The air clung to my skin, thick with the damp scent of the rice fields stretching endlessly before us. Our steps sank deeper into the wet earth, my boots dragging through the mud like they were tethered to something heavier—something ancient. The sky above was vast, but in its sheer emptiness, it felt suffocating, like the land below was trying to swallow us whole.

We were running, but not just across the field. We were running through our pasts, through the weight of what had been and what was yet to come. It felt like it pulled me further from who I had been, closer to a version of myself I didn’t fully understand yet but knew I had to meet.

Jimin led us, his pace steady, every muscle in his body tense, ready for whatever was ahead. His eyes were fixed on the horizon, unblinking, like he could see the road already, even though it was still a distant blur. Antonella moved behind us, her eyes sharp, darting across the field like she could feel the danger in the air—the insects that would rise up from the wet ground, the creatures of the field that had no place in this moment. She guarded us, but I knew she was guarding herself, too. There was a sharpness to her that was born from more than just the mud beneath our feet.

Jared was clutching his duffle bag to his chest, his fingers wrapped around it like it was the last thing connecting him to the world that had slipped through his grasp. The bag was heavy, weighed down by memories—paintings, letters, fragments of a life that had long since vanished. He didn’t let go, not even for a second.

Y/n walked beside me, her breath shallow, quick. The distance between us and the road felt unbearable, but there was a deeper weight pressing on her, too—something psychological, existential. The field was not just earth and water; it was a place where she would either find herself or lose herself entirely. She moved like she didn’t know where the road would take her, but she needed to get there, to find the end of this journey, just as desperately as I did.

Y/n’s hand brushed mine for a moment, and I could feel the weight of everything she was carrying. It was as if the earth itself was testing us—making us question who we were and why we were here. But with each passing second, it became clearer. We were crossing the boundary between what we’d been and what we could become. We had an unwritten page, a decision we hadn’t yet made.

I could see it now—the road ahead, faint and distant, but closer. And in that road, I knew, there would be no answers, only more questions. But it didn’t matter. I wasn’t running from anything anymore. I was running toward something: a future, a conclusion, a reckoning with everything I’d ever been.

The rice fields stretched on, but my eyes were fixed on the horizon. We would get there. We had to.

"Halmeom," Jimin called out, his voice wavering in the stillness of the field. No answer came, but the scene before us was clear—there, at the far end of the rice paddies, stood a frail figure, draped in heavy layers of clothing that offered little protection from the elements. In her hands, a sketchbook, worn and well-loved, rested with an intimacy only she could know, her fingers moving in a slow, deliberate dance, as though etching something into the very air around her.

Jimin called to her again, his voice more insistent this time, but the silence was thick—an oppressive kind of quiet that seemed to hold its breath as we were not just witnesses to the passing of time, but to the metamorphosis of an entire world, one that did not dissolve into a utopian existence, but simply… continued, with all the inevitability of a tide.

It was then, on the third call, that I spoke her name—not Halmeom, but Mai. The name she was known by, the name that had once been shared by those whose voices had long since faded from this world. The name that had been a thread of continuity in a tapestry now unraveled by time and distance.

"Mai," I called, my voice low, but it carried in the air between us. And there, at last, her gaze shifted, not to me, but beyond me—her eyes locked on Y/n, as though recognizing something only the very marrow of her bones could understand.

"Jui..." Her voice, weak but unmistakable, broke the silence.

Y/n stepped forward, slowly, with a tenderness that spoke of years spent imagining this moment. Each movement was measured, deliberate, as if her very presence was an offering, a prayer to a past that had slipped away.

We stood there, frozen, as Y/n crossed the distance between them. I had no connection to this woman beyond her name, but Y/n did. And she deserved this moment—she had waited her whole life for it.

"Go," Antonella whispered in my ear, urging me forward, her hand gentle on my back. "Go with her."

And so I did.

"Are you, are you..." Mai's voice quivered as our figures grew clearer to her, her words trembling in the air. "Mon amour..."

"No, Mai, I'm Jungkook." I spoke softly, my words as much a comfort as an introduction.

"Oh, Jungkook. Hello, Jungkook." The frail voice extended a warmth that contrasted with her shivering form, her face lined with age and hardship. Her once-hidden scar above her eyebrow now stood as a testament to a life lived through more than just time—it was a wound, a history, a memory of battles fought long ago.

"Hello, Mai. This is Esmé, your granddaughter," I said, pulling Y/n closer. She waved, an awkward sincerity in her gesture, but there was nothing to mask the depth of her emotions.

"Hello, granddaughter," Mai repeated, her voice distant, the words seeming to float in the air, disconnected from any real sense of recognition or interest.

"Halmeom, you don’t understand," Jimin interjected, his voice strong, trying to force through the fog of confusion. "This is your granddaughter. She is Ju Gyeong's daughter, she is the baby your daughter had with her husband, Shane Albertson."

Mai blinked, her eyes shimmering with a strange gleam as recognition sparked in them. A faint smile tugged at the corners of her lips when she saw Jimin, and then Antonella, but the truth of her granddaughter’s identity seemed to be a bridge too far—too impossible to cross.

"Halmeom, I am Esmé. I am really your granddaughter." Y/n knelt at Mai’s feet, her fingers gently grasping the older woman's hands, tears cascading down her cheeks like a river of sorrow and longing.

"Yes, hello, granddaughter," Mai repeated in monotone.

"Jared, bring out the letters," I instructed, my voice tight with an urgency I couldn’t suppress.

Jared moved swiftly, bringing out the precious letters, their edges worn and yellowed with age. Jimin immediately picked one up and began to read aloud, his voice steady but thick with emotion. The letter, written in Cheon Seok’s hand, began with a stark declaration:

"The skies have grown darker. There's no certainty, that we will win. The only thing I know is that poor people have no refuge, the poor has no one to go to, no food to eat, no water to drink. Wars do not devastate the government but the grievers. I don't know if this letter will reach you but I know that our little one will be here very soon. I will come back. I will come back."

The letter ended abruptly, the ink smeared as though Cheon Seok had written it in haste, just before his life had been violently torn from him. I remembered the day well—the last day he lived.

"Jiminah, what are you reading?" Mai asked, her voice slow, as if coming from a great distance.

"This," Jimin said, holding the letter out like a sacred relic, "this is the last letter Cheon Seok wrote to you, Halmeom. It’s the only one he never sent. We have all your letters."

"Jiminah, don't call him by his name," Mai murmured, her voice thick with grief. "He will be your Halabeoji. He would have been my husband."

Her words, though simple, pierced the air with a poignancy I could feel in my very bones. Mai, an old woman, was lost in the labyrinth of her past—her memories tangled with the present, and she could not disentangle them.

"Did you meet him?" she asked, as if her world had stopped moving for just that moment, waiting for an answer.

"Mai," I said gently, sitting beside her on the bench, "Cheon Seok died a long time ago. After his troop leader, General Torres, fell, he was gravely injured trying to save him. Your due date was close, and he requested relief, but the new trooper was cruel and unjust."

Mai’s eyes focused on me as Y/n sat beside her, holding her hands.

"Cheon Seok was beaten… and killed one week before your daughter was born." I said, my voice breaking slightly.

"No, he said that he would come back," Mai whispered, her eyes unfocused, her body stiff with the weight of her denial.

"Halmeom, he won’t." Y/n’s voice was gentle, but it carried a heavy sorrow, a truth she had to share.

"You speak just like my Jui. She always said that my Cheon Seok would never come back." Mai’s eyes dulled with the memory of her daughter, lost to her long ago.

"Yes, Halmeom," Y/n continued softly, her tears now flowing freely, "I have met your Jui. She was my mother. She passed away when I was young."

"Oh, I see," Mai muttered. "Where is my Jui?"

"She’s long gone, Halmeom. Mum had cancer, and she passed away in her sleep. That was almost 13 years ago."

Mai’s face fell, her eyes clouded with confusion. "And her husband? Where is my Jui’s husband?"

"He died two years after your Jui passed away. They’re together now," Antonella replied quickly, moving closer to Y/n, offering her solace in the only way she could.

Mai was quiet, as though each word was too much to process at once. Then, finally, her eyes rested on me again.

"Oh, Jungkook, you look like my Cheon Seok."

I smiled faintly, but it was bittersweet. "Halmeom, he has your Cheon Seok’s memories. And Y/n is your blood. She is your Jui’s baby."

Mai’s gaze softened, but the truth was too much for her to bear. She repeated her question, this time with more clarity:

"You are my Jui’s baby?"

"Yes, Halmeom," Y/n said softly, her voice breaking. She leaned forward, and Mai pulled her into her frail embrace. The tears flowed freely now, washing away the years of waiting, of mourning, of a hope that had never quite been extinguished.

The cries echoed across the field, raw and uncontained. The land, the sky, the world itself seemed to mourn with her—sounding a requiem for all the lost things, all the things that had never truly been lost.

When they finally broke their embrace, Mai’s gaze turned to me. Her eyes, though clouded with age, were sharp with understanding.

"Who are you, Jungkook, my child?" she asked softly.

"I don’t know, ma’am," I answered, my voice thick with emotion. "I think I’m the messenger sent by your Lieutenant Cheon Seok—with just half as many memories. Do not wrong him, Mai. He did everything he could. The Gods didn’t work in his favor."

Mai smiled—a rare, fragile smile. Her teeth were missing, and her frail body no longer bore the strength it once had, but in that moment, she was Mai—the same woman who had carried the weight of so many stories in her heart.

"I am your Y/n’s lover. I am her fiancé, and I will marry her. I will never leave her unanswered," I said, my words finally finding their place in the silence between us.

Mai’s smile widened, a faint spark of recognition lighting her eyes. And in that moment, we were all whole, despite the weight of the years and the pain that had come before. The future, uncertain though it was, was now ours to claim.

It was a cruel twist of fate, wasn’t it? That the family, torn apart by war and death, would only find their way back to one another in this moment, under the weight of too many years spent apart. And yet, for all its tragedy, there was something sacred in this reunion, something fragile and precious, like the last petals of a flower caught in the autumn breeze

The old woman smiled softly, but it was a smile tinged with the sadness of understanding, of knowing that time was a thief. “I’ve lived long enough, my dear. I’ve seen much but I’ve never seen commitment,” she said, turning her gaze to me now, her eyes sharp despite the haze of age. “I see it in your eyes, Jungkook. You will care for her. You will protect her, won’t you?”

Fate is a cruel thing, I think. It bends and twists, makes mockeries of our plans, only to lead us somewhere we never anticipated. We dream of tomorrow, of futures we paint in vivid colors, but the truth is, time doesn’t care for our whims. It moves on, indifferent, leaving us to pick up the pieces of lives we thought we had control over. And perhaps, in the end, that’s what makes it beautiful—its unpredictability, its refusal to be contained by the small, fragile hands of man.

We try to outrun it, to escape the weight of what was lost, but reality always finds us. It shapes us, molds us into something new, something unrecognizable. And here, in this moment, I realize that I’m no different. A man caught in the whirlwind of time, lost in its currents, grasping at fleeting moments, at fragile promises. The woman I love, the family I thought I would never have, the history I never knew, they were all part of something far greater than I could comprehend. And now, they are gone. But they are with me, etched into the very fabric of my being, woven into the tapestry of who I have become.

I was a boy, and they turned me into at least half a human.

"Yes, ma'am, forever and more."