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sailoryooons · 2 years

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Carved | Two | jjk (m)

→ Summary: Hundreds of years after the Underworld wins the war, Vaesen - demon kind - rule the Realms. The Vanir - creatures of light and the Heavens - are hunted and enslaved by Vaesen. When the demon prince Jungkook is given one of the Carved - angels who have been stripped of their wings - he has no idea what to do with you. You, however, have plans you are determined to see through. Even if it means death in the end.

→ Pairing: demon!Jungkook x angel!Reader

→ Rating: NSFW & 18+ Minors are strictly prohibited from engaging with this content. Any minors discovered interacting with adult content will be blocked immediately.

→ Type: Series (ten chapters)

→ Genre: Urban fantasy AU, dystopian, enemies to semi-lovers, semi-slow burn

→ Warnings: This is in generic a very dark world where the evil and cruel rule - there are slavery dynamics, abusive power dynamics and mistreatment. This chapter includes: graphic depiction of torture, graphic depictions of blood and dismemberment, dubious consent to naked bodies (reader has no way to know if characters have consented), lewd descriptions of posing, mentions of enslavement, disassociation references to reader's body, sadistic behavior from minor and major characters, explicit language, referenced sexual acts as art (oral, m. receiving), references to reader being used for pleasure, descriptions of fear and anxiety, Taehyung is the absolute worst, Jungkook is bleak AF.

→ Main Masterlist: here

→ faq

A/N: After going back and forth a LOT and with special thanks to @jjkeverlast and @gimmethatagustd for being amazing sounding boards and letting me pick their brain / encouraging me to do what I want with this story, this chapter does not have the originally planned smut. In order to fully develop a connection with reader and Jungkook where the sexual intimacy doesn't feel dub-con, I've opted to extend this story from eight to ten chapters to give myself more room to create tension between them, as well as to allow me to write chapters that aren't 20k because that has become increasingly time consuming. Please be patient with the smut - I promise it will be there but a great friend (Lati, it was Lati) recently told me that I should not sacrifice plot for the sake of smut and my wife is RIGHT. Enjoy :)

Disclaimer: All members of BTS are faces and name claims for this story. This is entirely a work of fiction and by no means is meant to be a projection, judgement or representation of real life people. Any scenarios or representations of the people and places mentioned in works are not representative of real life scenarios. Moreover, none of my works accurately reflect, represent or take a stance on the nuances of Korean culture, cities, people etc. BTS is not BTS culturally, intellectually, physically or representationally in my stories, and should be considered name and face stand-ins for made up characters.

/ PREVIOUS / NEXT CHAPTER /

Cold concrete bites into your knees as you kneel on the ground. Your eyes look at the listless color and you begin to list all of the shades of gray that you can think of.

Gray. Smoke. Slate. Ash. Soot. Gunmetal. Iron.

And then there are other types of gray that don’t have a name, but you can picture them perfectly.

The gray skin of a corpse that has long been left to rot in the cot next to you while you wait for a buyer.

The graying pallor of a Vanir’s face as they're rutted into, painful silence between you, looking at you with tear-stained eyes and bulging veins from across the room.

Gray, prized bones fashioned into necklaces around the glaedia who proudly wear their victories on their necks, their arms, their ears. Bones collected, blood conquered, money won.

Your life is painted gray, toeing the line between good intention and violent methods.

But there is no peace without violence, no morals without corruption and no peace without war.

Thankfully, the concrete is just gray. There is no other implication, no other memory laced with the color. Even more prominent than the listless color is the fact that it is absolutely freezing. Though you don’t have the means to prove it, you believe that this is Faustus’ last vicious send off.

Stripped to underwear and a bra, you wait, head tilted down. The air conditioning in the room hums, air coming through the filter. It is crisp – not like the stale air of the barracks that you’re used to, humid with Vanir sweat and piss.

Immediately after your sale to Lord Jungkook, you were carted back to Faustus’ manor in the Manor District of Lythos.

The house is a horrific design, fashioned to look like an archaic Greek temple from days that were ash and dust on an earth that is ash and dust now. You have no idea what the temple to the Greek gods looked like, but you’re sure that bleached marble and the horrific red curtains he favors was not it.

It will be the first time you’ve seen your wings since Faustus bought you over seventy years ago. Before that it was another master in another city. You have been a glaedia for so long, have had so many masters over the years.

They blend together, the masters and their whips. Both mortal and immortal. You have been through rounds of sales – private auctions, sales of state after an untimely death, forced acquisition to pay off debts.

Fighting in matches, slaughtering criminals of war, wrestling in blood and mud in underground fighting rings, standing on gilded pedestals while painted gold and glitter to be ogled at, laying in beds to be roughly thrust into, dragged by your hair across a ballroom of blood at a party– your uses are endless.

You have been a fighter, a whore, an art piece, a collector's item, prey for hunting games. You are versatile, moldable.

It is a wonder how Faustus stumbled onto you at all. You were quite out of his price range when your previous master, a Shinigami lord of Parthos, had died in a bizarre manner- scorched through the chest with something.

But the Shinigami was the oldest of his kind in Parthos, a powerful user of light and shadow.

And there were no fire users in his house. No Vanir who could summon flame that could damage a Vaesen permanently, no weapon that could carve a whole through his god-like chest and rip out the very soul of him.

So you were sold in the estate sale – no heirs, no will – and greedy little Faustus had picked you out. No one had any idea where he got the money. He had a single successful glaedia under his name before you bought him additional wealth to his home.

That single glaedia was now dead.

You stare at concrete. You tell yourself it will be the color of Ulf’s ashes. That they will burn him, that they will get rid of any existence of him. He will float up and up to the heavens and into the halls of Valhalla where his people will wait for him in that gilded hall.

It will not be full of Vaesen, commanded by no lord, but ruled by chaos and carnage.

These are the lies that you tell yourself. No one is a bigger liar than you are - especially to yourself. You have made an artform of lying, perfected it better than your skill with a sword.

It is so cold in the room. You cannot imagine what the temperature of the home must be to affect you. You are a seraph– an immortal that belongs to Heaven Delta, the name they have assigned to the Christian theological resting place. There are so many heavens and hells it’s hard to keep track of them all. But someone somewhere has done just that – filled a page with a list of heavens and hells, other worlds and underworlds, neatly scribbling them into order.

Seraph.

The seraphim are angels of God. Soldiers of Heaven – well, Heaven Delta.

You know very little of Heaven. You’re not the legendary Michael with his flaming sword, or the conquering Gabriel with his spear. You’re much lower on the totem pole in regard to the hierarchy of the seraphim, but you were a part of the legion, a trained soldier united in the fight against the Underworld.

There aren't many seraphim around anymore. They had been on the frontlines of the war, natural born leaders and mindless soldiers who could chew through ranks of Vaesen kind like machines. Perfect weapons who could communicate through their ranks filled with hundreds with just a touch of the mind. Creatures who commanded heavenly fire, storms, minds – the seraphim were built for battle.

So why shouldn’t they be on the front lines?

Cannon fodder, you think absently now. You don’t know if it’s hubris or stupidity that has eradicated your species. There are plenty of malakim and malaikah left – the angels that belong to heavens associated with Islamic and Judaism faiths – though they are smaller in nature and don’t have the same, brutal obsession with war.

But they can be Carved just like you can, their pretty little wings ripped from their backs like butterflies.

The door opens behind you. You go still – unbreathing. The voices are loud as they enter the room. You were so distracted replaying the folly of the seraphim that you had not heard them approach.

Regardless, you remain head bowed, looking at the floor which you have settled to just call gray.

“Its back is an eyesore,” a deep baritone snorts. You associate this voice with Kim Taehyung. His voice is sweet as honey and dulcet, all the better to lure prey with. His words don’t bother you, though. “Can something not be done for that? That is the last thing I want to see while getting off.”

Jungkook is in the room. You feel that disconnected presence that you block out, the energy that hums on the same frequency as you.

Seraphim radio, your commander called it once upon a time. A mental thread that only those with seraphic blood could tap into, some sort of psychic energy tied to your race.

Jungkook says nothing – has said nothing since telling Taehyung that he will take you instead. There are rituals to be performed, papers to sign and wings to pass on.

It is always the same. Your new master must be bound to you in the ancient language – the moment he touches your wings, the very essence of your grace that makes you seraphim, he will own your grace, your power.

To be a Carved angel is to have the wings removed for two reasons: the symbol of power and glory, and the absolute command of an angel through their grace – the very essence and power that God himself used to command the Legion eons ago.

You don’t know who discovered that if you separate the wings, you separate the grace. It became the most efficient way to rid angels of their power. But Lilith – now one of the three ruling Triumvirate – took that atrocity a step further: bind the grace to a Vaesen and command an angel like their god.

“It is a reminder of what they are,” Faustus informs Taehyung. Faustus strokes your hair lightly. You do not react. “She has such pleasing features, though. Her back is not so disfiguring in comparison.”

“Ugly,” Taehyung notes. “Such a shame. It has an exquisite face.”

“She also rides well.” Faustus grabs your chin with his meaty hands. They are cold and firm as he tilts your chin upwards. The white lights of the sterile room make you dizzy, blinking until your eyes adjust. He looks down at you – his jowls are fleshy and pale, such an odd combination for a vampire. “She is my favorite,” he croons. There are tears in his eyes as he looks behind you. “Lord Jeon, you are getting quite a prize.”

“You are most gracious,” Jungkook murmurs. His voice is a soft ripple in the night. “I know that Taehyung truly appreciates the chance to gift me the Carved. She’s an exquisite and rare gift, one I am likely not to forget.”

Faustus puffs out his chest. He licks at the sugared compliments, either uncaring or unaware that they’re the candy-coated words of a politician. He drops your jaw, and you go back to staring at the floor. Still gray, still cold.

“Do I need to know anything about her?”

Faustus calls for one of his other Vanir servants – Melli, from the smell of it, a small witch he uses to tend to his glaedia’s wounds. “This is Reaper’s physical and medical profile since being Carved.”

“What about before?”

“What do you mean?”

The sound of flipping papers whispers through the room. You imagine that they’re white, just a few shades lighter than the gray of the floor. Jungkook sifts through them, the pads of his fingers scratching the edges loudly. He must have callused hands, from the sound of it. You wonder how he has earned them.

Working isn’t likely as the son of a Triumvirate. The Triumvirate are the three ruling powers of the Realms, split between a fair share of Realms and worlds to rule over. There are, of course, minor lords who rule cities and Realms with the guidance of the Triumvirate, for the world is far too vast to be everywhere at once.

Your guess is training. Jungkook is the son of Belial, an ancient demon and one of the fallen, first to follow Lucifer for Heaven Delta and Hell Delta’s war on earth.

That war is older than time itself, it feels like. You know Jungkook isn’t that old – doesn't feel that old to you as his energy flickers like a twin flame to yours. But it doesn’t make him any less powerful.

Greater demons and gods stretch across the Realms everywhere, ancient creatures who slunk out of their holes for the War of the Realms to help the Underworld overwhelm the Heavens and gain sovereignty.

Sometimes you wonder what the humans would think, knowing that all their beliefs and theological stories had a lot of truth to them. There are hundreds of gods, monsters, creatures, spirits. All of them exist in heavens and hells, their dimensions lined up neatly in universal order.

And you exist among them, among the Vaesen, the scores of creatures from the Underworld.

“There is nothing that exists after the Carving,” Faustus says carefully. You acknowledge that it is both true and untrue. “The removal of the wings is like removing the core of a creature. The grace is what roots all angels to their power, to their god, to one another. Without the wings, which carry the grace, they are unable to use things like rationale and emotion.”

“She did not seem devoid of emotion while giving Quietus a vigil,” Jungkook notes.

You grit your teeth. You want to scream at him, to rage and shout, His name was Ulf.

To give him that stupid Latin name was an insult to his people, to his heritage. He was made of waters cold and deep, of halls filled with power and warmth, of mountains steady and proud. He was Ulfheðnar and he was your friend.

And you killed him.

"We encourage glaedia to be more in tune with instinctual emotions when they fight,” Faustus answers Lord Jungkook carefully. “It creates a more genuine fight, a raw beauty to the slaughter that makes these matches worth it.”

Your knees are beginning to grow tired of the floor and the room is still so cold. Faustus strokes your hair and it offers no warmth. You feel no relief at the gentle motion. It does not lull you, but rather a slimy feeling seeps in through your scalp, clinging to your skull.

“So, you have no information of before she was Carved?” Boots appear in your line of sight, heavy and black. You can feel Jungkook just before you. His presence is stifling, like there is a shadow that presses up against your senses. “How did she come to be Carved?”

“Like I said, there is no history before they are Carved. They are reborn into the Carved and that is where their history begins. What happens before is of no concern.”

“I do find it concerning.” Jungkook smells like spice and sandalwood. You feel that gentle brush of his consciousness again, like a finger tracing a door frame. You don’t let him in. You can sense him there, but you do not have to acknowledge him. “My father spent hundreds of years eradicating the seraphim. Those few that exist are either enslaved by the worthy or are rebel conspirators for Libram.”

Faustus pauses. Faustus has no idea that you are a seraph. The lower Vaesen rarely can tell the difference. You’re sure he would not be parting with you so easily had he known.

You admire Jungkook’s mind. You can already see him putting together the pieces of a conspiracy: a Carved seraph, one of the rarest and the most loyal Vanir slaves mysteriously landing in the hands of a gutless vampire with the means to buy and sell Vanir for glaedia fighting.

For Libram, a seraphim-led rebel group, to have an inside network of slaves entering and leaving the city under the guide of glaedia matches would be an excelled asset – especially in the heart of Lythos. Information could flow to and from with Libram moving their Vanir agents all throughout the city.

It’s a good theory. You have to admit that Jungkook’s ability to see the potential threat. It’s a wrong theory, but it is a good one.

The vampire’s grip on your head increases. “She is seraphim?”

“You did not know?”

“Like I said,” he answers carefully. “There is no history before they are Carved. It is burned out of them.” There is a shift in the room. “Can I convince you to purchase another one of my glaedia? I- “

Taehyung snarls, “How do you not fucking know you have a Carved seraph? How did you come by the Carved? You were nothing before your purchase of Reaper. How do we know you’re not an agent for Libram?”

“I- I bought her in an estate sale, Mr. Kim. When Lord Sato of Parthos was murdered-"

“How could you afford her?” Taehyung is a bloodhound after a trail. You hear him shuffle closer to Faustus. The demon is on the edge of your vision, but you keep your gaze diverted. “Did not a single person know she was seraphim? I find it hard to believe you look at her and think she’s malakim.”

Faustus sputters. “I don’t know! I won a hand off some strange Japanese demon or other at the casino two weeks before the estate sale. Her papers said she was a good fighter, so I bought her and entered her into a match. She was good at it!”

Jungkook sighs. “Enough, Taehyung. We’ll question him after the transfer of ownership. Can we complete whatever ritual is necessary?”

You hear the ripple of Faustus’ clothes as he bows. His voice is thin now, his fear showing. You smell the sour tinge of it, like sweat but worse. “Of course, my lord.” His voice is weak and frightened. “Bring the wings.”

No one speaks in the room. Faustus is trembling, standing less than a foot from you. He tries to make conversation a single time but Taehyung hisses at him, the sound dark enough to curdle milk.

A scuff on the floor makes your ears perk. Whispers of feathers on the floor, the shaking power that comes with grace. You know that you have a fraction of that power still in you, but the room crackles with power as they bring your wings into the room. You can feel them and suddenly your shoulder blades are aching, the twisted and ruined scar tissue.

You grit your teeth, fists clenching and opening resting in your lap. The sensation is painful but most of all, it's uncomfortable. It's like an itch you can’t reach, like the issue and nerves under layers of skin begin to writhe and squirm like magots, twisting and turning and crawling.

“If you would please cut your right palm, Lord.”

You close your eyes. The worst part is coming, but you’ve done this before. This is nothing.

The smell of iron and honey reaches your nose. A shiver snakes through you as Jungkook shuffles away from you, boots leaving your field of vision. You can smell the angel blood in him. It calls to you, knowing what he is poking at the walls around your mind.

A needle-like pain scratches your back. You know the wings have been cut. You can still feel your wings, the link between you and them permanent. Faustus instructs someone to cut your back open, to peel open one of the main scars. Taehyung offers to do it, so quickly that you hardly have a moment to inhale before his knife licks across your spine much deeper than necessary.

“Taehyung,” Jungkook murmurs. But it’s too soft to be a warning and it isn’t firm enough to be a reprimand.

Taehyung giggles. The sound is child-like, making you imagine a young Taehyung licking sticky, sweet candy from his fingers. “Sorry, I wasn’t sure it bled. It was cut so little during the fighting.”

Your wound weeps, read tears sliding down stiff, knotted skin. Jungkook cuts his other palm, placing it on the open wound. You feel the press of his blood against yours and power snaps through you with a physical crack. You flinch and hiss, the first sound and movement you’ve made since they have entered the room.

“Hush,” Faustus chastises. “Forgive me, Lord. She is still ill-tempered from her fight. I suggest that you take her home and wear her out by whatever method you prefer, it is the best way to soothe her fighting irritations.”

“Does this cause her pain?”

“It is very uncomfortable for them. I will be putting the grace connecting me to her wings back to the wings, while you will be pulling grace from the wings and passing it through you to her. It is not much grace – just a pinch will do. But it will bond you – your word will be final.”

There is no response from Jungkook. Your jaw aches from how hard you clench your teeth. Nails dig into palms as Faustus begins to chant, having Jungkook repeat the words. You feel the grace within you wake up, opening a single, fluttering eye as it yawns and shakes in its shackles.

Jungkook repeats the words and you feel a sharp yank at your soul. You gritted your teeth, the enamel grinding. It feels like there are hooks grabbing your mind, your soul, your being. You feel the drag of your grace from Faustus to the wings, from the wings to Jungkook. The sensation is like being chain at the angles and being dragged over pavement, scraping, biting, burning.

“Eyadai,” you gasp. Your hands and thighs are sweating as the grace is hauled through channel to channel. Your hands slide on your thighs as you sag forward, panting with the effort. Bloody marks appear as your nails damage your thighs. “Eyadai.”

“What?” Jungkook asks.

You can barely hear him over the mounting pressure in your eye. You squeeze your eyes shut so hard there’s stars and colors flashing behind your lids. “You’re saying the words wrong,” you snarl, spit flying from your lips. You feel the wetness on your thighs. “It’s pronounced et rei a eyadai sol. You will not bind the wings wrong if you do not say it right.”

“I don’t even know what language this is.”

“Enochian. Say it right. You are dragging my grace instead of commanding it.”

“That’s not how you speak to your lord, you Carved bitch,” Taehyung snarls.

“Apologies,” Faustus squeaks. “She has been temporarily unbound and has no master at the moment, making her quite able to say whatever she pleases. However, she is correct.”

Jungkook makes no comment. Instead, he repeats the words, careful to adjust to the new pronunciation. You sag in relief. The pressure lessons and the ritual flows better, Jungkook chanting the angelic language in his soft voice.

And his voice is soft, often barely speaking above a murmur. He is nothing like the son of Lord Belial should be. He should be loud and vicious, cruel and power hungry. Instead, he moves with quiet determination, either content to let Taehyung do the talking and decision making or unable to.

Weak, your mind whispers as Jungkook’s connection to you grows for a moment, flaring. You keep your mind shut off to him, refusing to let him see any part of you. He might have seraphim blood, but you are not the same.

The disgust you have for him flares into resistance as the spell claws at you. It hurts even more, burning through you and making you heave for breath. It burns your nerves, touching them with white-hot flame. Jungkook’s fingers dig into your wound, as though having a firmer grip on your mangle flesh will help him push his way into you.

Mental nails rake across the steel walls of your mind. You feel him scratching there, a dog gnawing at a bone. You don’t budge, sweat forming on your brow as the flow of grace begins to siphon off.

And then the connection is gone. Jungkook removes his hand from you and the ritual is done. You are panting on your hands and knees, blood drip drip dripping down your back. You feel it seeping into your underwear, making the waistband sticky.

Exhaustion pulls at your edges. You feel stretched, like too-thin skin pulled over a flat surface, edges beginning to fray. Behind your closed eyes, you see Ulf’s realization that you’ve switched weapon hands, realizing he has gone for your dagger and not the sword.

Piercing flesh makes a unique sound each time. It's never really the same way twice – usually dependent on weapon and force. You remember the thick crunch as your sword cleaved through his chest cavity. The wet sounds of his internal bleeding. All of the sounds and images weigh you down, stretch you furth, skin lancing in the middle with lightning bolts of stretch marks.

I deserve this, you think. You accept the cold hands as they jerk you to your feet. Evil has dripped from your hands for years, and it will continue to do so. As long as you're breathing, your choices will always be the same: sacrifice or survival.

And you have to survive.

So you sacrifice your friends – the Ulf’s of your world. You pretend that they find peace after you send them into the next world, but you know they will not.

You just send them to another hell. Another monstrous place.

“Do you have any belongings?” You’re wrapped up in your thoughts, wondering what it is that Lord Jungkook will use you for. He seemed to have no interest in you until Kim Taehyung threatened to use you as a pleasure slave. A hand snaps in front of you and you look upward.

Again, you are startled by Jungkook’s face. His features are at ends with one another – round eyes often associated with innocent, plush lips that are always flushed the color red, high cheekbones and a wide nose that looks flattering on him but would look ridiculous on anyone else.

Jungkook is the perfect mix of angelic and demonic. He’s too ethereal to be a demon, but his eyes are too dark and his jaw too sharp to be angelic.

“Do you have any belongings?”

“No, dominus.”

The honorific feels fuzzy on your tongue. He nods once and looks toward the door. “Namjoon, please take…” His brows pinch as he looks at you again. “Do you have a name?”

“For fucks sake,” Taehyung sighs somewhere behind you. “I forgot you used names.”

Your jaw ticks. Somehow it is unsurprising that Taehyung does not call his slaves by their names. Nor did you miss the way he only refers to you as it. “Your feedback is no longer welcome, Taehyung. Your name?”

“Y/N, dominus.”

“Namjoon, please take her to the penthouse. And have that wound seen to elsewhere, I don’t want blood in my car.”

Jungkook turns away from you. Another large Vaesen enters the room – he is tall and broad with thick shoulders and thick arms. Personal security by the looks of it. He has dark hair and keen dragon eyes that watch you closely. You sniff and you can smell a hint of cinder and a touch of brimstone.

A hellhound. You know the scent of Lucifer’s halls anywhere – it is a smell that very faintly tinges Jungkook’s honey scent. Turning to Jungkook, you bow deeply at the waist. Your wound stretches open, stinging. Good, you think. Let it hurt. Pain keeps me grounded.

The hellhound – Namjoon – leads you back through the house. In the grand foyer, there are marble pedestals, Vanir standing on them, some in poses, some not. They are naked, some painted in gold and some painted in grays and whites to make them look like a statue.

They are all collared, standing impossibly still. You pass by a nephilim woman, bent at the waist with her ass facing the main hall. Her pedestal is wide, accommodating her spread position as she reaches behind her, holding herself spread open with delicate fingers. You just make out the black collared with a single red ruby and a little gilded ‘f’ on it. She is shaky, from terror of having her most private parts exposed or from exhaustion, you don’t know.

You pass another living statue, two male demigods of some sort, If the glow on their skin is anything to tell by. One is frozen in the act of fellatio, drool running down his chin in endless rivulets as the cock of the other demigod sits in his mouth. Neither of them moves. The male receiving has his head thrown back in mock pleasure.

These are nothing new to you – the shapes and art changes, but it’s always the same, Vanir on display at their weakest, at their most sexual. Sometimes crying, sometimes bleeding. You try not to look at them. Not because you are afraid or because you are ashamed of them, but because if you acknowledge them, you’ll be expected to do something.

Saving Vanir you don’t know is not a part of the plan.

So, you avert your eyes, watching Namjoon’s heavy boots as he leads you out of the gilded foyer and into the misty sky of Lythos. It's still night, the glow of the city casting an eerie, phantom light down below the hill from which the Manor District is built.

Namjoon does not lead you to the sleek, black car that waits in the drive. You say nothing as you walk across the courtyard, gravel and rock digging into the soles of your bare feet. Your blood is slowly crusting over, but the wound doesn’t stitch itself closed.

Anger flashes through you, white hot for a moment before it cools.

An unhealing wound on an angel means one thing: demon stone.

Demon stone is the only weapon in the realms that works across the board on every Vanir, regardless of species. One thing every version of the Underworld has in common is brimstone, an element universally toxic to Vanir. When ground down and combined into metal, it becomes a lethal weapon, making it impossible for Vanir to heal from wounds.

Kim Taehyung would cut you with a blade meant to cause permanent damage.

Anger simmers as you follow the hellhound onto the paved road. The pavement is hot and wet. Humidity hangs in the air, the forever rainy city thick with it. Lythos is constantly wreathed by rainclouds, built high in forested mountains of Auraea, a continent that belonged to one of the Realms of the universe.

You have no idea which one. You've been in Auraea for years, but never bothered to learn if this was Realm 4509 or Realm 200. It doesn’t matter which Realm it is – you're enslaved in all of them, bound now to Jungkook by an ancient language that runs in your blood and bones.

Though you know the loopholes he has not yet figured out, you are still tied to him. Even if you cross a hundred Realms, Jungkook has a grip on your grace, making you a slave to the universal system.

But you know there are a few free cities. Whispered about. Kept secret and out of the media for general consumption. Cities Fallen to Vanir rule once more, defended tirelessly by ancient seraphim and whatever resources they have scratched together.

You have no dreams of reaching these free cities. They won’t last long. Liberated by the Vanir rebel group called Libram, you know it will be short-lived. Those brave enough to fight the Vaesen are few and far between, and they always lose in the end. Ten years of rebellion and bloodshed cannot permanently gain control from thousands of years of ruling and Vaesen enforcement.

Once upon a time, you may have made it a goal to join the rebels. You know that the few remaining seraphim in the universe are there with Libram – ancient names like Jophiel, Castiel, Raziel leading the rebellion against the Underworld.

The liberation fanfare is a little too much for your taste. You’ve done war. You’re tired of it. And the only difference between the tactics Libram uses and the Vaesen forces is what side their victims are on.

You are on no side. There is only your side, walking with bleeding feet and wet undergarments. Namjoon walks on the side of the road through the drizzle that has started to fall on your heads, soaking your bra and underwear through.

Manors rise up on either side of you. Expensive cars drive by. You know that the white silk of your bra and underwear no longer hide your body to the world. It doesn’t bother you much. A body is a physical mass for the soul and the mind. And as long as those are intact, nothing can hurt you, not really.

Pain is inevitable.

Pain is constant.

Pain is power.

But most importantly – pain isn’t real. It is a physical response to the body. And your body is not you, not really.

That is how you have stayed alive. That is how you get by. That is how you continue walking behind Namjoon for an hour, back and feet bleeding. Your skin is covered in dirt and carmine as you enter the city proper. Vanir ignore you, busy with their own problems, head tucked down and looking at the sidewalk. Vaesen laugh and leer as Namjoon leads you around a corner.

Neon lights up the mist. Holographic advertisements are everywhere, reflected in the dark puddles that wash some of the blood off your feet but leave sludge in its place. Light causes refractions in the cloudy air, rainbows bouncing from mist to window, from window to puddle, from puddle back to mist.

Downtown Lythos sits at the bottom of the hill that the Manor District sits on. When it rains, it collects all the slime and shit that rolls down from the Manor District, collecting in one single dark puddle between the streets with storm drains that don’t work and streets shoved full of trash.

This is where the lower Vaesen thrive. Goblins and skittering demons with scaled skin and yellow eyes prowling behind dumpsters and grinning from drains.

You pass a window with red lights, Vanir men and women showing off their bodies in tiny little boxes, pushing their breasts together or stroking themselves hard. Just as quickly you pass a window advertising new synth alteration.

Angel wing modifications here! Grow your mer scales today! Pixie wings available.

A glowing red medical sign flashes on and off in between a store selling custom collars and what smells like an opium den. You can smell the acrid smoke when a green Vaesen shuffles out, pulling his Vanir on a leash and collar.

Dingy lighting flickers above your head. Namjoon waltzes to the counter, catching the attention of the vampire receptionist. Smoke wafts from the synth cigarette between her fingers, red nails tapping the end to ash over what appears to be someone’s medical files.

Namjoon talks to her in a soft voice. You ignore them, turning to look at the waiting room. Scuffed tiles with dirt in the grout makes up the floor, cracks and pieces missing. Metal chairs of varying degrees of rust rock back and forth every time someone shifts in one.

There are a handful of patrons in the office: a scaly demon with hooves for feet crooning and brushing the hair out of the face of a dryad with skin too blue and lips to dark to be alive, a witch who stares unblinking at a health poster peeling off of the plastered wall with her master next to her, and a Vaesen with inky skin and eyes looking up at the ceiling.

“You can’t just skip the line,” the vampire hisses. “Wait your turn like everyone else.”

Namjoon puts a card on the counter. “She belongs to Lord Jeon Jungkook of the House Belial.”

“O-oh. Of course, sir. Someone will be right with you.”

You turn to look at the vampire as she bows her head. Her hair is stringy and lacks color and shine, skin so pale she’s almost translucent. Upir, you think, one of the specifics of vampire that’s considered lower than the strigoi or drac. Even the lower level Vaesen struggle in a city like Lythos.

Before you can choose a seat, which might give you an infection if you were one of the mortal Vanir, a reaper appears. He is bone white and his eyes lack all color – not white, not gray- but the lack thereof. He is gaunt, skin pulled too tight over hollow cheeks and wide eye sockets.

Highlights flash in your mind as the light above you flickers. You, slashing a son of Poseidon. Using wind to cut a titan in half. Running and jumping high into the air, weightless for a moment before bringing your sword down into the back of a Berserker.

The highlights are gone as the reaper calls your name. You follow him as the echo of your entrance song – chosen by Faustus – follows you in phantom echoes, the toll of the bell a dull hum in your mind.

Reaper. The name is no longer yours, you suppose, belonging only to the Vaesen who looks at you with dead eyes and touches you with dead hands. He has a witch Vanir for a nurse. He is in a tattered lab coat, his bare feet covered in blood and grime. There is a shackle around his foot, the chain tinkering across chipped tile as he moves about the room, the chain bolted into the ground.

You turn your back to him wordlessly. You hear the scratch of the chain and shifting links. You can smell the witch as he approaches you – sour and rotten. His ankle is infected where the shackle chafes his flesh. Clammy hands prod at your back and the reaper murmurs something to him in an old language- Death.

“You do not heal,” the witch translates. You don’t need him to translate but you don’t tell him that. “What caused this?”

“Demon stone.”

“Ah. I will administer a numbing agent-”

“I don’t need it.”

The witch hesitates. You feel him hover behind you, trembling hands as he fights his fever just above the wound. “It will hurt.”

“I know.”

The reaper hisses at him. You sense the witch bow to his master and murmur, “Yes, dominus.”

Careful not to bite your tongue, you take in a deep breath, stealing yourself for the spell. The witch’s hands hover above your back – you feel them like a sixth sense – and he begins to chant. You recognize the words, an ancient angelic language that precedes what you know.

A hot burn spreads like acid across your skin. Your teeth, feeling every bit of brimstone as it pulls out of your skin, a living mineral similar to synth. You don’t cry out and you don’t tremble. The hot pain is less than the itching associated with binding your wings to a new master, and even then, it is minimal pain to what you have felt previously.

The skin melts together, every fiber of muscle rooting back to bone, the skin crawling over exposed tissue. When he is done, you roll your shoulders. The witch faints from the effort of the spell, the chain on his ankle rattling. You look at him briefly, and then the reaper.

The reaper looks at you with two eyes full of void, as though he wants you to say something. You don’t. You exit the room to where you see Namjoon looking out the window at the pouring rain. When he sees you, he approaches the counter again, throwing bills on the counter. He doesn’t ask if you’re okay or if the reaper healed you – he assumes what’s done is done.

Namjoon opens the door, and the rain washes in, wind blowing and cold. You're soaked through, sloshing through the water rushing in from the gutters on the sidewalk. You pause at the door, much to Namjoon’s annoyance as you look at the scaly demon with hooves, still cradling his dryad.

“She’s dead,” you call to him. He looks up at you, orange eyes like two tangerines. “Has probably been two hours.”

The screaming sound of the Vaesen as he accuses the reaper of malpractice for making them wait five hours follows you out the door.

Jungkook wipes the splatter of blood on his face before he realizes his hands are slick with it. He curses loudly. Getting the red off of his face is impossible now. He summons a trembling doe shifter. She shifts to him, not meeting his eyes. The ruby on her collar trembles with her violent shaking. He wipes his bloody hands on her dress before waving her off.

Sweet smell of fear wafts off of her and Jungkook closes his eyes. He opens and closes his fists. Counts to ten. Counts to ten again. Imagines himself on the balcony in the rain, nothing but the dark and air around him. His nerves settle and the hunger and need to lose it fades away.

It isn’t that Jungkook isn’t supposed to lose himself to instinct. Lord Belial would love nothing more than Jungkook to give in to the demonic urge to frenzy, to rip into flesh and bone and to satiate every single desire, to fuck until he can’t, to kill until he runs out of victims, to bite until it no longer serves him.

It’s what demons do.

But Jungkook doesn’t give into that need to work himself up into a mess of teeth and claws and blood. Because though his father would love Jungkook to frenzy because that is what demons do, he will also beat Jungkook within an inch of his life because, That’s not what Jeons do.

It is a lose-lose situation, as Jungkook’s entire life is. He must be evil without being self-indulgent, he must be cruel while being humble. It is a careful balance that he fails at every day. But he will win this battle. This is his to win to control.

It is just an instinct, he tells himself as he looks at Faustus, who is bleeding in his grand foyer of wonders. The Vanir on the pillars do not move. They are witnesses to Faustus beating, to his idiocy, to his inability to explain how a lowly vampire had a Carved seraph in his possession. Instinct is not the decision maker, it is an option.

Taehyung flicks his wrist. The whip whistles, three tongues with blades on the end flaying Faustus’ back again. The vampire screams. He is naked on the tile, bleeding and squirming in his own blood. His security team looks on, watching the man that pays them flounder like a slug burning in salt.

The whip was easy enough to find. Any Vaesen master who owns a Vanir slave has one. The particular whip of choice Taehyung has chosen splits into three at the end, Pathos steel on the end, sharp and impossibly thin. They can sever the limb of a troll with a casual kiss of metal.

Lucky for Faustus, his limbs knit back together, as vampires do. Unlucky for Faustus, Taehyung doesn’t miss when he cracks the whip every time Jungkook does not get an answer that satisfies him.

The leather shoes are sticky with blood as Jungkook approaches the heaving vampire. Jungkook realizes he’s going to have to toss the shoes out and sighs, bending down to look Faustus up and down.

“You’re greedy, Faustus,” Jungkook notes softly, as though he is comforting the vampire. “Before your purchase of the Carved, you had failing glaedia. Your maker before you additionally had failing glaedia, though the maker before him had great success. Someone tipped you off about the sale of the Carved. Who?”

“I told you, I don’t know their name,” he cries, sobbing. His cheek is painted scarlet. Vampires bleed just as red as humans do. “I met the fellow in a gambling den deep in the Underbelly. He lost a hand against me and we spoke of the ways I would spend the money – he mentioned that there was an estate sale rumored to be selling a Carved!”

“Why would someone with money to buy the Carved themselves have you buy her?”

“I don’t know! Please, Lord, I don’t know!”

“Are you associated with Libram?”

“NO! I do not associate with Vanir rebel scum!”

“Libram is rumored to be led by seraphim. How do we know this Carved is not an agent of Libram seeking to infiltrate the city?”

“Lord, I swear to you I didn’t know she was a seraph, my lord, please!”

Jungkook taps his knees, tilting his head. Faustus’ blood smells like a mix of the creatures he has fed on. Vampires need human blood – he has a small farm of them on his property in the back – and he feeds on his Vanir for pleasure, not sustenance.

“Well,” Jungkook decides. “If you cannot confirm where she comes from, then you’re of no use to me. However, you having a Carved seraph in your possession is unacceptable.”

“I didn’t know my lord! Please. I would have never sold her-”

Faustus snaps his mouth shut when he realizes what he’s admitted in his babbling. Jungkook grins, the smile devoid of any kindness. The vampire begins crying, babbling on the ground. Jungkook knows that he’s strigoi. That alone gives Faustus some privilege, but only the eldritch vampires, the original vampires of the world, can get away with hoarding wealth beyond their status.

“You would have coveted her more than you already have,” Jungkook finishes for Faustus. “Faustus, you are Vaesen, but you are not meant for the things that you have. There is an order to things, and you have reached far beyond your means.”

“Please, my lord.”

“It is something that has been left unchecked. Your greed and disrespect for our carefully balanced system has let a Carved seraph exist in Lythos for...” Jungkook flicks his gaze to Taehyung. “How long has he had her?”

Taehyung picks up the folder tossed on a bench by a living Vanir statue that is crying as she looks up to the sky. Taehyung flips through the pages, bloody fingers leaving behind prints. “78 years ago, in two weeks.”

Jungkook hums. “She has been here for that long. The very species my father sought to eradicate.” Jungkook’s stomach growls. He realizes how hungry he is. Checking his watch, he realizes that it’s morning. They have tortured Faustus through the night. “Well Faustus, let’s go for a walk.”

“My lord?”

Jungkook moves faster than the wounded vampire can trace. Jungkook's grip is iron, fingers digging into the vampire's wounded flesh. Faustus screams, Jungkook’s nails biting and tearing as he drags the vampire to his feet. The vampire flails, arm reaching to remove Jungkook’s grip. The whip cracks and Taehyung laughs as Faustus’ hand drops, leaving a dripping stump.

Sighing, Jungkook drags the vampire as Taehyung follows, his glee nipping at Jungkook’s heels. Faustus seems to realize how much time has passed. Night has turned into day, and the sun is eating away at the misty clouds off Lythos, replacing them with humid shafts of gold and heat.

“No no no no no,” Faustus is begging and chanting. It’s useless. Jungkook doesn’t feel elation from this kind of torture. There is no strength to break here – Faustus is weak-minded and weak willed. Bullying him brings Jungkook little pleasure – it's too easy.

Thrashing, the vampire wails. Jungkook pulls him down the steps, his body thumping down the worn marble. The vampire screeches as Jungkook reaches the first shaft of light, trying to lurch away from the demon’s grip. He gives a solid yank, pulling Faustus screaming into the sun.

A soft sizzle hisses. Faustus screams get higher pitched, a frequency that rattles Jungkook’s ears painfully. He shoves the vampire down as patches of skin giveaway to licking flames. It smells like burning hair, acrid as Jungkook steps back as Faustus screams while going up in flames.

Taehyung appears at Jungkook’s side, grinning wide with his hands shoved in his pockets. “Have anything to toast over him?”

“Taehyung.”

“Oh fuck off, Jungkook. You may as well find pleasure if you’re going to do the deed. Enough of this sulking bullshit.”

It isn’t the first time Taehyung has said a variation of those words to Jungkook. He is constantly trying to get a rise out of the younger, to get Jungkook to indulge a little in his line of work.

And it’s not that Jungkook doesn’t enjoy – he does sometimes, when someone gives him a particularly difficult puzzle to solve, when something unexpected happens. The only thing unexpected is that you turned out to be one of the seraphim.

Jungkook has experience with the Carved. Taehyung has two of them, beautiful malakim that he and his father keep as collectibles. Jungkook forgets their name – no, he has never tried to remember their name. It's easier that way.

But you….

“What made you change your mind?” Jungkook looks over at Taehyung who pops a lollipop between rosebud lips. His wrists are a river of blood, dripping across tan skin down to the elbow. Jungkook furrows his brows in question. “About taking the Carved? You’re that afraid of your seraphim blood?”

Jungkook scowls as Faustus continues to turn to ash. Jungkook turns to Taehyung in full, ignoring the way that there are pieces of dead Faustus drifting to the steaming sky. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Jungkook, your mother was a seraph. Get over it. I know it, you know it, the entire fucking world knows that you were whelped from an angel.” Taehyung’s bloody fingers spin the lollipop in his mouth as anger thunders through Jungkook. “But guess what? Your mom is dead and whatever tiny amount of blood you’ve got is fucking irrelevant. You’ve established that you’re Vaesen.”

“You know that isn’t true.” Taehyung sighs dramatically. “The world does not see me as you see me. It doesn’t matter the good I’ve done for this fucking city. The elite still turn their noses at me, even when they walk in the buildings I own.”

“Well fuck them. You don’t care anyway, right? You never have. So why the fear of the Carved?”

“I just have no use for her.”

“And yet you changed your mind and let me buy her for you.” Taehyung turns his eyes on Jungkook, two blinking flecks of amber. His eyes are near gold somedays, a trait that Jungkook thinks that Taehyung might get from his mother, though he doesn’t know who she is. “You didn’t want her and then you did. Why?”

“Because you were right. My father will like that I bought her. And he’ll want to examine her, figure out where she came from.”

Taehyung gives Jungkook a critical eye. “Whatever, man.” He tosses the lollipop stick sans lollipop into the pile of Faustus’ drifting ashes. “If you want to fuck her, you can just say it. My Carved girl sucks cock like no other. God it’s like she’s hungry for it.”

“Great. I’ll see you for the shareholder meeting tomorrow?”

“Mhmm, go get your cock sucked. I’m gonna go hunting these little Vanir the vampire had in his house.”

Jungkook watches Taehyung bound up the steps, long-legs making quick work of it.

Some days Jungkook hates Taehyung more than he hates anyone else. The demon is confident in who he is, born to a father who rules his own domain to limitless power, money and connections that Jungkook should have, but doesn’t. All because his mother was an angel. All because his father thought it would be funny.

He hates that word. Funny.

The Vaesen who suck up to him laugh at all his chokes, brushing their fingers across his thigh. You’re funny, my lord.

The Vaesen who are at the same level as him look down their noses at him, miniscule smirks carving their faces. How funny, that you have angel blood.

A life built off of a punchline, though Jungkook is not entirely sure what the punchline is. Perhaps he is the punchline, destined to make the world laugh everywhere he goes. He knows that he isn’t funny – he does not tell jokes. He does not entertain the way Jimin does, his dry observations don’t startle into laughter like Yoongi.

And yet that word haunts Jungkook.

Taehyung has never had anyone laugh at him in his life. Always with him, but never at him.

Jungkook shuffles to the black car parked in the drive. As he gets in the car, he realizes that he’s tracked blood inside the cool interior. The leather is made from dragon skin, which doesn’t take well to Vaesen blood. He closes his eyes and breathes out sharply through his nose. This is exactly why he didn’t want the Carved in his car.

Funny.

Around him, the world blurs. His sticky fingers pointedly tap the screen of the vehicle, setting it to autopilot. He reclines the seat back as the car purrs to life, pulling out of the drive, gravel crunching beneath the tires. He can just hear the start of screams as he pulls away and into the Manor District.

Faustus’ estate was near the bottom of the hill to the elite district, a smaller villa decorated ostentatiously. Jungkook frowned at the gaudy curtains and gold in-laid marble.

Quiet luxury, Jungkook’s father always said. Money does not talk, it whispers. Remember that.

The vampire’s house was screaming look at me.

Further up on the hill, the large homes exist. Sprawling lands with tropical jungles and conservatory, built with rivers and fantastical pieces of landscape on their property. At the top of the Manor District is where the rolling Jeon Estate sits, where Jungkook grew up.

He doesn’t look in the rearview. He stares ahead, unseeing.

Taehyung’s question nips at him like a gnat.

What made you change your mind? The question weighs heavy in his mind. What did make Jungkook change his mind? His answer to Taehyung is a truth, but it’s not the truth. Lord Belial will be happy Jungkook has brought a Carved seraph home – he will want to study her, to figure how she has managed to stay alive this long, if she has any connections to Libram.

A seraph buried under their noses is troublesome. Jungkook believed that his mother would be the last seraph he ever saw, unless Libram ever made it to Lythos. In that scenario, though, it would mean that the thirty or so seraphim that existed in the Realms had managed to take over more than just three cities.

Jungkook’s building stretches toward the sky in the Ivory District, the business part of the city. Banks, firms, conglomerates and flashy apartment buildings with cutting edge design and technology claw toward the sky, asserting dominance over the older, shorter building.

The parking garage is dark when he enters, entering the space for his car, hitting the button on his key fob to start the elevator. The car begins to lift, muted lights flashes as Jungkook is lifted through the elevator shaft that goes directly to his four-story apartment.

A flicker of feeling lights inside of his mind, like a match sparking to life and then simmering to a soft flame. He realizes it is you – the lone seraph in his house. Jungkook shifts back and forth in the seat of the car as he reaches the garage level.

Rows of sleek vehicles, both practical and collectible line the wide space. The ceiling is low, lined with RGB lighting that changes color based on a setting from Jungkook’s phone or panel by the door. He drives his current vehicle back into its space, between a shadowy looking sports car and large SUV.

The apartment is made up of four levels, the bottom level the garage. The only way in is by the elevator from the main parking garage or through a service stairwell that is heavily coded with security and hasn’t been used since Jungkook had the building constructed.

Jungkook’s steps echoed as the lights of the garage flicker off. He goes up the stairs, passing a wall of glass. The third floor is a massive training and workout space, a fighting ring, matches for stretching and martial arts, a shooting range, walls and locked cases of weapons, machines meant to help stretch and keep his body in perfect shape – even as an immortal.

Being a demon – even with angel blood – gave Jungkook eternal life, magical abilities, and supernatural strength. But it didn’t come without conditioning the mind and body to support the flow of magic. He had to train to fight – it wasn’t an instinct – and he had to maintain training to match his strength with those of the same caliber.

It was a give and take, and it felt so human.

Jungkook hated feeling anything less than demonic. It felt weak, like he was open for attack, like he was missing covering a base. To be weak in his world was worth more than death.

Faustus was an example of that. Greed made one weak. Giving into the lust for extravagance was something that made so many Vaesen vulnerable. There was a careful balance to everything, and Jungkook was constantly wavering on that beam.

The ground floor of Jungkook’s apartment looked different during the day. The shadows weren’t so heavy, natural light filtering in through the floor-to-ceiling windows that made up the east wall. The lowest level of clouds floated by the window, condensation collecting on the windows. It was going to rain again

Your presence was like an inferno in the home. Jungkook could always sense the creatures in his home. Namjoon lurked during a set schedule, never seen but always there, drifting from space to space like smoke. Ari was harder to detect – the lares was mostly a spirit, no mortal pulse to latch onto. Still, Jungkook had gotten a feeling for the creature, feeling them drift through the apartment. They liked to spend most of their time in the garage.

You stood near the elevator doors near his apartment, the entrance guests and Jungkook used when he wasn’t taking cars. He stopped short, staring at you. Your hair was damp and frizzy from the humidity. Your feet were dirty and blood stained, kept on a towel colored with the red of your feet.

A ripple of desire coursed through him. It was beyond your physical appearance – which was exquisite, hauntingly so.

It was the threat between the two of you, the energy that was now a constant bridge. He had felt that same connection with his mother, and felt it burn away with her death, leaving a void that had left Jungkook wounded for years.

To be connected mentally like that... it was more intimate than Jungkook could explain to Taehyung. And now there you stood, looking at him with an impassive face.

Namjoon appeared in the archway leading to the kitchen, a glass of water in his hand. He was dressed in a leather trench coat, black attire underneath and heavy boots. Jungkook knew there were all manner of guns and knives underneath the coat.

“Why the fuck is she just standing there?” Jungkook grunts, looking at you.

You’re not looking at him, eyes scanning the apartment. He can feel a shimmer of imitation slide through you and then the feeling is gone so quick that Jungkook thinks he imagines it.

“You didn’t tell me what to do with her,” Namjoon shoots back, sipping the water and shrugging. “It’s not like you have a place to keep your slaves. Ari is the only Vanir in this place and they lurk in your cars.”

Jungkook pinches the bridge of his nose. “I have no idea what to do with her either.”

“Then why’d you buy her?”

“I didn’t. Taehyung bought her for me as a gift.”

“Well, now you have a slave. I don’t know, have her cleaned or something.”

Both Namjoon and Jungkook look around the apartment. It is spotless – Jungkook insists on it. He refuses to see evidence of his friends partying and violence in his home in the daylight.

Jungkook chews on his lip. You’re looking at him now. You're careful not to meet his eyes but he feels like if you wanted to, you could. There is something off about his bond to you – he feels resistance. You’re trained enough to keep a mental barrier between the two, but he expected the binding ritual to your wings to rid him of that.

“Ari.” The lares appears and bows low at the waist, murmuring the honorific. “Find somewhere for her to stay. And get her clothes.” He looks at you. “You stay put until I figure out what to do with you.”

You grin. Not at Jungkook, but at the floor. It is something sinister, an inky feeling carried with it that peels away at his confidence. You bow your head – not as low as before. A vein ticks in his jaw. “Dominus,” you murmur.

Jungkook and Namjoon both watch you as you follow Ari’s shadow. As you reach the guest hall on the bottom floor, you cast a single look over your shoulders, eyes burning. Again you give Jungkook a look that screams resistance.

You vanish from his line of sight, but Jungkook can’t help but feel like something is very wrong with the Carved seraph in his house.

Three days go by and Jungkook is nowhere in sight. You've been given a room far grander than is appropriate. Jungkook has no slave quarters. You find that Ari is the only Vanir staff member he keeps. The only other people you have seen are Namjoon who occasionally appears to stick his head in the ornate room, mutter under his breath that it is a waste, and vanish.

On the first day, the door is fitted with new locks from the outside. You can’t go out – even when you channel magic through the door. You growl, feeling the brimstone metal in the device before returning to the large room to pace.

Floor to ceiling windows face the east, waking you when the sun rises beyond the mist and clouds. The room is so high in the sky that you feel more at ease than expected. It is familiar, the glass frozen by the chilly rain and condensation from the clouds.

Pressing your forehead against the glass, you close your eyes. Your skin welcomes the cold – Jungkook keeps the house hot, something that you’ve grown to hate. His demon blood makes him run cold like the snake that he is, and it's stifling in your room.

Your room that you hate. The walls are dark gray, one of them textured artfully. A large bed rests against it, a painting above the headboard. You don’t look at the painting, realizing immediately that it is an old painting depicting a close up of an angel crying gold.

It's not the tasteful neutral colors that make you hate the room. Objectively, you suppose that the room is exquisitely decorated in the muted wealth that the important Vaesen prefer. It isn’t the ridiculous ornamentation that Faustus decorated his manor with, and for that, you are thankfully.

But you have only seen these walls for three days. Have only seen Ari arrive with food and to take plates. Have only seen Namjoon’s scowl to make sure that you hadn’t escaped out the window.

And why haven’t you? A soft voice asks. Because you could. You could shatter the windows, burn down the door, slaughter the household and escape. But you don’t. Your discomfort and annoyance of being kept like a caged animal is not nearly as important as your goals.

A sound makes your eyes flutter open. You feel Jungkook enter the home. Even though you’ve closed off the connection to him enough for it to feel like a gnat buzzing in your ear, you can’t sever it. Only death can do that, and you have no intention of killing him off.

For now.

Jungkook’s light steps scuff toward your room. You turn away from the glass, tense as you stare at the door. His soft steps betray his large, muscled frame and the heavy boots he prefers to wear. When he opens the door, he looks as you remember him: dressed in black boots, dark jeans, a black long-sleeved shirt tucked in and a leather jacket pulled over shoulders. His hair is styled back, a few strands escaping and hanging over dark eyes.

“Come,” he orders, beckoning you with a single hand. You hesitate a second too long. His brow arches as you bow your head, scurrying toward him.

You hate it – the act of submission. As you follow him, eyes on the floor, you remind yourself it isn’t true submission. He doesn’t own your mind. True submission only comes when someone hands their mind over to you willingly, either because they trust you or they are too tired to fight.

Jungkook will never own your mind. He owns your wings, your grace and your body, but you will die before he can take anything from your thoughts. Anything from your true self.

Pain is inevitable.

Pain is constant.

Pain is power.

Jungkook leads you to the elevator on the main floor of this apartment. When it opens, Namjoon is leaning against the wall, watching you with dark eyes. Jungkook enters. You follow, keeping your eyes on the floor as he jabs the ground floor.

Mechanical systems purr. You stand in silence, the tension growing between the three of you. Jungkook is like a gnat at your mind, flitting near your thoughts and pressing himself against the wall you have built around your mind to shield yourself from him.

Metal floor is cold against your feet. You stare at them – they are clean for now. But you’re not looking forward to walking across the city again barefoot.

Jungkook senses where your attention is. He makes a sound. “Namjoon where are her fucking shoes?”

“You didn’t tell me to get her shoes.”

“I said get her some clothes and you’ve barely done that. Did you buy her your size?”

“I’m your security detail, not your personal shopper.”

“You’re about to be fucking fired.”

You can sense that Namjoon rolls his eyes. There is more than a business relationship between the two of them. The way they exchange words isn’t terse and heated. You get the sense that perhaps they were friends first.

“You refuse to keep Vanir who could have done this for you. I’m not your slave.” Namjoon shuffles in the elevator as it opens. He strides through the doors. “Lord Belial won’t care what she looks like. He’ll only care about what she can do.”

Jungkook sighs as he follows Namjoon out. “It’s my Carved. He’ll care.” Jungkook glances at you and looks at your feet. “Come on, I guess you need some fucking shoes.”

You don’t speak to Jungkook for most of the day. He barely looks at you, as though you are an afterthought as he drags you through a store. Though Jungkook gives you commands that rattle down the thread between the two of you, you never respond.

It’s what a good Carved would do.

Obedience is valued above all else among the Carved. It is the sole purpose when taking the wings off the angel. The problem is that you’ve always had a problem with that obedience. It was a learning curve, knowing how to act without hesitation because you were still your own person.

Several owners early on hated you for it. Did not understand why their Carved bitch was broken. By now, you know how to let the commands guide you. Though you can sense them, you can decide to let them make you move. Which is the hardest part – giving your body over to that decision that isn’t your own.

But that is the life of the Vanir. The body is not their own, and for many, neither is the mind. You’ve defeated the odds thus far, and you want to continue to do so.

The tires of the car hiss on the road. You close your eyes, dressed in your new clothes, sitting with your hands in your lap as Jungkook and Namjoon converse on the other side of the vehicle from you. Neither pays you much attention, so you take it to yourself to run over what you know of Lord Belial.

One of Lucifer’s princes during the first fall. Old, but not nearly as old as Lilith. The prince of lies, sin and lust. You suppose it makes sense that Jungkook looks the way he does: he is the perfect balance of beauty and darkness to entice others, the perfect lure.

An image of the Dead Sea Scrolls flashes across your vision. There are hints of Jungkook’s parentage all over his home.

But for the corruption though has made Belial, a king of hostility. All his dominions are in darkness, and his purpose is to bring about wickedness and guilt.

The quote comes to you like a dream, something you read so long ago that you’ve forgotten you read it at all.

You’ve never come face-to-face with Belial. Anxiety eats away at you at the thought – not because you are afraid of him, but because you’re afraid of what he might see when he looks at you. There are so many things you have protected fiercely and though you are closer than ever to the end, the fear of it being ruined makes your hands shake.

Jungkook brushes against your consciousness, almost as though he is… knocking.

You crack an eye open to look at him. He isn’t looking at you. He’s listening to something Namjoon is talking about – crypto currency for synth sales.

Heart pounding, you dim the veil between you slightly. Your curiosity is the master of your fate, piqued by Jungkook asking permission to speak to you in a way that you haven’t communicated in years.

You don’t know why you do it. He could strike with his mind like a sword into yours, could attack and try to seize control. But something about him feels hesitant and unsure, like he doesn’t know how to do that and like this connection between your minds is new to him.

How do you keep me out? Jungkook’s thoughts are fuzzy and muted, like he doesn’t know how to project them yet. They are deep, raspier than the sound of his voice. It’s a clever trick.

Years of practice, dominus. Jungkook flinches across the car when you respond, like he almost had not expected a response. Is there something you need, dominus?

I can sense your anxiety. There is a pause to his thoughts. Anxiety and fear affect me heavily, I suggest you find a way to put an end to it.

As you wish, dominus.

Of course fear and anxiety affect a demon like Jungkook. Many demons feed off of it, but he’s the child of Belial. Fear and anxiety are what drives people to sin, which is his father’s main goal. You wonder if it sends Jungkook into a frenzy – a terrible and chaotic pattern of behavior that demons slip into when they lose control of their base instincts.

It’s a good piece of information. You file it away for later, like a dagger tucked into the hem of your pants.

A sprawling jungle estate rolls lush with green by the window. You can’t see the manor over the bursting green trees and the flush of tropical plants, but you can feel the home. The demonic energy pulses like a throbbing heart, steady and powerful.

Gravel crunches beneath your feet as Jungkook leads you out of the car and up the steps of the home. it is not a dark and gothic building like one would expect – it is white and clean, a manor that is more like a palace than anything.

Inside the home is stifling. Beautiful tile floors with veins of gold shooting through them stretch out in the grand foyer. A massive staircase that leads to the second floor sits to the right. The teak handrail is carved, depicting some sort of story of heaven or hell, you’re unsure.

It does not smell of death and decay inside the manor like Faustus’ home, but you sense the omnipresent darkness against you. it’s like a second skin, the heaviness of Lord Belial’s presence. It settles over you, snug and choking as a collared Vanir greets Jungkook and Namjoon with a deep bow.

The Vanir is a Nephilim man, with beautiful golden skin and sun kissed hair. His collar is simple: black leather inlaid with a gold Chthonic symbol for Belial. Gold beads are threaded through his hair. White linen pants hang low on his hips, and he’s shirtless. There is a gold, cosmetic shimmer to his skin as he leads your trio through the home.

Everything in the house looks carefully curated. You see relics of the past, tasted artwork and muted colors all swirling together to create a quiet elegance that the high profile Vaesen so love. They love having all of the power in the world to indulge and then doing the opposite.

Only the low Vaesen indulge. There is a power in self-control here.

It is hypocrisy at its finest, by creatures who are bred to sow chaos and indulgence and gluttony.

The irony of Belial’s home is not lost on you.

You pass more Vanir. They are all nephilim and Carved: malakim, malaikah, erelim. All beings with angel blood, a leather collar around their neck with the symbol of Lord Belial, Prince of Darkness, Prince of Sin. They all look at you as you pass. You feel their eyes, the heavy stares. None of them look beaten and broken, each one of them with polished skin and that golden shimmer.

Like prizes, willingly given.

You can’t help yourself – you reach out with a soft mental tendril. While other Carved cannot communicate mentally like you can, you can still feel them there. Your suspicions are confirmed as you pass them – nothing but empty shells. Their minds are so lost and vacant of thought and emotion it’s like touching a cold vacuum of space with nothing but nothingness inside.

You shive as Jungkook leads you into a warm office, fireplace crackling.

It is impossible to miss Lord Belial – his presence presses down on you, a sort of hum like there is static in your veins. You keep your eyes trained to the floor, trying not to let your breath quicken. It has been hundreds of years since you stood in front of a member of the Triumvirate.

“Lord Belial,” Jungkook murmurs, bowing deeply. You sink to your knees, keeping your head down. Out of the corner of your eyes, you can make out the rich rugs of the dark space. There is furniture that belongs to an office and the room smells like wax, old books and a touch of brimstone. “The Carved that I spoke to you about. She is of the seraphim. We have found no evidence of where she came from before she was Carved. She was Carved in 5029 by Mikael Anjel and was immediately purchased by Lady Urikohime in Realm 89 where she was used for pleasure. Since then, she has been owned by 23 lords, most recently Faustus Immoratus as a glaedia.”

A dark presence moves in the room. It feels as though Belial is wrapped in shadow and rot, sin and greed. You feel a torrent of emotions, hideous and angry as they claw at you. Being in the presence of a Prince of Hell wears on you. Your mental shield feels like it’s built from paper, threatening to collapse at any moment.

Images – no, memories – flash in your thoughts.

Angels falling from the sky. Gold blood smeared on your hands and face. A burning sword. Blue hellfire. Cracked bones and rotting flesh. The sound of greedy mouths sucking the marrow from bones.

The images are gone as a single, cold finger slips under your chin. You hold your breath as that finger applies pressure, turning your face to look upward. Slowly, your eyes rise to meet the face of Belial. In the distance, you hear the crack of a whip. His eyes are whirling darkness, bottomless pits that pull you in.

He is as beautiful as the day he fell from Heaven with his brothers and sisters. He is as terrible as the dimension that he now rules over. He looks like Jungkook but sharper, as though his very bones were carved with the sharpest knife and the thinnest point.

Belial looks at you and he grins.

“Hello.” His words whisper in the air, a hundred voices of the suffering and the damned. “You look so much like your father. Jungkook,” Belial calls, turning to his son. “You didn’t tell me she was Legion.”

“I did not know, Lord Belial.”

He clicks his teeth in annoyance. “I forget that you are as stupid as you are useless. This Carved is the daughter of Michael.” Belial drops his fingers from your chin. “I want her questioned. Namjoon, please summon the Flayer. I want to peel answers out of her.

D E F I N I T I O N S

Carved – angels who have had their wings surgically removed and sold for ownership. The possession of an angel’s wings gives the owner power over the angel’s grace, thereby giving them power over the angel.

Chokes – electronic cuffs with micro-needles that send signals to the nerves and nervous system to block channeling magic – most often used on glaedia

Collared – a Vanir who is owned as a slaved. They are often identifiable by the custom collars their masters put on their necks.

Chthonic - language used among Christan-based demons

Dominus – term used by a slave to their male identifying master

Eldritch Vampire - original vampires, high Vaesen

Enochian – language used among Christian-based angels

Glaedia – Vanir slaves that fight in the arena for their masters. Some glaedia are incredibly popular in the media and are members of the elite via their status in the arena. Popular glaedia can live a lavish lifestyle but are highly managed and marketed.

Grace - the source of a Christian-based angels power

Lares - spiritual guardians in Roman mythology

Malakim – refers to the angels associated with Shamayim (Judaism)

Malaikah – refers to angels associated with Jannah (Islam)

Nephilim – those who are half-angel, half-human

Seraph - a single angel, one of the seraphim

Seraphim - species of angels associated with Christian heaven, soldiers of God

Triumvirate – the three Lords who rule the Realms – figures of the Underworld

Underworld – refers to the collective hells of multiple realms

Upir - species of vampire, low Vaesen

Realms - Refers to the infinite universes as a whole

Strigoi - species of vampire, mid Vaesen

Vaesen – creatures associated with Underworld Realms such as demons, daevas, sorcerers, vampires, wraiths, and monster-like creatures

Vanir – creatures associated with Heaven Realms such as angels, faeries, witches, dragons, demigods and any heavenly-like being

War of the Realms – the multi-universal war between Heavens and Underworlds, in which the Underworld won. Demon-kind have been ruling the Realms for over two thousand years.

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