had a suspicion that it would happen." He places one of his hands on his hip, waving away the pop up windows to get this out of his sight. She looks at him incredulously, so he elaborates with some bullshit that sounds accurate enough. "I though of what the dokkaebi would do to make us suffer the most."
'But I didn't expect them to add a 'Survival Penalty'.' That must have been something new that Dokja had caused by his contract with Bihyung. Did it really change the story that much? 'TWSA would definitely pull something like this, but this wasn't in the original novel.'
"You have to have been expected things to be different when you've already changed so much, Dokja-ssi." That sort of sounds like disappointment from Sangah. Dokja shivers. He never wants to hear that again.
She hasn't really spoken to him like that ever, it was mostly just a polite or scared tone since the apocalypse started. She was always polite before that. It's weird to hear anything else.
He sulks a little in his less squished seat. Which is a new development. When did the seat get bigger...
Joonghyuk pats him on the back and Dokja sort of leans forward. What is this bastard trying to do now, he sends him a suspicious glare. The protagonist sighs but glares back all the same.
How dare-
"Dokja!" A voice from behind Dokja snaps him out of thinking about the effect he has on predetermined events. He looks behind him to find the rest of his group coming towards him. It was Hyunsung who had called out to him.
"What do we do now? Should we join the search party too?" The soldier walks ahead of Sangah, one of his arms a little outstretched towards Lee Gilyoung a bit in front of him.
Dokja turns his body to look at them proper, placing his hand on Gilyoung's head when he gets close enough. "No, we won't go aboveground. That place is a death trap."
"But we need to go there for food-" Hyunsung is taken aback, raising on of his hands to accentuate his point. He's obviously nervous about the situation just like everyone else.
"We'll need to find a new food source since the world around us has changed." Dokja interrupts him, shifting to look towards the area that he and Heewon had just come from. The entrance to the tracks is clear. Hyunsung is still looking at him but his concerned gaze has melted into confusion. "Sorry?"
The rest of the group turns to see where Dokja is looking, turning weary faces around to look at the ominous subway tracks. The Geumho station plaque is clear within view. Hyunsung startles, jumping a bit and turning so quickly back to Dokja that he worries he would have hurt himself if he was any faster. "Wait, Dokja-ssi. Don't tell me-"
Hyunsung wrings his hands in his lap, laughing nervously as he twists a little in his chair to look past Sooyoung. "I think we were all surprised when Dokja-ssi suggested going on the tracks..."
Sangah and Heewon are nodding along when he looks back, still leaning against each other. "So many people went there and they never came back."
"I get that," He starts, turning so he is looking over Joonghyuk's shoulder, looking them face to face as he talks. "but there was no other way to get the food we need."
[The Constellation 'Demon-like Judge of Fire' protests about you not telling the whole truth.]
There is a long silence, it's sort of charged. The atmosphere is heavy and Dokja tries to stay quiet as long as he can. It wouldn't be hard if a whole bunch of windows didn't immediately pop up in front of him. Even the dragon chimed in.
[The Constellation 'Demon-like Judge of Fire' is looking at you.]
[The Constellation 'Abyssal Black Flame Dragon' is looking at you.]
[The Constellation 'Prisoner of the Golden Headband is looking at you.]
[The Constellation 'Secretive Plotter' is looking at you.]
He fails to do so for long.
"I also needed to get that weapon." The eyes trained on him turn away and he sighs when the pressure lifts from him. At this point they're just going to stare him into telling the truth and he'll have no more card up his sleeve to play. "The one from the ground rats hideout."
[The Constellation 'Demon-like Judge of Fire' applauds you for telling the truth.]
The constellations ganging up on him was concerning though. Uriel sounds borderline condescending, but Dokja knows she means well...
[The Constellation 'Prisoner of the Golden Headband' sticks his finger in his ear.]
"That's right." Dokja confirms with a calm face, staring ahead with a relaxed demeanor. The gleam in his eyes is back, his mouth twitching up into a grin slowly as he stands there with everyone's incredulous eyes on him.
"We're going monster hunting."
Dokja walks forward, stepping down onto the tracks with his little group following him. Once he's hopped down, he turns and grabs Gilyoung by his armpits and lifts him up to set him gently on the ground.
"You're going to follow the rails?" Inho's voice from behind him irritates Dokja, that guy is looking down at him from up on the platform. Dokja's group is gathered relatively close to him, each of them listening to the slimy bastard talking to them. "I guess we do need a team who will work on completing the scenario."
"Ugh, he pisses me off even now." Heewon whispers to Sangah, groaning and grumbling complaints about the bastard. She keeps clenching and unclenching her fists. "Especially the way he treats Dokja."
Sangah nods, mumbling her own complaints about him. She sighs but makes a little motion with her hand when the scene on the screen shifts.
The Major group is crowded around behind Inho, blocking off the entrance to the tracks in a way that borderline seems purposeful. The smug guy is standing above them with his arms behind him and his eyes squinted up with a smile.
'That jerk. Does he think he's the leader?'
'I thought he'd lash out at us for not joining the search party,' Dokja thinks about it, taking into account everything Inho has been doing so far. This serves to only irritate him all over again. 'but I guess he feels reassured that I'm staying away from his group.'
[Your understanding of 'Cheon Inho' has increased.]
[Your understanding of 'Cheon Inho' has passed a threshold level.]
'Now that I think about it...'
The screen splits in two and the scene with Inho on the right and one of the scenes of Kim Namwoon on the other side. They're both moving, but the colors have been replaced with black and white. At the bottom of each shows the [Your understanding of '...' has increased.] on the usual pop up windows.
'Every time I make a favorable impression on a character, or earn their trust, or guess what they're thinking the level of understanding seems to increase.'
Color returns to the screen, a close up of Inho's slightly shadowed face assaults everyone's eye balls. His eyes are blank and his lips are turned up in a strained people-pleasing smile. 'I've probably done the latter. Thanks to that, I can read his mind and know his feelings with this increased level of understanding.'
['Cheon Inho' is suspicious of your intentions.]
"It's really cool that your skills tell you this kind of stuff, ahjussi." Jihye pipes up. She has uncurled her legs and has them propped up on the recliners foot rest. She's playing with something in her jacket pocket.
[The Constellation 'Secretive Plotter' agrees with incarnation 'Lee Jihye']
Dokja just shrugs, running his fingers along the marks on his forearms. "I guess so. It's definitely useful."
The teenager smiles and nods rapidly. She taps her temple with her pointer finger while she talks next. "Does that mean you can read my mind?"
She looks so excited about the idea that he's almost unwilling to tell her that he really can't right now. But he has in the past so he's not really lying to her when he tells her this.
He just really doesn't want to talk to her about the time he used it to cheat at (rock paper scissor shoot). Dokja really hopes they don't play that part. They don't seem to be skipping very much, but he hopes all of the same. Just this once.
[The Constellation 'Prisoner of the Golden Headband' is intrigued.]
"Yes, I'm able to read your mind." It's weird watching her jump up out of her chair and cheer. Everyone had previously been wary that he was able to read their minds, looking at him wearily, but here Jihye is cheering at the fact that he can read her mind.
He's- He really doesn't get it.
"Could you perhaps let a member of our group join your party?" There's the twist he had been expecting. Dokja knew it was too good to be true that he was just letting them go. 'Of course. There's no way he would have let us off that easy.'
"We'd also like to know how the scenarios can be cleared." The group behind Inho shuffles around a little bit, whispering to each other as they push someone through the crowd. Han Myungoh is the one that pops out from between the people.
Inho places his hand on the shoulder of the man with a grin and Dokja is forced to sigh and accept the man into their entourage. He'll be useful at the very least.
A little ways down the track, after they had long escape the heavy gaze of one(1) Cheon Inho, they come across the corpses of the people who had gone down this way before them. Dokja looks at them carefully, observing their wounds and trying to see what they could have been killed from.
Sooyoung scoffs and points to the screen, tilting her head and giving Dokja a sleezy smile. "I guess that's where all those people went."
He purposefully exaggerates rolling his eyes. That witch. They all already knew that. There's no reason for her to point out obvious things.
"You rat! How dare you!" She reaches over again, curling her fist up and setting it on his head. She rubs her closed fist aggressively on the top of his head. Is she-
She fucking is.
Snarling, he bears his teeth at her and gets ready to lunge for her. He grabs her by her wrist and is about to go for her when a gruff voice interrupts him.
"Kim Dokja."
Uh oh. That doesn't sound very happy. Dokja twist a bit to see Joonghyuk with a tick in his jaw and he can see his teeth are clenched when the protagonist goes to talk again.
"Sit still."
Dokja doesn't immediately let go of Sooyoung, but she twists out of his grip anyway. Sneering at her one last time he lets her go. That's no fun.
[The Constellation 'Secretive Plotter' looks on knowingly.]
[The Constellation 'Demon-like Judge of Fire' shrieks.]
"What-?" Why is Uriel shrieking? Is she excited that he just got threatened? Grumbling, Dokja admonishes the angel under his breath.
[The Constellation 'Secretive Plotter' greatly encourages you to kick incarnation 'Yoo Joonghyuk' out of your chair.]
He really should, shouldn't he...
Han Myungoh shrieks from behind, jumping a foot in the air, and backtracks away from the bodies on the floor. "Cor- Corpses!"
"Sangah! It's dangerous here! Hold my hand!" He backtracks enough that he's almost completely Sangah, coming closer to her.
"You look more scared than I am." Sangah's voice is flat and she's trying to slowly retreat away from the shouting man. Everyone else just looks on at Myungoh embarrassing himself.
"N-No, I'm fine!"
"...are you sure about this?" Hyunsung walks a little closer to Dokja, eyeing Myungoh cowering behind Sangah as they just stand there. Gilyoung watches the scene with a blank face. Dokja continues past the corpses, walking further down the tracks. He does tilt his head towards the soldier as he answers him. "He's no threat to us. So it should be fine."
"What about you, Heewon?" Hyunsung turns his head over to Heewon who is walking alongside them. She tilts her head and sends him a questioning gaze. "You haven't even fully recovered yet."
Scoffing at him, she lags behind a bit to be closer to him as they converse. Dokja walks a little bit ahead of them. "You should be worried about Gilyoung, not me.
She continues to talking, kicking a severed limb out of her way as the tunnel slowly gets darker and darker. The only light they have is from a flashlight that Sangah is holding onto. "The road ahead is dangerous. We're not just going to charge ahead, are we?"
"I've been worried about that as well." Hyunsung turns away from his conversation momentarily to look forward at Dokja's back to make a comment. "It might be a good idea to send Gilyoung and the women back..."
Heewon, in her outrage, talks louder than she should in these monster infested tunnels. Dokja shoots a look behind him, but they're too busy talking to take any cues from him. "Listen, Hyunsung. I may not be as good as you are, but I still know how to fight. I used to practice kendo."
"But-" The soldier starts to object to her, startling a little at her harsh tone and stumbling a bit when his foot lands halfway on one of the rails.
Dokja interrupts, not willing to listen to whatever Hyunsung may say next to justify his prejudice. It's just better to get this over with now before they end up attracting something they're not ready enough for yet. "You two must be forgetting something.
"A few days ago, the world we lived in changed completely." His voice isn't harsh, that's not what he's going for, but it definitely is stern. They must learn now before it is too late for them to do so. He's not going to get attached to them just for them to die due to their own outdated ideals.
"No one is weak anymore. Those ideas are outdated and only aim to hurt the people you speak about." Dokja turns to Hyunsung as he admonishes him, trying to make his voice stern like earlier. He rearranges the collar of his robe when it slips.
[The Constellation 'Demon-like Judge of Fire' agrees with incarnation 'Kim Dokja']
"If you sideline people like that they will never get stronger. The longer this goes on the more dangerous it will get." He thinks about all of the scenarios to come, how they will get progressively more and more difficult to pass while keeping everyone alive. "If you keep them away from danger, you keep them from getting stronger. The longer they go without getting stronger, the more likely they are to die."
Hyunsung stays quiet, shamefully averting his gaze and turning his head away from the rest of the group. Sangah sighs and leans forward, tucking her hair behind her ear when it falls in her face. "Dokja-ssi..."
"He needs to hear it again." The reader gives no leeway, not willing to let anyone see that he wavered slightly when she called out to him.
That... She nearly sounded like his mother with the tone she used. He really needs to get a grip on himself. Dokja will be no use as a leader if he can't get himself together.
"I- I understand that now." Hyunsung mumbles, once again wringing his hands in his lap. His legs is moving up and down with the balls of his feet kept on the floor. He's jittering his leg, he must be nervous.
"It's just hard having to watch people go through things just to make them strong enough to continue to survive..." And doesn't Dokja know it. He's already had to do that several times, watching the people around him getting hurt so that he knows they will survive is difficult. It's so very difficult.
But if he doesn't, he knows he will loose them no matter how much stronger he gets or how many powerful allies he makes. There will always be a chance, a mess up or mistake that will put the people around him into copious amounts of danger.
He even forces himself through similar situations so he may stand by his protagonist proudly.
[The Constellation 'Abyssal Black Flame Dragon' complains about the lack of fighting.]
Unfortunately, the dragon is going to get his wish for violence soon. There were corpses, isn't that enough for you?
"Saying women and children are physically weak is prejudice. Anyone can become strong when they increase their stats." Dokja stops walking, turning cold eyes on the group he's leading. The rest also slow to a stop, watching him closely as he speaks.
Turning his whole body around, he waves Gilyoung over. The boy comes forward a bit. The cold eyes melt away, softening while looking at the child. Dokja asks something of him. "Gilyoung-ah. Show them."
Gilyoung nods, lowering himself down into a crouch and placing his hands on the floor in front of him. Where his fingers brush the concrete there is a thin light green line that flows out and further into the subway tunnel down the tracks.
It travels out of sight of the flashlights radius, flowing into the darkness. It only takes a moment for something to crawl into the light, the green light connecting to a cockroach that comes into the light of the flashlight. Heewon pipes up from beside him. "Oh fuck- What is that?"
Many of his group shivers at the sight of the bug. Heewon makes a sound as the shiver chitters up her spine. "You should have warned us. That was actually kind of disturbing."
[The Constellation 'Demon-like Judge of Fire' nods her head rapidly in agreement.]
Now, that's actually a pretty dramatic reaction, isn't it? Bug aren't really that bag. Dokja really thinks about it before amending his thought. The flesh eating ones really are that bad. He hates anything to do with mosquitos.
"I wouldn't know why," Gilyoung turns cold eyes and a blank smile to the grown up behind him, he's probably pouting now that Dokja thinks about it. "bugs are great, noona."
[A few constellation agree that bugs are cool.]
"No they're not! They're not cute at all!" Both Yoosung and Mia start to squabble with him, debating about whether bugs are good or not.
Dokja sighs and cradles his forehead with one of his hands. Rubbing at his temples with his fingers, he just lets them do what they want as long as they don't get physical.
Kids.
"D-Damn it! It's a cockroach!" Myungoh shouts out, scuttling away from Gilyoung as the bug gets closer. A couple of the adults of the group cringe at the sight of the pest.
"My attribute is called [Bug Collector]. I can have simple conversations with insects." Gilyoung leans in closer to the cockroach, vague light green particles float around him as he activates his skill.
['Lee Gilyoung' has activated the 'Interspecies Communication' skill.]
"That is a pretty cool skill..." Yoo Mia grudgingly admits, not sounding at all happy to do so.
She does soften a little bit when Gilyoung turn a bright grin at her with all of his teeth on display.
It's cute to watch them when they get along.
It's also cute to watch them fight, but he wouldn't dare tell them that. Dokja bets they would fight purely for that reason alone with how this has been going so far.
The kid stays crouched down, holding his hand out so the bug crawls onto it. Gilyoung brings it closer to his face to look at it better. "It says there's nothing up ahead. We'll be safe for at least another hundred steps."
"Thank you for your concern, but I didn't come all the way here to be a burden to you all." Gilyoung sets the roach down, watching it scurry away down the tracks. He looks up at Hyunsung with blank eyes. He's still just crouched there.
"Oh... Sure." The soldier slowly nods along, looking at Dokja with big round eyes. He snorts to himself and looks away from the Hyunsung. Did he really think everyone was so weak in an apocalypse? Getting rid of the women and children would half their group.
Gilyoung gets up from the floor, scampering over to stand by Dokja. While they look at each other, Dokja rests his hand on the kids head.
Heewon cautiously stepped around the bodies on the rails, hopping over a thick puddle of blood when it looked necessary. She jogs to catch up, looking around the tunnel while still following along. "It looks like human corpses aren't the only corpses here."
"No wonder this place reeks of blood..." She mutters under her breath, wearily looking around. Sangah points her flashlight forward, smacking it a little when it doesn't light up the tunnel any further. "The road up ahead looks pitch black as if there's a wall blocking the way."
Hyunsung reaches his hand forward, brushing one of his fingers against the black wall stopping the light from going further. A loud ding follows windows that pop up in front of all of the group.
"Why would you touch something when you don't even know what it will do?" Sooyoung asks a quivering Hyunsung, throwing her hands out as she speaks. She's actually quite aggressive with it.
[The Constellation 'Master of Steel' asks you to be nicer to his incarnation.]
The writer points at the screen with one hand while still flailing the other around. "You didn't ask the rat -who is supposed to be leading you by the way!- whether it was safe to tough it or not! What if that one move killed you all!"
[The Constellation 'Demon-like Judge of Fire' says you should be more careful!]
The more she yells at him, and she is yelling at this point, the further the solder sinks into his chair until Dokja can't even see him very well anymore.
Scoffing, Dokja grabs onto the witches arm that is still moving and turns her to look a him. Which was oddly easy to do. It's sort of funny watching her get manhandled by someone. At least it's not him for once. "As if you haven't done equally stupid shit so far. Like the dragon?"
[The Constellation 'Prisoner of the Golden Headband' sighs as he remembers the dragon.]
Sooyoung flushes quickly, spluttering and peeling his hand off of her arm. She turns around to him properly, forgetting all about poor Hyunsung who has melted to the floor. "That's different! You weren't supposed to be there!"
"Yeah, but you should have had a couple of back up plans. Were you expecting everything to just go your way first try?" Dokja taunts her, dancing around the subject in a way that only the witch, Heewon, and Hyunsung would understand.
[The Constellation 'Secretive Plotter' tells incarnation 'Han Sooyoung' to plan better.]
They'll probably get to it eventually, but it's funny seeing the plagiarist squirm in her seat because he's so close to exposing her.
She grumbles at him and nearly goes to grab him again in her flustered state, but the scene continues and she gives up.
[A new sub scenario has arrived.]
As he had expected, the scenario window in front of him displays the scenario he was looking for. It was rated 'E' and it was about hunting and cooking an edible monster. The time limit doesn't exist and they get a reward of 500 coins. The penalty for failure is just three question marks.
"Yikes! A Mon- Monster!"
When the wall disappears, there's monster corpses covering the rails. They're about as big as they were, two sets of spines on their upper backs. Dokja walks forward a bit and uses the light from Hyunsung's flashlight to look a little close, the corpses are a weird fleshy color.
'Tier 9 Subterranean Ground Rat'
"Who could have done this?" Heewon asks, walking forward to observe the dead monsters as well. Dokja stands there with the thorn in his hand. He knows those slashes, plus there's only one person who could do this as early on as they are.
'Ground rats live underground, are pack hunters, and are known to be extremely persistent in hunting their prey. It won't be easy to move about since the tunnels that connect the different stations are full of monsters.'
'Who else but Yoo Joonghyuk' Flashing a sly grin, Dokja starts to form a plan. Walking forward and crouching down before the corpse, Dokja eyes the mostly intact bodies.
[The Constellation 'Secretive Plotter' declares he could do so much better than incarnation 'Yoo Joonghyuk.]
Well, yes, Dokja hopes he can considering he's a whole ass constellation while the protagonist is an incarnation. It seems he has to be specific. There's no incarnation besides Joonghyuk that could do that.
Sooyoung rolls her eyes at the cheesy guy sitting next to her. Actually, you know what. She fake gags in the most exaggerated way she can.
She gets smacked for her efforts. She snickers behind her hand anyways. Dokja cusses her out under his breath, aggressive even when he's whispering it.
Joonghyuk sends him a dirty look, side-eyeing the kid. The reader gives him a smarmy smile, leaning in closer to the protagonist.
Joonghyuk's heart jumps as Dokja leans closer into him, leaning forward to meet him halfway. He doesn't completely miss the mischievous smile but he's hoping that there is no need to worry about that.
He was sorely, sorely wrong.
Grinning, Dokja stops just before his nose hits the protagonists. He lets the suspense sit in the air for a couple of minutes, not bothering to say or do anything except look. He opens his mouth and bursts the illusion. He whispers as low as he can so the kids can't hear him. "Bitch."
[The Constellation 'Secretive Plotter' tells you to insult that guy again.]
Done with his shit, Joonghyuk reaches his hand up to grab at his throat and only gets thwarted when Dokja starts to shout about the kids being here.
Like that asshole actually cares, Dokja just cursed on purpose to irritate Joonghyuk. That constellation is also starting to seriously piss him off.
"Won't these be enough for us to clear the scenario?" Hyunsung asks good questions, at the very least. The reader still shakes his head.
"The clear condition said that we had to hunt, so probably not." Shuffling a little closer to the monster, Dokja prods at it's back with the dull side of the thorn he holds. The bodies are still. He is asked another question, the soldier coming forward to stand just behind him. "I guess you're right. How are we supposed to cook them? Over a fire?"
Ignoring the question Dokja tilts his head up in Heewon direction. She ended up standing close by to his left. "Heewon, you said you were good at Kendo, right?"
She chuckles nervously, raising her arm to rub at the back of her neck. Heewon reverts her eyes to look just above him instead of in his eyes. "Well I'm not good to be exact..."
Dokja smiles at her with a feral grin and a gleam in his eyes. He turns back to the corpse, twirling the thorn in his hand so it's sharp side is pressed up against it. Digging the thorn in, he shoves his hand into the body and pulls out the spine still covered in tendons and muscles he cut through.
[The Constellation 'Secretive Plotter' applauds your thinking.]
"I still can't believe you knew how to do that, Dokja-ssi." Sangah taps her pointer finger on the recliners arm rest, humming as she thinks through the events of the past. "Was that also from the book? It's amazing you can do that just from reading it."
Dokja laughs nervously, a little embarrassed about being called out on it. Seriously, where has the fourth wall been when he really needs it? This is getting ridiculous. He hasn't had to regulate his own emotions in a while. "The descriptions were detailed."
"That's still an amazing feat!" Heewon chimes in, make motions like she's snapping something in half. "You even just stuck your hand in there like it's nothing."
"Ah, I'm just- I'm used to blood and stuff like that." Dokja mumbles picking at the blood left under his fingernails, being particularly rough with one he gets a layer of skin out from under his nail. Did he really scratch that hard...?
The atmosphere immediately turns a lot heavier as everyone is reminded about some of the scenes they had been shown earlier. Joonghyuk snakes an arm around Dokja and squeezes him a little. Right, they're still not over that. Heewon just mumbles, "oh, right."
It makes him feel a little guilty about bringing it back up. He tries to joke a little. "Besides, I don't any of you would have been able to do it considering how squeamish you were about a bug."
"That's different-!" Heewon stutters, shivering at the reminder of the pest.
"Of course it is."
"It feels as if we've traveled back in time to the stone ages." Everyone is standing with a weapon, Heewon looking at her own bone sword with curious eyes. Everyone has a sword except for Gilyoung, who was given a hammer made out of one of the skulls.
"They'll need to be sharper, so try sharpening them on a rock laying around nearby." Dokja stand after shaking off his hands of what little blood was on them. The bodies didn't have much so they were probably here for a little bit.
[You have successfully obtained weapons using your intellect.]
[A few constellations are interested in this primitiveness of humans.]
[The constellations have sponsored 100 coins.]
"You seemed clumsy but you've somehow managed to make yourself a fine weapon" Heewon sounds surprised, chattering on to him as he look at her deadpanned.
'I know what to do because TWSA had a detailed chapter on butchering monsters.'
"It really does just have everything" Sooyoung mutters, kind of wishing she read more of that trashy novel if only to know these kinds of things.
"All of you have some coins left, right?" Dokja turns to ask the group, standing up from his crouching position and looking at each of them. Sangah mutters to herself curiously "They gift coins for something like this?"
"Invest all the coins you have into strength, stamina and agility. Leave behind only enough to pay the survival fee." He looks carefully at the people he's gathered so far, looking at their profiles when he can and guessing their stats when he can't. It'll be close... "This may sound cruel, but I don't expect all of you to survive."
They startle, snapping their head over to him with their eyes blown wide. Each of them looks to be in come varying levels of disbelief. It's only Gilyoung that looks more determined than anything. "But still... Try to keep yourselves alive."
Loud scuttling from further down the tracks echoes in the tunnel, startling the rest of his group. Dokja turns away from them, his back the only thing they can see of him. He says one last thing as a growl rings out close.
"Please."
That... Dokja tries to laugh off how desperate that sounds to his own ears. Did he really sound like that when he had asked the first time? Scratching at his forearm again, he attempts to brush it off by making conversation. "Well, you'll be putting those new weapons to good use at least."
[The Constellation 'Abyssal Black Flame Dragon' is excited about the on-coming violence.]
"Yeah, but those things were disgusting..." Heewon says with a shiver, there's a break in her voice like halfway into her sentence. Dokja hums, thinking his answer over. He is quickly bulldozed.
"We survived, hyung." Gilyoung talks when the conversation lulls a little, he's making solid eye contact with the reader. His gaze is filled with a wisdom that Dokja really wishes he didn't have. It does the kid good when he has to survive in a world like this, but Dokja really doesn't like that it means the kid is so good at reading him.
"Yes, we survived Gilyoung-ah." He just agrees with the boy, hoping he doesn't elaborate on what he was trying to hint. Dokja is sorely tempted to pray that no one else catches on.
They don't say anything about it, so it's his win this time. The screen lights up again with a new scene. Time to continue this charade.
Notes: