Work Text:
The Reader’s Point of View
Ordinary.
That was what he was.
Average physique, average athletic skills, average social skills and an “average” face.
The only thing that wasn’t average for him was his intellect.
But, in the current era that their world held today, only having a brilliant mind isn’t enough to change the way their lives went.
He was named as Kim Dokja by his father in hopes of him (KDJ) becoming a great person. That said, this hope was made into null. After all, at the age of twenty-eight, Kim Dokja knew that he was doomed to be a nobody for the rest of his life.
Beginning from his childhood, as much as there was enough drama that happened to his life due to the crimes of his mother, he was easily overlooked. Staying in his hometown, he was always dubbed as the child of a criminal and his advanced mind was feared for the so-called threat that it was for being capable of potentially planning heinous crimes. They actually thought of him as a possible psychopath. How scoff worthy the idea is.
Overlooked or gossiped about and sometimes even abused by the adults while his peers and the other children always bullied him made him understand that his role was forever to be no more than what was assumed of him. That he was nothing more but a pathetic type of human. He was about willing to give up.
He was about to willingly end his own worthless existence.
But then, he found it.
He found that novel.
Three Ways to Survive in a Ruined World by tls123
That novel made him think that living wasn’t that bad.
He read about the protagonist named Yoo Jonghyuk and what kind of things he had to undergo to survive in the aforementioned ruined world.
Seeing the hero’s struggles, he found himself gaining courage to leave the terrible hometown that he had and move somewhere else. That said, things may have improved a bit in the environment. But that couldn’t change everything.
He was still ostracized and bullied.
Nevertheless, it was still better than what he experienced and so he trudged on. His lifeline during his high school days was Yoo Jonghyuk and his experiences. Clinging little else but to the novel that gave him hope, he had his life revolve around it.
As a teen, even with the bullying, as long as he had his phone and thought about him every single ache and pain that he suffered wouldn’t matter. To be exact, even when Kim Dokja visited his mother, the only thing that came out of his mouth was about the novel and Yoo Jonghyuk. The problem he had with her would matter little and he could have the strength in facing her while visiting her in jail.
Then, finishing high school he went into college. The somewhat normality that he gained there continued on with the presence of the novel. From the end of childhood up to the cusp of adulthood, spanning up to more than ten years of his life up to the present, the novel and Yoo Jonghyuk became his sole companion.
His lifeline and reason of existence.
Which was why, when the paid service notification came and the idea of the novel ending somewhat saddened him. Kim Dokja, at such a point, actually felt at loss at what should he do next now that the novel was coming to a close and that Yoo Jonghyuk was close to his goal.
As the days of the novel ending came closer, the usually quiet and “normal” reader got more listless. His composure and mask of normalcy began to slowly crack. Which was why, knowing that his performance all the more became something easy to overlook and disappointing. Hence, once the announcement about his contract in the company was ending and wasn’t to be renewed, he was hardly bothered at all.
Instead, he was still preoccupied at the novel’s ending.
It was ending soon and he was about to lose his connection with him.
Yoo Jonghyuk.
His lifeline.
Forcing himself to calm down and try to keep things together, Kim Dokja tried to go on with his mundane and useless life. Going to work early in the morning, doing his duties and going home so late at night. Going over it in a boring cycle of rinse and repeat.
That was until, the day came where the last chapter of the novel was about to come.
It was early in the morning and the time he was in the subway station heading to work when incidents began to happen. An alarm blared out and mysterious creatures appeared all of a sudden, his conversation with Yoo Sangah forgotten as the “thing” in front of them spoke of instructions.
A dokkaebi.
The thing in front of them was a dokkaebi and what was happening to them currently was part of what was called as a scenario.
Realizing these things, as absurd as it was, a part of Kim Dokja found himself ecstatic and overjoyed to find out that his beloved novel was real. That said, the rational part of him also found the situation troublesome since he knew what the scenarios entailed and how messed up their world would be if the novel became the truth of their lives.
Nonetheless, as much as his emotions and rationality still had a hard time grasping over control, he understood that what was currently important was his very own survival. For that reason, using his knowledge he immediately started planning and had his schemes come true.
At the first scenario, he killed Kim Namwoon and took Lee Hyunsung as his companion along with two others. Yoo Sangah and an eight-year-old child named Lee Gilyoung.
Following which, he met him.
Tall, fair skinned and undeniably handsome which was enshrouded by a cold and hard to reach aura. Yoo Jonghyuk’s appearance far exceeded his imagination and expectations. No wonder the author always used the protagonist as a standard of male beauty.
He was breathtakingly handsome. Far exceeding even any of the male models/celebrities that Kim Dokja has ever seen.
Yet, there was an unmistakable killing intent coming from the handsome man that made him wary.
At an unimaginable speed for a human, the man clothed purely in black took his neck in a choke hold and interrogated him.
This person questioned him on who he was and how did he ever survive in such a scenario. Taking into consideration that he had the Sage Eyes and Lie Detection skill, Kim Dokja knew that he (KDJ) shouldn’t lie and should just let him assume how things are.
So, he did so. Which in his expectations, that bastard threw him off the bridge with an annoying smile as if to test him and his credibility as a prophet.
Then, the next time which they met, the bloody bastard acted too blasé towards him. As if, the swordsman didn’t just throw him of a bridge. Feeling somewhat irritated, he tried provoking the regressor but instead the other ignored him and chose to irk him whenever he pleased.
Next to that, during the green tile/survival scenario the jerk even refused to look for another place resulting Kim Dokja to use the method becoming a ghost. While, during the disaster of questions scenario the damn hero continuously questioned whether he could even deal with the disaster.
While just after the Absolute Throne scenario, the other even had the gall to be angry at him for being defeated and destroying the other world’s relic. As to when Yoo Jonghyuk was poisoned, he didn’t even say thanks and refused to not let the reader go without a hit after the 5th scenario.
Hell, there were even more scenarios and meetings of the protagonist exasperating him than anything.
Again, and again, the resulting annoyance that he felt from the regressor’s actions somewhat overshadowed the awe and longing that he had in his heart.
The longing to be close to him.
Shaking his own head and shoving that feeling far behind everything else, Kim Dokja did the scenarios as best as he could and hid most of his emotions to everyone around him. That was why, it may have looked like to outsiders that he was in control of his emotions and he was powerful enough alone.
But what the people didn’t know was that the reader wasn’t really that emotionally in control to begin with. They didn’t know that one of Kim Dokja’s biggest struggles is stopping himself from reaching out towards Yoo Jonghyuk and holding onto him.
He was in a sense pathetic.
Kim Dokja always knew he was.
But he didn’t want Yoo Jonghyuk and the others around him to look down on him due to such. So, he hid everything. Most of his worries, insecurities and longing. Hiding behind a wall and using a façade to act like he was okay. That he was always okay.
So, when Yoo Sangah began showing interest, he played along and forced himself to think that he was normal. That the person he was looking at was her and not him.
He (YJH) would have hated him (KDJ) if he found out. After all, for the 1 863 times that Yoo Jonghyuk lived his life, he always like women. Never did he take any interest in men.
Which was why, as much as he wanted to reach out to him, he refrained and did his best to only act when necessary.
He stopped himself from showing more of what he felt since he didn’t want to be hated. Particularly not by Yoo Jonghyuk.
Yet, when situations where he was forced to be close to him happened, Kim Dokja couldn’t stop his heart from beating loudly. To be exact, this annoying loud beating of his heart was what worried the usually silent twenty-eight-year-old that he would be found out.
He was just usually a reader. A bystander that watched from the sidelines and supported the characters that he liked behind the scenes.
Hence, when situations came that he was forced to directly interact and support Yoo Jonghyuk, the usually composed reader would end up affected for different reasons.
At the very beginning, he was just in awe of him.
That during the time he first interacted with the regressor. He became too preoccupied staring at him that he easily ended up following the protagonist’s whims that resulted him being thrown off the damn bridge.
During the third scenario where the black clothed swordsman had helped him with Gong Pildu and didn’t deny being his friend the reader felt elated.
Then, just after the theater dungeon where Lee Jihye told him that she heard their complicated relationship and that she supported them, confusingly that’s where the joy and heart thumping began.
It was where the longing for acknowledgement changed to longing for acceptance and affection for the man.
It was where his reaching out hand wanted more than just touching and affirming that his dear protagonist existed. His reaching out hand ended up yearning to hold the suffering man’s hand and give the other warmth.
It was the point that he wanted to give back to the regressor and be the lifeline that Yoo Jonghyuk was to him in his old life.
With each scenario that happened and forced him to be the one to help the serious hero along with Lee Jihye and Uriel’s misgivings about them, it gave him some kind of twisted hope and made his feelings for the other more complicated.
Was he falling in love with him?
It couldn’t be, right?
Yoo jonghyuk would only hate him further and easily discard him for having such repulsive feelings.
Aside from being hated by him. It seems that there was something else that Kim Dokja realized that he feared the most. It was that the person he adored would discard him.
That he would just leave him behind.
Shaken by such thoughts, he then continued his farce of feelings for Yoo Sangah and only prayed that at the end she would forgive him.
After all, he can’t let Yoo Jonghyuk to hate and discard him just like that.
He still had a long way to go before he became a constellation and be of use to the regressor from a far.
He still had a long way to go before he could be a great help to his friends/team with him not by their side.
Hopefully, even at the very end and epilogue of the scenarios and the world, Yoo Jonghyuk may never find out that he has feelings for him. Hopefully, he would never know how much it somewhat made Kim Dokja happy how Uriel, Han Sooyung and Lee Jihye referred to him as the regressor’s wife.
Hopefully, Yoo Jonghyuk would just even consider him his equal.
That was enough for him. With that, as a reader, Kim Dokja knew that he could end his own existence happily.
