gladiolus | enhypen (On Hiatus)

5: The Thief and the Witch

NIKI

"So where can we find this Jungwon fellow?" Jake asked as we walked through the town.

" Oh, we don't have to find him...he'll find us," I replied. He raised an eyebrow.

" Keep your hands over your pockets just in case," I warned him.

Immediately Jake's hands shoved into his pockets. When he realized he didn't actually have anything in them he slowly took them back out embarrassed. I laughed at him.

But the smile was wiped out from my face as I saw the state the town was in. Since we were pretty close to the center of the kingdom, the damage was significantly less than the outer areas that were attacked . But it was still a depressing sight to see.

All the faces around seemed to have lost any sign of life. Moving about their day mechanically as if their minds were disassociated from their bodies. They only had a burst of movement to bow to us before they went back to their blank stares.

Every few blocks I would see someone just wailing on the sidewalk.
But most people paid them no mind. I doubt they were in any position to comfort anyone when they needed it themselves. Many of these people had someone in their family who left to fight for the war and never returned.
Many of them were probably trying their best not to join the person on the sidewalk.

A thought crossed my mind, 'they probably hate us right now.'

But I brushed if off as quickly. Thinking like that won't do anyone any good.

Jake didn't seem to have realized that though. When I looked over at him, his brows were furrowed in distress. I reached over and squeezed his hand as we continued with our walk through the depressing town square.

That was when I suddenly felt a chilly breeze on the top of my chest. What in the world...

I looked down and to my disbelief the top three buttons of my shirt were missing!

My left eye twitched in annoyance, " Oi Jungwon! You better show yourself before I ask Sunoo to turn you into a frog!"

We heard a snort from behind us and turned around to see the devil himself clutching my buttons in one hand and clutching his stomach in the other, practically bent over laughing.

" You should see the look on your face!" He said pointing at me wheezing.

Then all of a sudden he faced Jake and turned into a completely different person.

"Oh hello Your Highness. How was your day?" He said bowing and speaking in the most polite tone I've never heard him speak.

I was have having none of it. " Why you!" I dashed towards him with my hands out as if to strangle him. He yelped and started running too.

"How dare you steal a princes' buttons! And where's my 'Your Highness' you jerk?" I said still running after him.

" Well I was actually going to steal your belt" Jungwon looked over his shoulder and grinned, " but I realized even 'Your Highness'," emphasizing the two words in the most sarcastic way possible, "wouldn't be able to pull of the pants-around-your-ankles look." He finished.

At which point I had caught up with him and tackled him to the ground.

" I swear I'm gonna kill you one of these days."

"But you won't, cause you love me," Jungwon just cutely stuck his tongue out.

I gagged.

Jake who was watching the whole show from a distance finally approached us.

He held out a hand to Jungwon to help him.