Chapter Text
The ground is trembling again.
Scenario #94 has turned the city into cracked asphalt veins and burning sky. Buildings collapse like tired lungs. Screams claw the air. The constellations are watching them. Yoo Joonghyuk is watching Kim Dokja.
He always watches, more than a gaze that always lingers.
Kim Dokja steps forward first.
“You’re not doing this again,” Yoo Joonghyuk says. His voice is low, dangerous.
Dokja’s coat is half-burned, torn at the hem, black dust covering one cheek. He smiles.
“Someone has to trigger the collapse,” Dokja says. “You know that.”
“Then I’ll do it.”
Dokja doesn’t even flinch. He walks past the rubble like he belongs in the ruins. “You’ve done it too many times.”
Yoo Joonghyuk’s hand tightens around his blade.
“Get out of the way.”
Kim Dokja turns to face him. The glow from the collapsing scenario flickers in his eyes. He’s not mocking him. Not this time.
“Why must it be you?” Yoo Joonghyuk’s voice cracks, quiet and raw.
Dokja’s shoulders drop. And for once, he answers without a riddle.
“Because it has always been you.”
Joonghyuk stares.
“Always you.”
He’s still walking.
“So let it be me. In this regression. Let it be me.”
Joonghyuk moves. He doesn’t remember deciding to — just that suddenly he’s in front of Dokja, grabbing his wrist, dragging him back like the gravity of this world can be undone by sheer force of will.
“You’re an idiot,” he says.
Dokja smiles again. Softer but more resolute.
“I learned from the best.”
The light behind them pulses. Time is almost out.
Yoo Joonghyuk wants to scream. To kill. To throw the scenario itself into the void. But Dokja’s hand slips free, and he’s already turning.
Already stepping into the circle.
And then the world explodes.
When he wakes, everything is quiet.
Yoo Joonghyuk breathes ash.
There is blood on his hands.
But not Dokja’s body.
Not this time.
Only a voice, barely lingering in the smoke.
“Because it has always been you.”
And Yoo Joonghyuk, the regressor, with all the title he’s earned, the man who survived everything except him, sinks to his knees.
And curses the idiot who refuses to learn.