Chapter Text
As soon as Park Moondae entered the pink utopia that was his dorm room, the system immediately started blaring loudly. Usually a sound this loud would annoy the shit out of him, but since this was the sound of sweet sweet success he supposed he could let it slide this time.
Mission Accomplished!
Well done player! You have successfully met all 6 capture targets!
-> collect reward
-> reveal truth
Park Moondae blinks. Collect reward or reveal truth?
He does vaguely remember when he first entered this world that the system mentioned something about revealing the truths of this world, but as he had been so busy meeting the capture target he quickly forgot about it. He also wasn’t sure how much truths he could uncover about a dating sim world with seemingly no plot but he figured he’d eventually find that out.
Although that wasn’t important to him right now. He wanted his prize. Park Moondae had gone through multiple moments of embarrassment that would follow him in lifetimes to come so he strongly feels that he deserves a little treat for his efforts. Mostly he would like cold hard cash to buy a little treat but he knows that unfortunately, the prize isn’t going to be anything like that. He still wants it though.
So steeling himself in case the system decided to try him yet again, he clicked ‘collect reward’.
Suddenly a clear glass bottle that was entirely too fancy looking appeared in mid air in front of him. It was bottom heavy with a fancy cork top and filled halfway with this light blue liquid.
Confused, Park Moondae reached out to take it. When he did the system once again piped up.
Reward received!
Affection potion
Item Description: A mysterious potion that can increase your affection level by 10% for one of the targets once consumed. Can only be used once.
To be fair, the game has not properly started yet. Park Moondae has just cleared the tutorial stages and he knows it, so he can’t really judge how useful the item will be. He doesn’t know how fast the affection goes up naturally so he has no clue if 10% is a huge amount or not to achieve at the one time. Although from his knowledge, dating games don’t usually give out items that don’t come in handy at some point as there’s not very many game play mechanics to begin with. So Moondae decides to not just use it straight away, but to keep it until he knows it’s true value, and decide what to do with it then. Hopefully it will come in handy.
As soon as Moondae accepted the item the system pop up appeared again.
Mission Accomplished!
Well done player! You have successfully met all 6 capture targets!
-> reveal truth
Except there’s only one option now.
Well, he might as well!
Taking a deep breath, Park Moondae pressed ‘reveal truth’.
——
It was like a dream sequence, like looking through someone else’s eyes. Like being yourself but it’s not yourself. Except, you knew deep down that this was ‘you’.
The environment surrounding ‘you’ was entirely pink. The lines blurred together, but there was some white amongst it too.
Standing on shaky legs ‘you’ approached an object. Once in front of it, it revealed itself to be a mirror. Except the ‘you’ looking back was not the ‘you’ you expected it to be.
The dream confuses you. You’re already not yourself but now you’ve been reborn again. Or perhaps this was the original?
The mirror reflection showed that the ‘you’ this time was a girl. The features were blurred like most things in this vision, you couldn’t tell what she looked like. Pretty or ugly? Long hair or short hair? Slim or plump? Although these details might’ve mattered to ‘you’ they did not matter to you.
‘You’ take time in the mirror. Inspecting what, you do not know. You could feel ‘yourself’ twirling a piece of hair around. Like trying to come to terms with something.
All of a sudden from the silent dream ‘you’ open your mouth.
“At the beginning again,” ‘you’ sigh.
‘You’ turn to the left, a white object that reveals itself to be a desk comes into view, with a white sheet of paper on top.
‘You’ pick the paper up.
Love Interest Character Profile
Cha Eugene
Seon Ahyeon
Kim Raebin
Ryu Chungwoo
Lee Sejin
Bae Sejin
Park Moondae
The dream ends as suddenly as it started.
————
Blinking Park Moondae finds himself at a bit of a loss. That was… confusing to say the least. Who was that? Was it him? Was it someone else? It was hard to say.
If that was the truth he was left with more questions than answers. If this was Park Moondae’s room who was that girl? And the piece of paper she picked up had Park Moondae’s name on it.
Was it some sort of alternative timeline where Moondae was also a love interest? If it was, what did it have to do with the current Park Moondae? Did it even matter? Would he ever even find out!?
Before Moondae could think about what he just witnessed any longer, another notification popped up.
Part one of Truth revealed
Part one? So that means there will be multiple truths.
Park Moondae sighed. He figured that’s why he didn’t understand much from just that. The truth would be revealed to him in segments.
Straight after that first pop up another pop up followed immediately after.
New feature unlocked: Chat Log
“Chat log?” Park Moondae questioned aloud.
Suddenly a huge wall of text appeared in front of him.
Player 3122: wow so this is the dlc?
Player 2322: yeah I’m excited but the person playing the game seems like a noob lol
Player 9281: totally I mean they haven’t even started stat grinding yet like what’s the plan here haha
Player 9291: maybe we should link them a guide?
Player 2813: man I hope they go for the harem route I wanna see what that ending looks like
Park Moondae somehow reached a new height of confusion. The wall of text was going fast and he could only read a few messages off them but even what he could catch made no sense to him.
“What is this?”
At his question the ‘chat log’ closed and in its pace a system pop up.
Chat log
To help the new player get used to this world we have introduced a new help feature called chat log. This system functions like the player is a ‘streamer’ and the chat log is ‘chat’. This function is in place to help the new players when they are stuck on what to do and need others input. To open chat log just say “chat log” to close it press the ‘x’ in the top right hand corner.
Right. He almost forgot that this world made absolutely no sense at all. Sighing, he gently massaged his temples.
So this ‘chat log’ was the game trying to help him? A strange way to go about it but Park Moondae won’t complain about a free feature that cost him nothing. He’ll have to try it out next time he talks to one of the capture targets to see if it’s useful.
Out of pure curiosity, he decided to take one more look at this chat log.
“Chat log”
Player 6327: I wonder if they’ll attempt the hidden route?
Player 8372: Eugene is my fav! I love his romance arc!
Player 4728: I found Lee Sejin rivals to lovers more interesting… more interesting than the original route anyway
Player 1937: yeah I prefer the dlc too tbh
Player 1111: anyone else notice that whoever it is hasn’t even attempted to change styles yet? They’re not gonna be able to pass the next mission successfully if they don’t
At the last message Park Moondae jolted. He would fail the next mission? So that means the chat knows the next mission.
But after reading the chat for another couple of minutes he only found them arguing over their favorite characters and nothing to do what the next mission would entail. Although the change styles hint was good enough for him. He was planning to change to a neater hairstyle anyway so maybe that would be enough. If not he could always work more to save up for some new outfits.
Closing the chat log he went straight over to the mirror. This time there would be no Seon Ahyeon to interrupt his browsing.
So browse he did.
He spent a good 10 minutes looking through the hairstyle options. Some of them were straight up ridiculous like going bald, or a Mohawk, but there was quite a few nice styles he’d always wanted to try as Ryu Gunwoo, but didn’t think he’d be able to pull it off with his face. Since he was now Park Moondae, that wouldn’t be a problem.
For now though, he just wanted to neaten up the shaggy hair. He felt that changing style completely should be used later if he needed a drastic change or to catch someone’s attention.
So he simply chose the cut he found earlier before Ahyeon interrupted him and hoovered over the buy button before his eyes snapped open. The default colour was blonde and he hadn’t changed it yet! Letting out a sigh of relief that he remembered he went to change the colour to the one he already had. No drastic changes for Lee Sejin to make fun of him for this time he thought smugly.
Then suddenly the system dinged so loud Park Moondae felt he was suddenly flung into an ancient bell ringer's shoes who was one more chime away from going deaf.
Sadly in his disorientation, he accidentally stumbled slightly and tripped into the mirror… and pressed buy… with the default setting of blonde still on.
Park Moondae could only stare in shock as he looked at his new, tidy but now bright blonde hair.
At that moment the system window decided to pop up.
New mission
Capture the targets interest in you
- Accept
- Decline
Well… he was certainly going to gain some interest with his change. If that interest is in good or bad faith, it has yet to be seen.