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“…you listening, Jinu?”
When Jinu glanced to his right, he noticed Rumi was sitting beside him. Their legs dangled over the wall that sloped on the road that enclosed the hanok village, Seoul’s skyline shadowed with twilight.
But what was he doing here? The last thing he remembered was—
Rumi waved at him, her eyebrows raised. Her dark eyes glistened in amusement. “Hey, I’m talking to you,” she said. She flicked her braid over her shoulder with a chuckle. “Looks like you really did drink too much soju last night. How much do you remember?”
He swallowed, staring at the way the lights caught the strands of her amethyst-colored hair. Unthinking, he reached out to touch the end of her braid.
Rumi stiffened. Then, she clasped his outstretched hand in hers. Her skin was soft and warm. He smiled.
“You have that look on your face again,” she whispered, clutching his hand tighter.
He looked at her, dazed by the gentleness of her expression. “What look?”
“The look that says you might choose me.”
“Choose you?” Jinu turned his hand in hers.
“There are other people you care about, though, aren’t there?”
He sucked in a frigid breath, the icy coldness of it shocking his system. The world exploded in white light, and then he floated for a second, descending on a different scene.
He sat on the dusty porch of his old home, engulfed in the darkness of a pitch-black night. In the distance, he glimpsed the glow of flickering torches—the night watch walking around Hanyang to make sure no one was out beyond curfew.
But this was impossible. His heart pounded loudly in his chest, and he could hear the rush of blood through his body, roaring as he realized he had been sent back in time—to Joseon.
“Jinu,” a voice broke through the silence.
His head whipped around, staring at the familiar silhouette of his mother. His younger sister snoozed on her lap, smacking her lips in her sleep.
“Mother,” he breathed. “How are you here?”
His mother hummed. “You have suffered much,” she observed. “All these years…”
Jinu swallowed hard. The night air of Hanyang pressed close, thick with smoke and memory. “I tried,” he said hoarsely. “In the end, I didn’t live a life that would make you proud. My pathetic life won’t have meaning.”
Silence stretched between them, filled only by the chirp of insects and the far-off call of the watch. He looked up at her, desperate. “If I could go back—if I could choose differently and save you—”
“When you make your choice…remember, my son,” his mother said. “We have been gone a long time. Perhaps it is time you move on.”
The words struck him harder than any blade could. The torches dimmed. The porch beneath him dissolved into mist. His sister’s small breathing faded, then the scent of home, then the night itself.
Darkness consumed him whole.
Then, the sound of waves filled the void.
Jinu gasped as cold water surged around him, but he did not drown. He hovered in an endless ocean lit from below by a luminous blue glow. Gigantic, azure scales shimmered through the deep like constellations beneath the sea.
A colossal form coiled before him, coiling and twisting. Its great claws reached for him, and one of them held a pearlescent jewel-like orb before him, larger than Jinu’s own body.
Horns curved like crescent moons. Whiskers drifted like silver banners in unseen currents. Eyes, ancient and fathomless, opened. A dragon loomed before him.
“You wake at last, child of many eras,” the dragon said. But its maw did not move with the words. Instead, a booming voice resounded within Jinu’s mind. “I am the spirit of the Dragon King of the East Sea. For centuries I have vowed to always protect my kingdom, and you are a worthy subject.”
The dragon bowed its head to peer at him. “Ah, I see you clearly now. I see your heart. Tell me, human, what do you wish for?”
Jinu blinked. He hadn’t been referred to as human in a long while. He’d been a demon for four hundred years.
“Well?” the dragon pressed.
Jinu tried to bow back, but his body felt weightless. “Am I…dead?”
“You offered your life freely,” the dragon replied.
The memory struck him in a blinding flash—stage lights, the roar of the crowd at the Idol Awards, the crack of something going wrong, and Gwi-Ma’s laughter, Rumi’s startled gasp, his own body moving without hesitation.
He had pushed her out of the way.
The Dragon King’s long body shifted, stirring tides that he created. He presented the orb in his claws to Jinu.
“For a sacrifice made without regret,” the Dragon King intoned, “a boon may be granted.”
The pearl drifted closer. Its glow bathed Jinu in warmth that reached into the fractures of his soul.
“One wish,” the Dragon King said. “Upon my yeouiju. Restore your mortal life. Rewrite your past. Sever your ancient bond. Or choose another fate entirely.”
Jinu stared into the orb. Within its depths, he saw fragments—his mother’s fading smile, his sister’s sleeping face, Rumi’s amethyst braid catching the twilight.
He let out a startled breath, and the repressed feelings within him stirred. “I wish to live a life without shame or guilt,” said Jinu. “I wish to live a life with the ones I love.”
The water was alive against his skin, beating in time with his heart.
“You have a lush life ahead of you,” the dragon’s voice echoed inside his head. “But every wish comes with a consequence. You must choose.”
“Choose?” Jinu breathed.
“Your family or your love?”
But how could he make such an impossible choice?
“You cannot live in two eras,” the dragon said.
The ocean stilled, waiting.
The Dragon King lowered its massive head, ancient eyes fixed upon him.
“Speak, Jinu,” it commanded softly. “What does your heart choose?”
He remembered his mother’s words.
We have been gone a long time.
Jinu had failed them once. But as he reached toward the yeouiju he remembered Rumi. She was alive now, and he would not erase her.
When he opened his eyes, he awoke on a balcony, the blue sky hovering over him with bright daylight, the earthy smell of freshly watered plants, and the sound of a beautiful voice singing.