Save the date

Finally left alone, Rumi sighed wearily. The girls had organised a ‘day of suffering’ with melodramatic films, mournful humming of the Saja Boys’ repertoire, and the sudden writing of a new song about grim reapers, inspired by all of this. Scrolling through the raw melody in her head and marking unsuccessful rhymes in her notebook, Rumi sat buried in her blanket when the balcony door opened. “You!” Unable to believe what was happening, she tangled herself in the bedding and fell headlong onto the floor, then rushed towards the familiar tiger, as if it had stepped out of a minhwa painting. The clumsy beast opened its eyes wide, surprised by Rumi’s embrace and tears. “At least you’re alive, Derpy…” she muttered after a while. The tiger blinked slowly. “Not like your master…” Sussy’s magpie chatter made Rumi turn around with a wobbly smile. The two demons reminded her of Jinu, and after the sad evening with Zoey and Mira, the already bleeding wound in her chest ached more than before. “A letter, stupid cat,” the magpie cawed in a human voice. “You can talk?!” Sussy only puffed himself up pompously, but refused to answer. Rumi unconsciously rubbed her left cheek—two demonic marks hid a pair of yellow eyes. When her power was activated, they opened and coloured the world purple. She hadn’t had time to think about the resemblance between her and the Jinu’s pet demon… Derpy spat out the letter and, snorting in a funny way, crawled away from Rumi into the corner to start licking himself in his ridiculous manner. A wet spot from tears darkened on the tiger’s chest, and his rough, slobbery tongue stretched down fruitlessly. Giggling and wiping her eyes, Rumi picked up the letter from the floor. ‘I am sorrowful that you have forgotten me. Jinu.’ Just one line made Rumi bury her face in her knees and cry again. Despicable and, as always, old-fashioned, Jinu kept her believing for a whole week that he was dead! Remembering that terrible day, she looked up at the bird, searching for answers. Hadn’t Jinu’s soul nourished her with strength and found peace? “Now I know you can talk, Sussy,” Rumi said firmly, wiping her nose. “Where is Jinu now?” “Only demons can enter,” the magpie cawed condescendingly. “I’m half demon.” “And half human. Unless one half outweighs the other, you will not pass through the gateway.” Rumi didn’t even bother to change out of her pyjama pants—let it be a tradition between Jinu and her—and just pulled her tight boots and threw on a jacket. “I’m ready!” she proclaimed. Sussy rolled his eyes and flew onto Derpy’s head. The tiger, having made no progress in washing himself, got up without a shred of feline grace and strode onto the balcony. The portal beneath him lit up, and Rumi hastily grabbed the blue fur. A moment later, she had fallen into another world. “Oh no!” came a chorus of voices from all sides. Rumi didn’t rush to draw her sword, but quickly scanned the surroundings to assess the situation. She found herself in a spacious interior, the living room of a traditional Korean house, right in the middle of a table where almost the entire Saja Boys were seated. The boys’ demonic appearances didn’t make them any less attractive, to Rumi’s surprise, but rather added depth and ethereal angularity to their features. They sat in a semicircle, hunched over a half-completed jigsaw puzzle. All the pieces, sorted by colour and shape, were mixed up into meaningless piles after Rumi landed on them. Only the piece with the cut watermelon remained intact. The tiger and the magpie had already gone, leaving her alone with the enemies. Hopefully, the former ones. “Hey, didn’t you bring your pretty gang?” Romance asked, fluttering his indecently long eyelashes. “No,” Rumi muttered, noting to herself that she would have to tell her friends about the unplanned outing and the demons-idols who had risen from the dead. “Where’s Jinu?” Baby pouted childishly. Rumi wasn’t impressed. “Selfish,” Mystery hissed through clenched teeth. His grin rivaled a knife in sharpness. “I can deliver letters for you,” Rumi offered. “Oh.” The shaggy demon leaned back in his chair, clearly losing interest. “We don’t know how to write,” Romance explainedwith a wilted voice. “Someone never thought to teach us…” Rumi barely managed to keep from rolling her eyes. She imagined Jinu surrounded by four handsome but dim-witted tigers. “Then draw it!” she suggested, stifling a laugh, and poked Abby, who had been silent the whole time, in the shoulder. Cheered up, the demons bustled around and got paper and ink from nowhere. “Jinu is outside,” Romance finally said, without looking at Rumi. The hallway was empty, except for the wall covered with Saja Boys posters. The demonic world was dull and cold, windless and quiet. Instead of trees, there were weirdly shaped stones, thorns resembling bizarre corals, and trembling tentacles sticking out of the ground. Too absorbed by the view, Rumi did not notice another demon approaching. “You came,” whispered Jinu right behind her. Rumi jumped. “You scared me!” “Bad habit,” he grinned, and in the next second his arms were full of an extremely upset girl. Rumi’s marks glowed faintly, and her extra eyes opened slightly. They perceived colours differently, seeing purple swirls in the air, the lazy flow of energy in the ‘corals’… The demonic world was more beautiful than it had seemed at first glance. Jinu sat her down on a bench carved from a huge boulder. On one side stood a stone guard with its mouth agape, and on the other sat Derpy, who had finally figured out how to use his paw to clean the fur on his chest. Sussy was hiding somewhere. “How are things going for Huntrix now when their only competitors are gone?” Jinu smiled warmly and offered Rumi a seat. She didn’t want to let go his hand for a second. The touch proved that it was all real, that Jinu hadn’t disappeared anywhere. A spark had flown between them even before the decisive battle, and now Rumi didn’t know how to move forward. Considering how old Jinu really was, he probably had no idea how relationships should develop in the twenty-first century either. Resting her head on his shoulder, Rumi slowly began to sing. Look, the reapers’ skin is pale, Eyes steal dreams and make you wail, Mad for prey, their souls are frail. Being endless is an illusion, So intangibly confusing, Harvest grim is what they choose, so. Have they beating hearts or not? Mum or sis are their weak spot. Sure, the bait can get them caught. We will give them all our support, Answer their soundless resort— Love-starved souls we long to exhort. Over with perennial despair— Days off for them we go to share, For a peaceful home, we will care. Have they beating hearts or not? Mum or sis are their weak spot. Sure, the bait can get them caught. Fill their spirits with sunny light, Make faces colorful and bright, Take them as our close satellites. Call to sing here side by side, Fight with fire until it dies, We will be their saving guides. Have they beating hearts or not? Mum or sis are their weak spot. Sure, the bait can get them caught. “Very touching,” Jinu whispered after a long silence and lightly kissed Rumi’s temple. “I… We thought you were dead.” She had nothing else to say—the song contained all of Huntrix’s feelings. “One good deed is not enough to atone for sins. But this is a start.” Rumi couldn’t bring herself to feel sorry about it. No matter how much she tried to convince herself that Jinu’s soul had gained long-awaited freedom and gone on to a well-deserved rebirth, she was glad that he still belonged to this world. One of her worlds. Chatting about this and that, they spent the whole day—or night—in the‘garden’and fell asleep shoulder to shoulder. Rumi missed this peace, without Bobby’s fuss, Mira’s temper, and Zoey’s endless chatter, without fans lurking in the streets and restoring their image, without bittersweet encounters with Celine—here, Rumi was free from their expectations. A loud crack woke her up. “I warned you,” a stern-voiced unknown demon said. He was dressed in a reaper’s robe and wore a long black veil over his hat. Familiar circles with dots in the centre stood out on his white sleeves. “Sussy?” Rumi squeaked, quickly wiping the saliva from her chin, hoping Jinu hadn’t noticed. Turning to him, she breathed a sigh of relief. Jinu was asleep, impermissibly cute and flawless. Even dressed in a simple traditional jacket, he looked ready to perform on stage. Lately, Rumi had noticed that she was spending less and less time on her makeup. Perhaps her demonic half preferred to always look good… “What are you talking about?” Rumi asked, turning completely towards Sussy. A bad feeling began to overwhelm her. The man tilted his head like a bird. “Unless one half outweighs the other, you will not pass through the gateway. Leave now, or there will be too much demon in you. Then the rules will change.” “B-but how—” Rumi looked at Jinu. “What rules? I won’t be able to come back?” “Breathe, child,” Sussy burst out with a cackling laugh, ironic but not malicious. “No. Jinu will not stop your dates. Just remember my warning.” “Dates?!” Before she could say anything else, Rumi fell into the open Derpy portal. Rubbing against her legs, the tiger left, leaving the girl alone with a new burden on her shoulders.