"Rise and shine!"

Wonwoo was mercilessly smacked in the face by a pillow. He let out a dismayed grumble, only clutching and pulling his blanket over him. "Oh, you think he's just like Jihoon?" Soonyoung suggested, a playful tone hinted in his voice.

Wonwoo perked his head up in caution. "Well, he slept through everyone waking up," Mingyu noted, tossing the pillow aside onto his own bed. "Let's lift him up!" He heard Seokmin suggest at the end of his bed. He felt weight being lifted off from the mattress, presumably the three preparing to drag him off the bed. Wonwoo pried his eyes open, kicked his blanket off and threw his feet over, "I'm awake." He slipped into his flip flops, standing up and idly walked as Mingyu pushed him out of the shack.

Sunlight hit his face, and in a distance he could smell something toasting out in the open air. He could vaguely hear wake up calls in the other shacks where the rest slept. Marching into the kitchen, he sat himself down and stared down on his empty white plate.

Seokmin ruffled Chan's hair, who had also been sleepily sitting still on the same table, "Good morning!" Chan didn't bother greeting back and instead went straight into a conversation, "I had the weirdest dream last night." Seokmin sat next to him, only half interested with what the younger had to say, "Yeah? What was it about?" Chan only grumbled, "I don't remember too much anymore, but I just remember that I was following somebody while we were in a building."

"Wow, so weird," Seokmin sarcastically commented. Chan could only lazily protest, "Seungkwan was so noisy, I tried remembering as much as I could but he kept talking!" 

The conversation prompted Wonwoo to remember his own dream last night. He was running, and though he had no context, he felt a stir of multiple emotions through the experience. To say the least, it was odd. He heard nothing and saw nothing. The whole time he dreamt, he could only feel what was happening. He was definitely sure he was running, but he knew nothing else.

There were some jars of spread placed on the tables and bags of sliced bread lying around. "Oh? It's just bread for breakfast today?" Soonyoung saw what was set in front of him, slightly disappointed over the menu. Seungcheol turned around from the stove, "Hey, we need to finish the bread before they go bad. We shouldn't let them go to waste." He turned back around, pressing down on his own toast with a spatula. Wonwoo got a slice out and opted for the hazelnut spread. He paused momentarily, realizing that he didn't know what he was allergic to. It then took another moment for him to realize that he didn't care.

He proceeded to slab on the hazelnut spread on the white bread with the back of a spoon, sloppily going up to the edges and corners of the bread. Wonwoo absentmindedly started eating, though he made sure to greet everyone who came in.

The whole time eating breakfast, he held on to that dream, scared that it would slip away from his mind just like what had happened with Chan. He at least wanted to write it down somewhere he could refer back to if needed. He didn't know why, but it felt important that he did it anyway.

The morning wasn't as rowdy, quite understandably so as he felt the hazy atmosphere the morning had. They could all feel that it was quite cool outside despite the sun peeping above the horizon.

Wonwoo was the first to leave, heading back to his shack to change out of his pyjamas and into something much more suitable for the outdoors. He brought his towel to the river, and wrapped within it were his toothbrush and toothpaste. He freshened himself up, careful not to spill the water onto his clothes. Feeling the coolness of the water made him think how lucky it must've been to have water heated.

He didn't spend too much time and dropped off his things in the bedroom. Wonwoo walked across the open space again and went into the leisure storage room. His eyes scanned the shelves. Beside the game boards was a pile of notebooks stacked up. He took a the brown soft cover notebook located in the middle of the pile, skimming through the pages to confirm it was unused.

Seeing no problem, he picked off a mechanical pencil from a pencil holding cup and went outside. Wonwoo climbed up the stony steps on the elevating hill, going further away from the others. There were several other shacks structured like the bedrooms, though it seems that the others let the vines grow onto the walls due to the lack of occupancy. He picked a small one and swung the door open. The door heavily creaked as it opened and closed. The space was small compared to the shacks on the lower level, this one had area large enough to be a bedroom for two people. 

Wonwoo sat down on the tiled floor against the wall opposite to the door. Flipping to the first page and clicking the pencil's lead down, simply writing down a 'dream' as a title. Under it, he began jotting his notes. 

I kept running.
Couldn't hear or see anything.
Somebody was running with me.
Felt panicked and desperate.

He fidgeted with the pencil for a while before he wrote again, double spacing to indicate a new section. 

Village could be a prison.
Village could be protecting us from external conflicts and factors.
Village could just be a village. 

He let out a sigh, slightly stumped while sitting alone in peace and quiet. He couldn't believe he was depending on a dream for clues, but it was better than nothing. From the looks of it, they might not ever find any clues in the village-

"There you are." Wonwoo flinched in surprise, snapping his head up and looking out the window beside the door. Jihoon was peeping through the glass and invited himself into the shack, stopping right in front of Wonwoo. "Seungcheol's looking for you," he told, "he just wants to hang out with you for a while. You should go."

He wanted to let out a sigh when he said that. He just started getting comfortable in the spot he sat. But with the way he worded it, it seemed that Wonwoo wasn't necessarily in any position to decline. "Okay," he closed his notebook shut, placing his hand on the floor to push himself up. As he hauled himself up, he put pressure on his feet.

The tile on his left foot budged.

Wonwoo paused, applying pressure onto the tile again. He was able to wiggle it more under his foot. Jihoon noticed it as well, blinking down on it with the same curiosity the other had. Crouching down and lifting up the stone tile, Wonwoo put it aside and saw a small storage space underneath.

Inside it were boxes of choco pie.

Wonwoo felt a pang of disappointment. Contrary to him, though, Jihoon furrowed his eyebrows together. "Wait, what?" He kneeled down and grabbed the two boxes of choco pie, it seemed that the one on top was already open. "What's wrong?" Wonwoo asked, and Jihoon immediately answered, "I've never seen any choco pies delivered by the tree."

The boy his heels and marched out. Wonwoo slid the stray tile back into place before following him down to the lowest point of the village. "I swear, if someone's been hiding these the whole time.." He heard Jihoon mutter under his breath. Despite Jihoon being one of the shortest among the villagers, he was quick on his feet. Wonwoo was slightly impressed over how he seemed to just bounce down on the steps with perfect footing. He had to put effort to keep up with Jihoon's pace. Perhaps it was because the boy had a culprit to catch.

They were nearly at the bottom of the stone steps when Jihoon held up the two boxes and accusingly yelled, "Hey! Who's been stealing the choco pies?!" Several boys turned their attention to him, putting most of their activities to a halt when they heard his tone. Seungkwan was the first to holler out, "We had choco pies?!" He sounded terrified over the fact that he was oblivious to the choco pies' existence. The rest of the boys soon followed up with their own reactions, mildly but sincerely confused over the matter.

Seungcheol popped out from the kitchen, noticing the commotion outside. Spotting Jihoon looking down on everyone from up the elevated stone pathway, he jogged over to him and saw the boxes in his hands, "Oh? Choco pies?" Jihoon went straight to explaining the matter at hand, "We found it hidden in one of the shacks up there. Someone's been hiding away the choco pies for themselves before any of us could bring it down to the pantry."

"Really?" Ironically, the leader figure didn't seem to be bothered over the problem, prying the open box off of his friend and taking a choco pie. "I'll catch this person," Jihoon said before taking the opened box back and heading out to interrogate the others.

Seungcheol took a bite from the choco pie and turned to Wonwoo, "You wanna play soccer with us?" Wonwoo wanted to decline, but he remembered what Jihoon had said. Seungcheol wanted to get to know him. "Can I play defense?" He indirectly agreed. The leader smiled affirmatively, "Sure!"

Wonwoo joined in with the others in the open space, huddling up before they begin choosing their teams. Seungcheol patted Chan on his shoulder, holding up and offering his choco pie, "Here, you can have the rest." Chan happily complied, taking the choco pie and biting into it, "Thanks!" As he munched on it more, his face twisted into an expression of distaste. He pursed his lips and looked down on the snack, "Seungcheol, why does it taste like it expired-"

"Okay! Team captains, whoever wins Rock-Paper-Scissors gets to have their first pick!" Seungcheol ignored the younger one.

"Seungcheol-"

"Hansol and Junhui, step forward!"

"Why do I even bother?"