I found myself aimlessly stumbling through the streets of Daegu. My mind was swirling as I tried to make heads or tails of everything that had happened today. It felt like a week had gone by since I woke up this morning from the erotic Hobi dream. How had it gone from being the best day of my life to the worst?

Ever since I found BTS, I've wanted to come to Korea; although now that I was here, I wanted to be anywhere else. The stares I was getting were making me feel like I was an alien stranded on another planet... though, in a way I was. I felt eyes gazing at me non-stop as I made my way, following the direction my body took me.

I pulled my bucket hat lower and dropped my eyes to focus on the ground. I didn't care that I was missing out on seeing the city around me. I flinched as I felt a hand touch my exposed stomach. All I wanted to do was curl in a ball and cry, but I reminded myself that I had more pressing problems.

The longer I walked, the more I was thankful that I couldn't understand what the people on the street were saying. Feeling their judging gazes and occasional hands touching me was bad enough. But if I had to hear their words, well I don't think I'd be able to handle that on top of everything else. I was already unsure whether my heart, brain and soul would be able to comprehend what had happened today and I didn't want this to be the straw that broke the camel's back... or I should say the thing that got me committed into a Korean mental asylum.

For the first time in what felt like hours, I couldn't feel eyes on me. I looked up and realised my feet had steered me to a park. Relief passed through me as I took in the flowers and shrubbery; I needed to be in my happy place and if I couldn't be in my kitchen at home, then a garden was the next best place.

Ji-Hye's words echoed in my head as my feet padded along the uneven dirt path that wound like a river between the banks of flowers and bushes. What did she mean by I'm meant to be here but not here? Was she meaning that I should be in Daegu, but not in this universe? Or was I meant to be in this universe, but in another city?

'Find the Oracle in Seoul.'

The words were playing on repeat as I walked. I had no idea how I was meant to get to the capital city—'is it still the capital of South Korea in this universe?'—since I knew it was about 250km away. I mentally thanked my brain for remembering more information that seemed useless but came in handy during times like this. I hated to guess how long it would take me to walk to Seoul, and seeing as I still hadn't seen any kind of transport that wasn't powered by animals, I knew the journey to the other city would be long whichever way it happened. Not to mention, there was the fact that I didn't have any Korean money on me. And if I did, would it be the same currency as they used here?

Feeling both physical and mental exhaustion, I found a bench overlooking a large grassy area. I stood for a moment and watched the children run around, trying to get their kites airborne. My heart clenched at the memory of Esther and I doing this exact thing on Christmas day with our nephew, Caleb.

I forced my unshed tears down as I sat on the smooth wooden slats. I was too lazy to remove my backpack, so I left it on. I found myself wincing as something poked my stomach. Groaning in annoyance, I reached into the pocket and pulled out a white business card. I hadn't looked at it when Ji-Hye had given it to me. As my eyes settled on it. I could tell it was made out of high-quality cardstock; it was thicker than the usual cheap business cards I often saw back home. The front had a sheen to it that looked as if it came from within the paper and not as an overspray. I found myself tilting and moving the small rectangle in fascination as the sun caught the card and made it sparkle. I noticed it had nothing on this side, so I flipped it over. My mouth dropped. My eyes bulged in disbelief as I watched the letters swirl and move.

"Have I found myself in the universe where Harry Potter is real?" I murmured as I watched the writing morph from Korean symbols to English letters: Speak your heart and it shall be.

I closed my eyes and breathed in deep, filling my lungs completely with the clean air. Thoughts of my family and friends entered my head and a few tears slipped down my cheeks. I didn't have to think about what was in my heart... "I want to go home," I said with undeniably clear confidence.

I hoped this would work and when I opened my eyes, I'd find myself looking at my family and friends. Hell, I'd even settle for looking at a dodgy run-down car or a McDonald's. Tentatively, I crossed my fingers and peeled my left eye open a few millimetres. My heart sank once again as I found myself looking over a cobblestoned path with horse-drawn vehicles passing by.

It took me a moment to realise that I was no longer in the park in Daegu; instead, I was standing on the sidewalk opposite a traditional-looking building. It felt like I was back to square one not knowing where I was. Although, the longer I looked at the building in front of me, the more I felt like I'd seen it before.

The sound of a crowd in the distance caught my attention. While my introverted brain begged to go the opposite direction where it was quiet, my body pushed off the sidewalk and dodged the oncoming carriages and horses. I noticed three women walking through the entrance of the large gates that surrounded the building. As they walked past, I noticed that they were all dressed in hanboks. With curiosity flowing through me, I found myself following. As I looked around at the other people in the area, I observed that all the women were wearing hanboks, while only some of the men did.

As the women walked and I followed, the crowd was getting louder and louder. It reminded me of the cheers Aroha had made at the Astro concert Esther, Isla and I had gone to last year. The only difference was this crowd wasn't calling the names of a band's members; I could make out certain words and I had no idea what they meant. Yet, as I got closer to the congregation of people standing around waiting to be able to walk through the large arching gates, I gasped when I found that I could understand what they were saying. The weirdest part though, was they were speaking their mother tongue. To me, they sounded like adjectives you'd use to describe someone's appearance: glamorous, exquisite, ethereal, radiant, majestic, heavenly, enticing.

"I can understand Korean?" I whispered, nearly falling over my feet as I heard the foreign-sounding words coming from my mouth. "What the fuck?"

"I hope I get picked," I heard one of the women in front of me say. "I really want to know what the Heavenly One looks like."

"I want to be assigned to the Glamorous One," another said.

"Glamorous One? Heavenly One? Assigned and chosen?" I murmured to myself under my breath, completely confused.

"You both know only seven will get chosen today," the third woman remarked to the other two. "If we don't get assigned to one today, at least there's another group of Seoul Seed Bearers that have their Allocation Ceremony in a few months."

"I don't care really which one I'm assigned to," the second woman said, "I only want the opportunity to sleep with a Seed Bearer."

My bottom jaw dropped as I heard that last comment. The more the women talked, the more confused and concerned I was becoming. It sounded a lot like these women were vying for the chance to throw themselves at men for sex. The entire concept sounded gross and archaic to me, and as much as I wanted to walk in the other direction, my feet wouldn't follow the order to turn around and run.

As soon as I stepped through the archway and entered the area, I knew instantly where I was. Ever since BTS performed DNA, Mikrokosmos and Dynamite here in 2020, Esther and I had wanted to go to Seoul and visit Gyeongbokgung Palace. It felt surreal that I was living out one of our shared dreams, albeit in a much different way than we could have ever planned.

There was a lot of waiting around and to be honest, it felt a lot like waiting for a concert to start. However, unlike being surrounded by lots of fellow fans who lifted each other up, there were a lot of judgemental digs and harsh words aimed mostly at me. I was thankful that my bucket hat shielded my face from their harsh words. The few men dotted throughout had expressions on their faces that varied between looking like they'd sucked on a lemon, or they smelled a steaming pile of dog shit.

I kind of wished that I could go back to the ignorant bliss I'd been in while walking through Daegu. It was infinitely worse here in Seoul because I could now understand every uttered word, each laced with venom or contempt towards others. There were a few nice women who gave me soft smiles that reached their eyes but most of the time people looked at me like I was a beached whale after a storm.

Screams echoed around the buildings as a line of men walked onto the stage behind an older gentleman. There was something familiar about this man; I couldn't quite put my finger on what it was until he turned to the front. There was no mistaking that nose. ARMY had seen it so much that it became synonymous with the group, even more so when in his Daechwita MV, Yoongi held up a wall hanging of the meme JK drew.

What the hell was a slimmer Bang Si-Hyuk doing on the stage?

Since I knew of the man leading the procession—the first person I had seen here that I recognised from my universe—I paid more attention to the men walking behind him. Was it possible that there was a BTS concert happening today, and I'd happened to stumble upon it by luck? The first thing that caught my eye about them was they had masks that covered their faces. They were not like the face masks that Yoongi used to use to cover his dark stubble, but similar to the ones used in Fake Love. I then noticed long black cloaks covering them from head to toe, which made trying to identify them by their hair impossible. I couldn't even tell the differences in height either, so that was out too; they must be using shoes with different heel sizes to make the seven men all at the one height. Plus, the cloaks all had shoulder pads, which made them look broader than usual.

As Bang Si-Hyuk raised a hand, the screams from the crowd died down to silence. His signature gummy smile lit up his face as he raised a microphone to his lips. I waited with bated breath for him to speak, hoping that he would shed some light on what was happening and why I'd been brought here.

⋆⁺₊⋆ 💜 ⋆⁺₊⋆

I had eagerly anticipated this day for what felt like my whole life. 23 was the age which women could take part in the Seed Bearers Allocation process. For my 23rd birthday earlier this year, my friends and family asked what I wanted. I could have had anything my heart desired but there was only one thing I needed: things to be the best so I would find myself assigned to one of the Seed Bearers. This meant the best clothes, makeup and accessories, all things to garner the attention of the Oracle.

Like everyone else living in cities of the Greater Kingdom of Korea, I was not related to my parents by blood. Our brothers and sisters weren't related biologically, which was why we called them our 'diblings'. This did not stop my adoptive parents from making me stand out from the rest of the women here by using the finest garments, makeup and jewellery. My Eomma and Appa had received me the day I was born. It was the same case for every infant that was either a boy born with black hair, or a baby girl. Only the male babies born with coloured hair got to stay with their biological parents since they would become future Seed Bearers.

When I first was told about this as a young girl, I cried and became angry. How dare people take me away from my real parents all due to my gender. Although as I grew up, I became like the other women in the Kingdom; all I wanted was to be assigned to a Seed Bearer and conceive a baby with him.

This became my goal, the dream I would dedicate my life to. I saw it as my right to be one of the chosen ones and not once did ever let myself believe it wouldn't happen. After all, if I wasn't selected today, other Seed Bearers would have their Allocations later in the year. I didn't care who I was paired with, as long as I was allocated to a Seed Bearer at some point in my life.

My Eomma and I had painstakingly critiqued every hanbok until we found the perfect one. The fact it was purple and the colour of royalty didn't hurt either. I knew not many of the other women would be able to afford a hanbok of this hue so I would stand out; purple dyes were the most luxurious and expensive, so only the very wealthy could afford to own pieces like this.

Walking with my group of friends into the palace grounds, we looked at the other women entering the Allocation area. None looked anywhere as good as the five of us, and we made sure to let them know that.

"Ugh, look at that over there," my friend pointed with her perfectly manicured finger.

I followed the direction she was indicating, and I made a retching sound as I took in the disgrace standing not far from us. "Shit, I didn't know they were letting farm animals in here," I said loud enough that the people around us would hear. "You'd think they'd have standards and not let fat cows in the gates."

Another of my friends joined in, "Especially ones who have no pride in their appearance." The rest of us laughed as we agreed.

"If she gets chosen, I pity the future of our Kingdom." Venom dripped from every word at the very thought of that happening. "I can see it now... no woman would ever want to have sex with a Seed Bearer that came from her... that is if she's even able to produce one with her size. If I was a Seed Bearer, I'd want her banished from my castle immediately."

A smirk came across my face as I watched the woman's shoulders hunch inwards. I hoped that she would realise that she wasn't worthy of being assigned to a Seed Bearer. She should do her civil duty and leave. That would increase my chances of being chosen, which was my main goal.

The crowd screamed as the Oracle walked on stage. Seeing him meant that the Allocation Ceremony was starting. I watched as the masked and cloaked Seed Bearers flanked him. Some girls had no decency when they screamed out some of the pseudonym names; my friends and I kept our mouths shut. We knew that the Oracle would choose only girls deemed of high quality, so we behaved like the sweetest and most polite women.

"People of Seoul, welcome to the 248th Summer Allocation Ceremony!" The Oracle's voice boomed through the air surrounding the crowd. The applause that came in reply was almost as loud and I scoffed at the women who degraded themselves by cheering and hooting.

We listened as the Oracle went through the standard speech of why we were here. Frankly, I tuned it out as looked around the extravagant palace. It wasn't the first time I had been here—I had been in the audience at previous ceremonies even though I couldn't participate because I was underage. Yet, standing here looking at the double sloping rooves, the red wood separating the expanse of windows, and the low decorative fence that spanned the perimeter, I felt a different kind of excitement. I silently prayed to the universe for it to pair me with one of the seven men on the stage.

Nobody knew what a Seed Bearer looked like without their mask or cloak; as long as they had coloured hair, that was the only thing women cared about. Rumours had circulated that they were incredibly handsome but I'd judge that for myself when I got to meet them. All that was known about them were their pseudonym names.

The Ethereal One.

The Radiant One.

The Enticing One.

The Exquisite One.

The Glamorous One.

The Majestic One.

The Heavenly One.

Where Seed Bearers got names like these from, no one knew. Maybe they were bestowed with the name when they were born... I hoped I'd get to find out when I had my own little boy with colourful hair.

* Which member do you think belongs to each pseudonym name? Let's see who's right!

The Ethereal One.

The Radiant One.

The Enticing One.

The Exquisite One.

The Glamorous One.

The Majestic One.

The Heavenly One.