The mother was eating her food with utter silence. She put a bite of her food in her mouth, chewing it, gulping the food with extreme sorrow. She tried eating a little more, but couldn't so she threw the rest, unable to eat anything.

It's been years since she peacefully ate or slept. She looked at her 3-year-old son seated beside her. She placed a hand on his cheek and ran her fingers over the crack on his face and started tearing up.

"Eomma! Why are you crying? Did Seokjin make you cry?" the kid asked with innocence. This kid didn't even have a clue about what was going on. He didn't know what he and his parents were going through. He didn't know what the future awaited him.

She shook her head and immediately hugged her dear son. She promised herself that she'll love him no matter what.

•••••

<Flashback>

After the parents meet with Lucifer, all they could think about was the child's future.

He won't lift the curse. What should we do now? How can we find that someone in the whole world? How many more people will die in the meantime?

Many questions like this were running in the parents' brain. There was silence through the whole ride way back home from Saint Lucifer's.

The father finally decided to break the ice once they reached their home.

"S-Shihyun-ah" her husband called out her name to which she just hummed in response without making eye contact.

"A-Are you mad at me?" he was ready to blame himself for everything that happened if his wife said that she was mad at him.

"Mad? For what?" she asked while turning to face her husband in disbelief.

"About not saving the saint's child that day," he said with guilt. Only if he had not ignored Lucifer's child, none of this would have happened today.

"What should I even be mad about? Even if it was your fault, blaming you or being mad at you wouldn't make me feel any better. The damage has been done. Right now, I'm not mad but unhappy and sad. So don't blame yourself, dear." his wife said, assuring him that he doesn't have to worry about things.

The husband was taken aback by what his wife said. He expected her to be mad but she was not. He was steeped in guilt. One mistake, just one mistake ruined his family's life. He burst into tears at the thought.

His wife immediately slid his arms around him and wrapped him into a tight hug.

"It's okay," she said while patting his back.

He pulled out from the hug and took his child into his arms and started speaking,

"You know, I always felt a burden in my life. A burden that I tried to lift but I couldn't because I didn't know what the burden itself was..." He sighed before he spoke further.

"But now I realised what it was..."

"The greatest burden in life is the memory of the sin one committed deliberately." He said while glancing at his wife and child.

"And today, my child has to suffer for my one wrong deed. I'm sorry Seokjin." He said while hugging his baby who was sleeping peacefully.

•••••

<Present day>

The mother was lost in her thoughts just then she heard a knock on the door. She rose from her chair and made her way towards the door.

She opened the door to discover a tall figure, wearing a t-shirt and a coat over it, with jeans underneath. She looked up to see a face of a woman covered with sunglasses.

"Joseph, what brings you here?" The mother asked with puzzlement crossing her face.

"You won't let me in?" Joseph pointed towards the door.

"Uh sure." the mother said and made way for Joseph to get in.

"Nice home," she said while letting her eyes roam around the living room, admiring each detail of the room.

"Please take a seat." The mother said while pulling out a chair for her.

Joseph placed her bag on the table and sat on the couch instead of the chair. She glanced at the mother who was standing, thinking about Joseph's disrespectful actions. She patted the space beside her on the couch, gesturing the mother to have a seat. The mother decided to shrug off her thoughts and sat beside Joseph.

"So why are you here?" the mother asked with curiosity while turning to face Joseph.

Joseph looked at her and squinted her eyes. "Why? Can't I visit my client? Well, would you mind getting me a cup of hot coffee?" The mother scoffed and went to get what Joseph wanted.

"How did your meeting go with Lucifer?" Joseph asked while taking her coffee from the mother's hands.

The mother squinted her eyes and looked at Joseph with utter disbelief.

"What? Are you really asking me this after 3 freaking years?"She asked with rage.

"Just answer my question," Joseph said uninterested, taking a sip of her coffee.

"It didn't go too well. He refused to lift the curse." The mother said, stress evident in the her voice.

"I see, then you will have to go with the other option I guess." Joseph stopped and slightly nodded. "What about his studies?" She continued.

That's when the mother got a thought about his studies. Exactly, what about his studies? She couldn't think of anything else except for the curse making her forget about her son's future.

"Well, We haven't thought about it yet but we'll probably not send him to school," She said while looking at the cup of coffee placed on her table.

"I can understand why," Joseph said with a nod. She started looking around and abruptly stopped when she noticed a painting on the wall. She rose from her seat and walked towards the painting. The mother looked at the standing woman and followed her.

Joseph folded her arms and started observing the painting.

For the mother's eyes, this painting was just a splash of black colour on a white canvas, some blue colour and designs here and there. She thought all of this was just for aesthetics but there was something more to it. Overall, she disliked this painting because the black colour wasn't pleasant for her eyes.

"Where did you get this painting from?" Joseph asked the mother, turning towards her.

"My mother gave this to me when she visited us. I think about 3 years ago." The mother said, trying to remember.

That's when a question arose in Joseph's brain and she decided to ask right away.

"I see, Your mother didn't die when she saw your son's face right?" She asked while glancing at the mother.

That's when the mother got a click that she never noticed the fact that her mother is still alive even after seeing her son's face. "No. She didn't." The mother replied.

Joseph just hummed in response while taking her eyes back to the painting.

"Do you know what this painting is about?" Joseph asked while pointing a finger towards the framed painting.

"No. It looks kinda messy, isn't it?" The mother shook her head.

"There's a lot of meaning behind that mess. This painting depicts a cursed mask. Can you see something drawn in light green, it kind of looks like a mansion? The black thing is a masquerade mask. That depicts evil. The mask is evil because it's cursed. It needs the power of good to lift the curse. And then some elegant designs that depict good. There are blue coloured dots and the design that's painted on the black mask, it shows that the good is slowly taking upon the evil, and the evil will slowly become good too, that is the curse will be lifted." She took another sip of her coffee.

"I never thought that it had so much meaning behind it." The mother gaped in awe.

"Hmm... Well now that we talk about masks, I got you a little something." Joseph pulled out a white thing from her leather bag. The white thing had holes here and there. The mother tried to take a closer look. She saw a mask. A mask that would cover the whole full face if put on, it had two holes for the eyes, two holes for the nostrils, and a hole for the mouth.

The mother gaped her mouth in awe, thinking why Joseph was pulling out a mask.

Joseph took the mask and walked towards the child. She put the mask on his face.

"Now this will be his life. He'll be hiding his face from the world. He has to." Joseph said folding her arms. She was surprised that she was feeling emotional. But decided not to express them.

The mother broke down into tears. She ran towards her child and hugged him. She faced Joseph and started speaking,
"My child isn't a criminal to be hiding his face. Why does he have to keep his face hidden then?" The mother exclaimed. She didn't want any of this to happen.

"I know. But it's for the sake of other people's lives. When your child will learn that he's unintentionally taking other people's lives, what do you think he will feel about it? He'll feel miserable. This is the only solution. At least this is what you will do till he turns twenty five...and die eventually" She mumbled the last part, not loud enough for the mother to be able to hear.

The mother felt broke and weak. She couldn't protect her only son. She fell on her knees and started crying. On the other hand, Joseph too felt emotional seeing the mother in such a miserable state. She couldn't help it so she kneeled to the mother's level and slid her arms around her, caressing her back, comforting her. Unknowingly a tear escaped Joseph's right eye.

"There's nothing you can do about it. You need to leave it all to fate. If your son will find someone, he'll live." Joseph said in an assuring way.

The mother couldn't help, but hug Joseph tightly and sob in the crook of her neck. She needed someone to comfort her, support her and say everything will be alright. Joseph hugged her back and comforted her.

After a while, the mother pulled away from the hug and decided to move on instead of crying. She promised herself to love her son at least for 25 years of his life, and save other people from her son. This felt like the right thing to do.

Joseph pulled out a bunch of money from her bag and handed it to the mother.

"W-Why are you giving the money back?" The mother asked moving her eyes from the money to look at Joseph.

"Taking money from you... Just doesn't feel right... But I would like to take something else from you instead.." She said with a huge grin on her face, which was seen rarely.

"S-Sure." the mother stuttered but managed to speak.

"A promise... Promise me that you'll be my friend... You may think I'm weird just like how other people do, but I want to be friends with you..." Joseph said with a slight hope for the mother to accept which the mother found cute.

The mother hugged her and whispered in her ear...
"I promise.."

━━━━━━━☠️━━━━━━━

Finally! End of the back story! This one's the longest chapter I've written till now. Hope it wasn't boring. I wanted to post this chapter in two parts but I didn't want to take this any longer, so I ended it in one chapter and it's too long.

Well, from next chapter, it'll be Seokjin's story.

Okay, take care and be happy! 💜