Falling down a hole wasn’t in Kang Yuchan’s plans that Saturday, but that was what he found himself doing nonetheless.

The day started out normal enough. He was a bright eyed, Jeju boy just walking around Seoul with a look of wonder that could rival that of a kindergartener being given a shiny new toy. Yuchan had only been around for a few days—his father’s transfer to the new city only recently finalized—so everything was still interesting to him. All the tall buildings, the multitude of cars, the amount of people bustling about; it made his curious mind happy.

So when he came across a tall boy with shockingly white hair, Yuchan couldn’t help but stare, and wanted to keep staring. He had tried to be subtle about it, at first, spotting the boy walking alongside the city park with hurried steps. In retrospect, that was probably his first mistake. Who would just follow a complete stranger around, right? However, in his defense, Yuchan was about to turn the other way and continue exploring the city, momentary curiousity gone, when the other dropped something.

What kind of person would he be if he didn’t help?

“Excuse me,” Yuchan called out after he picked up the item—a pocket watch, huh, those things still exist?—but the white haired boy appeared to be in more of a hurry than he thought. He picked up his pace too and spoke louder, “hey, you dropped something!”

If anything, the boy still didn’t hear him and seemed to walk even faster, fast enough that Yuchan could have sworn that all it took was a second for the other to suddenly disappear in place. That would have been weird. One moment the boy was standing next to a large tree by the corner of the park, then the next moment he was gone. Yuchan may have been a country boy from Jeju, but he was pretty sure that Seoul couldn’t have been that different that people could just disappear into thin air.

He walked over to the spot he last saw the white haired boy and froze in place. Okay, maybe there was a big difference between Jeju and Seoul after all. Next to the large tree was a very obvious hole in the ground, except it wasn’t pitch black or lined with soil like Yuchan expected a hole in the ground would look like. Instead, it looked almost like it was a mirror of sorts, showing the same large tree beside it along with a bright, blue sky littered with clouds, something so similar to his surroundings yet also somehow different.

Now, Yuchan wasn’t exactly a naive boy. 

Whatever the hole was, it clearly wasn’t supposed to be there. Either that, or he wasn’t supposed to have spotted it. He clutched the pocket watch in his hand and debated over what he should do. The thing looked fairly antique, with gold plating that had images of flowers carved into it. It still worked, though, although the time shown wasn’t the current time in Seoul, South Korea, even with the seconds hand ticking away. If anything, it looked like something too precious to lose.

The pocket watch was of no use to him, either, so it made no sense to keep it for himself. He had decided to just drop the watch into the hole and hope for the best, but the moment his hand hovered over the hole just a little closer than he had been seconds ago, Yuchan was suddenly falling. It was more like he was into the hole, really, a great sudden force that he couldn’t fight as he felt his body launch into the hole. 

His last thought as he fell was how his family would react to him being missing.

Thoughts like that were soon replaced with thoughts about the way he was falling. It wasn’t the same fast paced, lurching feeling like riding a rollercoaster would give, where he could feel the pressure even inside of him. No, it felt a lot more like floating, if Yuchan could describe it as that since he hasn’t really experienced that before. His surroundings passed him in a blur of bright blue, but he didn’t feel the same sensation happening to his own body.

When he looked up, he could see the hole which he fell through getting smaller and smaller.

Soon, Yuchan fell on grassy ground with a soft thud.

“Maybe this is a just a dream,” he said to himself as he stood, taking in his surroundings. That was the most logical thing he could think of since there was no way what he was seeing was real. He seemed to have landed in a garden of sorts, even if he couldn’t tell what the flowers around him were. For a split second, Yuchan could have sworn some of them had faces and that one winked at him, but when he blinked, the faces disappeared.

Not just that, but the garden was on top of a pretty high building, judging by the way Yuchan could see the makings of a small town below him as he explored the area. Everything looked less modern than the buildings in Seoul and even the ones back home in Jeju, even almost a little Western in design. Tiled roofs and brick walls could be spotted even from where he was standing, with each house giving a soft yellow glow underneath the moonlight.

Right. That was another thing. 

Yuchan was pretty sure it was just nearing noon by the time he fell, but it was night time wherever it was he ended up in. The time he noticed on the pocket watch matched that of the clock tower he could see from where he stood, still observing his surroundings. It was precisely 11:30PM, with the stars twinkling above him and the full moon shining extra bright, almost like it was nearer here compared to back in Korea.

Assuming he was no longer in Korea, of course, which he could bet on at that moment.

“Who’s there?” 

A deep voice cut through the silence, for which Yuchan was actually grateful for, until he actually saw who spoke. The other boy was clad in what could only be described as a soldier’s attire, bright gold and red, with a very long sword that was being pointed at Yuchan right then and there. His eyes were sharp and calculating as he spoke again.

“You don’t look familiar. Tell me, which side are you on?” The raven haired boy flashed a wicked grin, stepping forward with his sword raised higher. “Your answer determines your fate.”

Before Yuchan could reply—not that he could even if he tried because that sword looked too real for comfort—somebody else appeared, clad in the same attire. This one had slightly silver hair and a smile on his face that would have been comforting, except it was a little too wide to be polite and friendly, so Yuchan ruled calling this one a friend out of the way. He was a stranger in a foreign land; maybe he wouldn’t ever get to call anybody there a friend.

“Calm down, Hojung,” the other said, smile still in place. 

Surprisingly, the boy named Hojung nodded as if being to