Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

[Son of the Absolute Throne]

Ju-hee didn't think the name was very creative at first. She had spent her second to third year reading this and then completely forgot about it as if it never existed, like how one just scrolls by to binge an anime whose names of the characters they will completely forget about the next week.

For that reason, only a few scenes stuck in her mind.

Two of which were vividly clear like the day she entered the Double Dungeon.

The first one was the protagonist dying at the hands of the system, becoming a puppet to the second heart, realizing how he had lost all of his emotions as the corpses of his friends and family laid all around him.

The second one was the protagonist really, well, probably dying at the hands of that thing. Which was the final ending. An ending she could never understand.

There were a lot of issues that had been left unsolved even from the first chapter, and the fact that it ended with the death of someone she had only heard about once in all five hundred chapters really made her tongue sour.

Her blue eyes looked at the 3D hologram in front of her, with a different system than the one Jinwoo had.

It was a book, a floating book which looked more like an encyclopedia by the amount of pages stacked inside. It had an old red paste with no name or picture on its cover as if the one who picked it up would have known what was inside of it immediately.

“Open.” Ju-hee said as she got up from her bed, whipping off her tears with the medical gown and walking over to the counters on the front as she carried the IV drip.

It was only one in the morning, but if she went back to bed she would have to meet the nightmares of the Double Dungeon. Instead, it was better to look at the rest of the book while she ate some early breakfast.

Due to the instance of the double dungeon, all of the survivors had been given a special room in the hospital.

The medical bed, the khaki colored cushion, a study table, a smaller stand table where she had charged her phone, to the other side of the room were two chairs for visitors, another far bigger rectangular dinner table with four less comfortable chairs to sit in. The wardrobe was on the corner, and to its right a kitchen counter where Ju-hee stood grabbing the few snacks that were given to her.

The book finally revealed the first page.

"Shop"

The pages flipped and now it started to look like a magazine. With its pretty colored fonts, the pictures on each page, different discounts and popular items as of now. Even the cover had changed.

"Search Bar."

The tiny 3D loupe appeared above the magazine.

"Epilogue."

The pages turned again, her eyes were met with a blank page containing the words she had said along with the rest.

Ju-hee opened the lid of the water bottle, sitting back to the table as she read each description of the items. The first one being the most unusual request out of the four.

"Heart of the Monarch."

The heart of a Monarch represented its whole being, all of its mana was inside of it, all of its powers grew from it. The heart was like a seed and the user it's soil, if it was bad, the seed will never grow. Pour it too much mana and the ground will be washed away piece by piece. Too much pain for the user like the heat of the sun and anything that grows will die in seconds. So too happens in reverse.

Ju-hee needed to get the heart of a Monarch now, something so delicate yet horribly overpowered, even Baran's heart, if given a proper soil, could grow a thousand times more than it used to be. Even so, how strong or weak a Monarch's heart was did seem to matter for the requirements, which was certainly an unusual request.

Just any Monarch's heart?

Then again, each heart had the same roots to its creator. But that was all she could think about in terms of similarities.

"Close."

It did, but a paper letter floating in mid air didn't wish to disappear just yet. Not so long ago, it used to look like any notification on a phone.

The paper stuck beside her peripheral vision, and if she took a peek at it, it would come closer to the center, as if it was asking for her attention.

"The Fates." Out of all members in the first place. Was she blessed or was she cursed by the beings? Either way Ju-hee wasn't fit for such a job.

But is there anything else which I could do...
After being a member, there really wasn't any other option though.

She looked back at her phone, still in hand, the screen right on the first page of the book.

It will be better to read it again I guess... So she did, carefully reading the prologue first, examining every part of it like a literature teacher, and clicking on the second chapter after 4 hours spent trying to memorize every word on it.

[Error, the requested url does not exist on this server]

"KGAH-" Suddenly a wave of pain washed before her as if someone had cracked her skull open. The ten worse seconds of her life calmed down once it felt as if hours had passed by. With her lungs out of breath, her mind in pure exhaustion, after ten minutes when she could feel as though the pain had subsided, she grabbed onto the IV drip, and took her trembling feet one by one to the restroom.

As she looked at the window, her mind recalled the pages of the second chapter word by word, then the third, then the fourth, then the last.

On the counter the phone rang.
9 in the morning.

Ju-hee shifted her eyes from the holographic book and out into the window to see the clear blue sky again, the misty clouds disappeared by now. Closing the book, she tried to stand up again, this time heading somewhere outside of the room and to the hallway where she would be directed to the cafeteria.

The small whispers caught her ears after she ordered the food.

"There, it's one of the survivors from the Double Dungeon." Ju-hee listened to the conversation even without wanting to know about it.
"Poor woman."
"Should we ask her?"
"As if she'll never answer us!" She won't, at least that's what she made up in her mind.

"Come on, she might even know your oppa." Ju-hee's eyes widened for a bit as she turned around to the startled girls.
They were highschoolers, one of them wearing a simple hoodie to hide the black short hair, the other with a lighter tone of hair tied up in a ponytail and the same gray eyes that she had seen before.

"Jin-ah." The girl whose name had been spoken turned around, it was the ladder.

"Yes?.."

"Ah, so that is what happened." Jin-ah said, while Ju-hee avoided most of the details about the Double Dungeon.

"So, will he wake up soon?"
Ju-hee nodded, it was the third day after all, and the system was finally being placed. The sister however was still not pleased with the simple answer. So Ju-hee tried to offer a bit of reassurance instead.

"Your brother is strong Jin-ah, he wouldn't dare to leave you behind." The hundreds of times he endured the pain for his family, whether it be as E Rank or S rank hunter, were proof enough of his love for his family.

"Th-thank you, but I'm still worried…" The sister's voice cracked in the sound. "He's an E rank, the weakest out of everyone, he always gets injured on every raid, and when I look at him every time he comes home…" A few tears slipped by Jin-ah's cheeks, her friend quickly going to her aid as she hugged her.

"I'm sorry," This wasn't the first time the authorities had called her to the hospital and said her brother might not make it out alive. She must have been worried to the bone, yet even in the very first time Ju-hee read about her, she was always holding herself, remaining strong despite how many members in her family she had lost.

"That's alright." Ju-hee said, holding the girl's hand with both of her own, she tried to get the words out of her without being questioned as to why she was so sure about it, in the end she simply smiled.
"Trust him, alright?" Jin-ah looked at her, the tears in her eyes stopping for a while.

"I… I will."

The first four days after his awakening passed without much trouble. The Korean Hunter's Association Surveillance team had come and gone, then so did his sister to which she nagged him about being injured again, a completely different reaction to the one in the cafeteria. After the first day ended, Jin-woo had "surprisingly" not followed the rules of the system and was completely exhausted to the point he almost missed another day, if it wasn't for the check up she did around the afternoon.

"Ah." The cold water bottle grazed his sweaty skin, gray tired eyes looking up front to see Ju-hee.

"How's the training?" She said before sitting down next to him, noticing his eyes looking at the front and then at her.

"I've still got 3 more kilometers to run." He said, grabbing the water bottle of her hands. "Thank you."
"No worries." She responded before Jin-woo ran away to finish up the rest of his workout.

Stats, skill, items, inventory, stashes, so on and so on. Those would be the things he sees as he gets to learn more about the system.

No one else but him, not even Ju-hee could see. Which bugged her for the most part considering she was now one of The Fates.

"You're back." Ju-hee looked next to her as he carried the bottle with him in one hand, and in the other a green key with not much of a design in it.

So it's today.

Chapter Text

Would you like to hear a story? It's about a world, just like ours, full of magic and fairy tales,  nightmarish ones that come to life. What we fear the most: Monsters the size of houses and skyscrapers, beasts from the unknown. Strength far greater than mountains, intelligent as us and just as savage too.

They live in the snow, they live in the wild forests or endless deserts. They live close to the waters and far away in the mountains. 

They live everywhere, and they are here. 

To find you.

Ju-hee tickled her little cousin as they played in his small room. The boy giggling from ear to ear and the joys of his laugh filling up the room. Finally having some mercy upon seeing the boy’s tears, Ju-hee stopped her games and let the boy breathe. 

Meet you.

“You should get going now.” Ju-hee looks at the clock on the bed. “It's time for you to go now.” The boy stands up as he smiles widely and grabs the fishes nearby. His eyes slowly dimmed as time went on. Giggles could still be heard from the back of Ju-hee’s head

Hear you.

Ju-hee gasps as she finds herself in a black room. no, it's the same room. How much time has passed? her things are in a backpack, her grandmother’s too. She is holding on to her cousin’s shirt, folding it. Tears seem to fall on it. She sobs and wails again. The pain of a memory coming back from the depths of her brain.

See you.

Ju-hee sprints to the door, walks through the forest as the grass keeps getting long and a wave of mana emits everywhere. 

Eat you.

She runs, the deep breaths pass, something from her back pushes her down, gravity increases but the road is still endless. No matter how much she runs, she can't find the ground, civilization, nothing, nothing, nothing. 

Goodbye.

The weight on her back finally breaks her. The girl falls. 

“...well?”

Ju-hee almost drops her spoon as she hears Jin-woo call out to her from the other side of the table. His tiny smile and worried eyes made Ju-hee realize that her food had gotten cold. So far she had only eaten a piece of her vegetables and the rest still lingered there, not even grazed. Ju-hee turned to look back at him. “Did you say something?”

“Did you sleep well?” 

“Oh. yeah.” 

Before the food got colder, Ju-hee picked up the chopsticks and went to eat as much as she could. Even when the food felt distasteful, even when her stomach and tongue turned it away and her throat was full. Ju-hee turned to grab a cup of water and saw the young man look at her direction for a second with wide eyes before focusing on his own food. 

“What about you?”

“Hu?”

She drank the whole cup. “Did you sleep well?”

“I think.”

Ju-hee took a better look at him, his eyebags and the fatigue from running today still present. Both of them seemed to be lost in their own minds. It's obvious by Jin-woo's eyes going back and forth between his pockets, when he thought she wasn't looking, that he was planning on going to the dungeon right after he finished his meal.

"Hunter Su–" Jin-woo almost dropped his rice bowl. "Sung Jin-woo." Ju-hee stood back as she watched him put down the bowl with trembling fingers and ask if something was wrong. He tried to put up that smile again, tiny and crooked, almost as if to show a bit of teeth. A year ago she hadn't really thought much about his awkward smiles and small nervous chuckles he often made. It bothered her, it confused her, other times she tended to laugh along. 

But this was one way to cope through almost brutally dying over and over again. So Ju-hee guessed, right now, this was the same. Hide the fact that you are trembling all over, hide the idea that you are thinking of going into that dungeon, hide the exhaustion in your eyes and think that no one will notice as you slowly shrink into the background.

It works, it worked throughout the entire story. It worked on his mother and sister, his father, his wife, his…

"Are you going out today?" 

It doesn't work on her. 

Jin-woo tilts his head. "No." And has the audacity to lie. 

"I see. I was going to ask you if you wanted to visit something today. An ice cream parlor right across the street."

This brings his messy head back to focus. "Ah, can it be another day? I'm kind of tired…."

"Yeah, what day will you be free?" 

"Two… maybe three days from now." 

"Okay."

"Alright." 

The conversation is as state as the other two that they've had ever since Jin-woo woke up. None of them wanted to bring up dungeons, hunters, the incident, maybe anything relaxing to the outside world. Neither did they wish to talk about their personal life, no matter what they just went through together. However, that was all they knew from each other. Even if they met every single day, or those days where Jin-woo wasn't in the hospital, it was almost pitiful, funny, just how little they knew about one another.

It's funny that even now, Ju-hee still feels as though he doesn't know where Jin-woo's thoughts could go. 

So most of the conversations were quiet small talks. How have they been? When will they be discharged? Have you seen the others? Are they doing well? Have you eaten today? Ju-hee mostly started those talks whenever Jin-woo was running off in the park. And although he looked annoyed at the chatting that never seemed to go anywhere, he didn't pull back from the talk. Good, Ju-hee would keep being annoying as repayment for healing him all this time… and maybe, just to also think about other things that aren't the monsters from real life. 

"I think I'll go now." 

"Have a good day." 

"You too Hunter Sung, don't forget to drink some water. Your lips are dry." He touched them without thinking. It wasn't all that dry, but he would need a bottle to whoever he was going. 

On the other hand, Ju-hee went back to her room and grabbed the new phone that the Association had gifted. The light flashed, the book appeared again, as she pointlessly scrolled through the phone, her eyes stuck to the book. 

Open. 

[Son of the Absolute Throne]

Rebirth Arc.

[Directing to the Rebirth Arc]

The pages flowed as soon as the book was opened. A brilliant glow appeared on the fixated page as letters emerged painted in ink. 

[Objective: As a member of the Fates, you must properly guard the sanctity of {Sung Jin-woo} until the next arc.]

[Reward: Unknown.]

The rest of the pages were blank, Ju-hee turned the whole book upside down and yet those were the only things shown. Apart from the Foreword and the Table of Contents, nothing else was new. However, a lack of information can also be a reward on its own. 

For starters, it called out the fact that she was a member of the Fates, meaning that she had some sort of special privilege by her side. As one of them, she must do her job properly. This itself could mean that, as long as Jin-woo’s sanctity was present, she could possibly exploit some loopholes here and there, change the story to her liking and with the almost omniscient-like knowledge on her, maybe create a new world capable of taking on the next arcs. 

Secondly, sanctity. 

Ju-hee kept her eyes over those hovering letters, lips growing downward as her mind wandered, not noticing the phone had already been turned off a long time ago. 

Sanctity as in being pure and hopeful? Naive? or do they mean she will have to stop him from killing others? Maybe this could mean that she will have to keep him holy, but has he ever been like that in the first place? She went on to look further.

Sanctity is the same as the state of something not being tainted. A holy place or being. It could certainly be talking about him being a vessel to the Shadow Monarch, his body is quite a ‘holy place’ in that regard then.  

Ju-hee took her hospital gowns off, choosing a more casual look for going out today. The Association never really bothered to tell her when she could be discharged, and even though she worked for the association, her high B rank status is something well respected so no one would try to kick her out so soon. Despite this, she didn't try to overstay her welcome in this place. A lot of new problems would be boiling right away so it was better to start out early.

First and foremost:

“Mister Woo Jin-chul from the Korean Hunters’ Association? My name is Lee Ju-hee from - The recent D-ouble…Dungeon–” 

She will call for reinforcements, all the help she can get from the most loyal man and powerful A rank that she has known from the story a long time ago. The only one to hear out the protagonist's burden since he was a mere E rank hunter, the only person that can and will keep an eye on him if anything were to happen that she or Jin-woo couldn't control. And the man that owes her a debt ever since she became a hunter.

Ju-hee took a deep breath and continued. 

“I have recovered new memories from that time that are very crucial for you to know.”