"Azadeus, please," Kaelsu begged. His hands were up in a surrendering pose while he backed off.
Junwoo was overcome with rage. After he poured his heart out, he really just goes ahead and tricks him like that? If there was one thing he couldn't stand about Kaelsu, it was moments like these where he'd still treat him as a pet. After all this, he thought that he had finally convinced Kaelsu that he didn't belong here. He thought they were finally going to work together to figure out a way out of this place.
Kaelsu pondered if he should use another command to calm him down, but considered that it would enrage him further.
He wasn't sure what would happen to his in-game character if he were killed by his own pet. He assumed at least he would be sent back to his territory. But what would happen to Azadeus?
"If you're just going to trick me like that, then release me."
"Trick, what are you talking about?" Kaelsu was backed up against the exit to the area. He was tempted to exit the area and leave him there until he calmed down. Although… he'd probably try to destroy the house again. "Listen if this is about the collar thing, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to."
"This isn't the first time you've done it. I let you get close and then you pull that stunt. Do you even know how humiliating and painful it is?"
That's right - he didn't know. It wasn't something that crossed his mind until he finally registered that Azadeus was likely not a glitch in the game.
"If you're sorry then release me," Junwoo spoke as he tried to calm down.
Kaelsu wasn't sure if this was a bluff or not. "Okay fine."
"Fine."
"Fine."
He slowly opened the menu and his fingers danced on the party screen. He looked at Azadeus, then looked back. He repeated that a few times and hoped Azadeus would say something other than "fine," but nothing. Instead, he stood there looking somewhat hopeful with his arms crossed and his lips curled into a pout. One of his clawed feet tapping with anxiety.
"Really, you want to leave that badly? What are you even going to do without me?"
Junwoo didn't think that part through, but he was too stressed and annoyed to care.
"I don't need to tell you that." He turned his back to Kaelsu.
"You know what. Fine. Go."
He removed all of the equipment he'd given to Azadeus, leaving him in his original white robes. He was shocked for a moment, but some heavy feeling rose in his chest. Junwoo couldn't put a name to this feeling, it was somewhere between excitement yet despair.
He was removed from the party, then the collar clicked. It fell to the ground and shattered into pieces. The way it dropped, it was almost like the glass screen in his nightmares. The ones that repeated almost nightly.
Memories flashed in his mind at the sight of the collar dropping and shattering – flashes of blue and red lights, noises blared like sirens and screams. Panicked words were muffled and surrounded him as they got louder and seemingly closer, he couldn't hear what they were saying but the sound flooded his senses with adrenaline.
The splintered pieces disappeared and suddenly, he felt… free?
So why did it feel so bad?
Kaelsu wouldn't look at him. A breeze softly whisked his hair to the side, and a dull glint in his crimson eyes disappeared with a blink.
The name Azadeus disappeared from the top of his head.
He glanced up and felt his heart drop. Did this really happen? The feeling wasn't pleasant at all – is everything finally over?
"So, that's it?" He mustered the courage to ask. "Am I finally free?"
Kaelsu remained silent, averting his eyes further. Junwoo walked and broke out into a jog, running past Kaelsu who stood firmly in place. He felt for the edges of the territory and tried to force a smile when the magical barrier allowed his hands to slip through instead of beating him away like a drum.
Instead, his fingertips caused a ripple that swallowed his body in its entirety until there was nothing but a rainbow shadow behind. He slid through the barrier like it was never there.
A small wet tear dropped from golden eyes. He gazed back to the territory, but it was gone. No portal, no fences, no house. Nothing.
He'd exited the area and there was no going back. 'Isn't this what I wanted?' He thought to himself.
The last time Junwoo was out in the wild alone, he was weak and disoriented. He'd woken up in the middle of nowhere, with a random tail, ears and fluff in all kinds of places. Now, this was his life. He was ready for this. At least, he felt like he was ready.
Probably.
He lingered around for a moment. He secretly had hoped that Kaelsu would come back for him and beg him to come back. He felt a pang of guilt when the white haired, seemingly giant man (in comparison), never came through the portal. Junwoo started to walk on, his steps were heavy and sluggish.
He placed his claws into the nearest tree and BANG.
One fell over, sliced in half. A small portion of the rotting oak stood as a stump with jagged edges from the aggressive swipe. The rest of it lies in pieces scattered around.
"What the FUCK," Junwoo yelled. He released some pent up anger, his breaths were heavy and laboured. He couldn't figure out why he felt so angry. Was it the betrayal from someone he was partnered with (albeit forcefully)?
Before he realised it, he'd been stomping off for some time now and left a wake of destroyed plants, shrubs and trees in his path. Some of it singed from flames, some of it with bite and claw marks, and the rest pounded from various martial arts physical abilities.
Other monsters around him cowered away, the fierce aura of the fox was too overwhelming to contest.
Junwoo tried to enter one town but was rejected by the magic force and a threatening message about being unable to enter due to being untamed.
He was about to try another zone, one further down the beaten path, but opted out after recalling what happened last time he was able to enter a player zone. Instead, his hand was frozen at the portal entrance.
Originally? His plan was to ask other people about where he was and what he was. Now? He wasn't sure that was going to work.
Junwoo took a moment to breathe. He admired his own work of mass destruction, but started to get exhausted. A golden tail wagged gently in the wind.
"A Jiuweihu? No way," A voice called behind him. Junwoo snapped to face the voice in question, and was met with some stranger, who looked indistinguishable from all the other characters he's seen in this game except Kaelsu.
Ugh, he desperately wanted to forget about that guy.
Junwoo didn't want to give away his story and refused to make any contact with him. Instead, he took a couple of cautious steps backwards, hoping the player didn't want to make any spicy actions and start a battle with him.
Leaves crunched, and monsters spawned all around him. 'Fuck,' he monologued. Some of these monsters were twice his size. On his right was a monster that looked like pure red ooze, and on his left a drake with sharp blades trailing down its spine. Behind him, two other similar fox-like creatures, but they were smaller and not humanoid.
Ears pricked as heard a familiar chanting, the sound emanated from the player who started the battle. Junwoo disregarded the monsters and his attention now trained purely on the summoner attempting to capture him.
Not again. All fours fell on the ground as he prepared a charge, his golden fur, one soft but now burst into flames. Junwoo couldn't contain his rage; it spilled out into the fiery inferno flickering around him.
Then he pounced, eyes now level with the other summoner, claws out and flames encircling him to engulf.
…
Kaelsu listened as the magic barrier absorbed Azadeus. He had some regrets, but honestly he knew it wouldn't last long.
He hoped.
In the real world, the person behind the Kaelsu put his hands on his head and kicked his chair back from his desk.
"What was I thinking?" He whispered to himself. Kang Min shuffled on his chair, then stood up to walk around his room. To the window, the door, the bed. Yep, he regretted it.
His heart ached.
He clicked back onto his browser and sifted through all of the tabs, looking for anything that could lead him to Azadeus' in real life. His eyes came across an article Foxseo fell off the leaderboard, where is he now?
From his research, he'd noticed that this Foxseo character was a long time player and had been in the top 50 players on the game's leaderboard. Eterna had been around for only a couple of years, but the playerbase has remained strong. This Foxseo character frequently contributed to the forums. Kang Min clicked on the name and scrolled through the profile. The profile picture was the generic placeholder. The 'about' field was blank, and no personal information was displayed anywhere.
He couldn't see anything obvious, but scrolled further and further down the posts.
A decent amount of time had passed. He'd clicked links, searched up names, looked through videos and posts but finally he'd found one small bit of information from a short snippet of a video. His age. That was it. Foxseo was a 19 year old, his posts are sometimes in English, sometimes in Korean. While it doesn't exactly narrow down who it could be, he made a note.
If he could just find this Foxseo player, he'll be one step closer to unlocking the mystery behind his pet– ex-pet. Kaelsu thought he'd be okay with what happened, but he wasn't. He wasn't okay with how things ended. He missed Azadeus.
His character was still logged in, AFK and stood in place facing the house. Wiggling the mouse, he regained control and swiftly left to follow the tracks of his once-tamed pet. He slipped through the exit and broke off into a sprint, but stopped abruptly at the hellish sight of the forest around him.
The path was blocked by felled trees and ripped shrubbery. It was clear something seething with rage passed through here. Claw marks scarred old oak, ashes danced with the wind and scorched patches of singed grass led into one direction.