Sunghye was woken up by a call early in the morning. Even though she had about fifteen minutes before she officially was supposed to wake up, she was still annoyed that her sleep was disturbed. However after answering with a grouchy “hello” she realized that it was her boss, and remedied her tone quickly.

Soyou called to inform her they had moved their location for the food trucks. When asked why, apparently the neighbourhood that Soyou had scouted ahead of time was populated with gamers who were allowed to play as they worked in office buildings around the area during their breaks. Because of that, Soyou knew it was a gold mine.

“We have to lay claim on a spot before someone else takes it from us,” Soyou said. “So hurry up and help me set up.”

Sunghye sighed and agreed before hanging up, and then literally crawling out of bed until she was sprawled on the floor accompanied by her blanket.

Was it bad that all she wanted to do was go back to Arceldia?

The disappointing part however was the meeting time for Crusade wouldn’t happen until later on in the evening so if Sunghye were to go play, she wouldn’t be able to take on a quest without them.

She sighed. She didn’t know that being in a group would be so demanding.

Sehun would reprimand her for sure (and there was Kyungsoo’s disapproving look too).

Initially it was her who valued the word team but after the time they spent together it seemed everyone now was on the same page as her. Even Kyungmi, who would roll her eyes every time Sunghye would mention something about bonding, had a different attitude nowadays.

Sunghye tried not to focus too much on that in case everyone would revert back to their old selves a day later especially since their personalities were more eccentric than not. They literally threw the word normal right out the window.

It could have been the fact that the game brought out different sides of people that wouldn’t typically show in the real world, but Sunghye didn’t really know. She didn’t want to know in all honesty.

The dynamics of the game were remarkable though. As much as there were so called heroes in the game, those who considered themselves mighty as they fought for a good cause and played fairly, there was just as many—maybe even more—villains.

Luckily for Crusade, the situations they got themselves in never were never as bad as the time with BoA and Luhan.

But in the towns in particular, groups would declare war suddenly on others especially if their rankings were high. For the most part as well, the top players would battle it out whenever they got the chance because for them it wasn’t about playing the game but fighting with each other.

Because Kai was on their team, some people would recognize the Elf from previous quests apparently and between fight-or-flight, Kai never failed to choose flight.

As strong as he was, Kai seemed like the pacifist of the group, always opting for the safe route out while someone like Chen dived head on even though no one actually started anything with him. He was always the cause of trouble.

It was then that Sunghye realized she sort of treasured the time away from Arceldia when she remembered things like that. Sometimes a break was needed and well, necessary if she wanted to be the rational voice of the group.

So when she arrived at Soyou’s food truck and quickly ushered in to start on the meals they had on order, Sunghye welcomed the distraction since it didn’t seem as though she would have time for semi-immersion on her Ninowatt anyways.

The new change of location did in fact make them busier but with their automated messaging system implemented within the truck, customers would type in their chosen meal and it would quickly appear in the screen where Soyou and Sunghye were cooking. It skipped the whole interaction in the beginning and the only time Sunghye would talk to them was after their meal was ready and she had to collect their money.

So as another message appeared requesting for their famous stir fry, Sunghye thought nothing of it and quickly got the order ready.

When Sunghye appeared at the window with the dish in her hand though, she nearly dropped it as her eyes took in the person standing before her.

“Kai?”

*

*

*

Much to Sunghye’s disappointment, Kai didn’t actually have pink punk styled hair. In fact it was mundane, a simple shade of brown that was artistically tousled as if he had woken up and run his fingers through it.

Kai was actually very similar to his virtual self, minus the ears and the clothing.

She had to admit that he still looked really good.

Kai blinked at her in astonishment. “