Chapter Text
---
In one world, Kim Dokja listened to his mother and read the story again. He devoured the same words over and over again until they were embedded into his retinas, until the stories made a home in his brain and stayed there. He consumed books like they were his lifeline and they gave him the motivation to live just one more day, until he found something else worth living for.
In that world, Kim Dokja found a family that he loved and a family that loved him back, but only after years of suffering and heartbreak and constant sacrifices that he was always happy to make. In that world, Kim Dokja may have been an only child, but he found his family and he was, first and foremost, a reader.
But this is not that world.
In this world, Kim Dokja listened to his mother and read the story again. He devoured the same words over and over again until agony coursed through his veins and he learned to loathe the characters that made his name. He looked at the words and saw nothing but pain and suffering by his side in the future. In this world, Kim Dokja only had an absent mother, a dead father, and a book that spilled their bloody past out for everyone else to see.
It used to be their story, but now it wasn’t.
On Kim Dokja’s fifteenth birthday, he climbed the creaky stairs onto the roof of the tallest school building. He felt the cold winter breeze ruffling his hair. He closed his eyes, and he jumped. He always knew that this was how his story would end, and he welcomed this with open arms. Kim Dokja felt quiet relief fill his body as he saw the pavement approaching.
Even he could do this. No matter how much his books made it seem like everything would be fine and that the bad guy would always be defeated, he knew it wouldn’t happen. There would be no knights in shining armour swooping in to save him, no wizards to pull off miracles, no genies to grant his wishes.
Kim Dokja knew that there would be no happy endings waiting for him.
But then he woke up. He woke up when he wasn’t ever supposed to open his eyes again and was greeted with the sting of antiseptic in his nose and another sting in his eyes that had nothing to do with the glaring lights on the ceiling above him. The beeping of various alarms barely registered in his mind. Doctors and nurses rushed in, prodding him this way and that way and asking him to complete tests that he could tell were important but didn’t have enough strength to care. He thought he heard voices muttering about how it was a miracle that a bush cushioned his descent or how he shouldn’t have survived such a high of a fall but he somehow did and all Kim Dokja could think about was how he had never done anything correctly in his life.
He couldn’t even die right.
The pain of his failed attempt rushed over him like a tsunami. He waited for the regret to crash into him. It never did. He wondered if he could die from his failures. He hoped so.
He closed his eyes and prayed to never wake up again.
---
“Mom,” Kim Dokja whispered, wide eyes darting back and forth in the dim light seeping through the closet. Lee Sookyoung shushed him gently, hands moving quickly to pile more blankets on him. He tried again with a little more urgency. This was important.
“What is it, Dokja-ya? You know we have to be very quiet right now,” she murmured, quickly glancing back. Her body was rigid with tension. They were running out of time. She shuffled a few boxes to hide him better.
“I know, mom but—” Kim Dokja stumbled over his words. “What if… What if we ran away? Like in the stories you tell me about, the one about the princess and the horse and the knight! We could—We could go somewhere else! Somewhere where he wouldn’t ever fin—”
The front door slammed open, and his mother quickly slid the closet door shut. Heavy footsteps stumbled closer to where they were. “F-found you, you bitch,” the drunken man snarled. He took a swig out of the bottle in one hand and used the other one to grab his mother and drag her up by the hair. Kim Dokja clamped his hands tightly over his mouth to muffle his sobs at his mother’s pained yelp; his father didn’t like it when he was loud.
“What, what were you even doing, huh?” He slurred, still keeping a tight grip on Sookyoung’s hair. There was a pause. “What, what were you trying, trying to hide, huh?”
“Nothing,” his mother said a little too quickly. “I was just cleaning.”
His father noticed her hastiness. “Liar!” Kim Dokja heard a muffled thud and screwed his eyes shut, curling into himself a little more. “I know that you’re
cheating
. You whore. Where’s the bastard?” Another pause before,
“The closet.”
“No!” Lee Sookyoung yelled, throwing her body at him to stop his advance toward the closet. Not expecting her to retaliate, he lost his balance and slammed his hand onto the closet door to avoid falling flat on his face. Kim Dokja flinched at the way the door rattled, and nervously watched the shadows flutter back and forth through the gap between the door and the floor. He pressed his palms against his ears to muffled sounds of flesh meeting flesh. He tried to drown out the noises by thinking about brave knights, about princesses in towers and dragons that were kind. He tried to distract himself with the stories that had nothing but happiness and laughter in their endings. It didn’t work.
Later, much later, when his father left and everything was quiet again, he would come out of the closet and pad carefully over to his mother’s prone form, trying to avoid stepping on any glass shards. He would gently shake her awake and guide her to the bathroom. He would pull out the well-used first aid kit and start cleaning the cuts on her face, hands, legs, everywhere. He would wrap clumsy bandages around her arms. He would start talking about the latest book he read until his mother’s glazed eyes managed to focus on him again.
“Dokja,” she whispered slowly. He watched as the movement opened the wound on her lip. He would have to put another bandage on that. “What… What were you saying earlier?”
Kim Dokja stayed silent for a few moments, “Nothing, mom.” The lie burned in his throat and he closed his eyes with a shuddering breath. “It—it was nothing.”
“Okay,” she nodded.
After guiding her to his bedroom to rest, Dokja went back to the bathroom to clean up everything. He thought of his father’s furious face, the way he pummeled his own wife into the ground. The way he would have done the same to his son, had he found him hiding in the closet. Kim Dokja chuckled humorlessly. If that was what happened after his father saw his mother crouching by the closet door, imagine what he would do if he found out they were trying to leave.
“Nothing,” Kim Dokja repeated the lie to himself. “Kim Dokja, you’re an idiot. It’s nothing at all.”
It was easier this way. The first aid kit snapped shut with a small click.
---
The next time he woke up, he was more clear headed.
There was a nurse puttering around him, checking things on a chart and pinching his fingers and adjusting the tubes around him. Later, the doctor came in and started talking prattling about the myriad of injuries he sustained—because it turns out surviving a fall from the fifth floor could leave you with a number of broken bones— and how, “It was a miracle that he fell into a bush that cushioned his fall enough to save him.” Kim Dokja just gazed at the gauze curtains fluttering in the wind that slipped through the open window.
“That was a really dangerous stunt you pulled off,” the nurse complained after the doctor left with more instructions about therapy and being admitted into the psych ward and other things that Kim Dokja didn’t bother to pay attention to.
“You’re lucky you’re alive right now,” the nurse said. When he gave no response, she sighed in annoyance. Kim Dokja stayed silent through her dark muttering, looking at the cast on his arms and legs, the one immobilizing his broken hip wrapping halfway up his stomach. He looked at the familiar white bandages that covered every part of his skin.
“Kids these days. Only making more work for the rest of us. Do you know how busy the hospital is right now? This room could be used for someone else who actually needs it.” She kept complaining even as she walked out, leaving Kim Dokja with nothing but his thoughts and a worn down body that was never meant to live this long.
Kim Dokja closed his eyes and let the darkness claim him.
---
“Dokja-ya,” his mother asked, a tired smile making its way on her pale face. “Why do you like reading the stories about knights and princesses so much?”
Kim Dokja slowly ran his finger along the spine of a well loved book, ignoring how the movement pulled at his stitches. “Because the knights always rescue the princess and they always, always beat the bad guy no matter what,” he said, looking up at her with wide eyes. “Then they live happily ever after!”
“Oh, Dokja,” his mother whispered brokenly, pulling his skinny form into a trembling hug. “Dokja-ya. My little reader, I’m so sorry. Mom is so sorry.”
It wouldn’t be until much later will Kim Dokja understand why tears spilled across his mother’s cheek.
---
He didn’t know how long he slept this time, but he felt movement beside him and for a second he thought he was back in that broken home surrounded by even more broken bottles. Kim Dokja startled, instinctively shrinking away as best as he could with plastic immobilizing his joints and ignoring the sharp ache that filled his body at the action.
“Oh! Did I wake you?” It was just another nurse. Kim Dokja breathed through the panic. “Sorry, sorry, I’m just trying to get everything organized. And I have your phone charging here, we found it in your bag. I thought you might like to use it, especially since you can’t really do anything but lay in bed right now.” She didn’t seem to mind his silence, happily chattering along as she did her tasks. Kim Dokja was glad, and let the background noise lull him back to relaxation.
The next few days passed like that. Kim Dokja would sleep, and would wake up like a fish coming up from deep waters, groggy and reluctant to surface. He would stay silent as various staff members did their jobs around him, and was exhausted by the effort of being alive so he would simply sleep and hope that he didn’t dream.
Rinse and repeat.
---
A volunteer once came to deliver a few books for him to read, and Kim Dokja flinched so hard at the sight of them that he dislodged one of the IV needles inserted in his arm, triggering some alarms. The nurses rushed in and the poor volunteer looked like he was about to cry.
They didn’t bring him any books after that.
---
“ Dokja ,” his mother’s words echoed in his head. “ Read it again .”
“No,” he whispered, clutching his blanket tighter. Tears blurred his eyes until he could barely see the faded pattern. “No, I don’t want to.”
The crumpled pages of the book he threw haphazardly mocked him from its place on his bedroom floor.
Read it again read it again read it again read it again read it again read it again read it aga—
He squeezed his eyes together and let out a shaky breath. Slowly, he stood up, shivering when the cold wood met his bare feet. His legs almost gave out under him when he glimpsed the author’s picture near the end of the book, when he saw the reviews written on it’s back, singing nothing but praises at the way his mother aired their dirty laundry out for the world. He picked the book up and managed to make his way back to his bed before collapsing on the worn sheets.
Fingers trembling, he returned to the first page.
---
Kim Dokja opened his dry eyes to the dim light of the moon.
The words looped in his brain like a poisonous mantra, chipping away at his sanity with every passing second. His eyes wandered around, staring at nothing until his gaze fell onto the screen of the old phone. He doubted there would be any messages waiting for him, but maybe he could find a free game to play or something. He resolutely didn’t think about the novel chapters he downloaded. He thought they were enough to help him see another day, but eventually even the excitement from a new update faded and he decided to—well, anyway. He unlocked the phone and stared at the home page.
There was a game on his phone.
Kim Dokja blinked, staring dumbfoundedly at his cracked phone screen. Why would a game be there? He never played them before, and he’s never needed to because for the longest time books were the only company he ever needed. And look how that turned out, he thought bitterly.
“Well,” he murmured to himself. “Let’s see where this goes.” He clicked on the app icon.
[There are three ways to survive in a ruined world.]
Kim Dokja raised his eyebrows curiously. Were all games like this? He wouldn’t know.
[Now I have forgotten a few, but one thing is certain. That fact that you who are reading this now will survive.]
His breath hitched at the words, nose souring a little bit. Isn’t this what he had been waiting for his entire life? Someone to tell him that he could make it through alive and whole? It was ironic that he only found this after he decided that he didn’t want his life anymore, and he somewhat wished that he found it earlier. Maybe that would have made everything a little easier to bear.
Kim Dokja looked at the screen and the short sentences and the blue pop ups and made a decision. He couldn’t read books, but he could play this game. The text boxes seemed more manageable than thousands of words that spanned hundreds of pages. It seemed a little easier to digest when the story was fed to him in bite sized chunks. He tapped the screen to continue the introduction.
His eyes moved slowly across words, then gained speed as he immersed himself in the story unfolding before him. So he would be playing as something called a constellation. He would choose a character, also known as an incarnation, to sponsor. Constellations helped incarnations clear scenarios to gain stories and coins, things that Kim Dokja assumed were used as currency in this world. The next line caught his eye.
[Your main objective is to keep your Incarnation alive.]
Huh. He wasn’t exactly sure what to expect, but it surely wasn’t this broken text. Tapping the screen again, the app elaborated on his task. There would be various meters recording his incarnation’s status, from health to hunger to strength and…. mood?
[If any of the meters drop below a certain level, there is an exponentially increased chance that your incarnation will soon die.]
He tapped the screen again.
[Choose your constellation name].
Kim Dokja stared for a moment, then decisively clicked ‘generate name’. A screen with jumbled letters rolling from one to the next popped up. Slowly, the letters settled one by one to create his name.
[The Star Stream welcomes the constellation, ‘The Oldest Dream’].
“The Most Ancient Dream, huh,” Kim Dokja chuckled softly, wincing slightly at how it jostled his healing ribs. “How fitting.”
[Choose your incarnation.]
There was a list of names under the command. Curiously, he clicked on one that said ‘Han Myung Oh’. The pixelated screen slowly focused to reveal a middle aged businessman wearing a suit. Kim Dokja took one look at the picture and immediately went back to the list of names. Definitely not that one. He scrolled through and got to the end, and one without a pixelated profile picture got his attention.
‘Yoo Jonghyuk’ only had a black screen where his picture was and there was nothing in his character list. Literally nothing; all the sections were either censored with black boxes or filled with question marks.
Was this game broken?
Curiously, he tried clicking on the boxes. Nothing. He tried to press the ‘back’ button to return to the main page instead.
[You are now the sponsor of the Incarnation, ‘Yoo Jonghyuk’]
Wait. What?
Kim Dokja paled as he realized what he did. He accidentally clicked on the wrong button. Looking blankly at the cast covering his hand, wrist, and forearm, he tried to wiggle his thumb and index finger, the only ones not immobilized by the cast and groaned in annoyance. But before he could wallow in his inability to press simple buttons, a new box popped up.
[Start the paid service?]
He had nothing to lose, so he might as well continue. Kim Dokja sighed and clicked ‘yes’. The screen morphed into a scene on the subway car, the camera slowly panning around the different passengers until it settled on a teenaged boy wearing black. His arms were crossed and he had a nasty frown on his face. Wanting to get a better look, Kim Dokja tapped on him and gasped when the screen zoomed in on the boy’s face. Then he gasped again when he saw the boy’s—no, the god’s features.
Wavy hair hung loose over his forehead, just long enough to obscure one eyebrow that was drawn low in either anger or annoyance, Kim Dokja couldn’t tell. Double eyelids framed the top of his dark eyes, one of which Kim Dokja swore turned gold for a split second. It must have been a trick of the light, he thought dazedly, hyper focused on the way those thick lashes brushed his cheeks with every slow blink. Kim Dokja’s eyes followed the high bridge of his nose and down to the curve of his cheek, still slightly soft with a little baby fat, before trailing across that sharp jaw. The boy shifted in his seat, and Kim Dokja’s eyes were immediately glued to the way that his toned biceps flexed under the dark long sleeved shirt he wore.
“ Wow ,” Kim Dokja mumbled, eyes flitting back and forth to take in every detail of this god-like character. “...The developers really went all out on him.” Kim Dokja excitedly tapped on the character again to see him better, and a character list screen popped up. He was about to disregard it when he saw the name listed on the top.
“...Yoo Jonghyuk?” he said. “ This is Yoo Jonghyuk??”
Kim Dokja was infinitely glad for his broken hand. This wasn’t a mistake at all!
Some movement at the corner of the screen caught his eye, and he immediately snapped out of his thoughts to pay close attention to the game. A white creature that introduced himself as the dokkaebi Bihyung materialized out of thin air to explain what was going to happen next. Just as Kim Dokja was reading the blue text boxes, Yoo Jonghyuk moved and killed everyone on the train.
He just… killed everyone on the train. Kim Dokja gaped at the blood splattered everywhere. Was this… normal? How overbearing!
Then, the people that his incarnation just killed slowly stood up, as if they were being dragged by invisible strings, and started making their way towards Yoo Jonghyuk. Kim Dokja watched as he tried to fight them off, and he was honestly doing quite well with just his bare hands, but eventually he started getting overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of them.
Kim Dokja’s heart pounded on his ribs. Was his incarnation going to die this early into the game? Desperate to do something, he started tapping randomly on the screen. The closed subway door creaked and he brightened up when the metal was forced open and a gap wide enough to fit a man was created.
He turned his attention back to Yoo Jonghyuk, who was fighting valiantly under a pile of zombies, and Kim Dokja slowly swiped a finger across the top of the stack, watching with surprised glee as they flew across the screen. Kim Dokja tapped on Yoo Jonghyuk’s chest and dragged him out of the door he forcefully opened. Bypassing the shimmering bridge, he directly dropped Yoo Jonghyuk safely onto the other side where there were no monsters. They should be safe now.
Too satisfied with his victory, Kim Dokja didn’t notice how Yoo Jonghyuk’s mood plummeted straight into the negatives. Yoo Jonghyuk stood up and started walking to the side. Kim Dokja watched as picked up a large stick on the ground, curious as to what he was going to do with it.
Yoo Jonghyuk raised the piece of wood and stabbed himself in the throat. Blood gushed out of the wound as Yoo Jonghyuk fell. The colours faded from the screen, leaving a grainy monochrome film over Yoo Jonghyuk’s bleeding body.
Kim Dokja dropped the phone in shock.
What just happened? Weren’t they doing well just now? Why did Yoo Jonghyuk just kill himself?
His mind raced with shock and confusion, almost missing how the screen morphed into Yoo Jonghyuk’s character screen to show his final status before death. Kim Dokja noticed that his mood bar was in the negatives, and groaned when he remembered the game telling him that if any of them dropped below a certain level, then the character would soon die. And by “soon,” this sly game meant immediately .
[Regress?]
“This is harder than I thought...” Kim Dokja muttered to himself even as his finger tapped ‘Yes’.
The game started the same way, and Kim Dokja watched as Yoo Jonghyuk sat calmly in his seat as pandemonium occurred around him with the arrival of the dokkaebi. He stood up, leisurely, almost like he was just taking a stroll in the park, and snapped the neck of the woman crouched beside him. He settled back in his seat and watched as the shiny veneer was peeled away and the ugliest parts of humanity were revealed. Then the survivors made their way across the bridge in pairs, and when it came to Yoo Jonghyuk’s turn, someone decided they couldn’t wait anymore and rushed on. Kim Dokja paled at the cracks forming the bridge and hurriedly caught Yoo Jonghyuk before he fell. Sighing in relief, he slowly moved Yoo Jonghyuk back across the bridge, ignoring the screams of those left behind, and set him down, gently this time now that he knew how to control his fingers a little better.
Yoo Jonghyuk turned his face to the sky, expression unreadable, and jumped straight into the canyon. He fell on some jagged rocks before Kim Dokja could react. The screen turned grey, and his Character List appeared. His mood was even further in the negatives than the last.
Kim Dokja stared, frustration building up in his throat. He clicked ‘Yes’ again.
The screen panned across the subway station before focusing on the protagonist’s face again. Kim Dokja was a bit wary, but happy to stare at this handsome protagonist some more when Yoo Jonghyuk suddenly stood up, grabbed the umbrella of the man next to him, and stabbed himself again. The screen turned monochrome, this time showing the scene of Yoo Jonghyuk’s slumped body as the passengers around him panicked at the sight.
Kim Dokja wanted to scream. He clicked the ‘Yes’ button again.
This time, when the camera focused on Yoo Jonghyuk’s face, Kim Dokja quickly pulled up his Character List and looked at Yoo Jonghyuk’s status bars. He sighed in relief when he saw that the mood bar stayed firmly above the critical level, but he remained alert for any changes.
Yoo Jonghyuk then repeated his actions from his first life, killing all the other passengers with no hesitation. Then he stood there and did absolutely nothing as hordes of the undead advanced on his defenceless body. Kim Dokja swore under his breath, and moved his finger to get Yoo Jonghyuk to safety again.
Yoo Jonghyuk bent down to pick up a rock and Kim Dokja flung it out of his hands. He picked up a stick and Kim Dokja flicked that away too. He walked to the edge of the broken bridge and Kim Dokja hurriedly dragged him back. Yoo Jonghyuk looked up at the sky, one eye flashing gold. Kim Dokja panicked at the sight of Yoo Jonghyuk’s mood dropping again, tapping the screen desperately in an attempt to find a way to talk to him.
“Why was this not in the introduction earlier,” Kim Dokja complained, fingers still exploring the screen. “Do all games provide their players with unfinished instructions?” And as if hearing his grievances, a new box popped up.
[You have unlocked ‘Midday Tryst’. You may now communicate privately with your Incarnation].
“Okay, great, thanks. Now how do I do that?”
[You may access this function through the message box located at the bottom].
Kim Dokja stared at the text that seemed to read his thoughts and shook it off. It wasn’t important, his priority right now was to talk to Yoo Jonghyuk and stop him from regressing again.
Yoo Jonghyuk was still looking at the sky, not having moved a single muscle since Kim Dokja stopped his last suicidal attempt. Kim Dokja used his slow, clumsy fingers to type out a [Hello].
Yoo Jonghyuk’s eyes widened, no doubt surprised at the message. Kim Dokja wondered if he was also seeing a blue screen right in front of him and was curious as to how he would respond back.
[What do you want from me].
How demanding.
Yoo Jonghyuk’s mouth didn’t move at all, Kim Dokja observed. It really was just between the two of them; he ignored the giddiness in his chest at the thought. His fingers twitched hesitantly over the screen as he debated about how he should reply. After some time, Kim Dokja decided to go with honesty.
[I want to help you see the end of the scenarios].
Kim Dokja zoomed in on Yoo Jonghyuk’s face and catalogued the way those dark eyes widened minutely in shock. It may not have been as noticeable to others, but Kim Dokja spent his entire life carefully watching others for their thoughts and responding to their body language; it was easier to avoid bullies if you knew when they were planning to beat you up.
[Why? What do you get out of this?]
A reason to live.
Of course, Kim Dokja didn’t type it out, but he snickered at the thought. Surely the game developers didn’t think to design a character response to that .
[I want to see the epilogue,] he typed nonsensically. Hopefully it made sense to the game algorithm.
Yoo Jonghyuk was silent for a while, and Kim Dokja didn’t interrupt, all too willing to look at that handsome face some more. Yoo Jonghyuk really deserves the protagonist title. Kim Dokja wanted to give the development team a thumbs up. Surely a majority of the budget was spent on lovingly rendering Yoo Jonghyuk’s features; the amount of detail was insane. A message popped up before Yoo Jonghyuk answered.
[Constellation, ‘Oldest Dream’, please ask Incarnation, ‘Yoo Jonghyuk’ if he would like you as a sponsor].
Kim Dokja raised an eyebrow. Wasn’t he already his sponsor? Oh well, might as well ask anyway. Maybe it was one of those things that triggered the next event in the game. He read about those in some online novels, before he—well. He pushed those thoughts away. There was new a response from Yoo Jonghyuk.
[Is that what you really want?]
[Yes,] Kim Dokja said, and thinking of the text box he just saw, he said: [I want to be your sponsor. I will help you reach the ending you desire].
Yoo Jonghyuk took such a long time to respond this time that Kim Dokja almost fell asleep after sending his message. He startled awake at the appearance of a new blue screen.
[I accept].
Those two simple words filled Kim Dokja with an indescribable happiness. Finally, he did something right. And in his haste to reply, he accidentally swiped his finger across the screen, grabbed Yoo Jonghyuk’s shirt, sent him flying off the bridge and straight into the mouth of a ginormous beast. Kim Dokja watched with horror, unable to do anything but watch the tragedy unfolding right before his eyes.
It all happened very quickly, but not fast enough for Kim Dokja to miss the murderous glint in Yoo Jonghyuk’s eyes as he fell neatly into the waiting mouth. The fish-like beast snapped its jaws shut with a reverberating snap, swallowing Yoo Jonghyuk whole, and immediately retreating back underwater with a large splash.
Shit.
---