hi, I'm shroomi (or loaf/oz)! they/he pronouns, i am 20 years old. i kinda bounce around different stuff!
fun fact about me! i absolutely looooove whale sharks so much, they're literally the best thing on this planet alongside frogs and mushrooms
(profile pic from the wonderful fluffysheeps)
does anyone else just have a song playing over and over again when they try to get work done? i have a few, but generally my go to is a very specific daft punk song lol. iykyk, the cockroach is a hint🪳🌈
who’da thunk it that basements are scary at 3am, esp when the lights are automatic and also it’s a quiet study space? well not me apparently and now reaping the consequences of mine own actions
So why does writing academic papers have to be so annoying to do? I have been staring at a blank google doc for the past hour or so(i’m taking a break rn) and I know what I want to write, but I don’t want to write anything🫠
also side note: one of the funniest things I’ve read while trying to write it was that butterflies were described as “bimbos of the natural world” (which idk if I’d go that far but it was funny). Pretty privilege is a massive thing in bio conservation and it sucks😤 I love moths, but they get less attention compared to butterflies AND BOTH ARE IN THE SAME DAMN FAMILY OF LEPIDOPTERA.
I just wanted to come here and rant, thank you for listening
What video game world would be your #1 travel destination?
Feed your dashboard by answering my question, blogger.
i would say the world of pokemon, i think i’d be a bug trainer tbh, i just think pokemon had really cool locations in the games that would look beautiful in real life!
What game do you associate most strongly with a specific time in your life?
Feed your dashboard by answering my question, blogger.
i think i associate pokemon black and white, also legend of zelda ocarina of time, with my childhood around 4th grade. Specifically it was one of the first video games i played in its entirety, and it was my own rather than it being from my older siblings
lore drop on my end, but this was me in elementary school bcs i discovered razors and i have adhd(un medicated at the time, totally why i did it and not because i was dumb)
i would not put it past pokémon to do this. will i be sad? yea. but i’ve accepted the inevitable. also i’m too broke to have a switch 2, so i won’t be able to play this until like 2 years after release lol
pairing(s): hyunjin x fem!reader
series summary: when tempted by an intoxicating offer by hyunjin the goblin king of the underground, you fight against him to find your own sense of self once more while in his labyrinth.
glimpse:within the walls of the goblin city, the foreboding castle awaits you. after a long journey, you will see if you have it within you to win.
warnings/tags: inspired by the 1986' movie Labyrinth, follows majority of the movie's plot points with lore divergence, 3rd person POV, use of Y/N, mature, suggestive adult content, faerie lore, world-building, explicit language, canon-typical violence, fighting, battle, uneven power dynamics, blood, injuries, toxic relationships, angst, magic, let me know if there is anything else i can tag.
word count: 8.4k
previous chapter <- -> last chapter
series masterlist
It had once been startling to be alone in the Labyrinth, running through its twisting hallways. She had been torn away from Han and Chris too many times to count at this point and each time a flare of unease had bit down her spine when she was by herself. Not now. This time she wasn’t frightened. Even with the clanking and clashing of armor behind her, chasing her down as they yelled and shouted, she didn’t feel afraid to be alone. She knew that no matter what everything in this place revolved around her. It was her path. She was in control. The knights didn’t care about her friends; they were focused on her.
Stopping her.
Defeating her.
Her.
“Run, Y/N!” She heard her Chris cry out.
“We are right behind you!” Jisung called. “Make it to the castle!”
There were shouts of pain far behind her, curses in tongues she could only just begin to decipher, and screeches of surprise. None of it sounded like her friends, but she couldn’t stop to listen closer. She had to cling to the hope they could fend for themselves if only for a moment.
Have courage in them as they had courage in her.
The tight winding walls weren’t dark or scary. They were lantern-lit, leading towards an even brighter light. Keep going, keep going. She felt like she could hear something whispering in her bones to keep running. It wasn’t like before. It wasn’t fear that trickled through her veins.
The light bloomed into a city as she ran, ran, ran into the town square.
The Goblin City was gleaming with false-light. It felt like the world was casted into a golden glow. Unlike the Gardens, there was no dome overhead with a false sky. There were still the floating candles that flickered everlastingly but with new additions of bubbles. Sparks of sunshine, caught bundles of starlight, flames of flickers, all gleamed in bauble-like large lanterns; some floating in the air like it was nothing but a lost bubble and others tied down with floral-like vines like makeshift lamplights lining the roads. It reminded her of Hyunjin and his magic.
This was the Goblin City – at the base of the Goblin Castle. His home after all. Why wouldn’t his magic trail over its cobblestoned streets more than anywhere?
For the first time in the entire Labyrinth, the world she walked felt lived in. Quaint even. There were no feral hints of abandonment. No cobwebs and dust. Buildings, large and small, were built up around her with strange architecture. Brink clambered high in twisting ways, defying gravity, or reason. Washed clothes of all sizes zig-zagged between the cobblestoned buildings windows. A central fountain for the city sat, babbling. The grotesque faces carved into the rock spat out water into its shallows. Abandoned woven baskets of grass sat with half-washed clothes. Watery footsteps led away from the fountain, reminding her of the banshee in the Inner Gardens. Her words echoed:
The way forwards is sometimes the way back. Quite often, it seems like we aren’t getting anywhere when, in fact, we are.
There was the smell of food cooking; chimneys billowed with smoke that smelt of spiced stew and warm bread. Shop stalls stood in front of rickety homes, their wooden facades full of bits and bobs. A basket of eggs sat beside a too-calm rooster that stared at her with dull eyes. Large chunks of cured meats hung beneath canopies, lighting-flies nibbling at them greedily. Stray cats roamed, hissing in displeasure. A rat scurried past.
Y/N slowed just a smidge, heaving heavily. She continued to glance around. As if to find a new threat looming around the corner. Her hair stuck to her sweatied face as she tried to find her next path in the seemingly abandoned city. Slowly but surely, she could see figures peering out of windows, holding curtains close to their faces. Humanoid like Jisung but some furried. A skeletal hand curled around a door, a skinny face glanced around the corner curiously. A tail wiggled down an ally in view before being scooped up by a clawed hand. Even fungi that lived in the bricks of the buildings peered at her from between caulking, tiny eyes of mushrooms and whatnot tracking her before hiding away into the walls.
Goblins and fae hid from her.
She heard a whimper from a nearby shut door.
“It’s her! It’s the Runner!”
Her head turned to see a wide-eyed goblin. No taller than a toddler with fear in its animal-like eyes. His head full of hair, fur-like and porcupine all at once stood on edge before he was tugged into a nearby basement entry. Like she was some sort of natural disaster coming for their town.
There was a hiss of quiet as the basement entry locked with a clank. A strange eeriness that came over the city as she slowed to walk. She was unfitting to the surroundings. She was too big and yet too short for everything. Otherworldly to the otherworldly. The city held its breath as she caught hers.
Glancing back, she could see the figures of the Knights - or her friends - creep forward in shadowy forms down the city wall’s entrance. She quickly rounded a corner, passing the makeshift shops and startling a cat that yowled into the strange before-the-storm silence. She could hear squeaks and whimpers as she passed dwellings. Shuffling behind shut doors.
“Runner!” She heard a snarled shout.
Fast, she hid behind another wall, back pressing into brick as she held her breath. Footsteps and jingling metal spurs rushed past. She caught a flash of gold and a gleam of a cutlass. Y/N didn’t dare to let her breath out. The fungi beside her did though in a startling loud squeak. The footsteps stopped.
She glanced aside at the mushroom with fluffy like hair on its spore-mushroom head; a glare in her gaze as it squeaked again and hid further into the cracks. When she glanced back at the alley’s opening, she was startled by the Captain. Hongjoong with his intimidating aura. Blood dripped down his temple, a snarl was on his pretty mouth.
“There you are,” he growled out with a wicked grin that looked not a smidge happy.
And with two strong strides forward, he grasped her wrists to yank her from her hiding spot, pulling her into the square. With the whirlwind energy of a tornado, he had lost his composure; he looked flustered, red faced and hair blustered. “Your coup is over! You cannot win!”
She struggled against his grasp, tugging and pushing at his hold. “Let—go; unhand me!” It was a grunted command, one that he half-listened to, letting go of one wrist with a gasp. His gaze rose and glared at her with an accusation in his gleaming eyes.
“How-“
He didn’t get to finish his words as Changbin full-body slammed the smaller Knight aside with a thunk.
“Go, my Lady!”
A scream broke through with that, more like a horse’s neigh than a human’s. A crash was heard in the distance. She scrambled away, climbing up a nearby flight of stairs. Taking two steps at a time, she crept up onto a plateau, filled with more houses layered upon one another. It was no longer calm though like the lower levels. There were fleeing goblins here, running this way and that.
“Watch out! Watch out!” There were layered shouts and cries as a crowd of townsfolk, large and small, rounded a corner.
Only for their eyes to bug at the sight of her.
“Run away!” they cried out. “It’s the Runner! She’s here! She’s here!”
They scattered around her, parting around her like she was a rock in a sea of fur and fangs. Trying to see what was ahead from amidst the stampede, her own eyes widen at the sight of knight upon knight. Some were tall and spindly, and others were itty bitty and covered in tufts of fuzz like rats, but they all were running full speed, waving their swords this way and that. Irresponsible and bloodthirsty. On backs of odder-looking creatures. Heading towards her in a stampede.
“Shit,” she muttered as she turned on her heel to run back down the stairs, weaving through the townsfolk. Barely rounding the corner of the stairwell, she heard Jisung cry out from somewhere.
“Y/N! Duck!”
She listened, dropping down as a canon-ball hurtled towards her and crashed into a home. Screams burst forth from inside the dwelling. Her head snapped in the opposite direction. A smoking canon stood with tiny furred creatures in knight leathers manning it. A manic cackle left one of the goblins sitting atop the weapon before it let out a screech.
Another fireball whistled through the air and hit a building nearby. The destruction ricocheted. Rubble fell onto the streets. Innocent goblins cried out and scurried out of their homes like bees escaping a disrupted beehive. They flooded into the knights, facing violence from the blood-thirsty warriors who seemed to not care if they were her or her friends at all. They just wanted chaos!
Y/N had never seen such destruction so fast. The calm before the storm had barely lasted a minute. The entire town was in anarchy. They were destroying their own city in the efforts to stop her- or try to! Her brows crinkled in confusion. She heard creatures whimpering inside their homes, whispering words she could only begin to make out. Prayers to a Mother, prayers to the King. Mercy! Mercy! Mercy! They cried out.
She ran around another alley way, trying to find the path away from the destruction. She wanted it all to stop. They were being hurt for no reason!
A tolling bell rang out hauntingly like a clock’s chime; once, twice, thrice. Her eyes flashed to the highest towers of the nearby castle. It lurked over closer than ever with its tall spindle-like towers. She could see him watching, in his dark leathers and dark hair. Like some sort of raven of misfortune, he wiggled his fingers at her. A smirk curled on his lips, never meeting his eyes.
“An hour left.” It was a taunt on the wind; his mouth didn’t even murmur it and yet she could hear it loud and clear in her ear.
Glaring, she tilted her head.
“Stop destroying your own City.” She said aloud, as if he’d hear her from so far away. Because he could. This was his playground, his kingdom. “They’re innocent.”
Hyunjin raised his brows in a disregarding manner, flicking dust aside from the cool stone of the windowsill.
“Goblins are like rabbits – or roaches. There will always be more. Perhaps you’ll be one soon.”
It infuriated her. He infuriated her. He had just berated her for destroying his kingdom and yet he did the same thing. He didn’t make sense. Like a child he destroyed his kingdom of toy blocks on purpose. A tantrum.
“You are-“
A hand wrapped around her wrist again, and she yelped, being pulled from her strange haze. (In that moment, it felt like it was just him and her. Hyunjin and the Runner, frozen in time and talking as if he was just a short distance away. Glancing back at the distance, she realized how far he was actually. How could she see him so clearly before? It was scary.) Looking towards her friend, her eyes must’ve shown it because Chris reassured her.
“It’s me! It’s me!” Chris exclaimed. His caring eyes gleamed in concern. His chest bore a scratch; it painted a deep purple blood stain over his skin.
“C’mon,” he insisted. “We’ve got to find cover.”
Jisung joined her on her other side, hair a mess. A cut in the shape of an X decorated his cheek. Quick, he blocked her from a shrapnel thrown her way, his bicep taking the brunt of the attack.
“Ji-!” she barely could get out her words as Chris shielded her from another goblin with twisting twig-like limbs. His roar was like the moaning of a falling tree.
Jisung held her closely to his chest, looking this way and that for the remaining member of their party. His dagger was brandished out protectively in front of them. It had blood on it.
Blood. It only made her realize how deadly this was – for them, not her. After all, she couldn’t be harmed fatally here – not until the hour was up. Until her fate was written in stone. But they could.
“Where’s Sir Changbin?” Y/N asked worriedly.
“We lost him around the corner,” Chris told her. “He will find us.”
As if on cue, there was a loud ‘yah’ nearby.
“Stay back, villains! Hah! Take that!” There was the clash of swords, multiple by the sound of it. Like one by one, he swiped at them with vigor.
Clash, clang, clank.
A splash was heard.
Jisung’s wide jeweled eyes latched down a path; she could see his mouth mumbling something as he thought.
“Changbin!” she called.
“Busy, your Ladyship,” she could hear him faintly.
But Jisung knew this land better than the Labyrinth. It was his home for so long. He knew where to go even if it twisted like the maze beyond the city.
“This way.” Jisung instructed.
He grabbed her arm and tugged her along.
They wriggled through the skinny alleyway, past itty-bitty windows into small abodes for creatures and whatnot, before they tumbled out into a new portion of the square. They grunted as the brick spat them out. Jisung pushed them back behind some barrels of pickled who-knows-what.
Hidden away, they peered around the corner at the chaos.
Goblins laid in the street, injured or worse. Knights were cackling riding around on the backs of chickens and tormenting the stray cats. It seemed like more and more knights were flooding into the city – even into the townsfolks’ homes. She had to find a way out of here. Whether through the castle’s walls or out of the city. If only to lead the terror elsewhere.
A wail caught her attention. There were goblin-folk, younger and older caught in the mess in the streets as the Knights pulled out another canon. How do they have so many portable canons!? The smoking thing was already aimed at the crowd. A countdown begun. A warning that seemed almost merciful if it wasn’t going to be followed by an attack nonetheless. Fair-folk scrambled away, emptying the street. Except for a goblin, tiny and crying, caught with a large rock, a fragment of debris, on their tinier foot.
Y/N watched in horror as they were left behind by the flock of fleeing goblins, shrieking, and howling every man for themselves.
“Watch out!” she called, stumbling out of her hiding spot.
Quickly, she went over to the small trapped goblin, skidding to her knees to shove at the rock. It was big enough she needed both hands but not heavy enough she couldn’t move it (even if Chris was quick to jump in to help, all the while cursing her recklessness.) Freeing the goblin with a huff, they all fell down under Chri’s protective arms, shielding her and the goblin as a canon whittled through the air above them.
Jisung was quick to thwart the Goblin Knights with ease. Lean muscles rippling as he simply pushed the goblins aside, dodging spears poking towards him. With one shove, he pushed the canon into the nearby moat with a grunt.
Turning back, he was surprised to see Y/N and the goblin they saved hugging.
“You saved me!” The tiny thing cried out. “You—the Runner!!”
It was said in surprise, shock, awe. All things positive and pure. The goblin-child’s eyes gleamed with gratitude. Y/N smiled softly before she heard another clash of swords nearby.
“Hurry, hide,” she encouraged the innocent goblin despite their fear. “Go.”
It screeched as Y/N moved to nudge it towards a nearby home; the door opened a smidge as if to invite in any survivors.
“Runner!” A voice cried out again. “You deceitful girl!”
Y/N turned; Chris and Jisung were already there at her defense, shielding her physically from the Knights of Ateez’ comeback. They prowled towards her in the streets. It was two of the prettiest Knights with their ethereally sharp features. One with the musket aimed and the other with the split-dyed hair. He was no longer smiling.
“Hurry, go, little one,” Y/N pushed the creature aside, behind them as she, Chris, and Jisung prepared for an attack. Chris’s arm outstretched in protection over Y/N. The small goblin watched as their shadows covered them as they faced the Knight of Ateez.
Protecting them. Putting their safety ahead of their own to face the fearsome Ateez. A flash of confusion flickered over the little goblin’s face before they stumbled over their webbed furry feet, limping away. They didn’t understand why the Runner pushed them to safety? No one had defended them before…
“Lead them away,” Y/N urged to her friends. Jisung glanced away from the Knights of Ateez to his friend. “Away from the town.”
“Away?”
“Towards the castle!” Chris suggested. “Its close; we can lose them there. You’ll be there too!”
As quick as the Runner was there, she and her comrades were gone, running away – like the Legends foretold. There was an air of awe in the goblin-child before it scurried away.
The due of the Ateez Knights followed with vigor, chasing them down as they rounded a corner, over another bridge until they were in a new town’s square. The towers of the castle taunted her with their nearness. The castle’s drawbridge laid out like a maw, its tongue the wooden planked bridge. It was unguarded, oddly. All the Knights were out in the city.
Magic zapped in front of her like a lightning strike. She stumbled back with a shout. Chris’ arm went around her, tossing her behind him with a growl. His eyes zeroed in on the Knights of Ateez about.
“Be careful” Chris huffed out at her, less threatening and more simply in touch with his troll-side as they backed up against a nearby wall. He felt like it was safer to have her cornered, away from danger. “You keep jumping into danger!”
“I had to help!” she cried out.
“Where’s Bin?” Jisung repeated, scanning the foreground. He swore he had heard him over this way.
“Sir Changbin!” Y/N called.
Like a dog, loyal and true, Changbin’s eyes rose from his battle, ear perking up. “Lady Y/N?” He was surrounded by goblin knights, some crawling up his form and whacking them with their weaponry. It did little to stop the Sir.
“Go forth, fairest! I’ve got this under control!”
There was a particular hard whack of a spear’s length to his rear. He yelped.
YN’s eyes bulged at the sight of him being swarmed! How could she leave him?
“We aren’t leaving him,” Jisung read Y/N’s mind and speaking it aloud.
“No way.” She agreed.
The one called Seonghwa raised his musket and aimed at Jisung, leading her to tug him down to dodge. “Watch out!” she yelped.
Chris called upon the rocks to roll in front of them, the debris from around them tugging up from the ground to act as shields.
“Go,” Chris encouraged Jisung and Y/N.
“Not forth this way!” Changbin exclaimed.
Jisung threw a dagger towards the Knight that slashed towards Changbin. It sliced his cheek. The Knight of Ateez growled out.
“Runner!”
“There you are,” the one called San growled out, pointing with his muscular arm.
“You’re a sneaky one,” another growled out as he tried to swing towards her with his axe. Chris grunted as he blocked it with a thrown piece of Earth. The troll-fae hadnt flexed his powers this much in years.
Another Knight rounded the rocks to chase around them, blocking them with his own broadsword.
“You can’t hurt me! Call off the reinforcements,” she argued back. “The city is innocent.”
“And you’ll surrender?” The pretty-one, Yeosang, scoffed, slinging a flash of magic her way in contempt.
She dodged it and watched as an innocent chicken fluffed up from the impact with a squawk.
“I don’t want anyone to get hurt!” She exclaimed. “They aren’t at fault!”
Hongjoong prowled back and forth in front of his Knights, almost like a wolf. He reminded her of Minho, of Felix, of Seungmin. She could almost see him thinking. The cogs ticked behind his eyes. Her eyes flashed away to look toward Changbin who was still making progress with defeating the tiny goblins about him, knocking away swords and spears with ease.
The Knights watched her as she watched the situation tumble out in front of her.
“She’s got brains,” Seonghwa commented with a scowl. His long hair was huffed out of his sharp face. There was a long talon-like scratch over the bridge of elegant nose.
“She sure does,” the Captain commented from aside.
“I could do with brains like hers,” Mingi commented.
“So could I,” San muttered in front of her, lunging towards her. “To eat!”
Nearby, Changbin grew incensed at their words; trapped by battle, he grew angry. He let out a roar that was more human than animal. The goblin-knights tumbled to the ground. Rushing forward, he slashed at San, blocking him from his crew. How dare they impugn her honor!? How dare they think such disgusting thoughts? He shoved the buff Knight aside after the slash. He turned to the nearby house and grappled with a barrel. Throwing it at them with a shout, it toppled them to the ground like a row of bowling pins.
“Vandals! Rascals! How dare you blaspheme a maiden!” He threw another nearby crate. It crashed down over them, breaking into wooden chunks and chunks of whatever was inside. Groans and moans filled the square as they struggled to remain awake from the concussion the strongest Knight threw at them.
“Changbin!” Y/N cried out in surprise.
“You foul-hearted knaves!” He tossed another barrel for good luck before Changbin rushed to his party once more in a flurry of heroics; the Knights groaned in pain as they tried to get up, stunned. “You scorn my Lady’s name? Her wit? HUH!”
There was no time to soothe her angered knight; all she could do was focus on the clear path to the drawbridge with the Knights of Ateez and goblin-knights knocked out.
“Go, go,” she encouraged as she pushed around them, sprinting towards the drawbridge of the Goblin Castle. “We can go now!”
“Not so fast,” Yeosang of the Ateez Knights groaned. With a wave of his hand and the last of his energy, magic burst forth. The drawbridge began to rise.
“No!” She yelped. She ran. Ran as fast as she could. But it still shut, raising too high for a human with human dexterity … until it shut with a clank. At the same moment, Chris managed to whack the last conscious member of the Knights asleep with a well placed rock.
“No…”
Y/N’s eyes grew wide in despair. No, no, no. The drawbridge’s only way of opening was from the heavy chains holding it – which only way to access were from within. The fall to the moat below was far and dangerous. Eerie dark water sludged by with bioluminescent creatures diving in and out of it frightfully. It wasn’t possible. How would she get in now?
She let out a sagging breath, eyes searching over the castle. The very castle she had been trying to reach. Despair begun to claw at her nerves. What now?
The group stumbled back. Their eyes looked this way and that. Jisung had begun to talk, mumbling out about other possible entrances. She barely could hear him over her roaring heart.
“Over here!”
It was quiet. A small voice.
“Milady! Over here!”
She heard it again and looked around. Glancing down, she saw a goblin no taller than a mouse. They gestured towards them urgently. Y/N spared one look to her friends, watching as blood dripped from Chris’ temple before she decided.
She knelt beside the mouse-goblin.
“Yes?” she whispered.
It looked at her with beady eyes, gleaming from the captured light floating around them. The goblin stuttered.
“This way, Runner Milady,” the goblin chimed out. They sounded like windchimes. “We can help!”
A door was opened nearby. Taller than expected, there was a warmth from within and a flickering fireplace gleaming. The mouse-goblin held a hand out to her, a little paw. Looking back at her friends, who were all staring at her wide-eyed, she nodded. She took a step inside the home.
“Y/N!” Jisung scolded, chasing after her. The others followed suit.
“We don’t know them!” he eyed the goblin family that had let the much-larger fae wiggle into their abode. The building seemed to shrink as they continuing into the main living space, becoming some small they had to kneel or squat. Changbin’s shoulder banged into the overhead chandelier of candles, dousing them out on accident. It left only the fireplace spluttering for light.
“We’re helping!” One goblin-member chittered beside the fire. “Lady has been kind! She helped our Bobbins. She saved him!”
Jisung’s eyes flashed to her, worried, Doubtful. And all she did was nod. She felt like this was meant to be. The goblin-child was nearby sitting on a chair with a bounded foot. He smiled at her with fangs. The goblin was pure of heart. Kind. A paw stroked over his head lovingly. Looking at the huddled group of fae helping them, she realized they all were.
“Its okay, Han,” she told him quietly.
Changbin groaned nearby tugging away a stray arrow in his bicep.
“Oh my God, are you alright?” Y/N asked, stepping towards him to access him.
“My Lady, it is my duty!” he declared, looking at her with big confused eyes.
“Duty or not, I don’t like seeing any of you hurt,” she admitted. Her hand went to touch his skin and he winced. “I don’t wish for that.”
As she helped Changbin, there was a sizzling of stones as the room was doused into darkness, along with the firepit.
“This way, this way, we can get you out by getting you in,” the seemingly old goblin croaked out. Their goblin family began to claw at the now empty chimney’s rocks, tugging them out with an otter’s precision.
“You can get us into the castle?” Jisung doubted. His hand hadn’t left his dagger.
“We’ve worked there for centuries. We know,” an old withered goblin whimpered out. “The help can help!”
The goblins that served the royal family seemed to have their own tricks because soon enough there was a dusty pathway from the hearth of their family home.
“It was an old path for when we needed to go home quick… you need to go home too, right?” The littlest goblin squeaked – it was the same one that they helped earlier.
“Yes. I do.” Y/N agreed.
“It’ll take you through the kitchens and then the rest is up to you!” A woman-goblin chirped.
Turning to the goblin family, she smiled. “Thank you! Thank you very much!”
“It is our oath, milady! Life for a life! We are square.” The oldest goblin gobbled out.
Grimly, Jisung nodded beside her.
“Debt repaid. Honor intact,” he echoed, nodding firmly at the other. He knew that it was their life-blood’s rules. Not wanting to overstay their welcome, Jisung grabbed her hand and led the party through the small escape hole. “C’mon.”
The crawl space was dusty, sparkling with the same dust that made up the entirety of the Labyrinth. It was as if this tunnel hadnt been used in decades. There were small shoes, forgotten game pieces, even a rotting chicken bone. There wasn’t time to explore; they continued on until they ended up in a grand kitchen made of fine stone and woods. It smelt of firesmoke, something that made Y/N freeze. Nose twitching, she looked around. Only to spot a nearby oven full of flames as if forgotten. Chan was quick to put it out with the nearby dousing bucket.
The kitchen was left in a state of abandonment, Half chopped vegetables were left on chopping boards. Spilt mead was across the floor. A forgotten apron snagged on the nearby stairs.
“I haven’t been here in years,” Changbin whispered. “It looks the same.”
“I never came down here,” Jisung admitted.
“I know the way,” Changbin said, eyes sparkling with something. Remembrance.
He pushed ahead of them, leading them down curving hallways of wood and rock. Like the kitchen, the castle was left in an abandoned state. There were no knights. No goblins. Nothing.
It didn’t look grandiose. It was rock like much of the Labyrinth. There were less cobwebs but it still twisted around like it was a maze of its own. A path only those familiar with could navigate with ease. They continued their journey inside the mystical castle. Crackling torches guided them forward, lighting with a flicker of magic as they walked further and further. As if sensing them.
“This way,” Changbin was the one to encourage as he guided them through familiar hallways. His hand wasn’t in hers but he kept glancing back at the Runner.
Chan was keeping watch from behind her while Changbin and Jisung remained ahead of her, weapons drawn in defense.
But nothing came.
They were alone. The path narrowed to a single staircase. It spiraled up and downwards into a tower. She could see one doorway at the top and nothing below.
“We’re almost there! Up here,” Jisung encouraged as he began to climb upwards.
It didn’t take long - especially in the eerie silence. Their footsteps echoed on the polished marble.
As they reached the top, they entered a singular room of the highest tower of the castle. It was larger than anticipated but nothing that wowed her. The vacancy was the only shocking thing of the throne room. It was empty. Left abandoned in a hurry, it seemed. Half-eaten bones of meat, puddles of mead, and scatterings of peanut shells laid about, cracking under their feet as they crept forward. A lone vulture laughed from the hanging wooden chandelier, cackling at her as she startled. Its eyes felt endless as it stared and seemed to chortle silently now.
“Spread out,” Chris commanded, quietly but firmly.
Her friends spread out throughout the chamber, walking carefully around the forgotten bits and bobs. Han glanced out the nearby window, the phantom smell of perfume lingering there. Changbin spotted a desecrated seal of the Goblin King, used as a napkin on a barrel. Chan heard the clanking of chain on a nearby wall post.
YN approached the throne; Hyunjin’s words echoed in her mind.
“If you can defeat my labyrinth and reach my true throne in my castle beyond the goblin city within 13 hours, you’ll receive your wish.”
There was nothing special about his throne. Despite the boney structure and the dark velveteen drapery, it was nothing magical. It was worn with a scuffed up, ox-horn backing. She walked closer, dipping into the circular sunken pit of the room. The tiny steps were meant not for human feet but tiny goblin paws. She carefully made her way in and out of it, eying what was around. A rattle. Crumbs of bread, bones, apple pits.
This wasn’t a wonderous throne room. It felt like a mess. She crept up onto the other side, standing in front of the throne. The vulture laughed behind her. She felt like something tugged at her hair.
Her fingers brushed over the bone making up the back of the throne. It was cool to the touch, sturdy at first. Yet soon enough, pieces of it crumbled along tiny hairline cracks in the bone, leaving bone-dust on her fingertips. She was quick to pull her hand away, wiping it away on her shirt. The cushion was half on the seat; moving it into place, she could feel the cold worn leather beneath her palm.
He wasn’t here.
He hadn’t been here for a while.
He wouldn’t have just left. He was too proud for that. She knew Hyunjin despite their few encounters. She knew he wouldn’t just let her win. This didn’t feel like a victory. It felt stale like the nearby loaf of bread on the edge of the pit.
She turned and sat on the throne, lips pursed against teeth in frustration as she thought.
“This isn’t it.” she said.
“It’s the throne room,” Jisung exclaimed from nearby. He turned and his eyes widened at the sight of her on the throne. His heart nearly stopped.
No one had ever dared to sit there except the Royal Family. He’s only seen Hyunjin and his father lounge there.
“He wouldn’t just leave,” she replied, glancing over at him.
Her forehead crinkled. Her arms crossed. The room was quiet. The vulture shifted on its perched; its wings shuffling. Looking around the room, she couldn’t but take in its normalcy. Its lack of awe. Its lack of magic. Except for the sparkle behind a draped curtain. A small crevasse of light twinkled at her. A barely covered exit, glowing with a ghastly white glow. Almost like Hyunjin’s baubles. (It didn’t make architecture-sense. If this was the highest tower, how was there another passage outside of the structure? She wasn’t sure, but she did feel a pull in her stomach, from the naval of her belly.)
Y/N stood and approached it, brushing the curtain aside to look up at a flight of stairs. The light glowing was fantastical like a sunset glowing within the passage. Pulsing. Tempting. Magical.
Licking her lips, she turned to look at her friends in the tower. Each stood at alert, at different parts of the room. Jisung’s eyes looked like big shiny amethysts.
“Y/N,” he whispered. He knew.
“I—I think he went this way,” she told them. “And… I think I have to face him alone.”
“Alone?” Changbin echoed. His usually booming voice was small.
“What if you get hurt?” Chris asked.
Jisung looked like he had been fatally hit. His mouth was downturn into a pout.
“I – if I am,” she swallowed, glancing back at the staircase. Hauntingly luring. Her stomach tensed. “I don’t think he will hurt me.”
She didn’t know. He has hurt her. But that feeling in her bones. She wasn’t afraid. Not really. Her blood buzzed.
Y/N was ready.
“He won’t.” she told them.
She looked back at her friends. “I need to do this alone.”
Jisung’s lip quivered but he was quick to swallow down his discontent. His worry. His love. And instead, he nodded.
“If you need us, just yell.” He told her.
Y/N wasn’t the same woman he had met at the beginning of the Labyrinth; she was his friend.
He trusted her.
She was ready.
Chris and Changbin echoed their support. Y/N took a moment to look at them. Her friends who had gotten her so far… before turning away and climbing the stairs ahead. Alone.
Her footsteps snapped in the silence. Her sneakers squeaked and echoed. The stairs seemed to go on and on, twisting and turning until she came upon a strange chamber. It was glowing with that heavenly glow, but shadows casted this way and that in a confusing manner. Stairs crawled up and down, this way and that, everywhere. Her path led nowhere and yet everywhere.
It felt like she was inside some sort of abstract painting of a room set in a cloudy heaven. Glowy and never-ending. It was ever changing; a blink and the stairs shifted to be on the ceiling, Another doorway here, another entrance there. Upside down, inside out, right-side up.
It was impossible and marvelous and otherworldly. Altering and changing. She’d never be able to predict it. Does it keep changing when no one is looking? She wondered.
Counting the steps ahead, she shut her eyes and climbed. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 -
“You precious thing,” she heard a voice whisper. It didn’t sound like him.
She opened her eyes. The only thing in front of herself was her. A mirrored version of her.
In the reflection, he was behind her. Turning around quick, she realized he wasn’t there.
Only in the mirror.
Hyunjin with that intense gaze and curled lip. His hand went to adjust her double’s hair. It moved ghostly. She felt it.
“You’ve run so long, so far,” he said. “And you are still here.”
Stuck in a labyrinth.
She glared.
“Your eyes can be so cruel,” he hummed out a laugh. He leaned forward; phantom lips pressed against her hair. “Just as I can be so cruel.”
She tried to push him away, the ghost of him. He laughed and spun about in the mirror before walking off down a corridor. Her eyes followed after him; the real corridor he had passed into was to her right. Taking a few steps in, she peered through it; it was just a path to more stairs, criss-crossing, curling up and down and all around. Further into this Labyrinth.
Stepping back, she stared at the mirror closely. Nowhere else had been here has had this. Her eyes looked older. Tired. Her clothes were raggedy. Battle torn, smoke-kissed. Blood splattered. Vermillion red and royal purple. Taking a step forward, she peered closer still. The smell of honeysuckle kissed her nose.
She reached out with a careful finger.
Ting!
There was a sound strange and ethereal. The reflection rippled, waves distorting her figure as she felt a suction on her finger. Until she was sucked into the mirror.
There was an oddly refreshing feeling that coated her skin. Like entering a freezer, her face chilled as she stepped further into the new world. It was cold here. Her hair felt like it was standing up but when she went to brush at it, it laid flat. Static hummed, buzzing close to her skin.
It felt like a reflection of reality here. A mimicry, a dream of the previous room. A sky full of stars in a dark sky encompassed the world, suffocating it into what felt like a chamber rather than a landscape. There were floating stairs, chunks of rockwork hovering in the sky. There was a ringing in her ear.
Breathing out, she tried to calm her nerves of the unknown. After all, everything here has been unknown and she’s handled it. She could do this.
Y/N crept further inside. Her footsteps echoed on the grassy floor. The smell of river water, fire-smoke, of honey-suckle, and of something far more distant. Like a memory of childhood, nostalgia itched at her nose. The singular path began to taper off into something more abstract. Floating chunks of earth made a stepping stone towards a central platform. Floating in the nothingness. Everything felt like a dream or a nightmare. Unreality mixed with reality.
One, two, three, she hopped the stepping stones until she landed onto the central platform with a thud.
Mushrooms curled up around the space, around her, around the lone object in front of her. It was a throne made of dark stone, cold as ice. It hovered above the dirt ground with a faint shimmering shield around it. Tendrils of the night sky made solid, like a slab of carved obsidian, was carved into a high-backed throne. Stars reflected in its surface, and magic hummed from deep within occasionally making blooms of red, blues, and greens dancing underneath the polished throne.
Unlike the other throne, this felt like a living thing. The way it bloomed as she looked it over. The way the world quieted between her and it.
It called to her.
“You’ve traveled and fought valiantly, Runner of the Labyrinth.” She heard it murmur in her ear. Neither female nor male, she felt its voice rather than truly perceived it.
Stepping closer, she peered into the stone, the jeweled surface of the crystalline throne twinkled at her. A faint reflection of her grinned back. Her enthrallment was only stopped by a voice.
“Y/N,” his voice was torn between despair and admiration.
Hyunjin looked nothing like he had before. In feathered downy cloak, his hair a split of blonde and black, he looked unlike himself, fragmented like his own form couldn’t decide if he was something of dreams or nightmares. He didn’t look like the confident man that had crept into her bedroom hours ago. The crestfallen smile that crossed over his face disappeared with a flash of lightning in the room to reveal the glowering that consuming him once more. The feathered cloak shed feathers with every shuddering breath like he was molting.
“You are not meant to be here.” He growled. In a blink, he was near the throne, blocking her view of it. He stood between her and it, the goal of this journey.
His eyes were panicked. Hers weren’t. A rumble growled through the stranger ethereal room; it trembled. He looked around startled, face distraught. Meanwhile, she barely looked startled. Everything she had faced had been like this. Uncertain. Ever-changing. As the world stopped shaking, she took a step towards him. He took a step back for the first time. His hands outstretched as if to stop her physically.
“Beware.” The word was deep and inhuman from his lips. Like a wolf corner, he bared his teeth in a facsimile of a smile. “I have been generous up ‘til now. I can be cruel,” Hyunjin warned.
Once upon a few hours ago, that threat would’ve been fear-inducing. Now, she simply scoffed.
“Generous?” the Labyrinth-Runner repeated dubiously, almost laughing.
Like a movie reel, moments of her journey flashed through her mind. Being dropped into an endless labyrinth, walking for hours on aching feet, falling, tumbling, bleeding, being chased, being taunted, being trapped, being torn through space and time.
“What have you done that’s generous?” she asked.
“Everything,” the King claimed, taking an insistent, desperate step towards her. His hands outstretched now as if to touch her.
Y/N did not shudder as she once did as he crowded closer. She looked aside of him, not giving him the attention he sought.
“Everything you wanted I have done,” his hands went to cup her cheeks with ferocity. Her eyes met his. Deep and dark, he swore her eyes were almost as dark as the infinite of the magic around them. “You asked to be stolen away; I took you. You cowered before me; I was frightening. I have reordered time. I have turned the world upside down, and I have done it all for you.”
The smell of smoke danced in the air, fire-smoke with a hint of honeysuckle illusion. The world about them shuddered and shifted with his emotions like a glitching television set. An undulating creature, alive. Part of him. Or perhaps he was part of it.
“I am exhausted living up to your expectations,” Hyunjin murmured. His voice was gentle now, lacking the disdain it previously held. His head lulled forward and she was reminded of her peach-induced fantasy. His gentleness mixed with his cruelty. His long hair brushed her cheek with a knife’s gentleness.
“Isn’t that generous?” he breathed out with a soft disbelieving laugh.
“What more can I do?” he whimpered, his fingers tightened on her temples as he threaded through her hair distressed. “Please, Y/N. Tell me.”
It was strange to see him jump from threats to begs. It would’ve confused her before. But here, before him, she felt different. It wasn’t as frightful. He wasn’t all that powerful. Everything he’s thrown at her, she’s been able to face. By herself or with her friends. Her friends who were nearby, always with her even if they were far away.
When she didn’t say anything, Hyunjin sucked in a breath through bared fangs.
“You are cruel, YN,” he hissed. It wasn’t a scold. It was almost pained. He turned away from her, pulling away from her skin. It felt like honey clung to his bare hands. He clenched and unclenched his fingers, circling her nonetheless even as he didn’t gaze upon her. Like a wolf, circling its prey. But she refused to be something so weak.
Her feet began to mimic; her steps echoed his until she was nearly one step ahead of his pace, walking with him in circles.
His gaze flickered to her sneakers… sneakers! It made an unraveling sort of laugh bubble up in his chest. A random human had made it here. No… no… she wasn’t a random human; she was YN, she was--- The King looked mad, unkempt as his mind flashed between one thought to the next.
“We are well matched.” He almost giggled. His hands, bare of any gems or metallic jewelry, tug at his locks, pulling at them as if that’d help him think clearer. He couldn’t think around her anymore, consumed by the anxiety, the whirl, the heart pulsing, head rushing energy that pushed through him like a hurricane.
“You and I… I need your cruelty,” he admitted, glancing her way. His eyes gleamed like golden sunlit seas, shimmering inhumanely. “Just as you need mine.”
“I don’t need you.” She said simply, looking at him solidly.
It wasn’t a lie. They couldn’t lie after all.
Hyunjin’s laughter sounded all around her. Damp and watery like it was echoing in an inlet of an ocean cave.
“You’re acting like… like you’ve won,” he lamented, facing away from her. The room vibrated and undulated like a beating heart. The sky blurred into something fuzzied, less defined like a watercolor.
“I am here,” she simply said.
“You understand nothing,” Hyunjin bit out, turning to look at her. “You have answered none of the Labyrinth’s riddles. You don’t even know what the questions were!”
He sounded like a child now. Her head tilted.
“That wasn’t our bargain, now… was it?” she asked.
Hyunjin hissed out turning away.
She watched his fingers twitch and fiddle with his disheveled white outfit. Angelic feathers fell from his hair and bled to black onto the ground.
Y/N spoke to him: “You’re frightened, Hyunjin.”
“So are you.”
And in a flash of something fae, she watched as he jolted forward to be beside her. His eyes and her eyes locked, watching one another.
She didn’t deny it. But she could do things while afraid.
“I’ve traveled though dangers untold and hardship unnumbered.” She told him. The world trembled again like a roiling earthquake.
“Listen!” She swore she could hear a goblin cry out somewhere in the distance.
“For my will is as strong as yours,” she stated.
There was a crash of lightning and she heard Hyunjin’s voice in her ear like a ghostly whisper.
“Stop.” It was shaky and trembling.
Phantom hands grasped at her shoulders; his shadows were around her clinging to her skin desperately. Hyunjin stared at her, frantic. Pleading. His eyes were like a weeping angel’s, glossy and soft. His hand outstretched towards her.
“Look what I can offer you.”
Almost in slow motion, something materialized in a sparkle and shimmer. In his hand, there was a bauble, a bubble, reflective and soapy. It glowed but it wasn’t as captivating as she once thought. There was a faint image of something, too distant and fuzzy to be enthralling.
“Your dreams. I can make them a reality,” he whispered.
His fingers trembled; his entire body did. There was a tremor, a pallid sheen to his appearance.
“I’ll ask so little of you,” he promised. “Just believe in me.” He took a step closer, the bauble of magic in his hand caught between them as he crept closer. His head ducked down, closer. His breath was shared with her. The room felt tighter; the shadows around her shoulders curled around him and her, trapping them in the darkness of night. Two stars floating together. The bubble sparkled between them.
"Just believe in me and you can have anything you’ve ever dreamed of.” His whisper was intimate. “What you saw at the ball was only a hint. Imagine… imagine being mine. Just let me rule you.”
It was still fantastical, still painted with watercolor strokes as if he’d be a gentle lover. She’d seen his nature in the Labyrinth. Prone to enjoying a challenge, but often abandoning things. Jealous but envious. Haughty yet… fragile.
He was fragile. She was not. YN tilted her head at him. His eyes were crashing waves, sad and somewhat surging with energy.
“Just fear me and love me,” he told her, almost like a lover. “Do as I say, and I will by your slave.”
He was so close for just a moment, so close she swore their lips would meet. Each word was said so tenderly as if he was professing love rather than commands. Fear him, love him, be his.
She was no one’s.
Throughout this entire journey, she had made her decisions. She had found the paths with her own will power and with the help of people she chose. She wasn’t his. No matter how many obstacles he placed in her way. She overcame. Not because of his will. But her own.
“You have no power over me,” she realized.
The despair that crashed over him sent him backwards in a rush. The entire room seemed to expand then. The darkness fading into a brightness as the crystal bauble of her dreams hovered mid-air. Only to pop. A mist of water atoms and sparkling dust evaporating into the air and, with it, Hyunjin stumbled back.
“I—I believe in you,” he muttered, whimpering. “I believe… in … you. Please believe in me.”
He was a sorry sight, tears trickling down his face as he stumbled into the throne that seemed to sizzle at his touch. He glanced back at it. “I can’t—” His despair was something that consumed him in a flurry of feathers, curling into his cloak as he faded into something less human. Shrinking writhing into an owl as he flew off, away. Into the magic of the room, into nothingness. Her heart jumped at the sight, fearful despite the freeing tolling of a clock. The same clock that she had been racing against.
“YN…. YN…” his voice whimpered in a moan; his voice becoming nothing but a ghostly wail in the true throne room.
The Throne of cut-starlight and night sky glimmered at her, winking at her with a shared secret. Luring her in until she sat down upon it.
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