Joohyun

It’s hard to look at Seulgi’s face after what she’s done. She probably thinks she’s just a stupid girl whose parents gave her everything she wanted, and she wouldn’t be wrong. She was a spoiled child, after all; although she survived longer than people expected of her, so she felt she had earned some credit. 

Seulgi selected black clothes for both of them. She looks at the underwear on the bed, a brilliant blue, almost metallic color. She looks back at Seulgi, who is resting on the balcony. She’s already dressed in black cargo trousers and a hoodie. It’s a cold night, a hard contrast to the really hot weather they had to endure that day. 

She dresses in silence, hurrying so Seulgi won’t skip her meal because of her. In all their time together, she’s never skipped a meal. Even when they didn’t have anything to eat, she would eat wild animals and would offer Joohyun too, but she started to hate the rat taste pretty quickly. Seulgi would always force her to eat at least a bit since she was too thin according to the assassin. She felt just fine. 

They don’t talk while going down the stairs toward the bar zone. They pass the reception, Joohyun still hiding her face behind the curtain of her now dark brown hair. She briefly looks at herself in a mirror, surprising herself with how pale she is, and how lean she looks like. 

The place is full, and the volume of the music is high enough to hide their conversation without causing her ear pain. The lights are very low, so getting recognized is also not on her mind. 

“Joohyun…” Seulgi finally dares to speak. Joohyun looks at the menu to avoid her gaze. “Will you give Sunless City an opportunity?”

It’s not what she was expecting to hear, maybe what’s wrong with you would have made much more sense, so she replies with surprise.

“...What?”

“I said,” Seulgi leans over the table, repeating louder. “Will you give Sunless City an opportunity? It’s where I was born.”

“Weren’t we heading to Death Valley, where the castle is?” 

“Yes, but that’s temporal. You can have a peaceful life in The Sunless City. Believe me, I wish I hadn’t left.” She sounds gloomy, but quickly recovers her composure, putting a small smile on her face. 

In the back of her mind, Joohyun can hear the real question. “Will you give a shot to life long enough to find peace?”. That’s the real question behind it, one that she isn’t sure how to reply to. 

She nods, hoping she will be able to give back to Seulgi everything that the girl has done for her when she didn’t even need to. 

As promised, Seulgi asks for a plate of french fries with more cheese than the plate can fit and a lot of sweet mustard just how she likes it. Long gone are her days of trying to be as vegan as she could be, not by choice, but it was hard to find any nutritious food in the middle of the forest and landscapes she had to walk through. She was lucky to find fruit in those days, mostly eating rats, snakes, and the small animals they could capture without getting hurt. She makes a mental note to try it again soon.

“Do you have a plan to cross the border yet?” Joohyun asks, talking with full.

“Not yet, we could get mistaken as waterlanders by Dimland’s army on the other side. And we can’t use powers, since they have blockers on Waterland’s side to level the battlefield. The only way would be crossing through the flooded tunnels but I’m afraid they might have blocked them too and I don’t want us to drown.”

“Tunnels?” 

“Yeah, like the holes in The Boiling Point. They are connected, but we can get stuck or worse, get into one that has no exit.”

“We can think of something when we get there,” Joohyun says, sounding much like the princess she used to be. “Now, eat. I don’t share with many people.” 

The assassin gladly does so, diving on the french fries and pouring as much sweet mustard as she can. 

They drink wine and listen to the bard on stage, then to more music. They stop, dizzy, stumbling toward their shared room, but they immediately sober when they see the door slightly open. 

“Did you…?” 

“No, I locked it, I’m sure,” Joohyun says, moving so she’s behind Seulgi’s back. 

She quickly pulls a knife from her boots, making a signal to Joohyun to be silent.

There’s nothing out of the ordinary, except for a letter on the bed. 

“There’s no one here,” Joohyun tells her, lowering the arm where Seulgi holds the knife. “I think Ningning was here.”

Seulgi puts the knife back into her boots, reaching for the letter. It’s a plain, white envelope without markings, except for a For Joohyun in the middle. 

Dear Joohyun, I hope this letter finds you well. 

I don’t know much, but I think you also heard the rumors, I think you even saw them firsthand and may not remember. Taeyeon loved Tiffany, they were a thing for a long time, even after your mother married your Baekhyun. They saved both you and Tao when you were just toddlers, but I don’t know much past that. He was your brother by blood. He was a friend to me, but he was manipulated by Yixing, and for that I’m sorry. I wish things were different, that I could help you like I promised, but now we have to cut ties. You’re no longer alive, and that’s the reality I need to enforce. The palace in Sproutland might have had more information, but Winter destroyed it all. Yixing also burned all of Granny’s belongings. 

Forgive your parents, they did what believed was best. You’re alive thanks to it. Leave this land as fast as you can. Things are just going to get worse, and you’ll be safe in Dimland, or as safe as you can be in this Kingdom. 

I hope this helps you understand a little more about who you are.

With love, 

J.

“What does it say?” Seulgi asks, keeping her distance to give her space. “Are you okay?”

“I will be, eventually, but I’m not sure what made her send me this. I think I would have preferred not to know.”

“The truth is rarely nice.” 

She’s quiet, re-reading the letter over and over again. Now she has one more person to feel guilty about. 

“I think she’s… warning us. Look.” She handles the letter to Seulgi, watching as she reads through it. 

“She could have made it more explicit, like, putting a deadline to it.” That earns a laugh from the former princess. 

“I think she’s telling us to leave now.” 

Seulgi hums, giving the letter back, then throwing herself on the bed dramatically. 

“God, I wanted a bed tonight. This was so expensive.” 

“Will you tell me where did you get the money?”

“I… did an exchange.”

“Exchange?”

“A favor exchange.”

Joohyun frowns, thinking about what kind of favor could she exchange until something clicks in her mind. 

“You mean ual favors? Did you sell your body so we could sleep here? We could have slept outside, Seulgi, what were—”

“No! God, no! Not that kind of favor, Joohyun. I just had to kill those animals in exchange for money.”

“Who are they? I know there are lots of bad people in this place, but killing for money is not the way to stay in the low!”

Seulgi’s laugh interrupts her, making her frown again. 

“What’s so funny? The fact that you’re an assassin doesn’t mean you have to—”

“Joohyun, stop,” She continues laughing, “I just had to kill some hens. They just started the business but the owner is incapable of killing any living creature, which is in fact funny. Their employee is drunk and the hens escaped from the barn.”

Joohyun frowns even deeper, squinting her eyes in disbelief. 

“Aren’t you saying this to keep me calm?”

“No, believe me, I would have preferred killing some bad guys. Killing hens is the most atrocious thing I’ve ever done. That’s why we don’t eat many animals in Dimland, that and the fact that Sproutland and Waterland put a blockage in place. Many of us starved to death,” Seulgi stops halfway, or at least Joohyun thinks it’s halfway. She does that sometimes like she has to refrain from jumping from one topic to many others. 

Joohyun mimics her, removing her shoes before throwing herself onto the bed. She sighs. Her feet look awful now that she pays attention. She’ll probably need to take something for the inflammation and also put ice on it. 

“What damage can one more day do?” She says, supporting her weight with her forearms. “The Front will still be there tomorrow.”

It’s a silent agreement, both of them removing her clothes to sleep more comfortably. It’s the first time they've done that all that time, unthinkable if they were out in the open instead.  

“Will you still be here when I wake up?” Seulgi murmurs against her pillow, extending her arm to reach Joohyun’s hand on the other bed. The question behind it is clear. 

“Yes,” she says, squeezing the girl’s hand once. She lets it go, repositioning herself higher on the bed. “Good night.” 

Seungwan

She begins waking up in the middle of the night, screaming, so Yeji starts hating her more now that she can’t even sleep in peace. Meanwhile, it brings Lucas closer to her. Those siblings are day and night for her.

It starts harmless, first just some unintelligible conversations in her dreams, some faces she’s never seen before, and things she doesn't remember doing. A tall boy with curly hair making her look into the mirror, two little kids pulling her from her shirt, gray eyes with tears. Then it begins to get progressively worse. A black dagger in a man’s heart, the back of a gun against her temple. The pain comes with it too, leaving her with no signs of harm in real life, but with a headache throughout the day.

The only thing that keeps coming to her is those gray eyes and the girl’s face, thin eyebrows, dark hair, and the feeling that she did something to her. 

She tells Lucas one night. They are sitting in the docks of the lake, a few meters away from the ponds. It’s a chilly night as expected of Wong’s Dwelling. 

“Are you sure you don’t remember anything about who they are?” He asks, using his hands to rub his cold skin. “Your description doesn’t help much. It could be Princess Irene, but I never met her so I wouldn’t know what eye color she had and I didn’t check yours when we found you.” 

“How someone like me could have met the crown princess of Sproutland? That doesn’t make sense. I don’t feel like someone important, and certainly don’t look like one. Besides, she’s dead now, there’s no way for me to get answers from her.”

“Maybe you were just obsessed with looking like her and decided to shapeshift into her? What? Don’t look at me like that, that’s a valid theory.” 

Seungwan laughs, hitting him in the arm. 

“Maybe,” she doesn’t go further than that. 

“Any luck about a name?”

“I did hear someone calling me something, but I need to pay more attention to my dreams to understand it. Give me some days. For now, Hamster’s fine.” 

He nods, and Seungwan sees him in the corner of her eye trying to put his arm around her.

“The good thing is that you’re a cute hamster,” he decides not to put his arm around at the end, moving closer to her instead. 

She may be a blank canvas, but she knows what that behavior means, and she’s not sure how to feel about it. 

“Lucas…” 

“I’m sorry…” he mutters, moving again to where he was. “I haven’t known many girls and I just thought… it’s not that I like you or anything.”

“Hey,” she puts her hand over his. “It’s fine, I get it.” 

Be it out of loneliness or real interest, she lets herself get kissed by him. He’s younger but is very manly. His chest is solid against hers. There’s a feeling in the back of her guts as if she’s betraying someone. They keep kissing without real passion behind it, just exploring something unknown for both of them. Seungwan is not even sure if it’s her first kiss or not. 

He stops, leaving some distance between their bodies. 

“You aren’t enjoying this, are you?”

“I’m sorry, I feel like I have someone already, and I just don’t remember who. I can’t really enjoy it when I don’t even know who I am.” 

He smiles like nothing happened, throwing his arm around her in a friendly way. 

“It’s fine, really. I felt like there was something between us, but after this kiss, I think we can both agree it’s just a friendship bond. I care about you, but I haven’t had many relationships in my life past my sister, so I got confused.” He sounds genuine for Seugnwan. She inspects his expression searching for any sad emotion, but there’s just happiness there and a soft look that shows her he cares for her. “Now, be honest, how was the strawberry onion salsa?”

➼➼➼

Working hard is an understatement of what she does on the farm every day. She wonders how they could finish all their tasks before she started helping them. Probably they didn’t, since some of the crops are in terrible shape. She wants to say something (not about being their slave, but about Yeji’s focus on the corn fields leaving the rest of the crops unattended) but she prefers to maintain a professional relationship with her as employer and employee since having a friendly one seems impossible. 

Still, she’s frustrated with Yeji’s nonchalant behavior.

“Hey, hey!” Yeji yells, and Seungwan thinks it’s because she caught her hateful glancing. She runs towards her, so Seungwan prepares herself to be punched in the face or something worse, but instead, the pink-haired girl takes her face in her hands, just centimeters away from her own face. “Deep breath.” 

She follows, not understanding what’s happening. It continues for a whole minute until Yeji releases her face. Lucas watches the scene, too far to identify what’s happening, and is also too busy with a duck that escaped to be able to pay attention to them. 

“What—?”

“Did you feel anything weird?” She interrupts, still searching for something on her face.

“No, why?” 

“It was… remorphing. Imagine your face is water and the water turns turbulent. It was like that. Your face disappeared in a strange mass with eyes. I thought you were dying.” 

Seungwan touches her face immediately, now in its normal state. 

“I’m not sure… but I don’t think so. Lucas would have seen me if that were the case.” 

“Go inside, keep doing breathing exercises, and drink some water. It might be your powers trying to come out again. Have you used them these days you’ve been here?” 

“I don’t really remember how to use them,” she says, scratching her neck anxiously. “Should I?”

“Beats me. Most waterlanders’ powers never manifest, besides the usual being able to breathe underwater and move faster in it. We have them, but since we don’t train they slowly turn dormant. The lack of usage may be affecting you.” She ponders. Seungwan can see the scientist in her, which makes her even more attractive to her, in a friendly way. “Go. Do what I told you. I’ll make dinner soon. Meanwhile, I’ll send Lucas to town to find someone who actually knows.” 

She gently pushes her towards the ranch. She cares for her, after all. Seungwan makes a mental note not to take her outburst personally, this time for real. 

Minjeong

Minjeong doesn’t remember going to sleep. She must have been very tired for that to happen. She’s disoriented, sweeping the room in the dark looking for Jimin. Her presence always grounds her, but tonight she’s not there. She wonders if she’s still terrorizing her army. 

The clock on her nightstand signals 2:07 am. Jimin should be there already. 

She puts on her slippers and walks to the window. From there she can see the practice field, along with the prison tower. There, behind the tall building, is the reason for her sudden sleep interruption. A commotion is going on, with two trees caught on fire while her night guards throw buckets of water to put it out, yelling at each other in panic. The fire quickly spreads, turning another tree on fire. 

She has no clue why no one thought to inform her, but it’s probably because she tried to kill her army’s higher rank. Still, it’s bad judgment on their part. She was gonna find out either way tomorrow. 

Something like that wouldn’t have happened back in the Frozen Palace, but Sproutland was so hot at times, just like that night, that she felt feverish. 

She takes no time putting shoes on and fixing her bloody red crown over her head, similar to the one her father used to carry. The walk to the back is silent except for the whole yelling her employees have going on. What she felt earlier that day is still there, intensified with each screaming from them. She needs Jimin, and she needs it now. 

She starts crossing paths with the palace’s staff who promptly move aside to make room for her (although not needed since there’s plenty of space for her to walk through). She thinks she really did a number on them. 

“Care to tell me what’s going on?” She yells, quickly looking around. 

One of the staff that is not holding a bucket kneels in front of her. 

“We thought we were under attack, Your Majesty. It was an explosion, we thought… but… we already checked and the defenses were still in place surrounding each possible entrance. There’s no one outside.” 

Minjeong has always been smarter than most, always ahead of everyone’s reasoning, which was how she got the throne all for herself. She doesn’t need a lot of information to connect the dots, usually, which is the case at that moment. 

“That’s because no one was trying to get in, they were trying to get out.” She walks toward the night guards a few meters away, closer to the fire than she would like to be. “You had one job. One. Is it so hard to find trustworthy employees nowadays?”

It’s a rhetorical question, of course., If someone should have known better, it would have been her. She couldn’t even trust her clones, which were supposed to be controlled by her. But just like her, they were also smarter than most, cunning even, and as ambitious as she was. She didn’t realize one of them would betray her, it sounded hilarious for a clone to betray its own master. And once a clone did it, then it would have been a matter of time for the rest to follow. So she had to end it, kill them all, kill the magic that helped her create them, and with that, all their feelings came rushing towards her, making her an unstable person. 

She had used them to get rid of her weaknesses, compartmentalizing them in her clones and leaving in her just her best self. Still, she managed to fall in love. How silly of her. 

She should have known wearing a crown was a lonely thing.

“Kneel, all of you. And you, bring the day guards here. They’ll be taking it from here.” The man runs to do as he’s told, leaving the night guards behind, who are still kneeling in front of their queen.  “And for God’s sake, put that fire out. The smell is killing me.” 

She takes the sword that is offered to her, recently sharpened from what she can see, and with a decisive, quick movement, she cuts their heads off, splashing her robes with their blood. 

“Find Karina, unless you want more of this,” she points at the mutilated men, nonchalantly, as if she’s talking about toys and not people. 

And although she’s recently gained some consciousness and morals, it’s not enough to make her care or see how wrong she is. She only cares for Jimin, and she trusts her, but if she ever betrays her, she will have to do the same to her. She’s not sure if she would be able to, though. 

She can only hope that won’t be the case because she would burn down the world before laying a hand on Jimin. Of that, she has no doubt. 

Jennie

“So? Speak up, I don’t have all day.” 

“Uh, harsh,” Ningning says, grabbing a chair and sitting in front of her queen and beside Jisoo. “The rumor goes like this: Queen Winter is searching left and right for a witch that can help Princess Karina. Well, ex-princess, I guess.”

“Technically she’s the new Queen Consort, isn’t she?” Jisoo comments, deviating further away from the conversation.

“No, no, dear mother, they’re not married yet, but at this point, it wouldn’t surprise me…”

It has always been weird for Jennie how Jisoo and Ningning's relationship is. Although they were mother and daughter, they looked more like friends or even sisters, not because of the age only, having her at a very young age, but also because of the way they spoke to each other. She had always blamed it on Yixing’s upbringing of his child, sending her to train in the army from a very young age. She knew deep down her sister always resented him for that. He had stolen Jisoo’s teenage years with a (very much) forced pregnancy and then, also decided to steal her opportunity to at least make it right by her daughter. 

Jisoo rarely spoke of it, but the relationship they had now was the closest she would get to a mother-daughter relationship. Still, all that background was disturbing for Jennie. 

“Girls! Please!” Jennie interrupts finally, prompting them to go back to the topic at hand. “You were saying…” 

“Yeah, right. As I was saying, Jimin’s not well. We all saw her last time, she’s got her hands on more than she could handle. It wouldn’t surprise me if she’s beyond saving. She’s corrupted to the core. However, our dear Winter is searching anyway.” 

Jennie looks at her, bewildered. 

“Doesn’t she know…?”

“It doesn’t seem so,” Ningning replies right away. “She’s in for a big surprise if she even finds her.” 

“What if… we find her first?” Jisoo ponders, looking between both Ningning and Jennie. “We would have the upper hand.” 

“No way,” Jennie says, “It could go horribly wrong if she finds her because of us.” 

“She doesn’t know who she is but is already looking into Dimland for her. It’s just a matter of time until someone tells her. It’s now or never, aunty.” Ningning counters, using the endearment term she knows the now queen hates. 

It takes her some time to make a decision, but she knows they are right. They don’t have many options left. 

“Let’s do it. Bring her here, Ningning. Our future is in your hands.”

“As usual,” Ningning rolls her eyes playfully. “If you don’t mind, I’m going to put on something more presentable first.” 

  A/N:
hey, i'm trying to write one chapter each weekend but sometimes am just too tired,
however, i bought a keyboard since the laptop one was damaged
and it's proven to be my best investment for writing yet.
Merry Christmas for everyone!
I'm not keen on it but at least writing makes me happy today.
Enjoy!