Cursed

Chapter 1: The Painting at the next turn

"What can I get you, sir?" Erina smiled as she asked the customer for his order.

"One iced americano." The customer replied.

"Is that all?" Erina confirmed his order.

The customer nodded his head.

Erina collected the estimated money and gave a bill to the man.

The man waited until a staff member made the americano. After making it, Erina passed it to the customer as she said, "Here's your Iced Americano, sir. Thank you for coming here."

The customer smiled and left with his order.

Erina Brown was an 18 years old girl, a freshman in college who was a part-time staff in a cafe. She used to work in a cafe to create less pressure on her parents because educational fees were a huge load of money. And Erina couldn't see her parents struggling because of her.

The clock showed it was 9 pm. It was Erina's shift ending time. As Erina completed her work hours, she removed her apron, branding the cafe, and brushed her hair. And then she moved out to go home.

"Eri!" Someone called Erina from behind. Erina stopped and turned around to see that person.

It was Trevor, a co-worker at the cafe and a good friend of Erina. He was a sweet gentleman with a great height with a cute face and personality.

"You forgot your phone at the counter," Trevor said as he held a phone high up in the air.

Trevor reached near Erina, and he started panting as he ran until there. Erina's eyes widened. She couldn't believe Trevor ran a long way only to give her back the phone.

"You're fine?" Erina asked as she smiled at Trevor.

"I am.." Trevor replied as he handed over the phone to Erina.

"Erina...I wanted to ask something." Trevor asked as he was still panting a little.

"Hmm?"

"I have two passes to the new art museum for tomorrow. You can come with me if you want." Trevor asked as he scratched the nape of his neck while flashing a sheepish smile.

Trevor was her good friend, and he always helped Erina while working in the cafe. Trevor sometimes hid the fact from the manager that Erina entered late at the cafe because of her college hours.

Though Erina wasn't really interested in the arts, she still couldn't turn him down. Hence she nodded.

"Okay.."

Trevor looked really surprised at first, but he just smiled and asked, "Okay, then I'll pick you up at 5 pm.?"

"Cool.." Erina replied with a smile and then left.

Erina couldn't even see Trevor jumping and dancing because she agreed to go with Trevor the next day.

***********

The Next Day,

"You look cute." Erina's mother complimented her as Erina waited in the living room while wearing a brown dress.

"I can't believe my daughter is going on a date for the first time." Her mother added a smile.

"Mom, it isn't a date. I swear." Erina cried as she couldn't make her mother believe that it wasn't a romantic date. At least not for her.

Suddenly the doorbell rang. Erina stood up from the couch to open the door, but her mother went to the door and opened it.

"Oh my. Are you taking my daughter on a date?" Erina's mother asked, smiling at Trevor.

Trevor's cheeks turned bright red as he heard her sentence. Trevor almost answered her when Erina jumped in between them.

"Stop embarrassing me, mom! You are making him uncomfortable." Erina complained as she walked closer to the door.

"And for the last time, mom, it's not a date!" She added and pushed Trevor quickly, not to let her mom and Trevor chat more. Erina didn't want to embarrass herself anymore.

"Have fun, kids!" Her mother said from the door, but Erina kept pushing Trevor away from her house.

"Your mother is quite jolly," Trevor said as he walked beside Erina.

"I know. Mom is the sweetest. But sometimes she embarrasses me a whole lot, like today. Don't mind her." Erina sighed as she remembered the incident just happened a moment ago.

"Haha. No, no. I didn't mind. I liked your mom." Trevor replied with a smile.

Erina smiled back.

After a while, Trevor and Erina arrived at the museum. It was famous for its antique collections. The museum even had a lot of antique paintings of Royal families.

As they entered the museum, Erina instantly understood that she was going to get bored as she saw people talking about the shades of the color on paintings. Though, Trevor was quite interested in these things.

Trevor pulled Erina to the ancient paintings and explained to her the theories step by step, which was really boring to hear. But she tried to keep a smile on her lips and nodded her head every time as if she was interested.

Suddenly Trevor yelled, "Oh My Gosh!"

Erina stared at him with confusion.

"I didn't expect this painting to be here," Trevor yelled again and ran to a painting at a distance. The painting had a crowd around it, and people were smashing each other to catch a glimpse of that painting.

Erina didn't know what that painting was and nor did she have any interest to know about it.

Instead, as Trevor left her side, Erina felt relieved that she could receive a little break from Trevor's historical theories. Erina leaned on the wall as she waited patiently for Trevor to come back.

Erina pulled out her phone from the purse and started scrolling through her work schedule. She adjusted her work hours to accompany Trevor, but it wasn't a very useful choice in the first place.

"I shouldn't have said yes to him." Erina sighed as she thought.

Suddenly a light breeze touched Erina. She glanced up and found nothing to be a source of cold breeze. She searched right and left.

Trevor was still busy with the painting he went to see. Nothing seemed unusual. Hence she decided to ignore the sensation.

But before shifting her gaze to the phone again, Erina noticed a glowing turn at her left. A bright light was coming outside. She narrowed her eyes at that turn.

"What's so shiny to make the whole turn glow?" Erina thought as she kept staring at the turn.

Soon, Erina found herself walking towards the turn as she couldn't suppress the curiosity to discover the secret of the glow.

Before entering the turn, Erina took a last glance at Trevor, who was still too busy with the painting to notice Erina was not there. She turned her head back to the turn and entered slowly.

The white light captured her whole vision, and she went blind for a minute.

When Erina could finally see, she saw she was standing inside the turn. There was a painting hanging on the left wall of the hall. An elderly man was staring at that painting with all his concern.

Erina sauntered towards the painting and soon arrived near it. But as soon as Erina arrived near the painting, her eyes widened, watching the sight.

It was a painting of 7 men who looked like fallen angels. They were incomparably handsome. The view behind them was an enormous castle. Erina didn't want to but kept staring at the picture.

"Do you know the story of these men inside this painting?"

The heavy voice startled Erina as her mind was occupied by the beauty of the painting. She turned to the man beside her, who was staring at that painting from the very beginning.

Erina finally shook her head as she was never interested in this art or history.

"That's okay. Many people nowadays don't know about these princes." The man smiled.

"They are Princes?" Erina asked with shock.

The man nodded.

He had grey hair, a beard, and a moustache. And he wasn't too tall. Even he was shorter than Erina.

"These princes lived 700 years ago, and they all had faced a sad fate.

They all got hunted by a curse their family received. And they all died, ending the family line." The man explained.

"A curse?" Erina asked curiously.

"Yes, A woman cursed the royal family, and the Evans family got destroyed. The Princes died one by one. And after that, everyone died in that kingdom." The man sighed as he explained.

Erina was staring at the picture. The seven men were incredibly handsome, but one of them caught her eyes specifically. He had sky blue eyes, silver hair, and he seemed very real as if he could come back to life any minute.

"He is 5th Prince Ace Evans." The man said as he pointed towards the man Erina was staring at until now.

"I noticed you are staring at him. Is there something You found at him?" He asked as he flashed a weak smile.

"He…." Erina paused as she felt difficulty expressing what she was feeling.

"He looks real as if I could see the tears in his eyes," Erina replied while having conflicting thoughts in her head.

The man seemed shocked by Erina's answer. He let out a giggle as he turned his eyes back to the painting.

"I think I have found the right person." The man said as if he was talking to the people inside the painting.

Erina stared at him with confusion.

"You can touch the painting if you want." The man said.

"What? No, no. The security will throw me out for touching things here." Erina shook her hand, hinting no.

"There is no one, miss.

Don't you want to know if the tears are real or not?" The man suggested.

"But…" Erina tried to protest, but the man wasn't listening to her at all.

Finally, the man held Erina's hand and made her touch that Prince, Ace's picture, whom she was staring at until now.

As soon as Erina touched the painting, her whole body shivered in fear because it didn't feel like a painting at all.

Erina felt she was touching human skin instead of a painting. She gasped as she pulled back her hand in fear.

But everything in the hall turned white by an increasing white glow. Erina couldn't see anything at all for a few seconds. She covered her eyes with her hands and waited for the bright light to disappear.

Silence~

The bright light disappeared after a while, and Erina finally felt her eyes could see everything vividly again. She slowly removed her hand and glanced up to find the man and the picture, but Erina's heartbeats almost stopped.

Because Erina wasn't in the museum anymore, she was standing in front of a handsome man.

Erina couldn't believe her eyes. He was the same man she saw in the picture. Ace Evans! He was much more handsome than the painting. But there was a problem.

Ace Evans was standing there, naked in front of her!

Erina checked him up and down before screaming her lungs out while covering her eyes with her palms.

"Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!!!!"