"So you're not mad at me anymore?" Myungsoo leaned his head on my shoulder, flashing his brown, puppy eyes up at me.
"I'm.....slightly less mad at you than before."
He lifted his head and looked at me, "What's with the 'slightly'?"
"We should get back to the others," I stood up, pushed off from the ground, and flew my way back to camp, leaving Myungsoo in a small whirlwind of dead leaves.

It's not that I didn't want to answer him.
I was just tired.
All this drama was totally unnecessary and being stuck in this game was even more unnecessary.
If the game maker ever shows his face in front of me, I probably would punch right through it.

"Where the heck were you?" Dongwoo rushed up to me before my feet even touched the ground back at camp. Sungyeol looked over form his crouching position by the fire while Sungjong put down the fire wood he gathered next to him and ran up to me.
"I uhhhhh...needed some air," I hated lying. And especially to them. But I assumed the stuff Myungsoo just told me was suppose to be a secret so I couldn't just go blabbing things.
Dongwoo lifted an eyebrow, "There's air everywhere. You freakin' control it."

I shrugged, "It was just getting a little crowded so I flew off for a bit. Don't worry, I'm fine."
"Where's L?" the maknae asked, looking around the camp site. EXO was on their side, making their own fire and setting up their own things. Some of them were huddled in a group around Kai, whispering and occassionally looking over at me.

I had no idea what they were talking about, but I had such a bad feeling about it.

"I'm here," Myungsoo's voice came from behind me. He was standing literally right behind me, but for some reason, I felt like he was standing all the way on EXO's side. I mean...he might as well have considering how he's gonna start acting now in front of the others. "I followed her, don't worry. Nothing happened."

Yeah.
Right.
Cause it's not like you just told me about how I might be on the front cover of this game and there's a chance that I could be the key to getting out of here.
Well....that last part was just me. But it actually sounded...logical.

Sunggyu walked up behind Dongwoo and put a hand on his shoulder, "Calm down dino. Melodia's here, L's here. Everything's fine. For now," he nodded at Sungyeol, "we're just gonna keep an eye on EXO."
I looked over at their huddle, which got bigger since the rest of the group joined them. "They're all in a big huddle. I don't think you're gonna get much by just keeping an eye on them."
Sungyeol left the fire, reaching his hand out to pat my head, "Oh silly little one. You clearly didn't read the guide book when you opened the game."
"Uhhhhh....who does?"
"Someone smart," he winked at me in the dim fire light. I felt Myungsoo tense up behind me, "like me."
"So tell me oh wise one. What did the magical guide book tell you?"

"Wow, someone got sassy during their road trip," Hoya commented, appearing behind Sungyeol out of nowhere. I almost let out a scream but Sungjong covered my mouth in time.
"What the heck? How did he-"
"You would've known by now if Hoya didn't totally just kill the moment," the choding shot a glare at Hoya, who put his hands up as if he was surrendering.
"My bad dude. The move gives me hiding abilities, not super hearing."

Sungyeol sighed, "Me, Hoya, and L are equipment type charas. We all have special moves that only come with equipment types because we can't do any of the fancy, magical stuff the rest of you can. Hoya and I have stealth moves while L has more offense and defense enhancing moves. The stealth moves basically lets us move and hide silently and undetected."
"Only if you don't screw up," Hoya added, plopping himself down by the fire. Sungyeol rolled his eyes.
"Right. That too."

"So you and Hoya have been taking turns eavesdropping on EXO?" I lowered my voice, scared that the people on the other side of the field might hear me. Not they could. But if Hoya and Sungyeol could sneak around without people knowing, then who knows if super hearing actually exists.
"Pretty much," Sungyeol nodded, walking over to the tent so that he was blocked from EXO's view. A slight breeze rustled the leaves on the ground and Sungyeol was gone.

Whoa.
Equipment type magic is so strange.

I looked up at the trees above me unconsciously.
"Don't make it so obvious," Myungsoo whispered in my ear, his hand brushing mine slightly and his fingers intertwining with mine for a split second. "If you keep looking up at the trees, they're gonna think something's up."
"Literally," Sungjong appeared on my other side, on a lemon flavored lollipop. " But if you're really curious, I think Sungyeol's in that tree over there." He jestured at the tree with a branch that was leaning a bit too far down for it to be naturally grown.
"Whoa. How do you know?"
Sungjong tapped his temple lightly with the hand that wasn't holding onto his lollipop, "I'm an elf remember? We can read minds. I just kinda zoned in on a general area and found Sungyeol thinking about how close he should lean in without snapping the branch of the tree."

"You finally leveled up enough?" Myungsoo asked from beside me. The maknae smiled and nodded. 
"And that's not all I know," he whispered, sticking the lollipop back into his mouth.

I froze.
And I'm pretty sure Myungsoo did too.

Sungjong pulled the candy out of his mouth and flashed us another smile, "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone. I think it's kinda cute actually."
"You read my mind?" Myungsoo's voice was so steely, it could've cut through the trees in this forest
"Yeah. It's not a big deal though. Unless you're hiding something that could save us from the game..."
"As if we could have information like that," I watched Myungsoo look away and focus his attention at the EXO huddle in front of him.
Sungjong shrugged, popping the lollipop into his mouth again and moving it to one side of his cheek before he walked off while saying, "So it's not a big deal."

Right.
Cause the fact that I may be the girl on the front cover of the game is no big deal at all.
It's not like knowing something like that was going to get us out of the game

Author's Note
wow....i haven't updated in a long time haha xD sorry everyone for the really long hiatus! i guess my writer's block on this fic was more severe than i thought. i'm trying to work my way to getting them out of the game soon so the rest of the fic will take place in the actual world :)
but we'll see where things end up hehe.
title quote: "i, i need to live, i, i need to endure"~Paradise