Same Memory || Another Story

→• The New Leventis

Yn's steps softened instinctively. She climbed carefully onto the bed, the mattress dipping with her weight. Her hand hovered for a moment before resting gently on what she hoped was Dahyun's side.

"Dubu?" she whispered. No response.

She leaned closer, squinting through the dark. "Okay... head or feet?" she murmured to herself, cautiously patting upward until she found hair.

Head. Good.

"Hey... It's morning," Y/N said gently, wrapping her arms around Dahyun's blanket cocoon and resting her cheek against it.

Silence.

Then-a small shift-slowly, like a turtle emerging from its shell-Dahyun peeked her face out, cheeks puffed and lips turned into a sleepy pout.

"I don't wanna go to school," Dahyun mumbled.

Y/N couldn't help it-she laughed, soft and fond, and reached up to pat her head gently. "I know. But it's just a half day. Then you can come back and bury yourself in a dozen more blankets."

Dahyun blinked slowly, still curled like a burrito.

"And..." Y/N added with a sly smile, "there's cake waiting for you."

That got her attention. One eye opened slightly more.

"Cake?"

"Yup," Y/N nodded. "chocolate one. We all made it last night"

"Did Momo eat it?"

"...She might have tried."

For the first time in what felt like days, Dahyun's lips quirked-

She groaned and finally let her head drop fully onto Yn's chest. Yn grinned, holding her a little tighter. Then She pressed a kiss to the top of Dahyun's head and gave her a final squeeze.

"I'll be waiting outside, okay?"

And with that, she slipped off the bed, pausing at the door just long enough to glance back and see Dahyun blinking slowly at the ceiling.

The faintest smile ghosted her face.

---

The marble floors of the royal palace gleamed beneath the glow of countless chandeliers, their crystal edges catching the afternoon sun and casting fractured light across the gold-etched walls. Tapestries lined the corridors-embroidered histories of wars, rulers, heroes, and beasts-all watching silently as Y/N walked past, feeling increasingly like she'd wandered into a place she had no business being.

Her steps echoed lightly through the long, long hallway, her heart thudding like a drum. This wasn't just a stroll anymore. She was on her way to meet the Queen.

And the King.

And apparently, everyone else who mattered in the Queendom.

The letter she received the night before was still folded carefully in her pocket, though she'd read it so many times she could recite it by memory.

She was too caught up in thoughts-running mental simulations of what to say, how to bow, and whether she should fake a fainting trick-when her royal escort stopped in front of door that could comfortably crush an elephant.

Double doors. Huge. Towering. Unfairly majestic.

Y/N's brain did a quick loop:

Toxic trait #1: I could probably survive if it fell on me.

Toxic trait #2: I could hold it back with sheer willpower.

Toxic trait #3: I could totally open it myself.