The Fallen Angel // A Kim Namjoon Fanfiction

44

Namjoon's lips were parted as he gazed at the beauty in front of him. The lake where he took his bath a few days ago was nothing compared to this magnificent piece of art.

It was endless, making him think if it was really a lake or some bigger water body. The water in the lake was glistening beautifully even in the dark like a diamond shine brightly when some light is shown to it. There were small trees, like the one where they picked their berries, they covered the border of the lake on his side.

He wished he could fly to see how the place would look from the sky, he wanted to take in the entire thing in one picture. It felt magical, too good to be real.

He looked at the water again and felt like it was inviting him and without any second thought he started walking towards it, his legs we working on its own and his mind was still absent.

He passed by the trees and was finally next to the beautiful lake. Still looking at the lake with longing eyes, he crouched down and extended his arm to touch the water, his finger just inches away from it.

"I wouldn't do that if I was you." He heard a voice and immediately took his arm back in a snap. He still couldn't believe that he was about to touch the lake when Hyeri had already warned him that it was very dangerous.

He looked back at the direction of the voice and saw a very old and tired man with a big bird on his shoulder. The bird was green and blue and seemed more interested in him than the old man.

Namjoon awkwardly stood up and walked towards the man who eyed him lazily. Hesitantly, Namjoon slightly bowed towards the man who was supposedly going to take his next test.

"Thank you sir, I don't know why I did that, for a moment I was lost." Namjoon admitted.

"Never judge the book by its cover, especially if you're in the middle of nowhere." The man said looked at his bird who started flapping it's wings scaring Namjoon more than he already was. Soon, the bird sat back calmly on the man's shoulder again.

"Look at the lake again." Namjoon lifted his brow and turned back again but almost screamed as he was surprised at the change of scenery.

"Ho- what happened?" The lake that he saw before was gone and so did all it's glory. What was left behind looked something like a swamp. A dirty and greasy swamp.

The trees were replaced with trunks covered with greenish slime. The lake that was shining like a jewel was now covered in thick green slum. He now felt the insufferable stench coming from everywhere around him.

The feeling he had earlier was now replaced with disgust and unpleasantness. He couldn't believe that he was about to touch that thing which looked like it had stopped flowing millions of years ago.

"An illusion. Like a wanderer sees a mirage in the middle of nowhere, you saw what you wanted to see." The man said monotonously.

"I was going to drink the water."

"Many had drunk it before and suffered a long painful life, it hindered their ability to think so now I have to warn you universe travelers." He said but judging from his tone Namjoon figured he didn't want to deal with him anyway.

"So let's start." The man said and walked towards the lake.

If there was anything that Namjoon found similar to the previous illusion was that it was still endless. He still couldn't see the other corner and it scared him.

Everything about the place scared him. From the weird man standing in front of him and his strange bird to the ground he was standing that was almost invisible, he was unsure about everything.

He saw the bird leave and the man staring at him without any expression.

"Why are you here?" The man asked as a routine.

"I'm here to cross the lake."

"There is only one way to cross this river." The man said and the bird returned but it wasn't alone, almost parallel to the flying bird was a boat paddling on its own.

The boat didn't look like a boat at all. It was just a piece of carved wood with two long oars sticking on its side. Namjoon was not sure if that boat was safe but it was his only means to do that according to Hyeri's theory and the man himself had said it.

"You can take my boat but you'll have to pay for it."

"Pay for it?"

"Yes, follow me." The man started walking away from the lake.

Namjoon was scared, he thought he was supposed to answer questions here. Hyeri told him that it will be easy but how was he supposed to pay for it? The only thing he had on his body was his shirt and pant and he wasn't ready to give them up, not when he had someone waiting for him outside.

He still followed the man and his bird although he kept a good distance from him considering the foul aura he was emitting. Although Hyeri had told him it was better to have a man instead of a demon, he had better experiences with the demons in his last challenge and would prefer them in his place.

They walked for about ten minutes and Namjoon was surprised to see that the boat followed the man and the bird very closely. The magic aspect was strange to him. He realized that if many people before him drank the water, the illusion was not just his thoughts but a wicked cover up that they had initially put up but like Hyeri said, they can't use nature to manipulate the results, they dropped it a while ago seeing that it made the task almost impossible.

Namjoon saw the man stop and the bird leave his shoulder again, it flapped it's wings and the rock in front of him split up into two.