THE CURSED ONE - THE BOY WHO CHALLENGE DESTINY

In The Shadows of Destiny

Old man Jung Kook feels very tired after one day full of tasks, he feels his old body will no longer be able to work as hard as before. In his mind, he wanted Jin as his successor, at least he will have a legacy, someone whom he can teach his cooking skills, but he started to lose his hope after knowing Jin’s condition. In the night after he finished his work and cleaned up his workplace, he entering the restroom and walks to the bed, he looks into Jin’s sleeping face and feels happy because that kid's starts to breathe normally, he always worries if one day this child will not wake up anymore after passed out.

Jung Kook lay down on the bed next to Jin’s body, a glimpse of memories in his mind reminding him about the day when he met little Jin for the first time that happened more than half years ago. He remembered the day when he went out to Sinmu’s market to buy stock and supplies as usual, after a busy day in the market he finally finished his business and asked the merchant to deliver the supplies to Golden Flame. On his way back he saw a little child lay in the ground beaten by two men without mercy, his little hand tried to protect his head from their punch and kick. He immediately rushed his horse towards them to stop their action, at first those men refused to stop what they did, but after he offered some money, they want to talk. It turns out that those men were accusing little Jin of a thief who stole their fishes, something that Jin never admitted. Jung Kook understands that Jin might be dead at that time if he didn’t save him, so he pays 2 silver coins from his savings to those angry men. What he admired most from Jin is he have the bravery and strong mentality, he didn’t cry or be scared at all even after being beaten up by two men. Now, after more than half the years he had lived with Jin, his feeling start to accept Jin as his grandson, a feeling that almost forgotten by him for a long time. 

“It is a pity that you always have to experience a terrible destiny, Jin?” Jung Kook grunted while he staring at the ceiling, he feels sad about Jin’s life. Not long after, his old eyes can’t bear his drowsiness and he starts to fall asleep.

Jin awoke and open his eyes before the sun rises, he sees Jung Kook still sleeping in his side. His head now feels light and his body feels full of energy, he sits on the edge of the bed while trying to move his arms in every direction, he doesn’t feel any pain at all. He tries to remember what happened yesterday before he passed out, the last thing he can remember is when he was on his daily task to clean up the Yellow Hall area, he saw some of the students practicing their martial arts moves, his curiosity leads him to follow those movements. At first, he enjoyed the feeling with the moves he made, but not long after he started to feel some heat in his heart, the heat continues to spread through all over his body even after he stopped his moves, the heat then followed by unbelievable pain in all over his body, the pain that unbearable, he starts screaming loud and then passed out until he awoke this morning.

Jin remembered the pain that he feels yesterday was the same pain he feels a few months back when one of the Golden Flame students named Hyul shaken his hand, that time he feels something flowing inside his body through his hand, he doesn’t understand what had happened but right after that he feels miserable pain and passed out. Later he found himself awoke in the bed with Taeman, one of Jung Kook’s men. At that time Taeman told Jin every incident which had happened when he was passed out, he told about Hyul who had been punished by the school committee after they found that he was guilty in Jin’s incident, Hyul was proven intentionally pushed his energy inside Jin’s body and that was f*******n unless in official fighting. The other thing that Taeman also told was about the commotion that happened in the entire school after he passed out which make everybody in the school talked about him. “They said you bare some devil curse inside your body, they knew it after school healer checked your body when you passed out,” Jin clearly remembered Taeman said this to him. At first, Jin didn’t care even a bit about this curse, but later on that day Jin understands the danger of the curse after Jung Kook told him that everyone who carried this curse will be dead before their 15th birthday, no one ever survived.

Now Jin started to think again about Black Devil Curse, somehow he feels that he heard about this curse long before somewhere, but he can’t remember where or when even he can’t remember anything from his past. The more he tried to access his memory, the more pain he feels inside his head. The last thing that he can remember was around 6 months ago when he found himself awoke in a small hallway near a market without knowing where he was or how he got there, his head feels dizzy and his stomach trembling to ask for something to fill, he then walked inside the market. Without any money, he was only able to watch all the busy persons inside the market until he saw a cat stole a fish from one of the fish stalls, that cat runs toward him and he scared the cat out, the cat dropped the fish from its jaws and runs away, he took the fish and wanted to give it back to the fishmonger, but suddenly someone yelling at him and called him as a thief. In confusion, he runs as fast as he can, he pushed his small legs to their limit until he reaches outside the town when he no longer has the energy to run, that was the time when he got caught by those men and get beaten mercilessly until Jung Kook saved his life. He owes his life to Jung Kook, that’s why now he tried his best with hard work and relentless effort to help Jung Kook’s works. 

The rooster crowed and brought Jin out of his reverie. He stands up and wanted to start his daily tasks, he decides not to think about his curse or his miserable life. He doesn’t care what will happen in his future, what he only wants is to be as useful as possible for Jung Kook in his remaining life, this is the only thing that he can do to repay Jung Kook's kindness. 

Jin still doesn’t know that his miserable fate will not stop right now, miserable life full of pain and sadness will continue in his life until one time in the future he will bear the burden of the entire world by himself.