When last we left our unhappy teen and (game) player, things went from cute to confusing to existential dread. This episode was just more of the latter, it’s great.
The (not so) Final Countdown
Myungha hasn’t chosen between sacrificing his grandmother or his boyfriend. I don’t blame him. His grandmother wakes up to twist the knife by talking about going home and picking apricots. She urges him to care for himself before others and not be like this when he grows up.
Yeowoon tells Myungha that he’s working on catching the stalker. Myungha doesn’t want him to, but Yeowoon wants to prove himself.
Once Yeowoon is gone, Myungha sees the system error prompting him to choose. He sits outside of his grandmother’s room as the clock counts down. It’s under 10 hours when Yeowoon returns with apricots he picked for Grandma. Awww.
Suddenly, we’ve got 59 seconds left and Myungha is crying on the hospital roof. There’s a flash of Myungha in the car wreck (?) and his grandmother dead in the hospital. He says he chooses both.
These are not the kind of numbers you want to go down
His time is deducted, made even crueler by being intercut with happy memories of his time with Yeowoon. In the end, he’s got 15 days left and the system is still glitching.
Myungha runs back into the hospital and into his Sunbae memories. His Sunbae asks him what he would choose: break up now without suffering, or be together longer but it’s painful. Myungha would break up, there’s no point in suffering together. And no one can be together forever anyway. It’s a very fatalistic attitude. They’re in front of bubbling water, like some modern art installation.
Myungha gets a new choice, end after 14 days, or get back 100 days but Yewoon’s affection level will be reset to 0. He makes this decision easily and quickly, choosing to “end” after 14 days rather than lose Yeowoon’s affection.
“End” sounds awfully ominous
It’s not good, that’s for sure. Myungha looks sad as Yeowoon talks about the future. He tells him he loves him too soft for him to hear. So. Sad.
Ignoring his grandmother’s advice, Myungha prepares Yeowoon for a future without him. He invites Sangwon and Kyunghoon for a BBQ so Yeowoon can have friends. They have a cute time together until a 12-day warning notification pops up. As they do a group selfie, Yeowoon takes Myungha’s hand, and Myungha looks at him rather than the camera.
He’s also still working on getting Yeowoon fans. So I guess Yeowoon’s account came back? That got fixed?
Myungha instructs Yeowoon on taking care of himself. Yeowoon is more interesting in protecting their future. Bad things happen to people around him but he’ll protect Myungha so he’s not alone. Myungha wants Yeowoon to remember he has friends, talent, and people around him.
Yeowoon wonders if he says he’ll be okay without Myungha, will Myungha break up with him? He’s okay liking Myungha more than Myunga likes him but wants Myungha to rely on him. He tells Myungha he loves him, and this causes a system error. So love breaks the game?
Is that an item reward in your pocket?
It is. A pen, that Myungha gets for some reason. He looks confused. Maybe it’s a Soul-Painting Pen?
Sangwon finds him sitting on a bus bench as he has another sick spell. Meanwhile, Yeowoon takes care of the stalker situation with the sportswear woman. Then he offers to be the brand model. The sportswear woman wants to be sure this is what he wants because that’s what Myungha requires.
Yeowoon can’t reach Myungha but he’s waiting at his home with a present. Yeowoon is upset because he knows Sangwon took care of Myungha. He wants to know why Myungha won’t rely on him, deals with everything alone, and excludes him.
Yeowoon is unhappy. Myungha looks sad as he walks away. We see a flashback of him getting Yeowoon a present even though he didn’t feel well. He only has 10 days left.
Myungha doesn’t get it, but Yeowoon is confusing
The harder Myungha tries to make Yeowoon happy, the more unhappy he makes him. He knows it and takes it hard, wondering why he thought he could make Yeowoon happy. Poor Myungha. Yeowoon wants him, not the things he tries to give him.
But there are 6 days left and Yeowoon is avoiding him. When Myungha catches him in the hallway, Yeowoon says he’s in agony and to leave him alone. He walks away.
Myungha breaks up with Yeowoon outside his place. He takes all the blame on himself, for not making Yeowoon feel like he likes him. Yeowoon wants to know what he did wrong. You said you were in agony and wanted to be alone? But Myungha says he didn’t do anything wrong.
Yeowoon begs not to break up and is willing to do anything. Myungha says not to cry and Yeowoon promises not to cry but can’t help himself and keeps apologizing. He says he loves him again and there’s that system error again.
Myungha walks away.
Myungha tries to fix everything with a pen
He pulls off the cap and is at a desk in a black void. It’s not the Soul-Painting Pen, it’s the “Original Author’s Pen”, but it seems to work similarly. He can use it on a character to change things. He writes Yeowoon’s name, but we don’t see what he writes after.
There’s another system error, the server is severely damaged. Myungha is back in his room. He’s being deleted, and we see earlier scenes without him. The server damage gets worse.
Myungha runs from his room, looking for Yeowoon. He calls Yeowoon and asks him to meet him on the roof as the school cracks around him. Yeowoon starts running.
Myungha reaches the school roof and sees a hole in the sky. It’s growing, but he can’t go back because the stairs are no longer there. The Love Supremacy Zone is approaching him and he should see Yeowoon but he doesn’t. A notification says the cause of the error is being deleted. He calls Yeowoon’s name.
And falls through endless darkness.
That’s a lot of weird, dark, unnerving fun
Poor Myungha just doesn’t get what it is to love and allow yourself to be loved. He’s too anxious about ensuring Yeowoon will be okay, not realizing he’s only making things worse. No one wants anyone they love to suffer, I get that. And from what Grandma said, this is an ongoing issue for Myungha, made worse by his mother’s abandonment. He probably feels that he’s not worth loving, which is sad.
Yeowoon confused me and Myungha in this episode. He pushed Myungha away and was shocked when Myungha wanted to break up. It’s fair to want to be able to get mad at your partner and not have it lead to an instant break-up, but what did he want? If it was Myungha’s attention, he had it in the hallway. Did he just want some time? I don’t know.
It was heartbreaking that when Myungha’s world started literally falling apart, he wanted Yeowoon. Breaking up with Yeowoon was something he thought he was doing for Yeowoon, but his actions in that moment of frightened panic revealed what his heart wanted.
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