It started with a cough. A tiny cough. Barely audible.

But to Jinu, demon-idol of the underworld, voice of enchantment, chaos incarnate and romantic disaster extraordinaire… it was the siren song of impending doom.

And then you sneezed once. Once.

And Jinu—shirt unbuttoned halfway down his chest, hair still perfectly tousled from a brooding Instagram shoot—snapped his neck around with the urgency of a K-drama finale plot twist.

His eyes flared amber for just a moment. Amber. As if his soul recognized the signs before his brain did.

“A cold?” he whispered, stunned. “No… no. No, no, no. No.”

[45 Minutes Later]

Your apartment looked like a shaman’s tent met a hanbang museum and had a very dramatic love child.

Jinu burst through the front door, arms overflowing with dried ginseng roots, demon-brewed plum tonics, five variations of "Tiger Spirit Tea", and something that looked suspiciously like a pouch of grave dirt.

He skidded across the hardwood floors in Gucci loafers, slamming a jade teapot down with flair.

“Drink this. All of it,” he declared, eyes wild. “It may taste like sadness and burnt twigs but it’ll burn the sickness out of your soul.”

You were still trying to sit upright in bed. He was already boiling water on a portable stove he’d set up beside you.

And then. Then. At precisely 3:08 PM, he knocked on the door of the apartment next door. Moments later, he returned with an 83-year-old Korean granny named Halmeoni Kim, dressed in full hanbok, carrying a wooden spoon and a bell.

“She agreed to help us with a minor exorcism,” Jinu said seriously. “Just in case this illness is spiritually rooted.”

Granny Kim lit incense. She rang the bell. She began chanting something that sounded suspiciously like a recipe for kimchi. Jinu harmonized. Badly.

You were sweating from the fever. They thought it was the spirits leaving your body.

He dabbed your forehead with a monogrammed silk handkerchief, whispering, “Stay with me, my light. Don’t go into the void.”

You blinked slowly. You had a cold.

When Granny Kim left (with a bag of ginseng and Jinu’s eternal loyalty), the demon boyfriend snapped into full “spoiled empress of a fallen empire” mode.

He dressed you in four layers of the softest robes he could find. He hand-fed you peeled grapes. He hummed lullabies that sounded suspiciously like forgotten demon laments. He held your wrist dramatically, eyes locked on your pulse like he was reading ancient poetry.

“You’re… stable,” he said, voice trembling. “For now.”

You tried to say, “I’m literally just congested.”

He cut you off with a finger to your lips. “Shh. Save your strength for healing.”

Then he tucked you in with seven blankets, kissed your forehead like a knight in a fantasy epic, and curled up beside your bed on the floor with a dagger under his pillow. Just in case Gwi-Ma showed up in your dreams.

You later woke up to the faint sound of sobbing.

He was in the kitchen, back turned, whispering to the rice cooker.

“She coughed twice this time. Twice. What if her soul is unraveling?”

You sneezed again from the bedroom.

Jinu sprinted in like a dark prince of panic, eyes blazing.

“I knew it! You need the demon-cleansing plum tonic. With extra vinegar. Halmeoni Kim said this would happen. I’m steeping it now.”