When Cale was Kim Rok Soo, back at the company, he never scared anyone. Sure, they worried for him, they feared his Records or they felt a subconscious chill when making eye contact but-
Rarely has he ever scared them.
Except the week he disappeared.
He got trapped underneath rubble, like his first meeting with Lee Soo Hyuk, but no one was there to save him this time. Three days, he was trapped; an uncanny parallel, maybe even more than a coincidence. But on the third day… something changed. He gained a new ability, something that snapped inside of him like a key that forgoes unlocking the mechanism entirely and breaks the lock itself.
He lifted a building off of its foundations.
The metal holding together the crevice he was huddled in snapped and groaned, while the rocks and concrete scratched and shattered like glass. He forced his way out and walked.
He walked away from the company.
If he had been within his mind, he would’ve gotten help, accepted food and water and healed his injuries.
He wasn’t. Within his mind, that is. He was strong, his senses had heightened to find food and all of his necessaries, but he couldn’t remember anything from his life as Kim Rok Soo.
Kim Rok Soo at this moment had fallen asleep, and Survival woke up. For 4 days, Survival walked, ate, drank, and breathed the life of Kim Rok Soo.
If you could call it living.
Eventually he was found, wandering and dirty, and seeing his team members let Rok Soo wake up, and Survival fell asleep.
Cale Henituse hasn’t had to do that. No, not yet, but time catches up eventually and Cale found himself in a perilous situation again.
Trapped inside of a collapsing building with no way to contact his friends who are expecting him to be back in 6 days. They were in a different world, so Cale only had a portion of his abilities, but it should've been enough. It hadn't.
4 days inside of the building, which shuddered and broke multiple times around him, finally, Survival opened its eyes.
It had taken longer because of Vitality of the Heart, but with all of his abilities weakened extensively, he had no options for escape.
Survival looks around dumbly. Within its own consciousness, it’s doing calculations. The structural integrity. The state of his body. The nearest food source.
Lifting the building off of its body is easy, but it takes several hours to progress its way out of the collapsing caverns. Survival breathes heavily, but doesn’t hesitate as it finally breaks through the side. The building tips over and crashes on the opposite side of where it is. Survival blinks from the impact, but only because of the dust.
Finally, it gets found. By bandits.
It massacres them and steals their resources.
Soon after that, news breaks out about the supposed single-handed wipe out, and Raon finds him. Raon tries to speak to it, but after it deduced that Raon wasn’t a threat nor food, it walked away.
As a smart and clever dragon, Raon observed Cale before being so abruptly insulted. Multiple attempts to bring Cale back into those eyes, all failed attempts, Raon teleports the unwilling stranger back to the empire.
It doesn’t speak, it doesn’t respond to touch beyond a stern glance, and it only does the bare minimum to survive. It tried to store food under its bed after eating “enough”, and no amount of begging convinced it to not store the rations. It hasn’t bothered to use its powers either- like it doesn’t know it has them.
All attempts to speak are futile.
Choi Han even tried Korean, but it didn’t show any sign of understanding.
Rosalyn does research with Raon and Choi Han on what could have caused it.
Then they hear about the collapsed building. They hear about the bandits who had supposedly died a few days afterwards. Raon figures out that- yes- the stuff Cale had with him at the time used to belong to bandits.
A week after becoming Survival, days after being found, Cale opens his eyes on a bed.
“… They found me?” He muttered it so quietly, whisper soft, but Raon- apparently sleeping by his legs, jumps up with wide eyes.
Cale wants to sigh. How long was he asleep this time? By Raon’s expression, it must have beaten his previous records.
“Is it you? Is it really you? Say something! Say my name!”
Cale blinks in confusion. Two minutes ago he was dozing off inside of a dark hole that was close to collapsing, now— Raon wants to hear his name?
“… Raon Miru? Are you okay?” Cale sat up, ignoring his stiff body and pulling Raon into his lap. He seems to have lost a little weight?
“Human you must absolutely tell me everything you remember!”
While saying this, Raon was ordering everyone to stay out of Cale’s room with the exception of Choi Han and Rosalyn, as well as informing Beacrox to bring up food and to prepare tea.
Cale observes Raon, who is earnestly distressed for some reason, and concedes.
“The last thing I remember was falling asleep in a collapsing building.” Rosalyn gasps. She just entered the room with Choi Han, who is staring at Cale with a cold gaze.
“Why were you in there?” A chill runs down Cales spine at Choi Han’s voice.
“The conmen didn’t expect the building to collapse, they had likely planned something else. It just happened out of nowhere.” He doesn't say that he got lucky. He was next to one of the buildings main supports at the time, and the crumbling structure formed a bubble around him by chance.
Raon shouts, “I will destroy those bastards that made you go in there!”
“They’re already dead.” Cale shakes his head. Rosalyn covers her mouth. He hadn't said he got lucky, but it's obvious that he did. Did they almost lose Cale, and hadn't even known?
‘Three times…’ He’s been lucky with collapsing buildings three times now.
“Cale-nim…” Choi Han places a hand on his shoulder and Cale freezes in fear. “After the building collapsed, a bandit camp was destroyed, single handedly, a few days after. Raon found you wandering- with their stuff on you.”
Immediately, Cale figured it out. It must be an ability. He recalls the similar event that happened in the past and the dots are easy to connect.
But- he can’t say anything about that with Rosalyn in the room.
“I guess some part of me really wanted to live.”
