Hongjoong gathered himself. Tried to think of where to start and how his tale of magic would make the most sense to Seonghwa.

Apprehensive, Seonghwa hugged his arms around his body. He was scared Hongjoong might lie to him. Might try to get him on his side. But a small part inside of him hoped to understand.

Ultimately, Hongjoong sighed and settled for the beginning. Mindless fingers played around his bone staff and its dangling light source swept over him hauntingly.

"I was born 200 years ago to a humble family of peasants."

Right away, Seonghwa almost lost his footing despite being halfway seated on top of the table.

"Two-" He gasped with a hand before his lips. Hongjoong snickered, aware of their big age difference. But it was barely to be noticed, with an ageless creature like him.

Hongjoong continued, voice nostalgic over a distant past. A different lifetime.

"In early years, we discovered the magic in my blood. I had a morbid fascination with death. It was fun for me to kill the animals in the fields, to take them apart and mix their blood and guts with water and herbs. I didn't know back then what I was doing, but it was my blood calling to me."

Seonghwa shuddered at that sentence. He could envision it vividly. The small child with the pointy features, hands splattered with blood as he made his potions with anything that came into his hands.

"Necromancy isn't inherited. It's a learned skill. Some say the children growing up to become necromancers are often ill and have a close relationship with death, so they teeter on the edge of life and death. Befriend the dead. I was also ill and wasn't expected to get older than my twenties."

Worried, Seonghwa eyed him up and down. Nothing of that illness remained visible. Had he suffered how the people in the village had? Did his necromancy eat at his livelihood?

Hongjoong continued, no longer attached to this part of him. He brushed it away, as if falling sick and wanting to save his life wasn't a valid reason to reach for the helping hands of magic.

At least to Seonghwa, it was.

"I received schooling at the royal court of this castle. The court mage was no necromancer, but he taught me to harness my magic and hoped I would use it for good. I largely worked as a healer for a couple of years. But every day, I coughed up more blood."

Seonghwa's hands clenched in his lap. His heart ached at the vision of Hongjoong as a young adult, barely starting life when it already declined. Was he cynical back then? Did he hate his fate? Or were his eyes full of hope?

Seonghwa wanted to see below that blindfold.

Steady on his tale, Hongjoong's hollow voice weaved Seonghwa into the fabric of his story.

"I knew the end was coming, so I dabbled into the magic inherently my own. Felt how easily it came to me. Its rush of power. I made sure my death wouldn't be permanent. That I would come back into a stronger body."

"This one," Seonghwa whispered, finally understanding what was off about it. Hongjoong had died long ago. His blood ran cold and his heart stopped beating. This body wasn't alive, it was just his shell to live in. 

"I built this form. From the bodies of this tomb, I took their strong legs, their lean chests. I shaped myself a body that wouldn't easily fall sick and crumble. Only my face would remain my own. And when I passed, my soul made its new home."

Somehow, his story was full of sadness. How long must he have felt alienated by himself? By his pale face on a collection of foreign limbs? Did he feel cold? Or was he no longer tied to such mortal concerns?

Whenever he wanted, Hongjoong could make a new body. Could become a dreadful beast.

Yet he chose a shape so human. His only demand being that he wouldn't get sick again, even when he couldn't, in death.

Sorrowful, Seonghwa watched him talk. His fingers didn't stray near the blade again, even when a monologuing necromancer was so easy to kill. 

"I have lived here for many years. At first, I worked for the same king. Drew confessions from the dead and supplied him with a sinister army. But he was doomed to fall. Only I remained. Me and my many friends in the palace. I buried them, gave them new life. Related to the upset of dying too soon for reasons we couldn't control."

Hongjoong studied his staff, and its light illuminated his blindfold.

"My presence here wasn't a secret. Some inhabitants of your village have always known the magic that lurks here. The priest shuns me, but most feared or even respected my seat here. I never bothered the village, and they never bothered me."

Seonghwa tensed up. Now came the part of the disease. Why would Hongjoong, who lived so lonely to catch up with the time reaped from him, go against the neighbours he accepted for so long?

Unafraid to tell him, Hongjoong faced Seonghwa once more.

"One day, a man from the village came to visit me. His wife was deathly ill and the poor fool was so in love with her; thought they didn't have enough time left. He begged me to save her. I told him I was no healer, but it didn't matter to him. He wanted to be with his wife in whatever capacity. Though I didn't understand love, I understood the need to prolong a life."

Wary of where this was going, Seonghwa held onto his fingers. Did Hongjoong's magic fail? He was powerful enough to make himself a new body while he was alive, and he learned infinitely more. Surely, he wouldn't slip up and curse everyone else for a single woman?

"In return for my help, that man promised me his firstborn. A life for a life. Since a young soul is worth more to me than a sickly old one, I agreed. I brought back his wife after she died, and soon, she gave birth to the life that blossomed before her death. I promised them time; was patient to reap my rewards. 22 years with their child. And the rest would be mine."

Nervously, Seonghwa counted his winters. It was similar enough, though he lived for 24 already. When had this happened?

Hongjoong continued. His ever-so-unreadable face didn't change when he noticed Seonghwa gnawing on his lip.

"22 years passed, and I didn't receive what I was promised. The foolish man refused me my payment, saying he couldn't sacrifice his child. I warned him to keep his promises, for magic isn't easily refused its reward. But I was denied. When 22 years went by and my magic didn't regain the soul it was promised, it turned wrathful like the dead. Spread disease and sickness over the lands to punish those who withheld me from my reward. All but that child should die for fooling me."

His voice wasn't wrathful. Though wronged, he was only partly in control of that outcome. His magic wasn't appeased when it couldn't gather itself after its efforts. Hongjoong could have left and stopped its rampage, but he was the one who got crossed.

Seonghwa understood the human struggle, but he agreed with Hongjoong's wrath. Perhaps that man should have confessed to the other villagers. Could have found a different way to appease Hongjoong. But he didn't. He refused to acknowledge what he gained.

Hongjoong continued.

"And then you showed up right before me. Knew where you were meant to be and who granted you this life. The lovely soul promised to me had grown into such a beautiful person."

Seonghwa came up short. Wide eyes stared back at the necromancer, who leaned against his staff with a thin smile on his lips. Marvelling at Seonghwa.

"I-It can't be me," Seonghwa stuttered. Yes, he found this place, but he wasn't the child promised to Hongjoong. His father wouldn't have...

"It is."

"B-But my mother is alive. She is at home, still breathing."

Hongjoong shook his head.

"The person in your home is the husk of your mother's body, brought to life by my magic. All I could do when your father brought her to me. Her soul has passed on. It's impossible to bind souls back into their bodies. Upon death, they get separated."

Seonghwa sat frozen in his spot. This couldn't be the truth. Had his father done something like that? Was the ghostly appearance of his mother and her brittle health because she was... dead?

Terrified, Seonghwa peered up at Hongjoong when he stepped closer. His realisation dawned on him slowly.

Why he didn't get sick. Why his mother looked deathly ill without ever dying. Why Hongjoong accepted him in and became so fond of him.

This was where Seonghwa had been supposed to be from the very beginning.

Cool fingers touched his neck at the edge of his collar. Caressed over the laces keeping it around Seonghwa's neck. 

"When I made my oath, my magic ingrained itself in a mark. A summoning circle, changing as time passed. Once it was complete, it would spread illness upon everyone but the person my magic belongs to."

For the first time since Seonghwa could think, fingers tugged the laces of his collar apart. Seonghwa didn't fight it. His nape burnt as if it knew who was near. As if his skin flared in joy whenever Hongjoong's magic touched upon it.

The collar came apart. Hongjoong slipped it off Seonghwa's skin slowly, and it hadn't grown in. The flimsy leather fell into his twitching fingers, discoloured with age.

Seonghwa flinched when cold fingers settled on his nape. They traced a circle and the symbols inside. The same as the two had drawn countless times. Signs of binding Hongjoong's magic. 

"Here it is. My mark. Which your parents desperately hid from you. Burying their shame to hope you could live a regular life. When they knew all along, you wouldn't be at peace when they didn't keep their bargain."

A hand swiped over the surface of the potion by their side. Like a mirror, it reflected the vision of Seonghwa's nape he could never see. The purple ink in his pale skin. Glowing brightly as Hongjoong was near.

Seonghwa gulped. This was definitely him. Definitely his own nape.

But why? Why him? Why would his parents do that? 

Though Seonghwa wanted to sob and cry, Hongjoong wasn't finished yet. He stood before the trembling villager, so helpless against the forces of magic.

"I couldn't reverse its completion. Spells have a mind of their own to reap what they sow. But I felt sorry for your anguish. So I tried to keep you close, to soothe my agitated magic so it would forgive the villagers. Your presence calmed it, since it felt like you were finally mine. So our combined efforts stopped the curse meant to kill all."

A gentle thumb caressed Seonghwa's cheek. Showing empathy. 

Hollow, Seonghwa stared into the grand room. 

He was at fault for the village's suffering and at the same time, he wasn't. Yes, the spell would lift if Hongjoong was dead, but it never would have hurt people in the first place if Seonghwa had known the truth.

Hongjoong wasn't awful. Seonghwa liked being with him.

Why did they never tell him? Why would they curse the entire village for the sake of Seonghwa? How did his mother smile so serenely, happy when he lived and everyone else died?

The selfishness behind their actions tasted bitter on Seonghwa's tongue. He clutched his trembling fingers to each other.

Hongjoong couldn't be lying. Seonghwa had seen it himself, how the curse slowed the moment he started spending time with the necromancer.

"Ask your mother if you don't believe me, even when I know so much. The mark on your neck has long since been completed and that is when the curse befell the village. About a year ago, yes?"

Seonghwa peered up at Hongjoong. So sorry for him and the village. This wasn't his fault. It was the selfishness of Seonghwa's father.

"My mother... Go home?" Seonghwa muttered, dazed by all this information.

But Hongjoong shook his head and straightened his back. His fingers beckoned to a shadow nearby, hovering despite the light. They glided closer upon his command and Seonghwa wiped at his runny nose, so cold and hopeless against the forces ruling over him.

"Both of them are right here. Sticking around since the guilt of lying to you never granted them rest. And neither did I."

Seonghwa's heart leapt in his chest. Slowly, he peered over to the shadows as they began to shift and take form under the command of Hongjoong's magic.