Healing Castle | TXT Fantasy Novel ft. BTS

4 - Taehyun

Taehyun wakes up at 4 am in a happy daze. He's always happy these days. Each twenty-four hours, he finds at least twenty reasons to smile. And he bursts into laughter at least a dozen times, thanks to the other members.

Wow. After all those endless days and nights as a trainee, he can't believe the payoff. He's always been the wise one of the group, trying to talk sense into everyone when dismay almost overcame them. But sometimes he thought he was sinking too. With the support of MOA, it feels like he'll never sink again.

He's always the first to wake up. Even when an alarm goes off, he's the one to extricate himself from bed and head toward the clock to shut it off. By that time, at least one of the other boys is awake. But even then, he feels as though he's a bird of the morning.

"Guys?" he says. Soobin and Huening Kai are still snoring. The latter is drowning in a sea of plushies—everything from dolphins to penguins to otters.

Taehyun rolls his eyes and heads outside.

Vacation. The concept feels foreign to him, after such a long time on the road. He'll finally have some time to rest, enjoying free time that has nothing to do with nursing an injured leg or drinking honey tea for his vocal chords.

He grabs his laptop and heads outside. As expected, no one is here. He takes a second to admire all the gifts from their fan meetings—custom cup sleeves, a pillow with their faces printed on it, bags of candy, and even a teddy bear with a custom crocheted sweater.

Taehyun sits on the floor, leaning his back against the couch. He places his laptop on the living room table.

Two nights ago, Soobin muttered "MapleStory" in his sleep.

So Taehyun has to find what's up. He is the first to know and the last to give up a secret, so if the boys are playing MapleStory without him, he's going to log on and give it all that he has. He'll have a level 200 character and train that thing when everyone least suspects it.

MapleStory is possibly the greatest game ever created. MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role-playing games) allowed Taehyun's imagination to run wild. He could explore a virtual world, relieve his stress by battling enemies, and dress up like the pop star he always wanted to be.

Best of all, he could live out his dream of being a wizard. The game has a variety of classes, or jobs, that a player could choose from. Each class had a set of unique abilities and fighting styles. It was kind of complicated at first, but Taehyun grasped the concept easily as a child.

MapleStory has anime-style graphics, and the 2D style always appealed to him. He liked games like that—the ones that weren't too fancy. He feels like an old man when he sees Yeonjun playing Overwatch, all the complex movement making him dizzy.

Anyway, the point is that the game is a classic, both in Korea and around the world. He wonders why he didn't get back into it sooner. Oh, that's right. He was so busy he could barely find time to breathe.

It's been years since he's played—at least four. At that time, he barely entered high school. The school work along with his commitment to the singing club didn't allow too much free time, so he chose to focus on getting straight As instead. Sometimes, he regrets that decision. Playing the game allowed him the most fun of his life. He loved the feeling of destroying monsters with the push of a button, feeding his own pet porcupine, traveling the world of technicolor and fantasy—villages to snow-covered lands to brightened cities.

In middle school, he was one of the best in Scania, the most populated server. He could've reached well past level 200 if he continued playing.

After the download completes, Taehyun decides to make a new account. He uses his name mixed with TXT, borrowing one of Huening Kai's lyrics as the password. He tilts his head back and breathes a sigh of relief when the music comes on. The opening song is a mix of soothing piano and woodwind instruments. The nostalgia hits him in waves of melody and synth, and he feels almost as happy as when he's in the middle of performing "CROWN."

He chooses to start an Explorer, one of the only worthwhile classes. He'll be able to become a wizard again. However, he hasn't quite decided on what kind of wizard to become yet.

As soon as he hits create, he's expecting the screen to shift to the open world for beginning players.

Boom! The room is filled with a sound louder and more encompassing than thunder.

Taehyun flinches and jumps up to his feet. His knees bang against the table in the process, and the pain causes him to release a scream that surely wakes up the entire band.

After the boom, the room is covered in shade. Misty tendrils camouflage the Christmas lights. The holiday atmosphere gets replaced with a cemetery during the storm. This is kind of what hell looks like, right?

Shaking, panicking, he jumps around like a lost squirrel. Everything feels too real to be a dream. He's not imagining the chill painting his skin, or his breath coming out shaky, or how even his bones are trembling inside him.

The morning light is completely gone by now. The ceiling and walls are blanketed in darkness. Taehyun looks around and finds no evidence of their body guard, Peter. The members are nowhere to be found.

A voice like a thousand angels calls him by name.

Taehyun?

It takes everything within him not to faint on the spot. 

A/N: hope you guys are enjoying this story so far!