EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH ARTEMIS AND ISTAROTH, brought to you by Charlotte of The Steambird:

CHARLOTTE: so! artemis, tell me. what’s the vibe of “unscripted knight”? what is the sound?

ARTEMIS: …well, i hope all of you love rock! [laughs] of course, with me working on this track, there had to be that grittiness, y’know?

CHARLOTTE: oh, of course! i wouldn’t expect anything else!

ARTEMIS: we mixed a lot of rock elements into this album, both also a lot of synth and pop elements. it was my first time working with a more pop-ish sound, but… [looks at istaroth] we made it work. right, meine schatz? [smiles]

ISTAROTH: [claps her hands] yes!! we added both our sounds together to create a harmony! it’s a perfect blend of who we are and who we represent as lead singers in our groups!

ARTEMIS: we’re really looking forward to everyone’s reactions! [places a hand on istaroth’s thigh]

CHARLOTTE: [smirks] i heard from a little birdie there’s more going on between you two than just friendship. am i right in guessing something bigger has blossomed out of this collab?

[artemis and istaroth exchange a glance and nervously giggle]

ISTAROTH: we’ve been caught, liebling…

ARTEMIS: [sighs] we wanted to keep it secret for a little longer— just until the album dropped, but uh… yes. we realized we click in every aspect, not just in music. i’ve never had anyone understand me on a level like she does.

[istaroth kisses artemis’ cheek. charlotte coos and places a hand over her heart]

CHARLOTTE: how poetic! [wipes a tear away] i’m so excited to hear your love poured into this album! thank you for joining me today, lovelies. alright everyone, go support their new album, “unscripted knight”!

notes. THANK U SO MUCH TO julieta__sophia ON VGEN FOR THIS GORGEOUS AND COLORFUL PIECE OF DAYBREAK !!! I HAVENT STOPPED STARING AT IT 🥹🥹 ANYWAYS, IDOL/BAND AU OF ARTIE AND ISTAROTH AAAAA I HOPE U ALL LIKE IT AS MUCH AS I DO 🤍🤍🤍

“hey! don’t leave, y/n!” yunho’s voice is angry and his steps are heavy as he chases after you through your shared apartment.

the two of you had gotten in an argument that was quickly escalating into something that you knew would only cause a bigger fight. you ignore yunho as you head for the door, hurriedly putting on your coat and shoes. yunho grabs your wrist before you can step out of the apartment.

“let me go, yunho, we obviously both need to cool off from this,” you say ripping yourself away from your boyfriend.

“y/n, don’t be ridiculous, its storming like crazy out there,” he says trying to convince you to stay. he wasn’t wrong, the storm was probably the main reason you guys were having a screaming match only a few moments ago, who could say the nastiest thing louder than the rain.

“look i’ll be right back, okay? just enough time for the both of us to calm down,” you say, yunho still doesn’t want to let you go, but he doesn’t try to stop you.

“please come back,” he says softly, anger no longer fully present on his face. “i love you.”

“i love you, too,” you say before leaving, the door closing behind you as you leave both your apartment and apartment building.

the sky has long since turned dark, stars unfortunately hard to see due to all the city lights. the air can’t decide if it wants to be warm or cold, but you feel the latter more as the rain drenches you through your jacket and pajamas.

not a single soul is out other than you as you opt to sit down at the bus stop. you take the chance to finally think and let the angry you had during the argument be washed away by the rain. the sound of the rain hitting the bus stop shelter slowly calms you down and slowly you being to nod off. 

eyes closing and your head lolls to the side before you suddenly jolt awake. you don’t know how long you dozed off, but the storm was gone and the only evidence that it even rained was the wet surfaces of everything around you. you let out a sigh as you took out your phone to look at the time.

“great, its dead,” you mumble before standing up from the bench and heading back towards your apartment. 

by the time you reached your apartment door, your feet were sore and you desperately wanted to take a warm shower and get out of these wet clothes. digging into you jacket pocket, you realize you never grabbed your keys before you left. please still be up, yunho, you think to yourself as you begin knocking on the front door. 

“yunho! please open the door. i don’t have my house key!” you say, hoping that he would hear you and come open the door. you press your ear to the door and can hear the faint sound of the tv, so you try calling for him one more time and with success you hear the click of the door unlocking.

the door swings open and you’re surprised at the sight in front of you, yunho is rubbing his eyes as he starts talking, “do you not know... what... time... it is?” you see as yunho looks at you with a whole mix of emotions; anger, tiredness, confusion, heartbreak. you probably have a confused look on your face too, since when did he have the time to dye his hair? you weren’t gone for but a couple hours maybe.

“my phone died or else i would have called you,” you say hesitantly. “you dyed your hair brown. it looks nice, but when did you find the time to do it?” you question.

“i-i don’t understand...” he trails off. yunho reaches out to caress your face, as if to see if you’re real or something. “how is this possible? you-you’ve been missing–

“missing?” you cut him,”yunho, babe, i’ve only been gone for a few hours maybe.”

“hours? y/n, its been five years. no one knew where you went that night we fought, you never came back and–and i didn’t know what happened to you.” he says, and you look at him like he had two heads. five years? surely, you were only asleep for a few hours at the most. “come on, get inside and we’ll talk some more.” he says, snapping you out of your thoughts. you nod and step inside the apartment you had called home for two years (at least in your frame of time at least). 

you take in your surroundings and notice that some things about the apartment have changed and some things hadn’t. you felt like a stranger in your own home. yunho instructed you to go take a shower and that’s exactly what you did. your clothes still smelled like the laundry detergent that you always use and it makes you feel secure that yunho still buys it after all this time. 

“this doesn’t make sense,” yunho says softly as he holds your face between his large hands. they feel slightly more calloused than they did. his eyes were a little sharper than when you last looked at them, but he still had that youthful puppy-like look to them. you can tell he aged well and that he’s been taking care of himself, you’re glad. 

“i love you,” you mumble out without thinking. yunho smiles at you, with the look you had grown so use to seeing, but for some reason it felt like it had been years since you’d seen it. 

“i love you, too, i never stopped not once in these five years.” he replies and you feel tears brim your eyes before they start to spill down you cheeks.

“i told you i would come back, yeah?”

yeosang’s eyes burned deeply into your own. his eyes flashing that familiar bright pink for a split second before going back to the familiar brown you usually see. his hands held onto yours tightly like he was afraid to let go in fear that you would leave him. 

“close your eyes,” he instructs and you do as he ask, eyes fluttering close. you feel a cold wind whips past you, creating goosebumps on your bare arms. suddenly, the wind stops and you feel something soft and plush against your lips. it was yeosang’s own lips kissing you, you knew he lips anywhere having touched them probably a thousand times before this moment. “open your eyes,” he says and slowly you do so.

a gasp leaves your lips as you take in your surroundings. the place was nothing you had ever seen before, everything so heavenly and colorful. some straight out of a fairy tale you would have read when you were younger. 

“yeosang,” you call his name looking at the demon before you. he was holding a hand out to you and you took in his princely attire. it matched so well with his prince-like looks, the perfect image of a prince charming. 

“dance with me, y/n,” he says, you notice his eyes now have a tint of pink mixed with the brown and it looks absolutely beautiful. 

“yeosang, i don’t think my hello kitty pajama pants go well with you and the rest of the room,” you say, you gesture down to your bottoms to prove your point and yeosang only smiles. he covers your eyes with a hand for a few seconds before removing it. 

“there, now even more beautiful than you were before,” he says, stepping back to look at you. you look down to take in the silver, princess ball gown. everything about it seemed so unreal and made you scared to move or even touch it in fear that it would be ruined. 

“yeosang, this dress is... is so beautiful.”

“the wearer is what makes the dress beautiful, not the other way around,” he says, taking your hand softly into his and leading you down the stairs that are lined to brim with beautiful flowers, that you wished you knew the names of. 

“yeosang, what is this place?” you ask once you had reached the bottom of the stairs. you hear soft music begin to play around you, yet you see no true source of where the music comes from. 

“your garden, my love. a place only you and i can be.”

“just us?” 

“just us,” he answers, pulling you closer to him as his hand wraps around your waist and he slowly begins to lead you in a dance.

you two dance for what feels like hours. you getting lost in not only his eyes, but his touch and embrace as he spins you around. your head tilts back to look at the heavenly painting above you. of god and angels covered in a blue lighting and you can’t help but think how maybe this place is your garden and yeosang is an evil snake coming to taint you.

you rest your head against his chest as the pace you all had been dancing slowed down a bit. you are suddenly hit with the remembrance of the truth you both had been running from. you not wanting to leave and him not wanting to accept the truth. you don’t bother to stop the tears that stream down your face as you turn to hide them from your lover, but yeosang could hear the little sniffles.

“my love, please don’t cry,” he begs and you hear a slight crack in his voice as he tries not to cry as well. he’s a demon, he’s too evil to cry, or at least that’s what he tries to tell himself.

“i’m sorry, sangie, i can’t help it.”

“i promise i’ll find you one day.”

you pull away from him, a warm smile on your face and yeosang notices how quickly you had aged. you, now an old woman, standing in front of him. the beautiful ballroom full of flower slowly disappearing back into your bedroom that yeosang had completely memorized like the back of his hand. 

you weren’t standing in front of him anymore, now laying in bed. weak and slowly dying, something yeosang couldn’t understand. he brushed away some stray white hairs, ones that had previously been your natural color only moments ago. his illusion he created for the both of you, to experience being in each other’s arm once more. 

once more before you left the world behind.

“don’t be sad, sangie,” you say, voice now weak and croaky. your wrinkled hand comes to hold his still youthful and smooth one. “i love you, thank you so much for everything.”

“i didn’t do anything. you were the one that taught me how to truly love someone,” he says. “wooyoung and san are gonna miss you, those crybabies always get so emotional when it comes to human things,” he says and you both laugh quietly at his statement.

“i’m so tired yeosang,” you confess, finding it hard to stay awake.

“go to sleep, my love, i promise i’ll be here when you wake up,” he says and you nod once. he leans over to kiss your forehead right before you close your eyes.

when you wake up, you find yourself standing in a familiar place. everything covered in beautiful flowers and you look up to see the heavenly painting in blue lighting, however, you are alone this time. you walk down the first set of stairs and you’re once again in the beautiful silver, princess ball gown and soft music is playing all around the large ballroom. you notice a figure standing in the center of the ballroom when you get to the top of the stairs.

a smile appears on your face, tears of happiness running down your face as you cover your mouth to stop the sobs. the figure turns around to slowly to face you and finally let out a loud sob when you meet his burning pink eyes.

numb. you felt numb. everything felt unreal and yet so real at the same time. wait... do you even know the definition of real and unreal? no, you don’t think you do. or maybe you do, but you don’t remember.

‘don’t stray from the path’ the words echo inside your mind. path? what path? you don’t remember anymore, you just continue to walk hoping to reach your destination soon. what was your destination anyway?

‘grandmother’s house’ the voice echos again. grandmother? are grandmothers even real? they must be, right? when was the last time you saw her, it was a long time ago is what you can conclude. you don’t even know what this supposed grandmother looks like and yet you are expected to visit her. what do you do once you arrive? so many questions that eat at your brain and yet... no one to answer them.

“maybe this path?” you say to no one but yourself. of course, you would be talking to yourself. there was no one else in the grey world. weird... how you know what the color gray is called. weird how you don’t know any other color apart from grey. or maybe you do know other colors.

a finger sudden comes up under your chin and tilts your head up. when did you stop walking? your eyes stare deeply into the ones in front of you. they’re dark and twisted in tone. you know the person the eyes belong to is dangerous, and yet you don’t want him to leave.

‘don’t stray from the path’ the words echo again. would this man stray you from where you need to go? yes, he must if he’s evil... but is he actual evil or is it just his eyes.

“my what such innocence you have?” he speaks, his voice is deep and soothing and you feel calm. maybe he’s not so bad after all. 

“are you afraid?” he ask, his finger tracing your jaw once, twice before he trails down the column of your neck.

“afraid? i don’t know what that is,” you answer. your eyes never once leaving his. 

“so sheltered,” he begins, “do you know how to feel anything, or are you a puppet with strings being told what to do and how to feel?”

‘don’t talk to strangers’ he’s no stranger, he’s someone you once knew.

“i don’t remember,” you whisper, eyebrows drawn together as you finally look away from him. “i’m suppose to stay on the path and go to grandmother’s house,” you tell him, his hand coming up to wrap around your throat. maybe you should be afraid, but you don’t know how. 

“it’s a lie. grandmother’s house isn’t real, you go there and you die,” his lips hover dangerous close to yours as he talks. “do you know who i am?”

you do, his presence sparks repressed feelings deep inside you that you didn’t know you had. you know his name, and yet you can’t speak it. the voice in your head repeatedly calls him a wolf, yet he is anything but a wolf. no, he is not a dangerous beast but a handsome man. 

“you know who am i! say my name!” he says, distress covering his features.

“seonghwa?” you don’t think, only speak. you see something, relief perhaps, paint his face as he smiles at you. “they call you a wolf,” you add as he moves his arms to wrap around you and hold you closely to his chest. “i’m not suppose to talk to stangers, they’re dangerous but–

“but i’m not. let me free you, yeah?” he finishes for you, holding your face in his hands and you once again stare into his eyes. “this isn’t how things were suppose to turn out, you know that right?”

“i don’t know what going on anymore. i was suppose to stay on the path,” you say more to yourself then to seonghwa. “perhaps i am a puppet like you said.”

“you strayed from the path that’s how you found me.” he pauses for a few moments before he continues, “what color are you wearing?”

“color?” you’re confused, you don’t know any colors a part from gray. they’ve never taught you colors, only showing you gray and if you were lucky maybe a different shade of gray. you glance down to notice that no... this is not a shade of gray. this is bright and vibrant and dangerous.

“this,” seonghwa points, “this is red. is your mind questioning things that you’ve never thought about before?” you nod. “when you look at me what do you feel?”

“i-i don’t know what i feel.”

“tell me!”

“warm, my chest is warm and, and i think my heart is racing fast,” you confess and you take his hand and place it over your heart. “is my heart going to explode?” you ask and he chuckles deeply in reply.

wooyoung traced a finger slowly up your chest. the two of you looked at each other, his red eyes full of love and adoration. you only know because you look at him with the same emotions. his finger goes across the expanse of your neck, his eyes flick for a moment before meeting yours once more. 

“how could someone be so beautiful?” he questions softly, moving closer so your faces are millimeters apart. your lips ghost over his when you smile, a small laugh leaving your lips.

“i could ask you the same thing,” you reply back and wooyoung is the one to laugh this time. 

“you wouldn’t think i’m beautiful if you knew of all the things i’ve done,” he confesses moving away and back into his original position next to you. “i don’t deserve you,” he adds a few moments later.

you sit up, shocked to hear that last sentence. “don’t say stuff like that. i couldn’t imagine where i would be right now if it wasn’t for you,” you say, taking his hand into yours and pulling it close to your chest. wooyoung adored the innocent look your eyes held and he wondered all over again how you, a human, could love him, a ghoul.

“you know...” he starts, gaining you attention, “this all feels so unreal. like we’re some forbidden lovers in one those dramas,” he says with a laugh and you can’t help but crack a smile as well because he’s right.

“i guess that’s what makes our love all that more special,” you say, leaning closer to him before kissing him. wooyoung’s tongue swipes across your bottom lip and he hums at how your chapstick tastes like cherries. he always loved the different flavored chapsticks you wore, it was one of the only times he could taste human food and not want to vomit his guts out.

“baby, if you keep kissing me, i might have to eat you up,” wooyoung teases as he pulls away from the kiss. you land a quick peck to his lips before you scout down slightly to rest your head on his stomach. 

“i love you, wooyoung, whether you’re human or a ghoul, you will always be my wooyoung,” you say softly right as said male beings to calmingly run a hand through your hair. the action slowly begins to lull you to sleep, eyelids starting to droop as you try to keep them open.