Chapter Text
Standing in the middle of chopped corpses and torn fresh, the man looked like an angel. Kim Dokja's heart skipped a bit when the man turned his head to face them, brown eyes seemingly boring into his very soul. It must be the intensity behind the gaze. Or it might be the out-of-place serenity radiating off him. Either way, Kim Dokja found his steps frozen when their path crossed each other.
He opened his mouth to ask, who the heck are you, but Yoo Sangah solved it for him before he could even utter a word.
"TeSTAR's Park Moondae...?"
The angel of death pulled down his hoodie, revealing a messy mop of blond hair. He tilted his head in a gesture that somehow struck Kim Dokja as particularly puppy-like, the contrast with the bloody galore he was standing on top of almost gave him a whiplash.
There was a subtle beauty to this man, not ethereal like Yoo Joonghyuk, no, but--
"Kim Dokja-ssi."
Kim Dokja snapped out of his thought.
Next to him, Yoo Sangah continued in a low voice. "That's Park Moondae. The main vocalist of the idol group TeSTAR."
Idol?
Kim Dokja looked down at the carcass of flesh and blood piling up under the man's feet. Then lifting his gaze, he slowly tracked traces of massacre splattered across the man's tracksuit. His clothes looked one size bigger on him. From whose body did he rob it from?
He activated his skill just in case, only to discover that this man was, in fact, not a character of the novel.
"I can see that," Kim Dokja said acidly.
"Look at that face," Lee Jihye murmured under her breath. "He really must be an idol."
"He is," Lee Gilyoung said. "I've seen him on TV."
"Really?" Lim Hyunsung frowned. "I guess I have been too out of touch with the entertainment world."
Jung Heewon playfully slapped his back. "Come on, Lim Hyunsung, you must have heard of them at least once. Only people living under the rock don't know about TeSTAR."
"She's right," Han Sooyung smirked. "Only uncultured idiotic novel-obsessed fool wouldn't know about TeSTAR."
The last one was a jab at him. Kim Dokja ignored it and instead focused on the angel of death--Park Moondae--standing before him. At some point when his company was bickering, he had come down from his bloody throne with one graceful jump.
He couldn't be an ordinary person if he managed to come this far but the ease he had displayed effortlessly so far told Kim Dokja that he would be an enemy hard to deal with.
If he was an ally, though...
He turned his head and made eye contact with Yoo Sangah. She nodded. I got this, her eyes told him.
"Park Moondae-ssi," she began. "I am Yoo Sangah and these are my friends," she gestured at them, her voice softened at the word 'friend'. "Are you here because you're stuck in a scenario?"
Park Moondae shook his head. "I am waiting for my friends."
His voice sounded ordinary for someone who was supposed to be a main vocalist of a famous idol group but Kim Dokja couldn't deny that there was a certain charm to it.
"Your friends...? You mean the other TeSTAR members?"
Park Moondae ruffled his hair with a huff. "They asked me to stay put. We promised to meet here."
Yoo Sangah beamed. "Then, how about we cooperate with each other until you meet your friends?"
He crossed his arms, contemplating. "What do we each get from that?"
He's quick-witted, Kim Dokja assessed wryly. He didn't survive to this point with strength alone. That complicated things.
"You'll get our protection and we will get your assistance," Kim Dokja stepped forward, intervening. "But if you want me to be blunt, it's because we don't want to have unnecessary bloodshed."
The brown eyes slid toward him, scrutinizing.
"Are you threatening me?"
"That's depending on how you take it."
Park Moondae smiled.
He was really quick-witted. Kim Dokja regretted this already.
"I get it," he extended his hand. "You'll make a contact to make sure we don't attack each other, right?"
"That's the plan, yes."
Kim Dokja would kill him right then and there if he refused to make one. Either he would be the biggest pain in the ass or a temporary ally. Kim Dokja couldn't afford to see him as anything else.
The bloodbath he left behind spoke of monstrous strength and the caution shrouded in his words spoke of a cunning mind but more importantly, his stories consisted of paragraphs that Kim Dokja couldn't read. It was the scariest thing about him.
Besides, something about those eyes--
[Exclusive skill Fourth Wall has been activated.]
Kim Dokja blinked.
Park Moondae cocked his head. "Interesting."
"Yeah," Kim Dokja murmured, taking the young man's stretched-out hand in a tight grip. He grinned, baring his teeth. "Interesting, indeed."
The angel's eyes glinted.
The eyes of a survivor, Kim Dokja instinctively thought. And a bit more consciously, he thought, The eyes of a protagonist.
They continued the staring contest a few seconds longer before Park Moondae let go of the handshake first. He turned to face Yoo Sangah, who was more than happy to shake hands.
"I-I am actually a fan!" Yoo Sangah spluttered. "I particularly like the third album-"
From this point on, Yoo Sangah sounded as though she was speaking in an entirely different language. Kim Dokja heard words like 'vote', 'Magical Boy', and 'groom', and couldn't, for the life of him, string those words together.
Distantly, Kim Dokja wondered if this was what he would sound like if he ever enthusiastically shared his interest in TWSA with anyone. Was this what he sounded like to Lee Sookyung?
He shrugged the useless thoughts away.
"Yoo Sangah-ssi." There was that gaze again. "I think you'll make a great idol."
Yoo Sangah laughed as if it was a joke. Kim Dokja knew it wasn't.
Maybe Park Moondae had a sight skill that allowed him to see idol characteristics.
Kim Dokja entertained himself with the idea, his lips curling into a wry smile at the thought of a stoic idol waking up in the middle of the apocalypse with a very specific set of idol-related skills. The concept was too ridiculous even for him.
Still, something nagged at the back of his mind, and as Kim Dokja pondered on what it could be, KimCom members introduced themselves one by one. Jung Heewon, in particular, got really excited and asked for a photograph.
"Why do people call you Moon Puppy?" Gilyoung asked. "You're not like a puppy at all."
The last words were an outright accusation, one that Kim Dokja wasn't entirely sure the other party deserved, but Park Moondae smiled and took it in stride. "I agree."
When it came to Yoo Joonghyuk's turn last, the damn sunfish didn't bother to introduce himself, which was typical of him, but Park Moondae took one look at him, blanched, and downright ignored his existence after that.
Kim Dokja was tempted to ask, what did you see? but he saw himself in the rigid way Park Moondae refused to look in Yoo Joonghyuk's general direction and it left a bitter taste in his mouth.
"Well, Park Moondae," Kim Dokja said, already turning away. "Welcome to the party."
The angel's gaze burned on his back.
[Exclusive skill Fourth Wall has been activated.]
Kim Dokja refused to acknowledge it.
"Can you trust him?" Han Sooyung asked, catching up to his lazy strides. In a lower voice, she continued. "He's not a character from the novel. You can't predict him."
He can't predict me either.
Earlier, when Park Moondae talked about the friends he was waiting for, he had purposefully kept his voice emotionless, but that only made the fondness he desperately hid away stood out more.
Kim Dokja knew Park Moondae's goal(a reunion with his friends) and weakness(the friends he would be reuniting with). Park Moondae didn't know his(the end of the story). That should be more than enough to weigh the playground in his favor.
Instead of explaining all this, Kim Dokja just shrugged. "He's smart, he knows it's best for him to not make an enemy out of us."
Or make an enemy of Yoo Joonghyuk, was went unsaid.
"One heck of a party," she murmured. Kim Dokja barked a laugh.