Jinu had never meant to linger.

If he’d had his way, his soul would’ve passed cleanly like a breath extinguished on a winter night—swift, invisible, forgotten. But something had gone wrong. Or right. He wasn’t sure anymore.

All he knew was this: the first time he saw you, you looked straight at him.

It wasn’t possible. It wasn’t supposed to be possible. Most humans didn’t see. Didn’t feel the way your skin stiffened when he passed by, or tilt your head just so, listening to the thrum of a presence not alive but not fully dead either. You didn’t scream. You didn’t pray. You met his eyes.

And whispered his name.

He should have left.

He didn’t.

Your apartment was old. The walls creaked, the floorboards moaned, but you didn’t flinch. You lit incense not to banish, but to welcome. Sometimes you would leave the window open on cold nights, murmuring into the dark. He watched you with the wary fascination of a man who had forgotten what it was to be seen. You lived simply. Plants on the sill. A mug always half-full of something warm. A notebook with a broken spine. You didn’t hunt, not like the others—but your third eye was wide open, a lighthouse in the fog.

And that terrified him.

Nights became seasons. You talked to him about your day, your fears, your loneliness, and your dreams. He said nothing at first. His voice, when he tried to summon it, was dust. But you never stopped. And slowly, in the quiet between your words, he found weight again.

Not in flesh. But in meaning.

He started answering. First in soft winds. Flickers of candlelight. The occasional song humming from an unplugged radio. But then… clearer.

"You're not afraid?" he asked, his voice cold and raw, a thing reborn.