi threw him a sharp glance. “You sure?”, he inquired coldly, and Namjoon’s eyes flared up.
“Are you opposing me?”, he asked, even quieter than before, and to your surprise, everyone in the room seemed to stop breathing for a second. Only Yoongi seemed to stay calm, even if his eyes narrowed a bit.
“No”, he simply replied and averted his glance to Jungkook, raising his hand a bit.
“Zath qota maah.”

It was hard to watch when Jungkook’s body suddenly tensed up. Yoongi furrowed his brows, seemingly concentrating even more, and then the younger threw his head back and started to scream.
Everyone witnessed the torture silently until you couldn’t take it anymore and averted your eyes. Jimin was the only one who noticed while Jungkook’s screams died down to a whimper.
“What is he doing to him”, you whispered, more an expression of shock than a question, but Jimin apparently found it his duty to answer nevertheless.
“He’s making him feel the same pain you’re experiencing”, he quietly explained, eyes wandering back to the shaking demon. “Now, us demons don’t experience pain too often – we can turn it off, for once, and due to our powers and our nature, it’s hard to hurt us at all, be it physically or emotionally.” He paused for a bit. “That’s why Jungkook, even though he is barely experiencing the same amount of pain you are, is struggling a lot more.” A smile flickered over his face when he looked back at you. “In that aspect, you humans are stronger than us”, he murmured. “You are more used to pain than us.”
You couldn’t think of a proper answer so you just silently stared into your lap until Jungkook’s pained moans finally subsided. Only then did you dare to look up again.

Namjoon waved towards Yoongi, dismissing him from the scene, and the demon complied, leaving the room without a word. He looked tired, and you wondered what he was going to do now – it didn’t seem as if he had enjoyed his task a lot.
Namjoon looked down on Jungkook, who had yet again slumped together on the ground, and then motioned towards Taehyung to come closer.
“Take him upstairs”, he ordered quietly. The anger had vanished from his voice. “We will talk this over when he has recovered.”
Taehyung simply nodded and picked Jungkook up just to follow Namjoon through the door and vanish upstairs. The living room was quiet like before, only you and Jimin left at the scene. The demon didn’t seem like he wanted to leave you alone, and when the silence finally became to much to bear, you took a deep breath and turned towards him.
“Why didn’t Namjoon do it himself?”

Jimin’s lips twitched. “You’re observant for a human”, he commented quietly before looking down on his hands. “He won’t be amused if he notices I tell you this, but…” He hesitated for one more second before giving in.
“Namjoon doesn’t do it himself because he can’t.”
You frowned. “He can’t?”, you repeated. “But I thought he’s somewhat a leader of yours or something, shouldn’t he be-“
“The strongest then?”, Jimin interrupted. “You might think that way, but it’s different for demons.” He turned towards you a bit, resting his arm on the backrest of the sofa. “You’re right though, he isn’t necessarily the most capable. The reason why Yoongi, sometimes Jin or Hoseok are asked to do such stuff – not necessarily punishing people but getting rid of intruders, enemies and such things – is because Namjoon is not good with controlling himself.”
Jimin frowned, relaxing into the couch a bit more. “Namjoon has immense power. By means of strength, both physical and mental, he probably exceeds us all. But Yoongi and Jin, Hoseok too, have the best control over their powers. It doesn’t depend on your strength if you can invade somebody’s mind, project a picture of the whole universe into the void of the cave or light fire in the air.” He snipped his fingers and the blue flame you were already familiar with flared up above his head. “It’s a matter of willpower and control.”
His eyes darkened and the flame flickered, vanishing as quickly as it had come. “Namjoon is strong, but once he uses his powers for a more complex task, all hell breaks lose. And quite literally so.” He nods towards the entrance hall.
“When we “moved into here”, the cave wasn’t as much of a mess as it is now. We even had a lake. But Namjoon, in countless incidents, destroyed everything in his uncontrollable hate, rage and sadness.”
Jimin eyed you firmly. “That’s why no one messes with him. He might as well kill us if we do.”

You took a sharp breath when the truth dawned on you. With wide eyes, you looked at Jimin.
“Wrath”, you whispered. “Namjoon’s wrath.”
Jimin didn’t need to answer. The rattle of the tablet that Jin dropped in the doorway to the kitchen was confirmation enough.

Chapter Text

“How could you tell her?”, Jin hissed while cleaning up the mess on the floor with a move of his hand. The shattered dishes and spilled food vanished into nothingness within a second. “Now she’s in even more danger than before! What if Namjoon rips her apart when he finds out?” He pointed towards you. “Not only do we lose a meal, but Namjoon might break when he realizes he killed her!”
Before you could inquire why Namjoon would give a damn about killing you, a useless human, Jimin got up and stepped in front of you. “She deserved the truth”, he growled back. “Plus, sooner or later, she would’ve found out anyway! She’s not stupid like the others!”
He turned towards you as if to support his point. “Who have you figured out so far?”
You looked up, unsure about what to say, but when Jin nodded with a sigh, you straightened your back. “Yoongi was the first”, you answered quietly. “Then Jin, and now Namjoon.”
Jimin huffed. “See, Jin?”, he continued a bit calmer. “It’s no use.”
Jin’s eyes were dark and focused on you. “She’s been here too long”, he mumbled more to himself than anyone else. “She might as well not be eaten at this point.”
The younger demon stiffened. “Are you nuts?”, he hissed. “Namjoon will kill us if he finds out we are hesitant to devour her! The fact alone that Yoongi saved her has him all worked up! He’ll kill us!” He turned towards you with a somewhat apologetic expression. “And sorry, Y/N, I’d rather kill one human than be killed myself.”

“Are you sure about that?”
The voice coming from the door made the three of you look up. Yoongi entered slowly, wiping his hands on what appeared to be a kitchen towel. Jin took a deep breath. “Are you alright?”
The elder demon chuckled. “I’m fine, don’t worry.” His eyes returned to you. “How are you, Y/N?”, he asked while approaching. “How’s the chest pain?”
You rubbed the area that had stung before, feeling for any pain left. “It’s alright at the moment”, you then smiled in relief. Yoongi hummed. “Then it worked”, he said.
Jimin frowned. “Worked?”, he inquired. “What did?”

Yoongi sat down next to you and Jimin, his firm glance seeming to pierce right through you. “When I…” He hesitated for a moment. “- followed Namjoon’s orders, I didn’t only give Jungkook the pain but transferred it directly from you to him.”
Jin huffed. “That’s why you were so exhausted?”
Yoongi chuckled. “Yes, it required more depth than just giving him pain. But I recovered quickly.”
Now it was your turn to be confused. “Wait”, you gained the demons’ attention, “so if you guys don’t know what exactly Yoongi did, you- you don’t all speak the demon language?”
“Qaay”, Yoongi corrected you. “No, I am the only one.”
You frowned. “Why? I mean, aren’t all of you able to”, you looked at Jimin, “control your powers quite well?”

The older demon shot the silver-haired devil a short glance as well. “You mean, apart from Namjoon?”, he dryly commented, earning a silent gasp from Jin and a shocked glance from Jimin. Even you, remembering Jimin’s earlier explanations, expected Namjoon to break through the door in pure rage any second, but the house stayed silent.
Yoongi ignored the shocked reactions and turned towards you to answer your question for real. “Sure, most of us are capable of controlling our power quite well”, he said. “But control has nothing to do with how you phrase things. Control has something to do with how well you know yourself and your limits, and how well you can implement that knowledge during the active use of ‘magic’, if you will. Being able to phrase things gives you more power, yes, and more diverse ways of using it as well, but it doesn’t help with the basic usage of the power that’s been given you already.” He looked at you. “That’s why everyone is able to use their powers, even if I am the only one speaking Qaay. Which”, his lips curled into a smile, “has mostly to do with the fact that I was the only one of us who was living around other high-ranked demons also speaking Qaay during my early years of existence.”
“Why didn’t you teach them then?”, you inquired further.
Yoongi’s eyes wandered off to the other two who averted their glances elsewhere.
“Qaay is a difficult language”, he replied quietly. “If it wasn’t for the fact that we already have one rampant demon down here, if there were five others trying to figure out this powerful demonic language, we’d be dead within days. Don’t get me wrong, I would teach them – but not when we’re confined in this cave. It’s too dangerous.”
You cocked your head to the side. “You said you only learned it during your early years of existence als-“
“Y/N”, Jin interrupted, seeming a bit tired. “Yoongi is thousands of years old. His ‘early years’ might as well mean a century, or two, or three, or ten. That’s more than enough to learn Demonic.”
Jimin nodded. “But we don’t have that kind of time”, he hummed. “We’ve been here for, what was it again?”
Yoongi’s lips twitched. “246 years, 171 days and 13 hours.”

Jin threw the elder a glance. “You counted.”
Yoongi nodded. “Every minute.”
Jimin turned towards you again. “Anyway, it’s not enough time, let enough space to learn Qaay properly. So we decided not to.” A smile flickered over his face. “For our own safety.”
“Don’t you get sick of this?”, it slipped past your lips before you could do something about it. “Don’t you like, want to die sometimes?”
Watching the demons, all of their faces softened until they seemed almost vulnerable. They exchanged short glances, then all three of them looked at you.
“Of course”, Yoongi hummed.
“A long time ago”, admitted Jin, and Jimin simply nodded yes, eyes glued to the ground.
You felt sympathy and compassion welling up inside you.

“I’m sorry”, you said softly. “I’m sorry for what’s been done to you, guys.”
The three of them jerkily raised their heads and stared at you.
“You’re… sorry?” Jimin’s voice was rough, as if it took him a great deal of energy to speak.
You simply nodded, and their eyes widened even more.

Until suddenly, a sincere smile spread on Yoongi’s face, and something like fondness flickered in his eyes.
“You’re a weird human, Y/N.”
And then, the demon slid off the sofa and kneeled down on the carpet, bowing his head in front of you. The others were speechless at the elder's actions when he raised his head again and looked at you with an amused sparkle in his eyes. 

"Thank you for your sympathy, Mylady." 

Chapter Text

“What are you doing?” 
You flinched and hastily turned around when Namjoon entered the room. The other demons didn’t seem surprised, probably because they heard him coming, but to your human ears, the steps of a demon were nearly inaudible. 
Yoongi looked up and slowly rose from the ground. “Namjoon”, he greeted, coldly mustering the leader.
Namjoon approached the sofa, eyes flickering over the three other demons’ faces. “You kneeled?”, he then turned to the older. “In front of a… human?”
His words were sharp like spearheads, but you couldn’t tell if it was because of disgust or surprise. Jin and Jimin lowered their glances, but Yoongi stood straight. His left hand loosely rested on the armrest of the sofa, right next to you, and he stared right back at Namjoon. “Yes”, he admitted calmly, seeming not the least impressed with the leader’s intimidating aura. “I did.”
Namjoon’s jaw muscles twitched as he apparently controlled himself. “And?”, he asked, voice now soft like fresh snow, and still just as cold at the same time. “What was the occasion?”

Yoongi blinked. “You heard it”, he stood up against Namjoon. “There’s no need to explain.”
A slight tremble ran through the ground and the walls of the castle, even you could feel it, and you threw Yoongi a concerned glance. His lips curled into the faintest of smiles as an answer. “Don’t you worry”, he mumbled.
“I want to hear it from you still”, Namjoon pressed out, anger about Yoongi’s opposition now glistening in his eyes. “Now.”
The elder noticed how Jimin and Jin also looked at him with worry and thus gave in with a sigh. “She apologized”, he quietly stated. “She… felt sorry. For us. For this.”
Namjoon huffed. “And you bowed? Because of that?” Next to the anger in his eyes, there was something else that made your heart sink when you saw it. He stepped up to you and the other three, and out of the corners of your eyes you noticed how Yoongi shifted ever so slightly, as if he was preparing to shield you from Namjoon’s wrath anytime.
The leader’s eyes were now resting on you, a storm raging in them. “She’s a human”, he said silently. “She’s so emotional, so weak, so susceptible to influence.” His glance flickered towards Yoongi who with a stone cold face and tensed up muscles still stood beside you. Of course he had noticed how the older demon was willing to protect you from his anger. “And you bow in front of her because of that?”

Yoongi opened his mouth to reply, but instead a clear voice filled the room and only when all four of the devils looked at you in surprise did you realize that it was your own.
“How are emotions a weakness?”
For a moment, the tension in the air grew so thick you could’ve cut it with a knife. Namjoon tensed up and so did Yoongi next to you, ducking the slightest bit as if ready to jump in front of you, but then he relaxed and straightened his back again, and the next second, so did Namjoon. Still his voice sounded strained when he replied.
“What.”
It wasn’t a question, but for once it seemed like he didn’t know what else to say. With Yoongi relatively calm next to you, you mustered the courage to answer.
“Why is it a sign of weakness?”, you repeated your question. “If anything, doesn’t it make us strong?” You paused shortly when there was a movement in the shadowy darkness of the entrance hall. It was Jungkook, accompanied by Taehyung, who stood in front of the door and apparently listened to the conversation. Namjoon didn’t seem to notice, but Jungkook’s figure, still a bit slumped, gave you an idea.
“How about Jungkook?”, you continued softly. “The pain he felt? He seemed much worse than even me, and I”, you rubbed over your chest at the thought, “I lost a piece of myself.” You looked at Namjoon. “Isn’t that because he is not used to it? Because he doesn’t know true pain, or the emotions that bring pain?”
You tried to smile, but it turned out weak. “Sure we break easily, because our bodies are so fucking fragile and soft. A grip from your hand and you could have me dead. But emotionally…” You jut your chin forward defiantly. “I’m stronger than you.”

Silence filled the room while your words vanished in the air. The doorway was empty, Jungkook seemed to have left again, and Namjoon stood in the middle of the room and stared at you.
His fists were clenched and his whole body tensed up, and his eyes glowed a furious red.
“Humans”, he then hissed, voice rough and deep with fury. “Always thinking they are something better.” His glance was laced with pure wrath when he raised his head.
“Just you wait how much ‘stronger’ you really are, human girl.”
And then, with a movement of his hand, he vanished into nothingness. The lights in the room darkened for only a second, but then everything turned normal again and you were alone with the three others.
Jin was the first to move, leaning against the chimney and chuckling. “Well, that was interesting”, he hummed while eyeing you. “Yoongi was right, you’re a weird human.”
“Weird but good”, Jimin added almost shyly, sitting down on the sofa, and Yoongi took a step back. All of them seemed genuinely relieved, but now that Namjoon was gone, your adrenaline kicked in and you started to shiver. You stared into the flames of the chimney fire and pulled the blanket tighter around your shoulders when goosebumps formed on your skin.
“Oh my god”, you whispered to yourself, realizing what you had done. “He’s going to kill me. He’s so going to-“

Your monologue was interrupted by Yoongi who started to laugh quietly. “Rest assured, Y/N”, he said with a mysterious sparkle in his eyes, resting his hand on your shoulder and giving it a gentle squeeze, “I’m pretty sure he’s going to do everything but that.”
His glance rested on the spot where Namjoon had stood earlier and a smile tucked at his lips, but when you and the other two looked at him questioningly, he just shook his head and chuckled. “No, I’m not gonna spoil anything, plus I am not 100% sure either”, he said and turned to Jin. “Didn’t you prepare some dinner earlier?”

With Jin leaving for the kitchen and Yoongi excusing himself soon after, you quickly forgot about what happened and the mysterious words of the older demon.
A certain devil in his room on the second floor, however, couldn’t, pacing around in his chamber relentlessly.
“Humans”, he tried to hiss, but it came out sounding soft and almost fond instead of hateful.

Chapter Text

You woke up on the sofa after what felt like it had been a long, exhausting sleep. The chimney fire had burned down and nothing but the red glimmer of the last ashes lit the dark room. The house was quiet, as if all the demons had gone to rest as well, even if you assumed that they didn’t sleep. You freed yourself from the blankets that one of them must’ve draped around you and set your feet on the stone ground. You were well rested and sitting around doing nothing would just cause the memories of what happened before to twirl around in your head again, so you got up to get yourself something to drink.

You entered the kitchen to find it deserted. Jin was nowhere to be seen. You searched the cupboards one by one until you found a glass, then filled it with water and leaned against the kitchen island. Kitchens always had a calming effect on you, and you weirdly enjoyed standing bare-footed on the cold ground in a quiet house, drinking water and for once thinking of nothing. For the first time, you were actually inspecting the room more closely.
The kitchen was rustic, wood and stone dominating the interior, even if the dishes seemed more modern than that. There were herbs growing in a few pots on one of a countertops, inexplicably so because of the lack of sunlight, but you suspected it was some form of spell Jin used to keep them alive. You stepped closer and extended your hand, rubbing some basil leaves between your fingertips and stroking over a small bush of rosmary. The feel of something real, something worldly, made your heart ache, but the pain vanished when you turned to your right and, nipping from your water, grew aware of an old photograph that was stuck to one of the wall cupboards. It showed a group of young men, and only when you took a closer look at the blotchy, yellowed picture did you realize it was actually the demons.
You couldn’t help a small chuckle – all of them looked like the exact depiction of their character. Yoongi cold and distanced, Jungkook with obvious curiosity and slight discomfort, Taehyung bored, Jin stiff but not unfriendly, Hoseok with a wide smile yet a sharp spark in his eyes, Jimin also with a smile, just a more reserved one, and Daimon on his arm, and finally Namjoon – stern expression, crossed arms, and dark, dark eyes.
You found your glance resting on the latter longer than intended and quickly averted your eyes elsewhere, just to nearly drop your glass in shock when you saw Jungkook leaning in the doorframe and watching you.

“Fuck”, you quietly cursed, extending your trembling hand to set the glass down safely on one of the countertops. “Surprised me.”
Jungkook flinched ever so slightly and finally looked away, apparently finding a large interest in his toes. “Sorry”, he mumbled. “I didn’t intend to sneak up on you.”
You noticed the large, dark circles under his eyes and stepped a bit closer. “Are you okay?”, you asked, true worry making your heart clench. “I’m sorry for what happened to you.”
Jungkook looked up again with a firm glance. “Thank you for your concern”, he replied, then huffed with a bitter laugh. “I’m… recovering. Yoongi is strong.” He rubbed his chest absentmindedly. “I’m sure he held back, but no one dares to fully defy Namjoon’s orders.”
You kept quiet for a while, fighting down feelings of guilt and compassion. “I hope you’ll be feeling better soon”, you finally answered, forcing a weak smile onto your face, and quickly swallowed the words ‘At least you didn’t lose a part of your soul’. Still Jungkook seemed to know what you were thinking, because he turned away a little and ran his fingers through his messy hair with obvious distress.

“You know”, he finally broke the silence again, his voice sounding strained. “I should apologize, too. For… that attack on you, the other day.”
His hand dropped to his side and he sighed, facing you again though his tensed pose and his hunched shoulders gave away how much he hated it. “I shouldn’t have… You know.” He seemed at a loss for words and you felt bad for him how he just stood there, seeming like a little boy who apologized for stealing chocolate, so you decided to interrupt.
“It’s too late now”, you replied, shrugging although the squeeze in your chest proved that it was indeed not as okay as you made it out to be. “It can’t be changed. I won’t make a fuss over it, and I won’t blame you for”, you hesitated and took a deep breath, “for your natural behaviors. It’s okay.”
Jungkook watched you with obvious surprise and doubt, but his voice was clear when he replied. “It’s not okay, Y/N, and I’m angry with myself because it is my natural behavior, not despite of it.” He stepped forward and rested his palm on one of the cold surfaces as if he had to remind himself that this was real. “It’s not like I love being a demon. But it’s not like I had a choice either.”
He spat out those words with so much bitterness that again, you sympathized with him. “What happened to all of you”, you murmured softly, realizing that all of the devils seemed broken in one way or another, and every single one of them dealt with it in their own way – some for better, some for worse.
Jungkook ignored your comment and stared at his hand as if he couldn’t bear to look you in the eye. “Not everyone is born to be a devil”, he said, quietly, as if he spoke to himself. “But me, I seem to fail to adjust fully.”
He looked up and suddenly there was something like pain in his eyes. “I’m envious”, he admitted, voice so close to breaking you nearly expected tears to run down his face. “Envious of you. Envious of humans, who have emotions, feelings, who have pain and all the fleeting joys of life to dwell in…” He raised his hand from the countertop.
“I envy those who can die”, he finished his monologue.

He didn’t look up immediately, but suddenly two warm hands entered his field of vision, engulfed his cold one and when he raised his head, he was met with two warm, friendly eyes and a small smile when you looked at him – no judgement, despise or shock evident in your expression – and softly said, “It’s nice to meet you, Envy.”

Chapter Text

Jungkook pulled air through his teeth at your words, resulting in a sharp hissing sound, and then he stepped back and pulled his hand from your fingers. “Don’t call me that”, he said quietly, only to realize how harsh it must’ve sounded and therefore adding: “Please.”
You ripped yourself out of it and quickly took a step back too, bringing some distance between you and him. “Sorry”, you mumbled, and his face softened a little.
“It’s okay”, he said. His voice was a bit rough.

Desperate for something to do to interrupt the tension building between you and the demon, you reached for the glass on the counter and chugged the water. “You want some, too?”, you asked while turning around for a refill, all the while forgetting that the demon didn’t eat nor drink.
Jungkook’s quiet laughter made you realize your mistake and you sighed in playful exaggeration while turning on the tab and checking the water temperature with a finger – nobody likes to drink lukewarm water after all. “I’m a mess”, you mumbled to yourself while filling the glass, and Jungkook leaned against the kitchen island with a thud. He was seemingly more relaxed now that the inevitably uncomfortable part of your encounter was over. “Don’t worry about it”, he replied in an easygoing manner. “I appreciate the offer, even if I can’t take it.”
When you turned around again, he shot you a playful wink and you relaxed. “Still”, you shrugged, taking another big sip. “Sometimes I feel like I don’t want to offend you guys.”
Jungkook shook his head. “I told you not to worry about it”, he repeated himself. “Rest assured, we won’t get offended. Though”, the corners of his mouth twitched and you couldn’t tell if it was because of a smile or a growl, “I can’t speak for all of us.”

“Speaking of which”, you said after a short pause during which you debated whether you should comment on Jungkook’s implied criticism of Namjoon, “what is this picture?” You turned around to the cupboard and pointed at it with the glass in your hand. “Where is it from?”
Jungkook’s expression flickered somewhere between anger and sadness and his eyes darkened a bit. He pushed himself off the kitchen island and stepped up to you, stopping right by your side and crossing his arms in front of his chest. His eyes narrowed the tiniest bit and he seemed kind of defensive. “That was a gift, if you will”, he mumbled, whether he was lost in thoughts or memories you couldn’t tell, but his glance was glued to the photograph.
“A gift?”, you couldn’t hide your curiosity. “From whom?”

“The men who caught us”, a voice rung out to the both of you and you quickly turned around while Jungkook stood completely unimpressed. Hoseok was standing in the door, red eyes flickering back and forth between you and the younger demon before he sighed and approached you.
“That”, he said, eyes resting on the yellowed picture, “is us shortly before we entered this earth hole forever.” Walking by, he stroked past Jungkook’s side which could’ve almost seemed accidental if it wasn’t for his hand which rested on the devil’s back a second too long to be a coincidence. With a quick hand movement, he plucked the photo from the cupboard, threw a short glance at it and then handed it to you for further inspection.
“It was taken by one of the men as a reminder of their triumph over the Seven Sins.” He clicked his tongue and now seemed almost angry. “I don’t know if it was meant as a joke at our expense, but they gave us a second one. I didn’t know Jin kept it.”
You stared at the picture for a while, then gave it back to Hoseok who carefully reattached it to the cupboard. After a while of silence, you turned to Jungkook.

“You look younger in the picture”, you commented softly. “Almost…”
“- human?”, Hoseok finished your sentence with a short look towards the other when you didn't dare to say it. “Yeah. He does. He was. Almost.”
You frowned, but Jungkook made no attempt to speak up. Instead, he seemed frozen in his spot and couldn’t take his eyes off the picture. His expression was something you had never seen before, neither on humans nor on the demons, and thus indescribable - a flicker of different feelings within mere seconds, melting together into something that you weren’t sure any human was capable of feeling. Hoseok’s glance however turned soft. He seemed to understand too well what Jungkook felt. “You go”, he mumbled, causing Jungkook to flinch out of his haze. “I’ll explain.”
Jungkook threw you a short, almost apologetic glance before storming out of the room. You followed his movements with your glance, then turned to Hoseok in confusion. His eyes still rested on the door where Jungkook had already vanished. “It’s better to not mention this before him”, he finally said and returned your glance, but he didn’t seem angry at all. “Just so you know.”

Hoseok led you to the dinner room, the place where the two of you had first met. You set your glass of water down on the dark wooden table and took a seat. Hoseok sat down right next to you.
“I don’t know if you remember”, he began, frowning. “A human’s memory is so short-lived… But the first time I talked to you, here at this table, I asked you if you knew how demons were made, and you said no.” He cocked his head to the side slightly. “You remember?”
You nodded, the memory was vague, but you remembered the overall occurance. “That time when you threw the apple at the wall?”, you asked and Hoseok seemed as if he had to bite back a smile. “Exactly”, he hummed. “Jin had to clean it up afterwards. He was not amused. I had to run for my life.”
You quirked an eyebrow in disbelief. “You? Really?”, you asked, but Hoseok replied with nothing but a weak smile.  
“Now, I never gave you an answer to that, I think. Would you like to know, Y/N?” His red eyes now rested on your face with a firm, serious glance.
“Do you want to know the full story of the Seven Sins?”

Chapter Text

You hesitated only a little, but Hoseok’s hard glance didn’t waver or move away from your face. He seemed to know you would agree before you yourself knew it, and when you finally uttered a quiet “Yes”, his expression turned almost content.
“Fine”, he said – as if it took a lot of convincing for him to spill the story – and leaned back a bit. Ultimately, he reminded you of your grandfather who used to take on a position similar to Hoseok’s whenever he told stories to your four-year-old self or prepared for a rant about war and the deterioriation of the military. The thought made you chuckle, but even though Hoseok noticed, he overlooked it.

“Basics”, he started off. “How are demons made?”
It was a rhetorical question, but you still shrugged. Neither did you know nor had you ever thought about it, at least not since your first conversation with the demon in front of you.
Hoseok frowned, gathering his thoughts before answering his own question. “Demons, apart from the lower species and the top class, don’t just ascend from hell or wander out of a dark forest.” The thought alone that the folklores and the whispers of the people could be true seemed to amuse him. “We don’t just come from anywhere, and contrary to popular belief, we aren’t made out of darkness and”, now his lips twitched in despise, “supernatural… things.”
He seemed to have lost his train of thought for a moment, but you knew better than to interrupt him. Instead you patiently waited until he spoke up again.
“Demons were beings before they turned into what they are now. Some were cats – see Daimon, some were bats – see the lava devils that Jimin showed you, and some were humans.” He made a hand movement which included the whole house or rather, the demons that lived in it.
“Before we were the Seven Sins, we were humans. And some of us – Jin or Yoongi – were even normal demons before that. It’s a complex transformation, but we can start at the beginning, if you want.”
You simply nodded again, and Hoseok seemed fine with it. He leaned back a bit further and stared up to the ceiling of the room. “We’ve been here nearly 247 years”, he mumbled, seemingly more to himself than to you. “That is a long time, for a human. For a demon, it is”, he snapped his fingers, “like a blink of an eye.”

“How old are you?”
Your question caused Hoseok to lower his head and look at you again. “You’re asking me… how old I am? Rude”, he chuckled, but the spark in his eyes gave away that he didn’t really mean it.
Even so, he had to think shortly, and that alone – having to calculate and to take a moment before telling someone your age, not because you forgot for a second but because you are literally too old to keep count reminded you of the giant difference between you and the devils once again.
“I’m 12.784 years old”, he finally decided, eyes narrowing as he went over it once more, then nodded. “12.784.”
Your brain tried to wrap itself around the fact that this man had lived through nearly 13 millennia, but failed miserably. Yet you were curious. “How about the others?”, you inquired, and Hoseok was willing to reply – after another short calculation.

“Jin must be about… 19.000 years old now”, he begun, and even his voice sounded a bit strained at this. “I’ve lost count of his age. Yoongi is a bit younger – 17.473, if I remember right. He turned 473 just two months ago.”
“473?”
Hoseok felt interrupted in his calculations and threw you a sharp glance, then sighed. “Whatever”, you thought you heard him mumble to himself, then he proceeded to answer your unspoken question. “It’s too much of a bother to count the millenia. So we go by the hundreds until a new millennium is reached.”
You nodded and he continued. “You know my age already. Next is Namjoon – he is barely a mere 1000 years younger than me. Must be about 11.619?”
He shrugged. “Jimin is 10.851 and Taehyung 9407 years old.” Now his eyes darkened and he paused for a bit. “But Jungkook…” He seemed to take a deep breath as if he was hesitant about saying it, but then sighed. “Jungkook is a mere 2100 years old. He’s the youngest by far, and he struggles the most with what happened to him.”

You looked up, his choice of words making you curious. “Happened to him?”, you inquired, and Hoseok shot you a short, dark glance. Even though he offered to explain to you, the topic still seemed to be an uncomfortable one even for him.
“Y/N”, he now got your attention and leaned forward a bit, looking at you firmly. The dark bloody red in his eyes swirled with emotion. “As I said, demons don’t just crawl out of hell like in the stories.”
Silence weighed heavy on your shoulders for a moment as Hoseok paused, then he leaned back into his chair again and sighed deeply.

“If someone or something becomes a demon”, he mumbled, so quietly that you had to listen closely to understand him, “it means that something went wrong when their souls got consumed.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest and looked up to the ceiling, the grey stones apparently catching his interest. He didn’t raise his voice when he continued and this time you had to physically lean forward to understand what he was saying.
“In other words, someone becomes a demon when a part of their soul is leftover by accident or because it can’t be swallowed. It’s a teeny tiny bit, not enough to make us anything close to a human, but it’s enough to keep us alive unlike normal Xiqaas.”
You frowned. “X- Xiqaa?”, you asked, struggling to pronounce the unfamiliar word. “What’s that?”
Hoseok’s lips twitched. “It’s the Demonic word for “bite” – used to refer to a soul that is meant to be consumed, a sacrifice for example.” His eyes rested on you and you lowered your head when you realized what he was hinting at. “I’m a Xiqaa, then”, you murmured, and Hoseok nodded, but his expression was friendly. “A unique one”, he added, but before you could ask about that, he returned to his story.

“Six of us were Xiqaas whose consumption went wrong. However, one of us had a soul that couldn’t be fully swallowed. But let’s start at the beginning.” He crossed his hands over his stomach, reminding you even more of your story-telling grandfather now.
“Now, how did Jin, the oldest, become a demon?”

Chapter Text

Hoseok made a pause to heighten the tension, and successfully so. When he noticed how eagerly you were waiting for him to begin the story, he chuckled.
“As I said already”, he began, “Jin is about 19.000 years old. Yet that is only a fraction of the normal lifespan of higher demons like ourselves.” He hummed. “Jin, as far as I know, was the son of a villager’s family far away from here. They lived in a county that was well-known for its demon activity, therefore Jin wasn’t really afraid of them. His family had dealt with devils before.” His expression turned a bit more serious. “That’s why one of the higher ranking demons, a lady named Teannu, caught an interest in him.” Hoseok’s eyes darkened. “She made him her pet, and after a few weeks, when she grew tired of him, she made him her Xiqaa. But before she could swallow the remaining bit of his soul, Teannu was interrupted. Thus he grew to be a demon, and a strong one on top of that – being Teannu’s pet had allowed him to learn quite a lot about the demon world even before he was part of it. His knowledge did him good, he survived through hiding until his powers fully developed after a century or so. Since then, he kept quiet.”

Hoseok clicked his tongue. “His history shows the typical development of a demon. A higher rank likes you, plays around with you and then messes you up.” He shrugged. “It was the same for me and Taehyung, actually. Apart from the fact that my master was called Orza, Taehyung was pet to the same demoness as Jin. Teannu.” He shook his head. “She is a strong devil, high-ranked, and always thirsty for both souls and sensations of all kinds.” He cocked his head to the side. “Her pets never lasted long, and neither did her Xiqaas, apart from Jin and Taehyung.”
He paused shortly. “Orza however was a different kind. He was cruel, and his only goal was to feed. I was simply at the wrong place at the wrong time. But he left a part of my soul – willingly. I wonder till this day why he did it.” He sighed. “Jin and Taehyung, being a dôin, meaning the demonic offspring of the same ‘parent’, if you will, found each other shortly after Taehyung was turned. As I said, that was about 9400 years ago. Jin, at this point, had been a devil for 10.000 years. Being no ill-natured demon, he took his younger dôin in to teach him. As far as he told me, he never expected to be stuck with him for so long though.” A smile tucked at his lips.

“What Taehyung did before he became a demon, I am not sure. I think he was part of a lower-ranked family as well, but he never told me about it in detail.” Hoseok shrugged. “Everyone here keeps their secrets. I probably know each member’s story, but the details, most of us keep to themselves.” He turned towards you a bit more.
“As for Namjoon, he is- or was the son of a middle-class merchant family. His turning was bad luck – he attended one of the meetings his father regularly held with the local oracle to beg for good winds and full ships to keep his business going. Unfortunately, that woman summoned one of the less friendly demons – Aczaar. He asked for a sacrifice, which he was granted by Namjoon’s father before the oracle could intervene, and unfortunately decided that said sacrifice needed to be a human soul. As the oracle was the summoner and his father the one who asked for the favour, the only soul left to take was Namjoon’s.”
He huffed. “Although the oracle woman managed to seal the downworld at some point, it was already too late and Namjoon was left with a shard of his soul and an eternal life as a demon.”
You hummed. “I’m surprised you know so much about Namjoon’s past”, you commented. “He doesn’t seem like the guy to talk about it a lot.”
Hoseok’s lips curled into a smirk. “No, he doesn’t talk a lot”, he agreed with you, “but he can’t hide his thoughts from me – at least not during a rage.” He rubbed his temple. “I’ve acquired the details of his story over the years, and it took a lot of listening to manage that.”
“So you can read thoughts?”, you asked, intrigued. But Hoseok merely winked at you and put a finger over his lips, hushing you. “Another time”, he quietly said, “but for now we have a different story to tell.”
You agreed with a short nod, and he continued.

“Jimin, huh... Jimin was a kind of… a special case, in that he served his mistress, Zezenha, for over ten years before she made him a Xiqaa. Rumour has it that he was her favourite playboy but grew too greedy over the years.” He grinned. “But don’t tell him I told you that.”
The grin vanished as quickly as it had come. “However greedy Jimin grew – if that rumour is true – and whatever that greed was aimed at, he was still attached to his mistress. He roamed the downworld for a good 5.000 years before he even started to mingle with others. Even Jin was more involved with other devils.” He chuckled. “It took a while for Jimin to realize that being a demon meant he was free of Zezenha’s shackles and her rules. Now, it’s been mumbled that Zezenha actually tried to go after him after she realized he had survived, but he refused her.” Hoseok’s eyes formed small crescents with his amusement. “But I can’t guarantee for the amount of truth in that rumour.”
You couldn’t help a small smile and Hoseok seemed content with himself, but his expression got serious right after.

“Now, who’s next…”
“You forgot Yoongi”, you were quick to help him out. “Didn’t you say he was the second oldest?”
Hoseok nodded, apparently deep in thought. “Yes, he is, but I didn’t forget him. I just wanted to save him till the end.” He hesitated shortly and his next words seemed carefully chosen. “You see, Yoongi is the one out of us seven whose soul could not be swallowed. He was caught by Xagire, a high ranked demon who intended to make him a quick meal and nothing more.” His eyes darkened. “Xagire is one of the ‘Ayabbi’, hell’s officers with a very high rank. He has immense powers, but still he couldn’t swallow Yoongi whole.”
He paused for a moment. “Now, Xagire could have left the broken soul behind and let it go its way, but he saw the immense potential Yoongi held and decided to keep him in close proximity to the higher ranks in a hope that he would choose to become an Ayabbi himself one day. But Yoongi had other plans, even though he took advantage of the privileges of his position nonetheless. He learned Qaay, proper etiquette, and a lot about the world of the high demons that regular demons would not know.”
Hoseok crossed his arms in front of his chest, a frown forming on his forehead. “But when his time came, Yoongi decided to leave the high ranks and travelled by himself - not without ripping Xagire to pieces, and effortlessly so, for being unable to devour him completely. I don’t know why he deemed our group a suitable party to be with. Anyway, because of him, the Ayabbi aren’t too fond of us – they despise us for taking one of the strongest demons from them.” He laughed quietly, but it sounded bitter. “As if ‘we’ planned on 'recruiting' him! They fact that he joined the group by himself is easily overlooked by the officers, and also the fact that we had nothing to do with Xagire's killings.” 
The anger vanished from his face and he shrugged. "But I guess that was a risk we were willing to take when we welcomed Yoongi." 

“And Jungkook?”, you asked, curiosity at its peak. “What about him?”
Hoseok’s expression turned pitying, almost sad. “Jungkook was an accident”, he quietly said. “It was Namjoon who turned him during one of our raids. We rarely did raid – only in times of great hunger – and Namjoon lost his appetite in the middle of eating. He didn’t realize what he was causing until it was too late.” He sighed. “He didn’t mean it, I believe, and tried to make up for it by taking him with us, but Jungkook never forgave him fully.”

Silence filled the room until he sat up straight and looked at you firmly. “Now you know”, he said calmly. “How demons are made and where the Seven Sins originated from. Does that answer a few of your questions?”
You nodded as to not to offend him, but Hoseok didn’t seem to realize the fact that his story had probably caused more questions to arise than it answered.

Chapter Text

He had just asked you if his explanation had solved your questions, but Hoseok didn’t seem to want to leave. That’s why you still dared to ask one of your remaining questions after a while of comfortable silence.
“So, I know where you all come from”, you started, gaining Hoseok’s attention as he looked up to you. “But how did you form a group? Judging from your story, demons seem to roam alone for the most part.”

The demon chuckled as if he had expected your question. “You’re right”, he replied casually, “demons prefer to be on their own for most of the time. The only common reason for that being ignored is…” He leaned forward a bit, eyes sparkling. “Strength.”
You frowned. “Strength?”
Hoseok shrugged and leaned back again. “Or lack of strength, depends. As powerful as we might be, there are situations in which a single individual itself is not strong enough to reach its goal. Now, there are two of those goals that cause demons to search for support among others: greed for power – or the need for defense.” His lips twitched. “You guess which one it was for us.”

“I don’t know”, you answered quietly. “I can’t imagine you being so hungry for power that you form a group, and yet it seems unlikely that you had to defend yourselves. So which is it?”
Hoseok snickered. “Clever girl. You’re right, both seem very unlikely, huh...” After a short pause, his expression turned serious again. “But when Jin and Taehyung, the only original pair, picked up Yoongi along the way, things got… heated.” Redness flickered in his eyes. “The Ayabbi were furious when they found out what Yoongi had done. Xagire had been a well-known and respected member of them, and his death – which was pitiful from what I’ve heard – fueled their hate.” He hummed. “Plus, they couldn’t stand the fact that there was someone stronger than them who didn’t belong to their rows. Thus, they tried to hunt Yoongi down.”
The demon’s eyes narrowed into slits.
“And so they did.”

He ran his fingers through his hair. “The Ayabbi, as full of themselves and as arrogant they might be, aren’t called hell’s officers for no reason. They are hunting dogs – looking for those who cause trouble and getting rid of them. And so far, they haven’t missed out on even one.”
Hoseok quietly clicked his tongue. “But Yoongi outwitted them all, one after another. He didn’t kill them – he just kept quiet enough for them not to be able to spot him, Jin and Taehyung, but as far as I know, it always bordered on provocation. Being with Jin and Taehyung gave him the cover that he needed; it was safer than travelling alone. Still, when I crossed their way, he had been labelled ‘Kosab em Ayabbi’, “He who plays with Ayabbi” - short just 'Kosab' - already. Being infamous for defying their power, it was getting more an more difficult for him to stay hidden.” Hoseok frowned. “Yoongi knew that he was done for if they all attacked him at once. One or two at a time were a mere game for him, but even he was – and is – not almighty. Therefore he tried to find more members for his group.”

The devil snickered. “One might think that it was Namjoon who built the Seven Sins, but no. In the beginning, it was Yoongi.”
His snicker faded and he stared at the wall behind you. “Namjoon wasn’t with us until after we had found Jimin. Yoongi grew fond of him for some reason, although he was unsociable and had this… cat with him, but Yoongi insisted, and he was the strongest of us at that time.” His lips curled into a faint smile. “I’m sure you noticed, but Jimin and Yoongi get along well. One might think they are twins or a couple judging from how often you see them together, but Yoongi simply has a soft spot for Jimin.” He pulled up his shoulders with a small laugh. “Noone knows why.”

After a short moment of silence, Hoseok took a deep breath and continued.
“However, all that changed when we encountered Namjoon.” The red in his eyes darkened at the memory until it was almost black. “Namjoon was… different, even back then. He had a certain feel to him and seemed dangerous even to other demons, which is rare.”
Absendmindedly, he reached beneath the table and when he pulled his hand back, a little black being with tiny wings hung between his fingers, apparently biting and scratching to get free. Hoseok scrunched up his nose in disgust, silently hissed at it and proceeded to crush the tiny demon in his hand. Black dust trickled through his fingers and formed a little pile on the floor that the demon scattered with his foot.
“Yoongi stepped down immediately. Maybe he could have defeated him, but we all sensed Namjoon was unstable, even then.” The red in his eyes now vanished until they were fully black, deep as the hole you had descended through. “And we all realized when we went up”, he pointed towards the ceiling, “to feed. His power destroyed everything around us, ground shaking, fire blazing. He was a natural force, and earth bowed before him.” He lowered his head. “We decided never to go into villages after that. It was too dangerous and would attract too much attention. And if we caused a war between humans and demons, well, we would not only have the Ayabbi hunting us, but the entire human kind too. It was too much of a risk.”
He paused shortly and you tried to wrap your head around how Hoseok had chosen to describe Namjoon – he was a natural force, and earth bowed before him. So much power seemed so unlikely to you that your brain just couldn’t imagine it however hard you tried.

The demon next to you threw you a short glance. “I know”, he said as if he knew what was going on inside your head. “Until you have seen it once, you can’t imagine it. Even I, as a demon…” He hesitated. “I couldn’t believe it. I would’ve never thought that someone so powerful existed.” His voice was quiet and you couldn’t help but think that he still seemed to struggle with this.
After a while, the devil took a deep breath and proceeded to continue with his story.
“Looking at you, I believe Yoongi has mentioned Claire before.” You couldn’t remember but didn’t bring yourself to say it. Hoseok’s lips twitched; he seemed amused for some reason.
“She was a female higher demon, I believe even higher than most of the Ayabbi. 'Clare' was the name she chose for herself, but her true name was Aezraya. As far as I know, she was a sister of Teannu’s – the demon who made Jin her Xiqaa.” He paused and seemed to be searching for the right words. “She wasn’t on the hunt unlike the Ayabbi, but we encountered her on one of our strolls. Everything changed after that.”
The look he gave you was open and honest, almost vulnerable. “Namjoon fell in love with her. And seemingly, that was the only thing that could contain his powers.” His expression hardened. “She was a friend to most of us, but to him, she was his love of a lifetime. And that’s why-“ He stopped mid-sentence and apparently couldn’t bring himself to continue.

“Why what?”, you asked softly.
Hoseok’s jaw muscles tightened and he looked away.
“That’s why he broke when she died.” 

Chapter Text

You couldn’t prevent a silent gasp. “She died?”, you asked quietly. Grief was dancing in Hoseok’s dark eyes, and it seemed sincere.
“She died”, he confirmed and cleared his throat right after as if he was trying to seem unfazed, but the emotion in his eyes didn’t vanish.
“She was killed – by humans, surprisingly, even though she was so strong. She didn’t pay attention. Namjoon was too far away to help, and so were we.” His voice sounded sad. “When we arrived, we were too late. It just… completely ruined Namjoon.”
A deep breath indicated how difficult it was for him to talk about this. “After we buried her, his rage broke loose. He was the first of us who was assigned a sin. ‘Wrath’, because his fury – directed both at humanity and himself – was uncontainable, unstoppable.” His shoulders sunk down and suddenly, he seemed very tired. “We tried everything, but he wouldn’t stop.”

“What happened?”, you asked quietly, unable to raise your voice even a littlebit. Suddenly, the weight resting on the demons’ shoulders seemed to rest on yours too, crushing you beneath.
“He destroyed entire villages”, Hoseok mumbled, eyes glazed over with memories of that time. “During one of his fits, Namjoon encountered Jungkook. He was nothing more than a boy, around 16 years old. His older brother jumped in front of him to protect him and Namjoon ripped him apart in front of Jungkook. He didn’t stand a chance after that and then Namjoon lost his appetite in the middle of business.”
“What about the brother?” Your voice was rough because even though the demon's words had been clear enough, you still had the urge to ask about the older boy who died protecting his young brother.
Hoseok shook his head as an answer, apparently slowly getting out of his haze and regaining his composure. “Namjoon was furious”, he said. “We couldn’t do anything but watch and take Jungkook with us.” He sighed. “Yoongi and Jin tried to stop him at times, when it got too bad. They had full control over their powers which enabled them to cage him sometimes, immobilize him, things like that. But he always broke their shackles at some point. It went on for centuries like this. Destruction satisfied his wrath for a few years, and then it returned even stronger than before.”

He paused shortly, nearly unnoticeably wincing as if the following hurt him physically. “And when it broke lose again 246 years ago, it went out of control. We were trapped because Namjoon went too far, and as always, we were closeby – too close.” He shook his head. “Humans wouldn’t understand that our presence protected them from something much, much worse than what Namjoon did that day. They are blind.” His expression hardened. “But so was Namjoon, and we had no choice. He was our leader, and he was – or had been – our friend. Believe it or not, demons have something like compassion too.”
A weak smile tugged at his lips when he looked at you. “Normally only for fellow demons, of course. But it caused us to agree to a pact with the humans.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest, seeming defensive. “They wouldn’t kill our leader, Namjoon, but we would have to spend eternity here. They didn’t realize the fact that we weren’t the only demons who came to the human realm, but it was already too late when they did. And thus, we are trapped.”

Silence filled the room for a little while.
“Namjoon does feel guilty at times, I believe”, Hoseok finally spoke up again after a while. “But it only leads to more rage and anger. He made Jungkook a demon, he is responsible for us being here, and he even destroyed the cave to a point where all life and distraction is gone. He is to blame, but we don’t. Not anymore.”

“Why?”, you asked. “Aren’t you angry?”
Hoseok threw you a short glance. “Of course”, he replied, “especially Jungkook. That boy is still not over it. But with time comes indifference, and wisdom. Namjoon is not at fault for becoming a demon, he is not at fault for being unstable by nature, and he is not at fault for losing the love of his life.” He shrugged. “Who knows what would have become of Yoongi or Jin with their immense power and control if they found someone they loved as dearly as Namjoon loved Claire? What would’ve happened if they lost that person?” He smiled, but it flickered with melancholy. “I, at least, don’t blame anyone for going rampant at the loss of their one true love. And that they were.” He hesitated. “Soulmates, if you will.”
You sat in silence, unable to fight the feeling of sympathy for Namjoon. Hoseok’s glance rested on you, piercing, and he raised his hand with an apologetic expression when you looked up jerkily at a sharp sting in your head. “Excuse me”, he smiled, and it seemed sincere. “I couldn’t help it.”

You furrowed your brows while his expression turned softer.
“You know how it feels, don’t you”, he mumbled, eyes still glued to your face. “You lost your father, am I right?”
A shiver ran down your spine when you realized Hoseok just read your mind. “Yes”, you whispered, “ a long time ago.”
Hoseok nodded. “Human pain fades, you see”, he said, and you felt bad for not being able to deny it. Losing your father in young years, you couldn’t even remember his face clearly at this point. The demon chuckled, but it didn’t sound happy.
“Well, a demon’s emotions are stronger, less likely to be forgotten, and even though we can ignore them much more easily than humans can, grief and pain are… strong feelings. And since our memory lasts a lifetime, in almost every detail, well… Let’s just say, Namjoon remembers everything about Claire.” The demon’s smile seemed crooked. “Which explains why his wrath doesn’t falter.”

“Do you think it will some day?”, you asked while the demon got up and paced around the room with his hands behind his back. “Do you think anything can help?”
Hoseok shrugged. “I don’t know”, he replied honestly. “His fury goes beyond what the average being can imagine.” He stopped and thought for a while before continuing to walk in circles. “But I believe that there is some part of the old Namjoon left in him. You know – before he became Wrath. I believe he needs to learn how to feel again. How to love, specifically.” He laughed, but it sounded bitter. “But guess how likely it is that he will encounter someone who teaches him that down here, when everything we get is one tiny, weak human a year.”
His glance rested on you shortly, then he huffed.

“In other words, no, it’s unlikely. We’re trapped here forever. Changing him will be impossible.”

Chapter Text

The silence was weighing heavy on your shoulders and you assumed on Hoseok’s too. You now realized that the demons’ situation was utterly hopeless, all because Namjoon failed to control himself one crucial time.
Yet you felt yourself struggling to blame him. He lost the love of his life – and he was, from the beginning, an extraordinarily strong but unstable demon. Noone could blame him for that.
The more you thought about it, the less sense it made. Something didn’t add up until you finally remembered the day you had come down here and a silent gasp escaped your lips. Hoseok looked up and quirked an eyebrow.

“You’ve been here for 247 years, right?”, you asked, more a rhetorical question than anything else, but Hoseok still nodded.
You frowned. “But why…”, you started and now Hoseok cocked his head to the side. “Why what?”, he inquired and you quickly pulled yourself together.
“When I was sent down here… They called it the 1956^th Day of Descent…” Your frown deepened. “But you’ve only been here for 247 years.”

The devil next to you didn’t say anything, but you noticed his hand balling into a fist on the table. For a second, it seemed as if he was about to break something, but then he took a deep breath and slowly loosened his grip.
“Humans”, he growled, and his voice gave away just how furious he was, but he pulled his hand away from the table as if he was afraid of damaging it by accident. For a few seconds, he seemed to solely concentrate on calming down, then he looked up again.
“Sorry”, he said, voice still rough but sounding almost normal again. “That much audacity just…”
You shook your head and looked down on your hands. “No, I understand”, you quietly replied. “To think that they would lie to all of us…”

Hoseok shrugged. “Times are changing”, he said. “Slowly, but surely. And they’re afraid of people asking questions, or changing their opinion, or becoming curious… So they display it as an old, very old tradition, when in fact, it’s not.”
He hissed, eyes flaring up in the lightest shade of red. “To be helpless against that kind of abuse… It really sucks.”
You looked over to him, expression turning almost apologetic. “You know”, you spurted out without thinking about it a great deal, “after all of this… I’m not sure if I want to return.”

The demon’s eyes widened and he seemed at a genuine loss for words, just staring at you quietly. You averted your glance, feeling a bit uncomfortable at the intense glow in his eyes, but the more you thought about whether you meant what you said, you realized you weren’t lying.
Hoseok opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it, then opened it again. But before anything could pass his lips, a familiarly deep voice coming from the door of the dining room had the two of you quickly turning around.
“You don’t want that.”

It was Namjoon, casually leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed in front of his chest. His red eyes were fixated on you, but his expression was relatively soft, an unusual view. He slowly shook his head, pushing himself off the wall and approaching you two. “You don’t want to stay down here”, he repeated, grabbing a chair next to you and sitting down on it. “And you’re not going to.”
Hoseok’s eyes narrowed, but at a simple short glance of Namjoon, he held back.
The tall demon’s eyes returned to you and he sighed. To you, it almost seemed as if he was tired, burned out, even if you weren’t sure from what.
“If these guys insist on letting you go”, he started calmly, running his fingers through his hair as he was leaning forward, “I’ll comply.”
The redness of his eyes burned in yours.
“We’ll send you back up if it comes to that.”

“What if I say no?”
Your voice was surprisingly calm as you looked back at the demon. His expression didn’t falter. “Humans don’t belong here”, he stiffly replied. “You’d die sooner than later.”
Hoseok pulled in a sharp breath at his words. His obvious reaction to Namjoon mentioning your death surprised you, but the latter didn’t allow your glance to stray from his for even a second.
He stood up again, supporting himself on the table.
“I don’t want you here”, he coldly added, figure hovering over you to support his point. It didn’t leave any room for opposition. “If these guys refuse to give in to their urges, I won’t force them. But in that case, you will leave.”
His eyes flickered towards Hoseok just the tiniest bit and his expression hardened for just a second. “And I expect all of you to obey. There will be no discussions.” His tone was harsh and Hoseok turned his face away.
Namjoon straightened his back and turned towards the door, but not without throwing the two of you a short glance before leaving for good. His eyes were piercing your skin and it made you shiver.  
“Still…” His words lingered in the air as he left the room again. “Don’t forget that they’re starving, girl.”

The silence between you and Hoseok had suddenly turned heavy. Finally, the demon sighed, rubbing his forehead in obvious distress. “That man”, he mumbled to himself. Namjoon’s words had obviously gotten to him, and you figured he wasn’t in the mood for any more of your questions. Your lips formed a small smile. “Let’s stop here for today.”
Hoseok hummed. “I enjoyed the talk, though”, he said, eyes piercing right through you as he turned towards you again. “Let’s continue another time.”
You simply nodded, quietly watching as Hoseok got up and slowly left the room without even looking back once. Only then, lost in your thoughts, did you move to grab the glass of water. You pulled your knees up to your chest, curling up on the chair, and took small sips of your drink while you tried to sort all the things Hoseok had told you.
You couldn’t believe the people you had known for all of your life had lied to you and deceived you like this, and you slowly started to realize that maybe the demons’ view of humanity wasn’t all that wrong. Still it stung in your heart to blame your own race, even if you knew it was the truth. In the end, your mother and friends had been among those people, and how could you betray them like this?
‘It doesn’t matter’, it echoed in your mind. ‘They think you’re dead anyway.’

You slammed the waterglass on the table to shut the sarcastic, bitter voice in your mind up. The glass burst into thousands of glittering shards, some of them piercing your palm. You only realized you had hurt yourself when blood started dripping from your hand, and the pain was overshadowed by how impressed you were with your own sudden strength.
“What did you do?”
It was Jimin who stood in the door, Daimon next to his feet in a stiff posture and with pointed ears. You looked up and shrugged, the adrenaline still numbing the pain. “I set down the glass a bit too hard, I guess”, you replied, voice calm, and Jimin’s eyes wandered towards your hand.
He hissed, you couldn’t tell if out of annoyance or worry, and approached you with quick steps just to grab your hand and shortly inspect your palm.

“We need to take care of this”, he stated, and then the demon vanished into nothingness.

Chapter Text

Jimin returned within what felt like mere milliseconds to you, equipped with a box that seemed to contain medical supplies of some sort. Without saying a word, he pulled a seat next to yours and sat down before opening the box.

You watched quietly as he picked out bandages, a bottle of alcohol and tweezers. Then he reached out for you. “Give me your hand”, he ordered and you complied, placing the back of your hand in his.
He stared at the wound in your palm for a second, then turned around to pick up the tweezers and started to get rid of the shards of glass that were stuck in your hand.
“Why did you slam the glass on the table that hard?”, he quietly asked while he was working, and you tried to quickly hide the truth. “I just set it down a bit too hard”, you replied with a weak smile, to which Jimin looked up for a quick second, dark eyes boring into yours. Then he huffed. “Sure”, he said, returning his attention to your palm while he plucked out another splinter, “and that’s how you completely destroyed it?”
Only now did you realize that the ground was full of glass shards and water that was dripping from the table, making it obvious that you had set down the glass with full force – and possibly even the intention to make it burst.
You sighed. “I got angry for a second”, you mumbled. Jimin stayed quiet for a while, then he looked up again. “Why?”, he asked, putting the tweezers on the table while he inspected the wounds.
“I don’t really want to talk about it”, you answered weakly. Jimin complied with a nod. “Okay.”

For a while, Jimin worked quietly, drenching a bandage in the alcohol and turning towards you again. You shut your eyes in expectation of sharp, stinging pain in your palm, but nothing happened.
When you opened your eyes again, Jimin’s fist was clenched around the wet bandage, alcohol dripping from his skin onto the ground. His glance was fixated on your bloody palm, and just when you wanted to ask him what was wrong, he looked up.
His eyes were flaring a devilish red, sharp teeth showing when he pulled his lips back in a toneless growl, and before you could react and pull back your hand or move away from him, he lifted your arm towards his face, stuck his tongue out and lapped up one of the drops of blood on your wrist.

You were sitting, yet your knees buckled as soon as the tip of the demon’s tongue touched your skin, fire burning in your veins a few seconds after. The feeling was so intense that you sucked in a harsh breath, heat flushing your face. Jimin glanced up from your wrist and his lips curled into a sweet smile that sent shivers down your spine.
“You have good blood”, he rasped, the unsettlingly bright red swirling around his pupils, and leaned down again to have another taste. You were unable to move, even though your brain was trying to convince you to pull back, but every thought was fuzzy and you felt yourself drifting off into delicious nothingness.
Jimin’s teeth grazed your skin and he growled against it, sharp fingernails digging into your forearm as he forced himself to pull back, licking his lips. In his eyes stood bloodlust, pure hunger, and you could see the tip of his tongue repeatedly running over his sharp teeth and stained lips to catch every single drop of your blood.
You would’ve pulled back, but your body was limp, muscles not listening to the remaining conscious part of your brain screaming at them to save yourself.
Jimin’s glance lingered on your face and the grip around your arm tightened, fingernails cutting your skin and causing new, thin lines of blood to run over your wrist.

Jimin’s body tensed and then everything blurred around you when, with inhumane speed, he ripped you from the chair and spread your body out on the table. His hunger was too strong, you thought, and when Jimin grabbed your blouse and ripped it in two, exposing your top, you were almost certain you would die now.
Funnily enough, you weren’t even scared.
You simply closed your eyes and waited for Jimin to devour you.

The devil’s breath fanned over your neck as he closed in, surprisingly warm despite the icy cold feeling of his perfect skin, and he pressed his lips on the curve of your collarbones, carefully exploring the tempting softness of your skin. ‘
His teeth grazed against your neck, right where your blood was pulsing through your veins, and he tightened his grip around your arms, pinning you to the table even more.
One of his canine teeth left a tiny scratch in your skin, a few droplets of blood running over your neck with every pump of your oh so human heart, and Jimin licked them up as if he was a cat drinking milk.
“It’s been so long”, he murmured, voice muffled against your skin, the barely contained greed evident in his tone.
You found a last sliver of self-control and raised your voice – nearly inaudible and shivering. “Too long?”

Jimin’s lips didn’t stop moving against your skin as if he was addicted to your scent – or taste. “Yes”, he growled, shoving himself closer, full set of teeth now pressing against your throat as if he was about to rip it out. “Way too long.”
“Will you share my soul with the others?”, you asked. Your voice was still raspy and sounded pressed, cause being Jimin’s teeth around your trachea.
A low growl slipped past the demon’s lips and vibrated against your skin. “Who said I’m about to kill you?”
Before you could answer anything, his canines punctured your skin and you sucked in a harsh breath. It didn’t hurt, it wasn’t even unpleasant – instead, a rush of something you couldn’t name ran down your spine and goosebumps formed on your skin.
Heat filled your body, pooling in your lower abdomen, and against your will, your back arched off the table and a tiny moan tumbled off your tongue.
Jimin hummed.
“Good girl”, he whispered as he loosened his bite, violet marks around your throat from the pressure of his teeth, four small holes where his canines had been. His lips, normally a rosy pink, were a disturbingly bloody red now, but when he looked down on you, you didn’t even notice. Your expression was one of full bliss as pleasure was, inexplicably, pumping through your veins.
You were at Jimin’s mercy, and the devil knew. With a small smirk, he leant down again, fiery red eyes glued to where he knew your blood was rushing beneath your skin, and then he opened his mouth for the last time.

Chapter Text

Your eyes were closed, shades of orange and grey swirling behind your eyelids, and that’s why the only thing you got from what was about to happen now was a loud crash and a deep growl, more intimidating than any sound you had ever heard. It made the tiny hairs on your body vibrate with fear and your muscles tensed up.

Jimin’s weight was ripped from your body, and with the loss of body contact, the fuzzy feeling in your head faded. You opened your eyes, body curling into a ball to protect you from the danger that was obviously looming in the room, an aura that your senses couldn’t ignore.

A young man was standing in front of you and after a few seconds, you realized it was Yoongi.
You could only see his profile as he stood facing the wall Jimin had crashed into, leaving cracks all over the old stone. Some of them had crumbled and fell to the ground, the dust from the impact slowly rising and filling the dinner room now.
Even though you could only make out half of his face, Yoongi’s expression was no less than terrifying – so much so, that you crawled back on your hands a few inches, unable to peel your glance from his features.
His posture was stiff, but loosened a bit as he grew aware of your moving now. His glance shot towards you, eyes hard and piercing like cold mountain water. Only the deep red, frightening colour of them and their aggressive expression made it clear that Yoongi was way more dangerous than any mountain river could ever be.
His glance ran up and down your body. “Are you okay?”, he asked, voice even lower than usual, and the intensity of his tone and glance sent another shiver down your spine. “Yes”, you quietly croaked, to which his eyes narrowed.
“How about your neck?”

Only when he mentioned it did you grow aware of the pulsing pain around your throat and when you touched the area, you couldn’t prevent a small hiss. You pulled your hand back and your fingertips were drenched in blood.
Yoongi’s face twisted into a snarl, fury evident in his eyes. He turned back into the direction were Jimin now slowly rose from the ground, grimacing with discomfort. His right arm was twisted  in an unnatural way and you couldn’t help but feel sick when you watched it snap back into its correct position with a loud crunch.
“Killjoy”, Jimin said, dusting off his clothes. Yoongi’s reply was a low growl. “What the hell did you think you’re doing?”
Jimin’s eyes flickered towards you. He looked at your face for a second before his glance slipped downwards, too obviously resting on the spot where blood was still running down your neck, even if it was slower than before. You could see his jaw muscles tensing.
Apparently, so could Yoongi.

With a speed too fast for your human eyes, Yoongi crossed the room. Before he even reached Jimin, the latter fell to his knees and all control over his muscles seemed to have vanished from his body. Only his eyes were widening more and more, and you suspected that Yoongi had never treated the younger like this before. “Yoongi was fond of Jimin for some reason”, Hoseok’s words resounded in your head, and it became blatantly clear now that the older seemed to punish his friend for the first time in forever.
Yoongi loomed up before the silver-haired devil. His aura was vibrating with uncontained rage, white electricity flickering around his fingers, but he managed to control himself. The electricity died down when he balled his hands into fists. “How dare you”, he growled, voice like thunder, and the ground trembled under the impact of his words. Namjoon didn’t seem to be the only one the earth bowed before, and only now did you realize just how dangerous and powerful Yoongi was – Yoongi, who was one of the few who never rose a hand against you and at the moment stood in front of you to defend you against a starving Jimin. You decided never to provoke him as you saw him towering above the younger demon, air around him shimmering with tension.

Jimin ducked.
You always thought him a proud being, confident and sly, but next to Yoongi, he looked like a kid. Jimin was proud, but Yoongi was Pride itself. He didn’t stand a chance.
For a while, both of them were silent. The ground wasn’t shaking anymore and Yoongi just stared at the younger intensely.
“I expect you to control yourself from now on”, Yoongi said. His voice was quiet but the dangerous tone had not vanished from it; if anything, he sounded even more intimidating now.
Jimin didn’t move a muscle, but you could see his lips moving, even though his words were impossible for you to understand from the distance.
Yoongi stiffened, but his reply was just as quiet.
A second later, the younger demon dared to look up, glance resting on your figure. The red glow had vanished from his eyes, but their current bright silver colour wasn’t less unsettling. You averted your glance and a second later, a growl vibrated through the room.
“Behave”, Yoongi snarled at Jimin, anger flaring up in his eyes again. The younger hissed back a second later and Yoongi’s aura grew even more intimidating. Under the influence of his powers, the shadows in the room started to twitch, a concerning hum running along the walls. Suddenly, you felt as if you were pressed down by an invisible force, unable to move a muscle or even breathe properly.

Jimin’s glance flickered towards you.
“You’ll kill her”, he calmly said and Yoongi looked over his shoulder.
The red in his eyes caused a deeply rooted, instinctive fear in you, so overwhelming that your heart skipped a beat. He stared at you, your mind growing more restless with each second, but then he averted his glance and looked back at Jimin who still stood in front of the wall he had shattered.
A smirk tucked at the old demon’s lips but it didn’t seem nice. He approached Jimin slowly, reminding you of a tiger in the smoothness of his movements and the threatening aura looming around him.
“You’re very optimistic if you think I’d ever let control over my powers slip”, Yoongi said. His voice sounded scratchy now, so much so that didn’t seem like his own.
Jimin’s eyes widened the tiniest little bit. You saw him struggling to keep his composure as Yoongi took one step after another towards him, forcing him against the wall without even touching him.

Having reached the other, Yoongi leaned forward and brought his mouth close to Jimin’s ear. He spoke quietly, but you could still understand the last few words of his sentence for some reason.
“… so leave her alone.”
The silver-haired demon swallowed.
And then Yoongi took a big swing and rammed his fist into Jimin’s stomach. The latter opened his mouth as if to scream, but before a sound could leave his lips, he vanished into black smoke.

Chapter Text

After Jimin was gone, deafening silence was filling the room. Both you and Yoongi didn’t move for what felt like forever, but then the demon sighed and his posture relaxed.
“They’re all children”, he murmured, head lowering as he stretched his fingers as if they were cramped from how hard he balled them into a fist. “All stupid children.”
He seemed to be back in full control of himself, so you slowly slid towards the edge of the table Jimin had pinned you to and climbed off it. Only with the sound of you moving, the demon seemed to realize you were still there and slowly turned around.

His glance was dark but calm, and the redness had vanished from his eyes. He quietly watched you sit down on your chair and reach for a new bandage and the bottle of alcohol, but before you could start disinfecting your wound, he rushed over to you – so quickly that your human eyes weren’t able to follow his movements.
Before you could realize that he was next to you, his cold fingers picked the bandage out of your hand. “Let me do it”, he mumbled and sat down on the chair across from you. Without another word, you let him pour the alcohol on the bandage and didn’t protest when he reached for your hand and began to carefully clean the slits from the glass shards.

“What happened?”
It took you a while to muster the courage to ask the question that had been spinning around your head since Yoongi had ripped Jimin away from you. The latter’s actions didn’t make sense to you at all, and you wondered if Yoongi had an explanation for the sudden outburst of the younger devil.
Yoongi froze in his movements and then quietly put the wet bandage to the side, grabbing a new one to wrap around your palm. While he did so, Yoongi began to speak – slowly and quietly, atypical for him. You felt sorry looking at his face, his expression exhausted and depressed. It was more emotion than the old devil had ever shown before, and it made your stomach twist.

“He’s hungry”, Yoongi started, glance resting on the bandage that he was carefully wrapping around your hand. “Hungry, like Jungkook, like all of us. He just snapped, it’s nothing personal. Sometimes, the urge gets all too overwhelming and-“
“Why my blood?”, you interrupted him, and without wanting it, tears started pooling in your eyes. Your voice was shaking, proof of the emotional uproar within you – Yoongi tensed the tiniest bit when he realized and his hands faltered in their movement for a second, but he didn’t raise his glance. Only now did your body seem to realize that you had avoided death by mere milliseconds, and the adrenaline and shock caused your tears to overflow. “Why did he bite me?”
Silence weighed down on your shoulder while Yoongi seemed to gather his thoughts enough to answer.

“Blood has nothing to do with the soul”, he finally said. His voice sounded pressed and he seemed reluctant to answer your question. “Yet a tiny bit of a human’s soul runs in their blood. It’s hard to withstand if you’re starving, and it’s easier to attain than the soul, so…” His voice trailed off and he averted his glance. “He couldn’t bear it anymore, I guess.”
Your heart clenched at the sound of Yoongi’s voice. He seemed to be feeling genuinely bad about what happened as he now continued to wrap your hand in the bandage a few more times before he tied a knot and let go of it. “Here”, he smiled, but it seemed weak. “Make sure to keep it clean, okay?”
You quietly nodded, eyes glued to the expression on is face. It almost looked as if he was in pain, and when he turned away, a quiet sound slipped past your lips as you extended your hand for him.

The tug on his sleeve made the demon halt in his movements and he threw a short glance back, his expression softening when he saw your face. “What is it, human girl?”, he hummed and turned towards you again, but in contrast to Namjoon, the words didn’t sound harsh or humiliating.
For a second, you stared at him, body trembling with all the pent up emotions that still rushed through your veins, and then you looked away and gritted your teeth.
“Nothing”, you said, and Yoongi quirked his eyebrows.
You didn’t want to say anything else, didn’t want to admit what was going on inside you and the fact that being alone was scaring you to death.

A hand was closing around yours. Yoongi carefully plucked your fingers from his sleeve, the fingertips of his other hand raising your chin and turning your face towards him. His expression was serious, but the black of his eyes seemed almost warm as he eyed your features.
“I won’t leave”, he finally mumbled, intense glance still lingering on your face. “Relax.”
His words lifted the burden on your shoulders a bit and you attempted a small smile, but the turmoil inside didn’t die down enough for you to fully relax. As if your brain was trying to distract yourself from the mess you turned into, a question slipped past your lips – a question that probably seemed inappropriate given the setting, but before you could shut your mouth, the words already rolled off your tongue.
“What does a soul taste like?”

Yoongi frowned, seeming surprised if not the tiniest bit shocked. “The taste… of a soul?”, he repeated, eyeing you curiously. “Are you sure you want to talk about this? We can have a conversation about anything you want if you need some distraction.”
You shook your head. It wasn’t that you hadn’t wondered before what actually drew the demons to a soul, you just didn’t dare to ask. But now that it was hovering in the room anyway, you didn’t mind Yoongi answering.
The demon sighed and you thought you could see him slightly shaking his head as if he was in absolute disbelief over you, but he didn’t say anything about it. Instead, he indeed proceeded to answer your question.
“No soul tastes like the other”, he silently replied, which made it seem as if it was a secret between the two of you. His eyes glossed over and only now did you realize that he, as well, was starving.
You raised a hand. “Stop”, you interrupted, “you don’t have to talk about it if…”
Yoongi looked up, amusement making his dark eyes sparkle like black diamonds. “If what?”, he said mockingly and his tone made you feel ashamed for some reason. You averted your glance.
Yoongi snickered. “Don’t worry”, he said, and when you looked back at him, his eyes were glowing, but not in the same unsettling red colour as before. “I am much more controlled than any of the younglings. Let me finish.”
You nodded quietly and the demon returned to the original topic.

“A soul is like a flower. They all have the same purpose, but they’re shaped by their environment, and every flower has a different smell.”
His glance pierced right through you.
“They have only one thing in common – they all smell delicious to demons.”

Chapter Text

“But what DO they taste like?”
At your words, Yoongi’s lips twitched as if they were about to curl into a smile. He lowered his hand – the hand that was still holding yours – until it rested in his lap and then he glanced at you from behind the hair that was falling into his forehead. His glance seemed open, friendly almost.
“As I said, I can’t specify since they’re all different.” The tip of his tongue shot out between his lips and wet them, telling you that the topic still made him hungry, but you didn’t mention it.
“Friendly souls taste sweet. Souls which have seen rarely any bad, haven’t experienced a lot of anger or fear. They’re the most delicious. They’re the roses among the souls – the queens, if you will, souls every demon lusts after. But they’re rare.”
Lost in his thoughts, he didn’t seem to realize his thumb had started stroking over the back of your hand and you were afraid that if you said anything about it, even did so much as to look at it, he would stop. His fingers were cold as usual, but the touch and the constant movement made you feel calmer than before.

“The more anger, fear, sadness a soul experiences, the more bitter and sour they get. Fear and pain cause the bitterness, anger and hate cause the sourness. But there’s a bit of happiness in every human life. There’s always hope, always something before the bad. And the humans might not remember but demons, demons can taste everything. Memories don’t make a soul. Feelings do – all of the feelings, from the day you are born.”
He chuckled. “I’ve compared souls to flowers, but maybe it’s more accurate to compare them to a wine. It matters how old they are, of course, but it also matters where you store the wine – what wood you use, at which temperature it ripens, and so on and so forth. And that counts from the beginning, for years and years.”
“What about my soul?”

Yoongi’s glance was intense when he looked up again. “Your soul?”
You hummed. “My soul.”
His jaw muscles tensed up. “I obviously haven’t tasted it, but…” You quirked an eyebrow when he hesitated.
“But…? But what?”
He exhaled sharply, resulting in a hissing sound. “It smells delicious.” His glance burned on your skin. “I shouldn’t, but I can understand Jimin just giving in. It leaves… a scratchy feeling in the throat and a dizzy feeling in the mind whenever we’re around you.”
You pulled back immediately to give the demon more space, but Yoongi’s fingers closed around your wrist before you could scoot too far away. “Trust me. I know my limits.”
A short pause formed before you spoke up again, even quieter than before.
“What does it smell like?”

The burn of Yoongi’s glance grew so intense you felt as if your skin was being devoured by hungry flames.
“Like roses, mostly”, the demon replied just as quiet. For some reason, the low tone of his voice made goosebumps form on your arms. By the flicker of his eyes, you figured he could tell what was going on.
“There’s a tad bit of sourness, but not too much, and…” He leaned forward a bit without seeming to realize it. “The tiniest, tiniest bit of bitterness, it’s… almost perfect.”
Silence filled the room as you stared at Yoongi and he stared back, hunger evident in his dark eyes but no red shimmer anywhere. Only when your lungs screamed for oxygen did you realize you had held your breath for the entire time. With the first deep breath you took, the tension between the two of you vanished into nothingness and Yoongi cleared his throat, leaning back and pulling his hand from yours in the process.
“I suppose I can’t really explain to a human what a soul tastes like”, he tried a smile, and you smiled back. “That’s fine. It was still… interesting.”
At your words, something dark loomed in Yoongi’s eyes for a second, but he quickly pulled himself together again.
“Anyway”, he broke the silence, shoving his chair back and getting up. There was a harsh tone in his voice and his glance was stern when he looked down on you. “I think it’s better not to stay around any of us for too long.” He hesitated before he continued, a bit softer this time, but still allowing for no opposition. “Not even around me.”
“But you saved me twice already”, you said.
Yoongi bit back a smile. “That might be so”, he replied calmly. “But next time, I might be the one attacking you. The hunger is growing stronger each day. There’s no guarantee that my control won’t falter, and honestly, I’m surprised…” His voice trailed off, but you knew what he wanted to say even without him actually expressing it.
And honestly, I’m surprised there haven’t been more incidents like this.
You nodded and lowered your glance, intertwining your fingers in your lap to keep your hands from trembling. “Okay”, you said, even if all of this didn’t seem right to you and the fact that the demon might not be there the next time someone attacked you or, even worse, could be the next one attacking you, made your insides twist.

Yoongi managed a weak smile in an attempt to seem reassuring and turned around. “Get some rest”, he advised before he took the first step, then he stopped in his tracks again and looked back for a second. His eyes lingered on the small pile of bloody bandages on the table and the puddles of blood next to it where Jimin had attacked you.
His jaw tensed as if he was grinding his teeth, the sight obviously bothering him, then he furrowed his brows and casually snipped his fingers.
Next to you, small flames of blue fire flared up on the table, and right when you were done staring at them and wanted to get up to grab something to extinguish the fire, the flames vanished. They left no marks on the dark wood, but when you looked closer, both the bandages and your blood had vanished without a trace.
You looked back at Yoongi and he threw you a small smile that seemed almost sad. “Just to make sure”, he said before he walked away. “Go to bed”, and then he left the room and vanished into the shadows of the entry hall in the next second, leaving you alone with your thoughts.

Chapter Text

As soon as the doors of the dinner room closed, exhaustion rolled over you like a massive wave of cold water. As if in trance, you slowly got up and left the room, walking across the entrance hall and up the stairs towards your room. Upon reaching it, your mind was hazy; so much so that you didn’t even have the strength left to slip out your clothes. You barely managed to kick off your shoes, then you fell onto the bed, pulled a blanket over your head and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

When your eyes finally fluttered open again, you were sure you had slept for at least 12 hours, even if there was no way of verifying your theory. It took you a while to fully wake up and you lazed around in bed for a bit before you finally decided to actually get up. Your clothes were sticky and sweaty, a few blood stains still visible on your top which reminded you of what happened yesterday. Without sparing them a second glance, you quickly slid off the pieces of clothing and kicked the top under the bed before taking some fresh clothes and entering the bathroom.
The hot water on your shoulders helped to ban the unpleasant memories from your mind and for that reason, you stood beneath the water for a bit longer than necessary. But when your fingers started to shrivel up, you had to admit that staying in the shower for a full day wasn’t really a possibility, so you stepped out with a sigh and got into the clothes before leaving your room for some breakfast.

The castle was lying silent as usual, nothing hinting at all the ruckus that had been happening these past few days. When you stepped into the dinner room, the table was full of food as usual, and you sat down to eat – slowly and with a bitter aftertaste, but you ate. Yoongi had gotten rid of all the evidence of Jimin’s attack, but your mind hadn’t forgotten the fact that the younger devil had pinned you to this table and tried to quite literally rip out your throat not even a day ago.
The thought made your stomach turn and you shoved your plate further away from you, grimacing at the unpleasant feeling.
A short hum from the door made you look up, something like relief washing over you at the fact that you didn’t have to sit in the overwhelming silence alone any longer.
It was Jin, surprisingly. Even though yesterday, Yoongi was the only one who seemed to care about what happened, and even though you had come to the conclusion that even though the others probably heard what was going on, they didn’t care enough to step in, Jin was now standing in the door and eyed you carefully.

His dark eyes still rested on you as he calmly pushed himself off the doorframe and approached you. “Disgusted?”, he asked as he took a seat next to you and you turned towards him.
“Yeah”, you replied quietly. “The memory, on the table…” Your voice trailed off but Jin understood. A wave of his hand and his carefully prepared food vanished into thin air. The demon huffed.
“Namjoon is furious”, he murmured, still looking at you from the side. “Jimin is forbidden from leaving his room for a while.”
A bitter laugh escaped your throat, you couldn’t help it. “House arrest?”, you mocked, but it didn’t sound amused and you had to grit your teeth to stop the tears from spilling again. “I don’t think that’s very efficient, is it now?!”
Jin sat quietly and waited till you had calmed down a bit, then he sighed. “What else do you expect to happen?”, he asked. His voice sounded soft. “You didn’t like when Namjoon punished Jungkook for his actions. He’s learned from that, and now you’re not satisfied - again?”
The demon’s words cut deep and you realized that he was right. With another rush of desperation within you, you buried your face in your hands and took a deep breath.
“What’s happening”, you whispered to yourself, but Jin heard nevertheless. “I have an idea”, he said after a short pause and then clicked his tongue when you weren’t reacting. “Look at me.”
You slowly raised your head and Jin hummed. “I want to show you something”, he said and got up, extending his hand to help you up. “And while we’re there, I’m going to explain to you why Jimin is the way he is.”
You stared at him for a few seconds, then you nodded and placed your hand in Jin’s.
The demon smiled and pulled you to your feet. “Good girl.”

The tall demon led you out of the castle and through the stony desert surrounding it. Right when you wanted to ask where the two of you were going, feet aching from the walking and climbing along the uneven path, Jin turned towards you with a grin tucking at his lips. “There”, he said as if he read your thoughts, and pointed towards a large boulder that was rising up in front of you. It was so huge that you had to tilt your head back a bit to look up to the tip. “We’re going up there.”
You quirked your eyebrows and crossed your arms in front of your chest defensively. “As if I’ll manage to climb up there.”
Jin snickered and turned around, approaching you. “Don’t worry”, he smirked. “I have a solution.”
Before you could ask what he had in mind, the demon reached you and with one swift movement swept you up in his arms. The feeling of being pulled off your feet had you clinging to his shirt, and only when he grinned down on you with obvious amusement, you ripped your hand from his shirt and threw him an angry glance.
“I would hold on tight if I were you”, he said and chuckled when you grabbed his shirt again. “Okay, princess. One, two…”

Jin pushed himself off the ground with so much force that the wind was howling in your face. Seemingly effortless, he jumped high in the air, higher even than the boulder whose tip he wanted to reach. After you had reached the highest point, the jump started to curve down and you didn’t even have enough time let enough breath to scream when Jin’s feet already rammed into the stone of the boulder, leaving two visible imprints and a few small cracks around the area. The dust from the landing made you cough and Jin let you slide off his arms. “See”, he said, obviously very content with himself. “Easy.”
“Yeah”, you gave back between two coughs, “and life-threatening.”
Jin shrugged and flashed you a smile. “I’d never let you die that easily”, he hummed and the intensity of his glance made you look away.
“So, why are we here?”, you asked to interrupt the silence, and Jin chuckled, rolling up the sleeves of his shirt and stepping in front of you.

“Stay back.”

Chapter Text

As Jin ordered, you took one, two steps back, careful not to tumble over the edge of the boulder. Then you quietly watched as Jin raised his arms, redness sparking in his eyes as he started to mumble a few words and spread his fingers.

There was a bright, white flash of light illuminating the cave for a mere millisecond and you quickly closed your eyes in expectation of another flash to follow, but everything stayed dark. After a few heartbeats, Jin’s voice cut through the dark. “You can open your eyes now.”
Blinking carefully, you looked up again and wanted to allow your eyes to adjust to the darkness again when you realize you didn’t need to anymore.
The more you grew aware of your surroundings, the more you couldn’t believe what you were seeing.

The cave’s originally grey and stony ground was hidden by a thick layer of grass, small flowers growing here and there. Even though the cave ceiling was still intact, a few sunbeams managed to find their way into the huge room somehow, illuminating a beautiful scenery. In the distance, you could hear the sound of water splashing, and there was even a few butterflies and bees flying around. It was too good to be true, everything you thought you would never see again.
Tears of joy filled your eyes as you fell to the ground and ran your fingers over the ground. The boulder you and Jin were standing on top of was overgrown with moss and tiny, white flowers, and you couldn’t stop inhaling their sweet scent.
“It’s beautiful”, you finally murmured and looked up to Jin who had been quietly watching you the whole time. “It is”, he finally agreed, now letting his glance wander over the scenery. “Or was.”

You sat down properly, crossing your legs. “Was?”, you asked, and Jin nodded as he sat down next to you, his legs hanging over the edge of the boulder. Whereas you were keeping a safe distance from the ledge, the height didn’t seem to bother him at all. “This is a projection”, he mumbled and plucked a flower from the ground. As soon as he ripped out the stem, the flower vanished from between his fingers as if it had never existed. “It’s not real.”
Your heart sunk even though you had known all along that something had been wrong. “I see”, you replied and ran your palm over the soft cushion of moss once again.
Silence filled the air and it took a while before Jin spoke up again. “Namjoon destroyed all of it”, he said. He sounded indifferent but there was a hint of bitterness in it. “During his countless fits, he destroyed this one part after another. The last thing to go was the sunlight.” He raised his face and blinked into one of the sunbeams that was shining down into the cave. “It was a spell performed by Yoongi, bound to his life force. After Namjoon destroyed it, it was impossible for him or any other to rebuild it.”
“Why?”, you asked, and Jin threw you a piercing glance.
“We had forgotten what real sunlight looked like”, he answered tonelessly and your breath hitched in your throat. The demon turned his head away again.
“I’m the only one who sometimes agrees to build a projection, even though I’m unable to hold it for a longer period of time. And now that the cave is the way it is, I’d rather have it dark so I don’t have to look at it all the time.”

You nodded. You could well understand the demon’s decision, even though the knowledge that this view would be gone all too soon made your heart ache.
To distract both you and Jin from the melancholy of the situation, and because you were genuinely serious, you looked at him again. “Now, what about Jimin?”, you asked. The name on your tongue made your insides curl, but you ignored the unpleasant feeling. “You wanted to tell me about him.”
Jin hummed. “Right. I will.” He took a deep breath, then he started his story.

“As you already know, from Hoseok I suppose, Jimin and Yoongi were close from the beginning.” He frowned. “Noone exactly knew why, but Yoongi seemed to take a genuine liking to Jimin, and the youngling followed him obediently like a dog. Not anymore, of course, not since he grew into a strong demon and one of the Seven Sins himself, but when he was just separated from Zezenha, he was desperately looking for something to hold on to.” Jin paused shortly. “That something was Yoongi apparently.”
“What sin is Jimin?”, you asked.
Jin glanced at you sharply as if he was about to scold you, but then he sighed and lowered his glance again. “I guess you deserve to know at least so much after what happened yesterday, and you have to know for the end of the story anyway…”, he murmured to himself as he let his eyes wander over the beautiful scenery surrounding the two of you. A few heartbeats long, it was quiet, the sound of a cold breeze brushing through the bushes the only thing noticeable. Jin’s voice was surprisingly soft when he spoke up again to answer you.
“Jimin is Lust.”

You nodded to yourself - Jimin being Lust wasn’t a surprise to you - before you asked another question to get Jin to continue his story. “Why Yoongi?”
Jin grimaced. He didn’t seem to feel comfortable talking about this, but he wasn’t one to break his promise.
“Jimin is Lust”, he quietly said. “He can’t get enough. His appetite for all kinds of pleasant sensory impressions is wild and unstoppable. Especially before he got full control of his powers and what he was, it was unbearable. That’s why he was such a good playmate to his mistress, Zezenha.” His glance shot towards you. “You felt it yourself – Jimin only has to do as much as touch any being and it lies at his feet, begging for more. His power might sound ridiculous, but if you have once watched him make a whole army crawl at the ground trying to get closer to him and trying to touch him, it becomes quite scary. Lust is not to be messed with. Jimin… is not to be messed with.”
He paused shortly, then ran his fingers through his hair. “Anyway, as I said. Before he was aware of his powers, Jimin was uncontrollable. Yoongi…” He hesitated and shifted a bit, the first time you had seen one of the devils uncomfortable. “He took care of that.”
You had an idea what he was talking about, but you wanted to confirm. “He took care of it?”

Jin’s jaw muscles tensed.
“Jimin became Yoongi’s playmate.”

Chapter Text

Silence filled the air as you processed Jin’s words.
“Playmate”, you repeated. It wasn’t a question. “So Yoongi curbed Jimin’s appetite?”
Jin simply nodded.

“Yoongi… likes men?”
Now the demon snickered, throwing you an amused glance. “Why? You like him so much?”, he teased with a tiny smirk, but his expression turned serious almost immediately. “Demons don’t have sexualities. We’re either attracted by body or by soul – or by both.” He hummed. “There are demons who specialize on the intercourse aspect of this matter alone as well as some that find enjoyment in playing with human emotions. And in very rare cases, demons have been known to lead some form of relationship, consisting of both aspects.” He shrugged, fingers playing around with a little twig. “It was different for Yoongi and Jimin, though. Yoongi only did what he had to do. Which is not to say he didn’t enjoy it, but it was a necessary evil. Jimin was… extremely demanding.”
“Demanding”, you echoed, and Jin snickered at your reaction before he continued. “Yoongi taught him how to control himself. For him, it was work. For Jimin… it was different.”
You cocked your head to the side. “How so?”
Jin shrugged. “Let’s just say he’s still very attached to Yoongi”, he avoided your question. “And Yoongi’s attraction to him hasn’t vanished, but their sexual relationship ended millenia ago, when Jimin found control over his powers. He didn’t need Yoongi’s ‘help’ anymore, even though…” His voice trailed off.
“Even though…?”, you urged.
“Even though Yoongi still helps him out if it gets really bad. But it hasn’t happened in a few hundred years at least.” Jin sat the twig he had had been playing around with onto his palm. He had folded it into a small bird shape, and when he now blew on the stiff little figurine, the twig started moving and the teeny tiny bird slowly started flapping its wings and then lifted off the demon’s hand, fluttering over the meadows around you.
“Jimin is uncontainable”, he said, eyes glued to his little piece of art. “It’s better if you stay away from him for a while.”
His voice sounded dark and with it, the scenery around you slowly vanished, exposing the reality hidden beneath it – darkness, rocks and sand. The little twig bird went up in violet flames in the middle of the air, its ashes being picked up by a last breeze and carried into the darkness. Jin turned towards you.
“Lust is a strong feeling”, he murmured. “In some ways, Jimin is like Namjoon. His power is not about destruction, which is a good thing, but it makes him just as unpredictable and uncontrollable a force. And ever since he doesn’t have an outlet for it anymore, at least not regularly, Jimin has become more and more frustrated. He doesn’t mean to cause any harm, I believe, but his powers…” He hesitated. “He’s in an endless rut and his hunger makes everything worse. But he’s not a bad man.”

To your surprise, the demon then scoffed, but it sounded almost pained. “We’re demons”, he mumbled, more to himself than to you, and fell on his back, spreading his arms to the sides. His eyes were empty when he stared at the dark ceiling. “We’re all bad men.”
“I don’t think so, you know.” Even to you, it was surprising how soft your voice sounded. You scooted a bit closer. “You guys are not as bad as I thought you would be.”
Jin huffed. “You’re being blinded”, he mumbled, eyes boring into yours. “We’re the Seven Sins for a reason. And you’ve experienced a few of those reasons.”
You tried a weak grin. “Anybody would go nuts if they were prisoners in this cave, don’t you think?”

Jin’s features softened a bit. “Maybe”, he said, but he still seemed a bit bitter, causing a short twinge in your chest area.
Before your brain could tell you that it was a bad idea, you layed down next to him and, after a second, rested your head on his left arm that was sprawled out next to him.
Jin sucked in a harsh breath. “Get off”, he said, but his voice was rough and he didn’t sound convinced. You chuckled. “Millenia of experience and you get antsy when a human girl gets close to you?”, you asked.
Now the demon couldn’t help a snicker. “You wish”, he gave back, but you could feel him watching you from the side.

“Do you want to see the stars?”
You turned your face towards him with a silent gasp. “You can show me the stars?”
Jin shrugged, glance now glued to the ceiling of the cave. “The stars from before we were put here, at least”, he replied, but you didn’t have to hear anything else.
“Show me.”
Suddenly, Jin pulled you close against his side, his palm resting over your eyes to protect them from the flash that was caused by his spell. His body was cool and you couldn’t pinpoint his scent, but before you had a chance to compare it to anything you knew, he let go of you.
“Look”, he said, voice lowered to a whisper almost. “The stars.”

The ceiling was illuminated by thousands and thousands of glittering white dots, the black of the stone mixing with a dark blue and purple. The view was so realistic and overwhelming that your heart skipped a beat and your breath hitched in your throat. Jin heard and with a chuckle tightened his grip around your shoulders. “No need to stop your heart”, he silently said. “Just watch, keep breathing.”
And so the two of you did, laying next to each other without a word, slowly molding against the cold stone and getting lost in the myriads of unreal stars above you.
While you were staring into the beautiful, beautiful void, a thought started to form in your head. First you thought it to be macabre, but the longer it resided in the corner of your mind, you realized it wasn’t a bad thing given the situation you were in.
Fearing that Jin would make the stars fade any second, you rose and turned towards him. The demon quirked an eyebrow as you took a deep breath.

“About now would be a good time to die, don’t you think?”
The devil didn’t seem surprised at your words, calmly watching your expression as you stared at him in anxious tension. Finally he opened his mouth and you were half expecting sharp fangs to show like they did with Jimin, but nothing happened. Instead, Jin’s words shook you to your core as the devil gave his reply, calm and collected.
“Then throw yourself off this boulder, because I’m not going to kill you.”
A short paused formed.

“Not now, not ever.”

Chapter Text

The only thing you could do was stare at the demon while your brain tried to come up with a witty response to his words, but it failed miserably. Instead, you plopped to the ground and asked the only thing that came to your mind: “Why not?”

Jin sighed. He seemed almost relieved, as if he was glad you didn’t really jump off the cliff or insist on him eating your soul right there, right then. “I’m not hungry”, he tried to argue, but you knew it was a lie and Jin could see it in your face. You didn’t have to say anything for him to give in. He turned away and let his glance wander over the deserted cave.
“Because I don’t want to”, he finally answered, but this was way too vague for you.
“Why not?”, you repeated. “I mean, that’s my purpose. You know that.”

Jin growled, quietly and not directed at you. He looked frustrated now. “I know”, he pressed. “And believe me, before you, I didn’t give a damn who the sacrifices were or how badly they wanted to live.”
His glance returned to you, resting on your figure intensely as he continued. “But you’re… different.”
“How so?”, you asked, but this time, Jin didn’t answer. “It doesn’t matter”, he quietly said after a while and got up. He skimmed the cave once again as if he was looking for something. “Fact is, you’ll have to ask someone else to kill you. My decision might be selfish, but”, and this time a sly grin rested on his features as he looked down on you, “I’m a devil, after all.”
He offered his hand to help you up and you gave in, even though you were determined to bring up the question again. Just not now.

Jin slung his arm around your waist and jumped off the boulder, his grip effortlessly safe around your middle until your feet were safe on the ground. Only then did he pull back his arm.
“We should get back”, he said. “The others are wondering where you are.”
“How do you know?”, you asked as you followed Jin along the uneven path he seemed to be following, even if your human eyes couldn’t make out any form of trail in the messy landscape.
The demon shrugged as he jumped  a small boulder and waited for you to climb over it. “I can sense it, I guess”, he replied. “Our senses are far more evolved than a human’s, and if demons live together for some time, they form a special ‘bond’, if you will.” His lips twitched, curling into a faint smile as he looked at you over his shoulder. “It equals the human feeling of knowing who’s coming down the stairs just by listening to their footsteps.”
You nodded, the feeling was familiar to you, and kept following Jin. “Can you read their thoughts, too? Like Hoseok does?”
The demon grimaced. “Hoseok’s ability is quite special. I don’t know of any other demons, not even any higher ones, that possess the ability of reading someone’s mind to the extent that Hoseok does. Ergo, the answer is no, I can’t.” He shrugged. “But it’s natural to be able to figure what they’re feeling at a certain time, even if I’m far away. That’s not an ability though, it’s simply experience.”

“What’s your ability, then?”
Jin chuckled, it resounded from the huge boulder you were passing now. “Before I answer that question, I’ll have to explain to you how demonic abilities work. Not all of us have them, and not all of them are as apparent as Hoseok’s mind-reading, though I will agree that the Seven Sins are an exception from that rule. Generally, a demon’s ability forms even before they know their purpose or role, and it has nothing to do with what kind of demon they are. Our abilities have nothing to do with the sins that are assigned to us, for example, even though some of us use our abilities to conform to our sin.”
He shortly paused. “My ability are illusions and projections, as you may have figured, though I am less talented than Yoongi in that aspect.”
“Yoongi?”, you inquired, and Jin hummed.
“Yes, Yoongi. He’s kind of special, even among the Seven Sins.” He paused again, this time it seemed to be out of hesitation. “Yoongi’s ability is different from mine in that his illusions or projections feel perfectly real if he wants them to. You might argue that I did the exact same with the projection right now, but it’s slightly different.” His eyes sparkled red for a second. “the flower I picked up, which vanished from beneath my fingers?” You nodded and Jin hummed. “Yoongi’s flower wouldn’t have whithered. And there’s more. Jungkook’s punishment, for example? An illusion. Yoongi was playing with his senses to an extent where everyone, especially Jungkook, really believed he was being tortured.”
“But he said he transf-“
Jin nodded. “Transferred your pain to Jungkook, yes. I would tell you how he did it or what his abilities are exactly, but no one knows how far his powers go. It’s never been up for debate that he is one of the strongest among us, but no one wants to find out.”

You furrowed your brows, confused. “Why not?”, you asked. “Wouldn’t that make him able to be the first in command?”
Jin threw you a sharp glance. “Yes”, he carefully replied, “but either Yoongi or Namjoon would die. And that’s a risk no one here is willing to take.”
You were quiet for a while before you asked a last silent question.
“Who do you think would it be?”
Jin turned towards you with an apologetic smile. “That, my dear, is not meant for you to hear.” He stopped on the top of the little hill you were climbing, and when you joined him, you could see the castle lying right in front of you, dark bricks against even darker stone. “There we go”, Jin said and started climbing down the steep slope. When you started following him, he threw you a short glance.
“Careful”, he mumbled, eyes glued to you. “Don’t fall.”
You just wanted to give back a snarky response when you slipped on some loose rocks and fell, uncomfortably twisting your wrist on the ground and proceeding to slide down the hill without any opportunity to stop. Jin hissed behind you and apparently tried to reach you, but before he could stop you, you were engulfed by a body in a white, loose shirt and a deep voice chuckled next to your ear.

“My, my”, Taehyung whispered, looking at you from the side as he stopped your uncontrolled fall. “Take better care of our little sweetheart, won’t you, Jin?”

Chapter Text

While Taehyung put you back on your feet, Jin reached the two of you with one powerful jump and huffed as he landed next to you. “I told her not to fall”, he grumbled, eyeing you up and down. “Are you okay?” 
Before you could tell him everything was alright, Taehyung interrupted, dark eyes watching you intensely from beneath his bright blonde bangs. “She hurt her wrist when she fell”, he replied, and Jin clicked his tongue in response. “Humans are so fucking fragile”, he quietly cursed before he reached for your hand. Before his fingers could wrap around it though, he threw you a short glance as if it to make sure it was okay to touch you. When you agreed with a nod and raised your arm, he carefully slung his slim fingers around your wrist and turned it around. 
“Doesn’t seem to be broken”, he murmured to which Taehyung scoffed. “Would’ve been a pain in the ass”, he declared and Jin hissed, red sparks in the darkness of his eyes. “Behave, Taehyung”, he growled. 
The younger demon crossed his arms in front of his chest. “Without any proper medical knowledge, a broken arm would’ve been a reason to kill her to spare her the pain and infections”, he opposed before his lips formed a sly grin and his amused glance flickered towards you. “But since you’ve taken such a strong liking towards her, even that might be difficult now…”

You could feel heat rushing to your cheeks, but Jin didn’t seem to deem it a matter to be embarrassed about. Instead, a deep growl filled the cave as Jin stared down Taehyung with glowing red eyes, approaching him with a few steps.
Taehyung didn’t seem too impressed, yet he lifted his hands as if to sign his innocence to the older. “Whatever”, he shut him up without Jin even having started, “Namjoon wants to see you.” He peeked at you from behind Jin’s wide shoulders, smiling. “How about I take care of our little darling?”
Even when Jin’s eyes now narrowed, Taehyung didn’t seem to loose his casual attitude. He returned Jin’s sharp glance calmly and finally, the older gave in. “If you dare touch her in the wrong way, Taehyung…”, he warned the other before turning away, but the blonde shrugged. “Don’t worry”, he replied as Jin threw you a last reassuring smile. “I’ll just keep her company for now.”
Jin huffed and then he was gone in the blink of an eye, leaving you alone with Taehyung among all the rubble. The latter cleared his throat to gain your attention. “You’re weak”, he stated. “When’s the last time you’ve had a meal?”
With a shrug you admitted that you couldn’t remember. Taehyung nodded. “Fine”, he said. “I’m not one for walks and exhaustion, so let’s get you some food.” You agreed with a nod and Taehyung led you back to the castle, seeming very content with himself.

Upon reaching the kitchen, the demon plopped down on one of the seats and rested his feet on the chair next to him. He sighed and closed his eyes, almost seeming as if he was exhausted. Unsure on what to do, you just stood around for a while before Taehyung opened one of his eyes and looked at you questioningly. “What are you waiting for?”, he asked. “Make yourself something to eat.”
His words didn’t make it seem as if he was worried or actually interested in you eating, but you still complied and started to check the cupboards for food. The devil didn’t pay any attention to your doing, instead he closed his eye again and seemed as if he was about to take a nap.
The silence was too much for you to bear, especially since you hadn’t talked to Taehyung a lot in the past, so while you got out a pot to make some simple soup, you tried to come up with something to talk about and fill the way too empty kitchen with just a bit of life.
“Do demons sleep?”, was the only thing you could come up with.

Taehyung blinked and stretched out even further on the two chairs. “No”, he replied lazily. “Not normally, that is. But I like the concept of naps and, believe it or not, demons can be exhausted too.”
“From what?”, you asked, dicing up some vegetables. “There’s nothing really exciting to do down here, is there?”
The devil’s reply was a short hiss, but you had lived with the demons long enough to not be really impressed. “True”, he finally gave in, “but whatever. I don’t have to explain it to you, do I?”
The devil’s attitude got on your nerves, it reminded you of a 15-year-old boy rebelling against his parents and acting as if nothing got to him, and to be fair, you had never gotten along with 15-year-olds of any kind except dogs. That’s why you didn’t inquire further, just bearing the silent kitchen even though you could feel Taehyung’s glance piercing through you from behind.

Half an hour later, a quick vegetable soup was simmering on the stove and you put two slices of bread next to the plate before turning off the fire. Taehyung hadn’t spoken up ever since and you were kind of glad for it.
“Finally done?”, he now commented, blinking at you innocently when you turned around with the soup plate in your hands. “Yeah”, you simply said and sat down across from him, dipping your spoon into your food and tasting it. “Hm”, you hummed at the familiar taste in your mouth. This roasted vegetable soup was a favourite of your mom’s and it immediately took you back to winter days after school when she would plate this up for you and stand next to you with a smile while watching you eat up.
Taehyung eyed the soup curiously. “Is it good?”
You chuckled. “Very. You want a taste?”
The devil shrugged, closing his eyes again and leaning back. “Nah”, he replied. “Eat up. If I let you starve, Jin is going to kick my ass.”
You ripped a piece off one of the slices of bread and lapped up some soup with it. “I don’t hold him for a very impulsive person”, you said. “But you backed off immediately earlier. Why?”

Taehyung huffed. “Jin may not look it, but if he feels strongly about something – which is rare – he can be quite frightening, even to a demon. I’d rather not provoke him. It’s not my style.”
You paused in your eating and looked up. “What is your style, then?”
The devil grinned, sharp teeth showing up between his rosy lips. “Why work if I don’t have to?”  

Chapter Text

You grabbed the plate to get seconds and got up. “What’s that supposed to mean”, you frowned, and Taehyung snickered. “You don’t need to know”, he replied. “Let’s just say, I deem nothing worthy enough to make any efforts for it. Or endure anything unpleasant – like Jin’s anger.” His eyes followed you as you walked towards the stove and grabbed the ladle.
“You know”, he then continued, and suddenly his voice sounded serious, “it’s the first that a human has ever survived for so long down here.”
You froze in your movements but pulled yourself together after a few seconds and filled your plate. “I figured”, you quietly answered. Taehyung’s eyes pierced through your back.
“Are you glad about it?”

You sighed and turned away from the stove to return to the table. You waited with your answer until you had set the plate in front of you and sat down. “Well, it sure is unexpected”, you mumbled while grabbing the spoon. Taehyung cocked his head to the side and chuckled. “But I guess I can be glad that I’m still alive in fairly… good circumstances.”
The devil hummed. “Fairly good?”
You shrugged. “Well, I got hurt by Jimin once and the rest of you has left me alone, so…”
Taehyung’s eyes widened and he sat up straight, pulling his feet from the chair he had been resting them on. “Ohhhh”, he exclaimed quietly. “So that’s what he did.”
You frowned, confused about what he was referring to. “Who, Jimin?”
He nodded, a sly grin tucking on his lips. “Namjoon didn’t tell us anything”, he explained and seemed amused. “I’m lucky you can rely on humans’ refreshing frankness most of the time, huh.”

“Why wouldn’t he tell you, though?”, you asked. “Isn’t this something he wants to prevent?”
Taehyung shrugged, leaning back a bit again. “Sure he does”, he replied. “But mentioning it might tick off some others. We’re all hungry, you know. The slightest mistake and one of us might snap.” His lips curled into an almost mean smirk. “I’m pretty sure Namjoon wanted to keep this to as few people as possible, but it seems he failed. Thank you.”
The glittering in his eyes screamed malicious glee and you were quick to avert your glance elsewhere, finishing off the rest of your bread and then getting up to clean up after yourself. Taehyung’s eyes followed you as they did before, but there was something else hovering around him now – if not hunger, at least the slightest bit of agitation, and it was the first time you ever noticed something like a change in emotion on the laid-back devil.
“I wonder if it tasted good”, Taehyung now purred, making you pause in your movements for a split second before you continued to clean the stove with slightly jerky movements. The demon’s voice was rough and you could feel fear creeping up your spine, memories of Jimin’s assault flashing in your mind.
“Don’t”, it slipped past your lips, almost toneless but luckily, there was no hint of the turmoil within you evident in your voice. “Leave me alone.”

Taehyung’s grin widened, you could almost sense it even though you couldn’t see him – leering at your fear, finding joy in making you upset as if it could cheat his hunger for at least a little while. “Else what?”, he replied. “What are you gonna do, human girl?”

“Taehyung.”
With the sound of the deep, familiar voice filling the room, the tension immediately vanished and you could feel your shoulders relaxing at once, even if you were aware that the voice belonged to an even stronger demon.
“Leave her alone.”
Taehyung hissed. “Let me have some fun, Namjoon”, he complained, and you could nearly feel the latter’s aura expanding into the room until it filled every corner and didn’t leave any room for Taehyung’s resistance.
Namjoon’s voice was quiet, but dangerous. “Out.”
You could hear Taehyung shoving back his chair and getting up, and within seconds, he seemed to have vanished.

Now it was Namjoon quietly watching you from the door, but unlike when Taehyung did it, it didn’t bother you even if your muscles were still a bit tense, aware of the intimidating entity in the room.
“Sorry about that”, the demon finally spoke up while you cleaned the plate. “He’s agitated but doesn’t know how to deal with it.”
You turned around, resting your wet hands on the edge of the countertop as you leaned against it. A weak smile was tucking at your lips. “It seems none of you devils really seem to know how to deal with your own emotions”, you softly said, an almost teasing tone resonating within the words.
Namjoon’s dark eyes returned your glance with surprising deepness. “Well, forgive us for having nothing that could evoke any emotion apart from pain and anger for a few centuries at least”, he simply returned, and his voice scratching over your skin in an almost affectionate way made you swallow and caused you to whip around again to clean the soup pot.
Namjoon stayed quiet for a little while more, but you could hear him pull back a chair and sit down on it.

“Are you okay?”
His words surprised you, so much so that you finished cleaning the pot before you replied, simply so you could process the fact that the demon seemed concerned about your well-being for the first time ever since you had come here.
Silence filled the room until you were finished and grabbed a tea towel, drying off your hands while you turned around again. “Why do you ask?”
Namjoon’s eyes were piercing into yours. “Jimin”, was the only thing he needed to say and your hands immediately clenched up around the towel. “I’m fine”, you stated stiffly, but Namjoon seemed to see through your façade easily. His glance turned even more intense.
“Liar.” The corners of his mouth lifted the tiniest bit, as if your attempt to hide your sensitive side seemed to amuse – or impress? - him, but he didn’t comment on it. Instead, he scooted back on his chair and stood up. “I know it’s shocking to her this from me”, you didn’t miss the self-ironic tone in his voice, “but I think I need to apologize on behalf of Jimin.”
You quirked an eyebrow, trying to look unimpressed even if his behavior confused you. “Why should you?”, you answered and managed to sound cold. “Taking my soul is your job. You’ve been slacking.”

Namjoon’s eyes widened at your words as if he was impressed, but he sounded indifferent as he slowly approached you.
“Maybe”, he carefully said, taking one slow step after another. “But he defied my orders. And…”
He cocked his head and stared at you intensely, making goosebumps form on your skin.
“That was no way to treat an unique Xiqaa like you, is it now?”

Chapter Text

You tried to stay calm as Namjoon came closer and closer. He didn’t seem dangerous, casually approaching you as if he just wanted to chat, but his aura was still intimidating. When he towered up in front of you, looking down on you with an indescribable movement in his eyes, you were tempted to take a step back, bring some distance between you and him before you remembered that he had you cornered against the countertop. You couldn’t escape.

A cold finger touched your chin and the unfamiliar, definitely unhuman sensation on your skin made your head jerk away from it, but Namjoon didn’t allow you to escape his touch. His fingertips ran upwards, over your cheek until they reached your hairline.
“You’re so warm”, he whispered, roughly as if something was hard on him. “It’s been a while since I felt a human’s skin.”
You stared at the demon, breathless and unsure about what was happening. Warmth was dancing in Namjoon’s eyes, but then he seemed to sense something or someone, because he ripped himself away from you and took one, two quick steps back, twirling around to see who it was.

Hoseok was standing in the doorframe. If he had seen something, he simply ignored it and stepped into the room. You couldn’t tell if he was aware what was going on and he turned to Namjoon immediately. “Jimin wants to talk to her”, he reported and the leader clenched his fist. “He is in no position to make demands”, he pressed and Hoseok seemed almost as if he wanted to oppose, but didn’t dare to.
“Let me speak to him”, you interrupted before your mind could decide that it was a good idea, and both devils turned towards you. “You knew she would say that”, Hoseok said to Namjoon with an amused untertone, to which the latter quietly growled in annoyance. “Fine”, he finally gave in and waved him off. “Take her to his room.”
Hoseok chuckled. “Sure thing”, he replied and while Namjoon left the room in an almost hurried manner, he patiently waited until you had gathered yourself enough to follow him into the entrance hall and up the stairs.

“Jimin.” Hoseok knocked on the door, acting as if the other couldn’t very clearly hear a clumsy human’s steps approaching his room. A hum was the answer. “Come in.”
Hoseok opened the door and held it open for you while you entered a surprisingly light room given the fact that dark grey and silver were the dominating colours.
Jimin was sitting on his bed with crossed legs and bare feet, Daimon resting on his laps. The demon seemed very calm and casual, wearing nothing but a velvetly shirt, silver in colour, and some comfortable pants. “Y/N”, he smiled, a striking opposite to the time you had last seen him – stained with blood, glowing red eyes and fangs that were just a few inches away from ripping out your throat.
A shiver ran down your spine at the memory, but you ignored it. Jimin though seemed to notice and his eyes darkened a bit, seeming almost sad.
“Hoseok”, Jimin turned to the fellow demon. “Would you leave us alone for a moment?”  
The other hesitated, his glance searching yours as if he wanted to ask you how you felt about Jimin’s inquiry. You simply nodded and Hoseok turned away with a last concerned glance towards you. “I’ll be in front of the door”, he stiffly said and then left the room, closing the door behind him.

Jimin sighed.
“Sit”, he asked and patted the spot next to him. When you approached the bed, you noticed two fine, white marks around his wrists. The devil noticed your glance and chuckled. “Yoongi made those”, he answered your unspoken question, rubbing over the glowing lines. “They are shackles to keep me confined in this room for some time. Don’t worry, they don’t hurt.”
“I wasn’t worried about that”, you heard yourself say, voice raspy. “You deserve some pain.”
Jimin’s figure tensed. “I do, huh”, he murmured before he averted his glance. Daimon opened his silvery eyes and his ears twitched as he stretched before leaving Jimin’s lap and coming over to you, rubbing his head against your arm. You managed a weak smile. “Hello, Daimon”, you whispered, feeling Jimin’s glance now returning to you as you rubbed the cat demon’s head. “I missed you too.”
Daimon purred as an answer and climbed onto your lap, curling up on your thighs. It didn’t seem like he was going to sleep, though, his eyes were still open and he attentively watched – and listened to, you presumed – the two of you.

“Listen, Y/N”, Jimin finally spoke up. “I know I’ve probably messed up, but I still wanted to apologize for my doing.” His dark eyes were honest, not even a hint of redness within them. “I did wrong.”
“Yes, you did.” Your voice was toneless and sounded much sharper than you wanted it to be, but you couldn’t help it. “You devils have no feeling for what’s right and what’s wrong.” And, under your breath, you hissed: “Bastards.”
Jimin turned his head and looked out the window, into a darkness that your eyes couldn’t penetrate. “We are”, he said, sounding soft. “And you have no idea what we are like all the other times… With other sacrifices.” His posture was so stiff one could almost think he was a statue. “But then, every 75 years or so, a special soul comes along.” He finally turned back to you and his glance was so intense it almost forced you to lower your glance. “A special soul that defies all the odds and our devilish nature and makes us feel better despite the misery that we’re in.” He paused shortly and let the words sink in.
“We’re not good, no”, he then continued, an almost sad smile on his lips. “But you are, Y/N. And that’s the reason why you’re still alive and why Yoongi protects you.” His smile widened. “He has a weakness for good people.”

“You don’t, apparently”, you commented tonelessly, and Jimin’s grimaced. “Low blow”, he said, but it didn’t seem like he was hurt. Instead, he simply shrugged. “Yoongi and Jin have tons of experience. I’m old, but not that old. At least from the perspective of a devil. I haven’t learned to appreciate the living as much as others.” The way he said it showed that he didn’t seem to bothered by it, and it made you sick to your stomach. You stood up to leave, Daimon sliding off your lap and complaining with a tiny growl.
“I’m going to forgive you”, you said, looking at Jimin for a last time. “Because I know that it’s in your nature, and it’s my purpose.” You paused. “But it doesn’t undo the things you did.”
Jimin smiled, sweetly as usual. “I know”, he softly replied. “It’s okay.”
His contradicting change of mind from remorseful and harmless to unbothered and cold just confused you more, and that’s why you simply opened the door and left the room. Hoseok was leaning against the wall across from the door and looked at you as you closed the door. “That went well”, he commented, but you didn’t know if he meant it or not.
“I guess”, was the only thing you said as you turned away and walked back to your room. You needed some time alone.

Chapter Text

After a long, hot shower which didn’t only rinse the dust off your skin but also helped to wash all the thoughts and feelings out of your mind, you plopped down on your bed and almost immediately fell asleep. Despite all the stuff that had been happening to you, you had a dreamless, exhausted sleep that lasted for what felt like eternity, but in reality was probably closer to a day.
When you woke up again, your head was fuzzy and it took you longer than usual to properly wake up. A glass of water was sitting next to you on the night table and only after a few sips of the cold drink did you realize that you hadn’t put it there – ergo someone else had entered your room while you were asleep.
While the thought would’ve sent shivers down your spine only a short time ago, you were used to the ever-looming presence of the devils by now. You finished the water and then slowly made your way into the bathroom to freshen up.
As if the time in this cave had finally taken its toll on your body, all of your muscles were protesting every movement you attempted to make. Therefore it took you a long time to wash up, slip into some clothes and leave your bedroom. 

The mansion was lying quiet and dark as usual as you made your way down the stairs and peeked into the dinner room. There was breakfast arranged on the table – for which you were thankful, because you were in no mood to prepare something for yourself – yet the room as well as the kitchen were empty.
Half disappointed, half relieved, you sat down to have some food. You didn’t feel like you could stomach anything heavy and the unusual silence was buzzing in your ears. Whether it was the fact that you rarely ate anything down here anymore or whether your body longed for some sunlight and warmth, you didn’t know. But as soon as you attempted to stand up from the table to drag yourself back to your bed, convincing yourself that this was nothing, you felt your vision go black, The last thing you heard after all your other senses had already failed was the rustle of clothes and a silent huff, then you fell into all-consuming darkness.

“She’s fine.”
The voice seemed familiar, but you couldn’t tell who it was exactly.
A low growl. “She’s clearly not fine.”
It was tempting to just act as if you were asleep and shut out the whole world, but an invisible force made you open your eyes and blink as they readjusted to the weird light that was surrounding you.
“Water”, you croaked, and the two figures standing next to you quickly turned around to face you. “Thank Lucifer”, the second voice mumbled while the other just breathed a deep sigh of relief. “At least she’s alive.”
“Water”, you repeated yourself, your throat was so scratchy that your voice almost gave out. With a snip of his fingers, the first figure – you now knew it was Namjoon – made a huge glass of water appear on the night stand. A night stand, you now realized as you rolled onto your side to reach for the glass, you didn’t know; the demons seemed to have transferred you to a different room. The sheets also felt different on your skin, almost silky, and after another glance around while you chugged the water, you realized it was Taehyung’s.
As your eyes now adjusted to the dimmed light, you grew aware of the owner of the room leaning against the wall across from the bed, eyes piercing through you from the shadows. “She’s dying”, he stated calmly, unimpressed as usual, and the other two interrupted their quiet talk and turned towards him.

Silence filled the room for a while before Yoongi spoke up to reply to the younger. His voice sounded strained. “I know”, he pressed.
“Why only now, though?”, Namjoon asked, crossing his arms in front of his chest. He eyed you, seemingly deep in thought. “She’s been here for what, half a month? The symptoms are late.”
Taehyung snickered, but it sounded bitter. “How would you know?”, he spat, pushing himself off the wall. “It’s not like another one of them lived for half a month down here.”
Yoongi hissed. “Calm down”, he hushed both of them. “Before we find out why, we should try to understand what we can do for her.” He turned towards you and stepped closer, ignoring the heated glances Namjoon and Taehyung exchanged. “Y/N”, he gained your attention, now carefully sitting down on the edge of the bed. “Is there anything you need?”

In your weakened state, you weren’t able to act as tough or defiant as normal. Tears started pooling in your eyes and you couldn’t prevent a silent sob. “I want to see the sun”, you cried, emotions suddenly washing over you, and buried your face in your hands. A tiny part of you deep down quietly complained how embarrassing this all was, but your weak body wasn’t able to hold back anymore. The dam broke, and all the sadness, grief and anger that had been accumulating since you set your foot into this cave broke out all at once.
“I want to see the sun, and the moon, and the grass. I want to hear the birds.” Tears were now running down your face without you being able to stop them. “I want to go home!”

The devils stood there as if they were frozen, glances out of wide open eyes resting on your shaking figure as you cried yourself to sleep in their presence. Even when your breath had calmed down again, it was interrupted by a few hiccups and sobs, and tears were still glistening in your lashes. The demons still stared at your pale face and tried to pull themselves together. They had seen a lot of crying humans in their life, but somehow, this was different.
Finally, Yoongi stood up, careful not to shift the mattress so he didn’t wake you.
“She’s breaking”, he softly said, and it sounded as if he regretted it. “She’s not made for a life down here, however much some of us wish for it.”
Taehyung looked at him curiously. “Do you, Pride?”
Yoongi didn’t reply. His glance was glued to your face.

Namjoon growled lowly and regained his comrades attention. “I told you this would happen”, he spoke through gritted teeth, seeming agitated. “What are you going to do now?”
Yoongi sighed. For once, he seemed helpless. “I don’t know”, he mumbled, and the leader replied with a hiss before turning around and leaving the room with big steps.
“Then figure it out!”

Chapter Text

After Namjoon left, you fell back into a deep sleep, more refreshing than the previous one. Again, your brain couldn’t come up with any dreams that came even close to what you experienced these past days, and when your eyes fluttered open a few hours later, you were thankful for it.

The room was silent, but Yoongi was still sitting next to your bed. He rested on a chair that he seemed to have pulled close to be able to watch over you, arms crossed in front of his chest and apparently deep in thought. As soon as you took your first conscious breath and rolled onto your side, he looked up.
“How do you feel?”, was the first thing he asked with a voice that was as soft as cotton and almost melancholic. “Are you in pain anywhere?”
You shook your head. “No”, you croaked out, “I’m not hurting.”
Yet you couldn’t deny that you didn’t feel good – even though you had been sleeping for so long, your muscles still protested any big movement and your body felt weak.
You reached for the refilled glass of water and chugged it, all the while Yoongi was still watching you attentively.
“I don’t feel good”, you complained after you had put the glass back to its original place, voice a little less of a croak and more of a rough mumble now. “What happened?”

Yoongi leaned forward a bit, resting his elbows on his thighs and rubbing his palms together as if he was trying to relieve some of the tension that was evident in his pose. “We’re not sure”, he replied. “It’s nothing one of us did, if that’s what you wanted to hear.”
He sounded honest and you immediately believed him. “Then what is it?”
The devil slowly shook his head. “I’m assuming your body finally came to the realization that you’re not meant to survive down here”, he then gave in. “Your body’s failing.”
You pulled in a sharp breath. “Failing?”, you repeated. “I’m dying?”
Yoongi lowered his head even further, unable to look at you. “It seems so, yes.”
Uncomfortable silence filled the room for a while while you tried to come to terms with the fact that apparently, you would still die, even if it wasn’t the way you expected it to happen.
“How long?”, you finally managed to ask, and finally, Yoongi shot you a small smile. “You still have some time taking in account the speed your health is deteriorating at. And we-“, he shortly hesitated but then continued firmly, “we will do as much as we can to prolong that time.”
You snickered, even if it ended in a dry cough. “I’m sure not all of you are amazed by this idea”, you croaked, and Yoongi couldn’t help a short grin, even if your state seemed to worry him. “Well, no… But that doesn’t matter.”
He went quiet while you tried to calm your coughing, refilling your glass and adding a cup of herb tea without you having to say anything. While you slurped on the warm, sweet liquid which helped calm down the scratch in your throat, Yoongi sighed.
“Namjoon wants to send you back”, he murmured and his hands cramped around each other. “He thinks it’s best for you.”
You raised the cup towards him. “Sweeter”, you simply stated, and Yoongi’s features softened, lips curling into a warm smile.
“Of course, Mylady”, he whispered and snipped his fingers. The next sip you took was perfectly sweetened and you sighed contently.
“So, he wants me to go?”, you replied to the demon, and he shrugged. It seemed as if he tried to act as unbothered as possible. “Kind of.”

You hummed, feeling weirdly peaceful despite the devastating news you had just received. Somehow, you had always anticipated this – one way or another – and it didn’t really shock you. “How about the others?”
Yoongi chuckled. “Pretty much divided in their opinions and thoughts. Some agree with Namjoon, some don’t.” He paused shortly. “It’s a difficult situation and decision to make.”
You threw him a short glance, taking another sip from the tea. “How about you?”
The devil smirked. “Curious little thing”, he teased, but it didn’t sound mean. “I don’t know, to be honest.” He frowned, serious again. “I can understand both sides. Trying to save you – or trying to save their sacrifice, it doesn’t really matter in this situation – or getting their rightful portion of the annual sacrifice. Neither of them is better or worse.” He huffed. “But we don’t really have time to properly think about this and contemplate. You’re getting weaker every day.” He looked at you and his glance pierced right through you, making you shiver with its intensity. “We’ll have to decide quickly.”

You nodded, still taking small sips from your hot cup, when Yoongi asked a question you hadn’t even thought about: “How about you?”
You looked up, surprised. “Me?”
He nodded. “What do you think? What would you want to do?”
He probably expected you to fall into deep thought, but your reply was simple and quick. “I don’t know.”
Yoongi quirked an eyebrow in disbelief. “Honestly?”
You shrugged. “I don’t know if I could live among humans normally again after all… this. All that happened.” You sighed. “But of course I miss my mom and nature and what it means to live in the human world. Still. If someone made me choose for real, it’d still be a tough decision to make.” You threw him a short smile and returned to your tea, leaving the devil with an astonished expression on his face.
“You continue to surprise me”, he finally mumbled before he got up. “I’ll have to attend some business. Rest.” He hesitated before opening the door. “If there’s something wrong or you need anything, just say my name.” His voice gave away a light smile. “I’ll hear.”
You hummed as a reply, watching as he left the room and carefully closed the door. As soon as he was gone, overwhelming tiredness washed over you and you only managed to put the empty cup onto the night desk before you fell asleep again.

Downstairs, Yoongi entered the kitchen. Six pairs of reddish eyes glanced at him – some determined and angry almost, some sad or tired. He closed the door and only then did Namjoon speak up, crossing his arms in front of his chest. “How is she?”
Yoongi leaned against one of the counters and reached for the bottle of whiskey Taehyung was holding. The younger threw him a sharp glance, but he handed over the alcohol. Yoongi took a sip and sighed when he felt the whiskey sting in his stomach. Only then did he reply, handing the bottle back to Taehyung.
“She’s exhausted. She fell asleep as soon as I left the room, and she was awake for barely half an hour.” His posture was tense as he now lowered his glance. “It’s getting worse.”
To his and the others’ surprise, Jungkook now raised his voice – Jungkook, who normally stayed out of things and avoided you since the incident with the shadows. “What do we do?” He sounded half desperate, half irritated.
Yoongi was too tired to answer. Silence filled the room before Jin spoke up. His voice was way calmer than Jungkook’s, successfully ripping the others out of their daze.
“Namjoon. We have to make a decision.”

Chapter Text

Namjoon nodded, silently and seemingly lost in thoughts. For once, the usually quick-thinking leader seemed lost for words and the silence turned heavier the longer he stayed quiet, almost vibrating with the tension that was building within and between the seven devils that were scattered around the kitchen. Most of them had crossed their arms or seemed at least defensive and they were all brooding over something; only Jungkook’s glance attentively flickered from demon to demon – seeming almost scared, but at least anxious of the decision his elders would make.
Finally, Namjoon sighed and his posture relaxed a tiny bit. “We don’t have a choice”, he mumbled. Yoongi’s expression hardened at his words and Jin pulled in a sharp, almost inaudible breath. Jungkook’s face twisted as if he was feeling a twinge of pain, but the other three – Hoseok, Taehyung, Jimin – didn’t seem surprised.
The leader turned towards Yoongi, who seemed the most agitated. “I know you care about her”, he said roughly. “It’s not like the others don’t.” Hoseok’s reply was a slight nod. “But she’s dying. And we can’t do anything to help her.”
Yoongi’s hands balled into fists, but he didn’t utter an answer. The walls of the room were ever so slightly trembling with the intensity of his emotions as he slowly straightened his back and walked towards the door, with small steps that seemed almost too carefully controlled, as if it took all of his self-control not to blast the whole castle into ruins and take out his rage on every being around him. There was a cold glimmer in his eyes that made Namjoon and the others make way – a glimmer of pride, maybe even arrogance, and they all knew that was never a good sign.
After Yoongi had left the room and quietly closed the door, Jimin breathed a small sigh of relief. “He’s furious”, he mumbled as quietly as possible, glance still resting on the door. They could all sense Yoongi was gone by now, but the knowledge that one of the strongest among them was in such an unstable condition still rested heavily on their shoulders.

“When should we do it?”
It was Jin who asked, to the surprise of everyone else. Jungkook opened his mouth as if to interfere, but one very dark glance of the oldest prevented him from uttering any doubt. He closed his mouth, but the red in his eyes was flickering with emotion.
“Soon”, Jimin said. His voice didn’t quite sound cheerful either, but he didn’t show any signs of insecurity or doubt. “The more she deteriorates, the harder it will be to watch.”
“Let’s just get it over with quickly”, Taehyung added, sounding almost bored, and reached for the bottle of whiskey Yoongi had left behind on one of the countertops. He took a big swig. “We’ve been playing this game for long enough. It’s time to stop.”
“Show a bit more care, Taehyung.” Jin’s voice was almost toneless, his eyes nearly black and showing just how difficult this was for him. “She’s been good. To us. I get that you’re Sloth, but one more careless comment and I will rip your damn heart out.”
Taehyung shot him a lazy grin. “I don’t have a heart. Neither do you.” His expression turned more serious, almost dark. “Stop acting like you do.”

“That’s enough!”
Namjoon’s voice made everyone’s head turn. The leader was towering in front of them and his expression didn’t give away anything, as usual. “It’s been decided and we will follow through. But we will do it as we always have – properly, in order, and without any torture.” He shot Taehyung a short glance. “Jimin will be first.”
The latter just nodded shortly. “You’re starting tonight. Don’t mess it up.”

On the second floor, Yoongi was standing in front of your door, not a shred of his rage left within him, and listened to the words of the others. His jaw muscles were tightening when Namjoon ended the discussion in his usual cold and precise demeanor, but more than anything, his body was filled with lethargy.
The demon knew he didn’t have to knock, you were still fast asleep, and thus he shut out the silent voices of the other devils and quietly opened the door. As he expected, you were still sleeping, and he slipped through the gap before closing the door just as carefully again.
Nothing but your silent breathing was filling the room. When Yoongi came closer, his heart cramped up at the sight of your pale, gaunt face and when he listened a bit closer, your breathing was more of a wheeze than anything else.
Yoongi sat down next to your bed, leaned back into the chair and simply watched.

It took more than an hour before you woke up again. The voices of the other demons had died down a while ago, everyone was now attending to their own business and thoughts. As your eyes fluttered open, so did Yoongi’s, and before you were even fully awake, he straightened his back and snipped his fingers for a cold glass of water and a cup of tea to appear on the nightstand.
“Thank you”, you croaked after you had grown aware of his presence. Every single of your muscles hurt when you reached for the cup and carefully pulled it towards you, but your arms were almost too weak to lift it to your lips. Dangerously close to spilling the hot liquid on yourself, you tried to take a sip, but Yoongi couldn’t watch any longer.
“Don’t burn yourself”, he quietly warned, kneeling down next to the bed and softly pulling the cup from your cold fingers. “Here. I’ll help you.”
Patiently, as if he was feeding a little kid, he held the cup to your lips again and again until you sighed and leaned back into your pillows, already exhausted just from keeping your body upright.

“How are you feeling?”, Yoongi asked after the cup had vanished into nothingness again, and you smiled weakly. “I’m okay”, you replied, but the expression on his face showed very clearly that he knew you were lying.
“Did they decide yet?”, you continued to ask and Yoongi’s jaw muscles tightened, his glance stiffly focused on anything but your face. “They did?”, you inquired further, and after a minute of no noticeable reaction, Yoongi nodded.
“So?” He could hear in your voice that you already knew what was coming, and with a last push, he buried his emotions deep inside and tonelessly said: “They decided to sacrifice your soul. Jimin is first. Tonight.”
Silence filled the room for a while before you spoke up again. “I’m not mad, Yoongi. It’s what I am here for. And I’m dying anyway.”

The demon growled lowly. “How can you be so okay with this?!”, he snapped, fury and pain swirling in his eyes as he towered in front of you.
A coughing fit shook your body and it took a while for you to calm down again, but when you did, you gave him a tired smile.
“Do I have a choice?”

Chapter Text

Yoongi slumped back into his chair, occasional red flickering in his eyes as he ran his fingers through his hair. “I just care too much”, he quietly hissed through gritted teeth, but in your weakened state, you weren’t able to fully hear it. Yet it was obvious that the demon was struggling, so you slowly propped yourself up on your elbow and turned towards him, extending your hand for his. For a second, he didn’t react, then his shoulders relaxed with an inaudible sigh and he grasped your hand, holding it in his as you nuzzled your head into the pillow. Silence spread between the two of you, only interrupted by the glances you exchanged until your eyes fluttered close and you fell asleep, and only then did Yoongi’s expression harden again, because he could feel how cold your skin was, almost as cold as his own body, and for some reason, it made him shiver for the first time in 17.500 years.
The demon kept sitting there, watching over you, waiting for what was about to happen.

The dark seemed even darker than usual when Yoongi grew aware of the silent, unhuman footsteps on the floor and slowly sat up. You were still sleeping and apparently the intruder had noticed – the door was opened very carefully and then a silver-haired figure slipped into the room with a silent swish.
Jimin closed the door quietly and then turned around to the bed. Yoongi couldn’t make out any sign of movement or emotion in his face as the younger took in the scenery.
“How long has she been sleeping for?”, he finally whispered, and Yoongi shrugged. “A few hours, I presume”, he mumbled back just as quietly. “I haven’t been counting.”
Jimin’s glance wandered over to him. “You don’t agree with this at all”, he murmured. It wasn’t a question, and Yoongi didn’t react to it in any way. The younger’s stare was so sharp it almost penetrated the black-haired devil.
“Are you gonna get in our way?”, he asked, there was a hint of judgement and – fear? in it, and Yoongi’s face twitched, a sign of emotion for just a millisecond. “No”, he finally replied after a moment, slowly and carefully as if his tongue was struggling against an invisible hurdle to form the words. “I won’t.”
Jimin breathed an inaudible breath of relief before he stepped towards the bed, sinking down on the edge across from Yoongi. “Are you sure you want to watch?”, he asked, and this time he sounded soft, almost concerned as his glance wandered towards your face that looked tired even while you were fast asleep.
Yoongi crossed his arms in front of his chest. “I’m not leaving.” The younger’s glance lingered on his figure for a second more before he turned away and lifted a hand to wipe a few strands of your hair out of your face. “You look awful, sweetie”, he mumbled warmly, but the sudden bright redness in his eyes took the feeling of compassion and worry out of his words. “Don’t worry, it’s not going to take long”, he whispered before he lowered his head over your face and, after a second of hesitation, pressed his lips onto yours.

Yoongi could hear the tiny, pained sound that escaped your dry throat as Jimin took his part of your soul, and he watched coldly as the bright ball of light in your chest started to flicker.
“Jimin”, he finally hissed after what felt like an eternity to him. “You’re done.”
The younger demon pulled himself back from your figure with visible unwillingness. The look in his eyes was ecstatic, almost animalistic, as he licked his pink lips. “God”, he rasped, running his fingers through his hair. “She’s delicious.”
Yoongi’s fist balled on the armrest of his chair, but he controlled himself. “Out”, he said, so quiet only a devil’s ears could hear it. Jimin sighed deeply and took an insecure step back. His aura was looming with power and it made Yoongi grimace in disgust while the weakening thump of your heartbeat was resonating within his head.
With a few big steps full of a powerful spring, Jimin walked towards the door and left the room. He didn’t look back once, and Yoongi bit his lip to prevent himself from doing something stupid.

The old devil let in his fellow demons one after another, quietly watching as everyone took their turn. Some were gentle – Hoseok and Jin quite hesitant, and as far as Yoongi could tell, they took way less than they could have – some a bit more eager, like Taehyung. Jungkook took his time, as always. He was young, inexperienced, and Yoongi watched with growing unrest as your face twisted into a grimace of unconscious pain as he young devil’s lips came to a rest on yours. Jungkook could tell and pulled back sooner than later. He rushed out without saying anything else, but his eyes were full of emotion and Yoongi’s anger subsided immediately.
Namjoon was the last to enter. As always, he seemed calm, full of control when he approached your bed and looked down on you. Your face was even more pale than before and your breaths a lot more labored. Not much more, and you would be gone, a soulless being to be buried behind the castle like all the other unfortunate Xiqaas before you.
“She looks peaceful”, Namjoon commented. His voice was surprisingly quiet and almost rough, making Yoongi lift his glance from your face that he had been watching for the past he-didn’t-know-how-many hours. “More peaceful than ever, if you ask me.”
“Surprisingly”, Yoongi admitted unwillingly. “Despite this whole process is a less than peaceful.” He grimaced. “But that’s to be expected.”

Namjoon’s glance rested on the other’s figure now. “You aren’t going to do this, am I correct?”, he asked. There was no anger in his voice, no subliminal criticism or frustration. He sounded almost understanding, if not apologetic.
Yoongi’s face darkened. “Do I have a choice?”, he replied and his tone was sharp.
Namjoon shrugged. “You always have a choice”, he answered. “The question is whether she will appreciate that choice or not.”
Yoongi raised his glance again, watching the leader stand at the end of your bed, not moving a muscle. There was no way of telling what was going on in his mind, but Yoongi had never been scared of Namjoon - or of confronting him.
“You’re not going to either”, he assumed aloud, and an expression of surprise crossed his face as the other shook his head.
“No”, Namjoon replied, and now he sounded softer than ever. He walked around the bed until he reached your side, extended his hand and let it rest on your icy skin. Still asleep, a little sound left your lips at the touch, and your head moved towards the gentle hand ever so slightly as if you were searching for some comfort. Namjoon’s eyes filled with warmth. “I can’t”, he said, before he looked back at Yoongi.

The latter tried a weak smile.
“Me neither.”  

Chapter Text

“What?”

Jin’s voice was quiet, dangerously quiet, and Yoongi threw Namjoon a short glance. Anger was dancing in the eyes of the oldest, anger and something else – a feeling of betrayal. Before anyone could say anything, Jin lifted his fist, hesitating only for a second mid-air, then there was a twitch in his face and he rammed his fist onto the kitchen table.
With a loud crash, the wooden surface gave in to the sheer strength behind the punch and cracked, breaking in half under a second punch of the oldest demon who seemed to be barely able to control himself.
“You’re telling me”, he hissed, ignoring the mess next to him completely, “you made us take parts of her soul and then decided for yourselves you didn’t feel like it?”
Yoongi could see Jungkook flinching in the background. The expression of the youngest was one of guilt and maybe desperation even, the same form of pain that was evident in Jin’s eyes. Hoseok noticed as well. He stepped up to Jungkook and slightly nudged him in the back, ripping him out of his haze.
“Why?”, Hoseok then asked the question that was lingering in the room. “Namjoon, you said-“

“I couldn’t.”
The leader’s words made everyone’s eyes widen. As far as the demons knew, Namjoon wasn’t someone to go back on his word, let alone admit that he made a mistake. The tall demon now shook his head and leaned back against the kitchen counter with a sigh. “I couldn’t, and so couldn’t Yoongi.”
The other nodded, lost in thoughts.
“And now?” It was Taehyung who had spoken up, the least unfazed among them, lazily leaning against the doorframe. “What now?”
Yoongi looked up. “She’s sleeping for now. We don’t know for how long, but she’s definitely closer to a demon now than she was before.”
Sloth huffed, almost condescending. “What a surprise.” He pushed himself off the doorframe. “Namjoon, what will you do?”

The leader’s shoulders tensed up. “It’s too late to send her back to the surface, I’m afraid.” His voice sounded much more secure than he seemed to be actually feeling. “We don’t have a choice. Either we let her continue in this state or we finish the turning. There’s nothing else we can do.”
Yoongi agreed with a silent nod, his dark eyes were searching for some form of reaction in the other demons’ faces.
“Do you think she could go back to the surface?”
It was Jungkook who asked, voice quiet as usual, looking up at the leader from below. Namjoon breathed a quiet sigh. “I don’t know, Jungkook”, he replied. “I’m afraid she would be too different.” He shook his head. “What she is right now… We’ve never had a situation like this.”
Jimin hummed in agreement. “It could be a problem”, he concurred with Namjoon’s words. “What if-“

Yoongi knew he was going to be interrupted even before it actually happened. Suddenly, a quiet sound came from above them, soon growing louder and louder despite the thick walls in its way. It was a scream, they realized – a rough, pained, unhuman scream of pure torture. It sounded like an invisible hand collected a few hundred of all the death screams the Seven Sins had ever caused and combined them into one, heart-wrenching, bone-chilling anguish not even the devils could escape.
One shared glance was enough before Yoongi grimaced and vanished into nothingness within milliseconds, Jin following off the bat, and after exchanging another glance, the rest of the demons followed.

They assembled in front of the door that was barely muffling the animalistic screams behind it. Jin and Yoongi at the front looked at each other for a second before Yoongi snipped his fingers and the door swung open quietly.

The were greeted with the sight of you spasming, curling, trembling in your bed, the sheets entangled with your limbs as you tossed from side to side in an attempt to ease the all-consuming pain in your chest.
Jungkook couldn’t prevent a silent gasp and Jimin rested his hand on his back to try and calm him down.
“That answers your question”, whispered Hoseok. He didn’t have to be quiet, the presence of the Seven Sins went unnoticed by you, but for some reason, all of them tried to be silent. “We can’t leave here in this state.”
Jimin threw Namjoon a short glance, fingers pressing into Jungkook’s skin a bit more when he realized the emotional expression on the leader’s face, something they had never seen on him before.
“Namjoon”, Jin mumbled. He had noticed Wrath’s state too. “What should we do?”
The taller demon was as stiff and silent as a rock. The only movement that indicated he was still alive was the flicker in his dark, dark eyes. He didn’t reply, nor was there any sign of him recognizing Jin’s voice.

In the end, it was Yoongi who clenched his fist and stepped forward.
“Let me handle it”, he rasped and the others agreed in shared silence before he stepped up to the bed and looked down on you, still restlessly fighting against the pain in between the sheets. Your skin was glistening from all the sweat and the demon could see in your eyes that there was nothing more than agony within you – they reminded him of the eyes of an animal right before being eaten, wild and scared and almost insane.
Your hands were constantly twitching towards your chest as you frantically rubbed and scratched the skin right over where your heart was – as if you were trying to rip it out to end your torture. Yoongi’s expression darkened and he reached for your hands. Not even the cool touch of his skin could calm you down and with unhuman strength, he forced your arms away from you effortlessly.

“It’ll be over soon”, he whispered as he bowed over you, unsuccessfully trying to catch and hold your stiff, blank glance, pinning your wrists against the mattress with his unyielding grip.  

“Let me help you, sweetheart.”

Chapter Text

Yoongi leaned further and further down without your glance focusing on his figure. The rest of the demons stood quietly and watched, none of them able or willing to interfere. They could see that their fellow devil wasn’t enjoying this, but then again, he had never seemed very eager about taking his part of a soul. None of them knew why, and he had never spoken about it either.

Now his features softened as he shortly halted above your face. Your chest was still pumping, your heart struggling against the overwhelming pain of not having enough of a soul left within you, and Yoongi grimaced when he looked past skin and bones and saw the remaining splinters of what had previously been the colourful, shining orb which represented your whole being. It looked brutal even to him, and that’s why for the first time in centuries, the demon closed his eyes when he touched your lips with his for a soft, nearly hesitant kiss.

Silence filled the room as Yoongi consumed what he deemed enough – or necessary – to end your torture. Nothing in his face changed as he did it, and when he pulled back, his eyes were cold. He let go of your wrists and stepped back.
Your breathing slowed down to a normal pace and your heartbeat fluttered – once, twice before it fully gave out and your eyes closed. Under the piercing glances of the Seven Sins, your human body  changed into that of a demon at a painfully slow pace, invisible to the human eye, but much too obvious for a devil’s heightened senses. At some point, Jin turned around. “Let her sleep”, he mumbled. “It’s going to be her last, after all.”
He turned around and left without a further word, and slowly but surely, the others followed. Namjoon stopped in the doorway, waiting for Yoongi who was the last. It seemed as if he couldn’t rip his glance from your changing body, couldn’t get rid of the grinding of bones and muscles in his ears – until Namjoon spoke up.
“You did the right thing”, he said quietly, and Yoongi lifted his glance to look at him. “I do hope so”, he replied calmly before he turned away from you and stepped past the leader. The latter nodded as a simple reply and followed him, closing the door with a last glance towards your motionless body.

For a while, the castle stayed quiet. The Seven Sins, for the first time in their lives, were waiting for something almost anxiously. Their ears were constantly trying to catch any sound that might’ve come from the room you were resting in.
It took longer than expected. For almost three full days, there was nothing, and the younger ones started doubting what had been done, but everyone knew Yoongi wasn’t just any devil. He wouldn’t mess up something as basic as this.
And their trust in him was justified. After three days of nothing but silence, something stirred in the room, and the Seven Sins all raised their heads and looked at each other. In quiet consensus, they assembled in front of your room and again, it was Jin who pushed the door open with a slight bump of his fingertips.

For the first time since this human set their foot into their cave, the castle was completely devoid of the sound of heartbeat again.
The Seven Sins were greeted with a scared glance out of pinkish-red eyes that were swirling with uncontained emotion and power.
“What did you do to me”, you whispered, voice almost trembling. “What the hell did you do to me?”

Namjoon was the one who stepped forward, the others quietly making way. Within a few seconds, he was next to you, slowly sinking down onto the mattress next to you. “You don’t have to be scared, Y/N”, he mumbled while his eyes searched for your glance and didn’t let it go anymore. “But we had to do this. There was no other way.”
Neither of them expected your aura to suddenly grow thick and sickly sweet before you let your fist bang onto your nightstand – preceded by a swing of your arm that was half-hearted, almost weak, yet the surface of the table broke and splintered under the impact of your newly obtained power. The teacup Yoongi left next to you rolled off the nightstand and shattered on the ground and after a second of you staring at it, you buried your face in your hands and started sobbing into them.
“What did you turn me into”, were the only words the Seven Sins could make out as you curled up in your bed, and they exchanged dark glances.
At some point, Namjoon’s hand softly pressed into your back and started rubbing smooth circles onto your skin, but it couldn’t calm you down. Under the red stares of six demons – Jungkook had left in the middle of it, unable to bear the view – the tears flushed away the rest of you that was clinging onto humanity desperately until you were able to let it go.

“I’m sorry, Y/N.”
It sounded like a genuine apology and finally managed to make you look up. The devils had left after you had sent them away with a snarl, only Yoongi stayed – to keep you company, you presumed, but even more so to keep an eye on you.
Newborn demons were dangerous, they all knew that, and even you could feel the emotions rage within you, making your skin itch and your blood boil. The older devil had taken seat in the chair he had been sitting in before, calm and quiet, and his presence filled the room and managed to suppress any need and urge you felt to let it all out and destroy everything around you.
“It’s a good thing you’re here”, you rasped, voice scratchy and unfamiliar in your throat, and ignored Yoongi’s apology.
The older’s glance pierced through you. “You’re crawling in your skin, am I right?”, he asked huskily, and you hummed as a reply. He nodded to himself. “It will fade soon”, he said. “Wait for a bit longer.”

“A bit in devil years or human years?”
The snarky response rolled off your tongue before you could stop it. A few days back, you would’ve held your breath now, waiting for the devil to snap at you for your disrespect, but this time, another feeling crawled up your spine – excitement.
Excitement to see what Yoongi was capable of doing to you, and the wish to pay him back tenfold.
A few seconds later, the shock about what was going on inside your mind knocked the unnecessary oxygen out of your lungs.
The older demon looked at you with a straight, motionless face, calm and composed as ever. Only in his eyes was there a hint of movement – sympathy, compassion maybe, but it was gone before you could notice.
“You’ll get used to it”, he said quietly, as if he knew all too well what was going on within you, and while you ran your fingers through your hair and tried to calm the storm within you, you realized that all of them probably knew perfectly well how you were feeling.

Chapter Text

It took a week before they let you out of your room. You felt how time passed by for some reason, almost as if you could hear the stars and the sun move through the sky. Everything was heightened: the cave that had previously been dominated by the most overpowering, intimidating silence was suddenly filled with scratching, dripping, rumbling; the familiar darkness that before had been the blackest, most impenetrable thing you had ever seen – or not seen, for that matter – suddenly seemed like a mere thin veil of fog over the bizarre beauty of the cave, easily broken if you looked close enough.
A touch of a hand sent shivers up and down your spine now, the sheets in your bed became unbearably heavy and restraining, but despite all of the sensitivities, your body seemed immune to warmth or cold now and it didn’t get hurt although you still felt pain – which was a good thing, because demonic speed and strength was also a thing you had to get used to, and more often than not, you crashed into walls and boulders, jumped too high or rammed yourself so deep into the ground it took hours to get yourself out.
Yoongi was always around to keep you in check. Though sometimes, Jin or Hoseok accompanied you, the black-haired devil always had an eye on you, and that was for the better.

Demonic emotions, you learned, were a raging, uncontrollable fire within you. A day didn’t pass without this showing – in anger and aggression, mostly, because as Jimin explained to you in a moment of silence, “there is still human pain within you, and it will stay there for a long, long time”. Jin later added: “Your heart may not pump blood anymore, but it’s still a heart. Even if some of us don’t like to admit it.”
Yoongi never let you roam too far. Now, as a devil, you could sense the strength that radiated around him at all times, a much more elaborate feeling than the human awareness of his aura that you were used to. Often enough, this presence alone sufficed for your rage to disappear like a spiderweb in a storm, and even if not – you didn’t stand the slightest chance against the older devil. He handled you as easily as you had handled the newborn kittens of your mother’s cat each year. Sometimes, he let you fight him on purpose, and when he truly got into it, his ravenous grin and his flickering red eyes scared even you. After such an incident, you sometimes wondered how you weren’t more scared of him during your time as a Xiqaa. When you mentioned it to him, Yoongi’s reply to this was simple and delivered with a shrug: “You didn’t know this side of me then, so why should you have been scared of it?” Later he added, with a short smirk in your direction: “It takes way less to intimidate a human than it takes to intimidate a demon, you know.”

The first soul you consumed was that of a small mouse, one of the few unfortunate beings that occasionally found their way into the cave and never got out again in most of the cases. You wondered why the others relied on human souls to feed them, to which Jin explained that at some point, the souls of anything less than a human didn’t satisfy a demon anymore.
Though you felt bad for taking the mouse’s soul, it left less of a bitter aftertaste than the thought of consuming a human’s soul. The soul tasted like nothing you had ever tried before, yet it was the most delicious, exquisite thing you could imagine – an elaborate combination of flavours and feelings that left you in an almost high state for a few minutes, drunk with the power that rushed through your veins. Only Yoongi’s aura looming in the corner kept you from searching out that high again, possibly by rushing up the stairs and ravaging the human town above. You couldn’t even begin to imagine what it felt like to try a human soul, and as much as your demonic side was tempted by the thought of it, you were disgusted and shocked by it to a much bigger extent. Silently, you swore to yourself to never touch a human, completely missing Yoongi’s quiet chuckle – as if he was seeing right through you.

The thoughts of a devil were scary at times. More often than not, you found yourself shocked at the cold-bloodedness, aggression, brutality and arrogance evident in your being and behavior now; features that were almost unbeknownst to you during your time as a human.
“Demons are bad, Y/N”, Jungkook whispered once, leaning against the door with crossed arms after one of your fits. “You can’t fight against it, and it’s best not to. It’ll destroy you otherwise.” His face grimaced into an expression of discomfort, maybe pain for just a second. “Trust me, I tried for a long time.”
“I wasn’t a bad person, though”, you replied tonelessly, blood still raging as you tried to contain the rush of confusing emotions within you – despite the fact that the worst of your previous fit was over for now, it was still ten times, twenty times more intense than anything you had felt as a human. “And I still am not.”
Jungkook shook his head. “That’s not how it works”, he said. “Being a demon doesn’t make you bad, it just takes all the bad things within you and elevates them. No matter how good you think you are, there’s always going to be something off.” He paused shortly. “Humans are sinners, you know. If they believe in God, that may help, but it doesn’t make you a better person. And it sure as hell doesn’t protect you from becoming a demon.”
Whatever you were going to say was stuck in your throat and Jungkook’s face softened. “It sounds worse than it is”, he added, his voice a lot less harsh and bitter than before. “You will get used to these thoughts, and you will learn to control and accept your emotions with time. Just be a little more patient.”
You couldn’t help but wonder how long “a little” meant to the Seven Sins.

One night about two weeks after you had woken up, you stepped into the kitchen and found Namjoon leaning against the granite countertop, a glass of whiskey in his hand. He swirled the amber-coloured alcohol around and seemed to be deep in thought, but he looked up as soon as you opened one of the cupboards and grabbed another glass.
“Want some?”, he simply asked as you turned around, and handed you the bottle before you could reply. In silence, you poured some of the whiskey into your glass and set the bottle back onto the table – which had been mysteriously replaced after Jin had ruined it in his anger.
“Getting used to it?” The devil eyed you from the side after you had taken your first sip and you shot him a short smile. “Not eating and tasting anything is weird”, you replied. “But at least this stuff is strong enough to allow me to taste something.”
The reason the demons often drank strong alcohol was, apparently, that the drinks – next to souls - were the only thing pungent enough to stimulate a devil’s taste buds. It had been weird drinking pure alcohol in the middle of the day in the beginning, but sooner or later, you found yourself getting used to it, almost welcoming the taste. Plus, as Jimin explained with a mischievous grin once, it took a lot before a devil actually got drunk.

Namjoon now nodded, taking a sip from the whiskey himself. “At least something”, he chuckled quietly. “It’s a lot to take in, after all.”
You agreed in silence, now swirling the stingy liquid around in your glass yourself. Namjoon’s glance was burning on your skin for a while before he sighed and turned towards you.
“Believe us or not, we all know what you’re going through”, he said, causing a rush of demonic anger within you that resulted in a sharp glance towards him. He raised his hands, whiskey glass still in his right, as if to signal he didn’t mean trouble. “Some of us might show it more than others, but we do”, he insisted. Against his glance – one that spoke millenia of experience, pain and power, yours soon faltered and you averted your eyes to the ground to take another sip of the whiskey.
“Just know that we’re here for you now”, the demon hummed. “As long as it takes and as long as you want as to, because you belong here now.”
“You forced me to belong here”, you spat bitterly, and the leader’s lips curled into an apologetic smile. “That’s true”, he mumbled more to himself than to anyone else and downed the alcohol in his glass in one go, already reaching for the bottle again.
“But I promise you, we’ll make up for it as best we can.”

He filled his glass in silence, already back to his usual calculated self, but his words still lingered in your ears and when he looked at you questioningly, you handed him your glass for a refill.
The smile that filled his face as he poured you some whiskey lit up the room – for the very first time, it seemed completely real and genuine.
He gave the glass back to you and raised his.

“To you, Y/N. Welcome to the Seven Sins.”

Chapter Text

The young man carefully treads down the slippery stairs that decend into the overwhelming darkness of the cave and suddenly end on a rough, rocky ground. He takes one, two steps forward, his eyes wandering from side to side as he tries to penetrate the veil of blackness with his glance. His face is a stiff expression of fright and at the sound of a rock dropping from one of the cave walls, bouncing against the dark stone again and again and causing a sheer endless echo of the sound, he flinches nervously.
A silent laugh accompanies the remaining echoes of the stone falling, sending even more shivers down the young man’s spine, and he turns around to see if anything, anyone is standing behind him.

There’s nothing no matter how hard he looks, but when he turns to the front again, two red eyes loom in the darkness and make him stumble backwards. “W-who are you?”, he stutters, and the voice chuckles.
“Doesn’t matter really, does it?”, a second voice chippers. “You won’t be here for long anyway.”

The first one clicks their tongue. “Don’t be so rude, Jimin”, it chides, and the second snickers quietly. “Okay, okay.”
The young man has crawled back to the end of the stairs he came from, back pressed against the cold, wet stone, and erratically tries to find out where the danger is coming from. Soon enough, his human eyes manage to make out a silhouette in the darkness, casually leaning against the wall next to him, and with a scream he jumps up and scrambles away from the figure.
“Don’t be so scared”, the silhouette chuckles. “If we wanted to kill you, we’d have done that long ago.”
The young man stares at it in sheer panic and doesn’t react to the words in any way, frozen to his spot. He knows he lost, but it wasn’t much of a fight to begin with anyway.

With a sigh, you push yourself off the wall and approach this year’s Chosen One.
“Come here, boy”, you wave for him and as you come closer, the young man swallows and eyes you nervously, but the tremble in his muscles fades away. “I can’t run, right?”, he finally whispers when you stand before him, voice still full of terror, and with an apologetic smile, you nod.
“I’m afraid not.”
As if that’s the answer he needs, he straightens his back and looks you straight in the eyes. “Can you promise me that it won’t hurt?”

You throw a short glance back towards Jimin who agrees with a faint nod, then you turn towards this year's Chosen One again, number 277 if you count correctly, and reach for his hand. Holding it, you gently force the young man to follow you, and after the first few steps, he does so obediently. "What's your name, Chosen One?" 
His reply is quiet, but you hear it all too clearly before his voice breaks. 
"James." 

You look at him over your shoulder with a warm smile. 
"I promise it won't hurt, James."