Chapter Text
No one who walks into a ghost story expects beauty. Ghost stories are dark and dangerous places. One would expect shadowed alleyways, endless darkened hallways, thick mist obscuring the broken and twisted things lurking beyond. Their pages of suffering written in bloody ink were often filled with grotesque amalgamations of limbs and sickly, deformed bodies of those who succumbed to the contamination. Ghost stories left ashen stains on those daring or desperate enough to run their fingers along the words.
Soleum expected this. Experienced this. From the bulging eyes of the first ghost story creature he laid eyes on to the rotting centipede sage he just unmade. Anything beautiful was simply hiding a monstrous truth beneath like the golden resort or the mermaid palace. Beauty in a ghost story was a weapon. It made contamination into something sweet and all the more terrifying for it.
Still, he couldn’t help but find a strange sense of peace as the world around him seemed to brighten. The air seemed to lighten and the sun’s light reached further. A knot of wrongness so deep inside, one he never realized had become a part of him, loosened and slipped away with the breeze brushing through his hair. Leaves rustled in the slight wind, shadows dancing along with it without hiding something terrifying beneath.
Kim Soleum brought his hands close to his chest, fingers twisting into the white robes, finding himself almost overwhelmed by the sudden lack of pressure. Almost like something inside finally clicked together. The deep, unending feeling of desperation and loss of control he could never shake from his shoulders. The hollow scraping and twisting that made ribbons of anxiety and fear spiral through his mind suffocating him. The aching pain of longing that hooked into his heart and pulled him open, raw and never ending. All of them melted away into something smaller, more manageable. He could finally breathe. Just breathe. The pounding in his head and the muffled static in his ears drained away into a strangely satisfying bone deep tiredness. Everything felt… new.
The sunlight felt like fingers gently tracing along his face. A soft kiss to his lips, a caress against his cheek. A warm, inviting touch he couldn’t remember the last time he felt. The sunlight glittering across the pool of ink on the ground framed by the powder blue sky was beautiful. The ripples in the pitch black sent cascades of shimmering golden lights across Soleum’s vision. It was reminiscent of watching a sunrise for the first time, golden light spilling across everything in sight.
Soleum took a moment to savor it.
Like this, the darkness didn’t seem so bad. The reality that Soleum was made of one was not quite so terrifying in this gentle sunshine. He opened his hands to look at his palms. He was simultaneously fascinated and repulsed by the black ink smeared his skin and across the fabric of his clothes. The remains of a ghost story he pulled apart at the seams. Or, well, the writing?
‘This would have been so convenient in other ghost stories,’ he thought of the Red Rabbit mascot and the queen tumor thing. He suppressed a shudder at the memories. The terror from those moments echoed in his mind. No matter what had changed, Soleum would always be afraid of the ghost stories. Fear was an ingrained part of his being. He couldn’t handle seeing the disasters with his own eyes. His heart would still race and he would still be paralyzed by dread. He just… didn’t seem to hate it here as much as before. It didn’t feel quite so wrong to be in this world. He could handle the ink clinging to his fingers.
Soleum took a deep breath and let his arms fall to his sides. It was fine. Everything was fine. He could freak out about everything later when he wasn’t in a disaster and moments away from his legs giving out beneath him. There were still things he had to do. There were people waiting for him. He still had to find ■■.
Behind Soleum most people were gone, scared away by the true origin of this disaster, or were limp against the ground like puppets with their strings cut. The disappearance of the centipede that revealed madness to them left them empty husks for the time being. Only a couple familiar faces remained standing. Agent Choi and Agent Bronze.
They stood together, eyes wide and faces pale. Choi’s grip on his cleaver was loose, the tip of the blade was just shy of dragging on the ground. He didn’t have the will to hold it up. The glass handgun in Jaekwan’s hand trembled. They were horrified by what they just witnessed, scared they were too late.
Neither ever considered the possibility of Soleum uncovering the true core of the disaster. Mostly because no one had ever succeeded before. That Soleum would be able to quell the disaster single-handedly while deeply contaminated wasn’t something they could have imagined. Yet it was their current reality. The agents had just watched Soleum, their precious junior, form so small compared to the centipede sage, raise his hand and simply wipe the fracture-sanctioned disaster from existence. It melted into black liquid that fell like rain to the ground. Gone. As if it were never there. Unprecedented didn't even begin to describe the situation.
They watched their junior turn around, fear and anticipation gripping them tightly. Jaekwan’s hand gripped his gun tighter and Choi held back a gasp. Sunlight fell against Soleum’s cheek, enhancing the soft gold of his eyes. The gold that shouldn’t be there. His hair shimmered with the same inky blackness as the remnants of the disaster. The agents could have pretended everything was normal or perhaps a trick of the light if not for the gentle curve of golden antlers from Soleum’s forehead. Agent Choi’s heart twisted as he watched the younger man take a few tentative steps towards them. Golden footprints followed him. He wished it was blood Soleum left in his wake. It would have been kinder. It would have been easier to fix.
The younger man, dark hair swaying in the slight breeze, stopped a few paces away in front of the two agents. His face held the usual pale and slightly troubled expression they were familiar with. His fingers were visibly trembling and the quick rise and fall of his chest betrayed a measure of exertion.
“Seniors…” his voice was soft, barely audible despite the power it held earlier. His eyes wavered, looking between the two bureau agents' faces. The dark circles under his eyes were more pronounced than usual. He looked utterly exhausted.
“I’m back. Just like I promised,” Jaekwan’s voice was thick, filled with grief. “I told you I’d save you. I came in accordance with the rules. Two agents. It seems I wasn’t quite fast enough. I’m sorry.”
Soleum opened his mouth before closing it, confusion flashing across his features. Jaekwan didn’t need to apologize for anything. He was fine. Honestly, he planned for his senior not to return at all. No one ever escaped this disaster once they won the raffle. Just returning was more than Soleum expected.
“You’re here aren't you? So you were fast enough,” Soleum said finally. Jaekwan’s expression pinched like he was in pain. Soleum immediately regretted saying anything.
“No, we weren’t. We were a little too late,” Jaekwan raised a hand, like he was going to touch Soulem’s face but clenched his fingers together and let his arm drop like he thought better of it.
“You were! I’m fine, see?” Soleum said, holding out his hands. He elected to ignore that his palms were still covered in ink. Jaekwan’s bottom lip quivered. Choi let out a strangled, high pitched noise and turned away slightly, hand over his mouth. His shoulders were shaking.
“I-I’m fine?” Soleum insisted weakly, like he was starting to question his own words. It didn’t make for a very convincing statement.
“No, Soleum. You’re contaminated. You’re not fine,” Jaekwan said slowly, voice broken.
“Contaminated?” Kim Soleum echoed. The agents looked upset. They looked angry. They looked sad. They looked like their entire world was collapsing. Like someone important was dying. Soleum didn’t know why.
It’s not like they were upset over him, right? He was just a spy, one who would die in a month unless he leaked information from the Disaster Management Bureau.
He needed to stop running away from feelings like this.
The whisper forced him to think of the way the agents pushed through the crowd, desperate to get to him. The terror on their faces, not of the disaster but of what would happen to him. How he realized they felt like safety in this world of terror, like family in a world where he was alone. How he ran toward them without hesitation.
An itch reminded him of the melted rooster statue he stepped in. He picked one bare foot off the ground a little. Gold still stuck to his skin, though it was drying and starting to flake off. The golden liquid that contaminated everything it touched and made people go insane. It dawned on Soleum that to the agents it looked like he was contaminated. They weren’t angry, they were halfway through the grief they just lost their newest team member to contamination. It’s not like they knew what he was. They couldn’t possibly know that he knew the truth that made people go insane the whole time so it didn’t affect him. In the same way, at least. He had to admit it had done something. Still, what could he say to explain that? Before he could have just brushed it off. But now, with what they had seen, he couldn’t keep everything hidden. Soleum bit his lip, thinking hard about what to say. How to explain everything.
“I’m not contaminated. I can see why you thought that, but I-” Soleum started
“Soleum!” Choi cut Soleum off, the use of his name in a disaster, even one that was beginning to dissipate, startled him.
“But I’m not! It’s hard to explain, but I’m fine really!”
“Just, just stop,” Choi begged. Tears were welling up in his eyes. His cleaver fell to the ground with a clang.
“No I-”
“Look at yourself!”
“I’m not!”
“Soleum, Please, this- you-”
“I’m not!!”
“Your eyes are gold! You have antlers!”
“No- Wait, what?” That stopped Soleum in his tracks. He wasn’t wearing his Daydream mask, was he? It was still in his storage, right?
“Antlers. On your head,” Jaekwan said, putting a hand on Choi’s arm, holding him back. Soleum was disturbed by how small Jaekwan’s voice sounded. Even when the man was quiet he was confident and direct.
With some hesitation Soleum lifted a hand to his head. He jolted when he was met by the solid curve of an antler. Confusion spread across his face. He ran his fingers up, finding a few points. Antlers. Roe Deer antlers. They were like his old Daydream mask, but smoother, lacking the wood grain. Maybe it was more similar to the security team member outfit he had? The antlers he had now had to be much smaller though.
Soleum brought his fingers down to the base, trying to figure out how they were even attached to his head. The antlers smoothly transitioned right into his skin. He could feel where they connected to his skull, they were part of his skull.
No.
This was a joke, right? It had to be. Panic raced through him, chilling him to the bone. This wasn’t what he wrote before, was it? He was dizzy, everything around him growing fuzzy and distant.
No.
He didn’t want to be confronted by this.
No.
No, not now.
He wanted to keep pretending a little longer. It wasn’t supposed to be so obvious.
No.
No, no, no, nonononononononononononononononononoṋ̵̹͗́̄ͅo̵͚̰͕̍̍n̸̩̓̈̏o̸̗̓̋͝ǹ̵͍o̶̗̙̩̐n̸̰̻̳̑͆̕o̷̙̭̹̽̀͠n̶̯̓ͅò̷̢̪͈̕ń̵̥̹̖̏͠o̴͕̠͚̔̿ņ̶̥̄̌̿̾o̶̲̻̖͑͂̽̓n̷̼̿̒̀̆̾̐̕ò̶͉̗̋̀͋͘͠n̵̫̗̟̘͌͌́ͅȏ̷͇͍̆͐̆͘n̴̨̖̈́̾ơ̴̱̥͚̥͂̐́̓
He could feel things inside starting to come apart inside again-
“Soleum. You didn’t know?” Jaekwan’s voice was soft and strained. The question knocked him out of the spiraling panic.
“No… but it’s- It’s not… I’m not,” Soleum whispered, letting his shaking hand fall.
“Soleum. It’s ok, breathe with me,” His voice was soothing. It gave Soleum something to focus on that wasn’t his insides. He tried to take a breath, choking on his own terror.
“I- I, I’m not, it’s not-”
“It will be ok,” Jaekwan repeated.
“No! It, this isn’t-”
“Soleum, it’s ok,” Jaekwan’s voice was firm.
“Talk to us, please?” Choi asked, leaning in from behind Jaekwan’s shoulder.
“It’s- I don’t know how!” Soleum yelled, admitting something he hadn’t meant to in the remnants of his panic. It must have surprised the agents.
“It’s ok if you don’t know. Just try,” Jaekwan said after a moment.
"Don't worry. We’ll help you figure it out. Your seniors are here after all! Everything will be alright,” Soleum looked up, straight into Choi’s eyes. He always feared what Choi would think. The agent knew more than Soleum wanted him to. About being a spy. He had almost died learning that a couple days ago and now he was here. Though it hadn’t happened, Soleum knew Choi would’ve put his life on the line again against the centipede. All to save him, the inhuman spy pretending to be a good younger team member. Even so, looking at Choi's face, Soleum could see the truth reflected in his eyes. His words were true, everything was going to be alright. The certainty was written in stark black ink.
“You really mean it.” Soleum whispered. It wasn’t so much a question as a statement of fact tinged with surprise.
“Of course. We will always be here for you,” Jaekwan said with no hesitation.
“You’re our precious junior, of course we’ll be here!” Choi put one hand on Jaekwan’s shoulder and tried his best to give Soleum a strong smile. The smile wavered, like it was taking every ounce of Choi’s strength to maintain.
Soleum didn’t have a solution. He was scared. Scared to admit what he was. Scared to be so directly confronted by it. Scared of the way it made his heart ache to see his seniors so distressed. Scared to explain himself. Scared of the uncertain future that lay ahead now. He didn’t know how to talk to Choi and Jaekwan about the layers of half truths and omissions. About how he saw them. About what could change now. About what had already changed like the antlers he apparently grew. He didn’t have time to plan what to say or how to say it, to hide as much as he could. Not that knowledge ever settled the ever present fear making its home in his chest. Choi said it would be ok though.
If only it was anyone else maybe it wouldn’t be so nerve wracking. It was so much harder to talk to people he cared about. The tangled web of emotions surrounding being honest with the people he loved wasn’t the same as facing a disaster head on. It was uncertain with no rules or tricks or correct. Jaekwan agreed that it would be ok.
Soleum wanted to cry. He had just unmade a monster that turned his blood to ice and made his heart race so fast he thought it’d burst and now he was being bested by his inability to talk to others honestly. He had to think this was just like walking up the shrine steps. They both said they would be here for him and he had to believe them. He had to.
‘Everything will be alright. Just… say it. Even if I stumble they… they’re always there to catch me.’
“I’m not contaminated. You can't contaminate something that-,” he swallowed, “Something that wasn’t human to begin with.”
“...”
Soleum looked at the ground to avoid seeing what faces his seniors made.
“...”
The silence stretched on for what seemed like hours.
“...”
Soleum spiraled, imagining what expressions his seniors were making. Were they upset? Disgusted? Furious? He wanted to fall into a hole. Honesty was overrated; he should have just said he was contaminated and found a way out of that hole instead. The suspense was scraping his nerves raw.
“…”
With his head down he couldn’t see the flurry of communication through expressions and gestures Choi and Jaekwan went through. Their silent argument ended with Jaekwan making an angry face and pointing threateningly at Choi whose shoulders drooped in defeat. The silent message was ‘you better not mess this up, idiot’.
“Soleum,” Choi started.
“Mm…” Soleum kept his mouth shut, but acknowledged the agent.
“The antlers… look very nice. The gold really suits you,” Soleum made a face at the words, what kind of weird compliment was that? Jaekwan sighed and put his face in his hands, despairing.
“They don’t… hurt? Do they?” Choi asked. He sounded a bit lost.
“No,”
“That’s… Good,” Jaekwan raised his head from his hands to look at the sky like the clouds would give him patience with Choi. Silence followed for a couple seconds. None of the men moved, awkwardly standing there in various stages of uncertainty and exasperation.
“Soleum,” Choi started again, voice soft and coaxing. Soleum tilted his head up just enough to see Choi’s face. He didn’t see rejection. Instead he saw worry. He didn’t know if that made him feel better. “I have one important question I need you to answer honestly, is that alright?”
“Mhm,” Soleum agreed.
“When you said you couldn’t contaminate something that wasn’t human to begin with, you were telling us that you’re not human, right?” Choi asked. Soleum’s heart plummeted. Why that question? Forget the centipede this was the real ghost story.
“Yes,” he admitted after a moment of silence. He sounded a bit strangled. Choi nodded, wrinkles forming between his eyebrows.
“Do… Do you want to talk about it?”
“I- I… Not here,” Soleum brought his shoulders up. He still shifted uncomfortably, stepping back and turning his head a little bit as if that would hide the antlers, the manifestation of his monstrous nature, from the agent’s eyes. Jaekwan had finally reached his limit and whacked Choi on the arm.
“Ack- Jaekwan-ie!” Soleum jumped a little in surprise at Choi’s cry of pain, but quickly relaxed at the familiar occurrence.
“You’re bad at this,” Jaekwan glared.
“Why would you hit- Ack- I’m sorry!!” Jaekwan smacked Choi again.
“Stop making it worse,” Jaekwan hissed.
“Alright, alright! Ugh, you’re so scary!” Choi whined. This dynamic is what made Soleum love them so much. It was something he would have never gotten to read about in <Dark Exploration Records>. This was special because it was real.
“You are the one scaring our Junior,” Jaekwan just kept glaring at the other agent.
“I’m not trying to!! Maybe I shouldn’t have gone to Seoraksan…” Choi pouted, kicking at the dirt.
“Seoraksan?” Soleum echoed, curiosity getting the better of him. Why had Choi been there?
“Hmm? Yeah, want to hear about it? Come over here,” Choi said, beckoning Soleum closer. Soleum nodded and thoughtlessly walked towards him at the request. He didn’t hesitate. Not even a little. It wasn’t like he was far away so a couple steps landed him looking directly up at Choi’s face. The man had a rather pleased expression. Jaekwan just huffed next to them.
Choi held a hand out towards Soleum. Soleum was about to take it when he hesitated seeing the remnants of ink still smeared across his fingers. Could the ink, the remnants of what made the villagers go insane with the truth of the world, on his fingers contaminate Choi? His hand stilled, lifted halfway, hovering just over Choi’s.
The agent didn’t move, waiting for Soleum. He just searched Soleum’s face, finding worry. Maybe not worry, a little closer to anxiety and fear mixed together. Choi couldn’t help but feel his heart break. He really should have figured out how to talk with his junior better. How to reassure him. For now he would just be patient and let Soleum decide.
Soleum stared at the hand offered to him. For the first time he actively dug into his mind, searching for an answer or a way to not hurt his senior. Wiki page after wiki page flashed through his head, even some pages he knew never existed in his old world. Contamination was an ink stain, but not in a physical sense. The implicit knowledge that without a purpose the ink from a Named Lord’s pen couldn’t stain anyone dripped into his mind. Without a story the ink wasn’t wet. Soleum wouldn’t be able to contaminate anything with his own ink unless he wanted to either. What a terrifying realization that he even could was.
With some measure of reassurance he wouldn’t cause anyone to lose their sanity by accident, Soleum set his hand in Agent Choi’s. Choi let out a satisfied hum, squeezing Soleum’s fingers a couple times before pulling him closer. Soleum let out a yelp as he lost his footing and fell straight onto Choi’s chest. The other man laughed, a bright tinkling like wind chimes, and wrapped his arms around the shorter man, careful of the sharp points of his antlers. He smelled like pine and spring water. Soleum let out a wheeze as Choi squeezed tightly.
“Choi-” Soleum was cut off by Choi squeezing harder. He only stopped when Jaekwan cleared his throat.
“Fine, killjoy,” Choi muttered, loosening his hold but not letting go. Soleum didn’t try to escape. Choi’s arms were a comforting weight around Soleum.
“I went to Seoraksan for some fresh air,” Choi said after a moment.
“If you hadn’t gone there we could have gotten here sooner. Seriously, why was that your destination on your day off?” Jaekwan sighed, leaning on Choi’s shoulder.
“I take one day off. One day! And our kid gets abducted! This is why I can't ever rest. I’ll never take time off again,” Choi rested his head back on Jaekwan’s.
“Sorry…” Soleum’s bottom lip quivered slightly, barely noticeable to anyone who didn’t know him well.
“It’s not your fault,” Jaekwan raised a hand to Soleum’s cheek, stopping just shy of touching him, letting his hand hover there, uncertain if he was welcome as well. Soleum blinked at the man who had been so kind to him. They had gone through so many disasters together. Throughout everything at the Bureau, and even before then. Jaekwan had been a pillar of calm and reliability. His presence eased Soleum’s fears. The corners of Soleum’s mouth rose as he brought his hand up to Jaekwan’s, pressing the other man’s palm against his cheek. Jaekwan’s touch radiated warmth like a rock left under the sunshine, warm and gentle.
Choi gazed at his companions, content, before his eyes lit up with mischief. Choi shoved Jaekwan off, hand wrapped in his coat to pull him back, scooping him up into the hug as well. The man let out a huff, but still settled his arms around Soleum and Choi. Soleum let himself relax into their hold, wrapping his own arms around them and going boneless. Serenity bubbled up in his chest, so overwhelmingly warm and bright that his breath hitched. To the agents sounded a little bit like he was trying not to cry. Maybe he was trying not to, being confronted with a love he never knew existed. They both chose to reach out even though they had no way of knowing if they would be contaminated. They cared about him, loved him even. They wanted him here. With them everything would be alright. Soleum let it sink in for a moment. Willing this to be written into the core of his being.
“You know what I wrote in the book right?” Choi asked, carefully resting his head on Soleum’s. Soleum remembered the pages of notes detailing the village’s disaster and all of Choi’s notes.
“Kim Soleum, don't dig up the village secrets by yourself, we’ll all do it together…”
“You remembered and you still didn’t listen! What a naughty junior~,” Choi lamented, making them all sway together.
“In my defense I didn't exactly mean to do more than stop the ritual. The centipede sage was an accident,” Soleum mumbled, heat rising to his cheeks.
“Only you would ever call that an accident,” Choi laughed, it was wet sounding. Soleum could see tears in Choi’s eyes despite his big smile. Jaekwan wasn’t in a much different state. For some strange reason that made Soleum feel a little better. Nothing had been resolved really, they still had things to figure out, but something unspoken and gentle hung in the air between them.
Soleum survived this disaster, even if he was different now. So had everyone else, even if things were different now. He felt… light.
“It’s alright, this is exactly how Black Tortoise Team 1 should be,” Choi said.
“I wouldn’t want it any different,” it felt like a secret confession coming from Jaekwan.
They stayed like that for a couple minutes. Just happy to be together.
It took that long for Soleum to work up the courage to ask a very important question. The question that would grant his wish. The question that would take him ■■.
“Choi, Jaekwan…” Soleum started, cheek pressed against Choi’s shoulder, arm around Jaekwan’s waist, “Can we go home? Please?”
The question hit Choi like a gut punch. The words lifted a heavy weight, the heaviest he had ever felt, from his chest.
“Yeah, let’s go home,” his voice was thick, choked, but he was smiling. A laugh bubbled up from his throat, full and bright. He tried not to let the tears that bloomed on his eyelashes fall. He didn’t succeed.