Third Person POV

Due to the scream of her daughter, the woman almost jumps up from her position. "Am I dead? You were dead, I saw you were dead! What is this place? Get me outta here!"

The room door bursts open as her father dashes in. "Oh Ping," he gives her a hug to calm her down. As if the warmth carries magic, the girl stops struggling while her breath steadying. "Thank god you're alive." He murmurs while his large protective palm caresses his daughter's hair before letting her go.

"Why am I in a hospital? I thought our house is invaded by something... unexplainable..." Ping mutters with mixed feelings ghosting around her mind.

"A dream elf attacked you last night," says the father. "You nearly died when I found you outside the house, that elf consumed most of your essence and trapped your soul in a terrible nightmare." The statement sounds so unreal and fantasy until Ping couldn't even believe that it is said by her own father.

"What dream elf?" She queries, confusion written all over her face. But then, her eyes largens at the memory of what the taxi driver had told her last night. Beware or the dream elf will consume you.

"Have you recalled anything?" asks the father calmly. His strong stare full of warmth and concern. "My daughter." She gasps when noticing how different her father speaks now. He never called her like that before. He'd been using pet names to call her before this happens.

A question instead of an answer appears in her head: Can I trust them?

Swallowing hard, she directs her vision towards her father's eyes. Behind those human black, there is something shining. Something brighter than black. It is grey. It shimmers in the speed of a normal blood pulse, rhythmic and fascinating. "Is this real?" she asks with her shaky voice.

"This is the reality, Ping." The father answers firmly. "And it's time for you to know what exactly you are." He uses 'what' instead of 'who', Ping thinks. "All you need to do now is to tell me what you have remembered."

***

Ping

My dad is acting weird. His eyes are flashing the colour of grey unlike before, always stays in the perfect texture of black. "I-" Having two thoughts battling with each other my mind, I trail off and my brain turns blank as untouched paper.

"I suggest we let her rest," my mother voices out, breaking the dominating silence. "Once she recovers from her nightmare, we'll tell her everything."

I look from my mother to my father. His expression changes slightly with his furrowed eyebrows. "But she doesn't have much time," he states worriedly. "When night time arrives today, she will be attacked again. Her essence should be covered." I can tell how hard for my father to carry out the plan by seeing him rest his palm on his forehead and pinch the bridge of his nose.

"Does it mean we need a witch or a warlock to give her a mark?" my mother asks and it is unreal to hear such words spitted out from her own mouth. For me, she is a woman who believes nothing in supernatural elements but real things before her eyes. I have a mere memory about myself witnessing a pixie flying pass our garden when I was four. I was so excited that I told my mother about it. But she laughed it away by complimenting how creative I was to think of such creatures during that age.

"It does," answers my father with the same frown. "But warlocks and witches are my enemy."

"Guys," I interrupt as I can feel myself being ignored. "Please tell me everything. Tell me the truth, I want to know about the truth." My mother sends my father a knowing stare and my father nods. "Please?" He casts his point of view back on me and sighs.

"I suppose you have recognised your pink eyes?" He starts, approaching me and brushes my loose strands away to examine my eyes.

"Yes," I answer with a nod. "Please tell me everything."

Grey light flashes pass his eyes in a mere second before his mouth shapes the word, "Sure."

_____

It sounds like a fairytale. The truth, it sounds so... unrealistic. I remember every single word my father had said. And now, what I've known is I am neither human nor an elf or a fairy. With my blood mixed with an elf's and a human's, Dad says I either belong to both worlds or to nowhere. Speaking of hiding my essence, it would be hard for us these days before dad finds a witch or warlock to cast a mark on me.

It is because the dark Faeries would soon realise my existence and my life would be in jeopardy. They would all crave for my essence as spoken by my father, and I'll die being preyed by these vicious and deadly predators. Based on what my father has said, the dream elf is one of the predators preying on me.

That night, it attacked me.

So this is why I'm lying in the hospital right now. But better than the moment I wake up from my bad dream, I've known a little of my real self. Who I really am, and why am I being targeted.

Mum and Dad are now outside the room, discussing about their next move. "If we can't get her to Ji Yoo before this worsens, there's another way I'm thinking to cover her essence," My dad says as my mother listens attentively. "Hemolysis."

"Using your blood?" asks my mother, giving me half of the clue of what my father means in his Plan B.

"No," he denies. "Her blood cannot hemolyze with mine as we are part of the family, the hemolysis should be undergone between her and a Faerie." Faerie is the term used for those who belong to the FaeWorld.

"Why not hemolyzing with human blood?" asks my mother again.

"Not only her essence will be covered, Faerie blood will make her stronger," answers my father firmly. "Besides, the Faerie which is blood-bound with her would become her protector. It can protect her better than how a human can do." My mother keeps quiet upon my father's statement.

"But how are we going to get one for her?" She queries again as my father strokes his chin, creating a metaphor that will reveal an idea in his head.

There is a long pause before my father chuckles deeply. Such action makes him sounds unDad to me. "After tasting the sweetness of her essence, the dream elf will not give up just like that."

"Are you saying that-"

"Yes, it will come for her tonight." Although they are talking in a distance away from me, the words are so crystal clear when they reach my own ears. "If she finds her own Faerie ability and becomes stronger, she will survive both in the human realm and the FaeWorld."

ɪ'ᴍ sᴏ sᴏʀʀʏ... ɪ ᴅɪᴅɴ'ᴛ ᴍᴇᴀɴ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ʟᴀᴛᴇ 😭 ɪ ᴘʀᴏᴍɪsᴇᴅ ᴀ ᴛʜᴜʀsᴅᴀʏ ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇ ʙᴜᴛ ᴛᴏᴅᴀʏ ɪs ғʀɪᴅᴀʏ.